The Hunt
The day's work began, as always, with the sun climbing out of the eastern sky.
"Cry. Cry. Cry..."
Dawn broke and the sky slowly brightened, sunlight spilling across ground that had spent the night buried in murky dark, and I was locked in a staring contest with a sunflower.
It twitched.
"You gonna cry?"
A little teasing puff of air. Heh.
"Ah, you little shit. You're messing with me."
I'd gotten my hopes up when it trembled at the faintest touch of sunlight on its yellow petals, but this damn sunflower showed no intention of crying whatsoever.
"Come on, cry already. I've got a mountain of shit to do today... I gotta go hunting, I've seriously got a ton of stuff lined up..."
Rustle—
"Oh?"
As if it had actually heard me, the sunflower that had been standing ramrod-straight suddenly started twisting this way and that. It must have been stuck in the same pose all night. Like someone working the stiffness out of a locked-up body, it bent its stem, fluttered its leaves, writhing in every direction — then, just like the elf when she arched her chest out, it stretched the stalk right beneath its bloom straight toward the sky.
Meanwhile I set the buckets I'd prepared beneath the sunflowers. The moment the last one stretched its stem, the one that had been staring me down started twitching like it was giving the signal.
Kyaaaaaaaaah!!
Kehhhhhhhhh!!
Kyaaaaaaaak!!
A moment later, as if they had been waiting for their cue, the sunflowers all broke into a chorus of wailing at once. The flower heads that had always pointed straight at the sun crumpled like used tissues as they sobbed, and every last one of them brought its leaves up to its bloom like hands covering a face, howling their hearts out. True to the name Lamenting Sunflower, they bawled today just like someone who had lost their parents.
Drip, drip—
Soon a liquid began flowing from the flower heads down into the buckets. What people commonly called sunflower tears — sunflower oil.
I was watching with satisfaction when the window of the elf's room suddenly rattled open, and from inside, a thoroughly pissed-off elf — her enormous tits bouncing, as they did every morning — shouted down at me.
"It's so loud! What the hell is this circus every single morning?! I've been telling you to cut down those damn sunflowers for ages!"
"Without these we'd have to go all the way to the Alliance to buy oil!"
"I don't care! Uggghhh, I was having such a good sleep!"
SLAM!
With the sunflower tears filling the buckets so faithfully, I couldn't even argue — and the elf, covering her ears with a pillow in a show of protest at my words, slammed the window shut. The smell was nutty and rich, and honestly so was the whole situation. Chuckling, I patted the sunflowers' heads with my palm the way you'd soothe someone crying, and they wailed even louder, pouring out more tears — then, one by one, they settled back into being ordinary sunflowers.
"Oil harvest is booming."
When I gathered it all up, there was enough to fill an entire bucket with some left over — an enormous amount. I poured it into a large oil drum I'd prepared separately, then hurriedly loaded a Garand rifle, ammunition, and various other gear onto a handcart and left the warehouse, ready for the journey toward the western horizon.
Of course, vanishing without a word would be like begging the elf to pick a fight with me, so I called out toward the window she'd just slammed shut.
"I'm heading out!"
"If you come back empty-handed, I won't even let you set foot in this house! If you want to test me, go ahead and try coming back with nothing!"
"Jesus, what a bitch. That temper of hers."
"What did you just say?! What did you just say to me?! Get back here right now!"
After getting one last jab in at the lazy elf, I hurried out of the yard before her revenge could catch up with me.
After rattling down rough roads and cresting hill after hill, high and low, the lowing of cattle grew steadily closer. Beyond the next rise, a horned herd came into view. I let out a deep sigh and set the handcart down.
"Soaked through."
The clothes that had been bone-dry when I was collecting sunflower tears were long since soaked with sweat. They say the wind strips a traveler's clothes — but today it was the sun. I peeled off the wet shirt, pulled the woven mat from the cart, planted myself on it, and took out the binoculars I'd packed along with everything else.
"Alright, which one should I take..."
"If it were this lady, I would aim for a female rather than a male."
"Yeah, I know that. I know, but with all that fur I can barely tell which ones are male and which are female..."
A familiar voice had suddenly spoken up beside me as I was scouting for prey. Bewitched by a tone that conjured images of some seductive temptress, I pulled my eyes from the binoculars and turned my head — and there she was. A beautiful Dark Elf in an outfit every bit as revealing as the elf's: Pasuggun-ssi.
"Uh, when did you get here?"
"Rather than when I arrived... I simply let the wind guide my steps, and before I knew it, you had appeared before this lady."
"Ah."
True to her name, Pasuggun-ssi carried a dreamlike air about her. Combined with how exhausted I was from the trek out here, I found myself staring at her blankly, like a desert survivor who had just stumbled upon an oasis. Especially when my eyes drifted to her enormous breasts — easily a match for the elf's — a laugh reached my ears, and she folded her arms beneath them as if to drive the point home. I shook my head vigorously.
"My, there is no need to be so reserved."
"Ahem. I wasn't really..."
"If you wish to look upon this lady's breasts, you may look as much as you please. If it is you who would see them, I am more than willing to present them with joy."
"I came here to hunt, that's all."
If I had never known a woman's flesh, maybe I could have resisted. But my body, which already knew that particular pleasure, was all too eager to reach for Pasuggun-ssi's chest — and she, with a seductive smile, pushed her breasts forward as if to say I was welcome to touch them all I wanted. I shook my head again, fighting off the impulse, and Pasuggun-ssi clicked her tongue with what sounded like genuine disappointment.
"What a shame. I had thought that today, of all days, this lady's wiles might finally steal everything from you."
"Ahem. Enough joking around. Since you're here, could you give me a hand? I still can't tell the females from the males."
"If that is the case..."
Before I knew it, Pasuggun-ssi had approached the mat I was sitting on and slowly dropped down onto all fours. Before I could get a word out, she crept toward me — like a seasoned black panther stalking its prey, slow and at the same time utterly sultry — then draped her body over mine as I lay prone, as if pouncing on her quarry. Something soft and springy pressed down against my back.
"Hey, that's touching me...!"
"Hehe. Wherever do you mean? This lady has no idea♥"
"Nngh..."
She was doing this on purpose. Obviously. She mashed her breasts firmly between us, crushing them against my back, forcing me to feel every bit of that fullness and elasticity in a single instant as she pressed down on me. And since I had already stripped off my shirt because of the heat, it was essentially skin on skin.
"I'm telling you, it's touching me."
"Was it not you who asked this lady for help? How can one man be so fickle?"
She was a Dark Elf who made things difficult in a completely different way from the elf. Having thoroughly rubbed her breasts against my back as she climbed up to my shoulders, Pasuggun-ssi rested her chin there and then spoke, as if fascinated by the binoculars in my hands.
"What a peculiar tool this is. To bring things so close, as if they were right before one's eyes."
"These are pretty common even in the Alliance, you know?"
"Our kind is not exactly welcomed by others, you see. Until you — until our benefactor — granted us land, we wandered the wilderness without a place to call home. We are quite ignorant of how the world works."
"Ah."
I didn't know the details, but Dark Elves were supposedly shunned by other races as a people without honor. Come to think of it, even in the Alliance, where every race gathered, I had only seen Dark Elves a handful of times. And even then, it was always in back alleys or street corners — out-of-the-way places with barely anyone around.
I accidentally poked a sore spot.
I wondered how I should apologize, a cold sweat trickling down my back — but right then, with a little tsk, Pasuggun-ssi swept her breasts up along my spine, let out a soft laugh, and gently wrapped her arms around my neck.
"It is all right. Do not let it weigh on you. This lady knew from the start that you did not say such things to wound me."
"No, still, I feel kind of... sorry."
Then a soft hum from Pasuggun-ssi reached my ear.
"Hmm... Then, once the hunt is over, might you spare this lady a little of your time? I shall not take long, so you need not worry."
"No! If anything, I'd be the one saying I want to spend time with you, Pasuggun-ssi."
"Is that so? That is... most pleasing."
Squeeze—♥
For some reason, as if my answer had put her in a good mood, Pasuggun-ssi's breasts pressed softly against my back.