Amélie yawned as her alarm clock went off, groggily reaching out to stop it before sitting up on her bed. She rubbed her eyes and looked around, and was greeted by Mong Mong’s deep, low whine. “Morning buddy…” she croaked, her voice not yet warmed up. The morning felt rather slow today as she climbed out of bed and got herself ready for the day, slipping on her favourite turtleneck sweater, along with her skirt, and walked to the bathroom

She took a look at herself in the mirror, her hair a jumbled curly mess, Amélie wasn’t particularly a fan of her natural wavy locks, and would rather take her time standing in the bathroom with a straightener than head outside the way she looked now. She finished up and went into the kitchen, and to her surprise Amy was sitting on the long couch in the living room. “A-Amy?” She said, “Why are you up so early?” Her sister rested her arms on the back of her head and closed her eyes, “Iuno, woke up in the middle of the night and couldn’t go back to sleep, so ‘m here. Why’re you up?” 

“Aah pffhh, I’m— I’m heading out.” Amélie hopped on the spot happily as she searched around for her tote bag, relieved as she spotted it resting by the couches.  “Haaah? Where’re yuh off to?” Amy asked, she kicked her feet up on the coffee table and watched as Amélie took her laptop on the coffee table off charge and turned to look at her with a grin, clearly excited to go wherever she was headed as she slid it inside her bag. “Grace’s! She asked for some help with the plants, w-wanna come with?”

“Nah I’m good, hey uh… Have you fed Mong Mong yet, I can do that for you?” Amélie’s eyes widened and she smacked her head, “S-Shoot I forgot, sorry… Could you do that for me please?” Amy nodded nonchalantly and Amélie squealed, running up to her sister for a hug to the twin’s hidden joy, Amélie pulled away and Amy shot her small happy expression down, looking just as unbothered as ever. “I-I’ll be heading off now, thank you so much!”

Amy waved goodbye as the older demihuman unlocked the front door and made her way out, closing the door behind her, she then began her walk to a nearby subway station, one that would take her to the closest portal to the plant demon’s residence, Leafdon. She… did dislike going through portals, yes, but she’d do just about anything for a close friend. She made her way to the station and tapped her foot against the concrete floor as she waited for the train to arrive. Sure, making portals to an area was something demons could do, but it wasn’t like Amélie herself could. Such a heavy spell was already very exhausting to do, although it certainly wasn’t the reason why Amélie decided to catch a train instead.

Amélie can’t hear the supposed heartbeat of Larghetto—the wolf god—in Mars’ core.

The very thing that connected demons to their magic was the beating heart of Larghetto, and Amélie just couldn’t hear it. She was unsure if it was because she was unlucky, or if her mother was the reason why she couldn’t hear it, seeing as Hyejin was human. Not that she minded it of course, but her sister Amy could hear it perfectly fine, and that left Amélie curious. Was there something she had to do in order to hear it, or was there a way to work around it without being able to hear the heartbeat? And such curiosity was what gave Amélie the brilliant idea to make a website blog dedicated to researching resonance. It was a perfect opportunity to work on something she was intrigued by, while also completing a year long uni assignment, one that required students to make a blog about a topic of their choice.

And today was the day that Amélie was going to make her first post on her blog.

She set foot into the train and let out a silent squeal, quick to take an empty seat between two people. She tapped her hands on her thighs and tapped both of her feet, unable to keep still over the thought of seeing her close friend soon. Grace Lucroy was an amazing friend that she looked up to a lot, albeit she was a few years older than her, but Amélie paid no mind, enjoying the demon’s company whenever she could. 

Grace always acted like the mom friend of the group, and Amélie always found such a title to be pretty hard to carry with all the weight you’d carry on your back. But she knew Grace, she would always spring back up whenever she was dragged down, and even took the time to take care of herself, Amélie couldn’t imagine figuring out a schedule to focus on others and on herself at the same time at all, and that alone earned Amélie’s respect.

The train slowed down as it finally reached Amélie’s stop, and with a face of certainty she slipped her tote bag back onto her shoulder and stood up from her seat to walk right out, taking a moment to scan the area before making her way to the portal to Leafdon.

…Only to see Grace waiting for her by a set of stairs. Amélie simply stood there dumbfounded as Grace gave her a small wave, and caught herself stammering as she tried to greet her close friend. The plant demon only giggled as Amélie shook her head in a moment of disbelief, and went up to give her a reassuring hug.

“I-I thought you were gonna stay home?” Grace patted her on the back and brought her closer to the steps as she replied, “Well I was, but I figured you’d end up walking all the way, so I came to help.” Amélie blushed in slight embarrassment, knowing just what her friend was talking about. “T-Thanks but I could’ve just done it anyway, you really didn’t need to help.”

“Oh nonsense! Plus won’t it be quicker this way?” The taller woman stated, flicking her fingers around to summon a portal to her doorstep, Amélie looked at her with concern and opened her mouth to speak, failing to do so as Grace ushered her over to the other side. “Don’t worry, I already brung my board up before you came, I’m always a step ahead!” Amélie let out a sigh of relief as she stepped right in, finding herself stumbling again on the other end of the portal. Grace showed up behind the smaller demihuman and helped her back up on her feet, stepping aside to unlock her door to let the two of them inside.

Amélie squealed as she entered the house and ran straight to Grace’s backyard right where the garden was. It was always pleasant to hang outside where all the plants were, as the smell was very sweet on Amélie’s poor strong nose. Being half human may have just saved her from many episodes of sensory overloads, and she would like to thank her mom for that. Amélie sniffed around and noticed a bunch of plants grouped together wrapped up in lovely ribbons and pointed at it to inquire as Grace followed, gently closing the screen door behind her.

“What’s that for?” She asked, looking up at Grace as she responded. “Oh! That’s for the Floral Fete. I need your help with bringing these with the community garden nearby.” Amélie seemed unsure as she glanced at the plants and back at Grace, “Are— Are you sure I can help with that? I-I don’t exactly have the muscles for this kinda thing…” Grace raised her brow and couldn’t help but snort as she realised what Amélie meant, “Oh no, no no no! I’m not going to let you break your back with those, here,” Grace motioned Amélie over to a tray filled with cuttings, “I just need you to carry this for me, I can take care of everything else.”

The shorter demihuman’s posture relaxed upon hearing those words. Grace was very strong compared to her by a long shot alright, but Amélie came to help her, so carry this tray she must! “O-Oh, yeah I can do that!” She said with confidence, smiling from ear to ear as Grace ruffled her hair. “I knew I could count on you.”

Amélie’s ears then pointed upwards as she felt something fuzzy brush against her leg, and right beneath her stood a furry fellow the demon wasn’t familiar with. She crouched down to greet the Vannath, Ciepirs, that was what people called them, and what charming little guys they were. This Ciepir was of plant origin, at least that was what Amélie assumed as she had only seen ones of this colour at the Floral Fete, and looked to Grace for answers.

“Oh, hello there!” said Grace with a rather huge smile, she crouched down in front of Amélie to pet the Ciepir. “This is Petunia, she’s a retired guard of Leafdon. She’s getting pretty old now so I volunteered to take her in.” Of course, Amélie thought that was very typical of Grace. She was sure if given the chance, her fellow demon friend would say yes to taking in a kid too, but it wasn’t shocking. Such a caring, motherly person like her already finds interest in the care of others, so why wouldn’t she?

Amélie followed Grace back up and gave Petunia a little wave alongside her, smiling ear to ear over an unexpected head pat from Grace right after. She watched her friend in awe as she put the batch of plants in a box, already half filled with empty pots on top of small trays, and audibly gasped as she picked up the heavy thing! Her noodle arms could never carry something like that, and she was very aware of that, she doesn’t even have a body close to Grace’s! Grace was toned on top of the known fact that plant demons are naturally very strong. If there was someone to avoid upsetting, it was Grace for sure, but a glance from her plant friend was enough to snap Amélie out of her tranced state, and with slight uncertainty she picked up the tray filled with cuttings, catching up to Grace as she turned her head back with a reassured smile.

“A-Aren’t you gonna bring up a portal or?” Grace giggled at Amélie’s question, “Not this time, no, I think this’ll be good for you.” Amélie shot her an expression of confusion mixed with exhaustion, she barely started with her task and she was this close to her first complaint. “W-What, walking? I can do that just fine!” She told Grace in an attempt to trick herself into being confident, and as they left Grace’s house Amélie found that it was successful as she began to pick up her pace. It didn’t take them too long to reach the community garden, but that didn’t keep Amélie safe from tripping over air twice in a row to the taller demihuman’s concern.

Relieved at the sight of the entrance gate to the garden, Amélie sprinted to a spot where she could put the tray down, and wiped a drop off sweat off her forehead. Grace on the other hand took her time with making it inside, and made it seem like it wasn’t much of a challenge for her. As Amélie took this time to catch her breath she took note that she should’ve expected Grace to make her go through a session of cardio, given that Amélie was known to be on her laptop quite often, maybe she should start walking more.

Her eyes then focused on two figures coming up to her and Grace and stood right up to greet them, Acacia and Marienne, those were their names, and they seemed as bubbly as ever tending to the garden.

“Hey! What brings you two here?” said Acacia, as Marienne placed her hands on her friend’s shoulders, they were happy over getting a lovely greeting back from Grace who was first to reply. “We’ve got some more plants for the Floral Fete, would this be enough?” Amélie shuffled the cuttings in the tray around as she watched the three talk, it didn’t take long to be reminded of how nice it was to hang around the two, they were very optimistic just like she was, and she found that speaking to similar people was much easier to do. She decided to listen in to the conversation, something about this year’s Floral Fete having more volunteers for the charity, that was good! The Floral Fete is known for how much money and care goes into the wellbeing of Mars’ demon community, and Grace seemed joyed over the fact so many people were volunteering to help.

Amélie’s thoughts were then abruptly interrupted as she picked the tray back up at the request of Grace’s motion for her to come over, with Marienne assisting in pushing Acacia around as the conversation went on. She then placed it down where Grace pointed at, and crouched down in front of a garden bed, taking a closer look at the cuttings as her demon friend sat right beside her. One by one each cutting was placed into the garden bed, and Amélie’s ears flicked at the wind. It was starting to get a little chilly this time around, and for a moment Amélie considered wearing a scarf for now, if she had any that is. She was perfectly content with wearing her favourite clothes, but she guessed that a scarf would keep her comfortable and warm nonetheless.

With a relaxed sigh, Amélie glanced up at her good friend and smiled as she spotted the grin on her face, today was very good so far, and Amélie wanted to keep it that way, a moment to wind down and enjoy the breeze instead of looking at bright screens at night and papers on her desk. After the final cutting was planted into the garden bed, Grace and Amélie waved goodbye to Acacia and Marienne as they got up and headed back to the plant demon’s house.