Chapter 6: Ivy Oysters and Fishy Indirect Kiss

Docks, Outskirts, New Azazel Empire, Galia

In the kitchen of the Solaris' Ship, One Siren and one kraken looked at the two dead Ivy Oysters that the latter had caught two hours prior.

"Raw or cooked?" The Siren asked, serious and straight faced, looking towards the two large bi-valved mollusks the size of human heads.

"Ae... The question is: 'sliced or whole?' . Not 'Raw or cooked?' when you don't even know how to cook..."

"Ah. you got a point." Aegir said nonchalantly, shooing away the kraken and started preparing the food in the kitchen he borrowed from Cornelius.

The raw ivy oysters had quite a distinct milky flavour and a buttery aftertaste. Because of it's highly sought after flavour, it is considered as one of the most expensive and rarely served delicacies– Rarely served because as one of the few 'dormant' species that don't move but can survive the harsh nature of the Azazelean Sea, it had a strong poison contained in its very flesh, resulting in its tenacious survival.

Precarious as it is for other species to prepare, Aegir, A siren that lived long eating it on every meal knew how to direct the poison out of the flesh.

With precise accuracy, Aegir let out the poison with his innate ability to control liquids, prepping the meat out of the shell with one swift movement after.

The Ivy oysters was different from other oysters that comes from the other seas, in that it has a much larger flesh and is has more depth than the usual salty and briny ones.

Aegir cleaned the oyster of it's impurities, serving it raw on Miyu's platter, and again, prepped his own food.

"Ah, Paradeisos has come. It has been so long since I've had this baby. " Miyu said, gazing at the white piece of flesh with burning hunger, but only until he saw Aegir put his own oyster in a platter and sat down, did he actually dig in.

Aegir looked at the delicacy in his plate, the edges decorated with flavoring seaweeds unique to the Azazelean Sea. His eyes flashed with different emotions. Nostalgia and sadness coming on top amongst all others.

"See? This is how you treat a friend and not like how barbaric people do, dumping a load of unprepped and unflavoured lesser sharks on an ice slate ah."

"Will you let me eat in peace?" Miyu's fork thumped against the plate as he scratched his chin, whole face turning a shade of pink, a strange color on the kraken's yellow skin.

"heh."

"By the way, How did you know of this Myrre woman?"

Miyu swallowed a bite, " Ah. I happened upon a wretched being chased by a mermaid underwater..and we know how that would have ended with the mer clan's naturally strong girth and tail. But ofcourse, being your awesome daddy, I, this powerful kraken helped her. "

"I take it as the Wretched is Myrre?"

"Myes. "Miyu delightedly patted his stomach. "Damn, this really hits the spot."

"Mhm." Aegir bit into the violet part of the Ivy oyster, feeling the flesh dissolving satisfyingly on his tongue. A comfortable silence commeneced between them, the clatter of utensils the only thing heard amongst the chattering of the crew.

"oh by the way, what the hell where you doing with those ice?"

Miyu tilted his head. " Ice? What ice?"

"Yknow, the ones trapping you to death back when we reunited." Aegir casually mentioned while pointed his fork towards Miyu, eyes narrowed.

"a-ah that..hehe. this, I don't know how to explain..."

Aegir raised an eyebrow.

"Actually.." The kraken embarassedly scratched his chin. "Well I got lost when I tried finding your favorite flavoring seaweed and as a result, I got sucked in on an underwater tornado and was trapped in between those big ice, oh."

"Why are you even trying to find the seaweeds??" Aegir exasperatedly sigh, feeling that he is too pretty to go bald. But he really did remember that there was a storm the day he found the kraken, he can't blame the idiot much.

"Myrre said I would find you because you are like a starved hellhound, able to smell the food you like. I decided that flavoring seaweed might do the job so..."

"...." I appreciate the efforts, I really do, but Man, are you stupid.

Aegir distractedly forked down where he saw the last piece of food was, only for his fork to puncture air. Faintly, he heard a chuckle.

"Looking for this, little rose?" A roguish smile was plastered across Cornelius' face and in his hand, was a spoon containing the last piece of Aegir's oyster.

Helplessly, the old Siren watched as the idiot with a more idiotic name slowly licked the remaining piece of flesh, swallowing it after with an ambiguous smirk.

"How delicious."

Aegir, with a dark expression, looked down to see his plate, and sure enough, his spoon was missing. And he devastatingly looked up again to see the pirate captain lewdly licking his spoon. his. spoon.

"An indirect kiss. Just a pre-payment before we start our journey tomorrow. " He slowly made his way to Aegir, close enough to touch his face.

Aegir felt the man's finger tracing his jawline, and suddenly, Cornelius grabbed it tightly, forcing the two of them to be face to face incredibly closely, so close that he can smell the other's nasty fishy breath.

"Cornelius, not only is your name stinky, your breath is too." Aegir pushed the man's chest, feeling the familiar feeling of fresh air caressing his body as the distance between the two of them increased.

"Stinky?" Cornelius dumbfoundedly looked at the mischievous little Siren. Discreetly–or so he thinks, he smelled his own breath, and indeed, the odor of the Ivy Oyster had clung onto it.

"It's not even that bad. It's just the same as yours, smelling of raw oyster." Cornelius harrumphed, a suspicous patch of skin near and on his earlobes turning vaguely pink.

Aegir stared at the blushing pirate, feeling strange about finding it cute how embarassed the man is.

"Ok, very funny. But I'm still here??" Miyu almost forgot he was a living, breathing large entity and thought he was no more than an apparition.

Cornelius pretended to cough. "Tomorrow, we'll set off at dawn. be prepared. And little rose?"

Aegir had already numbly accepted the pet name. "Yes?"

At that, the Pirate Captain smiled lightly. " Don't forget abour our deal."