Tenha was not a fan of his decision to leave her alone with Fusa. Though she did agree with his reasoning behind it. So all she had to do was play her cards right and there would be no issues between them.

“So…” She put down the controller as they awkwardly sat around waiting for his return. “Those friends of yours message you back yet?”

“No, not yet.” She nervously answered, pretending to check on her phone. Fusa knew full well she wasn’t going to get a message from her friends while she stuck around here. Her plan was to find everything she needed to get to the bottom of this mystery.

Just who was this girl who suddenly appeared and now lived with Nishiki. He seemed to be a regular miserable office worker for most of the time she knew him. Then out of nowhere it seemed he had gotten a step quicker, his posture got better, he was much more sociable. Seeing as they told her Tenha’s presence in living here was recent, his change in demeanor had to have been caused by her.

How did he know this person? Nishiki had never mentioned knowing many people up until he told her about the Valentine’s day present. This was the first time she had heard of him being close to anyone, let alone a girl.

Tons of people would be saying she was jealous, but the girl would disagree with that assessment. This was merely an act of worry that any rational human being would think.

“So, you’ve known Nishiki for a long time, right?” Asked Tenha. “I’ve only known him for a little bit, but it sounds like you’ve known him at work for a while.”

“I’ve known him ever since I started working at the company.” She answered. Back then he was fairly similar to what he was now. A guy who worked way too hard and appeared exhausted all the time. Given he no longer appeared as tired, she chalked it up as Tenha’s helping him take care of the house so he didn’t have to work as hard. “What about you? Only a short while?”

“We first met a half a year ago.” She lied in response, looking towards the bathroom in hopes of Nishiki returning soon. “I fell onto some hard times a couple months back and he was the only person who was able to lend me a hand.”

“That’s really kind of him.” After hearing this, Fusa got to thinking of something else. What if Tenha wasn’t the one she should be worried about. Maybe there was a reason as to why he would hide away having someone like her living at his house. “Um, how old are you?”

“Uh…” She hesitated because there was no way she could tell her the truth about being 200. It was this hesitation that gave Fusa more cause for concern since people shouldn’t have to think about their age. “20.” There was also the problem that in her mind, this girl looked way too young to be 20.

“Hey.” She leaned in to whisper to the girl. “I just want to let you know it’s safe right now.”

“Uh, yeah?” Tenha replied with bewilderment. Obviously she would be aware of the situation in terms of danger. “I already know that.”

“You can tell me the truth now.” She attempted to persuade her to open up. The fox girl continued to not understand where this human was coming from. So she just shook her head to try and keep suspicion away from the two of them. It was a failure as all she managed to do was get Fusa even more suspicious there was wrongdoing occurring under this roof. “I suppose I don’t have a choice.”

“What are you doing?” Asked Tenha as she watched the woman get up and onto her phone once more. “Did your friends message you finally?”

“I’m sorry, but you look like you need help.” It wasn’t her friends she was calling for. “I’m calling the police so we can get you to safety.”

“You can’t do that.” And Tenha wasn’t about to let her do so easily. This would be the second time she had to deal with someone attempting to call the cops on her.

“Okay, hope everything’s been all right while I’ve…” It was in this moment Nishiki also decided now was a good time to leave the bathroom. He figured since he was gone for two minutes, that everything should be in a better position for him to tell Fusa to leave. However this was far from the case. “Uh, what’s going on?” There was a tense standoff as he reentered the living room.

“Oh no, he’s back.” Fusa exclaimed in fear. “Little girl, run out the door and get away. I’ll hold him back.” She was willing to die for this stranger she thought was a child kidnapped and forced to live with him. “go, run!” Tenha did not follow her commands in the slightest.

“Tenha, why is she so crazy right now?” He nearly prepared himself to blame his fox companion yet again, but realized there was no motive for her to want to do that.

“Forget it, I’m calling the police to get this all figured out.” She went to dial the number, which is then when Tenha decided enough was enough to did her move to stop the phone call.

It was not magic, but just the same thing when Nishiki attempted to call the police. This being to tackled the girl with her superior strength and keep the mobile device from her grasp. She did so in a manner very similar to when she stopped him from calling the cops the other time. So she ended up getting her onto her stomach, with her foot forcibly on her back to prevent the woman from wiggling out from underneath. “Ahh, no please.” Fusa begged for mercy. It was at this point she now thought the pair were together in some strange scheme and she had accident figured out their evil deeds. “Don’t kill me.”

“Fusa calm down, we’re not going to hurt you.” He tried to assure her things would be okay. “Well, I guess Tenha already hurt you, but that’s not the point.”

“But, what’s going on?” If they were supposedly not going to hurt her, then it didn’t make any sense as to why she got overpowered by a little girl so easily. While Fusa wouldn’t call the gym a place she went to ever, it wasn’t as if a grown woman like herself should get beaten by a child.

“I guess there’s no getting out of it.” Tenha sighed. As she breathed out heavily, her fox tail and ears made themselves visible to the woman.

“Ah, you have a tail?” She stared on in shock as the fox girl got off her. Fusa stood up and scanned for a long while to ensure her eyes were not deceiving her. “You’re not human?”

“She’s a fox spirit to be precise.” He answered. The pair would then go on to explain the truth to her about how they actually knew each other. There were a ton of details they left out about their time together. All they told her was about the circumstances and why Tenha lived here.

“When you say it like that it make sense.” Though even with their words and the situation surrounding them. She still had a hard time believing this was real. For a little while, Fusa believed this to all be one crazy dream where she’d be waking up at any moment.

This was not to be the case when she promised not to tell anyone. “I don’t think anyone would believe me anyway.” This was oddly easy in his mind. A little too easy for his liking that Nishiki was suspicious on if she was going to keep their secret.

“If you want to see a normal day with us, you’re free to hang around.” Tenha offered.

“No thanks.” She gave a respectful bow and made her way for the front door. “I should be meeting up with my friends. It would be rude to keep them waiting.” The woman would bid her farewell and head outside.

“Should we follow her to make sure she won’t rat us out?” Nishiki was worried about losing their secret. It wasn’t as if the contract would care if they were forced to deal with people knowing about a fox spirit. But at the same time, he would care about dealing with too much publicity.

“Nah.” Tenha was completely lackadaisical about the matter. She simply hopped back onto the couch to resume their gaming session. “You still up to play?”

“Eh…” He thought about it for a moment. Logically, they should try to ensure the safety of their secret. But because of hanging around the lazy fox spirit so much, her influence had rubbed off on him. “Sure, let’s go another round.”