Half an Hour

Freya was quite considerate, joining Yaxiu to wash the dishes. Once they were finished, Freya glanced at the Curtain of Knowledge. "Do you still need to use the Curtain of Knowledge tonight?" "Yeah, I want to look up some information." "Can't you just connect to the Curtain using your own chip to search?" "The prerequisite for my prison break was removing the chip at the nape of my neck." Freya was slightly surprised. "Then where are you going to live later? Without a chip registration, you won't be able to rent an apartment at all... You're not thinking of living with me forever, are you?!" "The Contract clearly states that I'm staying here for at most seven days," Yaxiu said crossly. "After seven days, I'll go sleep under an overpass myself." "As long as you give me the sympathy sorcery spirit according to the Contract, I wouldn't actually mind letting you stay a few more days... If you're willing to cook every day, I could even waive your rent." Freya paused. "I need to use the Curtain of Knowledge after my shower. It'll take about half an hour." "No problem. I happen to need a shower too, so you can have it during that time." Yaxiu went back to surfing the Curtain, while Freya began working on her sociology homework. Sociology was not a sorcery faction, but the content of the municipal civil service exam was entirely drawn from it. One could say that if someone wanted to become an administrative operator in the future, earning a Silver Degree in sociology was basically a prerequisite. Financier's speech during the Blood Moon Trial the previous night had already gone viral. Even someone like Freya, who hadn't watched the broadcast, had been forced to watch it during class. Consequently, the essay topic assigned by the professor was "A Discussion on the Pros and Cons of Socialized Child-Rearing and the Family System." Word had it that "socialized child-rearing" would very likely become a mandatory topic on the municipal civil service exam for the next several years, making it key knowledge that had to be mastered. The assignment was not difficult; passing only required following the line of reasoning that "socialized child-rearing completely crushes the family system." However, scoring high marks required more thought—writing something not found in textbooks that highlighted the advantages currently demonstrated in society. *Consider the professor's intentions... Financier's speech... the two Blood Moon races...* Freya quickly developed a line of thought: "...The family system fosters factional strife within the two Blood Moon races. Individuals who successfully transform into Blood Moon descendants will exploit their power to help relatives still of native races seize illicit gains, plundering resources that rightfully belong to other native races... This leads to mediocre individuals who are otherwise unqualified to join the two Blood Moon races being transformed into Blood Moon kin through unwritten rules such as familial ties, lowering the overall quality of Blood Moon kin..." "If an entire family belongs to the two Blood Moon races, they form unbreakable interest groups, undermining the leadership of the Research Institute and the Church... and corrupting the governance of the Administrative Hall..." "Familial bonds are a debilitating poison to the two Blood Moon races, a trigger for internal strife..." "The two Blood Moon races are the foundation of the Blood Moon Country's growth and prosperity; a backward system must not be allowed to taint the purity of Blood Moon kin..." With no other table available, Freya sat beside Yaxiu to write her homework. Fortunately, the desk was large enough. Freya worked on the left while Yaxiu surfed on the right. Aside from sitting rather close, neither disturbed the other—the left side of the desk had originally been cluttered with skincare products, lubricant, snacks, tissues, cotton swabs, and various other odds and ends, but it had all been neatly tidied up. Speaking of which, since Freya couldn't afford to hire an hourly cleaner, her apartment had basically remained in a state of "habitable enough to sleep in." Her underwear and clothes were washed only when she had none left to wear, garbage was taken out only after it overflowed, and the hallway had been turned into a labyrinth of clutter barely wide enough for one person to pass through. Even her landlord had remarked that she was completely normal. Looking around now, Freya realized her place looked brand new. The clothes were washed, the trash was thrown out, and the clutter was neatly arranged in corners, leaving her wondering: *Is this really my home?* "Did you clean up during the day?" Yaxiu hesitated for a moment before nodding firmly. "Yeah. Honestly, the sanitary conditions here were worse than the bathrooms in the prison. Since I had time on my hands anyway, I gave it a quick clean. Consider it my rent." Yaxiu added, "By the way, I threw your clothes into the wash. You don't mind, do you? It's been rather hot lately, and without air conditioning, those clothes piled together underwent a rather bizarre olfactory chemical reaction in such ideal experimental conditions. It's tolerable at night, but during the day, I really couldn't stand it..." Freya's face flushed all the way to her ears, and she said sheepishly, "I-is that so? I didn't smell anything myself... I don't mind. Thank you." "That's good. I was worried you'd call me a pervert when you came back, which was why I cooked in person to get on your good side." "Why would I scold you? Don't worry, you can do all my laundry from now on!" "No need for that. But could you please wash your clothes every day yourself?" "No can do. I'm the type who's used to letting a huge pile of dirty laundry build up before doing it all at once. Just like how you can't ask me to wear clothes after showering, you can't change my laundry habits either." "Tsk. You're so pretty, so why are your hygiene habits so awful..." "What does being pretty have to do with anything? Everyone's like this! Tidying up the room and doing laundry every single day is a waste of time." Having eaten its fill, Xiaoxian hopped onto the desk, curled into a ball of fluff, and seemed to lull itself to sleep to the sound of their chatter. With their idle banter passing the time, Freya soon finished her sociology assignment. Seeing that it was about time, she stripped off all her clothes completely naturally, tossed them onto the chair, and hummed a tune as she strolled into the bathroom. Yaxiu glanced at the undergarments on the chair. Hearing the sound of rushing water from inside, he found his eyes utterly glued to the lace lingerie. Only with great effort did he tear his gaze away. Then he activated the Substitute sorcery spirit, having the Substitute carry the clothes to the laundry basket on the balcony—young men's bodies were weak; they couldn't handle such stimulating sights! Xiaoxian perked up instantly and scampered after the Substitute to play. On the other side, Freya inside the bathroom also felt something was off. Veelas were exceptionally sensitive to mental states, and she clearly detected a bizarre emotion taking root in her heart. She didn't know how to describe this feeling; it was an experience unlike anything she had felt in her past eighteen years. Standing beneath the showerhead as the water rushed over her fair, tender skin, Freya quickly identified the source of this bizarre emotion—who else could it be but the Demonic Saint who had barged into her life? Was she afraid? A little. Did she like him? It seemed so. Did she detest him? As if her stomach were being wrung out like a towel, Freya felt a cramping ache so sharp it became hard to breathe. Yes, she detested Yaxiu. Though she couldn't pinpoint the exact reason, she suddenly felt disgust toward this man. Did she want to stay away from him, then? Freya panted in silence beneath the stream of water, leaning against the wall for a long while before suddenly chuckling. "How can such contradictory feelings exist... It must be physical, right? Yeah, definitely physical. After all, Yaxiu interrupted me last night." She quickly put the matter out of her mind, dried herself off, and wrapped her hair in a towel. Just as she stepped out to blow-dry her hair, she saw Yaxiu dart into the bathroom with a whoosh and shut the door in one fluid motion. He moved so fast it seemed like he had used a sorcery spirit; Freya barely caught a glimpse of his silhouette. "In such a hurry to shower? If you'd said so earlier, I could've let you go first," Freya mumbled. She walked over and sat in front of the Curtain of Knowledge, beginning her nightly routine. ... Yaxiu had only been washing for a short while when he gradually began to hear an alluring, bone-melting moan. At first, he thought the apartment just had poor soundproofing and some young couple next door was preparing to earn their procreation fund. But when he shut off the faucet to lather himself with body wash, with no rushing water to mask it, the low moaning abruptly grew clear. This impact was far more potent than any lingerie. Yaxiu quietly turned on the tap, cranking it to maximum flow—cold water! Yet that melodious, undulating sound tickled the inside of his ears like goose feathers. Even the roar of the water was useless to drown it out; instead, it acted like an audio filter, only amplifying his imagination. A thought suddenly sprang to his mind: *She can't seriously need half an hour, can she?*