Chapter 80
After that, I was worried that if you woke up and saw me, you might be frightened, so I sent the familiar, ‘Lucky’. As expected, you so easily gave your attention to small things. And when I guided Lucky to lead you into my room… the moment you saw my naked body, you were startled and scurried back into the burrow to hide.
Isn’t it said that humans are weak to beauty?
So, when thinking about what I should wear for our first meeting in the mansion, I decided that being bare was the most beautiful and so I was unclothed. But to you, timid and delicate as you are, it must have been too stimulating a sight.
The burrow I had prepared solely for you. There you holed yourself up, refusing to come out for a full four days.
My patience was nearing its limit, but humans always feel resistance toward what is forced upon them. I had to make you believe it was of your own will. I used Lucky to coax you into eating, and once you accepted food, I made sure you waited for me at the same time every day. Sometimes, I deliberately left you yearning for a full day. That was how you finally emerged from the burrow.
I didn’t want you to dislike staying here. I wanted to make you desperately wish to remain in this place. So, I let slip the words that knights were camped outside.
“…Could I stay here? At least until the search calms down. If I go out now… the knights will kill me. That knight who died tried to kill me, too.”
Timid and delicate as you are, those words frightened you yet again.
“Yes. I’m good at cleaning, and I can do laundry. I’m not very good at cooking since I haven’t tried much, but… I’ll do my best. And anything else you ask me to do, Mr. Hunter…”
“But what should I even have you do? There’s nothing in particular I need from you.”
“Really, anything, it doesn’t matter what. If you just give me something to do, I’ll try my best…”
Prina, to be honest, in that moment, I liked that earnestness of yours. So I gave a more evasive answer.
You were needed by me simply for your existence. I had never once thought to question the reason for that need, or what use you might have. You didn’t seem to be skilled in much anyway. I only wanted you to eat well, to live well.
But when I failed to assign you a purpose, you grew restless, anxiously bustling about cleaning, stirring up the entire mansion. You seemed uneasy even as you busied yourself, and so I thought it best to give you something else to absorb your mind.
It was then that I happened upon a fallen bird, cast from its nest.
Yes, Prina.
You liked to care for and mend pitiful things, didn’t you?
Like the name you gave my familiar, that too was a stroke of fortune for me.
When I brought you the bird, you looked happier than anyone I had ever seen. As you watched the frail creature recover day by day, you smiled brighter than sunlight itself. That smile, I wanted it too.
If only you would smile at me like that.
The thought left no room for hesitation. I cut my own shoulder with a blade, and drenched myself in rain until I looked pitiful in anyone’s eyes.
And it worked on you, Prina.
With soft coaxing, we made our complete union, and again, and again, we became one. Then, my innocent Prina gradually began to lower the walls of her guard. And little by little, you grew accustomed, tamed, as mine.
Greedy, selfish, fragile humans had always been tiresome to me. But because you were my human, I wanted to do anything for you. When I promised I would give you anything, and told you to make a wish…
“…I don’t have a wish.”
You lied. As though something like a wish could never belong to you. When I half-threatened and pressed you to speak, only then did you finally say.
“A vegetable garden. Not a big one… Just a small, cozy garden.”
It was an absurdly humble wish. Humans usually wished for things beyond their station, ridiculous desires. But even your wish was nothing but trifling.
Even while you made that little wish, you hesitated for so long. Muttering about whether you had the right, whether you ought to. That figure of you was both endearing and pitiful.
Desire only grows the more it is had. That is the very nature of desire.
And so, I decided I would not treat even your small wish lightly. I would grant it.
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