Chapter 12: Moma’s Leaf

Waking with a start early in the morning, Moma realized Leupen—who should have been right before his eyes—had vanished, and he scrambled to his feet. But perhaps he’d moved in his sleep, because a soft blanket was wrapped tightly around him.

“H-He’s gone.”

He turned his head this way and that searching for Leupen, but today, too, Leupen had hidden himself away. Grunting as he untangled the blanket wrapped around him, Moma saw the sky beginning to brighten and hurried out of the room.

As Moma scurried out of Leupen’s bedroom, the inappropriate gazes of several servants clung to him. Unaware of this even in his dreams, Moma busily made his way to the adjoining room.

“If I bring the towel, Leupen will come out.”

It was the fastest way Moma could think of to see Leupen. If he brought the towel to the bedroom in the morning, Leupen would emerge from the bathroom.

“I’m worried about him being alone.”

In the end, even last night Moma had failed to discover what Leupen liked. But he could tell what Leupen disliked. The thought that Leupen might be agonizing alone in loneliness quickened Moma’s steps.

From that day on, Moma visited Leupen’s bedroom every night so he wouldn’t be lonely. Of course, approaching Leupen while he was awake was still frightening, so he snuck into his bedroom secretly each day.

At night he guarded his side, and during the day he kept his distance, lightly assisting Eden in attending to Leupen. The more he watched Leupen, the more the conviction settled within Moma that Leupen was not a bad human.

“Leupen has nothing.”

Sometimes the servants would encounter Leupen in the hallway. At those times, they all hung their heads low and trembled. Their figures were filled with fear, but on their hidden faces, a vivid disgust lay thick.

Even though he was the master of the domain that protected them and gave them a place to stay, no one was on the side of the “cursed” Leupen.

Moma recalled Leupen, who couldn’t relax even at night and looked troubled even after falling asleep. He worried about Leupen, who must have been protecting the domain while receiving such gazes.

Unaware of the problems bearing down on himself, Moma was watching Leupen with worried eyes.

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The warning sign of trouble appeared on an early morning like any other, when Moma woke alone in Leupen’s bedroom.

Spring was nowhere near—outside the window, the height of winter was in full swing, with white snow flurrying. But atop Moma’s broken tree horns, a small sprout had budded.

About to casually sweep back his messy hair, Moma was startled by the sprout his hand touched and bolted upright. The tiny sprout, budding with a pop, was well hidden among his hair, invisible unless one looked closely.

But Moma, anxious that someone might have seen it, covered his head and looked around the empty room. At least it wasn’t the tree horns that had grown—that was a relief.

A sprout appearing was a good sign, but for Moma, currently hiding among humans, it wasn’t entirely a good thing. He had neither the courage to endure that pain and cut off his tree horns again, nor could he wait for them to grow enough to break off—he’d surely be caught first.

Even though he’d simply plucked the sprout with a pluck and hidden it away, his hand kept going to his head with unease.

‘Has it…… grown a little?‘

Perhaps he’d grown sensitive because of the sprout. The tree horns, which had been cleanly broken off and hadn’t been much of a bother, seemed to assert a small presence. Though anxious, he carefully tucked away the plucked sprout.

‘It’s something useful. I’ll hide it well.‘

Because he’d spent time checking the sprout, he left Leupen’s bedroom later than usual. Worried Leupen might catch a cold from not drying off, Moma trotted down the now-brightened hallway.

“It’s definitely…… right…….”

Usually, when Moma went to the adjoining room to fetch the towel, he never ran into other servants. It was too early for the other servants to start work, except in the kitchen.

But today, perhaps because he’d left the bedroom a little late, other servants had visited the adjoining room first. Facing other humans alone was still difficult for Moma.

“G-Good…….”

He wanted to say good morning, but the gazes reaching him weren’t kind. The servants, who had been whispering among themselves, glanced at him, then widened the distance and disappeared far off.

“What is everyone whispering about?”

At that moment, along with a hearty voice, someone draped an arm over Moma’s shoulder.

“Hello? Nice to see you like this.”

At the unfamiliar human’s appearance, Moma visibly stiffened. But the man paid no mind to Moma’s state and, without removing the arm around his shoulder, kept talking.

“You’re that rumored man…… no, that one, aren’t you?”

Trailing off mid-sentence, the man grinned and patted Moma’s shoulder with a thump, thump. His gaze swept over Moma.

“More than I thought…….”

Moma found it hard to follow what was happening. What on earth was the rumor, and was this man really smiling at him right now? His head spun trying to figure it out.

‘Man……? Manly? Is there a rumor that Moma is manly?‘

Moma was lost in thought, speculating this way and that about what the man had been about to say. But that thought soon had to be set aside because of the man boldly approaching him.

“I’m called Dale, but what should I call you? How did you end up here?”

No human he’d met so far had approached him like this. Eden was the closest, but he’d never encountered such a forward human.

Unable to hide his bewilderment, Moma backed away while dutifully introducing himself.

“M-Moma, here for the towel.”

“A towel? I heard you’re the duke’s dedicated attendant—guess it was true?”

Dale, tall with quite a striking appearance, smiled and personally placed the towel in Moma’s hands. Even at his refreshing smile, Moma’s guard wouldn’t easily loosen.

“Th-Thank you. Moma is busy.”

“Hmm…… I see. Next time, I’d like to talk more leisurely.”

Leaving Dale, who waved his hand fluttering, behind, Moma dashed out of the adjoining room. Dale himself was a little uncomfortable, but the fact that a human had greeted him so warmly made Moma’s face gradually brighten.

“It’s thanks to Leupen and Eden. Moma isn’t useless anymore.”

He wanted to hurry to Leupen and boast about this. Though Moma froze up whenever he actually faced Leupen, he always had many things to say inside. Someday, he wanted to talk and laugh with Leupen.

Arriving at Leupen’s bedroom with light footsteps, Moma threw the door wide open. By now, delivering the morning towel was something Moma could do alone. Fortunately, he didn’t seem to be late—Leupen wasn’t yet visible.

“Not late.”

He’d steadily prepared a gift for Leupen every morning. Nothing had succeeded yet, but Moma prepared gifts diligently, thinking at least one of them might please Leupen.

Though they were nothing more than a feather from the pillow, half of a delicious piece of bread from yesterday’s meal, or a small pretty ribbon picked up from the adjoining room floor.

“I couldn’t bring a gift today……. What do I do?”

Because of Dale, whom he’d met unexpectedly in the adjoining room, he hadn’t prepared a gift. After deliberating for a moment, Moma, as if having made up his mind, tightly grasped and pulled out something he’d carefully kept in his bosom.

Meanwhile, Leupen’s bath was taking longer than usual.

Around this time, he should have felt Moma’s presence in the room, but today it was a little late. Suddenly realizing he was paying attention to Moma, Leupen rubbed his face with complicated feelings and was about to leave the bathroom. But at the hurried presence of Moma that soon reached him, he stopped short at the bathroom door.

He stood quietly listening to the bustling sounds of Moma moving about. Water was dripping from him, but Leupen didn’t mind.

Only after the noise in the bedroom had completely ceased did Leupen open the door to the bedroom. He walked toward Moma, who visibly stiffened the moment he saw him. It was strange that Moma, clearly afraid of him, didn’t run away to the end—and it kept drawing his attention.

When he took the towel, Moma’s gaze kept darting elsewhere. It was a familiar thing. No matter how uninterested Leupen was in others, it was hard not to know what Moma’s behavior meant. Moma, too, felt the fear everyone directed at him.

But perhaps it bothered him that Moma also did things hard to explain by fear alone.

Every morning, Moma kept picking up strange trash. He couldn’t understand why on earth Moma brought trash to him and discarded it, but Moma’s very existence was hard for him to understand, so he paid it little mind.

But today, he couldn’t help but pay attention. He looked at the bed Moma kept glancing at. On the loosely made bed, Moma’s trash lay again today.

And that was something that, here—no, something that couldn’t exist. Bathed in the morning sunlight streaming through the window, it looked not just green but almost fresh and verdant.

Leupen picked up the fresh green leaf lying softly on the pure white bed, as if to say, look at this. At the sensation of the vivid leaf that wouldn’t crumble even when he applied pressure, Leupen’s gaze naturally turned to Moma.

Moma, flustered and fidgeting, flinched as if his own body were being crushed at the sight of the crumpled leaf. Then he sullenly looked at Leupen’s fist and let his shoulders droop.

Moma hadn’t left this mansion for days. And even if he had, there was nothing around but an endless snowfield. So there was no explaining how a leaf soaked with moisture could be here.

‘Who has he been in contact with?‘

But even if he’d been in contact with someone, questions remained.

The only ones who had come and gone from the mansion these past few days were himself and the letters that flew in via messengers. Even if a leaf had been sent inside a letter, it would have frozen long ago on the way here.

A small curiosity arose, but there was no emotion beyond that. It was something already dulled to numbness. For him, the emotions of expectation and disappointment had long since been cleanly erased, as if they’d never existed from the start. But Leupen couldn’t deny that his attention was entirely fixed on Moma.

At Leupen’s emotionless expression, unchanged from usual, Moma found it hard to breathe. The glinting blade surfaced in his cold eyes, but he desperately held onto his legs, which wanted to back away at once.

But rather than fear, it was the hurt that was greater—and greater than the hurt was the regret.

Moma had placed the sprout he’d carefully hidden away, thinking no gift could be better for Leupen, with a pounding heart. It was Moma’s effort, empathizing with loneliness more than anyone, and a token of gratitude toward the master of the domain who had accepted him.

Leupen, of course, didn’t understand Moma’s behavior in the slightest—but Moma, doing his best in his own way, had no way of knowing that.

‘It was precious Moma’s sprout, but…… Leupen hates Moma’s sprout.‘

It was still only a small sprout, but this too was Moma’s leaf. It was different in meaning from a leaf rolling around anywhere.

‘Ah……! Leupen doesn’t know. Doesn’t know Moma.‘

Not knowing Moma’s true nature wasn’t likely the entire reason, but Moma, realizing his own mistake, grew deeply gloomy.

To Moma, tears were nothing more than a sweet liquid, but leaves were meaningful to him as well. They were a medium filled with life force, an essential element for a tree spirit to exercise its abilities.

Though he hadn’t manifested any special ability beyond purification, for Moma, who was waiting for his own ability to appear someday, giving it was no different from giving the most precious thing he had.

But that precious thing, having failed to fulfill its purpose, had already been crushed in Leupen’s hand. Moma attributed it to having forgotten that Leupen didn’t know his true nature, but he felt needlessly aggrieved.

He hadn’t done it hoping for anything, so he wasn’t upset with Leupen. It was just that the now-useless leaf resembled himself, making him a little sorrowful.

“Moma’s head is lacking……. It’s a head ornament…….”

It was one of the many insults he’d heard from the servants at the pig-human’s mansion. But that, apparently, hadn’t been an insult but the truth.

Watching Moma, who was so deep in self-reproach he seemed ready to dig into the ground, Leupen felt a small dilemma. He could grab Moma right now and make him confess who had put him up to it and how he’d done it.

‘I wouldn’t even need to cut off a finger.‘

Glancing at Moma’s fidgeting fingers, Leupen deliberated for a moment, then indifferently turned away.

Moma, hurriedly raising his head, bit his lip and shuffled his feet anxiously, wondering if Leupen would leave the room. Then, at the fact that the leaf hadn’t fallen to the floor, Moma’s complexion brightened dramatically.

He’d crushed the tender sprout, but he hadn’t thrown it away.

‘He likes it!’

Even though Leupen didn’t know Moma was a tree spirit, Moma was certain Leupen had recognized its value, and he proudly puffed out his chest, which had been hunched with pride.

‘Moma’s leaf, the shape is really pretty. Moist and sturdy.‘

Moma, as if nothing had happened, twitched the corner of his mouth, thinking his fresh leaf was quite charming after all.

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