HA3 5.5 – Midnight Hum
In casual tone Hide started a story in faraway kingdom. It was about a belief that sleeping cat could help you having a solemn evening pray. The story started with a wise priest who led royal shrine in the capital city. This priest was so wise that the king would ask for his advice in regular basis.
One day, the king gave the wise priest a chubby cat named Chubbymaru as a present. The wise priest loved Chubbymaru so much and treated this chubby cat as his friend. However, every time he led Saturday evening pray, Chubbymaru would make ruckus inside the praying hall. He would wildly running around while kept meowing.
And so, every time he led Saturday evening pray, the wise priest would drug Chubbymaru into a sleep, and then put him on a pillow next to him as he led the evening pray.
One day the dullest student among the wise priest’s students asked him, “Teacher, why do you drug Chubbymaru and put him on the pillow next to you every time you lead Saturday evening pray?”
“Can’t you see it?” The wise priest replied. “It’s to ensure we have solemn and undisturbed pray.”
“Ah… I see,” The dullest student happily replied as if he just received the greatest enlightenment since the dawn of mankind. “Teacher, you are truly wise. This student has learned a lesson worth of a whole life study from you.”
A year later, the wise priest passed away. Without the wise priest leading the Saturday evening pray, Chubbymaru lost interest to running around and meowing inside the praying hall. However, the dullest student managed to convince some senior students that it was very important to drug Chubbymaru and put him on the pillow next to the new priest who led the pray.
The new priest didn’t really get it why he should sat next to a sleeping chubby cat when he led the pray, but he didn’t bother to ask. He thought he should respect the tradition from previous priest and avoid negative sentiment from his disciples while solidifying his position. It was being started by the wisest priest in the country after all.
A few months later, Chubbymaru got enough of the drugging routine and escaped the shrine. To maintain the tradition from his predecessor and gained respect, the new priest bought another cat that looked like Chubbymaru and gave him the role as sleeping cat in the pillow.
Ten years later, with the guidance from the new priest, the dullest student published sacred guidance on how to have a proper sleeping cat in a pillow to ensure you have solemn evening pray. After the king was being told that it was a legacy from the wisest priest, he immediately issued a decree that every priest in the country to adopt it without exception.
As the result, thousands of cats including kittens became the victims of this new regulation. Some even died from over drugged, and this regulation last for a few centuries before the kingdom finally met with its demise.
“And the moral of the story, believer can be so careless and cause unnecessary misery in colossal level.” Hide taking a glance at Aizawa as he gently ended the story. “Do you get it?”
Aizawa lightly nodded. “We shouldn’t believe people who put cat into misery. They are bad people.”
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
After a smiled Hide said, “Yeah, hurting animal is bad.”
It was easy to tell that Aizawa didn’t get the main message from his story, but Hide took it lightly. Aizawa was only six-year-old kid after all. Hide fully realized that it was him, who should pick a story with simper message.
“Aizawa, always remember this,” Hide said after a moment of silence. “Belief or faith is not bad, but it will be super bad to force it on other people. Believer who try to turn other people to become like them are no different than cancer cell, just avoid such people.”
“Mhm,” Aizawa firmly replied.
“As for the offer to play piano for Saint Marry, it is absolutely fine if you want to do it,” Hide calmly said. “Big Bro will talk it to Kaede Sensei. Daddy already asks Big Bro to handle every matter related to you, so let’s not bother him unless we have no other option.”
“Okay.”
“Big Bro will also accompany you when you go to Saint Marry.”
“Mhm.”
“Well, for now let’s sleep.”
Without delay, Hide and Aizawa laid down their body and used the rucksack as their pillow.
“Do you want Big Bro to sing a lullaby for you?” Hide happily asked.
“No, Big Bro is deaf tone. You can’t sing,” Aizawa calmly rejected Hide’s offer.
“How do you know Big Bro is deaf tone?” Hide curiously asked.
“Every time we do the dish together, Big Bro will lightly humming a song from Beatles, but it’s very weird because Big Bro is deaf tone.”
“Okay. Understood,” Hide replied as for the first time in his second life he took a super-duper serious internal damage.
However, as he could tightly hugged Aizawa, he recovered from the damage in an instant. A moment later, Aizawa already fell asleep even though the rainstorm was still at its peak. Shortly after, Hide also fell asleep and he had a big happy smile in his face
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Midnight, Aizawa slowly opened her eyes and she instantly got a chill on her nape as soon as she found everything around her was dark. Then, she remembered that she was in the middle of camping with Hide.
Aizawa immediately turned her gaze to Hide and took a deep breath full of relief after she found Hide was peacefully sleeping next to her. After looking at Hide’s happy sleeping face for a moment, Aizawa checked her surroundings.
El Hola was still wet, and some broken branches scattered on its surface, but it had no puddle water. The hanger was also still stood firmly in its place. Previously, Aizawa saw that it seemed the fierce wind would blow it up to unknown, but turned out the hanger was stronger than she thought.
‘Big Bro truly knows how to camp,’ Aizawa muttered as she recalled her camping experience with Hide so far.
Now, she also realized that when they hike the trail to El Hola, Hide could find the trail with ease even before they used flashlight to illuminate the path. All the way to El Hola, Hide also always managed to prevent her from falling to her knee every time she had a slip of feet.
When Hide suddenly took out a machete from the side bag in his rucksack, it also surprised her to the core. This was the first time she saw his big brother held a machete, and he looked like Jason from the horror movie somehow.
Then, his big brother gave her another surprise when with ease he climbed an Oak tree to cut some fresh branches. After that, everything was fun until the rainstorm poured down. But now, the super-duper scary rainstorm had gone and everything was fine as his big brother said.
After looking at Hide’s peaceful face one more time, Aizawa looked up to the night sky. The moon was in full bloom, along with countless blinking stars that filled the night sky to the brim. This was the first time she witnessed such beautiful night sky and it made her in awe.
A moment later, Aizawa heard a faint hum in the air. It was gentle and otherworldly beautiful, and triggered her curiosity. Without delay, Aizawa exited the sleeping bag and wore her rubber sandal. Cold night wind made her body slightly shivering, but curiosity had strengthened her resolved.
By stepping on the flat stone she previously used to sit, Aizawa managed to poke her head out of El Hola. She then scanned her surroundings. The moonlight and starlight had illuminated the surrounding area, so she could clearly saw everything to some extent, but for some reason she couldn’t figure out from which direction the hum came from.
After pondering for a moment, Aizawa also hummed in same tone and rhyme, and surprisingly the hum in the air responded. Now, the hum was sounded like a duet from two people who sat next to each other. It made Aizawa very happy, and as she was deep immersed in her hum a shadow soundlessly approached her feet from behind.
“Aizawa.”
“Awawawawa!!!”
Aizawa was startled to the core as suddenly someone called her from behind. She recognized the voice. It was Hide’s voice. Even so, she couldn’t help but had a tense expression as she turned around to check it.
“Big Bro…” Aizawa weakly said as she found the one who called her was truly Hide.
“You shouldn’t leave the sleeping bag without telling Big Bro.”
“Mhm,” Aizawa obediently nodded.
“Well, let’s go back to sleep.”
“Mhm.”
After checking the surrounding area one more time, Aizawa followed Hide went back to the sleeping bag. The gentle and beautiful humming had stopped, so maybe the person who hummed it already left.
A moment later, Aizawa already fall asleep one more time. This time, Hide didn’t let her to sleep next to him. He put her on his upper chest, letting her to use his shoulder as a pillow, while one of his arm was on her back.
*****