Chapter 354: Decisions have consequences, intended or otherwise
“Hey guys, I’m back,” Zhen Liu greeted as he returned from his unspeakable activities. He wasn’t ashamed of abusing the fact that he had an instant army on tap, he was ashamed of this world’s medieval toilets.
“Welcome back Xiao Liu,” Zhen Yue greeted.
“Sup,” Zhen Hai added.
“Did y’all determine where we should drink and I answer all of your burning questions yet?,” Zhen Liu asked with genuine curiosity. He might have used this moment to distract his cousins, but he figured it was light enough that it wouldn’t be an issue.
“Well, sorta,” Zhen Yue answered, “We managed to whittle the choices down between Hammerhead and Prawn-”
“After seeing a man straight up die of drink at the Sea Dragon,” Zhen Hai interjected.
“Right, but the group was decidedly split about which bar to go to, so…”
“Rock, paper, scissors! Dammit!”
“Rock, paper, scissors! Dammit!”
As of this moment, Zhen Xing, Zhen Guo, Zhen Feng and Zhen Tai we’re in the middle of a game of 2v2, rock paper scissors.
“Huh…how long have they been-.”
“Since you left to use the restroom, so about…five minutes?”
“Straight?”
“Yup.”
“Wow.”
“Rock, paper, scissors! Dammit!”
“Rock, paper, scissors! Dammit!”
Zhen Liu suppressed the urge to comment “deja vu” as he watched his cousins play endless rounds of rock paper scissors, just allowing this moment to play out.
‘Worst comes to worst, I did find one that I think works to meet our needs…but while they’re doing that…’
However, just because he was watching his cousins play, didn’t mean Zhen Liu wasn’t busy.
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‘Alright, Logos, Pathos, how are the kaijin doing?’
=Cleanly too. No bodies to worry about here.=
‘That’s go-wait…did Nepherage finally eat somebody?’
<=No.=>
‘Oh thank the gods.’
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“Eep! Jasper!”
“It’s okay Janice! I’ll protect you.”
‘D’www, that’s adorable,’ Hurricroak thought to herself as she watched the protective behavior of the boy over the girl.
She looked at the two children with a nostalgic look in her eyes, remembering another lifetime…that or an anime she watched with Pathos in her downtime.
Aware that looming over them might be considered intimidating, Hurricroak proceeded to squat down to meet the two kids at eye level.
“Hey there, little guys~ No need to be afraid of little ole me~.,” Hurricroak greeted them in a surprisingly soft almost melodic voice, a bit of a contrast to her rather colorful clothes.
“Huh?”
The beggar children were confused by Hurricroak’s voice, they were used to being told to shut up and go in a significantly more aggressive tone.
“Would you mind~ Telling this big sister, just what are your names and how much you heard?~”
“My name is Janice~,” the little girl suddenly sang.
“My name is Jasper ~,” the boy followed up in a equally melodious voice.
“We didn’t hear a thing~.”
“We swear~.”
“Wait, what?!”
The children looked at each other in shock as they appeared to sing along with Hurricroak in perfect tune, despite not having been taught how to even hold such a thing.
“That’s good to hear~,” Hurricroak sang with a smile on her face, “and you promise that with all your heart?~”
“We promise, big sis~”
“In that case~ A reward for your honesty~.”
“Huh?~”
Compelled by the singing, the two beggar children presented their hands, palm side up towards Hurricroak, who then proceeded to fill both of their palms with multiple silver coins.
Their eyes went wide as they saw the shining coins being added to their empty hands bit by bit. This was the most money either of them had touched in their lifetimes.
“Now then, Jasper and Janice~ Since you said you didn’t see a thing, promise you won’t tell anyone what you saw~ Agreed?”
“Agreed.”
“Good, now run along.~”
“Okay~”
With her performance now done, Hurricroak stood back up and returned to her companions’ side, as for the beggar children, they left towards the street and proceeded to run in a random direction. From what Hurricroak recalled, they were running towards the direction where all the food stalls were at.
‘Good, they have their priorities in order,’ Hurricroak mused as she watched the children run off from behind her shoulder. Once they were out of sight, she refocused to her companions, who were looking at her funny.
“What art was that?,” Nepherage asked.
“Oh that? Just a little trick I learned, makes the whole world sing to your tune if necessary,” Hurricroak answered nonchalantly, “Now then, mi amigos, shall we get a move on?”
“I…yeah, let’s go,” Nepherage agreed despite looking as if she had something to say about Hurricroak’s actions. ‘Noble for sure but was the singing necessary?’, she wondered as she took the lead leaving the alleyway and into the streets.
“Pretty…song…let’s…go…,” Frosttusk nodded before following suit.
Razor Maiden and Spring Brawler didn’t have anything extra to add, so they merely nodded and moved along with the flow, namely exiting too.
“Now then, if I just remember that signature correctly…that way, come along guys.”
And so, with their secret still secured, the kaijin proceeded to make their way through Pearl Tusk Harbor to where Donovan Wolfe and his posse was hiding out, however, things for them wouldn’t be going exactly as they planned…
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“This is so good!,” Janice exclaimed while tearing into a roasted fish on a stick. She had to pause every now and then to blow it cold, but she didn’t care. This was the tastiest thing they had eaten in a long, long time.
“Slow down, Janice. The fish isn’t going anywhere,” Jasper lightly chided his friend in-between bites of his own fish, “I mean, it’s already dead.”
“But this is the first meal we had in months that wasn’t spoiled or cold!,” Janice retorted, “I want to enjoy it at it’s fullest!”
“Fair enough…you got some fish meat stuck on your cheek.”
“Huh? Oh! Thanks, big bro!”
“No problem.”
Janice and Jasper weren’t actually siblings, but they had been together long enough to consider each other as such.
As far as their memories went, they only had about three that were important to the both of them.
The first was arriving at the orphanage where they would meet and become unofficial siblings. Jasper had been abandoned at the orphanage first, with Janice being left there a bit after him.
The second was their plan to leave the orphanage together. They had realized that the orphanage they were at was a terrible, terrible place and that it would be better to be a runaway than spend another day there…or risk being given to the men in blue masks.
The third, and certainly not least memory: their escape.
It took a lot of luck, a couple of coincidences and a storm, but the two of them managed to escape the orphanage and make their way to Pearl Tusk Harbor. It was a long journey, but it was worth it…sort of.
While they no longer had to worry about men in blue masks and possibly poisoned food, they now had to contend with other homeless vagabonds with more obvious intentions and no food on a daily basis.
Evidently, this was why they were so befuddled by that bronze-skinned lady’s behavior.
It was the most genuine kindness they had seen in years, well, two years and five months, but who was counting?
“Hey Jasper, do you think we’ll see that weird older sister again?”
“Maybe,” Jasper answered after a hint of hesitation, “…I kinda hope we do. She was nice, albeit, a bit intimidating.”
“Yup!”
As Jasper and Janice continued to enjoy their roasted fish, looks of contentment appearing on their faces, they failed to realize that had they caught the attention of yet another group of adults, albeit, those with less…pure intentions.
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“Man, I’ve never seen a beggar orphan sing like that before…think Miss Venus will pay extra if we can show it to her?”
“Oh, no doubts about that. Talented little tykes always fetch a better price. Don’t you remember that little girl from before? The nomadic one who knew how to dance? I heard the guy who brought her in got at least triple the asking price.”
“And this time we got two little ones that can sing, so…we can get nine times the price?!”
“No dumbass, singing is only twice at most, so we’d only get double for both separately, not combined.”
“Oh, boo…”
“It’s not too bad. At least this time around, we can get our hands on a nice…capturing bonus, we don’t have to report about.”
“What do you-oh yeah…damn, if that girl didn’t have so much company with her, we could have gotten an even bigger payout.”
“It’s whatever man, opportunities are like the tide. It comes, it goes, but it’ll eventually go in a direction you want.”
“Uhh…what?’
“Okay fine, I’ll make it more literal for you, just because we couldn’t capture that girl now, doesn’t mean we’ll be stuck capturing kids forever. Eventually we’ll get to the point where we can do both. Understand?”
“…yes.”
“You don’t understand.”
“…no.”
“Bah, let’s just go do our jobs already.”
