Egg World

Chapter 5 - Rain

Illustration credit goes to Konomi at https://www.instagram.com/konomidrawz/

SYLVIE POV:

I woke up with a soft yawn. The sunlight was coming in through a crack in the curtain, glaring into my eyes. I shifted into my humanoid form and stretched, more out of habit than from having actual muscles that needed stretching.

The couch next to me was empty. Looking over at the small dining table in the room, I noticed Grey eating breakfast, while reading a book with one hand. But what caught my attention the most was a second set of breakfast food on the table, with a chair pulled up in front of it.

I walked over and sat on the seat. Although I had made it a point to be somewhat obnoxious towards him these last few weeks, I felt a bit awkward today after our conversation last night.

"Is the food for me?" I asked timidly, looking up at him.

"No, it's for the other ghost in the room," he replied, his eyes still fixed on his book.

I smiled, reminded of Arthur's sarcastic humor. I was elated that it looked like Grey was starting to accept my companionship. There was surely more work to be done, but this was a huge step in the right direction.

I stared at the food and furrowed my brows. "I don't think I can eat this," I pointed out, swiping my hand through the plate.

"I think you can," Grey responded, munching on a piece of toast. "You're able to sit on that armchair, so my theory is that you can interact with this world if you just put your mind to it."

Skeptically, I reached for my own piece of toast, but as expected, my hand passed right through the bread. Grey lowered his book to look over at me.

"It probably needs to come naturally to you. You didn't have any doubt in your mind that you could sit on that chair, right? If you erase your doubts that you can touch and eat that food, it should be possible."

"Hmm." I tried remembering the last time that I had eaten. The sensation of touching food, and bringing it over to my mouth. Closing my eyes, I reached out towards the piece of toast again, and this time, I felt the rough texture of the bread underneath my fingers. I opened my eyes, and reached over to the knife in front of me as well. The feeling of eating a meal was starting to come back to me again. Spreading some jam on my bread, I brought the food over to my mouth and took a bite. My eyes lit up.

"It's delicious!"

Grey smiled warmly, and then taking on a much more serious tone of voice, asked, "So where does that food go?"

"It's impolite to ask a lady that," I responded in between mouthfuls of food.

Grey snorted. "You're a long way off from being called a lady in anyone's book, kid."

"I'll have you know that where I'm from, the deities of the land would call me Lady Sylvie," I retorted.

He rolled his eyes.

"Oh, the delusions of children."

***

Grey sat on a metal bench in a waiting room, about to enter a duel. We had been in this neighboring country for quite some time now, attending fight after fight. The fatigue of participating in these duels must be getting to Grey, but he looked like he was fine. I sat on a bench across from him. We could hear the stone walls vibrate lightly from the cheering going on in the stadium overhead as another duel played out in the arena.

"Why don't you wear a helmet?" I asked out of curiosity.

"Helmets don't really do much against ki weapons," he responded curtly. I realized that he was probably trying to focus on the fight coming up ahead, and decided to keep quiet to let him get into the zone.