Chapter 3 - Crisis
"What name..?" The child asks herself.
As the young child stood with a question about her name, she lowered her glance at the people fortunate enough to receive a name from her.
The great pleasure as visible as it can be is on everyone's faces. Whilst a big broad smile is formed, they carry on repeating their names, seemingly mesmerized by its sound.
And once the young child witnessed it all happen, she wasn't at all crestfallen at the idea of her being nameless.
Despite such a tender-hearted thought, the feeling of being called something is still indescribable to the young child. No matter how much she tries to hide it, she desperately wants to experience the moment these people beside her were having.
'A name..' The young child ponders.
"I like it!"
All of a sudden, a voice appeared to startle the young child while she was deep within her thoughts in search of a suitable name for herself.
This voice belongs to Thanatos, the one who is standing in front of Nemesis and is fixing his glance on the young child. Baffled, the child felt Thanatos' recognition resonating through his gaze.
'He likes it..?' The young child muses with disbelief. '..Does he really?'
Earlier, even though the child had seen how exhilarated these children were, the doubts within her were still lurking inside her.
Do they really desire the names she gave them? How much do these three like their names? Are they afraid to show dislike because those names came out of a murderer's mouth?
'Right… I'm a murderer.' The young child thought with hatred towards herself.
As though one can tell from the young child's expression and what's going on inside her head, Hypnos comes forward and holds onto the child's hands, startling the latter quite a bit.
"Thank you."
At that very moment, Hypnos, who is speaking with a gentle and gratifying voice, echoes loudly through the child's ears. Not only that, the sudden smile on Hypnos' face prompted the child to shift her glance to somewhere else out of shyness.
When the child's perspective moves over to the back, though, she gazes at Nemesis, who is nodding to Hypnos' claims. It's as vivid as the day when Nemesis' blissful expression permeated into the young child's head to forever remember this scene.
Whilst looking at Nemesis, the child spotted Thanatos who was grinning merrily toward her way. To the former, the latter looked rather silly with his expression which brought a smile to the young child's face.
This feeling of appreciation from these three people was immensely tremendous, and such a sensation.. was beyond any words the young child could define.
It may have brought a shred of a tear to the young child's eyes if she hadn't let her gaze wander off toward a certain distance. And with only a glimpse, the sheer cold of a chill raced all over her frail body as she was frozen in place with a bewildered and pale expression.
As though the wholesome moment cannot last forever; as though her chill is signaling the beginning of a recollection of the past, the young child's legs proceed to run toward her front where her chill originated.
"Stop!" Screamed the young child.
For her to make haste while ignoring her newfound friends, just who and what might it be for the child to be in such a hurry? The answer lies ahead when the young child reaches out her hand to grip a certain someone's arm.
"What the—"
"Victor, listen to me! You shouldn't eat that!"
"Why can't I?! Let go of me!"
Having a dispute right in front of them, Hypnos, Thanatos, and Nemesis look at the situation ahead whilst having a ponder as to why the young child is behaving like that.
During all of this, Hypnos wanted to prevent the dispute from escalating, which led to his decision to separate the young child from the murderer, Victor.
"...!" Hypnos hesitated.
Despite that, when Hypnos is close to uttering the young child's name, it's during this moment that he finally becomes aware of a crucial truth.
'I don't know her name..' Hypnos was dazed at the thought.
"I said let go!" Victor shouts before tossing away the young child's frail hands whilst a bruise on her ankle emerges after a fall.
Yet, Victor continued, regardless of his actions.
"Dammit! If you wanted the mushrooms for yourself, you could have said so! No need to touch me!"
"No. No, I don't want to eat it and neither will you, Victor!"
Dumbstruck by the child's bold claim even as she was thrown onto a tree, Victor scoffed at her words before casting aside the mushroom he was holding.
A mushroom that placed him in this situation isn't worthwhile being eaten in his opinion. And thus, Victor went ahead and extended his hand toward the mushrooms that were encircling a tree.
"Hey, are you okay?"
Hypnos stretched out his hand, expecting the young child who was on the earthy ground to grab hold of his kind gesture.
"Thank you."
When her gratitude was being laid out, her hand was put to a halt after Hypnos uttered a question to her.
"Why did you have to do that?"
Hypnos' hand toward her front as his concerned glance sent a signal to the young child. Even while her assumption of the meaning behind those eyes was thought to be true to her understanding…
She spoke. "I did it to save Victor."
A slight pause emerges before Hypnos begins to say. "That wasn't what I meant…"
Considered to be as clear as a crystal, the young child's understanding is shattered by the sight of confusion forming in Hypnos' reaction. As if to prove her understanding of Hypnos' gaze was wrong, the child was reminded of his question which had no mention of Victor in it.
"O-Oh.."
Puzzlement was written all over Hypnos' face when her cognizance turned out to be incorrect. This is the moment where a sudden rush of flustering red painted the child's face with embarrassment from her faulty lack of understanding.
"I'm asking you why you're involving yourself with him."
"I just.."
Within a mere second, the unprompted shock hurrying through her head displayed a wide-eyed child who was too speechless to speak.
Nevertheless, a second is only a second when the young child shifts her focus toward Victor, where she discovers him plucking out a mushroom with a keen expression to devour it whole once more.
"I said stop!" The child yells.
Victor exclaims. "What is it with you trying to stop me from enjoying my food!?!"
"That's a death cap!"
Once the words left her mouth, the young child felt a sense of bewilderment at her own words.
Information of unfamiliarity unfolded with her voice, yet she couldn't fathom how she obtained this knowledge of a mere mushroom and was confident enough of what Victor held in his hand.
'Now's not the time for this.' The young child forces herself to believe so.
Even with those words appearing before her head, they only served as a distraction to evade those foreign riddles of hers. Above all, the child knows deeply well what she has spoken yet chooses to be oblivious to it.
'...Later.' The young child tells herself, exhaling after a deep breath.
"Victor, hear me out."
At that moment when the child's words were heard, Victor spared a short glare toward her before switching to a gaze of nonchalance, as if he assumed no one would notice his hostile nature.
"If that gets you to stop bothering me, then do explain before I change my mind."
The seething irritation imbued into Victor's voice unfurls through each of his words, becoming quite evident to the ones who hear him. No amount of obscurity can mask away his lack of control over his emotions.
'Bastard.' Thanatos curses inwardly.
'...He's really unpleasant.'
The young child muses with a concealed glare toward the one who committed the murder. It's only natural for a boy who can't keep a lid on his emotions to be able to strike a life of sinfulness.
'..But.. I did help him..'
A flash of memory where the crimson liquid on the child's hand remains self-evident inside her head. Permanently straining her world in bloody red as the depth of the wooden stick sunk deeper into a human's flesh, it's a sensation that continues to be a reality oh so cruel for the child.
It was in her line of sight as if to taunt her of a never-ending torment of a trauma. A constant memory…
"Tell him quickly."
Hypnos's hurriedness to end the conversation between the young child and Victor was written all over his face. His reaction causes the child to accept her bloody memory as right now, but it won't last long until she recalls it again soon.
'..Right, it's best to let the future me think about this… I should do what I can for everyone here.'
"As a way to atone for my sins." The young child mumbles under her breath.
In no time, the child lays her eyes upon Victor, who still has his hands on the mushrooms, forever eager to eat. Not even his growling stomach could hide away his dagger-like stare toward the young child.
"Well? Spit it out already. Can't you see I'm hungry!?" Victor exclaims.
"If you're eager to die this early, then go ahead and eat those mushrooms. It won't matter to us when your life will end here."
"W-What? Huh? Dang you, did you just—"
"The mushrooms you're holding are death caps. They're known to be poisonous to humans, even a nibble can lead to death."
"A nibble?!!"
Like a scared kid believing in ghost stories, Victor immediately drops the mushrooms to the ground, stomping them as if he was enraged by the idea of a plant that could lead him to his death's door.
"Why didn't you tell me earlier?!!"
"..."
Hearing a question about senselessness was something the young child didn't expect from Victor, and it would have caused her to have a disgruntled expression if it weren't for her survival of staying alive in front of a murderer.
'There's no merit in aggravating this type of person.' The child thought.
"Come on, uh hm.." Hypnos calls out to the young child before remembering her lack of a name.
"..?"
"Say, what's your na—"
—ROAAARRRRR!!!
"Guys! Watch out!"
On the spur of the moment, the voice of none other than Thanatos caught the attention of everyone with his full-throated bawl. For all of his blaring voice, it was effortlessly deafened by the sound of a ferocious roar!
In the blink of an eye, the sheer strength fueling the thunderous roar engrossed everyone's attention, tainting the children's faces with trepidation while the roar bore a hole into their ears.
"It's a monster!?" Victor screamed in fright.
"What's it doing here?!" Hypnos exclaims, turning his gaze over to the young child before grabbing her hand to help her up immediately.
As if Hypnos' first thought was not of fear, but of desperation to assist the child, he lends a hand to the child without fright. Even so, the dismay of the situation stained a trembling dread into his hand.
At first, the child was on the floor after being tossed aside by Victor, yet now, she was standing in front of a ferocious beast. And to the young child's surprise, her hand that held onto Hypnos' hand, felt the unmasked fear within him.
Quiver and quiver it went, the young child perceived it all, not even her tremble could outmatch his terrified self. But it's no surprise for the younglings to be frightened by a feral beast.
"Run!!"
Right after his shout, Victor gets a headstart in escaping, leaving behind everyone to fend for themselves. Thanatos, who was hoping for a rescue, had no idea such a thing would occur right in front of him. And thus, his glance that caught wind of Victor's escape, turned narrowed as he glared in the direction where Victor left.
'I was scared of a guy like that…'
Earlier, Thanatos used to be afraid of Victor because the latter was the champ in defeating a slave guard bigger in size than him. Since Thanatos' first true impression of Victor was the scene of a murderous crime, he was naturally drawn to being fearful of the murderer who created that said crime.
"That bastard!! He called himself Victor despite not being the victor of killing this monster!"
In the end, Thanatos' hidden frustration can be heard by everyone, including the face-to-face encounter with the feral beast.
"Thanatos! Look out!!" Hypnos' desperate voice reaches Thanatos too late.
The moment Thanatos loses his focus, he now finds himself in front of the beast that is nearly steps away from putting an end to this young boy's life.
A beast of a monstrous size was standing there, glancing at its prey with its merciless eyes! Thanatos felt an unfathomable terror that couldn't be outmatched by anything!
Trembling with fear in his arms and legs, Thanatos had no idea what he'd do to save himself from this situation! It was horrifyingly—
"T-Thanatos…!"
In the spur of the moment, Thanatos soon realizes the young girl behind him is shaking even greater than him. This girl, Nemesis, is tightly grabbing onto his hand and the pain is getting to Thanatos.
It was obvious.
The constant droplets of tears on the dirt while the pale Nemesis is quivering like a rabbit in front of a wolf, she is filled with trepidation as a single glimpse of her becomes a pitiful sight for anyone to see.
"..H-Help..!" Nemesis's stuttering voice sounded incredibly dreadful that it brought hopelessness to the situation.
"What.. can we.. do?" Thanatos utters helplessly before turning his eyes toward the young child and Hypnos, speaking through his eyes to ask them for help.