Pursuit of Diligence (Part One)

“Hello, uhmmm… Primrose?” A voice called out from the front of his shop's desk. Primrose looked up from his book to see a short and very peppy succubun standing in-front of him. 

He looked her over, taking a mental note of every detail about her, down to her clothing choices. She had salmon-pink hair and very fluffy ears. Her horns were hot pink and heart-shaped, indicating the sin of lust… if she wasn't a cherubun, then why exactly was she here?

He couldn't figure it out until he heard what she had to say and he would rather not just keep staring, so he asked, “Yes? What could it be that you're here for?”

She saw him spare a glance at her horns, the unspoken question being very clear. She giggled and wagged her tail, “I heard from a friend that you're wanting help managing your greenhouse? I would like to give it a go!”

“You've heard somewhat correctly. To be more precise, I don’t require any help, I am simply offering an opportunity for succubuns and cherubuns alike to prove their diligence.” He crossed his arms and sighed. She looked eager, but the more excited people look, the more they're usually expecting this to be fun. She'd most certainly give up within a few weeks. Heavens above, maybe even the first task would be too boring for someone this cheery… but still, it would not be fair or just to completely neglect giving her a chance.

“Uhh… okay! Well, that's what I want to do… sooo… how do I start? What's the first task?” She tilted her head to the side and placed her hands on his desk, leaning forward to get a closer look at him.

“Well, you could start by introducing yourself. It would be the polite thing to do.” Primrose raised an eyebrow at her claws being against his nice, polished wooden desk. She wasn't digging them in at the very least… a thought crossed his mind that it might come across as discriminatory if he required her not to touch anything simply for having claws, but he couldn't help feeling worried when he'd just gotten this place fully deep-cleaned a few days ago. 

The rabbit nodded and stuck out her hand for him to shake. “My name is Elina! I'm an imp trainer, but I kinda run my own schedule so I've made sure I'm free today!”

Primrose made a little huff of resignation as he returned the handshake. “Ah, I see… something about that does seem to make sense.” 

Elina had a feeling that wasn't a compliment but no sign of that knowledge crossed her face. 

Primrose continued, “Well, I suppose you know my name already, but I am Primrose. I run the heavenly embassy, and I take care of my fellow cherubuns.” 

“Yeah! I know about you. Not like a whole lot, but I definitely do.” Elina grinned and looked around the embassy building for a moment. It was so well maintained, she couldn't spot even a speck of dust, nor any scratches. Some of the wood looked antique… 

“Great, well then… I'm on the clock right now, but I get off work in two hours. I would heavily recommend changing into some clothes you don't mind getting dirt on before we meet at the greenhouse then. Try not to be late.” His eyebrows furrowed as he searched for a pen and quickly wrote a little reminder to himself of the past events. It would be rude if he forgot her name and “appointment” after all.

Elina nodded excitedly. “Okay! Sounds like a plan, thanks!”

Just like that, she was gone again- she darted out the door with a sense of urgency. Perhaps she was just rushing to get changed into more fitting clothes for the occasion? Primrose wasn't entirely sure. He found her behavior a little bit peculiar, but ultimately… he could not be bothered to dwell on it anymore, not when he had lots of work to do. Even when no one was visiting the embassy, there were so many little things that needed doing…

...

Primrose headed out to the embassy greenhouse. He was a minute or so early, but that was quite alright with him. He was afraid the bun he had an unofficial appointment with would make him wait anyways, one extra minute couldn't be too big an inconvenience.

To his surprise, pretty much exactly when his pocketwatch's smallest hand struck the hour mark, he heard the greenhouse door swing open. He saw the same bun as earlier wearing a different outfit, exactly as he'd requested of her. She now wore a simple black shirt with a worn-down light pink overall skirt. She waved to him and headed over. “Hiya! These clothes look okay?”

“Yes, those will be fine. Come along.” He gestured for her to follow and headed to the greenhouse door.

Elina tilted her head to the side in clear confusion. She'd just arrived here and he was already telling her to leave? Well… if that's what he wanted, then sure, she supposed! She stayed close behind him.

He followed a gorgeously engraved path and his eyes narrowed as he walked along. He huffed and delicately kicked a small rock off to the side before shaking his head. “I'll need to clean this soon… we don't have time for that now, though.”

“Why not? Where are we even going?” Elina asked. Now that he was talking a bit too, she might as well!

“You see how dirt has gotten stuck in every individual little crevice? We would need to take a hose to the entire road. Perhaps next week I'll get your help with that, or maybe I'll do it on my own…” He shook his head, “But regardless, we're going to the storage shed. We need a shovel and some compost.”

Now that he'd mentioned it, Elina did see a shed close-by. She hummed softly as she walked- it wasn't really any particular tune, just something she was making up on the spot. A part of her worried Primrose might comment on it or ask her to cut it out, but he seemed to be alright with it! Or at least, he didn't give her any indication he noticed it at all, which was enough for her to feel more comfortable doing it.

Once they reached the shed, Primrose stepped inside and pulled out an empty wheelbarrow. He set it down, handles turned to face Elina. She quickly got the hint and grabbed onto it. He marched over to a wooden box with no lid on it and grimaced a bit as he peered inside.

There were three inkaps inside! One of them was yellow, one was black, one was brown with darker spots, and they all had big, white glowing eyes. There was a noticeable pile of black sludge at the bottom of the compost bin and no trace of whatever scraps had presumably been given to them earlier.

Elina squealed with delight at the sight of them. “Oh I love inkaps! They're so cuuuute…”

“Indeed, they do have a… unique charm about them. That’s not why they're here, though. I feed them food scraps and weeds, and they produce that strange black goo. It is actually quite useful when mixed into dirt… it moistens the soil, helps it retain water, traps excess water, and is densely packed with nutrients.” He pointed to the black one and narrowed his eyes, “I actually didn't put that one in here. It just… showed up one day.”

Elina giggled and reached into the bin, picking up that inkap. It trilled and chirped as it settled into her arms. “That's just how imps are, I guess! I think it’s a good sign though, it means your box is pretty comfortable for them!” A few spots of goop now stained her pink overalls, but she couldn't be bothered to care at the moment. She'd worn this outfit explicitly for the purpose of getting it dirty, no harm in starting a little early!

Primrose nodded and grabbed a small shovel, getting to work on transferring some of the goop into the wheelbarrow. “You have a point there. If you like inkaps so much then you’ll probably enjoy this task… could you pick up the other two so they’ll be out of the way while I do this? Usually I just work around them, but it’d be nice to not have to.”

Elina gladly agreed, scooping up the other two in an instant. They didn't squirm or fuss all that much, as her giving them attention kept them plenty entertained. 

A silence lingered in the air for a few seconds as Primrose worked but Elina quickly cut it short by asking, “So… there were no imps up in the Heavenly Meadows?”

Primrose nodded. “You'd be correct. They're demonic creatures so I imagine… they would most likely meet a fate somewhat similar to our cherubun ancestors if they were to ever cross that threshold.” A grimace flickered across his face for just a second before his expression returned to normal. He still looked quite sour, of course, but that was his usual and Elina had already come to expect it.

She decided not to press, instead nodding and smiling warmly. “Well, luckily I don't think they could even if they somehow tried it.” She noticed him set the shovel down into the wheelbarrow and assumed he was done with his work, so she placed the inkaps back into their box. They immediately resumed making their strange little noises to each other and idly toddling around. The big mushrooms on their backs swayed as they moved, making them always look on the verge of tipping over. They usually didn't- not nearly as much as one would expect they would- but sometimes they did end up toppling to the ground and they would have to right themselves. 

Primrose gestured for her to bring the wheelbarrow and follow him once again. Once he heard its squeaky wheels he spoke up, “I have to believe that a long, primarily virtuous life will bring much more good into the world than a perfectly pure, hopelessly short one… that we all have more value living as people than sacrificial lambs.”

He did not turn back to read her expression or even hesitate, instead continuing to walk along the path as he had before. Elina kept her mouth shut, instead humming a little sound of agreement. His argument was solid in her books, but he didn't need her to tell him that. In that moment, his words were moreso a self-affirmation than an argument or an explanation.

They were back at the greenhouse shortly. The rest of the walk was silent, save for the squeaking of the wheelbarrow, but it was only for a minute and it was surprisingly comfortable. 

Primrose pointed in the direction of a large pot. “We'll be planting our flowers there. The autumn season is perfect for planting some flowers that will sprout in fall and be harvested in the upcoming winter.” 

Elina tilted her head to the side and asked, “Since we're in a Greenhouse, why do we need to wait for fall to plant winter flowers?” 

“There is actually a very important reason! This dirt we're going to use has been created from composting down a huge quantity of autumn leaves. It'd be… simply unethical to make this stuff in other seasons, but this variant needs this specific nutrient composition to grow.” He pulled a seed packet out of his pocket and looked it over skeptically, as if he was expecting something to be wrong with it. Once he seemed satisfied in the knowledge that it was untampered with he continued on, “Anything else results in ambrosia that doesn't quite taste right and is completely unusable as medicine. Perhaps with the scientific intervention of rabbits like my… uh, friendly associate Beanny we can one day move past the need for rotating seasonal stock… but we're nowhere near that point yet.” 

Elina grinned, “That would be really cool! I imagine it’s pretty tough to do science with plants that you have such a limited quantity of…” She knelt down near the large rectangular pot and looked up at Primrose. “So… what do we do?”

“You'll want to gather some of the black ooze onto your shovel and incorporate it into the soil. Mix with the shovel, it can become a dreadful situation if it gets on your hands or clothes. It stains incredibly badly…” He winced and shook his head. “You don't have to use all of it, just a few shovel-fulls will do the trick. I'll use the rest on other parts of the garden.”

Elina happily got to work, her tail swishing side to side contentedly. She hummed and mumbled to herself, seemingly lost in her own world. A few specks of dirt spilled out of the container every so often, and she was quickly given a towel to wipe up the mess with. As the goop was mixed into the soil, it took on a darker hue and held its shape more consistently, a little bit more like mud than regular old dirt. She'd expected it to smell kind of gross, but it actually didn't really have any scent at all.

“Hm… that seems to be sufficient. I think the pot is ready to be planted. You can use your pointer finger to poke eight holes into the soil, and we'll put one seed in each one. Usually we double or triple up on seeds to ensure at least one grows per spot, but… We just don't have the resources for that yet.” 

Elina nodded. At first she took a second to look at the pot, trying to picture how to space out the spots she'd plant a seed. She started poking a few holes, and though the final result was somewhat uneven, it was plenty serviceable. Plants don't care too much about precise measurements, not in the same way buns often do.

Primrose gingerly held out the seed packet and explained, “These are tiny and very delicate. We don't have many, so please use the utmost caution. Just drop one into each spot, and very lightly cover it back up.”

Elina held out her hand, “I can do that! I promise I'll be careful.”

Only once he'd heard her promise did he actually give over the seeds. She opened up the packet to look inside and was shocked to see just how small they were. They were about half the size of a grain of rice- and she used to think sunflower seeds were tiny! She supposed they must actually be quite large as far as flower seeds go, then…

She reached in and grabbed one at a time, painstakingly slowly filling out the pot. Primrose allowed it though, as he didn't think there truly was a level of “too careful” with a task like this.

Once she was finished, she beamed excitedly and closed the packet back up, handing it over. She breathed a sigh of relief once it was no longer in her possession- she couldn't say she was a fan of that sort of pressure! The rest was fun, but that made her feel almost nauseous.

“That is all for right now. You did an acceptable job with this task. If you come back next week, I'll provide you with another as a chance to prove your capability and diligence. Goodbye, now.” Primrose began to walk away just like that, leaving Elina to stare down at her work.

She felt a sense of pride swell in her chest. It was nice to try something new like this… and she imagined Double might like this, too!

Next time she was definitely bringing him with. Maybe Primrose wouldn't love it, but… he never said she couldn’t bring a companion!