“Huff, Huff, Huff…”

 

I breathed hard. My chest was exhaling and inhaling fastly following it. Searching for the tiniest available oxygen in the air. Now, we are in the city. I'm sitting at a transparent-like bench park that came out of nowhere.

 

“Here's a drink, Dii.” offered Lea, sitting beside me. Though, contrary to her concern, she was holding back her laughter. One of her hands covered her mouth while the other gave me a bottle of water. 

 

"Thanks." Ignoring her conduct, I curtly thanked her, snatched the bottle, and drank the water hastily. 

 

*COUGH-COUGH*

 

I choked myself. Water and saliva spilled out. Seeing that, Lea burst out her stuffed laugh. 

 

How dare she laugh like that when this was all her fault. I cursed internally.

 

Fed up with the girl's laugh. I gazed up, the circuit-floored platform we were standing on earlier could be seen high in the sky. Its circular shape covers the sunlight, making a shadow of the same shape darkening the city.

 

From it, I can see human figures falling one by one. Yeah, they are the players who log in to the game after me. Without using anything, they started en masse free-falling downwards to the city. But, before they could crash to the ground, a cloud patterned bubble appeared and enveloped the figures. Slowing down the fall and popping up after reaching the ground. That's how most of the players came to the city. 

 

There are also other means than free-falling like that, using gondola-like transportation. At first, I wanted to ride the gondola down to the city. Alas, Lea has other plans. Before I could say anything, abruptly and silently, she pushed me down from the platform. 

 

Left with no preparation, what I could do was scream hysterically while thinking how to survive from bungee jumping -although with no safety rope- from more than hundred-meter heights, even with the magical security installed.

 

And that's the gist of why I was short on breath. 

 

"Did you enjoy the ride, Dii?" satisfied with laughing, the ponytailed girl began mocking me. 

 

Instead of answering, I launched the bottle in my hand at her. It flew flamboyantly towards Lea but she swiftly dodged it by shifting her body a little. The bottle trailed in the air then crashed to the ground, bouncing one-two times before dispersing into tiny particles.

 

...

 

The gentle breeze sweeps away the dispersing particles. We watched the colorful scenery quietly. Then, I look her in the eyes, she stares me back. Slowly watching me at the void in my eyes with her cold-flat expression. She's back to her servant persona.

 

"That was not a good thing to do, young miss." scolded Lea with her low tone. 

 

I flinched a little at that. Whenever she scolded me she always made that cold-flat expression. I intended to just nod at her scolding but after remembering how she pushed me off the platform, I felt annoyed again and huffed childishly.

 

"Sheesh… This is why I called you stubborn earlier. Indeed, the incident before was clearly my fault and I'm sorry for that, moreover, you're tired after dealing with your sister’s petty wish today, but still, you need to behave yourself.” Lea nagged at me fussily, but it’s just a flying word in my ears.

 

I threw my face to the other side, completely ignoring her.

 

"Fine, it seems the young miss is still displeased. Let's split up here." She said, after judging her master's behavior, that her master wasn't listening to her. 

 

I squinted my eyebrows. H-huh? Splitting up? Where? The idea of it was so sudden that my mind shuttered because of it.

 

She casually stood up, ignoring how hard I was thinking.

 

"There's a thing called 'Headquarter' on this island. That's where the center of the island is located and where most of the information was gathered. It’s easy to locate it if you take a look at the map.” 

 

Without heeding the bewildered face I had, she continued.

 

“Before I go, I have advice for the cute young miss here. Even though this world is just a game, be very careful out there. Think about the consequences first before jumping at something. Well then... I’ll be waiting at the Headquarters three hours from now. See you later Dii...”

 

“W-wait. Ja- Lea!”

 

Finished saying farewell, Lea walked away. Leaving my distressed call hanging in the air.

 

Honestly, I didn’t hear almost all of what Lea had said. My mind was short-circuited the moment she suggested we split up. Maybe, because she has been by my side since I became a girl, I felt everything will be okay when I have Lea. That’s why I didn’t expect we would split up on the first day. I feel lost about what to do that I blanked out for a couple of minutes at the bench. 

 

Later, I greatly regretted I didn’t listen to Lea’s advice carefully. 

___

 

In a well-lit room, Two women, dressed in laboratory coats, chatted while observing at a humongous monitor. The display in that monitor was divided to twenty evenly. In each, a person's activity was shown. One of the women was sitting in a chair while watching one of those divided parts and said, "They're progressing nicely, aren't they?"

 

“Yes, they are, especially your sister. Her emotional fluctuation was changing rapidly. It will become interesting data for the experiment.” replied the other women. She has grayish bob hair with a serious adult appearance. Her stern, pretty face was showing a slight smile after inspecting the graphic on her tablet.

 

“Right? She’s such a magnificent sister. She’s good at cooking, she does our laundry and takes care of the house. Her grades were also quite high.  And most importantly, she always got along with my wishful experiment even though she knew I would make a mess after it. I sometimes wonder how come I have a sister like that. The first woman, a black-haired beauty, started boasting the moment her sister was mentioned.

 

The gray-haired woman glanced at her researcher friend with an exasperated face. This was the countless time her friend was boasting about her sibling. She already forgot a long time ago how many times her friend was bragging about it. 

 

Leaving her friend alone, she moved her view to the room beyond the monitor, a glass panel was bordering the room she was in to another. In her view was a cylinder tube made of glass with some sort of liquid filling it. Inside, a naked girl with medium-length obsidian hair was sleeping peacefully. She curls her body like a baby in its mom's womb. A cute lovely face enveloped her closed eyes. Her clear smooth skin was so white as if it had never been exposed to the sunlight at all. 

 

The tube was connected with strands of cable to a ball-like device beside it. The ball device was divided horizontally by a LED and there was a circle at the front. Making it looks like a pok*ball. At the bottom part of it was writing that can be read as' Bentengan'.

 

This was the set of the experiment devices she was currently researching. The sister in question that was previously mentioned was inside of it. She looked at her with a mix of amazement and sympathy. Amazed at how patient her friend’s sister was while a the same time sympathized with her because they dealt with the same eccentric researcher that made a mess everywhere.

 

Similarly, many other devices were in the room. A total of 20 devices were lined up evenly. Like the first one, each tube was filled with a person. They all are either in their adolescence or in their mid 20's.

 

"Nee... Fel, Are you listening to me?" the black-haired woman cried out.

 

“Yes-yes, I’m listening to you, Tifa. Is there anything wrong?” the woman called Fel responded.

 

“Boo~ You’re not listening at all.” She puffed up her cheeks, but she quickly hid them with a serious expression. “Is there any problem on your side?”

 

“For now, there isn’t. The game was running smoothly and there was no comment from the higher-ups.” Knowing her friend was back at her work mode, she also answered seriously. Her friend was in a higher position in this experiment, the head of the researcher. Meanwhile, she was just one of the developers of the game that was sent here because the head researcher was her high school friend.  

 

“Good to know that, at any rate, I can say phase one of the experiment was completed. We just need to wait until next week and continue observing them in case a problem comes up. While at the same time, we need to prepare for phase two.”

 

“Yes, I’ll immediately notify the others. On a different note, where do I put the report for this phase?"

 

“Just send it to my email as usual.”

 

“Yes, ma’am.”

 

For a few minutes, there is just silence in the room. The two researchers were busying themselves with work.

 

“Oh my… There is a duel.” remarked the sitting beauty as she observed the test subject from the monitor.

 

Hearing her friend remark, Fel curiously moves her head from the tablet she was working with. 

 

"Look at test subject #2," said her while pointing at the monitor.

 

In the display, a silver long-haired girl is having a duel with a sturdy man. The girl was wielding a katana while the man was wielding a heavy sword.

 

"The silver-haired one is your sister, isn't she? I was surprised to know you also have siblings. Why didn't you tell me back then?" demanded Tifa with a pouty tone.

 

"Well, you didn't ask," Fel answered bluntly. And that makes her friend’s cheek bubbled up. But the stern woman just ignored her by watching the monitor.

 

"Anyway, it seems that your sister was having fun, unlike my own sister." seeing that her pouty looks didn’t affect her colleague, Tifa continued the topic.

 

"Yes, her long-time wish was fulfilled by joining the experiment." acknowledged Fel solemnly, she was recollecting the time when her sister was troubled by her gender.

 

"I see, so she was having that kind of trouble before… It didn’t come to mind when looking at her now.”

 

"Yeah... I am happy to see her having fun freely like that." smiled Fel earnestly. 

 

Tifa stared at her friend’s smile fondly. It’s rare for Tifa to see Fel earnest smile, that’s why she was going to enjoy it. 

 

“It seems both of us have the same sibling complex,” muttered Tifa slowly, taking care to not disturb her friend’s reminiscence.

 

___