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Beware the forest at the foot of the mountain. Everyone in town repeated those words to the children. They say a dangerous yokai lives there, you must not go alone.
No one had managed to warn Fran in time, and when they finally did, he had already traversed the forest alone, countless times. He didn’t understand why anyone thought it was dangerous.
A sharp whistle pierced through the air and it was the only warning he had. The boy ducked, tilting his head to use the massive apple hat on his head as a shield just in time to feel something sharp stabbing it. When he took it off to look at it, it had a deep slash on the thick fabric. It would have most definitely struck his face if he hadn't dodged it. The hat, worn and mended countless times, showed it wasn’t its first repair. Fran patted at it for its hard work, smoothing the gash while an eerie laughter echoed from the distance.
“Senpai, I know it's like talking to deaf ears with you, but could you try to leave my clothes alone for once?”
“It's not the clothes that I'm aiming for,” a smooth voice answered, seemingly out of nowhere. A blonde figure crouched on a branch behind Fran, hair sliding across half his face, yet the ever-present toothy grin remained unmistakable.
“It's coming undone…” Fran muttered to himself, still focused on the apple hat and assessing the damage.
The grin disappeared from the man's face, and just as he leapt forward, toward the back of the boy's head, Fran put the big hat back on and the blade made another slash on it instead. Tsk.
“The one who's deaf is you!” The blonde man landed only a couple meters ahead of the green-haired boy, crouched low to the ground. A black and purple old-fashioned kimono, the hair that never revealed the eyes behind, and a long blade stretched at his side as an extension of his hand. Quite literally, the blade followed the line of his arm and came out through the palm of his hand.. “I've told you time and time again that a puny human like you can't come here.” When he stood up, his body and legs were long and slender, enough for Fran to be covered in his shade, and he had a long furred tail swaying elegantly behind.
Nothing about the scene before him caught Fran off guard. Ever since he moved to live with his grandma, visiting the mountain a few times a week became routine. The first times he could hear voices in the distance, found himself all scratched up and sometimes felt something sharp prick him by surprise. Nevertheless, he continued to go and the figure in the forest became more insistent in trying to scare him off, as ineffective as it was. The day came in which the yokai got fed up and decided to switch from an indirect to a direct approach, appearing in front of the boy.
“Ah! A cavity fairy!” Said Fran that day, and ever since has been targeted by a very annoyed yokai every time he stepped foot in the forest.
It did everything but deter the human from entering. He would cross the forest, stop by the lake, spend an entire day there, not minding the constant harassment of a voice claiming it was his territory, or the way leaves were sliced around his path and claws brushed against him, at times harshly and at times more teasingly than anything else. And for Bel, it was interesting meeting a human so unfazed by everything and the unnatural place. It was irritating to always be met by indifference and monotony.
One time Fran asked, if he disliked him visiting so much why didn't he kill him? Clearly, he had the sharp tools for that. Claws? Swords? Knives? He never knew what to call them. Sometimes small blades were thrown against the wind, sometimes seemingly part of the spirit's body, but he wasn't curious enough to pry. The yokai had given different replies everytime. He was too boring to be prey, he was too weird that he didn't want his corpse laying on his territory, it was too much work. The yokai wasn't a stranger to murder, in fact he was fascinated by it and any bloody scene, but this particular human didn't motivate him enough to go through the effort.
So, in short, Fran kept spending his free time in the forest, not completely free of harm but alive.
“You stop so often at the lake I might as well call you a frog, ushishishi~” Snickered Bel from underneath a tree. Fran was sitting on a rock at the lake, putting water on the freshest cuts from the knives he wasn't so lucky to dodge –not like he had tried that hard to–.
“Okay.” He replied, as monotonous as ever, not even bothered. A knife flew by and nailed itself in a piece of floating wood, barely avoided by tilting to one side. “Scary, the fairies are upset today.”
“I'll really kill you this time.”
“You say that every time, it's losing effect.”
“A commoner can't correct me,” huffed Bel, but didn't press the matter. The sun was nice, he had been following the human long enough to become lazy. A nap sounded right, he wouldn't be missing anything anyway, so he sat on the floor with his back to the tree and his tail wrapped around himself.
To know if he was asleep or not was hard without seeing his eyes. It must be why after many many minutes he felt fingers reaching for his fringe, barely brushing the tips to the sides, but careful enough to test the ground and back up if he was actually awake. The yokai's hand gripped at the hand's wrist, stopping it right there and looking to see the human leaning over him with curiosity. It was maybe the only time he saw surprise in those green eyes, and yet it was brief. He didn't even seem uncomfortable, despite it being the first time in the few weeks they've known each other that Bel reached out with anything other than his retractable blades.
“Sneaky froggy, trying something?”
“I wonder if you even have eyes behind all that hair...” replied the boy as deadpan as ever.
The blonde's smile widened into a huge grin, laughing through his teeth, looking closer to maniacal than amused. Fran still didn't react, frozen in place but relaxed while water drops from the tips of his hair fell onto the yokai's clothes. That sickening laughter cut through the forest and it didn't even give the boy goosebumps to hear it up close.
Surprisingly, Bel let him go and didn't move from his napping spot where the shade of the trees shielded his face.
“No one in their right mind dares to approach a person who has often tried to kill them so casually.”
“You haven't been effective on that.” Released, Fran straightened his back but continued to look at the yokai, wondering if his eyes were closed and ready to sleep or if he was being stared at, though he had the feeling it was the former, or else he would have been stopped much sooner.
“I haven’t really felt like it.”
For a while neither moved. Bel did keep his eyes closed, telling himself he wasn't curious if the boy wandered off or not, but he didn't hear any steps and while it made him curious he tried a different approach to ignore him. When he did hear rustling it was followed by a sudden weight on his side.
“What do you think you're doing?” He asked, looking down at the boy who sat beside him and rested his head on the yokai's shoulder. Too close, as if he couldn't bring out blades to stab him with. Fran's eyes were closed and his hands blindly reached for the fluffy yellow tail that quickly was swiped away. “Oi! No touching the prince's tail”
“What prince?” Fran tilted his head back to glance at the blonde.
“Me, of course!”
“Self-proclaimed…– ow!” He felt a prick on his side from a blade barely poking out of Bel's hands. But he didn't move away, and for that afternoon Bel didn't push him off either, the weather was too nice to waste it chasing out an infuriating brat. He'd try to kill him another day.