–+–
Noon on Sixth Street.
Steam curled through General Chop’s noodle shop.
Sandrone picked up a small bundle of noodles with her chopsticks, blew on them, and put them in her mouth.
Beside her, Columbina had already buried her head in her second bowl.
“Im here!”
Belle jogged over, her short hair brushing her ears as it swayed with each step.
Wise pushed a bowl of noodles toward her.
“Slow down. It just came out of the pot. Is Eous charging?”
“Yeah, he’s charging.” Belle sat down, picked up her chopsticks, blew off the steam first, then lifted a small bite and put it in her mouth.
She chewed a few times, swallowed, and glanced at Columbina’s side.
“That big box.” Belle rested her chopsticks on the rim of her bowl and stirred the noodles.
“Did you two move it back?”
Sandrone finished chewing, swallowed, and nodded.
“Mm. We already moved it back to our—”
Her voice stopped, as if something had caught in her throat.
“Our… home?” Her pitch changed as she forced out the last word.
Belle blinked.
“What?”
“Nothing.” Sandrone lowered her eyes, shook her head, and picked up another bundle of noodles.
“Yes. We put it in the living room at our… home.”
She said the word “home” so softly it was as if she wanted to swallow it back down.
Belle didn’t think much of it.
She lifted her bowl and took a sip of broth.
“That box really was huge. When Columbina carried it, it looked like she was holding a balloon—”
She made a small gesture, then seemed to remember something and paused.
“What was inside it?”
The second the words left her mouth, Belle felt like the question had come out way too blunt.
Who asked someone they’d just met what was inside their box?
She waved her hands at once.
“You don’t have to say! I shouldn’t have asked anyway. It’s private, so don’t mind me!”
Sandrone stopped moving her chopsticks.
She didn’t speak right away.
Her lashes lowered, and the tips of her chopsticks tapped the edge of the bowl.
Belle grew a little tense and thought, Great, I messed up.
“…I suppose,” Sandrone said in a soft voice, “you could call them my family.”
Belle let out a breath.
“Oh~ Family—”
Pfft—
“Cough, cough. F-Family?!”
A mouthful of water went down the wrong pipe, and Belle’s face, red from the steam a moment ago, turned a few shades paler.
“Sandrone, you’re teasing people again~”
Columbina lifted her head from her bowl.
She hadn’t even swallowed the noodles in her mouth, yet her tone carried a hint of laughter.
“Teasing?” Belle clutched her chest.
“Whew. I thought…”
Sandrone tilted her head, her face blank.
“…Thought I’d chopped someone up and packed them in a box?”
Belle froze.
She scratched the back of her head and gave two dry laughs. This chapter was taken from g.com without permission.
“Well…”
“Belle, did you stay up late watching horror movies again last night?” Wise’s voice came from the side, tinged with helplessness.
“I didn’t!” Belle turned her head at once and protested.
“I went to bed super early last night!”
Wise didn’t answer.
He only looked at her, and that look said, Sure, whatever you say.
Belle kept muttering, “…I really did sleep early.”
She puffed out her cheeks, lowered her head, and kept eating.
Sandrone set down her chopsticks and watched the siblings go back and forth.
“You two… have a good relationship,” she said.
Belle lifted her head, noodles still hanging from her mouth, and mumbled, “Well, we’re family!”
Sandrone didn’t answer.
She lowered her eyes, rubbing the tips of her chopsticks against the bowl as she slowly chewed on those two words.
Family…
Something stirred in her heart, and her gaze drifted to the left before she knew it.
Columbina was focused on finishing the last bite of noodles in her bowl.
Her table manners weren’t ugly, but they had nothing to do with elegance either.
Her cheeks were puffed out, and her chopsticks were still searching the bottom of the bowl.
Like a hamster guarding its food.
The corner of Sandrone’s mouth twitched.
As if Columbina sensed something, she turned her head.
“…What’s wrong, Sandrone?” Her voice came out muffled.
“Nothing.” Sandrone turned her face away.
“Just eat!”
She lowered her head, picked up noodles, and put them in her mouth.
As she chewed, the tips of her ears began to feel a little warm.
—Why did I end up looking at her?
What’s there to look at?
Honestly.
Sandrone grumbled to herself.
“Ch-chopped up and packed in a box…”
Belle was still muttering under her breath, and her voice drifted over.
Sandrone set down her chopsticks, pushed her finished bowl forward, and her voice returned to its usual calm.
“Strictly speaking, that’s not wrong either.”
“What? What’s not wrong?” Belle didn’t react for a moment.
Sandrone looked into Belle’s eyes.
“Uh…” Belle’s gaze darted away, and she shrank her neck back.
“I really… didn’t watch a horror movie last night…”
For once, the corners of Sandrone’s mouth curved a little, as if she were smiling.
“Belle, you really should watch fewer horror movies.”
She paused.
“They’re Intelligent Constructs.”
She had only learned that term last night.
Pulonia and Sandrone herself weren’t exactly the same as this world’s “Intelligent Constructs.” Their core structures ran on a different system.
But from the outside, with the way they looked and moved, there didn’t seem to be much difference.
Belle froze for two seconds, then blinked.
“Oh, Intelligent Constructs!” She let out a long breath, and even her shoulders sagged.
She murmured to herself, then seemed to remember something else and glanced at the huge, slowly turning clockwork key behind Sandrone.
“Come to think of it, Sandrone, are you an Intelligent Construct too?”
Sandrone hesitated for a moment, rubbing her finger along the edge of the table.
“…Yes.”
She took out the citizen ID Aha had given her and looked at it.
In the photo, her face looked cold and still.
At the bottom, the category field was printed in clear words: Intelligent Construct.
Sandrone put the ID back into her pocket and repeated it, this time in a much steadier voice.
“I’m an Intelligent Construct.”
“What about Columbina?” Belle turned her head and looked at the girl who was sneaking a third bowl of noodles toward herself.
“She’s not a smart machine, right?”
“Of course she isn’t.”
Sandrone followed Belle’s gaze—
Beside Columbina’s bowl, two empty bowls were already lined up.
“Columbina!”
Sandrone’s voice rose at once.
Columbina’s chopsticks froze in midair.
She turned her head with care, her pink eyes blinking with pure innocence.
“Stop eating!”
Sandrone grabbed the edge of the bowl she was still trying to bring to her mouth.
“How many bowls have you had already? You’re going to get fat as a pig!”
Columbina said nothing.
She only tugged the bowl back toward herself.
The tips of her chopsticks poked at the noodles, and she looked at Sandrone with pitiful eyes.
Sandrone took a deep breath.
“…Just this one bowl.” She pushed the bowl back to her, her tone stiff.
“After you finish it, no more.”
Columbina’s eyes curved with a smile, and she lowered her head to keep eating.
Belle leaned closer to Wise and lowered her voice.
“Brother, I keep feeling like there’s something special between them. From the moment we saw them until now, they’ve been together nonstop, and they’re always holding hands. Don’t you think they…”
Wise picked up his bowl and drank the last mouthful of broth.
“Don’t gossip about people behind their backs.”
Belle pouted.
“Brother, you’re like an NPC.”
Wise set the bowl back on the table and pushed it forward.
“Human-computer interaction is also a deep field of study,” he said.
“All right, eat. We’ll go back and get some rest after this. We still have to enter a Hollow this afternoon.”
Belle gave a quiet “tsk” and said nothing else.
She stabbed her chopsticks into the bowl and started dealing with the rest of her noodles.
Sandrone didn’t catch what the siblings were whispering about.
She turned her head.
Outside the window, people came and went along Sixth Street, full of life and noise.
Then she looked beside her again.
Columbina had her head down, eating with focus.
Her bangs had fallen forward, covering half her face.
Sandrone lowered her eyes.
Family, huh…
Forget it.
They had plenty of time from now on.