Comics, daily stories

Nomiyama watched as the golden sun gradually descended, finally leaving behind orange clouds.

He saw liveliness in those stained eyes.

A noise came from the courtyard gate.

Snow fell, and snowy evening. Instead of sitting, he jumped off the edge of the walkway and walked toward the courtyard gate.

Nomiyama's eyes widened slightly as he looked in that direction.

Could it be that the variable is actually this moment?

Despite thinking this, he didn't follow, but watched silently.

A while later, he watched as she walked back, looking slightly angry, carrying a food box.

The food box has three layers; it's neither too big nor too small.

She didn't go inside, but instead sat back down on her favorite edge of the aisle and turned to open the food box.

The first layer is a plate of fish, two fish, one large and one small.

The second layer is a small plate of bok choy, fresh and lightly oiled, but very tempting.

The third layer is white rice, served in a large enough bowl.

Snow fell late at night. He took the large bowl full of rice, picked up a large steamed fish, and placed it on top of the rice.

She glanced at her sister, who was merely watching without making any move, then looked away and began to swallow large gulps of food.

Nomiyama glanced at Yuko, who seemed to have no objection, and then looked at her as she ate heartily.

She ate with great satisfaction, a satisfaction evident in her actions: taking large bites of fish, spitting out bones, pouring fish sauce over them, chewing vigorously with her mouth full, and making crunching noises as she chewed the vegetables.

She ate so earnestly yet without any manners, so greedily.

Nomiyama's eyes softened unconsciously.

Actually, it's not easy to eat to this extent.

He didn't understand why he needed to eat before, and just numbly roasted chicken on the mountain. Later, he understood that people need to eat, but his first meal in this world was just two small pufferfish. Then he went to the hospital for an IV drip and didn't eat for a day and a night.

Later on, he always wanted to eat rice, but only Eriri brought him food from home. Most of the time, he would buy instant noodles, or bread and milk. He didn't want to eat the heated bento boxes from convenience stores because they were unpalatable. He couldn't keep going to stores because he needed to save money. He also couldn't cook for himself because no one taught him.

Later, he learned to cook and realized that he actually had enough money to spend, but his craving for food remained. He hated being hungry, as it made him feel that his life was terrible and that he couldn't even satisfy his appetite. He liked the feeling of being full, which gradually made him feel that life was wonderful, with his stomach full and no need to worry about being hungry.

Yes, don't worry about going hungry.

Nomiyama watched her rummage through her food for a while, then pushed the leftovers to her younger sister, burped, and resumed her mechanical state of watching the wall.

Almost instinctively, he reached out and touched the grain of rice stuck to the corner of her mouth.

It passed right through.

Nomiyama looked at his hands for a while, then glanced at Yuko, who was also shoveling rice into her mouth, before sitting down and starting to space out.

It wasn't a very lavish meal; it was just one fish per person, with the big fish only the size of a palm and the small fish the size of two fingers.

Compared to the lavish meals that followed, this kind of food is really nothing to talk about.

As the sun set and evening approached, Xuexia Xuewan stood up, took the bowl with a little rice left from her sister's hand, reorganized the food box, and carried it towards the courtyard gate.

After that, she didn't look at her younger sister who was standing in the yard not knowing what to do, and went straight into the house.

So Yuko followed him inside.

The house was small, with one empty room and one bedroom.

Nomiyama watched her lie down on the bed, quietly cover herself with the blanket and close her eyes.

His gaze shifted to Yuko. Her eyes darted around, and finally she walked over, opened the wooden cabinet, pulled out a blanket, dragged it to the side, and lay down.

The reason she was dragging her feet was because her hands were too small to lift the blanket.

Nomiyama watched the two sisters fall asleep, then watched the world darken.

Their first meeting was truly their first meeting; they barely exchanged a few words, and the older sister even acted domineeringly, snatching food from the other.

Darkness fades, and daylight arrives.

Nomiyama watched her get up, then ignored his still-sleeping sister, walked out of the room, went to the spot from yesterday, sat down, and looked at the wall.

He sat down next to her, guessing that she was waiting for breakfast.

After a while, Yuko came out of the house and sat down a little further away from her, and they both looked at the wall.

A little while later, a noise came from the courtyard gate.

Snow fell late at night, and I got up and went over there.

Nomiyama watched quietly and noticed that what she brought back was not breakfast, but two new booklets.

He didn't go over, but sat and waited.

Sure enough, she sat down, tossed another booklet to Yuko, and then took out a rather strange feather and began to scribble on the booklet.

Looking out from Nomiyama, the first thing that appears is an arithmetic problem, and then...

Who are you? [Snow falls, snow falls at night]

How old? [Eleven years old]

Who are they? [A member of the Yukinoshita family]

boring.

Thinking this to himself, he looked up at Yuko, who was answering with her head down to the side.

On her end, it was probably a similar situation, with the same blunt questions being asked repeatedly, and the same predetermined answers being given since childhood.

He stopped looking and instead, mimicking her, looked at the wall.

Perhaps it's not that the wall has any significance, but it seems there's nothing else to do, and staring at the sky in a daze would be too jarring.

At noon, Nomiyama watched her go to the gate of the courtyard to pick up the food box, which still contained two steamed fish of different sizes, and a dish of green vegetables.

She was still the first to eat, and she ate with great satisfaction and gusto.

Yuko remained waiting on the side for her leftovers.

In the afternoon, Yuko probably felt a little bored, so she went to a corner of the yard.

Nomiyama could sense the movement outside the wall; someone had turned their gaze toward Yuko.

Yuko Yukinoshita didn't do anything strange. She just squatted in the corner of the yard, picking up stones that were almost everywhere and bumping them around.

He seems to be still young, with a childlike heart.

The woman arrived at that moment. She glanced at Yukinoshita Yuuko, who was holding two stones in the corner, then looked away and continued to look at Yukinoshita Yukihana, who was sitting in the aisle.

Have you finished your homework today?

After receiving confirmation from both of them, she picked up two booklets in the hallway and began to read them.

"As expected of the daughter of the Yukinoshita family." She closed the booklet and smiled.

This wasn't said to Yuko, but to that snowy evening when nothing had happened all day.

She handed the booklet back, reached out, and placed her hand on the little head again: "Xuewan, do you still remember what you are?"

Nomiyama listened to the question, which was exactly the same as yesterday's, and didn't react.

The answer was exactly the same as yesterday: "It's a medicine, a medicine that can bring happiness to the people of our tribe..."

......

Time passes in this routine.

There was no breakfast, and lunch and dinner were the same. In the afternoon, that woman would come over to look at the booklet and then say, "As expected of the daughter of the Yukinoshita family." Yuko increasingly enjoyed playing with stones in the yard, while Yukinoshita Yuki still preferred to sit motionless on the edge of the walkway, looking at the wall.

Nomiyama watched these unchanging scenes unfold, the sun and moon turning, spring coming and autumn going, spring coming and autumn going again.

He first encountered these memories in autumn. That year, Xueyan was eleven years old. Two more autumns passed, and she was thirteen.

The sisters' relationship remains very bad.

Perhaps it was because Yuko had grown up by two years and was starting to feel annoyed by this silent relationship under the same roof, and wanted to break the deadlock.

So that winter, with her frostbitten, red fingers tightly clutching a favorite stone, she breathed out the white mist that billowed in the cold air and said, "Sister, this is for you."

Snow fell silently as his listless eyes moved to her face.

Looking at the two sisters, Nomiyama could even sense that the person who had been monitoring them from outside the wall was beginning to feel anticipation.

What are you expecting? Are you expecting her to accept the gift?

He knew that as soon as she accepted the gift, the news would reach that woman's ears immediately.

Is this something she would allow?

Nomiyama asked himself this question in his heart.

"it is good."

Xuexia spoke late at night. She nodded, then took the stone and put it in her bosom.

Yuko Yukinoshita visibly relaxed, turned around, and went back to playing with her stones in the yard.

Nomiyama also sensed that the people outside the wall had breathed a sigh of relief. He was too lazy to pay any more attention and just looked at her.

A soft, shimmering light flowed around her, a very subtle fluctuation that went unnoticed by the surveillance personnel on the other side of the wall.

Because it wasn't powerful to begin with; it was a cultivation method she had only comprehended last night. If Nomiyama hadn't been observing her closely, he wouldn't have even been able to detect the aura that had begun to appear on her body.

It wasn't something she learned by stealing; rather, she figured it out herself by feeling the abundant energy flowing through the family every day, day after day, and it was so subtle that no one had noticed anything unusual.

It is currently very weak, so weak that it poses no threat whatsoever.

Having begun the cultivation journey, when exactly will the moment change everything, the moment that twists the thread of fate?

Nomiyama withdrew his gaze and sat quietly beside her, watching Yuko play with the stones and wait.

That woman will come, very soon.

A short while later, just as he expected, the courtyard gate was pushed open, and the woman in the sky-blue kimono walked into the courtyard in the cold wind. Her arrival seemed to deepen the cold of winter.

Without the slightest hesitation, she strode forward and then paused, meeting the gaze of the now-grown girl sitting in the aisle.

She paused for a moment, then asked, "Have you finished your homework?"

Xuexia Xuewan had a blank expression. She reached out and handed over two booklets beside her.

The woman opened the booklet and began to read.

She quickly closed the booklet and handed it back to the girl.

A gentle yet indifferent smile appeared on her face. She slowly raised her hand and asked the question she asked every day: "Xuewan, do you still remember what you are?"

Xue Wan lowered her head, seemingly waiting for that hand to touch her head: "It's a medicine..."

"Sizzle... sizzle..."

Strange noises were heard.

Nomiyama's pupils contracted sharply as he looked at Yukinoshita Yukihana, who was waving her hand beside him.

Those two hissing sounds were the sound of stones slicing through a person's throat and neck, causing blood to gush out.

The world began to turn red, and even the originally bright moon seemed to have turned into a blood moon.

Nomiyama stared blankly as a spray of blood splattered towards her, watching her eyes turn as bright as blood.

It turns out, it's now, right now, without any warning.

Snow fell late at night, and she jumped down the steps, looking down at her mother who was covering her neck with her hands.

She let go, and the sharp stone, unable to withstand the force of the air, shattered into pieces.

Reaching out, she slowly drew the long knife from the woman's waist, her eyes filled with vibrant pleasure.

A smile began to appear on that expressionless face, and he said to the woman what he hadn't said earlier that day.

"As expected of the daughter of the Yukinoshita family."

The 305th Fate is what you have to do.

"Heh...heh..."