Third Person
Ethan got off from the horse and positioned himself above a tree's branch to see more of the fruit-bearing trees' scenery. He covered his forehead flatly, using his hand straight above his eyebrows to protect his eyes from the reflection of the sun rays. His mouth curved down in slight response to seeing that those trees were not bearing enough fruits. Plus, most of those kinds of the tree already disappeared for a long time. It only takes few lucky persons to find trees that bear fruits.
"Yahoo! It's time to eat this fresh little plant here!" Ethan spotted Vince, who was screaming in delight while holding a citrus fruit. Vince's smiled while slowly peeling off the round fruit's skin. Ethan's attention focused quickly on him, not just because Vince found a fruit, but it was his most favorite fruit as well.
"Th-that's..." He whispered to himself with his eyes wide opened as he pointed towards Vince's direction.
While Ethan looked closely at the fruit that Vince was eating, he did not notice that the branch where he stood up was about to break. Fortunately, Nover arrived with his horse from hunting fruits around the forest. The cracking sound of the branch echoed to Nover's ears. So when the wood was about to break, he quickly got off from the horse.
"Ethan! Watch out!" He shouted, giving an alarm towards Ethan's half-conscious mind. However, it was too late for Ethan to respond.
When the branch separated from the tree, he fell off towards the ground from that high elevation. Ethan screamed as he felt the rest of the tree's branches hit his back. He felt dump because of what happened to him. He should not have focused on craving for that fruit in the first place!
"Ahhhhhh!"
"Ethan!" At this time, it was not only Nover who was surprised about the situation but also Vince himself.
When Ethan's body laid on the ground, his eyes were closed. A large part of a tree's huge leaves was about to hit him, but luckily, he was able to open his eyes. He dodged away from that falling wood using his two cables situated beside each side of his leg. Even though he made no injury from what he did, he was still a beginner. He is still learning to master his specialty.
For that reason, he was unable to balance himself after he landed. His cable switched back to his weapon storage, which made more cause of his body to fall within the bushes. Once again, his body laid on the ground.
He gasped in disgust while closing his eyes deeper, greeting his teeth as he felt his back aching. "Psh." This was the only word he expressed.
"Ethan! Where are you?" Ethan heard Nover's voice from afar. When he glanced in that direction, he saw their shadows. Nover and Vince were walking close to him as they swayed off the plants that covered their way.
As soon as his two friends arrived, they immediately consulted him. "Ethan, why were you not able to notice that?" Nover asked while helping him to stand up. He grabbed his right arm while Vince grabbed the other side.
Ethan glanced at Vince. Vince's eyes startled when Ethan gave him an angry look. Why was Ethan looking at him like that? What did Vince do?
"What-" Vince's words were cut off when Ethan took off his arms from the both of them as soon as he stood up. His eyes glanced at the fruit Vince was holding for a second before looking back at him! His eyes shrunk like he was about to punch Vince in no time!
"Hey, Ethan, what are you going to do-"
"You know that fruits are my favorite, but you did not even bother to tell us when you found one!" Nover's eyes became stagnant, and he stilled when he heard Ethan shouting at Vince.
Vince stepped back and humbly waved his hands in front of him. "Eh? N-No! It's not like what you think. I-I was just hungry a-and-" Vince's voice was eager to force himself to smile to make Ethan calm. But when he gulped, he was unable to reason out more.
Surprisingly, Ethan held off his anger as he turned back while crossing his arms. "Tsk, you were afraid, huh? What a coward." He commented in a low tone, teasing voice.
Vince froze, and his expression went sly. He could not accept what Ethan said and would never be! Vince was too confident about himself! Argh!
"You-" He wanted to go after Vince, who was now walking back to his horse, but Nover blocked his way. Nover raised his arm in front of him, a chin level while facing back.
Nover did not react to their fight since he knew that it was a friendly one and does not intend to hurt anyone. Vince's shoulder calmed down as he continued to eat that orange citrus fruit he was holding all the time.
Nover sighed and looked above those towering trees.
-
"You said that your mother carried you by that time she got eaten. How come you survived? Aren't you supposed to be eaten as well?" Sophia kept asking follow-up questions towards Larch every time he answered the previous ones. Flora, Larch, and her were sitting on the grasses under the tree. The three of them were sitting beside each other, forming a triangular shape.
Larch looked down, picked a small three-leaf Trifolium repens, and looked closely at its anatomy. His memory of his mother's last breath flashed back to his mind. He was a kid back then, and now that he grew up, he still cannot move on from the trauma it made.
"Woah! That looks beautiful!~" Flora leaned closer to their squad leader to see the plant he was holding. Her eyes roamed around every part of it, and it seemed that she does not want to take off her eyes away. She was smiling, like a child looking at candy.
When Sophia felt that the topic was fading, she stretched her legs and looked around her. A blinking of her eyes made Larch noticed that he did not answer her question yet. Thus, he has this feeling that Sophia was interested to hear his story.
Larch threw that plant, which has the same size as his thumb, at his back. He paid no attention to where that plant might fall. For this reason, Flora reacted and quickly stood up to look after the leaf.
"Hey! You should have given that to me! Agh!"
When Flora went off, Larch blew air in silence. His eyelids covered half of his eyes while Sophia was still glancing at the surroundings. Sophia might be mad? But, for sure, she understands.
"I apologize for not answering your curiosity." He started.
Sophia looked at him with her furrowed forehead. "Huh? Why are you sorry?"
Larch's head lifted, and his eyes met hers. Sophia's reaction surprised him. He thought Sophia was forcing him to answer all the time, knowing that he had been giving her the information she asked for lately.
"You don't have to share it if you feel uncomfortable," Sophia added. As a squad leader, this gave him more idea about what kind of member he will be dealing with.
"Hm." He agreed, nodding his head once.
Sophia looked at him for a couple of seconds. After which, she switched her sight at the scene she saw behind her squad leader's back. Her eyebrows curved and almost met at the center when she spotted Flora running around the area where flowers of different kinds grew. This girl really enjoyed playing at the flower fields, hm?
"Flora, be careful to where you are stepping!" Sophia reminded her after she noticed that she nonchalantly spread her arms in the air, looked up above her, without paying attention to where her foot brings her.
Flora did not give any response, instead, she continued touching those flowers and smell their fragrance. Even though, Sophia knew that her message reached Flora's ears. Then she looked back to Larch, who was now eating an Apple fruit. Sophia wasn't expecting to see food from Larch since she did not see that she was bringing one. Once again, curiosity hits her.
"Where did you get that Apple? I haven't seen you bringing any food, huh?"
Larch chews the food in his mouth first before he responded. "I did. I placed it at my side pouch when I sat down. Maybe you did not notice it. Anyway," Larch set aside the leftover especially the Apple seed. Sophia has a feeling that he was about to say something about her question a while ago.
"You need to be careful every time we go within these woods. It is hard to identify if a tree is a monster or not. We are lucky if we will only encounter one anito."
"Huh? What's the difference between fighting with one anito? We are still going to die by the size itself!"
"It matters. One monster tree can only eat one person."
Sophia stilled after he received such information. Now she knew another thing that she must keep in mind. She was not expecting that there are seems to be a lot of things everyone, aside from her, must know.
Anito is the term used for tree monsters evading Pag-asa for the past seventeen thousand years, as what Sophia could remember during their orientation.
"Wh-what? Does this mean that in every person that is born, a new anito will grow?" Sophia asked and her eyes became more alive, hunger for more knowledge.
"Yes."
Sophia did not say any word. She shut her mouth and processed the information Larch spilled to her. She does not know whether she will be believing in him or not. Besides, it made her overthink the possibility that each of them has a destined, fixed death because they will be eaten by an anito. On her world before, where she grew up, there are no such things as anito and the concept of one monster tree rise for every one child that is born.
Does this include her previous place? Does this involve Layvanna? Does their capital place Prisila affected by such belief?
Sophia spoke once again, but at this time, her voice was kind of crack. On the other hand, Larch seemed unaffected by how Sophia reacted. Maybe he already knew about it, especially if Hanaele told her about where did she come from.
"I-I have a question," She began, "Is a fetus a human being, and does it have the legal right to live?"
Larch, who was wiping his sword that has a length of about one-hundred and fifty centimeters with a pointed edge, paused for a while before he carefully placed the weapon above his knees. The size of his word is about the length of his waist down to his foot.
"As long as the person has full consciousness of a human being, and is adaptive to change, then that person is alive. Therefore, he or she lives."