Honkai City, Starting with the Anime Version of Honkai

"No way..." Kevin wasn't sure either.

"Hey, hey!" The waiter, seeing the two of them come in without ordering, just suspiciously peeking at the "couple" across the table, almost called the police. He forced a polite smile and said, "Excuse me, are you ready to order?"

"Ah, oh." Kevin ordered a few grilled meat platters and handed the menu to Mei, saying, "Do you think we should tell the people in the Golden Courtyard?"

"Let's not. Since they haven't notified us, why should we go out of our way?" Mei rejected Kevin's suggestion.

Kevin whispered, "Back in the academy, everyone knew that Mobius had feelings for Yaqing, but Yaqing either really didn't know or pretended not to."

"Kevin, do you think they'll return to the Golden Courtyard tonight?" Mei asked curiously.

"Don't know, let's just keep following them."

Chapter 52: Mutual Confession of Black History

The grilled meat sizzled with oil, the aroma wafting through the air. Just as Yaqing was about to pick up a piece, Mobius's chopsticks snatched it away. Mobius unhesitatingly ate the grilled meat, seemingly forgetting that it had just been taken from the scorching hot grill.

"Hot, hot, hot..." Mobius fanned her tempting red lips with her small hand, unwilling to spit out the grilled meat.

"Mobius, the airhead attribute really doesn't suit you." Yaqing looked at the scene before him, amused. Remembering Otto's teachings, he gentlemanly handed her a glass of ice water.

Mobius took the ice water and drank it all in one gulp, feeling the pain on her lips, suspecting she'd gotten a blister.

"Then how do you know what kind of person I am?" Mobius stared into Yaqing's eyes.

Yaqing smiled slightly, picked up a piece of grilled meat, and said, "We first met about ten years ago, right? You were a sophomore, and I, Kevin, and Su were freshmen. I remember you had a reputation as a cold campus belle."

"Heh, cold?" Mobius scoffed. "Would you listen to the thoughts of beasts? Rather than being cold, perhaps it would be more accurate to say that I disdain communicating with them."

Mobius suddenly seemed to remember something, unable to suppress her laughter, and chuckled. "Speaking of campus life, I remember, back then, you and Su, and Kevin, that little follower, were called... what was it called, the Three Kings of Qianyu, hahaha."

"Mobius, is it really okay for us to mention this black history?" Yaqing felt uncomfortable all over at the mention of this chuuni title. He guessed that only Kevin had been keenly interested in calling himself a prince back then.

"Weren't you the one who brought it up first?" Mobius didn't want to be at a disadvantage at all.

At the next table not far away, Kevin and Mei looked strangely at the two people laughing happily. Kevin wondered, "What are they talking about? They seem to be having so much fun. I wish we had sat closer."

"I think I heard them talking about... the Three Kings of Qianyu?!" Mei's expression was strange. She naturally knew that her boyfriend had been a hardcore chuunibyou in college. When others gave him the title of prince, he accepted it with great interest.

The mention of this chuuni title made Kevin, who had been a corporate slave for five or six years and had his chuuni spirit worn away by life, feel even more uncomfortable, especially when he remembered calling himself a prince back then, which made him feel physically and mentally ill at ease.

"Why are they talking about this for no reason?" Kevin ate the grilled meat in large bites, seemingly wanting to use gluttony to temporarily forget his chuuni days.

"Could it be that the current dating involves talking about each other's black history?" Mei said, finding it a little hard to understand.

"This is definitely not normal, but..." Kevin felt that it was normal for Mobius and Yaqing, after all...

Yaqing and Mobius sneezed.

They both felt like someone was cursing them.

"What are you thinking?" Mobius asked.

"Thinking about what?" Yaqing dipped the grilled meat in sauce.

"You suddenly want to film an anime again. The ratings for that Saintess Redemption Chronicle were zero, so you're not so confident in the new script?" Mobius blew on the hot grilled meat, and only put it in her mouth after it had cooled down a little.

"That Saintess Redemption Chronicle wasn't my script."

Speaking of this, Yaqing gritted his teeth in anger. As soon as he graduated, Otto called him back to take the blame, which caused the area he was responsible for to be delayed until now, and his creative ideas were stubbornly rejected by those people on the board.

"I can tell. Saintess Kallen looks like she was written by President Otto. You left the Far East without saying a word back then to take the blame, right?" Mobius really believed it back then, thinking that Yaqing had a crush on a married woman.

"So, this time you're letting someone else take the blame?" Mobius knew that Yaqing had made the same choice as Otto when she saw that the screenwriter's name was only Welt Yang.

"This isn't a lack of confidence. On the contrary, I'm too confident in the script." The fruit platter that Yaqing ordered was served. He ate a piece of sliced watermelon to relieve the greasiness of the grilled meat.

"It's precisely because of my confidence in the script that I'm afraid someone will send me razor blades, or even that radical viewers might come to reality and stab me." Yaqing said seriously.

"What exactly did you write in the later part?" Seeing that Yaqing would rather give his reputation to others than write his own name on it, Mobius became a little curious.

"Nothing, just a story about a beautiful girl saving the world." Yaqing added a pile of raw meat to the grill.

Mobius frowned and asked, "You're not a NTR fan, are you?"

Yaqing had just taken a sip of water and almost spat it on Mobius's pretty face. Fortunately, he held back, otherwise he would have been sent to the experimental operating table by Mobius himself before the radical viewers could stab him.

"How could you have such an idea?!" Yaqing couldn't maintain his fake gentlemanly demeanor and looked at Mobius in astonishment.

"Then what else? You said it's a story about a beautiful girl saving the world. Apart from NTR and cuckoldry, I really can't think of any reason why you'd be afraid of viewers stabbing you." Mobius took out a tissue and wiped her mouth.

"Heh, these are all tumors and shouldn't exist in the world." Yaqing said as he ate.

Mobius propped her head up and watched him quietly.

After finishing the grilled meat on the grill, Yaqing got up to pay the bill, but Mobius stopped him.

"Don't move."

Yaqing stopped in his tracks subconsciously.

Mobius took out a tissue and wiped the sauce from the corner of Yaqing's mouth.

Kevin at the next table silently took another photo and sent it privately to Su.

Doctor's Benevolence: "So... exciting?"

Su, who was eating with everyone in the Golden Courtyard, looked at the photo sent by Kevin and opened his narrowed eyes in shock.

"Su, what's wrong?" Seeing Su suddenly open his eyes, everyone's curiosity was instantly piqued, with Pardo, sitting closest, being the first to ask.

"Nothing, Kevin just sent me the address of that restaurant I've always wanted to go to." As expected of a doctor, he could tell a lie without batting an eye.

But Su's explanation wouldn't convince anyone, not even a tin can.

COOL~: "I feel like they're even sweeter than Mei and I. Gotta say, even the dangerous Mobius-senpai is acting like a maiden in love."

Doctor's Heart: "Kevin, you better not say that in front of Mobius-senpai, or you might end up like Klein-senpai."

COOL~: "Of course, I'm not stupid. Never mind, they're leaving."

After Yaqing paid the bill, he and Mobius left the barbecue restaurant. This time, they took the elevator straight down to the first basement level, with Mobius in the passenger seat of the McLaren.

"Senpai, where to next? World Serpent, or back to the Golden Courtyard?" Yaqing casually spun the steering wheel with one hand, pulling out his phone with the other.

"Let's go to World Serpent. I still have experiments to do, but first we need to go…"

Chapter 53: A Habit Unchanged for Ten Years

World Serpent Technology Company. Today, the three senior executives announced a company-wide holiday, leaving only a few people in fixed positions inside the company building. Mobius had Yaqing park the car in the company's parking lot.

"The company building is pretty big. Looks like your World Serpent has been doing pretty well in recent years." Yaqing held a cup of milk tea, with several more cups in his hand.

Mobius also held a cup of milk tea, taking small sips. After swallowing a mouthful of pearls, she finally spoke, "Isn't that all thanks to you, the big investor behind the scenes?"

"Don't say that. I only invested a bit when I graduated. It's been seven or eight years since then. World Serpent's development is all thanks to you guys." Yaqing didn't care at all about the initial investment, which was less than a quarter of his company's revenue.

Yaqing and Mobius swiped their cards and entered the company building. While they were waiting for the elevator, two small tails that had been tracking them finally arrived at the company building in a taxi.

Kevin hid in the bushes, holding up two small branches, and asked in confusion, "A date at the company? Does this have some special meaning?"

Looking at Kevin's silly appearance, Mei sighed and rubbed her forehead. "Kevin, are you... trying to disguise yourself?"

Kevin coughed a few times, threw away the branches in his hand, and said seriously, "Mei, should we keep following them?"

"How can we keep following them? There are surveillance cameras everywhere, and Mobius is definitely taking Yaqing to the lab. There's only one elevator." Mei gave up. She knew the company best, so she knew that if they continued to follow, they would definitely be discovered.

"Sigh." Kevin sighed, seemingly still unwilling to give up.

As Yaqing and Mobius entered the elevator, strangely, the elevator didn't go up, but down, until it reached the third basement level.

Mobius's lab was on the third basement level. This was her own request. In Mobius's words, it was so that no one would disturb her experiments.

Inside the lab on the third basement level, a girl in a white coat sat at a table, nodding incessantly. Her dark circles were so heavy that one feared she would suddenly fall asleep. On the table were three bowls of instant noodles held down by books. Beside her, a pair of rambunctious twin girls were also sleeping soundly on the lab table.

"Ding."

The sound of a card swipe rang out. A girl in a white, high-waisted jk skirt rubbed her eyes and yawned, "Ha~, is it already night? Senior Klein, did you make our instant noodles?"

The girl in the white dress nudged the girl in the black JK uniform next to her, who looked exactly like her. The girl in the black skirt then slowly woke up.

"Mmm... instant noodles, instant noodles!" Klein frantically lifted the books pressing down on the instant noodles, but the noodles were already soggy, and even the boiling water poured in was now cold.

"This probably can't be eaten... right?" Danzhu leaned over, looking at the cooled instant noodles that had been soaking for who knows how many hours.

"Let's not eat it. Let's make three new bowls." For safety's sake, Cangxuan didn't want to end up in the hospital again due to food poisoning.

"Cough cough cough." Mobius looked at them, her mouth twitching. She had clearly lived like this all along, so why did it feel like she was abusing her employees from the perspective of an outsider?

"Doctor!"

Attracted by the sound of coughing, Klein and the Cangxuan-Danzhu sisters noticed Mobius standing at the door and quickly went to greet her, while curiously looking at the man beside Mobius.

Few people could enter Mobius's lab, let alone men. They had only seen the three doctors of World Serpent working in the lab, or the corporate slaves who came specifically to deliver supplies but were actually there to see someone, specifically Kevin.

"I get it, Doctor, this is another lab rat you've brought in!" Danzhu was listless, but her eyes were full of wisdom.

Yaqing looked at Mobius strangely. First, she abused her employees, then she grabbed people to be lab rats. He felt that his senpai was even more dangerous than she had been at the academy.

Mobius knew what he was thinking from the look in Yaqing's eyes and snorted coldly, "Hmph, they all volunteered to participate in the experiments. I didn't force them."

Mobius turned her head sharply, her loose, clear green hair brushing across Yaqing's face. The fragrant scent of shampoo made Yaqing's nose itch.

Danzhu scratched her head, a little confused. "Did I say something wrong?"

"Idiot." As the older sister, Cangxuan tapped Danzhu's head lightly, causing Danzhu to glare at her.

"Hello, my name is Yaqing Schariac. I'm Doctor Mobius's junior and also her roommate in the Golden Courtyard." In front of strangers, Yaqing would always put on a gentlemanly act, even if it wouldn't make the other party like him.

Perhaps due to her instinct as a lab assistant, Cangxuan didn't shake the hand that Yaqing extended.

On the other hand, Danzhu became excited and grabbed Yaqing's hand with both of hers. "So you're that great director! I'm your fan! I especially loved your Saintess Redemption Chronicle when I was in elementary school. Please, you have to give me an autograph!"

Yaqing was quite happy to hear that the other party was his fan, but when he heard that unlucky work, his smile instantly froze, and he even wanted to pull his hand away.

Girl, I can't agree with your taste.

But as a gentleman, Yaqing didn't say it out loud, nor would he offend a lady, so he reluctantly signed his name for Danzhu.

"You're that Destiny board member?" Cangxuan then reacted, her eyes turning into money signs. Fortunately, Danzhu pulled her back in time.

"Ha... ha, I brought you guys a little gift." Unable to understand the thought processes of Mobius's subordinates, Yaqing had no choice but to awkwardly change the subject, placing the milk tea that Mobius had told him to buy on the table.

"It's milk tea! Shijie, come quick, there's milk tea to drink!" Danzhu called out to Klein, who was already falling asleep.

Klein groggily took the milk tea and muttered to herself, "It's milk tea, great... I can, I can work for a few more hours."

"Klein, long time no see." Yaqing smiled.

Speaking of Klein, he seemed to recall she was one of his junior students. However, by the time Klein enrolled, he was already a senior doing an internship off-campus. He first saw Klein following Mobius around at the graduation party when he returned to school.

"Um... Senior Yaqing, long time no see." Klein's voice was very weak, as if she might not be able to catch her breath at any moment.

"Klein, how long have you been working straight? I told you a long time ago, you'll burn yourself out if you keep this up," Yaqing said with concern.

"It's okay, it's okay, I already slept for two hours this afternoon." Klein was enjoying the joy brought by the sweetness of the milk tea, but she still quickly shook her head.

"Klein, you really need to rest," Mobius said as she walked over with a cup of instant coffee she had just made. She was equally worried about Klein's physical condition, truly afraid that one day Klein would die suddenly in the lab.

"But, the research isn't finished yet..." Klein said weakly.

"Research?" Mobius glanced at the twin sisters, "If it weren't for them, this research would have been over long ago."

"Doctor, how can you say that!" Danzhu said, putting her hands on her hips.

"That's right, that's right," Cangxuan echoed.

"Heh," Mobius sneered, "Who was it that knocked over their bowl while eating instant noodles the other day, causing an entire page of important data to be covered in broth? And who was it that was late for work twenty-nine days in a month, resulting in buying twenty-nine cups of milk tea? And who else..."

Mobius counted the stupid things Cangxuan and Danzhu had done on her fingers. Before Mobius could finish speaking, the twin sisters hugged Mobius's leg like Sun Wukong when Tang Sanzang started chanting the mantra.

"Doctor, please stop! I'll never eat instant noodles before putting away the data again," Danzhu said with tears in her eyes. She was responsible for almost two-thirds of the stupid things Mobius mentioned.

"I think I know why you two are still at the company," Yaqing casually opened the bottle labeled "Iron Phosphide" and poured the powder inside into his palm, then poured it into his mouth.

This shocked Danzhu and Cangxuan, who were still putting on a tearful performance. Was iron phosphide even edible?

"What are you looking at me for?" Yaqing licked the powder off his lips and smiled, "Senior, after all these years, you're still determined to put sugar powder in the iron phosphide bottle."