Requiem for a Goodbye Read online

  “I’m sorry for the inconvenience. We can decide on the rest of the details at the house. I’m going to head back now... Would you like to stay here a little longer?” Yuba asked out of consideration for Rio.

  “Yes, please.”

  “Do you know the way back?”

  “I’ll be fine.”

  “Oh? Then make sure you come back before the sun sets. We’ll host a welcome party for you, though it will be a small one.” With that, Yuba turned on her heel and left.

  “Thank you for your hospitality,” Rio said, bowing deeply toward Yuba’s retreating back. Once Yuba’s figure had disappeared from view, he raised his head to the stone pillars.

  “...I guess that means I’ll be staying at your place for a while, dad. It still hasn’t quite sunk in that I have relatives other than the two of you, though...” Rio muttered toward the pillars, a trace of bewilderment in the smile that pulled at his lips. Of course, there was no response.

  After a while, he turned around to look at the village. He spent another hour or so on the hill in sombre silence, before making his way back to the village chief’s house just before the sun set.

  “Excuse me,” Rio said as he hesitantly walked through the open front door. There, Yuba was waiting along with Ruri, who had finished her work.

  “Welcome back,” they said.

  “...Thank you.” Rio was taken aback, but he managed to shyly return their greeting.

  Then, just as Yuba had said, they held a small welcome party together.

  Chapter 1: Life in the Village

  The next morning...

  The day started early for the village. Rio woke up before sunrise and made his way to the living room of the chief’s house.

  “Good morning.”

  “Oh my, you’re quite the early riser there. Good morning,” Yuba replied with widened eyes. She was already awake, sitting on a cushion in the living room after lighting the fireplace.

  “I was thinking of helping out the villagers today with any tasks they might have. But first, could I help you make breakfast in any way?”

  “Is that so? If you’re offering, then you’re more than welcome to do so. I look forward to it.”

  And so, Rio and Yuba spoke for a while. Until...

  “Mrrgh... Good morning, Granny...”

  Ruri appeared in the living room, half-asleep and still wearing the underwear she had slept in. It was a slightly scandalous appearance for a girl of her age to be wearing before the opposite sex. Hidden beneath her underwear were limbs that emphasized her feminine softness, and plump breasts that accentuated her upper body.

  “Good morning... Have you forgotten about Rio here, by any chance?” Yuba said with stifled laughter.

  “...Huh? A-Ah!”

  Ruri finally realized that Rio was right there. She hurriedly looked down at herself, then blushed as red as a ripe apple. Rio avoided eye contact, but she took that to mean he had caught a glimpse of her unladylike form.

  “I-I’m going to change!” Ruri covered her body with both her hands and ran back to her room.

  Rio gave a tired sigh. He had encountered similar situations numerous times before, back when he lived with Latifa in the spirit folk village. Fortunately, it didn’t seem like Ruri had the personality to irrationally get mad at him for it, but they would probably be awkward around each other for a little longer.

  Sure enough, when Ruri returned from her room several moments later, she watched Rio from the corner of her eye.

  Ah, well. I guess there’s no helping that...

  Ruri was his older cousin, so Rio could honestly say that no strange feelings had risen from that. But that wasn’t the case when it came to Ruri’s point of view, because she didn’t know Rio was her younger cousin.

  “So, are you any good at cooking, Rio? You offered to help with breakfast.” Yuba smiled cheerily.

  “Y-Yes, please leave it to me.” Rio nodded with an embarrassed look.

  “Then, let’s have you make breakfast today and see how it goes. Ruri, go with Rio to trade for breakfast ingredients and introduce him to everyone. Have the village girls get used to seeing his face around here.”

  “Eh? O-Oh, okay. ...Let’s go, Rio.” Ruri hesitated for a moment, before giving an uncomfortable nod. She still seemed to be feeling humiliated about her foolishness earlier.

  “Oh, and tell Sayo to come to the house with Shin. We’ll be having breakfast here,” Yuba requested.

  “Yes, ma’am...” Ruri answered dully before leaving through the front door with Rio.

  Their first destination was the kitchen garden behind the village chief’s home. Unlike the fields that were managed by the village, the kitchen gardens were owned by each individual house.

  “Our village operates primarily on bartering and trading. The first thing we do every morning is harvest the vegetables grown in our kitchen garden. Then, we bring them to the village square and trade them with the vegetables grown by other families. That makes up the ingredients for a day’s worth of meals,” Ruri explained as they gathered the vegetables grown in the village chief’s garden. Once they were done harvesting them, they headed toward the village square.

  The square was already filled with young women from the village chatting noisily with each other. They ranged from their mid-teens to late twenties in age.

  “Morning, everyone!” Ruri greeted them energetically, moving to join a circle of the girls.

  “Oh, Ruri. Good mor—” The girls noticed Ruri and cheerfully made to return her greeting, when they noticed the unfamiliar boy behind her and froze on the spot. Before she knew it, Ruri was getting questioning gazes from all the girls.

  “Erm, this is Rio. He’s the son of one of Granny’s old acquaintances and has been traveling around the world. That’s why his clothes look a little strange. He’ll be staying at our place for a while, so I wanted to introduce him to everyone... Go on, Rio.” Ruri carefully watched the reactions of the other girls as she timidly introduced him. She then prompted him to step forward.

  “Please allow me to introduce myself. My name is Rio. I have yet to acclimatize myself to life here, so I hope you can find it in your hearts to forgive any inconveniences I may cause in the future. It is a pleasure to meet you all.” Rio adopted a friendly smile as he gave his well-mannered greeting.

  “Uhm... It’s nice to meet you too,” the girls replied, mildly embarrassed.

  “Hey, Rio. There’s no need to use such formal language with us. Everyone gets nervous when a boy like you acts that way,” Ruri advised with a wry smile.

  “Ah... I’m afraid I’m more accustomed to this form of speech. I will do my best to adjust accordingly,” Rio replied with a smile similar to Ruri’s.

  The women of the village watched their exchange closely; they seemed to be feeling rather bashful in Rio’s presence. However, they all shot implicitly questioning looks in Ruri’s direction — looks that said it wasn’t fair for her to be the only one close to him.

  The only men that the village girls had in their social circles were rough and rowdy, making Rio’s gentle and calm demeanor like a breath of fresh air. His handsome yet androgynous face only accentuated his allure even more.

  Haha... They’re definitely going to try to pry more out of me about Rio during work later.

  Ruri smiled bitterly to herself; she could feel the silent pressure coming from the girls. She glanced at Rio to see him standing somewhat uncomfortably on the receiving end of all the girls’ shy scrutiny. He shifted his gaze toward Ruri, seeking help with a troubled expression. Ruri was taken aback by the unintentional eye contact, her body shaking with a flinch.

  ...Hmph. He didn’t even care about how I felt before.

  Ruri recalled how Rio had seen her immodest morning attire earlier and pouted her lips as she blushed. She knew that it had mostly been her own fault, though. It was obvious that taking it out on Rio here wouldn’t make the situation any better. She had mixed feelings about the storm of questio
ns the girls would surely bombard her with later... but she just wanted to head home for now.

  And so, she decided to rescue Rio.

  “Come on, now, let’s get these ingredients traded already. It’s almost time for work!” Ruri snappily wrapped up the conversation and began to move around, trading for vegetables.

  The girls all looked like they wanted to talk to Rio, but they couldn’t find the right timing to do so. Ruri took that as a blessing and swiftly piled the vegetables into her basket. Once she had gathered all the ones that she needed, she turned to address Rio, who happened to be the one carrying the basket.

  “Okay, all done. Let’s go, Rio.” She pushed his back to prompt him to move.

  “Ah, that’s right! Sayo!” Ruri turned back, remembering one last thing.

  “...Huh?” Sayo was among the girls silently staring at Rio. Her body trembled with a start when her name was called, and she looked up in question.

  “Granny wants you to come to our house with Shin. We’re gonna have breakfast together,” Ruri explained briefly.

  “Eh... Ah, okay. Got it.” Sayo nodded timidly.

  “You’ll find out what she wants when we meet, I guess. See you soon!” With those parting words, Ruri hurriedly left again. Rio gave a small bow to the slightly confused village girls and trailed after her.

  ◇◇◇

  After the events at the village square, Rio returned to the village chief’s house and began to prepare breakfast. The village was low on dried meat and seasoning, particularly salt, so he dipped into the reserves of his Time-Space Cache to supplement his recipe. After all, there were enough ingredients and spices stored inside to last several years.

  However, he hid the existence of the Time-Space Cache, as it was too troublesome to explain. He simply removed enough supplies to seem as though he’d retrieved them from his backpack instead. It was still a fairly large amount of meat and seasonings, though — enough to make Yuba happy.

  “This is wonderful. Dried meat is a luxury around here, and we have very few opportunities to buy salt, so there’s never enough. Are you sure it’s all right, though? This many ingredients wouldn’t have been cheap, no?” Yuba asked hesitantly.

  “I don’t mind,” Rio replied, shaking his head gently. “There’s no point in letting it go to waste, so please accept it as rent for my stay. I’m going to make breakfast with this now... Enough to serve five people, is that right?”

  “Yes, Sayo and Shin will be coming later. Thank you. Ruri, go stand with him and watch.” Yuba saw them off as Rio and Ruri went to kitchen together.

  Since they were going to be living together from now on, they needed to find out how good Rio’s cooking skills were. He would prepare the food alone, and Ruri would act as his judge.

  “The firewood’s already been prepared — I’ll show you where later. All the kitchen tools and tableware are in that cupboard. If there’s anything else you need to know, feel free to ask.”

  “Okay. What should I do about water? I can generate it with spirit arts if needed.”

  “Ah, you can use the water in that jug there. Either Granny or I will use spirit arts to refill it once a day, but I guess you can use spirit arts too?” Ruri asked with raised eyebrows. Spirit arts were more commonplace than sorcery and magic in the Yagumo region, but the number of users there was fairly small.

  “...Yes. So, you two can use it too...” Rio’s eyes widened a little in surprise.

  “Yeah. Our family line has always had a really high aptitude for spirit arts, despite the fact that we’re commoners. That’s part of the reason why Granny’s the village chief. Other than me, Sayo and her older brother Shin also have the ability to use spirit arts, so we’ve all been learning together since we were young.”

  “I see... So that’s how it is.” Rio nodded in understanding.

  When compared to elves, dwarves, werebeasts, and other spirit folk, humans generally had a low aptitude for using spirit arts. However, very rarely, someone with a high aptitude for using it was born. This meant that his father, Zen, could probably use spirit arts too, Rio mused to himself. It would have been nearly impossible for his father to make the harsh journey between the Yagumo and Strahl regions without them.

  Rio found that information fascinating, but he couldn’t afford to let his goal fall to the back of his mind.

  After using spirit arts to light the firewood in the kitchen furnace, he began to cook. The menu included rice, miso soup, meat, and a vegetable stir fry, along with the pickled vegetables Yuba had already made.

  Incidentally, there were many seasonings available in Yagumo that were reminiscent of Asian foods on Earth — including both soy sauce and miso — which made it easy for Rio to recreate the taste of Japanese food. Rio had come across all kinds of ingredients and condiments during his time in the spirit folk village, but being able to collect those he hadn’t seen before in the Yagumo region made him feel a keen sense of satisfaction.

  “...Hmph. I guess you’re pretty good, Rio,” Ruri muttered absently as she watched Rio prepare the ingredients with an experienced hand.

  “Thank you very much. I have to be able to do this much, since I travel alone.” Rio shook his head bashfully.

  “No, no, this isn’t just some average level of skill. Your knife-handling is even better than mine.” Ruri gave a slightly conflicted smile. The two of them continued to chat idly and opened up to each other, bit by bit. Less than an hour later, they’d finished cooking all of the food.

  “Look, Granny. Rio made us a delicious-smelling breakfast!” With a cheerful grin, Ruri carried the completed dishes into the living room and served them on the table.

  “Oh? This certainly looks nice. It seems we’ll have no problem leaving Rio on cooking duty.” Yuba broke into a surprised smile at the sight of the dishes lining the table.

  “Umm, excuse me.”

  A cute feminine voice could be heard from the entrance, where the door was left wide open. There stood Sayo and a boy standing behind her; he was around Rio’s age.

  “Ah, Sayo. Welcome. Come in, come in. You too, Shin.” Ruri waved the two of them inside with a smile.

  “O-Okay. P-Please excuse the intrusion.” Sayo gave a polite bow and timidly stepped through the doorway.

  “Yeah, excuse us.” Shin followed after her.

  “Good of you two to make it — you’re just in time for breakfast. Come on up.” Yuba summoned the two of them closer as Ruri returned to the kitchen.

  “Thanks, Gran, for feeding us breakfast.” Shin thanked Yuba and lowered himself onto a cushion by the fireplace.

  “Thank you for the meal, Lady Yuba.” Sayo sat down too and bowed her head. However, she seemed rather nervous as her eyes glanced around the room. That was when Rio came out of the kitchen, carrying more dishes.

  “Good morning, Sayo.”

  “G-G-Good morning, Sir Rio. Is there anything I may be able to help you with?” Sayo asked nervously, offering to help.

  “...No, it’s fine. We just finished serving it all. All that’s left to do is eat.” Rio gave pause at how Sayo had addressed him, then put on a smile and shook his head. In the meantime, Shin was curiously watching Sayo’s peculiar behavior.

  “Rio, Ruri, you two come sit down too,” Yuba ordered. Both Rio and Ruri took their seats.

  Everyone settled down in a horseshoe shape around the table, with Yuba sitting at the center. Ruri and Sayo sat at her sides, while Rio and Shin sat beside them. Sayo gave a polite bow to Rio, who sat diagonally opposite her, making Shin shoot a suspicious glare between them.

  “This is Rio and Shin’s first time meeting, yes? Shin, this boy is named Rio. He’s the son of an old acquaintance of mine. He’ll be staying in our house for a while. Rio, that’s Sayo’s brother, Shin.”

  An indescribable mood threatened to settle in the room, but Yuba ignored it as she casually introduced Rio and Shin to each other.

  “My name is Rio. It’s nice to meet you.” Rio pasted on a s
ociable smile and bowed at Shin, who sat directly opposite him.

  “...Right. You too,” Shin replied rather bluntly, seemingly wary of him. Sayo, who sat beside him, looked like she had something to say.

  “All right, Rio went through all the trouble of making this meal, so let’s eat it before it gets cold. We can talk more after,” Yuba suggested. Then, as their gazes gathered on the plates in the middle of the table...

  “Hey, Gran... This stir fry has meat in it. Isn’t that a bit fancy for breakfast? Did you pocket some extra for yourself because you’re the chief? How sneaky!” Shin’s eyes immediately locked on to the pieces of meat in the vegetable stir fry.

  Meat was a luxury that couldn’t be eaten in the village very often. They kept cattle, but not for consumption — the cattle in the village were valued for their labor, and were used for things like transporting goods and plowing the fields. The only occasions where they could eat cattle meat was when the work cattle were disposed of from injury or old age, or when the distribution of hunting spoils came around to each family.

  “There’s no need to panic. I haven’t been sneaky — this is meat that Rio brought with him,” Yuba explained with a wry smile.

  “Oh, so that’s what it is. Well, as long as I can eat meat, I don’t care. ...Hey, this is good!” No sooner had he heard the explanation, Shin was shoving the stir fry into his mouth and complimenting the taste with rounded eyes. He gulped down some rice while the flavor of the stir fry was still in his mouth.

  “Mind your table manners, Shin,” Sayo warned.

  “Never mind that — you try it too. It’s so good. Ooh, this miso soup is great too!” Shin didn’t seem to care at all about Sayo’s warning as he dug into the meal with vigor.

  “Geez...”

  Sayo pouted her lips unhappily, but the moment she tried the stir fry her eyebrows rose in shock at the taste. “It’s delicious!”

  “Right?” Shin said with a smug nod.

  “The miso soup is delicious too. D-Did you really make all of this yourself, Sir Rio?” Sayo asked with a hint of envy.