Chapter Text
Part 1
A petite man is alone, hacking away at the tree trunk alone. The sound resonates throughout the otherwise quiet forest, accompanied by the sound of cracking wood.
The warm midday sun shines upon the earth, bringing some warmth to the man’s cold, shivering hands. The sunlight reflects off the white blanket of snow on the ground, and it hurts the man’s eyes a little when he looks down. He lets out a puff of air; it's foggy.
The cold air seeps through his thick coat too, a biting chill that sends shivers down his back whenever he feels it. And he feels it yet again, as he stands still in the forest without any movement to warm him up.
“There's not going to be enough wood for this winter…” The man shakes his head sadly, his bright red hair bobbing up and down like a beacon in this sea of green and brown.
This redhead is Nakahara Chuuya, an ordinary farmer like any other in his village. What makes him not so ordinary, however, is the fact that he's one of the poorest farmers in the village, partly because he has no family.
He coughs again, his shoulders trembling and throat rasping as the cough tears through him. It hurts his throat, and he spits out a warm, metallic-tasting liquid.
And then, a soft whimper catches his attention.
At first, it’s so soft, Chuuya was sure that he was just hallucinating from his illness. He chooses to ignore it, and continues to hack away at the tree trunk in front of him. But when he hears it again, there's no denying it.
A life is in danger.
Chuuya mentally curses himself for being too kind, even as he throws his axe on the ground(no one’s going to find it anyways), his eyes searching for the source of this noise.
Help me, it seems to say. Even if Chuuya can barely hear it, he senses it trembling at its unknown fate, as if it’s linked to him empathetically the moment he hears it. Perhaps it is, from the shiver that runs down his spine as he imagines what he might find.
And there it is.
A crane-like figure stands in the white snow, its wide wings flapping anxiously as it hangs from a snow-heavy tree, a thick rope the only thing keeping it from falling. As far as Chuuya can tell, the noose is intricately made, meant to be used as a trap for wild game in the forest and not flying birds.
But the way the crane turns to look at Chuuya seems a little too human-like: its curiosity at the arrival not one Chuuya usually sees in the animals around him; instead it's that of a human reflex when one detects movement and their eyes immediately turn to find the source.
The crane looks at him with the same curiosity now, its piercing, beady eyes too akin to that of a human. Were animals capable of unnerving humans?
It lets out another whimper, and the redhead finally remembers why he’s here in the first place: to rescue this crane. Hastily, he unties the noose around its branch-thin leg, then slowly letting it down from its hanging position.
The crane stands around a metre and fifty centimetres, just a little shorter than Chuuya. It looks up at him, cocking its head as if sending its thanks to the petit redhead for saving it. Oddly, said man finds a smile creeping up to him, as a certain fondness for this creature bubbles within him.
And then, it turns away and extends its beautiful, white wings, flying away towards the cold, grey skies.
Chuuya's eyes don't leave it until it's out of sight.