Living with a Magical Girl, but I'm a Monster Executive

"..." Lantian Zhu stared wide-eyed, unsure where to begin. She tried opening a folder... only to find more folders inside.

"???" Confused, she clicked into a subfolder again, only to see a huge pile of files with extensions she didn't recognize.

They weren't documents, spreadsheets, text files, or pictures, and they had nothing to do with the monster materials she wanted to see... Maybe they were games?

With that thought, Lantian Zhu opened another folder.

This one had to be a game... She even recognized the icon for this .exe file. It seemed to be a recently released online game.

She opened another one...

A game.

Another folder... A game.

"..." Lantian Zhu was speechless—Cong Yu was clearly a manga artist, so why was his computer filled with nothing but games from top to bottom?

Of course, she had no idea that this was merely her stereotype...

Forget manga artists—even novelists had computers full of games. Gathering material had nothing to do with one's profession.

"Click, click—"

Along with the sound of mouse clicks, something called "Monster Inspiration Sources" appeared before her.

Her gaze sharpened as she quickly opened the file.

[Loading—The Girl's Lifespan Is Being Reduced—]

[14%]

[40%]

[41%]

Perhaps it was because she was too nervous, but Lantian Zhu felt that the page was loading exceptionally slowly.

And perhaps it was just psychological, but she kept feeling as though footsteps were approaching the house.

"Come to think of it, Cong Yu, why don't you join a club?"

"Ah, a clu..."

"..." Lantian Zhu: "!!!"

It wasn't her imagination! She could already hear the two of them talking downstairs?

Mm... So that was it. Cong Yu was in the Homecoming Club, and Little Guang had not joined a club yet, so they came home early.

Lantian Zhu swallowed as she watched the page reach "99%," while the footsteps drew nearer and nearer.

The page was about to load. Even just one glance would do.

"Huh? My keys..."

It sounded like Yaochuan Guang was already searching for her keys, while Cong Yu said beside her, "Lantian Zhu should be home, right?"

Lantian Zhu nervously watched the image begin to appear, hesitating over whether to close the laptop and go open the door herself.

"No need, I found th—"

"..." It loaded!

Lantian Zhu bit her lip and looked at the page displayed on the computer—

A gorgeous monster completely stripped naked was embracing a magical girl without a top on. They appeared to be rolling around in bed.

No, they were definitely rolling around in bed!

Lantian Zhu could no longer keep calm. Racing against time, she scrolled down two pages... They were all screenshots from various adult manga!

These were obviously doujinshi! Why were they doujinshi?!

Mm, wait... There seemed to be notes beside them: [Tall

Character design reference for monster form—draw her flat-chested, then claim she is male.]

Was he copying character designs, drawing women, and stubbornly calling them men?!

What on earth did Cong Yu use as references for his manga?!

The Girl Who Stepped into the Abyss

Despair. Lantian Zhu was in utter despair.

She had thought she could find what she wanted by racing against time. Instead, she had found a whole pile of indecent things.

In the direst of emergencies, Lantian Zhu abruptly slammed the laptop shut and pressed the power button.

Then, she pretended that she knew nothing and started watching TV.

To make her act more convincing, she stiffly propped her feet up on the coffee table and tried her hardest to behave as usual.

"I'm home!"

Yaochuan Guang called out in greeting. As Lantian Zhu stammered, "W-Welcome back..."

Cong Yu said, "Welcome back—"

"Why are you the one saying 'welcome back'?!"

Yaochuan Guang complained, then hung her backpack to the side. "So much happened today. I'm exhausted—"

"Cong Yu even gave me quite a scare... Oh, right, Little Lan, did you hear about what happened at Wind City High School today?"

Lantian Zhu: "..."

She felt herself starting to sweat...

What happened? She had been sneaking around all day, so she had absolutely no idea whether anything had happened at Wind City High School.

"With so many people reporting it, Lantian Zhu must have seen it on TV. We just don't know whether monsters were involved."

As Cong Yu said this, he casually sat down beside Lantian Zhu. He fiddled with his phone one-handed while opening the laptop with the other.

"Hm?"

Before Cong Yu was a warning screen: [A program is currently running. Press F to force shutdown.]

"Did I not shut it down this morning? I wonder how much battery it has left... Ah, it was charging? No wonder it lasted all day."

As Cong Yu spoke, he dismissed the shutdown screen, failing to notice that Lantian Zhu beside him was already drenched in sweat.

To be honest, Lantian Zhu wanted to run away, or bury her head in the sand like an ostrich.

"..." Then, Cong Yu looked at the computer and instantly fell silent.

It was the little adult manga collection he had saved for character design references.

Countless blush-inducing manga pages appeared before him... There was no way he had accidentally opened this that morning.

After all, it was buried beneath several layers of folders.

There were two possibilities now. One was that his laptop's spirit had awakened and desperately wanted to see something spicy.

But that possibility was probably low. Which meant someone had touched his computer and started reading adult manga.

Today, Lantian Zhu should have been the only one at home.

After reaching that conclusion, Cong Yu glanced at Lantian Zhu, who was desperately looking away, and already had his answer.

"Lantian Zhu?"

Cong Yu asked.

"Yes!"

Lantian Zhu jolted and immediately answered in a loud voice.

Her voice was so loud that Yaochuan Guang poked her head out from the kitchen. "Hm? Little Lan, what's wrong?"

At Yaochuan Guang's voice, Lantian Zhu immediately looked at Cong Yu with pleading eyes... How should one put it? They were incredibly pitiful eyes.

They seemed to say, "Don't tell her. I'll do anything."

Yes, that was the line currently displayed on Cong Yu's computer screen.

"N-Nothing..."

Although Lantian Zhu stammered, Yaochuan Guang did not pay it much attention. She simply nodded and continued making dinner.

"..." After a moment of silence, Cong Yu looked at Lantian Zhu, said nothing, and silently closed the page.

Honestly, Cong Yu had not considered the possibility that Lantian Zhu had opened his computer to look for information.

Instead, he thought that he might have forgotten to shut down his computer in the morning, and that Lantian Zhu had discovered it around noon or in the afternoon and casually opened a few folders.

Then she had gotten absorbed in the erotic manga.

All he could say was that he had never expected a girl like Lantian Zhu to enjoy manga like that... It was truly unexpected.

Still, magical girls and monster executives did have a certain forbidden allure as a pairing.

"..." Damn, isn't that basically me and these two?

Realizing this, Cong Yu began sweating a little too... He had always felt that Lantian Zhu had more or less guessed something about his real identity.

Could opening my computer on purpose have been her way of confirming whether I was really a monster, or whether I had something to do with monsters?

Lantian Zhu: "..."

Cong Yu: "..."

Then the two, each with their own thoughts—or rather, each harboring their own hidden motives—fell silent together.

Cong Yu occasionally glanced at Lantian Zhu, and Lantian Zhu occasionally glanced at Cong Yu. Whenever their eyes met, both of them would look away at the same time.

"Um... Actually..."

In the end, Lantian Zhu spoke first. She frantically made up an excuse in her head. "I wanted to see the manga you draw."

"You've been very busy lately, so I was curious about what exactly you were drawing."

As Lantian Zhu said this, her logic was so self-consistent that she was nearly convinced herself.

Was that so? If so, that was pretty safe.

"Mm, so you saw that I hadn't shut down my computer and clicked into it? Actually, if you want to read it, you can find it on manga websites."

Cong Yu nodded as he spoke, relaxing slightly.

But soon, he realized something was off. "Then why did you stay on... that page just now?"

"..."

"..." Yes, why had she?

Lantian Zhu opened her mouth. Not knowing what to say, she blurted out, "Because I like reading it."

Cong Yu: "!?"

A shock that would last Cong Yu a hundred years.

Perhaps Lantian Zhu wanted to make her words more convincing, because she repeated herself expressionlessly, "Because I like reading it."

"..."

"Because I..."

Seeing that Lantian Zhu looked ready to keep going, Cong Yu quickly waved his hands. "Stop, stop, stop. I get it. Don't say any more."

After she had put it that way, Cong Yu had no choice but to believe her.

Seeing that Cong Yu completely believed her explanation, Lantian Zhu nodded without changing expression... Hm? It seemed she was not quite expressionless anymore.

Unexpectedly, a faint Crimson appeared on Lantian Zhu's face.

It was hard to imagine that she could be embarrassed too.

That night, Lantian Zhu lay in bed, tossing and turning, unable to sleep. Beneath her calm expression, one could vaguely see a trace of existential doubt.

I should have used another excuse.

Just as she thought that, her phone gave a notification sound... It was a message from Lixe. She did not know who wanted to chat with her at night.

Still, it was a good chance to forget today's embarrassment.