“If it’s too much for you then you don’t have to force yourself.”

Instead of speaking, she used sign language to convey her thoughts.

‘I have no idea about what she’s trying to convey.’ Kazuya didn’t know sign language.

“Hey Sumi, how about you type it up on my phone.” Kazuya hands his newly bought phone to Sumi.

She looks at him for a second and gets embarrassed when she realizes that he doesn’t understand sign language.

When she hands him back his phone he realizes why she is trying to be a rental.

‘You want to get over your fear of communication, huh Sumi? I guess being a rental is a pretty good idea for that. You get to interact with new people all the time.’

“I’ll get you a drink. Any preferences?”

“…” She doesn’t say anything.

“Coke?”

She nods.

Kazuya walks off to the vending machine to get a coke.

‘I should give her some time alone too. She should be able to get her bearings. It’s not easy for her to try to be a girlfriend all the time.’

When he returns, he sees two shit-faced guys around Sumi saying something to her.

Even from that far away he could see that she was trembling.

‘Who in the fuck wrote this shitty plotline? The date was going perfectly until these fuckers messed everything up.’

He notices that one of them is about to touch her.

“Hey, guys. You seem to be having an awful lot of fun with my girl here.” He walks up behind the both of them and puts his arms around both of their shoulders.

He was acting as if he was best buds with them, while they weren’t feeling anything close to that.

His arms were holding the two of them in a chokehold as he pulled the two of them back.

“Argh.” “Ack.” Both of them gag a little but Kazuya didn’t leave them any respite.

He throws them off to the side and he then walks to the still-trembling Sumi and kneels in front of her.

“You okay, Sumi.”

She nods imperceptibly.

“Come on, let’s ditch this place. I’ll feed you ice cream. It’ll cool you down.”

Kazuya held her hand and brought her to a nice ice cream bar in the mall, ordering two softies.

Sumi’s comes first as Kazuya has to wait for a bit to get his. Sumi looks at her ice cream cone with such conviction that Kazuya thought she’d be going to war with that cone.

Then she brought it towards Kazuya, offering him the ice cream. While looking down at the side.

‘That shy expression, combined with her initiative… God anyone would fall in love with her.’

“You don’t mind if I have a bite?” He still asked her gently since a shy girl doesn’t need someone assertive. She needs someone willing to go slowly and patiently with her.

“…No.” Her voice is still small but she has at least progressed since she didn’t need any prompting.

Kazuya takes a little bite and pulls back.

“It’s good, Sumi.”

When she took a bite out of the same ice cream Kazuya thought, ‘I’m not sure if this should be allowed by the rental agency. A saliva exchange like that could might health problems in the long run… I’ll let Chizuru know. The poor girl shouldn’t get sick because she tried too hard, should she?’

Next, they moved on to mini-golf. There was a track at the mall.

Kazuya had to teach her how to play that too. She couldn’t even hit the golf ball with her first shot.

Next, they tried football, then the rodeo where Sumi had to keep herself on a dancing bull.

Although she wasn’t good with anything, her efforts were something that Kazuya recognized completely. She tried so hard that even Kazuya felt motivated.

Finally, they went ice skating.

Sumi wasn’t that good but with Kazuya’s help, she was able to skate at least decently.

After that, they went to get some food at the food court.

When Kazuya came back from ordering, he saw someone unexpected who was sitting with Sumi.

“Mami? How are you here?”

“I was out with my friends and then I noticed you. I thought that I should say hi.”

“Oh… Hi. I guess.” 

“And who is this cutie?” She turns to Sumi.

“She’s a friend of Chizuru’s, she asked me to help her friend out.” ‘Can’t tell her Sumi’s name. She might name-search the girl and find out about the rental thing. While I don’t mind, this could lead to her finding out about Chizuru.’

Mami narrowed her eyes in suspicion and said, “I see… Well, you guys have fun. My friends are waiting for me.” With that Mami gets up and walks away.

Then Sumi and Kazuya eat up and leave the place since it was almost time for the date to end.

“Than… ou…” Kazuya heard unintelligible words from Sumi.

“You don’t have to worry Sumi. You aren’t a talker but I was able to see your effort to make me enjoy myself. Someone as gentle as you is very suitable to be a rental.”

He smiles at her and then says, “See you.” Before walking away.

“Kazuya! …See you again.” Somehow Sumi gets her voice at the end of the date and enthusiastically sees Kazuya off.

Kazuya turns around and smiles at her, “You’re amazing Sumi! The cutest! Just keep going, no matter what.” With the same level of enthusiasm, Kazuya encourages Sumi.

As if all of her courage was finished with that one sentence Sumi ran off awkwardly after that.

’Such a cutie… Her voice is very good though. I wonder if she ever tried out for singing…’

…

When Sumi left to go back home, she gets a call from Chizuru who is curious about how her date went.

“Sumi? How’d the date go?”

Sumi mumbles into her phone in a tiny voice that Chizuru miraculously understands.

“Really! He saved you from delinquents… I guess he does have that vibe around him, huh?”

‘He did such a thing, huh… I wonder what he’d do if it was me…’ She gets those distracting thoughts out of her head.

‘I’d beat those delinquents myself. Not everyone is like that guy who keeps on overpowering me. I know good self-defense. Umu.’ Chizuru brings out her inner iron lady.

“Hmhm.”

”With this, you’re one step further on your goal, Sumi. I’m happy for you.”

“Yeah~”

…

When Kazuya got back home he spent some time resting and playing his games. He hadn’t even touched any of them in the past three months knowing that he had to get his security algorithms up to date and make sure that he would be able to launch his AI assistant application by the end of February.

Now that most of his work was done, all he had to do was to launch the app and put it up on the various platforms. He’d bought a temporary home server after forking some cash to buy the hardware and set it up.

He set it up in his new apartment since that place had so many free areas.

He was confident in his code that even if there were 10 billion concurrent users, the home server would be enough. That was how efficient his code was.

The main database would be present within his home server and was protected by all of his security knowledge.

After all of that would be done, at the start of March, Nexus Tech was going to bring about a revolution in the world.

The next morning when he woke up, he went to the balcony to get some fresh air.

He heard some noise on the other side of the partition.

“Good morning, Chizuru.”

“Goof morfif.” He heard a muffled voice from the other side.

“You brushing your teeth?”

“Mhm.”

“Talk to me after that, then.”

There is silence for a while before Kazuya decides to go over to Chizuru’s side.

He goes over to her side and looks at her annoyed face.

“What the hell?” Her voice is still muffled.

“I told you to talk to me after you finish brushing.”

He casually takes a seat on the other side of her balcony and sits on it.

Chizuru sighs resignedly before she goes into her apartment for a bit.

When she comes out she says, “What is it with you and entering my place like you own the damn place?”

“It’s fun. Also, aren’t you cold? You’re wearing nothing but shorts and a t-shirt.”

“I like the cold, bite me.”

“Well if you insist…” Kazuya brought his face close to her neck.

“Wha- Noo! Stay away. Perv.” She pushed his face back and tried to change the topic, “How’d your thing with Sumi go?”

“It was fun. She’s pretty and amazing. A little on the shy side but honestly, it adds to her charm. I must say, I felt my heart skipping at least a few beats when I was out with her.”

“Is that so…” She trails off with her eyes narrowed and turns to walk back to her apartment.

“What? You feeling jealous?” Kazuya pulls her back and looks into her eyes.

She turns her eyes away from him.

“Tell me. If you tell me that you’re feeling jealous, I’ll confess my love for you in front of the entire neighborhood. What do you say?”

“Keep dreaming.” She pulls her hand away from him and walks back into her apartment, locking the balcony door.

‘Somebody get this chick an acting gig. She’s basically made a fucking wall in front of me as long as she’s a rental.’ Kazuya had to climb back over the partition.

…

A few days after Kazuya took Sumi on a date.

Chizuru got a text from someone while she was in the shower.

When she got out of the shower she checked the text.

“Really! Oh my god Umi, you’re amazing.” Reading the text her face gets a bright smile.