Chapter 272: Choco Craze!

Xavi sat outside while Ermin and Calis cleaned up the chocolate smears in her shelter. Xavi was leaning against the outer wall as he nibbled on his bar of chocolate with his eyes half closed.

He looked so happy and shy eating it, not paying attention to anyone else. Tera nearly melted. Xavi looked so adorable like this that it was almost shocking.

With the way his ears twitched with each bite, someone already had a sweet tooth. The sight reminded her of a video she had seen of a bear feasting on honey.

He was taking small bites, slowly, working each one around his mouth before he swallowed, and the expression on his face was one of absolute uninterrupted bliss.

Her heart could not take this amount of cuteness.

And it did not help that Naida was echoing him.

The little thing was seated on his leg with her SECOND bar clutched in both hands, munching away. She was covered in chocolate. Her entire face, her hands, both forearms, a good portion of her hair, and now a sizeable patch of Xavi’s thigh.

Neither of them had said a word in several minutes.

Tera stood there and simply looked at the two bear beasts who were lost in their own trance.

’OMG. They’re the same person.’

She walked a bit farther to see the rest of the clan.

The chocolate had split her people straight down the middle.

Some of them had taken one taste and been completely undone by it. Those ones were nursing their pieces, breaking them into smaller and smaller portions to make them last. They had especially developed a hunted look about anyone who came near them.

Eating the chocolate bar literally sent them to tears too, much to Tera’s shock.

It reminded her of the first time she had made them eat properly cooked meat.

The others had spat it out within three seconds and now would not go near the stuff. One male had taken his piece, tasted it, handed it back to Tera, and thanked her very politely in the manner of a beast who never wanted to speak of this again.

A particular sponsor had not been too pleased by this.

{PervyGoddess is shocked}

Tera froze in front of two cubs who were wrestling over a single bar of chocolate.

{PervyGoddess says that gift was for Tera}

{PervyGoddess says they are counting nineteen beasts currently holding her chocolate}

{PervyGoddess is not pleased}

’Uh oh...’

[Oh no]

[(;’?’)]

[Host. Host, say something]

[SAY SOMETHING]

Tera panicked.

’I’m so sorry. Really, I am. I just wanted to share this with them—’

{PervyGoddess pouts}

{BeastWorldAddict laughs and says Tera is very sweet}

{BeastWorldAddict finds this extremely cute}

{PervyGoddess says Tera may share her gift. It belongs to her, after all}

Tera let out a sigh of relief.

[(つ≧▽≦)つ]

[Crisis averted!]

Tera smiled, turning her attention to the squabble in front of her.

"HEY!"

While the reactions of the adults had been entertaining, the cubs were something else entirely.

It had started badly, because the first cub to come around the corner from their nursery had walked into a clearing full of adults with brown smeared across their mouths and chins, several of whom were in the process of licking it off their own hands.

The older cub had stopped dead.

Then he had turned around and ran, screaming, back the way he came.

"THEY ARE EATING POOPOO!"

"WHAT?" Another older cub screeched.

"THE BIG ONES ARE EATING POOP! THEY’RE EATING EACH OTHER’S POOP!"

Within about forty seconds, the entire cub population of the Dow clan had assembled at a safe distance, and they were all screeching at once. Several were confused and baffled, and when the adults approached them to calm them down, they scrambled away, crying as if they weren’t the sole source of messy poops.

Just yesterday, a few of them were still being potty trained, so the audacity for them to act so high and mighty was silly.

Then again, there was a distinction between passing one’s faeces and eating it entirely.

It had taken ten solid minutes to calm them down, and the only thing that had worked in the end was Tera sitting down on the ground in front of them, holding up a bar, and eating a piece of it very slowly while they all watched.

Then she had offered them some.

And the thing was, nearly all the cubs liked it far more than the adults did.

Not all of them. Althea was still boycotting on principle and had spent the entire afternoon sitting beside Calis with her arms folded. She constantly eyed the other cubs and adults with disgust while the majority of the little ones had taken one taste and gone absolutely feral.

Within the hour, Tera had witnessed:

One cub attempting to eat the wrapper along with the chocolate and having to be physically stopped.

Two cubs who had worked out that if they held their pieces in their mouths without chewing, it went soft and lasted longer, and who were now sitting in silence, cheeks bulging, staring at nothing.

A cub who had hidden his piece somewhere and then forgotten where was now crying and methodically digging through the entire clan looking for it while refusing all offers of a replacement because that one was not his.

Three cubs who had tried to trade Tera various items for more. She had been offered a rock, a stick, and somebody’s loincloth, but Tera had to control herself and not give the cubs any more before they developed tooth cavities.

One extremely small cub who had fallen asleep mid-chew with the chocolate still in her hand and had to be pried off it.

And Nadia, who had established a position on Xavi’s leg at the start of all this and had not relinquished it since, on the apparently correct theory that proximity to Xavi meant proximity to the supply.

Despite how much Xavi enjoyed his, he was still sharing his piece with her.

Yara had tried a piece, considered it with great seriousness, declared it "very strange," and then taken another piece.

Meanwhile, Ermin, Calis, and the other adults and a few cubs who could not stand the taste of the chocolate bars sat in a circle to watch the rest of the clan like they were witnessing an event.

By late afternoon, Tera had collected every wrapper.

That part had been bothering her since the first bar got opened, and it kept bothering her more as the day went on, because her clan now had a quantity of brightly coloured foil-lined packaging in a world that had never produced a single piece of rubbish like it in its entire existence.

There was nowhere for it to go.

It would not rot, burning was not a good idea, and she didn’t want it sitting in the soil of her territory for longer than anybody currently alive would be around to see, and she had watched enough of her own world go that way to know exactly how that story went.

So, she went around and picked up every single one out of the dirt, off the mats, out from under a sleeping cub, and one out of the mouth of the cub who had been trying to eat his.

Then she put the whole lot into her storage, with no plan whatsoever beyond keeping it out of the ground until she thought of something.

[Host]

’Mm?’

[What is Host doing?]

’Putting the wrappers somewhere. They don’t break down. I’m not leaving them in this world.’

[Ah!]

[Host is storing refuse]

Tera suspiciously eyed it. Was it trying to mock her?

’I usually don’t do this. If there was an option to obliterate it out of existence, I would.’

[Hehehe]

[(つ﹏?)]

[This system commends Host for its attempt at environmental conservation]

Tera chuckled.

[Host can rely on this system sometimes, you know?]

[This system will dispose of it properly, and at no cost to Host’s storage]

Tera blinked. ’Wait, you can get rid of stuff permanently?’

[This system can]

[Host may hand over all such refuse in future, and this system will see to it]

[(? ·? ?)]

’Hmm, you’re feeling pretty helpful today.’

[Hasn’t this system always been helpful?]

[? ? ? ?]

Tera laughed. ’No.’

[(·•?_•? )]

Tera smiled to herself.

’Thank you. Seriously.’

[( ? ?o - ? ?o )?]

[Hmm...]

[Host is welcome]

[Host should still not have threatened to make this system vomit for days]

’OMG! Are you still hung up on that?’

- ※ - ※ - ※ -

The sun was going down, and the clan had settled into the particular contented quiet of a group that had collectively eaten something extremely good.

Xavi had not moved from the wall. Nadia had finally fallen asleep against his chest with chocolate dried all over both of them, and Xavi had his arm around her and no apparent intention of ever getting up. Althea had migrated into Ermin’s lap, and the little chocolate objector was dozing while the rest of the clan still roamed about.

Tera sat down beside Calis, who turned his attention from the cubs high on sugar pestering him.

He smiled gently at Ro, happy to see her.

It had been a genuinely good day. The shelter was finished, her cubs were a mess, her mates were fed, and she had a box in her storage the size of a deep freezer.

By herself, those chocolates might as well be able to last her a whole lifetime if not a year.

[Host!]

’What?’

[Two beasts are approaching the Dow clan territory]

[They are from Host’s former tribe]