Rain had just killed a nightmare creature. She was sitting on the ground, exhausted; being a mundane person and being forced to face this kind of life-and-death situation was not something anyone should have to suffer.
Yet there she was; more or less, that is how her life had been for a couple of years.
'How long has it been? Two, three?'
It was a considerable time. It was a horror to have the life she had, but she chose this, more or less.
Rain stood up with difficulty and turned in the direction of her master, expecting some congratulations or some teasing about how he, being a Sleeper, killed some great demon when he was younger than her.
'Some nonsense or something.'
She looked at him expectantly, but nothing happened. Her master had been acting strangely lately, for a little over two months now. Occasionally, when they were hunting, he would just stare into the void and ignore what was going on around him. This annoyed her.
"Master." Rain uttered, trying to get his attention. She looked at the figure of the man staring at the horizon like a statue. Rain just sighed in annoyance.
'That bastard... I wonder if he's doing it on purpose.'
"Master!"
She raised her voice, shouting in his direction, but even then, she couldn't get his attention. He seemed to be in a trance or admiring something more interesting than paying attention to his pupil.
He frowned. At first, it only happened occasionally, but recently, he began to ignore her more often, even at times like this, where he was facing nightmare creatures. He would ignore her. Gnashing his teeth with rage, she thought of a way to make him pay attention.
His expression softened, his pupils dilated, and finally, a mischievous smile appeared on his lips.
'I know.'
Rain walked slowly in the direction of where her Master was standing. Even though she knew he wasn't paying attention to her, she walked carefully, making as little noise as possible. She stopped when she was one step away from bumping into him. She was right next to him, and even then, he wasn't able to look at her. She remembered all the times he teased her and forced her to do these torturous hunts.
'Well, I can get into mischief from time to time too.' He looked at her calm and relaxed face, but he couldn't help noticing that there was a hint of something in his eyes; it wasn't relevant right now, so he didn't think anything of it.
She and her master were of similar stature. For Rain, despite her master being a completely strange and mysterious entity, he was...
'He's disappointingly short... Am I taller than him?' She dismissed these thoughts from her head; the only thing that mattered now was that since they were about the same height, it would make it easier for her to do the next part of her plan. She took a breath of air, clenched her fists, trying to gather her courage; she wasn't afraid of the consequences, only that what she was about to do made her feel shy. But she had already made the decision to do it.
She leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek. The exchange was brief, but it was intense enough that Rain felt a surge of euphoria and a tickle in her stomach after it was done.
A goofy grin appeared on her face, along with a slight blush.
After peeling away from him, she immediately looked at his face, analyzing his reaction, watched as he blinked as if coming out of a trance, took a couple of seconds to seemingly process his surroundings, turned in Rain's direction, and looked at her dubiously.
"Rain, what was that?" Sunny asked in an uncharacteristic, almost uncanny tone.
Sunny's mind was somewhere else; he wasn't even really looking at the horizon. He just existed, so when he came out of his state, he forgot to use the personality of Rain's teacher. At that moment, even if it was small, it was Sunny, just Sunny.
He looked at his pupil beside him, and he touched his right cheek with a small trace of moisture on it.
She looked at him expectantly with eyes that showed a clear gleam in them and a slight blush.
After being stunned for a moment, he realized how he was acting and quickly began to reform his old personality.
He reeled back the relaxed smile he used to wear and said, "Oh, I see my student loves me very much. Aren't you in love with me? That would be problematic, but I wouldn't blame you. Many women have fallen under my incredible self."
Sunny scoffed at her action, but deep down, he was happy to receive this token of affection from his dear sister.
After his mockery, Rain lowered her gaze and immediately tensed up. She looked down and could see the blush growing on her cheeks. She looked down at the ground and found it more interesting than anything else in the world. Sunny's innocent question had an unexpected effect. Rain was having an internal conflict. She opened her mouth but immediately closed it, clenching her teeth.
She looked up slowly into her master's eyes. She felt very nervous but finally confessed.
"Yes i... do it"
After her confession, there was silence. Her master's face did not change. He just looked at her doubtfully and finally burst out laughing.
Sunny laughed. Rain had had these peculiar attitudes towards him for some time now. When he was near her, she always let slip a momentary hint of her feelings, but it was all a strange kind of humor to him, and he just laughed.
Lately, she always tried to get close to him, not holding his hand but his sleeve or looking at him for too long, making Sunny wonder if something was wrong with his appearance.
After Sunny's reaction, Rain's expression darkened, the smile faded, and her bright gaze faded, and she stared at her master with a complicated expression, somewhere between disappointment and exhaustion.
Sunny looked at the scene and saw the humanoid creature lying on the ground.
"Looks like you killed the nightmare creature already, didn't you? Extract its soul fragment," he ordered Rain without noticing her grim expression.
She didn't react for a moment, just stood still. Her lip trembled, and she immediately turned around, turning her back to Sunny.
'She has been in a bad mood lately. Could it be that maybe it's the time of the month? I don't think so... maybe I'm doing something wrong. I'll ask her later what's going on.'
Right now, the priority was to make Rain strong as fast as possible, and what better way to do that than to make her consume essence fragments and eventually force her awakening, and the path was in front of her.
From Sunny's hand emerged an obsidian dark knife made from shadows. He held it out to Rain, who turned her back to him.
Rain looked at it sideways, turning her face backward, turned, and took the black knife, turning around quickly and walking in the direction of the dead abomination.
Once the shard was extracted, Rain used all the strength she had and squeezed it with her hands, but it showed no signs of breaking. She was about to try again, but soon her master appeared at her side.
She turned instinctively to look at him, but he spoke in his soft, relaxed voice.
"Give me your hands."
Rain knew what was coming; they had done it many times in the past, but she still tried to do it herself.
Sunny wrapped Rain's hands in his.
Rain's heart leapt, but she held back her feelings. Her master carefully exerted pressure, and the fragment gave way to a form of energy that coursed through Rain's body.
"Thank you," she said in a voice that almost sounded like a whisper. He didn't look cheerful.
Sunny summoned a familiar glass pitcher and poured water on Rain's bloodstained hands.
She added to the gesture with a silent nod. She pulled herself together and looked around for her backpack, which appeared in the middle of her sight as a familiar figure held it out to her. She took it and proceeded to tie up the wandering humanoid creature, with the goal of dragging it to Ravenheart.
After getting the creature into a kind of sleigh tied on all sides, she turned toward her master in search of a gesture of approval to proceed.
But again, she was met with that look on the horizon. Rain clenched her fists in annoyance.
Sunny tended to stay that way lately due to a little annoyance too present to ignore.
The sojourns in which he shares affection with Aiko tend to be constant, more than they should perhaps, and as a consequence, Sunny's concentration with his other avatars is lost, leaving the avatars present half-functioning.
Rain's master clenched his fists and bit his lip, trying to calm his strong emotions from his amorous exchanges with the little woman.
The constant encounters with Aiko were bearable at first, but then for the other avatars, it was a problem to be reckoned with.
Sunny's original body thoroughly enjoyed the intimate encounters, but the incarnations only received a part of what was happening, and that part was the sensation of arousal. Sensations such as touch, warmth, and pleasure were distant. It was like a diluted phantom pain. They lived the same experience but did not feel it. It was as if the candy was taken out of their mouths just when they were suffering from hypoglycemia.
So this last time, he was somewhat frustrated in a way, forced to see but not touch.
'That hot fucker... can't he keep his damn thing in his trousers even for a day?' As Sunny cursed himself this time, he did notice the figure in front of him. With a scowl on her face and her arms crossed was Rain. He realized she was waiting for him.
"Oh, are you ready?"
She nodded her head.
"Good, let's go."
After saying that, Rain started to pull the abomination.
Sunny and her dear student used to talk frequently during the course of their hunting trips, but today was a different day. Rain didn't seem in the mood to talk, and Sunny noticed this, but didn't intervene right away. He felt it would be better to talk about it later in peace and quiet.
The silent journey lasted a couple of hours, and soon he would have to become a shadow as he got closer to the city.
He turned to look at Rain, and she had a face full of sweat and ashes. She was dragging her load with difficulty, but she didn't complain. When she realized she was being watched, Rain gasped and asked: "Master, do you have a partner?"
Sunny turned around and contrived an answer: "Partner? No, of course not. I've only been close with a few ladies, but nothing so personal as to be called my partner."
Rain looked at him as if he were admiring a head-busting complex.
"I see." Silence returned. After walking down another long stretch of road, she was only minutes away from her master disappearing, though it didn't show on her face. She was nervous that she had already made up her mind as they walked in the constant silence. She broke the silence again with a question.
"Master, do you think I look pretty?"
Sunny stopped walking. Rain asked him questions again, even though it wasn't strange for him. He turned to look at her with a smile and said: "You are a very pretty young girl for a normal human girl, that's true, but thanks to that, you attract a lot of attention! And by the way, you are forbidden to have a boyfriend! "
Rain didn't answer immediately. She stopped at Sunny's side, digesting the information. At the end, she smiled with a satisfied smile, taking courage. Her next series of moves would undoubtedly mark a before and after in their pupil-teacher relationship. Looking him in the eyes, she expressed with a naturalness unbecoming of the situation.
"I could accept it if you became my boyfriend."
Sunny, who was about to resume the journey, almost stumbled when he heard his student. Unlike the previous times, his smile faltered, and it was hard for him to keep his expression relaxed. He turned awkwardly to look at Rain. "Hey Rain, don't you have a strange sense of humor?"
Rain looked at him with a calm expression, but the glint in her eyes returned, and this time, they had a deep sense of purpose marked in them.
"Do you see me laughing?" There was no annoyance or defiance in her question, only cold resolve.
Sunny swallowed hard. He was beginning to feel really uncomfortable now. He was never completely immune to innuendo or teasing, as he took it. A hint of doubt had grown in his heart during this last stay.
'She couldn't be serious.'
"No... but did I ever tell you about the time I killed a titan with one blow?" Sunny tried to take the subject somewhere else. It was a clumsy act, but between disgust and nervousness, it was the best he could do now.
"Do you love me, master?"
Rain took a step and stood in front of Sunny.
Now Sunny's smile faded. He liked this less and less. He began to feel uncomfortable and pressured by her intimate questions, but he was forced to answer.
"Well, I... yes, I do, But-"
He was interrupted when Rain reached up and wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him in, bringing their lips together.
When Rain lunged at him and she felt the warmth and wetness of his lips, he froze. His mind short-circuited. Her lips unconsciously twitching from the strong, primal emotions contained, Rain recorded every sensation and movement in her head as she kissed him greedily.
In another part of the dream world, a man and several plates fell to the floor. In another part, a sinister silhouette in a mask fell from his throne ungracefully.
Rain enjoyed the angelic sensation as much as she could until she was interrupted by being pushed. A trickle of saliva followed the exchange. Sunny took a few steps back, visibly upset.
"Rain?!" Sunny staggered and fell to the ground in a sitting position.
He felt his heart beat like a drum and felt uneasy, even confused, his mind a jumble of emotions.
His sister just looked at him with a smile that Sunny recognized immediately. Rain's cheeks were pink, making her look even more beautiful than she was. She approached him at a slow pace until she was beside him, sat down next to him, and looked at him with hungry eyes.
"Yes?"
Sunny shivered. His mask dropped completely.
'And those eyes...' That smile and those eyes reminded him of someone in particular, Aiko. When she looked at him and smiled at him like that, it meant he was in danger, and here he was again.
In a panic, he raised his voice more than he should have.
"Why did you do that?"
Rain tilted her head to one side and replied: "I can't?."
"NO, y-you and I can't, we can't." He shouted. His hands trembled, and his mouth twitched, trying to articulate words but failing. Rain looked at her master and asked, "You said you loved me, and I love you, so what's wrong?"
Sunny began to sweat, and his limbs went numb. On the ground with Rain towering over him, he looked like prey about to be eaten.
"We can't... you're my sister," he managed to say.
Rain sighed in annoyance, closed her eyes as she frowned at him, looking at him harshly.
"That's your excuse? I don't have an older brother. If I did, I would remember him." After saying that, there was silence as they both looked into each other's eyes with different emotions in them, but they both had one thing in common, and that was that inside they were in turmoil. Rain leaned towards him, seeking to touch him and bring their lips together again.
Sunny watched this with horror and cowardly closed his eyes and gritted his teeth, giving in to the pressure, turning into a shadow, thus hiding from she.
Rain wasn't surprised when suddenly her master was no longer present, but sighed again and lay down on the dirty floor of ashes and snow.
"Well, that's something."