The Gallery
"I'm 23," said Nusa wryly.
"I'm 19!" shouted Neijya energetically.
"I see. Listen well, then.
"A weakling will turn a rock as heavy as a boat into the weight of paper if they try to lift it everyday. Now, both of you can tackle the hurdles in the future more easily, just use this experience as a guide."
"Huehehe. At first, I thought that you're a psychopath," Neijya said with a grin. "Turns out, you're just a daring perfectionist who always strives for the long run."
Sadly, I'm nowhere as a perfectionist as you made it out to be.
Still, as much as I prefer my stew with less annoying bones in it, things went way too smooth to my liking.
Usually, if I did shit like this in the past, there would be a vendetta and an attempt at putting the unnecessary pain into my ass instead of focusing on the given rules and tasks.
"Now that I look into it, how come both of you haven't been whining or complaining till now? Most people would either want to punch me in the face, or kick me in the groin without thinking that I could shove their face to the ground right away."
"Huh, why would we think of that." Neijya put on a frowned wry deadpan. "We would immediately die if we revolt, that's for sure."
Ahaha, so it was mostly the fear factor that became the major motivation.
Most of the rest of our doings were mostly some dumb things, commenced while throwing bad jokes at one and another. In which, even a reserved person like Nusa, turns out to be the most dumbasses in this gathering of fools.
"Bwahahah! Try to imagine that the three of us live within a Hive instead of this thug life." Nusa, with a serious gaze yet a sly smile pointed at me with his index finger as he leaned forward. "I feel like Mr. Faust is the type of teacher that will overwhelm the whole classroom on the first day, only to write an arrangement of letters on the blackboard that spells 'poop' with an unhinged smile!"
"Ahahahahah! Why the hell can I imagine that!?"
"If that was the situation, I would put a wide grin and a frown afterwards, before announcing the students with a very deep tone, 'We will be learning about poopie today'."
"GAHAHAHAHA!"
"'Open your poop-three curriculum'."
"BWAHAHAHAHAH!"
For the record, there were numerous empty bottles of alcohol on the floor.
Yes, the three of us were drunk as hell.
Haah, now that I recall, this stupid banters and interaction reminded me of the fact that I had a little brother and a little sister. Two siblings that I usually spend a lot of time with, especially in term of doing dumb shit together.
If they were still alive, both of them would probably be around at these buffoons' ages. I guess.
"It seems like someone had been celebrating their success far too early in the afternoon."
I faced the man with the blonde wavy hair. "Both of them worked really hard, they deserve the sauce."
With the forty minutes estimation of arrival came into reality, the Cheshire Cat with 20 personnel behind him arrived, equipped with various weapons that they still brandished after a hot battle in somewhere at the northwest area of District 67 where the alley's talon marked their turf.
Oh, they also brought some foods.
The faces that the Streetlight Talons made, aside the obvious poker face of Toronto, were spaced between a mixed feeling and after-battle amusement.
In the scene where the Headlamp Zero should greet and report to the department's supervisor equivalent of an upper figure, Nusa while still in a drunken state, walked up to us with a bottle on his hand with squint on his eyes.
As for Neijya, she fell asleep. In her act of being unconscious, she hugged a couple of dangerous weapons that may or may not hurt her in her rest like a bolster.
"Ah!" Nusa pointed at his superior. "Sir Toronto, the Cheshire Cat. I've always wondered why you never grin like a Cheshire Cat does, but needless to say, Nusa of the Headlamp Zero is reporting!"
"They are drunk as hell," I said, while being drunk myself.
While Toronto tried to stay silent about the behavior of his underling, some people behind him started to chuckle.
"Nusa being drunk, I feel like we've gone to a different timeline."
"Oy Nusa! What is three times four!?"
"Of course, it's twelve, idiot! I'm not sober yet but I can still out math you regardless!"
"Yoooo! Nusa is throwing shade!"
While the rare appearance of drunken Nusa was giving entertainment to the rest of the crew, I gestured my hand as I guided the Cheshire Cat to the opening view from the front entrance of the storage building to what was inside.
As the sight of the content within the storage building became clearer, slowly filling the Cheshire Cat's view. His eyes began to shrank, and the manic grin started to form on his face.
"I see… So this is how you want it to go, crazy Leprechaun."
"I might be a man with a funny way of speaking, but I have some artistic inner self."
"I assume that there are more than 39 people there. No, there are more than 50. Is it 85?"
"89 people, to be exact."
"Fascinating." Toronto facepalmed, hiding the small chuckle that he tried to contain. "You exceeded my expectations, Leprechaun."
"Though, we kinda resolved with some red paint after reconsideration about the atmosphere.
"After thinking that it wasn't creepy enough, we improvised by taking some from phosphors such as silver-activated zinc sulfide, and doped strontium aluminate from the underground lab that we raided.
"And probably because we didn't shine it with enough light, the phosphorescent effect might only last for a single day."
The Cheshire Cat then pulled out a handheld device from one of his pockets in the middle of my nerdy explanation. It consisted of numerous energy veins and a disc.