[PS: You might be feeling confused by now, wondering why I still haven't gotten to Little Red Riding Hood. There are actually two reasons.
First, this book is tagged with multiple female leads, so Daffodil and Broken Rainbow are also female leads. They appeared earlier simply because Inanna adopted them before Little Red Riding Hood.
As for when Little Red Riding Hood will appear? Broken Rainbow's new profile mentioned that she was brought back after Daffodil left the Garden. She was nineteen at the time.
Of course, I won't follow the original story completely, or it'd be too boring-besides, the male lead's ability is so broken that following the original would make it impossible to keep things consistent.]
[I've taken up enough of your time. Let's get straight to the story.]
Jin'en let go of the force he had been using to "press it back."
The rift didn't burst open.
It didn't close, either.
It simply hung open like a half-open eye, the faint light along its silver edges flickering. The low hum in the air remained, but it was less than half as strong as before.
Jin'en stared at it for several seconds. His right hand was still numb from wrist to fingertips, but the searing pain that felt as if his flesh were about to split had receded into a dull swelling ache.
"See?" Daffodil's voice came from beside him, her tone flat. "It's actually less vicious when you don't press it."
Jin'en looked up.
She was still crouching there, her knees less than a foot from the rift, her gray eyes fixed on his wrist. There was no fear on her face, nor any tension.
It was as though this thing capable of slicing cracks into the iron-sand floor looked no different to her than a wooden post split crookedly.
"...How did you know?" Jin'en's voice was still a little hoarse.
"Last night," Daffodil said. "I sat here watching for a long time while you slept. When your rift opened, as long as no one touched you, it stopped expanding at a certain point. You panicked first when you woke up, and only then did it burst out."
Jin'en thought about it.
He had fallen asleep in the training ground last night, and the rift had already been spreading when he woke.
According to Daffodil, the rift had actually been in some sort of "equilibrium" while he slept. His startled awakening and fear had pushed it past the critical point.
"...So that's why you told me not to press it."
"Mm." Daffodil stood up and brushed nonexistent dust off her knees. "The more you fear it, the more worked up it gets. Same principle as training. The more you're afraid of getting hit, the more you'll get hit."
Jin'en glanced down at his wrist.
The edges of the rift had already begun to narrow slowly, its silver halo retreating inward bit by bit like an ebbing tide.
He had done nothing but sit there catching his breath, and the rift had closed more than halfway on its own.
"...I'm pretty stupid, aren't I?"
Daffodil didn't respond to that.
She walked back to the wooden post, picked up her blade, planted its tip in the iron-sand floor, then glanced back at him.
"Get up once you've rested enough."
"My arm's still numb."
"Then stand up and move it. It'll stay numb longer if you sit."
Jin'en stared at her for two seconds.
The way this girl spoke reminded him of the man serving food in the orphanage cafeteria. His hand never shook. One scoop was one scoop, no more and no less.
He braced himself against the wall and stood, shaking his right hand twice. Prickling sensations came in waves through his fingertips.
The rift had indeed closed, leaving only a faint silver line on the inside of his wrist. It no longer glowed or felt hot.
"What do we practice next?" he asked.
"Nothing," Daffodil said.
Jin'en: "?"
"You lost control twice today. Keep training, and the third time won't be something you can rein in." Daffodil deftly returned the blade behind her waist. "We'll train tomorrow."
"...Then what do I do?"
"Eat."
Jin'en froze for a moment.
He glanced at the kettle in the corner of the training ground, then at Daffodil.
Was there something wrong with this girl's thought process? She had just been using herself as a target to test the rift's radius, and now she was telling him to eat?
"Are you serious?"
Daffodil was already heading toward the stairs.
After two steps, she paused and turned her head to look at him.
Her blue-streaked bangs hung over her forehead, covering half of one gray eye. But in the exposed half, Jin'en saw something... very level.
Neither cold nor warm.
Just level.
"Your right hand is shaking," she said.
Jin'en looked down. His right hand was indeed still shaking, not much, but his knuckles were white and his veins stood taut.
"Will eating fix that?"
"No." Daffodil turned and continued walking. "But if you don't eat, you won't even make it up the stairs later."
Jin'en opened his mouth at her back, but in the end, nothing came out. He followed her.
They went up the stairs one behind the other.
Daffodil walked with the same rhythm she used to swing her blade, every step steady. The neglected wooden stairs didn't so much as groan beneath her feet.
Jin'en followed with a jumble of footsteps and nearly tripped on the third step from the top.
Daffodil didn't look back.
But Jin'en noticed her pace slow just a little-so little that he would never have noticed if he hadn't happened to be staring at her heels.
He opened his mouth, thought about it, and decided not to ask.
Outside the underground training ground, the corridor was glaringly bright. Jin'en squinted for several seconds as his eyes adjusted.
Daffodil had already walked several steps ahead and stopped at the corner, one hand resting on the wall, as though waiting, or checking the way.
"Which way is the dining hall?" Jin'en asked.
Daffodil glanced at him.
The look was brief, barely a flicker, but Jin'en thought he caught a faint trace of "seriously?"
"Follow me."
Breakfast was already over at the dining hall, but the kitchen was still open.
Daffodil pushed the door open and entered. The cook glanced at her without asking anything, then turned and took two bowls of congee and several steamed buns from the steamer, setting them on a small table against the wall.
Daffodil sat down and picked up a bun.
Jin'en sat opposite her.
With a small table a meter square between them, they each ate their own food.
The kitchen was quiet, save for the occasional hiss of the steamer and the soft clink of bowls and utensils.
Jin'en took a bite of his bun.
It had a meat filling and plenty of juices, hot enough to make him hiss.
Daffodil didn't even raise her eyelids.
"How long have you been here?" Jin'en asked.
He blew on the bun and took a bite from another angle.
"A long time."
"How long is a long time?"
"Don't remember."
Chewing his bun, Jin'en felt that answer was to be expected, but he still couldn't help giving her another look.
Daffodil ate buns the same way she drank milk, her movements precise and unhurried. After one bite, the next landed in the same spot, like a feeding machine accurate to the millimeter.
"Why didn't you dodge earlier?" Jin'en asked.
"What?"
"The rift." He put down his bun and looked at her face. "I told you to move away, and you took a step forward."
Daffodil took a bite of her bun, chewed, and swallowed.
"Your rift's radius was less than a meter then," she said. "I was a meter and a half away, so it was safe. Then I took a step forward, and you panicked. The rift actually shrank a little."
Jin'en fell silent.
She was right.
That step forward had indeed panicked him, and that panic had shifted his attention from "I can't hold the rift back" to "why isn't she running?"
Once his focus scattered, the rift's expansion had slowed.
"You were gambling," Jin'en said.
"Not really." Daffodil finished the last bite of her bun and wiped the corner of her mouth with a finger. "I watched you for half the night. While you slept, the rift only reached sixty centimeters at its largest. You lost control after waking because you were afraid."
She stood and placed her bowl in the collection basket beside the sink.
"When you're afraid, the rift gets bigger instead. When you're not, it retracts on its own." She turned to look at Jin'en. "So what you're really practicing isn't controlling the rift."
Jin'en looked up.
"It's controlling fear."
Daffodil left after saying that.
The kitchen door closed behind her with a soft sound.
Jin'en sat at the table, still holding half a bun, and stared at the door for a long while.
Controlling fear.
He thought back to the moment he had woken in the corner of the training ground last night-the rift spreading, silver light illuminating half his arm, the air humming. His first reaction had been, It's over. I've lost control again.
Then he had desperately pressed it back, and the rift had rebounded harder.
Daffodil had sat motionless beside him, waiting for him to stop on his own.
What if I hadn't panicked then?
What if I'd opened my eyes, seen the rift opening, told myself, "It won't burst," and left it alone?
Jin'en stuffed the rest of the bun into his mouth and chewed a little too hastily, nearly choking.
He stood, copied Daffodil by putting his bowl in the collection basket, then left the kitchen.
The corridor was empty.
Jin'en stood there thinking for a moment. Instead of returning to his room, he turned and headed back toward the underground training ground.
The training ground's lights were still on.
As Jin'en descended the stairs, he heard that sound-swish, swish.
Daffodil had already returned. She stood before the wooden post, her blade drawn, in exactly the same stance he had seen that morning.
Black clothes, blue streaks in her hair. As she held the blade in her left hand, her right hung at her side, fingers slightly curled.
Jin'en paused at the foot of the stairs.
She didn't turn, but her swing paused for an instant, perhaps half a beat, before continuing.
"You didn't go back to your room," she said.
"Neither did you."
"I'm supposed to be here."
Jin'en walked to the corner and sat in the same spot as yesterday.
The iron-sand floor dug uncomfortably into him, but he paid it no mind.
Leaning against the cold wall, he rolled up his right sleeve and glanced down at his wrist.
The rift lay quietly beneath his skin, its silver line so faint it was almost invisible.
He took a deep breath and closed his eyes.
The only sound in the training ground was Daffodil swinging her blade, stroke after stroke, its rhythm as steady as a tune without a melody.
Listening to that sound, Jin'en slowly shifted his attention toward his right hand-not to "press" it or "push" it, but simply to... feel it.
The rift "felt" like a rubber band stretched to its limit.
He neither pressed hard nor let go, merely resting against it, letting it know someone was there.
Jin'en didn't know how much time passed. Perhaps ten minutes, perhaps half an hour.
When he opened his eyes, the rift on his right wrist remained closed. The silver line had neither expanded nor glowed.
"Did it stop?" Daffodil's voice came from ahead.
Jin'en looked up.
She had stopped swinging and was resting the blade's tip on the iron-sand floor, her face turned toward him.
Under the training ground's lights, her gray eyes looked paler than usual, like a lake frozen over in winter.
"No," Jin'en said. "But it didn't rebound."
Daffodil watched him for two seconds, then turned back and raised her blade again.
"Keep going."
"Mm."
She continued swinging her blade.
Jin'en remained seated in the corner.
Neither spoke again. Only the sound of the blade remained in the training ground.
Another ten minutes or so passed before Daffodil put away her blade.
She slid it into the sheath behind her waist, walked over, and sat against the wall beside Jin'en. Taking two compressed biscuits from a cloth bag, she bit down on one and tossed him the other.
Jin'en caught it.
The biscuit was rock-hard. Biting into it felt like gnawing chalk.
But after he chewed for a while, a sweetness emerged, stubbornly sweet.
"Did Broken Rainbow teach you?" Jin'en asked.
Daffodil's chewing paused for an instant.
"Mm."
"She's pretty good at this."
"Not bad." Daffodil swallowed the biscuit in her mouth, her tone flat. "Just too much flour. Hard."
Jin'en looked down at the compressed biscuit in his hand, then back at Daffodil.
Everything about this girl was a contradiction.
When she swung a blade, her hands were as ruthless as an executioner with ten years on the job. When she ate, she was as proper as a human ruler. Yet she always carried biscuits in her pocket, and the practiced way she handed them out made it clear this wasn't her first time.
"Do you often share food with people?"
"No."
"Then-"
"Your hands were shaking." Daffodil cut him off, looking at the wall across the training ground instead of at him. "Eating something helps when they shake."
Jin'en fell silent for two seconds.
"...Did you eat like this when your left hand was injured, too?"
Daffodil turned her head, her gray eyes fixed on him. Her gaze wasn't cold, but it was direct-so direct that Jin'en felt as though someone had flipped open a page of him.
"Who told you?"
"Broken Rainbow."
Daffodil looked away, down at the half-eaten biscuit in her hand.
"She has such a big mouth."
"You had three cracks in your wrist bones, and you kept training," Jin'en said. He stuffed the biscuit into his mouth, chewing as he spoke indistinctly. "You just told me to 'control my fear.' What about you?"
Daffodil said nothing.
The fluorescent light in the training ground flickered, buzzed twice, then steadied again.
"It's different." She finally spoke, her voice a fraction quieter than before.
"How is it different?"
"What I'm afraid of isn't what you're afraid of." Daffodil finished the last bite of her biscuit and brushed the crumbs off her hands. "You're afraid your hand will explode. I'm afraid my blade will stop."
Jin'en turned to look at her.
Daffodil's profile stood out clearly under the light, her nose straight, her jawline sharp as though cut by a blade.
Her blue-streaked bangs hung above her right eye, hiding half her face, but the gray eye left visible reflected the white glow of the training ground's fluorescent light.
"What happens if your blade stops?" Jin'en asked.
"Mother will be unhappy."
She said it very quietly, as though mentioning it in passing.
But Jin'en heard the meaning beneath it.
Inanna had bound this girl in some way.
Bound her so tightly that Daffodil herself didn't even know where the rope was, only that she couldn't stop.
"What about you?" Jin'en said.
"Do you want to stop?"
Daffodil turned to look at him.
Her gaze was complicated, so complicated that Jin'en couldn't tell how many things were in it-wariness? Confusion? Or the kind of blankness that only appeared when someone was asked a question they had never considered?
"I don't know," she said.
Those three words were far more honest than Jin'en had expected.
He had thought she would say, "No," or, "I've never thought about it." But what she said was, "I don't know."
Not knowing meant she had actually thought about it, but hadn't reached an answer.
The training ground was quiet for a while.
The light flickered again, longer this time, its white glow brightening and dimming, stretching and shortening their shadows across the iron-sand floor.
"How old are you?" Daffodil asked suddenly.
Jin'en paused.
"Nine. Or ten."
"Mother said you're older than me."
"How old are you?"
"Seven." Daffodil paused. "Six, to outsiders."
The corner of Jin'en's mouth twitched.
Exactly like Broken Rainbow, claiming to be a year younger to outsiders.
Inanna's rule?
"So you're more than two years older than me," Daffodil said.
"Yeah."
"Then according to the rules," Daffodil said, looking at the wooden post opposite them, her tone flat as though she were reading an instruction manual, "I should call you big brother."
The biscuit in Jin'en's mouth nearly went down his windpipe.
He coughed twice and turned to look at Daffodil.
The girl's expression hadn't changed at all. She still wore that same stone face, but Jin'en noticed the index finger of her right hand lightly pick at her knee, then draw back.
"If you don't like it... you don't have to force yourself," Jin'en said.
"Mm." Daffodil nodded.
Then the training ground went quiet again.
Jin'en thought that was the end of it.
He leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes, letting the coughing subside.
His right wrist was quiet. The cracks neither glowed nor jolted.
About half a minute later, he heard a voice beside him.
Very quiet.
So quiet that Jin'en almost thought he had misheard.
"...Bro."
When Daffodil said the word, her lips barely moved. Her voice squeezed out between her teeth, carrying an unmistakable awkwardness, like wearing ill-fitting shoes for the first time.
She didn't look at Jin'en. Her gaze was nailed to the wall across the training ground, her expression even flatter than usual-so flat it looked a little false.
Jin'en turned his head.
"What did you just say?"
"Nothing."
"You said something."
"No."
Jin'en stared at her for several seconds.
The tips of Daffodil's ears were faintly red under the light, impossible to notice without looking closely, but her sitting posture was more than a little stiffer than usual-her back perfectly straight, both hands resting neatly on her knees, as though she were undergoing some military inspection.
"...Bro," she said again.
Her voice was a little louder this time, but the awkwardness was even more obvious.
Her lips were pressed tight as she said the word, her chin tense, as though it had been forcibly dragged out of her throat. Then she hastily added, "There. Just once."
Jin'en opened his mouth.
He didn't know what to say.
To be honest, no one had ever called him big brother before.
At the orphanage, the younger children called him "hey" or "that new kid," and the older ones ignored him altogether.
During his days wandering the streets, no one had even called him "hey."
Daffodil was the first.
Even if she had squeezed it out, even if she had said it through gritted teeth, even if her whole body had gone rigid as an iron plate afterward.
"Yeah," Jin'en said.
Just one word.
Daffodil's shoulders relaxed half an inch.
Very little-so little that Jin'en almost missed it.