Chương 28: Side story: Cluma's playtime

My eyes snapped open. It was morning, which meant it was playtime. Yay!

"Play!"

"Not before breakfast, dear." Stinky breakfast. Mummy says I have to sit still while eating, but I hate sitting still. But if I don't eat, I feel hungry, and I hate feeling hungry too. Stupid unfairness. It just means I have to gobble everything down as quickly as possible.

"Not so fast, dear, you'll choke." Pfft, as if. In fact, I can probably go even faster! I suddenly started to cough and splutter as some water went down the wrong way.

"See, I told you. Now take your time for the rest." But if I take time here, I have less time for playing! But if I don't do what Mummy says, I might not be allowed out to play at all... Arrgh, stupid stupid unfairness! I slowed down just a teeny tiny little bit. Mummy gave a sigh, but didn't say anything. Yay, victory!

"Finished!" Now it's playtime, so I ran to the door and jumped to try to grab the handle.

"You have to get dressed before you go outside. And do you need the bathroom first?" Why are there always so many rules? What are clothes for? It's plenty hot enough outside without them.

"No bathroom."

"Okay, come here then and let's get you dressed." Mummy pulled a light blue one-piece dress over my head and put some sandals on my feet.

"There you go. Now you can go outside." Finally! There's no-one else outside at the moment. Playing with friends is far more fun than playing on your own, but I'm sure someone will turn up later. For now, I'll just run up and down the street for a bit. I like running; it's fun! So are jumping and climbing and bouncing and hugging friends! I saw Mummy pulling a chair outside to sit on, so I ran over and gave her leg a hug too. Everyone should have hugs! I'm not tall enough to hug Mummy properly, though.

I need to hurry up and grow taller! But if I did, then it would be harder to hug my other shorter friends. More unfairness! I ran back down the street screaming at the unfairness of everything.

"Please be a little quieter, dear. Other people might still be sleeping." That's silly. Why would they be sleeping when they could be outside playing? Hmm? I just heard a door.

"Peter!" Yay, it's my best friend! Of course, everyone is my best friend, but Peter is one of my bestest best friends. And best friends get hugs!

"Oof. Good morning, Cluma."

"Hello!" Peter can talk really well. I wish I could talk well, but he can't run as fast as me, so I think we're even. I hope he will play with me today.

"Play?"

"Only for a little bit. Tag, you're it!"

"Yay, tag!" This is why Peter is so cool. He knows all the best games! But he's too slow. He'll never escape me. I crouched slightly, prepared to run at my full speed. And go! Huh? Why is he just standing there? He's supposed to run away. Did he forget how to play? Oh, he's moving at last, but that's far too late. This isn't going to be a challenge at all! Huh? Suddenly Peter wasn't there. I went zooming past in confusion. What just happened?

One minute he was standing there, then he went all funny, then he was gone. I turned around and he was standing off to the side from where he had been, grinning at me.

"Huh? Peter went weird." He grinned even harder. This is fun! If he's got faster, then I just need to get even faster myself. I charged again. I'll definitely get him this time! He just stood there, the same as last time. Is he going to do the same thing again? I watched him carefully, waiting for him to make a move, then as I got close, I saw him step to the side. He went all funny again, and where he landed wasn't where it should have been. It was weird. And fun!

"It looks like Peter has been learning magic, Cluma. You're going to have to try harder if you want to keep up." Of course. I wasn't going to give up. I would try as hard as I needed to. I wasn't going to let Peter run away from me, however much magic he had.

"Try!" Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. I charged forwards again, watching him carefully. He can't fool me by doing the same thing over and over! As soon as I saw which direction he was leaning towards, I curved in that direction, ready to intercept wherever he runs to. There he goes! I can see him! I crashed right into him and knocked him over, but that doesn't matter. I won!

"Tag!" ding I blinked. Something in my head went ding. Mummy says that means that Mr System wants to tell me something. Go ahead, Mr System! Wisdom increased by 1 Hehe. I'm growing up again!

"Well done. You got me." I know. That's why I shouted tag. Maybe he didn't hear me? His ears are really small, after all. But that's not important, because now it's Peter's turn to chase me.

"You're it!" I bounced up off the top of Peter where I had somehow ended up, and ran away. He didn't chase me though, so I turned around to look. He was still getting up off the floor. So slow! Oh, he started moving at last. He went funny again? There was a blur in the air right in front of me. Was he doing that weird magic thing again? I stepped to the side, out of the way of the blur. Then the blur was suddenly Peter. Hehe, this is fun! Oh, he's stumbling. He went splat!

"Hehe. Peter fell over!" He stood back up again and glared at me. Maybe he's mad because he's so slow? Or because he lost his tail and can't balance properly? Oh, looks like he's trying again. The air in front of me went funny like before, so I got out of the way, and then Peter was suddenly there again. I wonder how he does that? But he keeps tripping up every time he does it, so he's still not faster than me. And besides, I can see where he's going. He looked at me again, but this time he was grinning.

I'm glad he's having fun too! Hmm? He's starting to move, but I don't see a blur. Where will he come from this time? Suddenly he went funny again, and I heard the crunch of a footstep behind me. I tried to dive forward, but I was a little too late. He got me!

"Tag!" I stood there blinking. Peter never catches me in tag! And he was grinning again. I burst out laughing.

"Fun!" Peter walked over and patted me on the head. I like when he does that; it feels nice. I gave him a nice big hug in return.

"Yes, I had fun too. But now I'm all worn out already. I wish I knew where you got so much energy from." Mummy says it's because Mr System made me hyperactive, but I don't know what that means and I'm not supposed to tell people, anyway. Fortunately, Peter didn't wait for an answer, and went and sat down next to Mummy instead. Abandoning your friends is bad, so I went to join them too. I bounced into Mummy's lap, which was comfy and warm, and put me in the perfect position to receive head-pats.

Mummy was looking down at Peter, though, so I had to grab her arm and put it on my head myself.

"Didn't that hurt? It looked like your whole body was stretching."

"The spell itself doesn't hurt at all. It's just disorientating. The pain comes from the face-plant afterwards, but I think I've almost got the hang of it. It's frustrating that I want to keep trying, but even with [Meditation] I still take around four minutes to regenerate a single point of mana." Bleh. Peter's talking about boring, complicated stuff. That's no fun, so I rotated around and tried to tickle his head with my tail. He was sitting too far away for me to reach, though, the cheater.

"Hah, you're complaining about one every four minutes? It takes me ten. Beastkin have a fifty percent hit to mana pool size and regeneration compared to humans."

"True, but on the other hand, I'm pretty sure that's the first time I've ever caught Cluma in tag, and she's a lot younger than me. I doubt that same trick will work a second time, either." Hehe, Peter is praising me!

"Yes, our physical stats tend to be better than humans, but to be fair, she's a bit special even by beastkin standards. Let's just say there's a rank three trait involved." And Mummy is praising me too! I'm special! I giggled and leaned back into the ongoing head-pats.

"Wow. A trait of rank three or higher is something only one in a hundred people should have, and our little village gets two of them in one year." Two of them? There's two of me? That can't be right; I would have noticed. But it would be cool if true; I could give myself hugs! I wrapped my arms around myself, but it just wasn't the same."" Good morning Cluma, Peter, Aunty Clana!"" Huh? I spun around to the new voices. It was Holly and Joe, two more of my best friends!

They often both say the same thing at the same time, which makes them sound funny. I bounced off Mummy's lap to give them hugs, but then froze up. There were two of them, and I only had one pair of arms. Which one do I hug first? Mummy greeted them.

"Good morning, Holly and Joseph. Did you come to play?"""Yes!"" Yay, more friends to play with! I can't let indecision delay play time, so I hugged Holly first because she was closest. Holly and Joe were older than me and Peter, but they still weren't faster than me. Or smarter than Peter. We all looked at him in expectation.

"How about hide and seek next?" I wonder how Peter knows so many games? But hide and seek is only fun when I'm seeking. Hiding is far too hard.

"I seek!"

"Of course. Count to a hundred and we'll run and hide." I giggled as everyone ran away from me. I'm a big scary monster! A hundred is a really big number, so I needed help from mummy to count, but before long I was off running down the street. I'll definitely find them all! Holly and Joe were easy to find. They always fidget, so I can hear them. It's the same reason why I'm so bad at hiding; I always move or giggle and then everyone knows where I am! Peter is far better at hiding.

He's small and for some reason he likes to sit still, even though sitting still is boring. It took all three of us ages to find him. He was laying down inside a cart with his eyes closed. I think he was sleeping, because he didn't notice us until we were right next to him even though we were all shouting, and then he did a massive jump when I bounced on him. That made me burst out laughing.

"Well done. You found me." Hehe. Playing is fun!