Chapter 27- Who’s Chicken~

Following Cael’s mournful shout that echoed out into the midday sky he eventually calmed down enough to see the amused look on Selene’s face.

『Want me to tell you?』

『It would be nice.』

Leaning in close to the boy’s ear as if to share an important secret, the princess then whispered softly.

『Hmm~ Don’t wanna.』

Hearing such cruelty targeted at his childlike curiosity Cael curled up onto the ground in a dramatic fashion as he began drawing circles in the dirt.

『So mean.』

Lily poking her head in from the side soon finished her fun as well having taken in Cael’s depressed figure long enough to eventually come to his rescue.

『Don’t worry Master, I’ll explain.』

Looking up with comedically blurry eyes Cael quickly latched onto the spiders thread she lowered him.

『Thanks Lillianne, you really are the only sensible one I can rely on.』

Somehow a mysterious sentence was said aloud. So odd it was Selene couldn’t help but quietly mutter under her breath when she heard such nonsense.

『I only meant to tease him, but to think I actually caused him brain damage.』

Lily however smiled brightly at Cael’s words before throwing them back at him.

『No, thank you Master.』

『Kiss ass.』

Selene as always was scathing in her assessments; Lily was of course equally unruffled though. Casually fishing out her fake glasses from the pockets of her dress, the silkie then elaborated for the sake of easing Cael’s sanity.

『It’s really nothing complicated. Like mother said before the children of humans and grand spirits are the fae and the kindred. Grand spirits with the exception of nymphs can be both male and female, depending on the sex of the parents one or the other is born of their union.』

Pointing to both her cheeks flamboyantly Lily continued with her stony face in contrast to her childish actions.

『You already know that I’m a silkie, my father was the former first prince of the imperial family, Auron vi Severin. My mother you’re also familiar with, the nymph Ciara. As my father was human and my mother a grand spirit I was born a kindred sharing greater resemblance to the spirit than the human.』

Changing her hand gestures to assist her next talking point Lily held her right hand flat and below her waist as if referring to someone very short as she continued.

『Using the example of dwarves they are fae born of humans and titans, titans being the grand spirits of the earth element, the servants of Lady Petra. Dwarves specifically are born when a male titan copulates with a human female. In the instance of the titan being the female and the human male, a giant would be born instead; a kindred.』

Rather than being happy at having his questions answered Cael’s mind was busy trying to work out the mechanics of a titan “copulating” with a human. Lily of course was ignorant to the strange derailment of the teen's thoughts and only assumed he was introspective after listening to her words carefully.

So as to pre-empt some of the questions she foresaw Lily added a few points to her previous words without prompting.

『Elves are neither fae nor kindred because they are the direct descendants of Lady Dryad herself with divine blood running through their veins. As for the beast people they are the descendants of humans and powerful essence beasts.』

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『Essence beasts?』

Nodding her head with an especially serious-er face Lily described them as best she could.

『Monstrous creatures that grow more powerful and crafty with age. The truly ancient ones have beyond mortal intelligence and can freely take on human form.』

Having all of his relevant questions taken care of Cael had just about enough of discussing the birds and the bees for one day at least and decided to stop getting detracted from the original conversation.

『After hearing all this I’ve made up my mind. The plan I have for now that is we’ll travel around Eden for a while collecting funds as best we can and then when we approach my half a year deadline we will set course for Eldenbloom!』

Finishing his words with a high spirited shout Cael raised his fist into the air.

『Yeah~』

Lily too raising her arm as well, met his shout with her own in flat monotone. While this was occurring Selene in juxtaposition lowered her head into her hands and sighed.

『I really am surrounded by idiots.』

Despite sounding depressed, after a moment of thought she raised her head again and smiled.

『Well maybe it won’t be too bad.』

Having eventually made up her mind she joined in on the cheers. The three acting like a group of weirdos continued on for yet some time until they managed to tire themselves out and sat down on the grass a little ways away from the Elder Wood.

Cael not knowing where to start with the specifics of their plan opted to lay down in the grass instead staring at the clouds drifting past slowly while he let the girls talk amongst themselves. Calmly watching the sky something soon caught his eye, a faded moon barely visible due to the omnipresent brightness of the day.

『Huh, so they do have a moon here, I wonder what the odds of that are?』

『We actually have two moons Aspro and Mavros.』

Before he even realised the two girls had finished talking and decided to join him on the grass cloud gazing. The one who spoke was Selene as she pointed at the faded moon lost in the azure.

『That one’s Aspro it’s almost always visible except for one day a year we call the Empty Sky Festival. When it’s completely full is The Day of Blessing when spirits around the world are forbidden from harming humans and people go to their dwellings to ask for blessings.』

『Blessings eh? My stat sheet said I had a neutral blessing but Alex’s was different, his said he had no blessing.』

Selene frowned at his words clearly just as confused as he was.

『That is strange. It should have said no blessing, I have no idea what a neutral blessing is. Lily do you know?』

『Mn, no idea.』

Scratching his head in frustration Cael was sick of it all. All of the mystery, all the secrets, his life was truly a mess.

『That damn Aria too chicken to face me.』

『Who’s chicken~』

Selene and Lily acted like a live grenade was just thrown at them and leapt up from the grass with extremely high pitched cries of shock. The cause of said shock was of course the demon god casually leaning on Cael’s chest lazily watching the sky with him.

『So you were around.』

『Here and there. As a primordial goddess I do get busy sometimes y’know~ If I didn’t know any better I would almost think you saw me as a NEET or something.』

『Who’re you fooling you’re definitely a NEET.』

Giggling lightly with her pearly white teeth showing Aria gave a lopsided grin.

『Caught me~』

Despite having many questions he wanted to ask Cael strangely enough decided to just enjoy the moment a little longer instead. If you asked him why he’d honestly have no idea himself; he just naturally found her presence very calming.

Staying as they were for a few minutes more Aria quickly grew sick of the girls’ gawking and with a wave of her hand vanished them to places unknown.

『They do come back right?』

Cael asked Aria such a thing with the casualness of enquiring about whether he could eat the last pudding from the fridge or not.

『Eventually.』

Looking at the sky again Cael noticed an interesting difference that wasn’t previously present.

『Mavros showed up.』

『Hehe~ of course, it only comes out when I do afterall.』

『That’s pretty cool.』

『Yeah, I thought the same thing; that’s why I enchanted it to do that. See all the little markings covering it in patterns, that’s the spell matrix. Normally it’s in the sky of Flux but the sorcery makes it automatically get summoned when it detects I stepped onto Pleiades proper.』

『So it’s a uselessly high tech toy.』

『Yep~ Still better then Ellie though. She just uses hers as a clock. One full moon equals one year exactly, so lame~』

Cael lightly chuckled together in time with Aria's giggles uncaring of how he might have looked to others. As the two slowly settled their laughter the pairs gazes coincidentally began to line up as well.

They had only each other in their eyes, turquoise met abyssal black and escape soon became an impossibility. Feeling this inexplicable yet undeniable force of gravity slowly, unconsciously, they both leaned in without thought.

Breaths within touching distance Aria suddenly stopped herself, a sad little smile where her uproarious grin once was placed. With a soft, heart wrenching tone she abruptly spoke her parting words.

『Bye bye Caelus.』

Before he could reply Aria was simply gone just as suddenly as she appeared, without warning, without trace. Cael still sitting on the grass merely closed his eyes consigning this moment as best he could to memory.

With a pair of yelps as his signal he opened his gaze again and saw the two cousins dishevelled state and teary eyes as they were once again joining him on the ground.