Chapter 587 Childbirth Season ②
Edited by: Kanaa-senpai
A few days later, Hazuki—the daughter of me and Love Mage Satsuki—came into the world as a true “hurry-up baby.” Not only did she pop-pop-pop right out like that, but her labor itself had been fast.
So fast that despite all our preparations, my mentor and midwife, Granny Miranda, didn’t make it in time for the birth.
She’s Satsuki’s grandmother, too, and she’s delivered every one of my kids so far. I never thought she’d miss her own great-grandchild’s birth. Her face showed nothing, but she seemed pretty frustrated about it. Well, that’s fine, but…
”Hey, don’t you think you’re overstayin’ your welcome a bit?”
”Don’t be so stiff. What’s wrong with comin’ to see my great-grandchild?”
Granny Miranda started visiting our house every single day. She visited more often than Satsuki’s parents. Apparently, even this stubborn old woman couldn’t resist her great-granddaughter’s charm.
”Hee hee. I’m happy, but if you fuss over her too much, Hazuki will get tired.”
”I know that. How many years do you think I’ve been a midwife? Honestly, you two, talkin’ back to me—you’ve gotten pretty big for your britches.”
She’s sharp-tongued with her granddaughter Satsuki, too—pretty strict, actually. But I wonder: when Satsuki was a baby, did she make that soft, loving face too?
Satsuki and Granny don’t look much alike, so I never quite connected them in my mind. But watchin’ them talk so freely with each other, I guess they really are family.
”Still, ‘Hazuki’… no matter how many times I hear it, it’s a beautiful name…”
Granny squinted at the sleeping Hazuki, then gazed into the distance as she murmured this. She says it every time we say Hazuki’s name, so I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard it.
Not that she was trying to compliment my naming sense or anything. This was probably the first time she’d praised me this much since I became her apprentice.
”‘She looks just like him.’”
”‘Hold on, she’s a girl!’”
”‘…’”
”Hee hee. How many times is this now?”
Satsuki chimed in with both our lines, laughing cheerfully. Yeah, I’ve lost count of that exchange too. Granny says “She looks just like him” about Satsuki’s grandfather—her late husband—and I do my usual straight-man bit.
Hazuki is the first of my kids born with my hair color. Though since Satsuki also has black hair, maybe it’s not that she looks like me, so much as that we happen to share the same color. Still, her facial features have a distinctly Eastern look—more like me than Satsuki, whose features are slightly Western.
I don’t know if she really looks like me, or if the blood of Satsuki’s grandfather woke up in her, or what genes were at work. But if Granny says so, I’ll go with the latter, for my mental health.
”Hey, why don’t you tell him about Grandpa already?”
After the two of us got caught doin’ our usual comedy routine, Satsuki threw this one out. It was the same question I’d asked the first time Granny saw Hazuki and made that comment—the one after she’d missed the birth.
I hadn’t been that curious, exactly, but if it came up, you’d ask, right? “What was he like?” Granny had brushed it off with “Oh, nothin’ special, just a regular guy.”
That was so like her. No way someone who murmured that with those eyes was talkin’ about “nothin’ special.” I wish she’d spare me the tsundere grandma routine. Besides, the more she hides it, the more curious I get—especially when she keeps repeatin’ the same line.
”Well now… I don’t even know if half of this is true.”
”Doesn’t matter. I want to hear it.”
”Good grief. I don’t like tellin’ old stories—makes me feel like an old woman.”
Looks like Granny had decided to tell it this time. I held back on my usual “You’re not ‘like’ an old woman, you just are one” tsukkomi so she wouldn’t get sulky and change her mind.
”…They say he was born on an island country at the eastern edge. Lived there until he was ten, then got caught by pirates and sold to a country called Suon, west of that island. For six years after that, he lived—somewhere between a slave and a servant.”
Granny told his birth story in simple words. The geography sounded familiar, and the country name was one I’d never heard. I tensed up a little, but it didn’t seem to be that country I know. I let out a small breath and waited for more.
”The turnin’ point came when his master’s house burned down. From what I hear, he wasn’t treated badly. He apparently wanted to stay, but his master said ‘can’t keep you’ and let him go. He could’ve sold him, but… the master didn’t.”
”Good fortune or bad?”
”Well, for me it was good fortune. If none of this had happened, he wouldn’t have drifted this far.”
”From there, west? He didn’t go back to his homeland?”
”No, apparently he intended to at first. But he got on a ship, went the wrong way, and ended up in a southern country.”
”That’s quite…”
”Heh heh. Clumsy, right? And then he thought, ‘Maybe this is destiny,’ and just kept hoppin’ on random ships until he drifted all the way here. You’ve got to admire the audacity.”
”Is it really that easy?”
”Probably not, but he himself said it was ‘a fun journey.’ Born into a famous warrior family, and he was skilled enough that he never had to worry about food, apparently.”
”Even though pirates captured him?”
”The pirates were strong too, apparently. He used to say if he’d been a couple years older, he wouldn’t have lost.”
”…So was he a violent brute or a laid-back guy? I can’t tell.”
”Both, I suppose. He was oblivious to people’s malice, but because things always worked out, he didn’t worry about it. He did love a good fight, though.”
”And then he met me at the port of Sylvaol. We got married and came to this country.”
”Granny, you were in Sylvaol?”
”I traveled around too. Got tired of just studying. I loved traveling—different scale from him, but still. Maybe that’s where we clicked…”
She trailed off, clearly wrappin’ up the story. There was plenty more I wanted to ask—how they met, what married life was like—but that could wait for another time. I realized I’d forgotten one important thing, though.
”Come to think of it, I never heard Grandfather’s name.”
”Oh, didn’t you? His name was Tadayasu. Tadayasu Mochida. I think he got called all sorts of different names in different countries he visited.”
Now that was a name I knew well. I felt like the mystery had only deepened, but I decided to leave it at that for now.
—
Summary:
The narrator and Satsuki celebrate their newborn daughter Hazuki while Granny Miranda visits obsessively, repeatedly noting that the baby resembles her late husband Tadayasu. Pressured by Satsuki, Miranda finally shares Tadayasu’s backstory—his childhood in an eastern island nation, capture by pirates, years of servitude, and accidental journey across the seas that brought him to her. The chapter ends with Miranda revealing Tadayasu’s full name, which the narrator recognizes, deepening the mystery rather than resolving it.
—
Trivia:
Granny Miranda has delivered every one of the narrator’s children so far, but missed Hazuki’s birth because it happened too fast.
The “She looks just like him” joke about Hazuki resembling Tadayasu has been repeated so many times that everyone has lost count.
Tadayasu was captured by pirates at age ten and sold into servitude in a country called Suon.
The narrator becomes tense when Miranda mentions an “eastern island nation,” fearing it might be his own homeland.
Tadayasu’s philosophy—”Maybe this is destiny”—reflects the Japanese concept of en (fate/encounters).
The narrator recognizes Tadayasu’s name and family name, Mochida, suggesting a hidden connection to his own past.
Miranda traveled extensively before meeting Tadayasu, saying she “got tired of just studying.”
The grandmother’s gruff exterior hides deep emotion—she cherished Tadayasu despite calling him “nothing special.”
Hazuki is the first of the narrator’s children born with his hair color, strengthening the resemblance to Tadayasu’s bloodline.
Satsuki orchestrates the family conversation, playing the role of bridge between the narrator and Miranda’s relationship.
Notes:
• Satsuki – Miranda’s granddaughter is a robed court mage and former top Academy student with long black hair and mixed Western-Eastern features. Now a Harvest Love-Mage at the Ddo-Buddy Palace, she is the protagonist’s playful, warm wife and mother to Hazuki and Nagatsuki. She orchestrates family conversations, tutors her husband, assists in prototype design, and is friends with pregnant Amelia.
• Hazuki – Job: Infant; Relationship: Daughter to Narrator and Satsuki; Great-granddaughter to Miranda; Appearance: Black hair like father, distinctly Eastern facial features; Note: Newborn, first of narrator’s children born with his hair color.
• Miranda – Granny Miranda is an elderly, witch-like midwife with silver hair and a weathered cloak. The widow of Tadayasu, she is grandmother to Satsuki, great-grandmother to Hazuki, and a shared mentor to the narrator and Barbara. She masters magic medicine to monitor unborn babies. Beneath her gruff exterior and old-fashioned rural speech lies a tender warmth.
• Tadayasu – Job: Deceased; Relationship: Grandfather to Satsuki; Husband to Miranda; Appearance: Unknown; Note: Born eastern island nation, captured by pirates, traveled extensively; name means “loyal peace.”
• Mochida – Job: Family lineage bearer; Relationship: Carried by Tadayasu; Note: Family name from eastern island nation.
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Edited by Kanaa-senpai.
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