Belle âme || Bungou Stray Dogs × Child!Reader

III.

It was in the broad of day when the bell of the café's door chimed, and in came the little girl about the age of six. Instead of another paper boat in hand, she carried the weight of a wooden chessboard. As she walked towards a table, she spotted a familiar mop of brown hair sitting on the next, and soon he disclosed to her a look of confusion.

"Oh, hello," greeted the little girl, "did you know I was to come here?"

"No, it's pure coincidence." Dazai said, his prior expression wavering later on, and replaced with a warm smile. "(Y/n), I thought you only opted to stay on Tsurumi River?"

She walked over to his table, and sat on the seat across him without permission. She felt the unaccustomed eyes of the raven-haired waitress who stood by the counter, though she paid little attention to her, as the gaze of the man whom she had met a few days earlier seemed far more bewitching.

"If he had promised during the night time, then he should fulfill it during the night time." She explained, remaining in an unwavering visual contact with him. "If he's by the river at day, then it's his loss. He will have to wait for me."

"That's a very odd logic," he mused, "but I have no say since you're the one who knows him best. So do tell, who is this man you speak of?"

"The one whose slot in my heart is permanent." She replied, and he frowned lightly at the vague description.

Nevertheless, he supposed the girl's sublimity was what made her all the more intriguing, and her inarguable naïvety made no room for suspicion. With the accountable circumstances, he shrugged off the topic of her promisor and moved on to the object she had brought along with her.

"What do you have there?"

"This is a chessboard, and inside are chess pieces." There was a tinge of pride heard within her unpretentious voice. "I know how to play it, and if you do too, then we can have a match."

"Oh, that sounds lovely! If only I actually knew how to play chess," his lips made a thin line, but soon curved up upon suggesting, "will you be so generous to share your knowledge of it?"

"Alright."

She opened the chessboard, and they proceeded to place all the pieces on their respective position, with Dazai occasionally asking the little girl where to put which. As they finished, she began by picking up the smallest piece.

"This is a pawn. Its only move is one square forward, and nothing else. But when it puts a piece to sleep, its move is diagonal."

"Puts a piece to sleep?"

"Yes. A piece is put to sleep when another of opposing color takes over its place on the square."

"Oh, I see." Dazai muttered, clearly amused. "But I've watched people play before, and they refer to it as the pawn 'being eaten' or 'being killed,' why is yours different?"

She tilted her head in confusion. "Really? Well, if that's the case, then..." she pressed her lips together, looking down on the pawn she held. "I don't like that."

He remained still, awaiting her explanation.

"If a player loses a piece, then he would have to carry the burden of knowing that his strategy did no good to it. He can be more restive at the thought that it is only sleeping."

"...I see." Dazai responded, gifting her a close-eyed smile. "But if your opponent practices no empathy, and fancies the concept of foolhardiness on the chessboard, wouldn't you want to apply the same mindset?"

"Why would I, when the thought of the pieces in slumber does not define cowardice?" Replied the child. "I'm simply finding consolation in the delusion that the pieces I've lost are only resting. And if that is still a cowardly act, then... in the end, it still wouldn't matter, would it?"

"Yes, because what does is your strategy to win the game, and one cannot play without being prepared to kill."

"Now it seems as if you're the one who's teaching me." The girl pursed her lips in reluctance. She looked at him in the eyes, and there was a glint that claimed betrayal. "All this time, did you actually know how to play chess?"

"Oh, how could you catch up to my lie!?" Dazai exclaimed rather flamboyantly. He flailed his arms for dramatic emphasis, but something in his actions told that he had foreseen her question. "But I hope you didn't mind, (y/n). It was very amusing to watch you teach me."

There was beauty in the reasoning of her pure mind, and it was the beauty he wished to cherish for as long as he knew her. It was the beauty he supposed he had lacked when he was a child, and it was the beauty that highlighted the rationality of innocence. Dazai loved the strange feeling of safety he felt as he continued to converse with her, because there were no consequences for saying anything wrong.

And in the midst of doing so, she made him realize that what lied between cowardice and foolhardiness was courage.