084: Origami

Eleanora entered my room as usual, not knocking.

“Al, what are you doing?” Eleanora

She looked at me with her hand on the doorknob, I was sitting on the floor with some paper. For her, the mansion is just an extension of her room, she doesn’t need to knock. Even if I complain about not knocking, I’ll just get a noncommittal reply.

“I’m folding paper, I call it origami.” Al

When I show my partially folded paper, Eleanora is unconvinced.

“Origami? I don’t get the point of what you’re doing, you know paper costs money, right?” Eleanora

I feel like I’m being ridiculed, does she think I’m folding paper meaninglessly? I’d be crazy to do that.

“I’m not wasting paper, ok? There’s something interesting at the end.” Al

“Huh?” Eleanora

I’d better just show Eleanora, she’s too focused on swords to get my drift.

I’ll start with a simple origami. I start folding the paper that I’ve already cut to the correct size. Unfortunately, the only color I have is white paper, so I’m looking at rabbits, swans, fish, and cows (after some work with a pen). If the silhouette is good enough, they’ll look cute after eyes are drawn on. I’d prefer to fold flowers, dogs, foxes, etc. with pretty colors, but they don’t come across when the only color is white. I think I’ll start with a cute rabbit, that should be easy to understand.

I move my hands to fold a rabbit, I remember the movements from my past life’s elementary school days. Eleanora sits down in front of me, watching what I’m doing. When Eleanora sat down, a nice scent drifted over, reminds me of my mother.

“You’re pretty dextrous” Eleanora

“Hmm” Al

I kept folding as necessary, and when I was done folding, I add a few details with a pen.

“Done! A little rabbit!” Al

The rabbit face is done, but it’s just a face. I don’t know how to fold the one that includes a torso. When I handed it over to Eleanora, she played with the ears then let out an admiring comment.

“Hmm, it sort of looks like a rabbit’s face, the ears are cute.” Eleanora

Well, that’s because I folded it to look like that. While Eleanora watches, I go on and fold a cow, swan, boat, and a bouncing frog. It’s a bit monotonous, but that’s all I have.

“Hey, can I have this?” Eleanora

Of the ones I folded, Eleanora like the bouncing frog best. If you push down on the butt, it will fly off. Eleanora is focused on the frog in her hand, her eyes are shining with delight. It’s sad that I don’t have any green paper, but I was able to draw a cute face.

I was fond of my frog-inspired Gekota slippers, but the Tonkichi ones are cute too. Eleanora ended up getting a pair of the Tonkichi, they’re currently on her feet. My room is carpeted in the center so there’s a comfortable spot to sit, but she’s near the edge. It’s funny how she and our mother wear the same style of slippers.

“If you like bouncy Gekota, I’ll give him to you” Al

“Wait! What’s with the bouncy part?” Eleanora

“Let me borrow…” Al

When I try to demonstrate the bouncing feature of the frog, Eleanora twists her hand away. What’s with her cute gesture?

“No, I just want to borrow it. I can always make another one.” Al

“Really? Then can you make five more?” Eleanora

Do you want a Gekota family?

“Ok, fine” Al

When I agreed, Eleanora smiled and handed me the original bouncy Gekota. I take him and place him on the floor. I then put my index finger on Gekota’s butt and let it go, then Gekota bounced into the air.

“It jumped” Al

“Wow!” Eleanora let out in a cute voice.

Eleanora’s cute appearance is making her seem gentle, it’s so different from regular Eleanora. Eleanora seems to have fallen in love with bouncy Gekota, she bounces and chases the frog around my room.

“This is great! Make like 10 more!” Eleanora

Perhaps it would have been better to not tell Eleanora about that function…

I fold a crane while Eleanora is bouncing the frog around. Ignoring paper airplanes, a swan is the most common folded item. For origami, Japanese people pick up during elementary school, for events and things. At first, I was mystified, I would say things like ‘Can I really make that by just folding paper?’. Eventually, I managed to fold an ungainly swan. I’ve gotten a lot better at origami since then, so I finished folding the swan and spread the wings to finish it.

“What’s that one? A bird?” Eleanora

Eleanora had sat down next to me to observe.

“That’s right, a bird called a crane.” Al

“So you can fold paper to make something like this” Eleanora

“It’s not that hard, I can show you” Al

If you’ll put your mind to it, you can make the 10 bouncing frogs yourself. Somehow, Eleanora picked up a piece of paper obediently.

“Then I’ll try it, so show me.” Eleanora

When I fold the paper into triangles, Eleanora imitates me and folds it. Oh, she’s not very careful, that won’t work later.

“Huh? What’s wrong?” Eleanora

Eleanora must have noticed my expression.

“No, you’ve got to match up the edges when making folds, it’s integral to the end product.” Al

“It’ll be fine” Eleanora

When I showed her the triangles that were properly folded, she complained a bit, but re-folded hers. This behavior makes me worried about her future. I fold it in half and Eleanora matches me, she managed to get the edges lined up this time. Alright, now we have the difficult step…

“Wait a minute, what did you just do?” Eleanora

It seems Eleanora is tripping over the step where the middle is pulled out to make a square shape.

“So you pull here” Al

“Like this?” Eleanora

“Nope” Al

“I thought I pulled here!” Eleanora

“Can you spread it out? I don’t know if you get the action, but…” Al

“No! It’s just confusing! I’m on the third step, but it won’t work for me!” Eleanora

“I don’t know what you mean, can’t you feel the steps with your fingers?” Al

Oh, it’s so weird. How can you be so coordinated with a sword and fall apart during basic origami? I almost said those things, but they wouldn’t go over well. The other party is Eleanora, she wouldn’t appreciate those thoughts. To be honest, it’s difficult to jump right into making a crane. Perhaps I can start her off with a simpler origami figure.

“Somehow, your expression annoys me” Eleanora

As Eleanora squints at me in annoyance, I hear a voice from my room’s entrance.

“Both of you sound like you’ve been having fun, but what are you doing?” Silvio

Silvio found a nice time to enter, really good. I guess I should thank Eleanora for not closing the door.

“Paper folding also known as Origami” Al

“Origami?” Silvio

I show Silvio the swan I had made earlier, he walked over to examine the swan with great interest. It seems he is wearing his Pyonkichi slippers today.

“Hmm, is this a bird?” Silvio

“That’s right” Al

“So it was made by just folding the paper? That’s interesting, can you show me?” Silvio

It seems it’s piqued the interest of Silvio, he seems enthusiastic.

“Yeah, Silvio can definitely make it” Al

Unlike a certain someone, he is careful and dexterous.

“Are you sure you should say that?” Silvio

“Don’t worry about it. Eleanora is fine with it, it’s a relaxed atmosphere.” Al

“Don’t count me out” Eleanora

Eleanora jumps into the conversation, possibly she’s worried about double meanings. Even so, I heard that ‘Al’s habit’ phrase, I’m worried about that. Sure I don’t have a high position in the mansion, but I just have to careful, right?

“So what are you going to fold next? What about something easier than the crane from before?” Eleanora

Eleanora sends a disgusted look at the crane figure.

“It was cool a while ago, but they’re both amazing.” Silvio

“Then, let’s make a shurikan, they’re easy to make and play with” Al

“Shurikan?” Eleanora & Silvio

I can hear a suspicious tone of voice from Eleanora and Silvio. It’s fine to make paper planes, but I’ll leave that til later.

“Is this one going to involve more of the weird pulling steps?” Eleanora

“No, the final step it a little tricky, but not as bad as the crane.” Al

I handed two sheets of paper each to Eleanora and Silvio. Silvio took them with a refreshing smile, but Eleanora was more suspicious of me. It’s not more difficult just because there’s two sheets of paper now.

“So, you start by folding the paper in half…” Al

“They don’t fit together!” Eleanora

“That’s why I said to fold one oppositely!” Al

Was Eleanora listening to my instructions? In front of us was two pieces of paper that weren’t combining since they were folded in the same pattern.

“Oh, it works. This is a strange star-like shape, right?” Silvio

As for my other sibling, he listens to instructions, so the observant Silvio had completed the paper shurikan. All the edges were carefully folded and the items folded together perfectly.

“Silvio made it?” Al

“You’re noisy! I’m trying to do the reverse way!” Eleanora

“Al, how do you play with this?” Silvio

Silvio asked me what the purpose of the shurikan was as Eleanora was trying to unravel one of her paper pieces to refold it correctly.

“You can throw it” Al

“Huh? Throw it?” Silvio

It seems Silvio didn’t expect it to be that sort of item.

“Yes, pick it up and throw it like this!” Al

When I went to the hallway to demonstrate the throw, it flew past Silvio’s room and ended up in front of Eleanora’s room. I’d guess that was about 6 meters in distance?

“That flies pretty well, yeah!” Silvio

Silvio tries to throw the shurikan, but it hits a wall and falls down.

“It’s difficult to control” Silvio

Silvio didn’t seem to care about the difficulty, he looked happy as he went to pick up the fallen item.

“Oh, can you pick up mine too?” Al

“I’m done!” Eleanora

When I called out to Silvio, Eleanora stood up and came out into the hallway. She aimed at Silvio who was bending over to pick up my shurikan off the ground. Really?

“Eh?” Silvio

“Silvio! Danger!” Al

As Silvio turned around to see what was wrong…

“Huh?” Silvio

Eleanora’s shurikan flew in a beautiful ninja throw right into Silvio’s forehead. I feel like I heard a worrying sound.

“Silvioooo!” Al

I lifted up Silvio who had fallen to the floor.

“Ah… Al. It hurts so much… Shurikan….” Silvio

“Silviooo!” Al

If that was an iron shurikan, Silvio would grievously wounded. That was an astounding throw, Eleanora is really good at the martial arts.

“This is nice… I wonder if it would be a good weapon to make from iron?” Eleanora

Next to me, my sister plots about things. Of course, she doesn’t check on Silvio. Perhaps she considers her younger brother as nothing more than a rock on the side of the road.

Really though, don’t use peaceful toys as weapons.

Translation

Good Job!

Do Better!

Chapter

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