"Alice-chan, are you ready to go?" Megumi's voice came from behind, snapping their attention. Megumi looked at Hiroyuki with a surprised face before she asked,

"I thought you would be there first with Erina-chan. What happened with her?" Hiroyuki just shrugged.

"There is a slight change in our plan. She will not be with us anymore."

"Oh?" Megumi seems amused, and suddenly, Hiroyuki handed her 1000 yen from his pocket with a grumbling face.

"What is this about?" Alice asked curiously.

"We are betting on how long it would last until one of you snapped. He guessed it would take at least three days, but I bet one of you left on the first day. It seems I was right here." She said with a smug face.

"Really, you bet on Erina-chan staying here for three days? Maybe you don't know about her as well as you thought, or you are being too optimistic." Alice said with a mocking smile, making Hiroyuki sulk more.

"Don't be that gloomy, it didn't suit you." Megumi teased him more.

"Whatever. Let's go." He can see the amused expression in Megumi's eyes, but he decided to ignore it for now.

"So, where are we going?" Alice asked curiously.

"We will go shopping!" Megumi replied with a cheerful tone, leaving Alice dumbfounded.

"Shopping?" Alice asked ridiculously. Megumi just nodded at her question.

"Yup. Shopping. Let's go!" She grabbed Alice's hand and moved, leaving Hiroyuki alone in front of the Den.

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"I know you said shopping before. But why should we go to this place?" Alice whined.

"Oh? What's wrong with this place?" They are at the small market near the Den.

"What's wrong? Look at the vegetables here, the fish, the fruits, the meats. Nothing is fresh here. They are third-rate ingredients! Why did you buy something from this place?" She hissed at Megumi and Hiroyuki. The latest just snorted in amusement.

"You are exaggerating, girl. The ingredients might not be the best, but it is still a good one. We always brought everything here, and you tasted it by yourself, didn't you? What could I do with what you called 'third rate ingredients'? I won against your sister, the holder of God Tongue, in a shokugeki." Alice grimaced at that memory.

"And as the ingredients here is not fresh, of course, it is not. This place is one of the poorest in Tokyo. People here could not afford to buy good ingredients or fresh ones. So, they brought it second hand to get the cheaper price."

"But it is not the best!" She said stubbornly.

"It is not the worst either. Just like I said, it might not be the best, but it is still good enough." Hiroyuki took a breath before talking again,

"Did you notice the condition of this market? It is clean, neat, and not smelly, something that you would have a hard time finding in a small market like this. But despite that, this market didn't have that many crowds that buy from here. How do you think they could live with that?"

"....Is that why you choose this market?" Alice asked.

"It is part of our reason," Hiroyuki admitted. Then, he added, "But it is not the main reason. You will know about it later."

After watching Megumi did her shopping, they leave the market quickly.

"Where are we going?"

"We are going to Hiroyuki's and my home, the orphanage." Megumi showed a fond smile as she talked about the orphanage, so Alice decided to keep silent for a while. Right after they arrived in front of the orphanage, they were greeted by a shout,

"Megumi-neesan! Yuki-nii! You are here!" It gained the attention of the orphanage resident as more children comes out of the building to greet them.

"Megumi-neesan!"

"Yuki-nii!"

"Megumi-neesan, are we going to cook today?"

All of them keep shouting at each other, leaving Alice dumbfoundedly behind.

"Neesan, who is this girl?" A little girl suddenly asked Megumi. The one who was the subject of the question send the little girl a smile and replied,

"My name is Alice. What about you, little girl?"

"Me? I am Kato, and when I grow older, I will be pretty like you!" She shouted while admiring Alice. Hiroyuki could see a twitch in the corner of Alice's mouth and the amused expression on her face.

"You will be far prettier than me in the future." This makes Kato's eyes shine in happiness as she asked,

"Really?"

"Sure."

"Thank you, Alice-nee!" The girl smiles once again before running back to Megumi and the resident who looked at them with a smile.

"That was nice of you," Hiroyuki whispered from Alice's back. She shrugged.

"Well, she wants to be pretty just like me, so I decided to encourage her." Then she turned and asks, "Speaking of which, what are we going to do in this orphanage?" She asked curiously.

"Megumi-san and I went to the orphanage once a week to cook something for them. We will do that now."

"Really? But what about the matron?" The question darkened Hiroyuki's face for a moment. He waited for Megumi to enter the orphanage with the children before he replied,

"Our matron… She is someone who didn't like working around children. Strange, isn't it?" He chuckled at the ridiculous expression on Alice's face. "Well, she worked for the orphanage because this was her parent's orphanage. She didn't want to close the orphanage, but she also didn't want to work around the children.

I told you before, this place is among the poorest place in Tokyo. Nobody wants to work here, so she decided to take the matron position just for the paper. But in reality, she just communicated to one of the oldest children here to make an arrangement about the fund usage and come here when the people from the government come to check. Other than that, we don't really have a matron to take care of us."

"But that is ridiculous." She muttered. Hiroyuki just snorted as the response.

"It is not that bad. At least she still sent the money here, and when I checked the financial report of the orphanage, she didn't take even a single yen for herself. If it was another matron, I bet they would take the money away from us.

The only bad thing is, we have to take care of ourselves. Nobody taught us about anything. That is why every week, Megumi will come here to teach them at least the basic cooking, so they could at least know how to cook when they live alone." Alice couldn't speak anything, just staring at Megumi who entertained the children in front of her.

"You asked before, why did we shop in a small market with what you called third-rate ingredients?" Hiroyuki suddenly asked. Alice nodded at the question.

"It was because we could not forget about the kindness of the people in that market. When Megumi-san and I were ten, we were the oldest in the orphanage. But both of us didn't know how to cook. We tried to learn how to cook. But, can you imagine how much waste of ingredients we spent just for learning? And at that time, we couldn't even cook a decent egg just for breakfast.

Honestly, that was a hard time. We made half of the residents here starved for several days. But that was when the people from the market come. It seems they noticed our failed attempt to cook. When we were out of money, one of them took pity on us and sent food here every day for a week. After that, several people from the market did the same for the orphanage, even until now.

That kindness, we couldn't forget about it. Buying our daily ingredients is our way to say thank you."

"That is why you are not fond of Erina-chan and her father," Alice said in sudden realization.

"Yes. They act like they own the world, throwing food that didn't meet their standard and sometimes even before they ate the food. I just want her to know that outside of Totsuki, there are so many people, so many children who will be glad to eat all of the food she threw away."

They spent about a minute in silence before Alice asked,

"So, will you join Megumi-san there?" Then Hiroyuki smiles mischievously at her.

"Yes, and you will join me too."

"Oh?" Now Alice stared at Hiroyuki curiously.

"You will help me as I would make something with your specialty, molecular gastronomy."

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Author note:

You can also read:

- Transmigrated Into Anime World as Kiyoko Shimizu's Older Brother up to chapter 47

- Naruto: Ashigaru up to chapter 15

You can read all of it at my Patreon account, pat_reon.com/zwolf1 (Without '_') Thank you for your support! :)