"Then, do you want to have lunch together?"
("A boy wants to have lunch with me? He doesn't mind being seen together with me?")
"Really?"
"Yes. Let's continue our discussion while eating."
"O-okay."
("How long has it been since I ate with a boy? No, how long has it been since I talked with a boy at all? He's also a lot less scary than he looks like. This is nice.")
We headed toward the school cafeteria together. The most common way students, or more likely parents of students, handled lunch, was to pay for one daily meal at the start of the school year. I was pretty sure most of the students here were doing this. My parents had reluctantly paid for me while grumbling that I would be on my own as soon as I graduated. Sapik was the same and we soon had a very average meal, both in terms of quality and taste, in front of us.
"What sorts of books are you interested in? Do you have any genres you like?"
"Hm, I don't know. I don't read much except for what we're forced to read at school. What do you like?"
"M-me? I like, um, romance and fantasy, I guess?"
("It's special types of romances and fantasies, though!")
She moved around on her chair uncomfortably and suddenly twitched.
("Whoops, I almost forgot I had this inside me. He won't find out, right?")
'I had almost forgotten too. She's so normal externally that it'd be hard to believe what she's doing under there.'
"Fantasy is the genre where characters have adventures in worlds of swords and magic, right?"
"Yes, exactly."
"That might be well-suited for me. I need something to take my mind off my everyday life. Do you have any fantasy novels to recommend for a beginner?"
("He wouldn't like erotic novels, right? But he's a boy too... No way, no way, I can't recommend that to someone I'm talking to for the first time.")
'I don't think I'd mind. If it's on the same level as your stories then it wouldn't be too bad.'
"Wait, let me check."
She took her phone out and started to manipulate it quickly.
"Oh, also, something not too expensive if possible. I don't have much money these days."
'I spent too much to prepare for the interrogation. Well, I'm sure those tools would come in handy again at some point.'
"What about reading web novels? Although the quality is usually less good, it's free and there's a large amount of them available."
"A web novel? A novel on the Internet?"
"Yes. The format is a bit different from a book. It's published chapter by chapter to online platforms and you just need to have access to the net to read them."
"Sounds perfect. Is there a site you recommend?"
"I know a few that are fine."
I continued to discuss with her while we were eating lunch. I opened a few browser windows on my old phone to serve as a sort of bookmark of the websites she recommended to me. As expected, she was a nice girl. Except for her initial surprise at my face, she hadn't had a bad thought about me a single time. I was glad talking to her ended up well. I think it helped that we were mostly talking about something she liked. I wasn't lying either when I said I wanted to find something to take my mind off my current situation. I thought I should read after investigating Cattivo and hoped this would help maintain my sanity.
She was slightly more relaxed with me when it was time to go back to class. She even smiled a little at the end. During classes, she spared a few thoughts for me and even looked my way a couple of times. I took it as a special honor considering how busy her mind usually was.
I went back to work after school. Since I had gone to the town outskirts the previous day, I focused more on the town center this time. Unfortunately, I still didn't manage to find anything worthy enough. When I came back home, I tried one of the best-ranked novels on one of the platforms Sapik recommended to me. I soon noticed another advantage of web novels: I could read on my bed, just as if I had a book in hand. Instead of turning pages, I just need to click on the next button at the bottom of each chapter.
I soon found myself engrossed in the story. It was some insane setup where ten people from ten different worlds ended up having to team up to save their respective worlds. The name of the novel was "Ten Saviors". Each character had a few quirks which made them interesting and the overall plot was both fast-paced and well thought out. I even laughed a few times during the most ridiculous moments. As for the passages full of tension, I just couldn't stop reading even while my stomach grumbled due to a lack of dinner.
It was 3 a.m. when I finally put my phone down for the day. I thanked Sapik for her recommendation. It had been a while since I enjoyed myself so much that I forgot about the time. My evaluation of her increased even more. Considering what I usually thought about people, she was pretty much at the top of my list right now.
The following two days were weekends. During the day, I roamed around town to grab any sort of information I could. I was starting to get a good understanding of Cattivo by now and even got to remember some of the more important names inside their organization. I was still as disgusted as before but knowing these things might come in handy at some point.
I noticed that they didn't know who attacked their prospective member. As far as I could tell from the minds of the few people who thought about it, the prospective members weren't that important to them. What happened also wasn't something unusual in their business. They believed it was done by a member of Giusta. They weren't sure about it because it felt different from how they operated, though. Eventually, they simply asked their members to keep what happened in mind and that was it.
When I was at home, I spent most of my time reading Ten Saviors. It was so good I wanted to share my joy with someone. That was when I noticed something. I forgot to ask for Sapik's number! I decided to fix that mistake as soon as possible.