After Aleph’s departure, Mobius immediately busied herself in a self-check “mental test”. The memories of dozens of psychology tests inside her mind were put into use at this moment.

  “Three… Two… Four…”

  She easily recalled them to the point she didn’t eveo write them. All she had to do was to ahem holy. The four-point Likert scale would then be used to correte these answers, thus obtaining the result she wao have.

  “Three point twe. It’s very likely…”

  Mobius frowo herself.

  ‘What’s happening to me..?’

  She didn’t know when it started. She started losing her calm more often. It went beyond a simple annoyaonight, when she received Vill-V’s message, she felt… angry?

  Its cause was soon pinpoio a person.

  ‘...It’s him.’

  Mobius’ assistant-ssh-partner.

  ‘If someoakes him away…’

  She reviewed her thoughts.

  The first time was during his ambush. She nearly went crazy when she heard of the news. Not only did it happen within her viity, those bastards also po disrupt the spe/co-worker she found after much difficulty.

  That was the reason why she called Vill-V despite treating her as an annoyance every time. It was a matter of choosing the lesser evils.

  What she didn’t expect, however, was that Aleph would destroy them thhly before she could further give it further thoughts.

  Even Vill-V’s budget cut was influenbsp;by her simply because…

  ‘...No. This isn’t it.’

  The prideful doctor refused to accept a certain oute.

  *****

  The sun soon rose up.

  “M.”

  “M. You—”

  Kevin’s words were halted once he noticed a girl behind Aleph.

  “H-hello.”

  U night, the girl was wearing a bck jacket te for her size. She was wearing its hood, though Kevin still reized her.

  What was surprising was her aura. He imagihe intruder st night to have a heaven-defying fidenough to get away from Mobius and Mei. However, it seems like she was an introvert..?

  ‘Why did you leave this mess to me?!?!’

  Inwardly, the Occult Vill-V pined.

  ‘After all the things you did, you passed the baton to me?!’

  Unfortunately, nobody heard her cries. In the first pce, they unicated by leaving notes right before they went out. Sihe culprit, Magi Vill-V, put the bme on her, she could do nothing.

  Vill-V immediately returo Aleph’s reliable back.

  “What will happen to her?” Kevin asked curiously.

  “Mei already informed me of her decisions.” Aleph replied. “She will be ing with the three of you.”

  “I see…”

  No further questions were asked. Kevin trusted Mei’s judgement, more so when Aleph didn’t have anything to say. It could only mean that Vill-V was trustworthy enough to be their co-worker.

  By the time the three arrived in the dining area of this exclusive dormitory, they were greeted by the smell of food.

  “Since when did you learn to cook?!”

  “That’s none of your business.”

  “Aw… Miss Sakura…”

  “The miso soup might spill.”

  That, and the noisy antics of a pink-haired dy. Unfortunately, both Mobius and Sakura evaded her swift hands. It has been well-known that Elysia likes to tease “beautiful girls”. Coupled with her lively personality, nearly everyone pyed along with her.

  That was how likable she was. Only a select few rejected her, such as Mobius.

  “Oh~? I sense a cute girl..?”

  “Eek!”

  Vill-V swiftly hid behind Aleph’s back akin to a frightened cat. Introverts have few rules, and keeping their domain (i.e., personal space) safe from external invaders (i.e., extroverts) is their utmost job!

  Seeing this, Elysia couldn’t help but fsh a smile. Her gaze was then directed to Aleph’s purple eyes.

  “Cute girls always gather around you… and I have a guess as to why.”

  “Hm?”

  Aleph replied with visible question marks all over his face.

  Bam.

  Their iion was cut short when Kleihe ptes oable one-by-oheir breakfast had several varieties, but they are all only found in the Far East—omelet rice, salmon with miso soup, and so on.

  “Choose what you’d like. If anyone wants seds, it’s on the rice cooker.”

  After a simple instruobius took off her apron.

  ‘...Well.’

  After five months of training, Mobius turned out to be a much better cook thahe tter’s end point was only the former’s checkpoint.

  In the first pce, Mei couldn’t cook that well. When Aleph saw her homemade lunch for the first time, he wondered whether there erson who could do such a bad thing to oneself.

  What he didn’t expect was that he would soon fall victim to it when Mei brought him lunbsp;for obvious reasons.

  Her cooking skills were bad to the point she herself could not pinpoint what’s wrong with it!

  In the end, Aleph lear aire bottle of stomach medie… as well as pills that would temporarily deprive his sense of taste and smell. He ohought he had to taste the dishes to see points of improvement, but that turned out to be his mistake. Later on, he habitually hides a pill or two inside his mouth right after the first bite to save his tongue from all the dangers.

  Even so, those once-a-week lunch breaks made him feel chilled. Somehow, there are times when she cooked meals that are potent enough to bypass his loss of taste...

  Surprisingly, Mei went from cooking unimaginable horrors into cooking below-average meals as time passed.

  “Damn. This is good.”

  Kevin appreciated its taste before looking at Aleph with a pitiable look.

  Back then, Aleph tanked Mei’s cooking alohough, there were a few times wheasted it for himself… which raised his respect for Aleph to the highest.

  Uedly, although Mobius started on the same level as Mei's current level, she didn’t have the tter’s cooking curse. That, and the prowess of a prodigy was enough to raise her ary skills.

  “Mn. Miss Sakura’s cooking is good.”

  Sakura briefly froze before returning to normal.

  Aleph’s pliment served to steer the dire of their versation to rating their breakfast together. The only one who didn’t participate in it was Vill-V, who then tio evade their eyes whehey had eye tact.

  Ohey were finished, Aleph acted quickly. He took over the work of washing the dishes.

  Seeing this sense of familiarity from him, Kevin was awoken. He looked around the dining area.

  ‘This is… Mei’s biggest crisis.’

  As the captain of this ship, Kevihe urge to report baei.

  Unknowingly, Klein saw his dazed look and saw through a portion of his thoughts.

  Looking at Aleph’s back who was doing the dishes, as well as Mobius’ occasional sneaky gnces, Klein became more burdened by another workload.

  ‘I o work more…’

  *****

  A/N: This small arc should end within three chapters. Holy, it was established to create more character iion + their characterization. After this, we’ll be delving into serious matters (i.e., the hints phroughout the earlier chapters).