"Akira!"
It wasn't just her. I was concerned for Akira as well.
Gena sat by his unconscious body. She pushed the heavy gun away. At least she tried. But to no avail. The gun was way too big for her, yet so lightweight for me.
I lifted the gun from his hand and tossed It to the side. No wonder. His hand was squished, but the murky jungle soil hollowed out to accommodate his hand, sculpting around his hand. There was no injury.
"Oh my God..." Gena said. I rolled my eyes at the mention of that entity.
"He's fine." I assured, I had to. Before she took the name of that entity again.
Akira was bleeding through his nose.
"Give him some time. He'd spring back up like a monkey. We halt here for the eve." I said, watching the sun set.
An hour passed by. Gena was preparing a fire to get themselves through the night. I needed no such thing, obviously.
All of a sudden, Akira's body sprung up to sit, just like I said he would.
"AHHHHHHHHHH!"
The poor girl got scared! Imagine a corpse waking up from the dead. Except, this corpse was alive and breathing. Barely.
"AHHHHHH"
"AAaAaAaAhHHhhH!"
"AHHHHHHHHHH!"
I rested on my blade, gleaming at them happily,
"Ah...reminds me of home. The screams~"
I recollected Hell. The place where sinners screamed as their souls were dissolved in hot lava. Mostly, it was demon excreta in that lava too. I'd call it a natural process of life. No one's really offended by that, right?
Humans have done worse things that float in...
Well. That wasn't an appetizing detail.
Their screaming contest subsided after two rounds of rematch.
I was sure the whole forest was alerted of our presence because of these two. It was amusing~
Especially since more Shifters would be attracted.
"Y-You are alive!?"
"You thought I was DEAD!? DO YOU WANT ME GONE SO BADLY!?" Akira screamed back at her.
It wasn't rage. Just concern.
"Well...I...uff...!" Gena stood up to circle around the fire. She was pacing to calm herself down. Why do humans do that?
"If you just gave me the gun sooner..." Akira said after a moment of silence.
"I didn't know, Akira. I didn't know! You were being such a dick and I thought you wouldn't...aim. I thought you'd fail." She confessed. Akira's gaze grew indifferent.
"Gena...do you not trust me? That was the weapon my ancestors have been using. Since a century! It's one of a kind and you think...I wouldn't honor it?" He said, hurt that one of his most trusted friend...didn't trust him.
"It's not like that, Akira—"
"What is it like then? Is it because I'm just a scrawny nobody? That I don't have any muscle on me which makes me weak? Tell me why, Gena. Why don't you trust me when all I wanted to do was protect you!?"
Gena...stood stunned.
"Don't follow me." The man, pretty hurt, stood up and walked away with a wet blotch of mud on his back.
Gena couldn't follow him. Her ego was too big to apologize just yet.
I stood up and changed my mind. I was going to follow Akira and maybe help him calm down. He probably made his path to the lake we saw a few minutes away from campsite by foot.
"It's too soon to judge a person. But it's not too late to apologise for it, Gena." I said, patting her shoulder. And then, I made my way to Akira.
Few minutes of following him, I could hear him grumbling to himself. Even with the distance between us.
At last, he reached the base of the lake's bank and grunted. His shoulders shook, as if he was irritated by something on his back. It was clearly the mud that dried up and stuck to his skin. It was irritable.
He turned around, signalling me to give him privacy. He stripped out of his clothes, and entered the lake.
I went to the rink of the lake where his clothes were and brought them to the surface.
"No. Don't do things for me unless I ask you to." He said. Admittedly, his tone was rude.
"You shouldn't take your anger out on the wrong people. Not on people at all, if you ask me." I said, washing the dirt away from his clothes.
His eyes shined against the moonlight.
"Why...? Why does everyone think I'm some weak, scrawny pig who's good for nothing? Like I'm a loser?" He said, touching his thin arms. I could see tears of frustration roll out of his eyes.
"Akira," I smirked, looking at my hands scrubbing the dirt away, "Dare anyone say you're weak and scrawny after what you just did today. That was criminally cool. You cool ninja."