Chapter 60: Rin Isn't So Bad (1)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 60: Rin Isn't So Bad (1)
Rin and I were still staying at Seira’s house.
She’d allowed it since inns were hard to come by, but also because she was clearly uneasy about leaving Rin in my care.
Still, it was obvious that even Seira, who’d been wary of Rin at first, had succumbed to her cuteness.
‘Though… there are a few problems.’
An uninvited guest had made its way into the house: the misfortune Rin brought with her.
Morning.
Seira woke up, covering a small yawn with her hand. As she came down the stairs, she suddenly lost her balance and lurched forward.
“Kuh…?!”
Fortunately, her excellent reflexes allowed her to land lightly on the floor. When she looked at the stairs, she saw that one of the steps was broken.
“The stairs…?”
“A coincidence. They must be old.”
Do stairs just suddenly break?
Crash!
“The plates…?”
“A coincidence. A gust of wind must have blown in from somewhere.”
Does wind just blow in and cause a neatly stacked pile of plates to shatter?
“This is…”
“What is it?”
Seira, who was preparing breakfast, showed me the pan. It contained nothing but a pure white liquid.
“What is this?”
“An egg.”
The egg had no yolk.
Not a double-yolker, but a no-yolker.
“Is this also a coincidence?”
“…A coincidence. The chicken must prefer egg whites.”
And so it went.
The only silver lining was that since Rin only had one tail, the misfortune she caused was no worse than a childish prank.
More tails would mean more chaos, but that was a problem for another day.
After a series of eventful ‘coincidences,’ breakfast was finally ready.
The quiet morning was broken by the sound of sloppy, ravenous chewing. Food flew everywhere from my side of the table.
“Rin, you should eat more carefully.”
“?”
“…Never mind.”
Completely inept at the delicate use of tools, Rin had long since tossed her cutlery aside and was now shoveling food into her mouth with both hands.
I was trying to at least get her to stop smacking her lips, but it wasn’t easy.
Then again, I was probably asking too much of a kid who couldn’t even talk and would drop to all fours and run whenever she felt like it.
Just eat well and grow up big and strong.
“This milk is quite fresh and delicious.”
It was milk Seira had gotten from somewhere that morning. It was a bit lukewarm, which was a shame, but it was still the freshest milk I’d ever tasted.
As if it had just been squeezed.
“Our neighbor, Ms. Taura, shared it with us.”
I didn’t know who Ms. Taura was, but I knew that a family of cow beastkin lived next door. They even had a newborn.
‘I remember her being quite pretty.’
I drank three glasses of milk that day.
The dishes were being emptied one by one, and breakfast was about to end peacefully when Seira, having finished her meal, took a sip of water and spoke.
“Be careful. There are many who don’t look kindly on you these days.”
It was a sudden warning.
I wiped the food smeared all over Rin’s mouth and looked at Seira. She continued in a calm tone.
“The beastkin don’t like that you’re human, that you’re a slave trader, or that you’re traveling with a pink fox.”
“That’s hardly news.”
Having Seira and Mr. Bolt right next to me helped, but whenever I walked around outside, it wasn’t uncommon to see wary glances directed my way.
Vestia’s general opinion of humans was slightly worse than average.
As neighboring nations, they had a long and tangled history. It was difficult for them to be on good terms.
It was the same back in Korea; all its neighbors were a mess.
On top of that, I was a slave trader. Stories of humans treating slaves harshly were widespread in Vestia, and my profession was arranging such transactions.
“Wait, in that case, doesn’t freeing slaves make me a good person?”
“You still don’t get it. People really don’t change.”
Right, the beastkin of this world were like that.
Their fundamental mindset was that of a pet. Being a slave trader wasn’t the issue; treating them harshly was. As long as you cherished them, there was no problem.
As proof, Bolt was highly respected in Vestia. This place was a paradise for furries.
Though, how many people in the world were actually kind to their slaves?
‘Besides me, of course.’
“In any case, just keep it in mind. I can’t be by your side all day.”
Seira’s expression was unusually serious. A warning like that forced me to take it seriously as well.
‘Should I hire a mercenary?’
I trusted slaves, but not people.
Hmm…
“Buuurp.”
Rin let out a satisfying burp. As if surprised by the sound herself, her odd-colored eyes widened and she blinked a few times.
The tension Seira had so carefully built up evaporated into thin air.
A small laugh escaped my lips.
Yeah, what did I need a mercenary for? If I just raised Rin well, she’d easily be worth a hundred of them.
*
For the time being, the plan was the same as yesterday.
Endless hunting.
Building up Rin’s spiritual power.
And so, the two of us headed to the forest again today.
Swish!
Rin’s claws glinted sharply. Once again, she tore a kobold to shreds in a single blow.
It seemed to make no difference whether she got dirty with slime or blood, so Rin dispatched any monster she saw.
Without a moment’s rest, Rin kicked off the ground, her small body launching forward like a bullet. Her pink hair whipped wildly in the wind.
Instantly closing in on a horned rabbit fleeing in the distance, Rin grabbed it and tore it apart.
Rrrrip!
A fountain of blood erupted, and entrails flew everywhere.
It was the violent act of a predator playing with its prey.
Rin looked down at the raw meat that was once a horned rabbit, now an unrecognizable mess, then bent down and picked something up.
The hot blood on her skin.
A twitching, bright red heart.
Rin stared at the organ, still pulsing with life, as if it were the most fascinating thing in the world. She proudly held it out to me like an interesting toy.
“That’s dirty. Throw it away.”
“Whine…”
Letting out a weak whimper, Rin carelessly tossed the heart aside. Instead, as she always did, she absorbed the horned rabbit’s essence.
“When you hunt something, just kill it quickly. If you tear them apart like that, there’s nothing left to use. Do that again, and you won’t get any dinner.”
“Yelp.”
I sighed.
The more she hunted, the more her cruelty seemed to grow. But I couldn’t just stop her from hunting, which made things difficult.
It seemed like a good idea to ask Seira for advice on this. As a wolf beastkin, she would probably be a great help.
“Let’s call it a day. We’ll stop by the stream and wash up before we go.”
Yesterday, people had freaked out when we walked around covered in blood, so I planned to just wipe most of it off and change her into the spare clothes I’d brought.
The stream wasn’t far. Since her dress was ruined anyway, Rin jumped right in to wash off the blood.
“Alright, arms up.”
Rin was good at listening to me.
She had come to see me as more than just a pushover who gave her food, but as a companion she could trust, even if just a little.
The proof was that she no longer growled at me, nor did she try to run away when her chains were off.
Rin stretched her arms out. I slipped off her dress and put a new one on her. She looked much cleaner now, presentable enough to walk around people.
Rin, too, seemed to like the fresh, dry clothes. She lay on the ground, stretched her arms, arched her back, and let out a long stretch. She swished her tail in a wide circle.
“Let’s buy some skewers on the way back.”
I’d noticed yesterday that Seira seemed to really like skewers. Rin, who loved any kind of meat, nodded vigorously.
We were holding hands, about to leave the forest and head back to the city.
Rin’s ears twitched, and she stopped walking. Since she stopped, I stopped too. She had clearly heard something.
Nothing reached my own crappy ears, though.
“Is something there?”
“Keng!”
Rin dashed off, disappearing into the forest in an instant.
I really needed to start over with teaching her to listen. I sighed and ran in the direction she had gone.
“Aaaargh!”
After running for a while, a strange sound began to reach my ears as well.
A dissonance that didn’t belong in the forest.
When I arrived at the scene, I saw a group of beastkin adventurers facing off against a tree-like monster, a Treefiddian.
A menacing face was carved into its trunk, and its leafy branches slithered like snakes. A beastkin was already caught in one of them.
Before I could even give an order, Rin had already thrown herself into action.
She ran toward the Treefiddian, her arms and legs moving nimbly. Recognizing her as an enemy, the Treefiddian’s branches rushed toward her with a snake-like hiss.
Rin moved her agile body, dodging the branches.
She kicked off one branch and launched herself toward the one holding the beastkin.
Slash!
Groooowl!
Rin swung her claws, severing the branch. The Treefiddian’s face contorted as it screamed.
The trapped beastkin fell to the ground.
“Grrrrrr.”
Rin glared at the Treefiddian and growled fiercely. The monster, sweating a sap-like liquid, moved its leg-like roots and fled.
Thanks to her, the beastkin adventurer party, having recovered, breathed a sigh of relief.
“Thanks. I was almost turned into Treefiddian food. We would’ve been in big trouble if it weren’t for you.”
“Keng.”
“Uh… um. Are you a wild beastkin?”
Seeing the speechless Rin, the rabbit beastkin tilted his head. I stepped between them.
“She hasn’t been trained yet, so she can’t speak. But she can understand you, so I’m sure your thanks got through.”
“A human?”
“I’m Rin’s master.”
The beastkin party was flustered by the sudden appearance of a mute fox girl and a human. Just then, the eyes of the lizardman, who had been staring at Rin in deep thought, flashed with realization.
“Th-that pink fox! It’s the fox that brings misfortune. I’m sure of it!”
In that moment.
The expressions of the beastkin party looking at Rin changed completely.