MY DAUGHTERS RAN AWAY
On a sunny morning, I took all our laundry and brought it outside.
“It’s chilly, but the sun should dry it all.”
Our family was big, which meant we had a lot of laundry. But still, it wasn’t nearly as stressful as doing overtime in front of a computer screen.
It was then that I heard a voice that left me no choice but to stop what I was doing.
Sandra was crying.
“Waaaaah! Aaaaaahhh!”
I couldn’t ignore her, not when she sounded so much like a little child.
“What’s wrong, Sandra? Did you have a fight?”
Sandra was crouched down in the vegetable garden. All my kids got along well, so I rarely ever saw any of them cry like this.
“Sniff… I don’t want to cry… I’ll dry up and wither…”
That was a plant’s perspective, though…
“Look at my head, Azusa. When I woke up this morning, a bug had eaten some of my leaves!”
When she pointed it out, I saw that part of her leaves—which was basically just her hair—was shorter. I guess bugs actually did see them as leaves…
Still, I understood why she would cry. When I was in high school, getting my hair cut too short was an upsetting surprise. Well, Momma Yufufu cut my hair once, too, but I was over three hundred years old at that point.
“Hair is a woman’s pride, after all. It’s not a nice feeling to have it cut short.”
“I won’t be able to photosynthesize as much.”
“Oh, that’s why.”
Fashion was the least of her worries, apparently.
“I’ll get hungry if I can’t photosynthesize. You’re not on a diet, Azusa, but you’d still hate it if someone took away one of your dishes at dinner, right?”
“I get that.”
It sucks not getting enough to eat—and since a daughter of mine was crying, I couldn’t just leave her to figure it out on her own.
I crouched down and gently pulled Sandra into a hug. I had to act like her mother at least once in a while, after all.
“You can stay in the house for as long as you like today until you calm down, okay? It should be safer in there.”
“I don’t like it in there because I can’t photosynthesize.”
We’re struggling to get on the same page here…
“Then you can stay with me, okay? I’ll swat any bugs that come your way. I’ll be sure to stay outside as long as I can.”
There was a lot of work I could do outdoors, like hunting for herbs.
“Okay. I’ll do that. And…at night…” Sandra hesitated for a second before she whispered, “I’ll sleep in your room. There might be more bugs here in the vegetable garden.”
Yes! She was counting on me as her mom!
“Of course! Mommy will protect you!”
I hugged Sandra even tighter.
“Um, it’s kind of weird for you to act like my mother since you’re not a plant… It’s not like you raised me from seedlinghood.”
“You sure are harsh with animals.”
We might not be in step for quite a while yet, but I decided to spend the day glued to Sandra.
For lunch, I sat eating a sandwich next to Sandra.
“Mm, delicious! Eating outside is much better—it almost feels like I went out for a little hike!”
“I wish the sun was a bit stronger, but this is nice.”
Sandra was standing up, which made it a bit unnatural, but this was the right way to communicate with a plant.
Afterward, Sandra and I ventured into the nearby forest to look for herbs.
“Oh, that grass is no good. It steals our nutrients. I’ll pull it out by the root.”
“It seems kind of unfair for one plant to be able to uproot others…”
“Plants must fight one another for survival, too. I almost feel as though I need to evolve with some kind of deadly poison in my leaves at this point.”
Was that something she could do on her own? And if she wasn’t wholly successful, I had a feeling she would only garner more attention as a plant that could be used for medicine instead.
At dinner, Sandra decided to lie down in the dining room. Not on the sofa, though. On the floor.
“…Hey, Sandra, it’s a bit strange to lie on the floor in the corner of the room. At least sit in a chair,” Flatorte reasonably cautioned.
It sounded like it was a little weird, even to the messy and haphazard dragon.
“No need. I will relax here, like a plant should.”
“Hey, Sandra? Do you want some water?”
“I appreciate the sentiment, but no. I can’t have too much water.”
It wasn’t easy living with a plant. I couldn’t just place myself in her shoes to figure out what she was thinking.
And then it was bedtime.
“Oh yes! You’re so cute! It looks so good on you!”
“Really? It won’t be easy to get in the ground like this, so I have a hard time liking it…”
I’d put Sandra in some adorable pajamas, complete with lacy embroidery. I’d bought them a while ago, but I never got the chance to put her in them. They’d get dirty in the ground, after all…
“Well, it’s still safe in here since you’re with me. I sense no bugs. I can sleep easy.” Sandra didn’t seem as annoyed as I thought she would be.
Yes, very good, very good. “Think of this as your own room until your leaves grow back, okay? I can sing you a lullaby, too.”
“No, too loud for me.”
There was a lot of work involved when it came to treating her like a child.
Sandra stole a glance at my bed. “But…I guess I can sleep in your bed.”
Yes! Yes! And I’d let her do anything she wanted!
“Of course, of course! You are a precious daughter of mine, of course!”
Things were going in a great direction. Maybe my love had finally gotten through to her. All my effort was starting to pay off.
But then—
Knock, knock.
—There came a knock at the door. I could tell by the sound who it was.
“Falfa? What is it?”
The door clicked open. I was right—there stood Falfa and Shalsha.
But something was wrong. Falfa was pouting, which was unusual. Shalsha just looked plain sleepy. It was nighttime, after all.
“You’ve been too nice to Sandra today, Mommy. It’s not fair.”
“Yaaawn… A government lacking in equity is not a good thing. Shalsha will give you candid advice.”
Ah. They must not have been happy with how much extra attention I’d been giving Sandra today. I think I made them jealous.
But Sandra had suffered real harm with her hair getting eaten, so I wanted to give her some special care.
“Falfa, Shalsha, some bugs got to Sandra and she was crying this morning. So just stick through it for a little longer, okay? It’s only temporary. Yeah?”
Falfa and Shalsha exchanged glances.
“Okay, Mommy. It’s too late to talk and make any decisions now, so tomorrow.”
“Yawn… We will stand down for the day. We will negotiate in the morning. Shalsha is sleepy, so I am going back.”
The two returned to their room.
I’d make sure they understood somehow. They were the big sisters here. Wait, Sandra is older than them age-wise, so maybe they’re not…? She might even be older than me.
I didn’t really have an answer for that yet.
That night, Sandra snuggled up in bed with me. And she fell asleep right away. I could hear her soft snoring almost a few seconds after she got into bed.
“Maybe you aren’t sleeping, exactly, but get some rest…”
Humans needed a bit of time before they fell asleep, but it seemed like plants could pull it off instantly. Exactly how many of Sandra’s behaviors were due to her being a plant was still a mystery, though.
The following day, my routine was almost exactly the same as it had been the day before.
When the sun was at its brightest, I went outside with Sandra and stayed there as long as possible. She needed the sunlight, so this was normal for her, though. It was another beautiful day, so that wasn’t a big problem.
But what made today different was that Falfa and Shalsha kept popping in on me to watch.
“What’s up, you two? Want to play with Sandra?”
“We’re just taking a walk during a break from our reading, so no thank you.”
“We wanted to spend some time with our books.”
That’s what they told me, but I could tell that they weren’t exactly happy with the way Sandra and I were glued together like this.
I did understand how they felt, but this wasn’t favoritism, and I wasn’t restricting them. They were allowed to have snacks and go out if they wanted. I was their mother, so I was well aware of these things. I just hoped they would put up with the frustration in the meantime.
I was basically a mom taking care of her kid while they’re sick. Sandra was injured (?).
The two were smart, and they seemed to understand that, which was why they didn’t expressly ask for her to come play with them.
I’d be sure to buy them something extra yummy in the near future.
—But those tasty treats came from a different route.
“Here, these are called ‘the lid on the purgatory cauldron,’ a well-known delicacy from a rural part of the demon lands. They’re so crispy! You’ll want to eat a hundred at once!”
Beelzebub came to the house in the highlands with a gift. She was seriously here so often that I was wondering if she actually had a house nearby.
“Another snack with a scary name, huh?”
It was a baked treat in the shape of a circle; my guess was that it was sweet.
“’Twas named eons ago. You’re best off ignoring it. Come now, Falfa, Shalsha, have a taste~!”
Falfa and Shalsha were both excited at the prospect of a snack.
“Yaaay! Thank you always, Miss Beelzebub!”
“We will repay you for your kindness one day.”
“Seeing you girls so delighted is enough for me. I may be punished if I ask for any more~”
“Yeah, I’m glad you got to see my girls’ delighted faces. I’m so glad that you’re so kind to my girls.”
“You are emphasizing that they are yours quite a bit, no…?”
“I’m just telling the truth, okay?”
Psychological warfare had begun over the silliest thing—but I had to be careful that she didn’t suddenly start assuming my daughters were hers.
Still, it was truly perfect timing that Beelzebub came today.
Getting treats from her must surely have helped them feel less slighted. Sandra didn’t eat our kinds of snacks at all, especially, so it felt like they were getting even more special treatment than Sandra was.
“I’ll get you some fertilizer in water, Sandra. I hope that restores your eaten leaves more quickly.”
“Thank you. I hope they’re even more beautiful than last time.”
After three or four days with Sandra, I’ll do something for Falfa and Shalsha.
I was going to be a well-balanced mother.
That night, Falfa and Shalsha didn’t complain to me at all about my sleeping with Sandra, probably an effect of the treats Beelzebub brought. I guess I could call this problem solved.
“You seem like a weight’s been lifted off you, Azusa.”
“I have to think about the well-being of every family member, you see.”
“Mm-hmm. Animals are a handful.”
Sometimes her standards seemed really arbitrary…
Again, Sandra hopped into bed and fell asleep within seconds.
“You don’t have to be a handful, sure, but it’s okay to be a little bit of a handful…”
The next morning, Beelzebub told us she had a survey on resources for marine products in the human kingdom for the next few days, hopped on her wyvern, and left.
“Byeee! Come agaaain! I’m sure you will anyway.”
I wasn’t sure if it was okay for demons to just go around surveying human territory, but it didn’t seem like they were planning a takeover or anything that would harm me.
However, it wasn’t Beelzebub who had woken me up this morning. It was Sandra, who had gotten up with the rising sun.
She was still with me, too.
Plants sure got an early start; maybe the sun made sure they didn’t sleep. I didn’t know any other mandragoras, so I wasn’t exactly sure, though.
“Right—I’m going to go make some breakfast. Are you going to photosynthesize here?”
“Hmm, the sun is still weak, so I’ll go back into the house.”
She seemed much healthier and more energetic compared to when she was sobbing, so it didn’t look like there was going to be much of a problem anymore.
I did have a room open just for Sandra, so she was more than welcome to live inside the house in the highlands at night. But she was the type to get offended if I was too pushy with my suggestions, so I was just going to wait for her to bring it up herself.
Laika was awake by the time food was ready. Rosalie was floating around the dining table, too.
“Great, breakfast’s ready. I’ll go call everyone else.”
As I went down the hall, I passed Halkara and Flatorte, so the only ones left were Falfa and Shalsha.
I knocked on their door.
But there was no answer.
I guess they’re still sleeping.
“Breakfast is ready, you two~” I slowly opened the door.
They were gone.
“Huh? Where did they go…?”
I then spotted a paper lying on their bed.
“Aaaaaaaah! They ran away!!”
I screamed.
How had it come to this…?
I hadn’t been so cold to them that they would want to run away, had I…?
Wait.
Maybe that was why.
Since I’d put up a defensive line to make sure none of them would come childishly whining to me for more attention, they might’ve gotten even more frustrated. Maybe trying to put up with it had only made them more stressed…?
I hated putting it this way, but maybe they’d been suffocated. I’d deprived them of the necessities to live but not enough to die.
Whatever—I have to do something!
“What is it, Lady Azusa?”
“I, Flatorte, will strike down any enemy, Mistress!”
The dragons had come running.
When I returned to the dining room, I showed the rest of the family the letter.
“‘Don’t look for us. Or maybe look for us a little.’ What do they want? I don’t get what they’re trying to say.” Flatorte was frustrated.
I was their parent, but I couldn’t say her complaints were completely ridiculous.
“You truly lack the delicacy for this, Flatorte. This letter reflects their feelings. What would be the point of running away if all they wrote was, Please look for us? They cannot simply write everything they think.” Laika skillfully explained the subtleties of Falfa and Shalsha’s letter.
“But it still says they want us to look for them.” Flatorte tilted her head.
“That is why this is complicated. You are a bad child, Flatorte—you must have run away from home several times before, no?”
“It’s normal for blue dragons to suddenly leave without saying anything, then come back a month later. When I was young, sometimes my dad wouldn’t come back for a whole year.”
Her family environment was so unique, she couldn’t connect at all!
“Ohhh… Why did it come to this…? Maybe I was too prideful… Maybe I got lazy because they were such good kids…”
“It’s not your fault, Azusa. It’s mine,” Sandra said, tugging on my clothes.
Doting on Sandra might have been what started all this, and Sandra was feeling responsible. But this wasn’t something she should worry about.
“Heh… Maybe animals and plants shouldn’t be friends after all,” she mused.
“Oh, stop it with the plants versus animals thing, already! That definitely has nothing to do with it!”
No one was on the same page here, so for better or worse, I was anxious about all this.
“They’re children. I think they were sad they didn’t get much attention.”
It sounded strange for Sandra, who seemed the most childlike of all of them, to say that, but things would keep going if I were to engage, so I ignored her.
“That may be it. And that’s why they decided to run away.”
This wasn’t a stereotypical runaway case, though.
“Oh, everyone, let’s think about this positively!” Halkara cried. “Let’s consider what we can do right now!”
“That’s right! Cheer up, Big Sis!” Rosalie added. They were both trying to lighten the uncomfortable atmosphere.
“Sorry for making you both worry.”
“Big Sis, all they really did was just leave the house, so it’ll work out! It’s not like they killed themselves, so we can still get them back! Me, I’m already dead!”
“All your examples are way too extreme!”
Oh yeah, Rosalie’s parents actually betrayed her, which led her to suicide and turned her into a spirit…
Everyone was way too unique; it was hard to concentrate on the incident.
“If we think calmly about this, then they likely went to the Great Slime, right? That is the closest they have to a hometown, and Wynona lives nearby. I believe that would be the perfect spot for them to run to.”
It was kind of rude to say this was a surprise, but Halkara was the most reliable one here. She was a terrible drinker, but her experience with the factory really came in handy sometimes.
“You’re right. The problem is that the Great Slime is kiiiinda far away…”
It was hard to tell exactly where they might be right now.
“If they’re going by foot, then I hope they don’t get attacked by monsters…,” I said. “They’re weak enough that an encounter with a boar could be dangerous…”
“I can search for them from the sky, Lady Azusa!” Laika declared, pounding her fist against her chest. “I will find them immediately! They cannot be too far as of now!”
“Thank you, Laika. Can you do that? I’ll look from the ground.”
“I, Flatorte, will help!”
“I’ll show you what a ghost’s really good for!”
I was starting to get my smile back. We were all a part of the same family. This wasn’t my problem alone.
Of course they would help search for the twins, and I knew if we put all of our heads together, we’d find them.
And I guess I wasn’t so much worried about them running away, but shocked that they’d take such measures.
The act itself was basically a cry for us to find them, so I figured this would get resolved quickly.
“Thank you, all of you!” I said to them. We were part of the same family, after all. “And I’m sorry, Sandra, but you should stay home, okay?”
It wasn’t safe to send her alone into the woods to search.
“Sure, I’ll be here, photosynthesizing quietly.” Sandra seemed a bit frustrated, knowing that she wasn’t going to be much help. But everyone had things they could and couldn’t do; that’s just how it was.
“And you go to work, Halkara. Flatorte, take her to Nascúte. You can start searching after that.”
“You’re right… Things would only get worse if I helped…”
Oh, she’s aware…
We settled on what we were going to do for the time being.
Either way, we were going to find Falfa and Shalsha. All I had to do was decide what I was going to say to them when I saw them again.
I’d apologize to them for forcing them to go through something they hated that much, and I would tell them to apologize to the whole family who went through the trouble of searching for them. That was probably a decent compromise…
A mutual apology wouldn’t leave any seeds for future trouble.
All that said…
“Falfa, Shalsha, where are yooouuu? Where are yooouuu?! Answer me!” I ran around the entirety of the highlands, but I could see neither hide nor hair of them.
It was then that Rosalie floated my way.
“Big Sis, maybe they hid when they figured out you were trying to find them? You wouldn’t be much of a runaway if you were found so fast.”
“You’re right… It’d be hard to call it running away if I found them in a half hour…”
And this meant that me showing them how hard I was looking was only going to make them harder to find. That said, I could see dragon Laika flapping around up there in the sky, so it wasn’t going to be easy to search quietly.
Wait, but maybe it was safer if Laika did the searching instead of me?
I wasn’t sure what sort of state of mind I should be in. I’d never run away from home—but maybe I should have, at least once…
After Flatorte had dropped Halkara off at the factory, she joined in on the search. Unfortunately, we didn’t spot anything that looked like the twins on the route to the Great Slime, and the morning came to a fruitless end.
We used our lunchtime as a strategy meeting.
“They probably…didn’t go to the Great Slime.” That was the conclusion I came to. “I searched the ground, Laika and Flatorte looked from the air, and Rosalie searched in places people can’t normally see. It isn’t like Falfa and Shalsha are world-class hide-and-seek players, so it’s hard to imagine we’ll go very long without finding them.”
“They didn’t turn into slimes and run, did they?” Sandra suggested. I hadn’t even thought of that.
“If…that happened, then it’d be almost impossible to find them, but…it isn’t as though they can turn into slimes of their own free will, so I think we’ll be okay.”
“But this will not be easy.” The hardworking Laika had, at some point, started drawing up a map for our search. “Flatta is in a different direction from the Great Slime, but I wondered if they had gone to pick up supplies first, so I went to confirm. However, the villagers told me that neither had been there.”
“Good thinking! You really are a good kid, Laika… You’re honestly perfect.”
“Please do not compliment me so lavishly… Anyone would do the same. But…it is an honor to hear your praise…” Though she humbled herself, Laika was still happy. She was complicated.
The Great Slime was far away, and it sounded realistic for them to spend time in Flatta instead, but that possibility quickly broke down.
Also, the reason I decided to leave Flatta for last was because I knew it would be hard for them to hide there. The villagers all knew who Falfa and Shalsha were, so they’d be found out super quick.
“Then where could they be…? Is it possible they might still be in the hou—?”
“I slipped through all the rooms to check. They’re not in the attic or under the floorboards, either.”
“If you’ve checked, Rosalie, then they aren’t.” It was nearly impossible to hide and run from Rosalie. “I looked in the walls and in the chairs, too, but they weren’t there.”
“We’d be in a horror story if they were in the chairs!”
They could pull out the insides of the couch and hide there, but that wasn’t technically running away from home.
“What should we do? I don’t know where to go…”
“Do not be discouraged, Lady Azusa. They are good children. It is not entirely unusual for them to have done something that would make them harder to find. We will search through everything one step at a time,” Laika consoled me.
She was right. A mom couldn’t get discouraged like this.
“Yeah, first, we’ll ask both the Great Slime and Wynona to contact us if they show up.”
If their plan was to return to their homeland, we’d get some info nearer their goal.
“And just in case, we’ll ask Beelzebub if they’re in—huh?”
A doubt crossed my mind then—something even deeper than doubt, in fact.
“Beelzebub left early this morning, didn’t she…? They weren’t with her, were they…?”
Beelzebub would gleefully betray me if the two said they were going to be her daughters. She’d do it without a single twinge of conscience.
I was almost certain she was the culprit here.
“But Beelzebub was getting around on a wyvern, right? Were Falfa and Shalsha on it with her…? I didn’t see…”
Oh, Sandra had seen Beelzebub off, too.
“Wait, but it still sounds way too easy, even if it was a coincidence. She told me where she was working, so I’ll go see her.”
I had a feeling it wouldn’t be very nice of me to summon her while she was on the job, and it wasn’t like summoning her alone was going to bring Falfa and Shalsha along, either.
We decided we would get going at noon and continue into the following day.
I hopped on Laika and went to visit the Great Slime and Wynona, where we told them both about Falfa and Shalsha running away.
As for Wynona, there was a chance that she was sheltering the two, much like Beelzebub, but it wasn’t possible that they’d made it to her place at this moment in time. Which meant Wynona wasn’t a suspect.
We had to give Laika a chance to rest, so that night, we stayed at the inn in a nearby town. We were not going exert ourselves, nor was I going to let her.
The next day, we met up with Flatorte and exchanged info. Neither of the twins had showed up back at the house in the highlands the previous day. Oh well. I hopped back on Laika, and we kept going.
We were making our way toward our biggest suspect, Beelzebub.
Beelzebub should not have returned to Vanzeld by now, so she was probably still in human lands. She said her work was going to take a few days anyway. Even though it was a rural-ish area, I still knew where she was going.
“I bet she’s feeding Falfa and Shalsha cake at a café during her breaks—I just know she is. Damn you, Beelzebub!”
“Uh, Lady Azusa? We still do not know if Miss Beelzebub truly is the culprit here…”
“I’m not saying she is. But she’s way too suspicious! I can read her like a book!”
Beelzebub was in the mountains with some other demons, checking how some trees were bearing fruit.
“Huh? Falfa and Shalsha aren’t here…”
“What are you doing here? I am certain I did not forget anything at your place.” Beelzebub seemed annoyed with us, so I told her about my daughters running away. I didn’t want to tell her, but I couldn’t come all this way and then not say anything.
“Wh-what?! How awful! We must gather a thousand-strong search party!”
“The human kingdom will mistake it for a demon attack! Please don’t!”
“But they have not been home for an entire day, so what are we to do if something has happened to them?! Azusa you may be, but you cannot guarantee their lives! I hope you have prepared for the consequences of your actions!”
“You’re still talking like they’re yours!!”
That isn’t something you say to a mother searching for her missing children!
But Beelzebub’s reaction was real, which meant that they hadn’t come to her, then…
“I can’t believe this… I was convinced that they told you they wanted to run away and asked you to take them…”
“How horribly rude you are! I knew you were not fit to care for the girls! Falfa and Shalsha are my daughters, starting immediately! I’m leaving everything I own to both of them!”
“See, this is why I’m suspicious of you! You’re responsible for exactly half of my doubt!”
“Ah, I believe you both will be going in circles, as though asking if the egg or the cockatrice came first, so please calm down…,” Laika admonished us.
“You’re right… Now’s not the time to fight with Beelzebub.”
“I will lay the life of every demon on the line to find them.”
That’s way too heavy a price, so please no.
“Hmm, but this just brings us back to square one. Where did Falfa and Shalsha go? Maybe it’s not more than hide-and-seek, but they’re way too good at this.”
They couldn’t fly, they didn’t know any teleportation spells, and they weren’t able to go fast like on horseback.
They may be hundreds of times hardier than regular children of their apparent age, but we should understand the scope of their movement.
I held up the map Laika made, and the questions were flooding my brain.
“’Tis times like these we must think logically. Let us say they can walk four gilro in one hour. Which means the farthest they were able to go without getting caught in your search that morning was about here.” Beelzebub drew a line on the map and noted 10 gilro.
The only human settlements in that radius were Flatta and Nascúte.
Oh! We still hadn’t checked out Nascúte.
“Hey, Laika, I know you checked Flatta out in the morning. Did you ask around Nascúte?”
Laika shook her head. “No. In order to reach Nascúte without passing through Flatta, one must take those disused roads, so…I thought that if they were to go in that direction, they would have passed through Flatta…”
Yeah. Laika’s logic was sound. It was a lot easier to reach Nascúte and the towns beyond it by taking the well-maintained roads from Flatta.
“If they went straight to Nascúte from the house in the highlands, then they’d have to forge their way through the fields.”
“Yes. I thought it was a path much too difficult for them.”
“But not impossible. It isn’t like there are any powerful monsters out there, and almost no one there knows who they are. Compared to in Flatta anyway.”
“Lady Azusa, it is possible they went straight to Nascúte, but…Flatorte should have investigated that area and the roads beyond in the afternoon.”
“Yeah. But what if they decided to stay in town?”
I was convinced now.
Well, I thought the same thing when it came to Beelzebub, but…this time, I was way more strongly convinced.
“Falfa and Shalsha are in Nascúte. More precisely, they’re in Halkara’s factory!”
“What?! Then we must raze Halkara’s factory and search for them!”
“Don’t!”
Beelzebub’s demonic nature always reared its head when the girls were a part of the equation.
Laika still didn’t seem wholly convinced.
I could understand, though. That alone made my conclusion sound somewhat improbable. The way I’m explaining all of this is starting to sound confusing…
“Lady Azusa, Miss Halkara was in the house with us yesterday when we discovered they ran away, and it did not seem as though she was trying to deceive us.”
“Yeah. I’m pretty sure she was wondering where they went at that time, too, just like the rest of us. But then, yesterday morning, after Flatorte took her to work, that was when she realized they were there.”
Laika gasped in realization.
“They left the note and then went straight to Nascúte before either you or Flatorte could spot them from the air. They killed some time in a place nobody would find them and then went to Halkara once the factory started up for the day.”
This sounded like the most reasonable way to run away from home.
“And if Halkara kept quiet, then they didn’t need to travel all the way to the Great Slime, and there’s a small chance they’d be found out. If Halkara told us they weren’t at the factory, then we wouldn’t exactly accuse her of lying and immediately go to the factory.”
Since they’d run away, they weren’t going to come back to the house in the highlands for a little while.
Running away was an act of rebellion; there was no point in it if they showed themselves so quickly.
That said, I knew from the way they worded their letter that they would be coming back eventually.
“Since they weren’t in Flatta, they’re in Nascúte. It’s close enough that if they left super early, they could have gotten there before we started looking.”
“Mm-hmm. A rather reasonable inference, I say! Now I suppose I shall gather the demons and head to the factory and—”
“Don’t escalate this!”
When Halkara gets home tonight, we’ll ask if the factory-hideout idea I had was right.
I really wanted this to be the right answer, but…even though I was confident in my deduction, I was still a little worried, since there was no way to confirm it. If they weren’t there, then I’d give up.
Laika and I arrived home, but no one had found Falfa or Shalsha yet. Beelzebub had said that now was not the time for her to return to the demon lands, so she tagged along.
In the end, dinnertime came without any sight of them.
The atmosphere was more weighty than usual, but that was to be expected. It wasn’t enough to skip the evening meal, though.
“We will find her, Big Sis. It isn’t easy, but you shouldn’t get too down about it. People don’t die that easily.”
“I know, thanks. I appreciate the sentiment, Rosalie.”
That said, I’d never heard of spirits dying before…
“In reality, the twins rarely ever stuck by Azusa’s side all day long. Even when they studied, they did so by themselves quietly. I think they wanted more attention.” Sandra sat in a chair.
She was probably right. When Sandra started to act more like a child, it served as a shock to Falfa and Shalsha’s desire for attention.
“Everyone, thank you so much for helping me today. I have a feeling we’ll find out the truth once Halkara comes home. I think they’re in Nascúte.” As their mother, I thanked everyone.
Then the door opened, right on time—Halkara and Flatorte were home.
First, Flatorte came in, wearing a clearly doubtful expression.
The reason for that became immediately clear.
Halkara was wearing a mask for some reason! I couldn’t see her face, but I knew those clothes and that physique.
And the mask looked like a slime!
“Hello, it’s me, the real Halkara.”
“I’m not questioning that part—this is strange, even for you! What’s with the mask?!”
“Oh, well, I got a bit of a cut on my face, so…I’m wearing one of the masks they sell in Nascúte. Yes. I am no slime, but the Halkara you know.”
She wasn’t just being suspicious—she was being outright weird!
“I don’t think you’ll be able to eat wearing a mask, Halkara. What are you going to do about that?”
“Good question… May I eat in my room?” She was doing all she could to avoid a conversation with me.
Wait a second. Yes, this was super strange, but if she was like this when she came home from work yesterday, then it would’ve come up in conversation. Flatorte would’ve informed us when we met up with her in the morning.
“Hey, Flatorte, what was Halkara acting like last night?”
“She was totally plastered when I went to pick her up. I thought she was drowning herself in alcohol when she couldn’t find the girls.”
It was odd that she’d decided to drink her sorrows away the very first day of this whole thing, and I honestly wished she’d stay sober to help us—but people deal with this stuff in different ways, so whatever.
More importantly—was getting drunk a tactic to ensure she couldn’t do or say anything suspicious?
I was going to get as much out of her as I could.
“Oh, at least sit with us until we’re done eating. I wanted to talk more about Falfa and Shalsha.”
“Oh… A-all right…”
Now that she couldn’t escape, Halkara sat uncomfortably in her chair. Her slime mask was still on.
This was supposed to be a serious talk, but now it was just starting to feel silly.
“So tomorrow, I want us to go to Nascúte and—”
Halkara’s shoulders jumped, tense.
She didn’t react until I’d said the word Nascúte… I could still tell, even with that mask on. It was basically confirmed that she was involved with this; timing-wise, we were still talking about Falfa and Shalsha.
“—And do a focused search of the area. By cutting through the highlands, they could’ve gone directly to Nascúte without going through Flatta.”
“Hoooo, hooooo.” Halkara was taking deep breaths.
“Are you ill, Miss Halkara?” Laika was eyeing her doubtfully.
“Oh, no… Just that my mask is a little tight on my face, which makes it hard to breathe… My body is fine… I’m wonderful…”
“Shouldn’t you remove the mask if you are having trouble breathing?”
“No, no, I don’t want to show where I was wounded. I think you’d all rather see the neat, shiny slime instead. Ha-ha-ha…”
“What part of your face was hurt anyway?”
“If I had to say, the tip of my nose is itchy.”
That’s not an injury.
“Are you absolutely certain you are injured?”
“…I feel injured, at the very least. Injury is a very subjective word, you see.”
Why not shake her down a little more? Well, more like flipping her upside-down and shaking her like a rag doll…
I heaved a big, dramatic sigh and then covered my face with my hands.
“Ohh…Falfa, Shalsha, where did they go…? I hope they come home soon… I can’t take this anymore…” I peeked through the gaps in my fingers at Halkara. I could see sweat dripping down her neck.
Got her.
“I—I—I—I—I—I—I—I think…Fa-Fa-Fa-Falfa and Sha-Sha-Sha-Shalsha will c-c-c-c-come home.”
She sounded like a club remix!
“If one dared to kidnap them, then they do not deserve to live!” Beelzebub was providing backup. “They shall die a painful death! I shall pluck every one of their fingernails myself before throwing them into the inferno of hell!”
Or was she just venting her honest opinion?
“K-k-k-kidnapping…? They’re simply hiding somewhere… I’m sure we’ll find them! Please, no need to threaten such horrible things…” Halkara was terrified of the punishment.
“It matters not to you, no? You will not be skewered or drowned within the mire. But if there were one who did indeed kidnap them, I shall simply make them pay.”
“Oh, I was just getting nervous with all those highly specific punishments… And by kidnapping, you mean taking them away against their will, right…? People who hid them away only because they asked are all right, aren’t they…?”
She was practically confessing!
“From my perspective, any who hides them away, willfully or not, is guilty. I shall cut open their stomach and string out their entrails. I shall make them regret ever having been born!”
“Well, I was thinking that hiding them away with good intentions would be different, you know~”
She was running straight toward rationalization now.
In all honesty, everyone already had the gist that the two were hiding in her factory. Flatorte and Halkara were staring at her in flat disbelief.
“Sis Halkara, I heard that if you lie, you’ll go to hell to be tortured when you die.”
“What an ominous thing to say, Miss Rosalie… If you lied and then got executed anyway, you’d have a terrible time in the afterlife. None of it would have been worth it…”
“That’s why you’re not supposed to lie. It’s better to confess.”
“O-oh no~ But then that would mean lying to someone else, wouldn’t it? When you assert that you will not tell anyone their whereabouts, going back on your word would be lying, too… Do you know how hard it is to please everyone…?”
It sounded like she’d promised not to tell us where Falfa and Shalsha were. But she was spilling everything anyway, so we were getting an even clearer picture.
Actually, she was kind of a victim in this situation… She was being forced to lie to us, after all.
If she came home and told us that the twins were at the factory, then she would resolve the matter but lose their trust. This was between a rock and a hard place, for sure.
I was certain at this point her coming home drunk yesterday was a way for her to make absolutely sure she wouldn’t let it slip.
“Sorry, Halkara,” I apologized.
“Ex-exactly. If you’d only taken better care of them, Madam Teacher, then things would not have gotten this out of hand. You know they wish they hadn’t run away. Please just make amends already. I can’t handle this anymore~”
“Wow, it sounds like you know everything.”
She was awful at lying.
“Oh, that was…just me babbling. I’m not well.”
“I thought you said you were fine and wonderful!”
“Don’t you know people say they’re fine when they aren’t?!”
She was desperate now!
“Okay, we know they’re in your factory! Just tell us the truth! It’s really obvious already!” I yelled.
It was plain enough that it didn’t matter if she said it or not at this point.
Halkara slowly took off her mask to reveal a tortured expression.
She leaned forward until her forehead met the table, like a sitting bow of apology.
“You’re right! That is exactly right! Please don’t make me lie! I tried wearing a mask to hide my expressions, but this task was too much for me!”
“Even if you were hiding your expressions, the mask made it obvious something was off!”
“I did my best! I’ll get an ulcer if I lie anymore! I’m done!”
She’d barely even tricked us to begin with.
“I can’t believe you found a mask like that…” Of all the things Sandra could have found astonishing about this…
“They don’t sell these in Nascúte, by the way. It’s mine. As a merchant, I sometimes need to hide my expressions.”
But it was pointless if the other party was just going to think she was weird.
Anyway, now we knew exactly where Falfa and Shalsha were.
“Laika, could you take me to Nascúte right now? Mama needs to go pick them up.”
“Yes! Of course, I—”
“I am coming, too!”
And now Beelzebub was getting excited?!
Things would get complicated if she came along, so I told her no.
Nascúte was only five minutes away on a dragon’s back. After alighting from Laika, it would be just under a ten-minute walk to the factory. But even those ten minutes felt like too much.
I couldn’t emotionally prepare myself in time.
First, I’ll hug them out of relief. Yeah, that’ll be good. But I can’t be totally happy about it. I have to scold them for causing us so much pain. Even if they had their reasons, they caused everyone else besides me to worry.
And Halkara had to lie to the rest of us, although she basically confessed immediately…
I had to do both of these things. It’s not a mother’s job to spoil a child with everything they want. I’d just be the same as Beelzebub. I had to say no when no was the right thing to say.
“But I don’t really want to scold them… I don’t want them to be scared of me…”
“Lady Azusa, you’re thinking out loud…”
“It’s okay—you’re the only one who can hear me up here!”
As we spoke, the lights of Nascúte came into view.
When we arrived at the factory, I spotted some light spilling out from the back of the building.
The factory should have been closed for the day, so that was proof that Falfa and Shalsha were here.
I took the key Halkara lent me to unlock the building and step inside.
It was dark, but I didn’t want to scare them away by turning on the lights, so I decided to just go straight in.
Laika followed close behind.
I arrived at the door where a sliver of light streamed from the gap at the bottom.
I placed my hand on the knob and waited. Initially, I was just trying to calm down, but I heard voices.
“I wanna go home already…,” Falfa whined.
“It hasn’t been long enough, Sis. This is how it works. Now that we started, we need to see it to completion.”
Meanwhile, Shalsha was oddly strict about this.
“But you want to go back to Mommy, too, Shalsha. It’s day two. Hasn’t it been long enough?”
“That goes without saying. But people only acknowledge what they have when it’s gone. So…we had to run away so Mom would know just how irreplaceable we are. We must lose this battle to win the war.”
“But now Falfa knows how lonely it is without Mommy around…”
“…Shalsha thinks you do not need to say everything you think out loud.”
They were desperate to come home already—and it was time to make their wishes come true.
I’d see them first and then decide if I should scold them.
I opened the door.
The two looked at me, and their eyes immediately pooled with tears.
I leaped at them, and they reached out to hug me back.
“Mommy!” “Mom!”
“I know, what you two did was very elaborate, so it took some time to find you.” I squeezed them tighter. “I really, really know how you feel, but you can’t worry me like this, okay? You’ve never done anything like this before, so Mommy forgives you. And I didn’t handle this very well, either, so we’re even. Okay?”
““Okay!””
In true twin-like fashion, they replied at the same time.
“But you also caused trouble for everyone else, you know. This wasn’t just between you and me. So when you see the others, be sure to say sorry. Can you do that?”
They nodded with tears streaking down their faces.
I knew running away hadn’t been the right answer here; it only caused problems for all of us.
“Ohh… Such a harmonious sight is bringing me to tears, too…”
Laika seemed rather touched by this, as well, and she was dabbing her eyes with a handkerchief. It was a little embarrassing, but she was family.
And if we’re talking about embarrassments, I was more embarrassed that my daughters ran away from me.
I haven’t been a mom for very long. Even though my level in battle and whatnot is high, I’m still low-level in the realm of parenthood. It’s not like I’ve been doing this for three hundred years; I still have plenty of room to grow.
“I’m going to keep leveling up as a mom. So you two level up as daughters, too, okay?”
The two were bawling already, so they could hardly answer. But I could tell right away that they agreed. Sometimes, the bond between parent and child was enough to know.
When we got back to the house in the highlands, Falfa and Shalsha apologized to everyone.
None of them rejected their apology, so that was that.
But I had a feeling Beelzebub was crying more than me…
“If you ever go through a hard time again, you must come to me. I will help you, no matter what… Running away from home is dangerous, so do not do it again.”
She really was trying to be their parent! I really had to be careful she didn’t snatch them away… What a jerk, capitalizing on this whole situation.
Afterward, Falfa and Shalsha very politely apologized to Sandra. They were right to feel like they needed to explain themselves to her.
“It really isn’t your fault, Sandra.”
“We were very immature about this, and that’s what caused everything.”
“It’s all right,” Sandra replied. “You may throw more tantrums—you are children, after all. One could say it’s a young animal’s role in life.”
I wasn’t so sure about her word choice there, but I guess I could call this neatly resolved.
Afterward, we had a little celebration to commemorate their coming home. Everyone was all together anyway, and I was thankful for that. That was enough to celebrate every day.
I’d been alive for over three hundred years, but there was still a lot more I had to learn. I’d take motherhood one day at a time.
Meanwhile, Halkara was exclaiming, “A toast to homecoming!”
And then she got wasted. She’d been a big victim here, too, so she could drink all she wanted without worry for the future today.
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