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“Let’s start cutting back on food gathering, okay?”
“Eehhh…”

After praising Sufi for coming back in the afternoon with yet another mountain of forest greens, I finally broached the subject. When I’d told her to regulate herself, I hadn’t meant to expand the search radius! Monsters and even Magic Beasts could show up out there. I really didn’t want her doing anything dangerous.

“We’re completely swamped with processing, and I can’t even keep up with the poison checks anymore.”
“Mmhh… okay.”

Sufi always listened when it was her little sister asking. If I explained my reasons properly, she understood.

“For now, please help us with butchering and processing.”
“Okaaay… but, why do you speak like that?”

After relaying the “orders,” I let out a breath. Something about my serious tone must have tickled her, because Sufi giggled and started squishing my cheeks.

“But really, did I gather that much?”
“Yeah, it’s way too much.”
“More than her?”
“…Probably?”
“I knew it!”

You couldn’t exactly compare animal protein to plants, but my vague answer seemed to satisfy her.

“Then I’ll help with the butchering too.”
“Yeah, that’ll be a huge help.”

With Sufi in a much better mood, I brought her along toward the storage room where we did the processing. If we could get through what we already had, food wouldn’t be a problem for a while. In the meantime, I wanted to focus on improving our base.

Just as we stepped out of the small room assigned to us, Filia and Noche came out as well. Noche’s lips were curled in a smug little smile, her tail swaying lazily—clearly in good spirits.

Filia, on the other hand, looked relieved as she gave me a small nod. It seemed like the talk on Noche’s side had gone well too.

We almost passed each other, but instead both pairs stopped to face one another… Noche’s gaze sliding toward me, Sufi’s toward Filia.

*…Uh oh. I’ve got a bad feeling about this.*

“Well, looks like I maaay have gone a tiny bit overboard, nya. I’ll ease up from now on, nya.”
“Sufi worked a little too hard too. Sorry, Filia.”

Was this… synchronicity? Their words overlapped, and the moment each realized it, they squared off again, sparks flying.

“Sufi’s the one who worked too hard.”
“*I’M* the one who worked too hard, nya.”

Filia’s rabbit ears, which had been standing tall a moment ago, wilted pitifully, the light fading from her eyes. I laid my own ears back and sighed deeply.

“Sufi worked harder!”
“I worked harder, nya!!”

*Why is it that both of you working hard can’t be good enough…?*

At least, fortunately, both of them understood the situation, so food gathering had been put on hold for now. But the rivalry itself… that looked like it was going to drag on a while longer.

*If only they could just get along, that really would be the best outcome…*

■■■

*…I’ve always hated the rain.*

“The worst, nya…”

The next day, after the two rivals joined in and the dismantling was finished at terrifying speed, we had everything ready to dry. And of course, that’s when the sky opened up in a heavy downpour. It wasn’t supposed to be the rainy season, but the weather had been unstable lately. My tail fur kinked from the damp, and my mood sank right along with it.

“Not being able to dry it is rough.”
“Guess that means we’ll just have to eat it all, nya…”

It was fine that gathering and hunting had to stop, but losing the ability to preserve food hurt.

“Anything that won’t keep, let’s just cook or roast it.”

Other than the things we’d already managed to dry, we’d put heat through everything—even the stuff still in the middle of processing. That way it should last at least a day at room temperature.

We split up and got a fire going near the entrance. Good thing we’d gathered dry branches yesterday.

Vegetables, mushrooms, and meat were skewered on sticks, roasted thoroughly, then wrapped in leaves once cooked. Beastkin with carnivorous traits could handle eating raw meat, but in these circumstances, if anyone got sick, there’d be no way to recover—so safety first.

The veggie-and-mushroom skewers were for Filia. Lepician apparently didn’t like meat much, and too much of it would upset their stomachs. Their digestion was basically built for herbivory, so they were omnivores with a heavy tilt toward plants.

Felician were omnivores tilted toward meat. They could still eat vegetables, but they preferred meat overall.

Wolfen like us, though, were nearly full carnivores. Too many vegetables and their stomachs couldn’t handle it; even some things like leeks were impossible for certain individuals.

I remembered once, when a relative of Grandpa’s had come by, he’d grinned while offering to “help” wash me down, and I refused. At that time, he’d mixed an onion-like vegetable into the soup I was making.

The man was in his thirties, married with children, but after learning luxury off the money he wrung out of my uncle, he’d abandoned his fields. Thinking back on it now, everything about him was awful.

Sufi, with her sharp nose, had sensed something and refused to eat the soup. But me, without such a nose, ate it—and paid dearly.

I woke in the night dizzy, my stomach in agony. In the dim light, I saw the urine I passed was bright red, and my legs gave out. Sufi screamed in panic, and things became a mess.

If Grandpa hadn’t known medicine, I’d have been in real danger. He was furious, cut off the man’s support, and in retaliation that b̲a̲s̲t̲a̲r̲d̲ sicced his son on us and harassed us relentlessly. After Grandpa’s death, he was the first to storm in, planning to sell us to slavers.

He locked us in the barn, stripped off our clothes with a sneer—“Beasts like you don’t need fine garments”—leering as he tossed rags at us. Remembering it even now makes my blood boil.

“Haaah…”

Come to think of it, it rained the day Grandpa died, and the day we were thrown out.

Really, nothing good ever happens on rainy days. To chase away the gloom, I moved my hands faster.

“Mmm.”
“Come here.”
“?”

Once I paused for a breath, Sufi—having just finished her own task—suddenly hugged me tight and pressed her cheek against mine. She’d gotten a little thinner, but her cheek was still soft.

“Sufi?”
“Alice doesn’t like the rain, right?”

She patted my head, soothing me like a child.

…And suddenly, I remembered Captain from my past life, roughing up my hair with the same gesture. Grandpa had rarely patted me like that, so the memory hit me with an odd sense of nostalgia.

Bad things always happened on rainy days. The same could be said even in my past life.

After I was old enough to remember, my clearest memories were standing alone, soaked by cold rain, listening endlessly to the sound of it falling.

Later, when I shut myself away indoors, it was cramped, sure—but there had been plenty of entertainment, and more importantly, no rain ever reached me. It had been comfortable.

“I hope it clears up soon.”
“…Yeah.”

The air was cool from the drizzle, but Sufi’s cheek against mine was warm.

If, back then, I’d had someone at my side like this—maybe I wouldn’t have grown to hate the rain. That pointless thought drifted up.

But in the sound of rain striking down around us, there didn’t seem to be any answer.