041. Making a Family (1)
041. Making a Family (1)
"Rinne, come out for a moment."
Of course, she didn't emerge.
Even when I recited the explicit scene from volume 14 of Beyond the Cradle that had horrified Rinne, she remained unresponsive.
In the end, after several warnings, I forced the door open and stepped inside.
The moment I entered, a foul stench sank deep into my lungs.
If it had previously been reminiscent of a peach just before rotting, now it was unmistakably a peach that had already rotted.
The source of that musty body odor wasn't the desk. It was likely inside the suspiciously bulging blanket.
I yanked the blanket away with a flick, and there lay Rinne, in a disheveled state.
And if this had been the usual Rinne, she would have been yelling at me hysterically by now.
Or she would have just kicked me outright. I had thought the latter was more likely, so I had prepared a defensive stance of my own.
But the action Rinne took the next moment was far beyond my expectations.
She immediately pulled the blanket back over herself and hid inside.
Baffled, I asked.
"What are you doing in there?"
A moment later, Rinne answered from under the blanket.
"...I was writing."
"No, you clearly aren't."
All I could see was someone hiding under the covers.
At that, Rinne changed her words.
"I was trying to write. But it won't come out."
"It won't come out?"
She had been writing perfectly fine last time.
"You can get blocked even when your writing was going fine. Besides, this time I was trying to write something new."
"A new piece?"
"That is..."
Rinne said.
Ever since she had equipped the skill module, Rinne had only written two types of narratives.
One was 'Weakness Discovery,' which weakened enemies.
The other was 'Ally Enhancement,' which strengthened our side.
With just those two, she could fulfill the basic role of a support-type biodroid.
Therefore, in training situations, she had never felt the need to create another type of buff.
But now, with a live mission right around the corner, Rinne had suddenly grown worried about her low endurance.
Even in a support role, combat would inevitably put her in situations where Legions targeted her.
She needed a way to block at least one or two attacks, so Rinne finally resolved to create a new narrative.
"...To be honest, it was also because I wanted to try writing something new."
Once a narrative that granted a specific buff was developed, it was more advantageous to just keep using that one repeatedly.
Because of that, Rinne had not had any reason to write new pieces recently. She had only been repeating the work of refining or applying the already completed texts.
Given Rinne's authorial temperament, she probably hadn't liked that situation.
So, for these various reasons, the third buff Rinne had decided to create was 'Ally Protection.'
Specifically, she was trying to create a 'Damage Transfer' type of defensive buff, where an ally with high endurance would take the damage directed at her instead.
To achieve that, Rinne had tried to write a new type of narrative, but—
"And you just can't write that narrative?"
Rinne, still under the blanket, nodded.
Then she added quietly.
"And it's not just that one; I've become completely unable to write any other text either. I guess I really am a moron..."
"I wonder."
I suspected there was another cause.
I pulled the blanket away again and shoved my PDA right in front of Rinne's eyes.
Displayed on the screen was the message I'd received earlier. A new status abnormality detected in Rinne.
"......My Writing Sucks Disease?"
Rinne asked, sounding utterly incredulous.
"There's a status abnormality like this?"
"Would there be?"
Of course not.
There wasn't one originally, but.
Rinne had newly created it.
"What do you mean?"
"You cast a status abnormality on yourself with your own skill."
"I never did that."
She probably hadn't done it consciously.
But while she was repeatedly dwelling on the fact that she, a writer, couldn't write, she had unconsciously imposed that very notion onto herself in the form of a narrative.
Because of that, her creative ability had plummeted so sharply that she couldn't even write things she'd previously been capable of writing.
The depression that kept her from coming out from under the blanket was a bonus.
"Is such a thing possible?"
"Entirely possible."
If she can cast debuffs on enemies, what reason would there be for her not to be able to cast a debuff on herself?
Especially since Rinne had no actual experience using her skills. Her proficiency was low, so it would have been easy for the skill to activate unconsciously.
So, what we needed to think about was how to dispel this curse that Rinne had cast on herself.
For starters, I figured that just successfully completing the narrative she initially failed to write would cause My Writing Sucks Disease to disappear on its own.
In that sense, a question.
"What kind of narrative were you trying to write in the first place?"
A moment later, Rinne answered cautiously.
"A story where I become someone else's family and receive absolute protection."
What? That didn't sound especially difficult.
"That's because you're human."
Rinne grumbled as if irritated.
"I'm a biodroid without a family. I don't know what it's like for someone who's had one. So...... I just can't understand how someone with a family thinks."
Hearing that, I thought that might indeed be the case.
But if that was the reasoning, what about the past?
"You portrayed family well in Beyond the Cradle, though."
As I had briefly mentioned before, the protagonist of the Beyond the Cradle series, Kang Min-hyuk, became a Commander because of his younger sister.
The inciting incident and the protagonist's greatest goal was that he headed for the Cradle of Silence to find the Healing Phase in order to cure his sick younger sister.
For that reason, there were numerous episodes in Beyond the Cradle centered on the familial affection between the protagonist and his younger sister.
The descriptions, the narration, the scenes related to that had all been perfect.
"......Back then, I was still writing at my best."
"And now?"
"My skills have really declined compared to back then. It's already been two years since Beyond the Cradle went on hiatus...... and I haven't been able to write properly since. In short, I've lost my touch."
Hmm.
Maybe it wasn't just self-deprecation caused by My Writing Sucks Disease. Even a bestselling author was bound to get rusty after two years without writing.
On top of that, although she didn't seem to fully realize it herself, I suspected a kind of trauma was also at play.
The trauma of knowing that her own writing had caused readers to go through horrific things.
Whatever the case, Rinne's writing skill really must have deteriorated considerably compared to her active days.
To revive that deadened touch, the only option was to recreate the experiences she'd had in her active days.
So.
"What did you do in the past when you were blocked like this?"
"In the past?"
"Back in your days as an active author. There must have been times you got blocked then too."
Above all, she would have had no sense of family back then either.
Despite that, Rinne had established an incredibly wonderful younger-sister-and-older-brother relationship and written a beautiful story based on it.
I speculated that there must have been some method that had made that possible.
And indeed, there was something.
"...Research."
"Research?"
"Yeah. Back then...... I asked people all over, went out to conduct interviews, and consumed lots of novels, manga, and movies for reference."
"Then how about trying to do fresh research starting now?"
Rinne shook her head.
"Getting a feel for it that way would take way too long."
"How long?"
"At least a month."
Hmm.
That was absolutely not doable.
Was there another way?
After thinking it over for a moment, I arrived at this idea.
"In the end, the problem is that you don't know what it's like to have a family, right? That's why you built up the necessary understanding through all that incredibly inefficient research before?"
"Right?"
"Then how about experiencing it firsthand this time? The psychology of someone who has a family."
"......Huh?"
Countless question marks seemed to float around Rinne's face.
"What do you mean? How could I possibly experience having a family firsthand if I don't have one?"
"We could just make one, couldn't we?"
"With who, and how."
"Well."
Basically, anyone would do. Laika, Alicia, or even Sumire.
The problem was that those kids, just like Rinne, probably had never experienced the existence of a family.
Meaning, they were somewhat unsuitable for the role of teaching her what a family is like.
Therefore.
"How about making a family with me?"
I suggested it as casually as anything.
And at that, Rinne's face flushed bright red.
Then she stretched out the foot she had hidden under the blanket towards me and—
"You crazy perverted bastard!"
"Gwack!"
She stomped on my chest.
It didn't hurt. It felt more like she'd simply pressed me down with brute force.
With one foot pinning me down like that, Rinne extended her other foot towards my face.
Soon, pressing down hard on my chest, Rinne protested.
"You barge in here and the first thing out of your mouth is what? Let's make a family? So you thought I'd just go 'Hai, shiki-kang-sama!' and start making babies with you? Has your head gone wrong?"
"No, there seems to be some misunderstanding..."
"Misunderstanding my ass! Die! You power-abusing sex offender!"
No, seriously, it was a misunderstanding.
Because making a family didn't mean forming one between me and Rinne.
"I mean, you and I should actually become family ourselves."
"Ha?"
"So... for example."
I would take on the role of Rinne's older brother.
Rinne would take on the role of my younger sister.
What I was proposing was a sort of family role-play, along those lines.
"......What the hell is that? Do you really think something like that will bring my writing touch back?"
"You never know."
At the very least, it would be more effective than holing up in a corner of the room and being pathetic like she was now.
"Even if I agree with that, why should you be the older brother?"
"Then should I be the younger brother?"
"It's not like I couldn't do that, right?"
Well. Given how we looked, I thought that would be a little hard to picture.
Well, if that were the only problem, I might have accommodated Rinne's preference.
But there was a bigger issue.
"Beyond the Cradle featured an older-brother-and-younger-sister relationship."
"...It did. What does that have to do with anything?"
"It has everything to do with it."
The fundamental reason for proposing family role-play was to revive Rinne's dead writing ability, specifically her sense for family narratives.
In that sense, if we were going to role-play anyway, it would be more efficient to proceed based on a relational dynamic she had experience writing before.
Of course, the only family narrative Rinne had experience writing was the older-brother-and-younger-sister relationship featured in Beyond the Cradle.
Therefore, it was most appropriate for me to be the older brother and Rinne to be the younger sister.
...That was my judgment.
"It's not that you just want to hear me call you 'Oppa,' is it?"
Not at all.
It wasn't.
But, hearing it, I thought it was a decent opinion. Terms of address did affect immersion, after all.
"You said it well yourself. From now on, call me Oppa."
"So it was that after all. Heuh—ng."
Rinne gave a snort full of self-assurance.
A moment later, she did as I asked.
"Oppa dummy~"
......It felt like she'd tacked on an unnecessary extra.
Without giving me a chance to protest, Rinne continued to tease me.
"Oppa loser~ Idiot~"
"No, that's not how you're supposed to..."
"Then how? 'Pinned under your little sister's foot, can't do a thing, total loser~ Die~' Like that?"
For reference, Rinne was still stepping on me and pinning me to the floor.
And in that situation, far from letting me go, Rinne began to tread on my chest with her foot again.
It wasn't that prodding, stomping motion from earlier. It was a motion reminiscent of a massage, using her toes and the sole of her foot to stroke and toy with my body.
"Isn't Oppa embarrassed at all~? A so-called Commander lying under a biodroid's feet~ Pathetic~ Kyah-ha-ha-ha—!"
...Good grief.
"Is that the kind of thing a younger sister should say and do to her older brother?"
"Huh? It's not?"
Rinne immediately asked back.
Her tone was quite serious. She seemed to genuinely believe that such words and actions were exchanged between a younger sister and older brother.
Probably because she had only learned about human relationships through otaku media.
Well, I didn't think it was an entirely inaccurate portrayal.
But that wasn't the core of it.
"Then what? What is the core of a family relationship?"
Let's see.
It was hard to define in words, and more importantly, I thought that conveying it through words, however defined, was meaningless.
Our goal was to directly experience the psychology of someone who has a family.
So I grabbed Rinne's ankle while she was still fooling around with my upper body.
Then I pulled her small foot toward me, knocked Rinne off balance, and sent her tumbling.
"Kyak...!"
And just like that, I lifted Rinne up.
In what you'd call a princess carry.
"Wha, what are you doing?! Let me go!"
Rinne's shouting face had turned bright red.
Despite having been making lewd jokes just moments before, being held by me was somehow embarrassing to her.
Regardless, I began moving Rinne somewhere.
The place we soon arrived at was.
"...The dining hall?"