Fried Brain Smells Surprisingly Good

Leigh with his arm through mine, led me through the forest until the trees gave way to sprawling, green fields. As I paused to let my eyes adjust to the sudden burst of sunlight, he did as well, glancing back at me and smiling. He reminded me of a boy I'd had a crush on back in middle school, who turned into one hell of a football player and the biggest jerk anyone outside of Yale had ever seen. Needless to say, 13-year-old-me was crying on the inside.

Once my eyes adjusted, I could see that the sprawling fields were, in fact, farmland. Rows of crops, from tiny sprouts to fully-grown plants filled these fields and were tended to by several farmers clad in what appeared to be overalls and straw sunhats. Surprisingly, I could identify most of the plants being grown and harvested from, but the humanoids working the fields were beyond me. A few had wolf tails like Leigh and the three others that accompanied me, but a few had long, slender tails, or even little bunched-up tails. Since their only identifying quality were their tails – ears were hidden – it was hard to tell what one individual was based on their medium-length, overly fluffy tail…at least until he pulled off his hat and waved.

The man who waved his hat at the party sported an intimidating pair of ram's horns, goatee, and long, somewhat floppy ears.

"Welcome back, Leigh!" he called, which drew the attention of the others. Leigh, meanwhile, stuck out his chest a little and waved with a chuckle. Other farmers also called and waved before returning to their work momentarily.

"Wow…you're popular, huh, kiddo?" I said, glancing to the workers, then to him. He huffed in response and planted his spare hand on his hip.

"I told you, I'm an adult. I've already got one mark, see?" Leigh pointed vehemently at his cheek where the tiger-stripe-looking-mark I'd spotted earlier resided. Was that what that was? Funny, I'd read something similar in a light novel online once, but ehh…

We continued walking down a well-beaten dirt path, passing by fenced-in fields of crops, then of animals, all of which I could recognize. There were pigs and sheep, as well as a herd of cows lazily grazing in their pen, each tended to by a different beast-person. It was strange, however…not a single female could be counted among them, much less children. But we still had a ways to go.

During the walk, however, I realized just how warm it was outside as I began tugging on my collar a bit, then fanning myself. Leigh noticed and pouted at me.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"What…what season is it?" I said, wiping a bit of sweat from my brow. I had dressed warmly for the Autumn season back home, so my clothes were starting to feel a little heavy, despite how tattered they were. He frowned at me.

"It's Spring. The Goddess renamed the seasons a long time ago. We're in the middle of it, so it's rather nice outside today, huh?" He beamed at me as we walked and I just grumbled.

"That's…one way to put it…"

Soon enough, the farmland became dotted with wooden huts, each with a stone chimney. Some emitted smoke and others stood quietly vacant. I call them huts, but they were far from small. Many were quite large, in fact, and could have housed upwards of a dozen adults comfortably. Around many of the huts were young animals of various ages, many of which didn't seem as though they belonged this close to a settlement.

I spotted wolf pups, baby deer, lambs, goats, and even what I suspect were a trio of cheetah cubs. Only once did I spy a female – or what I suspect was a woman – at a distance tending to an assortment of baby animals. She was rotund, likely pregnant, but at that distance, I really couldn't tell.

"Where are all the women in your village???" I asked off-handedly. When he didn't respond right away, I looked back at him to find a look of confusion and surprise on his face.

"Likely…cooking…I guess? It's too hot for females to be outside right now…they're probably inside…We don't have a lot of females, either, so…" he shrugged and rubbed the back of his head.

I stared at him for a second, then looked back to where I'd seen the female earlier, but found her conspicuously absent from where she'd been. I frowned.

"Define 'not a lot'…," I said.

"Well…," he began, looking a little nervous and chewing on his lip. It took him a moment before he started counting on his fingers. "About fourteen. Not including you, of course."

I was so surprised by that number, I'm pretty sure my eyebrows would have flown up over my head had they not been firmly attached…but for all I knew, fourteen families in a village like this could have been typical. That didn't really explain the number of people in the fields, though. Definitely more than fourteen.

"So…how many…men? I guess?"

Once again, he hesitated but began counting on his fingers much more quickly this time.

"Um…Four hundred? Maybe five? We're a pretty small village." He shrugged like this information was normal.

Just. Absolutely. Floored.

Five hundred men to fourteen women? That was something like…one woman for every 35 men. What the actual hell?! I stopped walking for a moment to take in that information and when Leigh glanced back, he became concerned.

"It's not so bad! Some villages have a few more…like twenty, maybe…but we should be having some females moving to our village soon!" he said with excitement, as though an extra six women made much of a difference in that ratio.

"That's still incredibly insane. Why are there so few? How often are females born? What the heck???" I was starting to get flashbacks from that light novel again…but stories are just stories…right?

"Oh. Well…uh…maybe…one in every hundred or so? Some clans have better odds of birthing females while others…well…"

This information was starting to fry my brain and it seemed as though Leigh could smell my grey matter cooking…or probably see the smoke leaking from my ears. He tugged gently on my arm.

"Maybe I'm explaining it poorly…My brother is better at this. Come on, I'm sure he'd want to meet you," he said nervously, and after a few more tugs, got me walking again. "Besides…the Goddess improved that significantly when she introduced her essence to this world." He smiled brightly at me once more as I shook my head in disbelief.

Sure enough, the houses became closer together and the road became cobbled as we entered what appeared to be a full-blown village caught in the middle ages…