Guide to tamming vilanesses-Chapter 103: Please, trust me part I

Not long after Shin sent Eva messages telling her what had happened, his girlfriend asked him to meet her in the cafeteria.

When he arrived, he quickly noticed the cute pout on her lips, her eyes showing a clear hint of annoyance.

"Did something happen?" he asked, getting closer to her.

As he approached, he noticed Kaho looking down. Her long hair hid most of her face, but he could see her ears burning red.

She’s still so shy around me? Shin thought with a sigh. Then his eyes returned to Eva.

"Why didn’t you tell me you had already met Kaho?" Eva asked.

Shin slowly blinked. He vaguely remembered seeing Kaho, so he guessed Eva was referring to that. Was she jealous or something?

"Oh... so it’s about that?" he murmured, a bit surprised. "Honestly... I just forgot."

"What do you mean?" Eva pressed.

"Well... when I first saw you posting an Instagram photo with Kaho, I thought something like: ’Oh! So Eva’s new friend is that girl.’ But it wasn’t really important, so I never remembered to tell you."

Shin just shrugged. He honestly hadn’t thought much about the encounter, or about Kaho as a whole.

"I don’t have much more to say," he added with an apologetic smile. "I really forgot about it."

"Did you hear him?" Eva turned to her friend, her tone slightly amused. "You don’t need to get all shy, he literally forgot about it..." Eva couldn’t help but laugh a little.

Kaho still felt extremely embarrassed. She hated that she had become the focus of the conversation.

"Are... are you telling the truth?" she asked Shin in a weak tone. Slowly... very slowly, she raised her head so her eyes could meet his for a fraction of a second.

Then her gaze drifted down again, focusing on her plate. If she hadn’t finished her food, she would definitely have taken another bite just to have something else to focus on.

"Yes..." Shin replied softly. "You don’t need to worry about it." He gently petted her head.

Kaho nodded, mumbling something so quietly that no one could hear her.

Eva clapped her hands, smiling smugly.

"I told you it would all be fine," she whispered to her friend.

However, even after that, the hint of annoyance on Eva’s face didn’t disappear. It faded temporarily as she laughed at her friend, but soon returned.

Shin noticed.

His eyes narrowed slightly as he gave her a questioning look, clearly picking up on the shift in her mood.

Eva met his gaze without hesitation this time. The playful edge in her expression remained, but she pouted again.

"Why didn’t you tell me about Lilel?" she asked bluntly. "I don’t think you could possibly have forgotten."

"How...?"

"Yumemi told me by accident," Eva replied before Shin could ask. "She thought I already knew, because you usually tell me everything..." she pouted even more.

Apparently, Yumemi had asked Eva for help to access a few articles, as she wanted to study more about system theory to help Shin.

Hearing that, the young man let out a long sigh. His sister really wasn’t capable of keeping a secret for even a single day.

If things were going to be like that, it would be better to just tell Eva something. That being said, he wasn’t comfortable talking about it in public, his eyes constantly darting around as he analyzed their surroundings.

"Don’t worry, we can go to my house and you can tell me everything there," Eva said, smiling smugly.

"Then I think I should go..." Kaho said, but her friend immediately grabbed her shoulder.

"You should come too. I promised I’d finish watching Fullmetal Alchemist with you today, didn’t I?"

"Yes, but..." Kaho’s eyes drifted toward Shin.

"Don’t worry, she won’t tell anyone," Eva reassured. "Besides, she’s going to be able to help you a lot."

"Help... how?" Kaho asked, completely lost.

Not long after, the three of them arrived at Eva’s mansion.

Once inside, Eva made Shin sit on the sofa while she went to get something to drink. Kaho’s heart wouldn’t have been able to handle being alone with him, so she quickly followed her friend to the kitchen.

Soon after, Shin began explaining a bit about Lilel. He didn’t reveal much about her powers or limitations.

He mostly talked about how she could become more useful if he learned more. And as usual, he kept many secrets.

At first, Kaho found all of it hard to believe, but then Shin said:

"Lilel, show yourself."

A faint shimmer appeared in the air.

From it, a tiny fairy emerged, no bigger than the palm of a hand. She floated gently, her small wings beating softly as she looked around with a bright, confident smile.

Shin gestured toward her.

"This is Lilel. She’s... a special component of my system."

Lilel placed her hands on her hips, puffing out her chest proudly.

"’Special component’ is such an understatement," she said. "I am an incredible, high-performance, fully autonomous system entity."

"Where did she come from?" Eva asked, surprised.

"I’ve always been here," Lilel said excitedly. Then she disappeared, becoming invisible. "Even now, I’m here, you just can’t see me."

Then she appeared again, this time sitting on top of Kaho’s head.

The usually shy girl wasn’t looking down anymore.

On the contrary, her eyes lit up.

One detail immediately caught her attention: when Lilel disappeared, she apparently had no weight or mass. Kaho had felt nothing when the fairy was invisible on her head, but the moment Lilel became visible again, she could feel a faint, almost nonexistent weight.

In the next instant, she grabbed Lilel.

"Wha—?!" Lilel squeaked in surprise.

Kaho froze for half a second, clearly not expecting any resistance... or rather, not expecting to feel anything at all.

"She’s... physical?" Kaho whispered, her voice trembling with excitement. "Hey... can you become invisible again?" 𝑓𝘳𝘦𝑒𝑤𝑒𝘣𝘯ℴ𝘷𝘦𝓁.𝑐𝑜𝑚

Lilel, still a bit startled, hesitated, but then complied.

The little fairy vanished. However, Kaho’s fingers remained in the same position. Still, the sensation changed completely.

She couldn’t feel Lilel anymore. Or rather... she could, but not in any normal way.

It was immensely strange, like touching something that didn’t exist. There was no real resistance, no pressure pushing back against her fingers.

However, at the same time, she couldn’t close her fingers around Lilel. It was almost as if that vague, conceptual presence itself was preventing her from doing so.

When she tried to tighten her grip, the strange sensation only became even more bizarre. Her fingers were pushed back, almost as if the direction of her force had been inverted.

Lilel seized the opportunity to escape from Kaho’s grasp.

Meanwhile, the shy girl’s breathing quickened as countless ideas flooded her mind.

And then she exploded.

"Incredible, this is absolutely incredible, an autonomous interface with independent cognition and physical manifestation? That means there’s a hybridization between conceptual system architecture and tangible output... No, wait! The tactile feedback alone would require..."

She kept going, her voice rising with each word, completely consumed by fascination.

Her words became less and less understandable, almost as if she had started speaking another language.

Shin blinked.

Eva blinked.

Even Eva, who was already used to how Kaho acted when she got excited about something, looked genuinely surprised.

"...Wow," she muttered.

Then the queen slowly turned to Shin, her eyes sharp.

"See... if you had told me about all of this earlier," she said, crossing her arms, "I could’ve told you that my new friend is probably the biggest system nerd in the world."

She pointed directly at Kaho, who was still acting a bit unhinged.

"Did you know she even published an actual scientific article, even though she’s just eighteen? She even uses a pseudonym to publish her work online!" Eva said proudly.

She was genuinely proud of how incredible her friend was.

"Of course, she’s too shy to go public and present her work. But her name is famous... I mean, her pseudonym is. You might have even heard of it. It’s M.I.L.A."

Up until that point, Shin had only been mildly interested in the conversation, but his expression changed instantly.

Not just his.

Lilel reacted too. After all, thanks to sharing Shin’s memories, she also recognized the name.

"Wait... did you say Mila?" both of them asked at the same time.

"Yes... what’s the problem?" Eva asked, startled.

"Is it true? Is your pseudonym Mila?" Shin turned to Kaho, grabbing her shoulder as he asked urgently.

The moment he touched her, his face so close, Kaho’s obsessive excitement vanished, and her shyness came rushing back.

"Y-Yes..." she managed to say.

Still, there was one thing Shin couldn’t understand. M.I.L.A wasn’t known for system theory. She was known as the only person capable of translating the Arcane Language of the Tower.

So... was it just a coincidence? Or could Kaho also know about that subject? Could she really be that M.I.L.A.?

"Do you have an interest in the Arcane Language?" he had to ask.

"Y-Yes!" Kaho answered, startled. "A-Actually, that’s what I’ve been studying the most. I know everyone has already given up on translating it, but I think it might be possible!"

She blurted everything out in a single breath, almost as if she were trying to say as many words as possible in the shortest amount of time.