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Dr. Fal: "Well, your sister may have a slight tendency toward codependent romantic attachment... specifically within the family dynamic."
Kaito: "...Is it the kind I think it is?"
Dr. Fal: "In my generation's terms, she's a 'bro-con.' Though I'm not sure if you youngsters still watch anime these days."
Kaito: "..."
Kaito: "Thanks for your time, Doctor."
Quack. Kaito silently slapped the label on Dr. Fal's forehead, and Su's status in his mind plummeted right along with it.
If a doctor had said this to him a few days ago, he would have panicked; he'd have been terrified. After all, he was still young and definitely didn't want his future path set in stone so easily.
But after Elysia's sudden fit of choking him and the exposure of her thirteen-person "little family," how was Kaito supposed to believe a word of this?
Absolute quack!
Looks like technological advancement isn't all sunshine and rainbows. Have doctors like this really managed to pass themselves off as experts?
"Are you going to take me out to clear my head, Kai?"
Elysia leaned against the car window. Through the gap in the front seat, she could tell Kaito's mood was anything but stable. She decided to add fuel to the fire, then magnanimously tell him, "It's okay, Big Sis can handle it, you go focus on your work,"—effectively guilt-tripping him into submission.
"..."
What a mess of a world. Troubles either don't come at all, or they dump themselves on you all at once. And it wasn't even the kind of trouble where you had to drop everything; it was the annoying kind that forced you to choose.
Kaito leaned back against the seat, his expression showing no signs of fatigue as he turned his head.
"Where do you want to go?"
Work? He'd quit.
Kaito wasn't afraid. He was young; he had too many possibilities to climb back up if he fell. But if his sister turned into a genuine mental case, there was a high probability she'd never recover.
Now it was Elysia's turn to be a little scared. "Doesn't your studio have that new project starting?"
"Doesn't matter. I've been tired of looking at that 'Useless Bronya' anyway. I'll just quit and go traveling."
Kaito was about to text Bronya and explain the situation, but Elysia reached out with some effort and pressed her hand over his screen. Her smile was forced.
"You focus on your work first. I'll introduce you to some friends in a while, and we can all go out together then."
"Besides, there's no way I have ADHD!"
She raised her voice again, sounding impossibly confident. Kaito tilted his head, watching her pale arm straining to wrestle the phone away from him. He hesitated.
Are you sure you don't have ADHD?
Well, his sister certainly didn't have an "attention deficit."
"Fine. Just don't let anything stress you out for the next few days. Stay home or go out, just make sure you're happy."
He handed the phone to Elysia, then leaned against the window, wondering if he could find a more reliable doctor through another friend. As for these next few days? He just had to keep Elysia stable.
"Did you delete your chat history? I saw you talking to someone just now."
"I asked Dr. Fal for your assessment sheet."
Elysia's face went stiff. Wow, what an annoying psychiatrist, exposing a beautiful girl's privacy so easily.
She went quiet and didn't say another word. Even the act of scrolling through Kaito's phone like a treasure hunter couldn't bring a smile to her face.
"Quack," Elysia said abruptly.
"It's rare for us to agree on something."
Kaito felt a sudden sense of relief. It seemed his sister's intellectual impairment wasn't that severe after all.
"Shouldn't you be sad when I say that?"
Elysia huffed. She was allowed to call him a quack because a beautiful girl has special privileges. But Kaito—the one designated by the "quack" as the lucky recipient of her affection—wasn't allowed to, because that made her sound unimportant.
"Why would I be sad?"
As the driver watched them with an expression of pure curiosity, Kaito tapped the rearview mirror, angling it so it pointed at the pouting Elysia. He gave her a bright but mocking smile.
"Sis, I'm twenty-five. I'm in my prime. The last thing I should be tasting is the bitterness of romantic drama."
Just as Kaito firmly believed Elysia would never be dumped, he felt that as long as they weren't constrained by responsibility, they were at the age where they should be experiencing adult romance.
Elysia stared blankly, seemingly not following.
"If my career weren't on such an upswing lately, your brother would have started a legendary dating history by now."
But his career luck really was good. He met Bronya through street racing, and after she taught him the ropes, he'd been busy ever since graduation.
Elysia opened her mouth but said nothing. She never imagined her brother thought like this—that he wanted to be a player, a veteran of the heart, a "little prince" of the nightclubs.
The rest of the ride was silent. The driver tried to start a conversation several times, but Kaito just brushed him off, clearly not interested in sharing his life with a stranger.
When they finally got home, Elysia pushed the door open but stopped at the threshold.
"What now? Unhappy again?"
"I'm wondering if I should enforce the family rules."
Elysia held a lofty sense of goodwill toward the world, but she never expected that Kaito—the boy she raised on bowls of rice and noodles—would want to descend into the gutter of society. He wanted to be a player!
"Since when do we have family rules?"
Kaito easily gripped Elysia's slender waist, lifted her up, and set her down at the kitchen entrance. Closing the door, he spoke slowly.
"And if we did have family rules, you would have been hung up and thrashed this morning."
Elysia bit her lip. She suddenly felt that the dream world was better in at least one way: she had power there. The power to suppress evil, save the world, and create a paradise.
Kaito ignored her. Seeing her face shifting through various emotions as she clearly plotted a "Sister's Rebellion" but realized she lacked the strength to do anything about it, he laughed out loud.
"Sis, just do whatever makes you happy. Even if you can't stand it, don't just sit there stewing in your own frustration. It's not good for your health."
"Kaito!" Elysia rolled up her non-existent sleeves. "Today, I'm going to show you exactly why I'm the older sister!"
Though the dreams were bizarre and her head was often groggy upon waking, she was still Elysia! A superhuman of the mortal world!
"Heh... it's still up for debate which one of us is actually older."
Kaito caught her with a counter-move, pinning her down. No matter how she resisted, the situation remained unchanged.
A few minutes later, Elysia was curled up alone on the sofa, pathetically seeking help from the group chat. She couldn't win. She really couldn't win. Without her dream-world stats and mechanics, she was like a fresh recruit in front of Kaito.
Unfortunately, after facing the terrible advice from her "family," Elysia was forced to concede and swallow her pride.
"Kaito." Her voice softened, and her pale, delicate foot lightly kicked him. "I don't want takeout for dinner..."
Kaito ignored her. Elysia kicked him twice more with her toes.
Kaito sighed and reached out, grabbing her restless ankle.
"What do you want to eat?"
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