The night is long, but it goes by faster than any of the many nights that he had spent beneath the surface of the world. Canta lays there, huddled together inside of his crusty blanket, with his head on Alleluia’s lap. Despite her excitement and bewilderment at everything in this new world, she had agreed to stop and to let him rest, for which he was more than grateful.

Something about the fresh air, about the resolving of their argument just before, about the whirring of the mechanisms that he can hear humming through her lap, much like the babbling of the nearby river, it all makes him feel a deep-exhaustion.

He is more tired than he was just after his rebirth, more tired than when he had found that real bed down in the dungeon, more tired than after their first nights together, in which his sleep was mercilessly deprived. Canta falls entirely slack, every fiber of muscle in his arms and legs and back loosens as they release from a tension which he himself was unaware of ever having carried, as he, in his light-less dreams, feels the hand running continuously over his head and hears the song from a music-box fill the void that he finds himself in.

By the time he wakes up, Canta is unsure if he can even ever want to get up again. How could the living world ever manage to compare to the heavenly quiet that had befallen him? How could his days, filled with drudgery, pain and suffering offer any value to his being, when his sleep could be so deep and so calm?

“Good morning, sleepyhead,” says a chiming voice from just above him, her cold, metal hand ruffling his hair. Canta opens his eyes and stares at the too smooth face that looks down towards him. She has a smear of old grime on her cheek.

They both blink at the same time.

“Good morning,” says Canta, rising up and awkwardly looking away, feeling a little embarrassed first thing in the day. He looks back to her a second later. “How was it?”

“I saw a bug. It was yellow,” explains Alleluia, thinking for a second as if this had been a great revelation.

His stomach growls. “Did you catch it?” asks Canta hopefully.

Alleluia shakes her head. “No, it was cute,” she explains. “It flew past you and went ‘bzzzz~’” she says, matter of factly, holding her finger in the air and spinning it around.

“Ah… right,” replies Canta, stretching himself out before heading to the river to wash his face and then fill his gut up with water. He wonders if there are fish in this river? If there are any though, he sure doesn’t see them. Let alone know how to catch any of them.

Canta sighs, he’s really, really hungry.

Choosing the only available option, he plunges his head into the wet and drinks until he feels like bursting.

River Water

~1100mL

Pure - Make Up - Trace Minerals: 3.00% Water: 96.00% Other 1.00%

“There are no stars,” says Alleluia, looking up at the cloudy sky. “Which way do we go now?”

“It’s daytime,” explains Canta, grabbing a cleanish rag from their bundle of clothes and dipping it into the water, before walking back over to her. “Hold on,” he says. “You got something there. Close your eyes.” Alleluia looks up at him warily for a moment, but then lowers her gaze and does as he asks, allowing Canta to dab her face clean, wiping off the last of the dungeon’s grime from it. “The stars only come out at night.”

“Oh,” replies Alleluia. “So they’re like owls?”

“Uh, sure,” laughs Canta. “Anyways, we’ll just follow the river. Rivers always lead to civilization, eventually.” He lifts his hand. “There.”

Alleluia slowly reopens her eyes and beams up at him. “Thanks, buzzy-bug!”

He rolls his eyes and wrings out the rag, before tossing it back into the heap of clothes. He packs it all up together, back into a tight bundle, along with his blanket. The two of them set out, following the river against the direction of its current.

Their stroll is much more leisurely than the one from last night. It feels like it is late in the summer and the warm night air slowly dissipates, making way for the dry heat of the day which slowly makes itself both seen and heard. Birds of all colors fill the many trees around them on either side of the river, chirping and singing their songs together with the babbling water and together with Alleluia who also joins in, trying to get Canta to do the same. But he doesn’t, simply letting her have her fun and saving himself the embarrassment.

Though he embarrasses himself nonetheless, as his hunger gets the best of him and he tries to climb up a tree to snatch some of the birds, or at least a few eggs. To little avail however.

Alleluia yanks him off of the tree and holds his head down beneath the river, until she has deemed that he had drunk enough to calm down. Though, she seems to have been a bad judge of the workings of the human body, as she holds him there far, far longer than necessary. On the plus side, Canta finds out that he can’t drown. It just hurts.

A lot.

River Water

~1800mL

Pure - Make Up - Trace Minerals: 3.00% Water: 93.00% Other 4.00%

Not much longer after that, the clouds part and reveal the bright sun, causing Alleluia to freeze in place entirely, as if spellbound, as her face rises up towards it. Warm, yellow light reflects off of her glass eyes, filling them with a shine that bounces off of the surface of her agape lips. Turning her head to ask Canta what the thing in the sky is, she sees that he is looking at her, rather than at the incredible oddity above them. He quickly turns around and keeps walking, explaining to her as they go.

“Shouldn’t we follow the sun then?” asks Alleluia. “If it’s the brightest thing in the sky. Like last night?”

Canta shakes his head, looking at the sparkling water of the river. “No good. The sun is always moving, we’d end up running in a circle,” he explains, not sure if that’s true. But he does his best to sound confident, so that she believes him. Which she does with a wide, awed expression that makes him feel good to look at, even though he isn’t sure that he’s earned it.

Still, he’s glad that she’s settled down a little. Sure, the fresh air was making her excitable and giddy. But at least he isn’t seeing anymore of that intensity which she had to her personality back down in the dungeon. He hopes it lasts.

“Berry!” calls Alleluia, he looks back at her, thinking this is her newest pet-name for him. But to his relief, he sees that she is kneeling down by a bush. She turns her hands out to him, her palms filled with large, glossy, peach-toned berries. His stomach growls and he rushes over straight towards her, feeling his eyes glaze over, as the berries become the only thing he can see.

Which means he misses the mechanical fist flying his way as he charges her, pressing into his gut and causing him to flop down to the ground, as the air is knocked out of him. He thinks his spine is broken again, he can’t move his legs. Alleluia grabs his crippled body and flips him over, pulling his head onto her lap. A string of spit runs out of the side of his tingling mouth.

“Ah! Ah!” she scolds, wagging a metal finger with a free hand. Grabbing one of the berries, she pops it into his mouth, feeding him. It takes a few minutes until his jaw works again, by then, his mouth is already stuffed full and Alleluia, apparently not realizing that this is a problem for his breathing, continues to push in more berries.

Apparently he can’t suffocate either.

It also hurts a lot. But he appreciates the sentiment, if nothing else. They do need to have a talk about her violent over-reactions though.

Peach-Brush Berries ~900g Calories: 570 Protein: 7 g Fat: 3 g *Carbs: 140 g Fiber: 24 g Sugars: 90 g Water: 78% Rich in IRON !

But the relief that the berries bring to his mind and body is more than palpable and he finds the edge, that has been growing inside of him all day, starts to lessen, if only a little bit. But the gnawing continues, as if his body was craving something else, something it isn’t getting. He remembers the taste of the distorted memory that he ate down in the dungeon, of the spirit of whoever became that wendigo. He doesn’t remember their name. Yasanda or Yara or whatever, it doesn’t matter. But he remembers the way she tasted, he remembers the way her sins felt when he ate them.

He wants that, his body is telling him he wants that particular spice, that particular flavor.

But for now, berries will have to do.

Alleluia apologizes to him after he explains that she’s been too rough again. She says that she didn’t mean to hurt him and he accepts that, finding her expression sincere. They walk for the rest of the day, then they stop to rest at night. Alleluia finds more berries for him, but does go out of her way to tease him, holding them above his head and pretending to eat them herself.

Then they walk like that again the next day. The forest never seems to end, but neither do the things that Alleluia is curious about. Apparently she never left the dungeon before, having been created and then imprisoned there. So everything, apart from things she had been told about in a distant, old life, is entirely new for her. Not that he minds, it makes him feel good that she always asks him about this and that. Though, he does make up a few more things than he probably should, not having the courage to tell her that he just doesn’t know.

He hopes that she never hears anything different about those things. But he does find it odd how she knows about some things like berries, but not like some other obvious things like the sun. Dungeon life must be really weird.

The night falls. He finds a fish flopping on the side of the river. Though he isn’t quite sure how it managed to do that. Alleluia lets him eat it, apparently not as fond of fish as she is of birds. Though in truth, neither is he. But food is food.

The fish has no sins to confess, however. Though he would have been more surprised if it did, in all honesty.

Blue-Water Carp ~400g Calories: 404 *Protein: 45 g Fat: 4 g Carbs: 0 g Fiber: 0 g Sugars: 0 g Water: 70%

He does wish that they had a fire, but he doesn’t know how to make a fire and neither does she. So, raw fish it is. Though, he supposes that he has eaten worse things than that. The river seems clean enough.

They walk for another day. Canta would be lying if he said he wasn’t enjoying himself, despite the gnawing hunger eating him away from the inside out. He finishes turning Alleluia’s crank and they keep walking through the forest that never seems to end.

Until suddenly, very abruptly, it does.

Alleluia and Canta stand at the edge of the tree-line, emerging out from the forest that they had spent around a week inside of, both of them looking the part. A lush, verdant meadow shimmers before them. The rolling green grasses glisten as the wind pushes them aside and lets the sunlight hit the rounded arcs of their bodies.

“Hey!” says Alleluia excitedly, grabbing his shoulder. “Chirpy-bird, do you think they’ll let us borrow some fire?” she asks.

“Huh?” Canta follows her pointing finger, which is aimed towards the distance, just past the meadow to the left, where pillars of black smoke rise from a large, destroyed village. There aren’t any screams or any shouts of terror that he can hear.

There is only the smell of smoke in the air, together with a scent that he recognizes, a familiar scent that causes his mouth to water, that causes his stomach to growl loudly, painfully.

It smells like sin, like Yashira.

Canta hurries off towards the destruction and Alleluia runs after him in excitement.