After receiving his name, little Yuuta could not stop himself. He bounced around the bone hut like a small, excited creature, his energy boundless despite the weakness in his limbs and the lingering pain in his body. Every few minutes, he would run to Sophia, tug at her sleeve, and demand her attention with the desperate enthusiasm of a child who had never had anything to call his own.
"Sophia! Sophia!" He jumped up and down, his small hands waving in the air. "Call my name! Call my name!"
Sophia was crouched over a pile of bones, carefully scraping the last bits of meat from a rib with a sharpened stone. She had been working for hours, trying to build up a store of food for the winter, but Yuuta's constant interruptions made it nearly impossible to focus.
She sighed, but she could not help smiling.
"Yuuta Konuari," she said softly.
