This field mission was a simple item escort. Chisato brought Takina Inoue to the designated location, where they found a minivan with an incredibly dowdy design. The enthusiasm that had filled her chest a moment ago got doused with a bucket of cold water — she tilted her head back, shoulders sagging in dejection. "Why does it have to be this kind of car?"
"For an escort mission, a vehicle that doesn't draw attention is the most reasonable choice."
"Aww~" Chisato pouted, unhappy, hands mimicking a steering wheel in midair. "But wouldn't a cool car feel way better to drive?"
Takina Inoue pulled Chisato toward the minivan. "Let's just hurry up and finish the mission."
"Can you even drive?"
"It's one of the required skills. Of course I can."
"Oh~ impressive."
"That's nothing worth praising in front of an Ace."
With the two of them out on a field mission, only Jhin and the slacking loli Kurumi were left at Café LycoReco. So Jhin immediately decided to close the café for the day, told her about it, and ran off to Gabriel's place.
"Ding-dong, ding-dong, ding-dong."
The doorbell rang urgently, the sound raining down on Gabriel's head. She was sprawled on a floor piled high with trash, playing games, and irritably scratched her slightly itchy backside through her underwear before pushing herself up with her arms. "Who is it, showing up at a time like this — it better not be that idiot devil Satania again."
"Yo~ Gabriel, I'm here." Jhin greeted her as she yanked the door open.
Since he'd come straight from the café, he hadn't changed clothes, and the mature, handsome style — so different from what she remembered — shot through Gabriel's mind like an electric current, sending a tingling warmth through her chest and leaving her stunned for a few seconds.
"Oh... oh, didn't you say you'd come in the evening? Why are you so much earlier?"
"What, you're not happy I came early?"
"That's not it. Whatever, hurry up and clean my place for me — I'm getting back to my game." Gabriel dragged him straight into the room, then carried her laptop over to the bed, sat cross-legged, and kept playing.
The complicated smell inside the room hit him full in the face. Jhin fanned the air in front of his nose with his right hand, then pulled open her balcony door. "Did Vignette not come by to help you clean?"
"She's busy studying, so she didn't come."
"Ah... spring break's coming up soon, isn't it? Are you ready for your finals?"
Gabriel answered offhandedly, "For that kind of thing, cracking the books right before the exam is enough to scrape a passing grade. Besides, Heaven doesn't require perfect scores."
Seeing the signs that she was reverting to a useless bum the moment he'd looked away, Jhin stopped sweeping and announced with a smile, "Very good, Gabriel. Your Master orders you to score high on this final exam!"
"Whaaat?!" Gabriel stopped playing entirely, set the laptop aside, and hurled the wireless mouse straight at Jhin. "You jerk, why would you do something so underhanded!"
Jhin caught the mouse and looked at her with a grin. "Forgot to mention — even though Vignette's busy studying, she hasn't forgotten to report to me how many classes you've skipped, how many nights you've stayed up, and how many days you've skipped school lately."
"That devil..."
Knowing full well she had no way to fight back, Gabriel let her shoulders droop and conceded defeat. "Fine, fine, it's just getting good grades, right? I'll just spend one hour every day — no, half an hour — no, that's still too much — ten minutes of my gaming time reviewing. That should do it."
Jhin badly wanted to point out that she was only willing to spare ten minutes for studying, but the room was such a disaster that he gave up on the commentary and got back to cleaning. Because the concentration of elements and mana in the Main World was so thin, he couldn't just wave his hand and have wind elements sweep the trash away the way he could on the continent of Astraea.
He had no choice but to work in tandem with his substitute for cleaning he hadn't done by hand in ages, though manipulating a faint wind element to clear away the pile of stinking garbage in the room was well within his ability.
Gabriel sat on the bed playing her game, but her mind had long since drifted away from the screen. As always, she wore nothing but an oversized red tracksuit and plain white underwear, her pink, cute toes wriggling restlessly like little waves.
What's going on? Ever since he walked in, he hasn't even glanced at my legs once?
Normally, as a reward for cleaning, she'd tacitly go barefoot, letting his gaze lick over them all it wanted. But now he'd come back from a trip and couldn't even be bothered to look.
Gabriel had seen this exact scenario in the dramas Vignette liked to watch. Applying it to her best friend felt a bit off, but this situation was usually called "there's someone else out there."
Since that's how it is, I suppose I'll... give him just a little more of a treat, then.
"Ah~ finally beat that boss." She stretched out her crossed slender legs straight, her pearl-like toes spreading open and then curling back together. Fighting down the shyness rising in her chest, she pressed her right leg over her left, made sure just a sliver of her underwear was showing, and then held the pose without moving.
The trick worked — Jhin's gaze was drawn to her, sweeping across her legs — and then he pulled his eyes away and went right back to cleaning.
"?????"
Gabriel's face filled with question marks; she wanted nothing more than to shout at him, "Have you been seeing some other woman behind my back?!"
His reaction was so flat, without even that scorching gaze that used to make her blush and her heart race — it was just too much to take!
Can't you see that sliver of pure white at a maiden's sacred place?
This is a special treat from an angel, you know!
In truth, she'd gotten Jhin all wrong. The Main World's thin mana and elements didn't mean the side effects from fusing with the origin essence of dragons had lessened at all — if he hadn't already gone through that fierce battle with Nymph earlier, his scorching gaze alone probably would've been enough to burn Gabriel's face red on the spot.
With just that one glance, he'd already burned the shape of her legs into his mind. Compared to Megumin's thighs — which looked slender but were surprisingly full of soft flesh, wrapped in bandages and black stockings that squeezed out every bit of their seductive charm — Gabriel's legs were slim and perfectly proportioned, like two flawless ivory rods.
A faint blush always lingered around her knees, a result of how often she went barefoot and lay sprawled on the floor swinging her feet, like a peach so ripe its pale skin blushed pink — the kind you could suck on gently and get sweet juice out of.
Even after walking on that filthy floor, her feet stayed spotlessly clean, without a single callus, faint blue-green veins visible beneath the skin on the tops of her feet, tender as a freshly peeled egg.
Such fine jade feet — make my Elemental Armament spin.
Quietly accepting this unexpected upgrade in treats, Jhin, his heart full of gratitude toward Gabriel, finished the cleaning job in record time, left her a few bottles of Another World cola, and dashed off next door to find Nymph.
An indescribable stifled feeling welled up in Gabriel's chest, like she'd thrown a punch straight into a pile of cotton and hit nothing at all. All she could do was grab a pillow in helpless fury, using it as a stand-in for Jhin and pummeling it with a flurry of kitty-punches to vent her frustration. "Next time you come clean, I'm not letting you look at anything, you ungrateful jerk!"
____
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