I sat up as I listened to the garage opening. Mile's lap was comfortable, and I really would've loved to lay there all night, but the awkwardness of having Season and Noitte around was a deal breaker… for now.

As I got up from her lap, Mile seemed to snap back to reality as well. 

"What's wrong sweetie?"

"Oh, well Noitte and Season are home, so…"

She gave me a confused look as she seemed to wait for me to explain what was wrong.

Right. For her this was a normal and reasonable thing to do to get closer to her family. Yay Corruption, I guess? That said, I somehow doubted Noitte and Season would see it that way.

Hm? Come to think of it, I also tried to make Noitte want more physical contact yesterday, so she might unexpectedly be fine with it if I just point out that Mile wanted something similar…

So once again the limiting factor is Season, huh? Welp, I guess I need to figure out a way to deal with her sooner rather than later. For now though, let's focus on not causing a scene.

I furrowed my brow as I tried to come up with a good way to explain myself to Mile.

“Er, I’m not sure that Season will really understand the idea behind us getting closer like this.”

“Why not, Conor? Couldn’t you just explain it to her like you did for me earlier?” she asked, looking even more confused. 

No, because I can’t use Corruption on her, obviously.

“Well… She’s always been really distant from me, you know? She never talks to me and she backs away whenever I get near her. I think she might just not like me, so-”

“Oh, sweetie, that’s not true!" Mile interrupted me with a face full of concern. "Your sister’s just a little… different in how she expresses herself. It’s been a little harder to get through to her now that she’s older, but she’d definitely want to get closer to everyone too!”

The worry in her voice was extremely evident, but it was also a good opportunity for me to help myself a bit. 

“Er, I just… dont know how to approach her. Do you think maybe you could talk to her for me? Like, check how she feels about me and if she’d freak out at us getting closer?”

“Of course, sweetie!"

Mile smiled warmly as she responded. From her perspective, she probably just saw a future where her family was closer, which I guess was true in a way. I felt a little bad about taking advantage of her feelings like that, but nowhere near bad enough to turn back now.

The sound of a car door closing a little too loudly brought me out of my thoughts and signaled the end of my Mile time.

I stood up and walked towards the entryway alongside Mile as we waited for the girls to come in. A moment later, the garage door loudly opened followed immediately by a cheerful voice.

"Mom! Conor! We're back!" Noitte called as she quickly walked through the door, her face practically glowing with excitement. 

Knowing that a torrent of words was coming, I stepped back slightly and waited for Mile to start tapking, which she did cheerfully.

"Welcome home sweetheart! How was the movie?"

"It was so good, mom. The effects were way better than the first movie and they actually killed off-"

I was immediately bombarded by spoilers. For a movie I didn't care about, sure, but have some courtesy, Noitte! 

As she rambled on, Season silently squeezed past her and into the house. She stared at me for a brief moment before walking to the stairs, so I decided to try to take the chance to at least speak to her tonight.

"Hey Season, how was the movie?"

"Fine."

Completely betraying my intentions, she quickly made her way up the stairs without elaborating whatsoever. The distance between her and Noitte's attitudes was ridiculous, but I was used to it by now, so I wasn't too surprised or upset.

"Conor."

I was snapped out of the tangent I was on by Season who had stopped at the top of the stairs for some reason. 

"Er, what’s up?"

"You feeling better?"

"Huh? Oh! From last night? Yeah… thanks."

"Yeah."

And so, with a grand total of six words, she made her way to her room and closed the door, probably not to be seen again for the rest of the night.

Well, at least she cares, right? … Yeah, hopefully Mile will be able to soften her up a bit sometime soon.

"Hey, Conor, what's up? Something happen?"

In contrast to her sister, Noitte seemed ready to keep talking all night as she turned to me with a curious look on her face.

"No. Or yeah, I guess. I wasn't feeling so hot last night, and Season was asking if I felt better."

"Oh! Gotcha. Glad you’re doing better. So anyway-"

Apparently satisfied that all was well, Noitte began talking at Mile once again. I briefly considered whether there was a way to take advantage of both of their newfound desire for physical contact at once, but quickly pushed the idea out of my head as I considered both Season and the number of ways things might overly complicate with two of them present.

With plan A on hold, I tried to think about my options. I had used Corruption once and Active Corruption once, so I still felt like I had more than half my energy left for the day…

"Psst! Conor! Over here!" 

Fig, apparently not caring about how "psst" was supposed to be used, yelled at me from the bathroom. 

I get that other people can't hear her and all, but jeez.

I excused myself from Mile and Noitte's conversation and made my way to the bathroom. I quickly closed the door behind me before speaking to Fig in a whisper.

"What, Fig?"

"You got a new skill!" She replied cheerfully.

Oh?

Status

『Conor Pitur

Age: 25

Sex: Male

Inherent skill: Corruption LV2.

Sub Skills: Active Corruption, Sympathize』

Let's see, so the new subskill is "Sympathize"? It’s not a "Corruption" this time, huh? And the name… sounds kind of… subtle.

Well, let's see what we've got here…

『Sympathize: A skill which spends a small amount of MP to either project the user's emotions at the target, or read the target's emotions. Greater MP can be expended to increase the effects. Repeated use will increase the effects. No daily usage limit.』

Ooh! "No daily usage limit", huh? That's a nice change of pace. As for the rest of the skill… I think I get it, but just to make sure…

"Hey Fig, what do you think of this one?"

"Right! Umm… I don't really have as good a handle on this one since it's not Corruption based… but, I mean, I think it's just what it says, right?"

Well, that's not helpful at all. 

Fig tried to continue on, still not sounding particularly confident.

"Hmm… yeah! So basically it feels like it just sort of pushes your feelings into someone's brain or lets you read theirs…"

I mulled over it for a second as I tried to figure out just how useful it would be.

"The first part is kind of Corruptiony," I whispered "Making others feel the same way as me would probably help with convincing them or things like that."

Matching my idea, Fig chimed in as well.

"And I guess the second part would be kinda helpful if you wanted to get a read on someone's feelings about something? Like, it would tell you how to talk about a subject or… something?"

It was a kind of weird feeling. We could both tell that it was a helpful skill and could be a good compliment to Corruption, but it was a comparatively lackluster skill given that even someone like me can mostly tell how people feel about things when we're talking, and Fig can seemingly read emotions almost perfectly anyway. As for projecting my feelings: if I could do that, it seems like I'd be better off just using Corruption, right?

Well whatever, a free skill is a free skill. Let's just leave it until I can test it out.

Fig returned to me before I quickly flushed the toilet and washed my hands so that it actually looked like I was using the restroom, then returned to the living room where Mile was still being bombarded by movie details.

Well, let's see. Season is a no-go, Noitte is going to be infodumping on Mile for a while, I already used Active Corruption on Mile, and my energy was still at more than half… hmm.

It's not like I didn't have the option of just calling it a day and just leaving things alone until tomorrow. My head probably wouldn't explode if I just called it a night and left some mana unused for the day. The problem was just that it felt wasteful, and I couldn't stand that.

If I start the day off at full MP every day, then the most efficient way to do things is to use it all every day, right? I definitely had a full Corruption left in me, and probably a couple of Active Corruptions too, so not using them felt like permanently setting everything back a day and slowing my own growth.

Moreover, I don't know if it was just because of the effect of having active mana or if it was just my own brain overthinking, but I felt way too energetic to call it a night right now. 

I weighed my options as I made my way back to my couch and sat down.

First: I could just suck it up and plan better starting tomorrow so that I could make sure to use my mana more efficiently from here on. It was probably the easiest option, but also one which felt extremely unsatisfying given my current desire to do something. 

Second: I could go out somewhere before it gets too late, and use up my extra energy on whoever’s there. It would definitely draw attention from Mile and the others, and it would mean trying to corrupt someone I didn't know, but it would help me progress.

Third: I could just spam my new skill until I run out of mana… but that just feels like a waste of time.

Noitte seemed to finish up her dissertation as I was thinking, and with an enthusiastic "Night mom! Night Conor!" she made her way up the stairs and to her room, leaving Mile at the entryway, looking somewhere between exhausted and happy that Noitte had fun..

It was as good a chance as any to test the new skill.

Sympathize

I felt mana leave my body and head towards Mile before looping around her and heading back to me. Unlike when my skill was reflected, I didn't feel pain when the energy came back to me and didn’t feel my mana refill, so the effect was clearly different.

Details aside, what I got alongside the energy was emotions. For just a moment, my curiosity and anxiousness at using the new skill seemed to evaporate from my mind, only to be replaced by a sense of tiredness and slight satisfaction. Maybe it was because I knew they weren't my actual feelings, but I quickly lost the feeling and went back to my original emotions.

Well, I didn't gain any new information on how she felt, but at least the skill worked.

Now for the reverse.

Sympathize 

Once again a small amount of energy flowed out of me and towards Mile. This time, however, it didn't come back to me, instead flowing gently into Mile.

She looked confused for a moment before turning to me with a bright smile on her face. 

"Well, I guess I'm about ready to get to bed too…"

She seemed to struggle for a moment on whether or not to say something, and I felt the slight tension in my head that seemed to indicate her resisting something.

The feelings I had were something along the lines of curiosity, eagerness, and maybe a tiny bit of lust. As for what conflict those might trigger in her… well, I'm not entirely sure…

After a moment, Mile seemed to give up on what she wanted to say and slowly make her way up the stairs, leaving behind a "goodnight sweetie" as she did.

I sat on the couch and waited a bit for her to get to bed before going upstairs. I'd decided to just go ahead and use the full Corruption on Noitte tonight, even if I might have been able to get away with just using Active.

After about half an hour of waiting around and doing daily missions, I felt enough time had passed for everyone else to be in bed, and began to make my way up the stairs.

I knocked softly on Noitte's door, and received an unexpectedly quick and energetic reply.

"Hello?"

Well, maybe it was a bit much to expect her to be asleep before eleven on a Friday. 

"Hey, Noitte, can I come in?"

"Course!"

I entered her room for the second day in a row, carefully closing the door behind me as I did.

As always, Noitte sat in the small free space on the bed, surrounded by pillows and stuffed animals as she looked up at me from behind her phone. Despite her looking so comfortable, she still hadn't changed out of the clothes she went to the movies in… come to think of it, does she just sleep in the same clothes she wears during the day? 

I mean, I do it, so maybe it's a pot and kettle kind of thing, but shouldn't girls be more… diligent about that kind of thing?

Well, whatever, I didn't really care that much.

Noitte stood up from her bed and walked towards me with a slight grin on her face.

"What's up, Conor?" 

Corruption

I felt a large amount of energy flow out of me. The difference between the energy output of Corruption and the other skills was ridiculous, but I guess you get what you pay for, right?

Anyway, Noitte was easy to work with since she was already so obedient. If I was going to be using Corruption on her either way, it seemed reasonable to just take the direct route.

"Okay Noitte, you're happy to be able to do things like hug me, but your graduation is coming up in just a few months. You feel like being embarrassed to get as close to me as you can is just a waste of your limited time with me, and don’t want to let it get in the way of spending time together."

I felt just a hint of resistance as the energy in the air flowed slowly towards her. I guess embarrassment is a tough one to let go of, even if you already love someone.

As soon as the air settled down, a feeling of exhaustion hit me like a truck. I stumbled slightly as I tried to figure out what had happened.

"Hooo~ you're cutting it super close there Conor… you're mana’s almost zero, you know?"

Fig yawned as she floated out of me and weakly complained. Despite her energy just a but ago, she now looked like she hadn't slept in a week.

Even without an explanation, I could feel what she meant. I was suddenly having trouble keeping my eyes open, everything looked slightly blurry, and I felt an almost irresistible urge to just sit down and sleep right there on the floor.

"My… my bad Fig…"

I didn't know how close I was to zero, but I definitely felt that my mana was dangerously low. As for what would happen if I actually hit zero… Well, I didn't really want to know right now.

Noitte seemed to come to as I tried to get ahold of myself. She looked at me with slight confusion at my apparent sudden change in expression.

"Er, Conor? You good?"

She walked up to me even faster than before and leaned way further into my personal space than she had been willing to before as she tried to examine my face.

That's great and all, but the feeling of exhaustion had wiped away everything else in my head, including my desire to push Noitte further tonight. That said, I wasn't about to just waste it completely. 

I was dead tired, and even if I were wide awake we couldn't do much here. The solution?

"Yeah, I'm fine, just… tired. I just came by to tell you I was going to go jogging at the park in the morning, and just wanted to know if you wanted to come with me?"

"What!? Really!?"

Noitte's face was a mixture of undisguised excitement and barely disguised confusion as she loudly called back. It was just going to the park together, sure, but the last time I had wanted to do that, she had been in high school. I tried not to feel bad at the thought that she was apparently this eager to hang out with me, but it still hurt just a little.

"Yeah, I need to start exercising again, and I figured it'd be fun to go together like we used to."

A brief look of concern flashed across her face as I spoke. Wait, why concern? None of this is new for me or extreme or anything, right?

Despite my own confusion, I was just too tired to pursue it. I needed this conversation to hurry along so that I could go get some rest.

"Well, anyway, you want to go with me?"

"Huh? Oh yeah, totally! What time?"

"Er… just whenever we're both ready? Before noon, I guess?"

"Sounds good!"

Noite smiled brightly as she cheerfully responded. She looked happier than she did talking about the movie, which I couldn't help but feel a little moved by. 

With the plan made, I yawned and stretched slightly as I tried to quickly excuse myself from her room.

"Alright, well I'm exhausted so I'm just gonna-"

As I turned around to leave, I was cut off by the sudden feeling of Noitte's arms around me and an increasingly familiar softness on my back as she hugged me from behind. Her head slowly came down and rested on my shoulder as we stood there.

I tried my best not to tense up at the sudden contact, something that was definitely helped by feeling dead on my feet and lacking the energy to flinch properly.

Even so, I couldn't help but question the sudden hug.

"Uh, Noitte?"

"I know. You're tired." She said, sounding slightly annoyed and slightly happy. "Just give me a sec, okay?"

Well, even as tired as I was, I could appreciate the warm feeling of Noitte hugging me. I slowly and somewhat awkwardly put my hand over one of hers and waited, slightly happy and slightly tense, for her to have her fill.

After some time that definitely wasn't "a sec" I was released.

"Hmm~ goodnight Conor!"

"Uh, yeah, night Noitte."

Both relieved to be able to sleep and disappointed to have been unable to enjoy the hugging and possibly more, I made my way downstairs, hit the couch, and immediately knocked out.