Chapter 5 - Skirmish between Heaven, Earth, and Hell (2/?)

On the other hand, he had no real problem with cooking or cleaning up and he did want to do some work since they were letting him stay here for free.

He had moved here because of the demons and FeTUS, but there had not been any sign of either one.

He did not regret moving here.

Ange was fitting in pretty well at school.

"Hah!!"

She spun through the air like she had wings slicing through the wind. She tied her red hair back in a ponytail during PE and it glittered beautifully like a flame.

She landed on the mat without wobbling a centimeter.

"Ohhhhhhhhhh!"

A cheer filled the entire gym. They were using the vaulting box for a PE class with boys and girls together.

"Wow, wow! How many flips was that!? How many was it!?"

Saya and then the rest of the girls raised their voices and ran over to her. Fortunately, no one was all that familiar with gymnastics, so they had not noticed their classmate had just shattered a world record.

(You can't do that, Ange.)

Mutsuki was worried about how much his angel roommate was standing out. She was probably only using a fraction of her athletic ability, but five flips was taking it too far.

"Well, that's just how it's going to be."

Ange did not seem to mind the attention as she brushed back her long hair and stepped off the mat. In fact, she seemed to be holding her chest out proudly.

Thanks to incidents like that, Ange was known around the school as a "small but amazingly athletic" girl.

She was pretty well liked. She herself still had a poor impression of humans and could often come off as cold, but everyone allowed it because she was cute.

Also…

"W-wood…y-yoo lik…s-sum…kof…ee?"

While her athletic abilities were superhuman, the rest of her was anything but. And that had a certain charm to it.

"Okay, Miss Jiyuuni. That's enough."

"Gh…"

Ange clenched her teeth in frustration as their exasperated English teacher ordered her to sit down.

Despite being an elite angel when it came to PE, she was more like this everywhere else.

According to her:

"Shut up! The languages, chemical formulas, and mathematical theory in heaven are completely different! It was hard enough learning Japanese in such a short time frame!"

At any rate, this helped Ange's arrogance not seem so disagreeable.

She did not move from her desk afterschool, but Saya and a few other girls had a habit of gathering around her. She did not seem wanting for friends.

She had really become a member of the class.

On another note, it had become common knowledge on the second day that Mutsuki and Ange lived together.

"Gh!? Mutsuki!"

During the midday lunch break, she kicked her chair back and approached him.

"What is it?"

He tilted his head and she held an adorable pink lunch box in front of him. She pointed at the dark green blob in one corner.

"You added your own twist to the lunch again, didn't you!?"

"Y-yeah. It's a cold Salisbury steak made with greens and seaweed. Did you not like it?"

"It's disgusting! It looks like Salisbury steak, but it's bitter and stinks of seaweed!"

"That's strange. I thought I'd done a good job on that one. …It's full of nutrients, you know?"

"I'm not going to make myself sick for some extra nutrition! …Cough! Cough!"

Some of the flavor must have lingered in her mouth because yelling was enough to make her choke. Mutsuki was not sure what to say, but…

"The couple is at it again."

"Fujita-kun's had fifteen straight losses, hasn't he? Keep at it!"

Sakae always ate lunch with Mutsuki and Saya would eat at Ange's desk, so those two classmates started the usual conversation.

"W-we are not a couple!"

Ange was short tempered in the first place, so whenever someone teased her, she would shout back with her face the same color as her hair.

Mutsuki tended to grow silent, so whenever she got angry, he would take a figurative step back and let it happen. When another classmate caught his eye, they would give him a sympathetic look, so he could only smile bitterly back.

"Hey, husband. Quit ignoring your wife. She's pretty angry."

"I'm not her husband. How many times do I have to tell you she's just a relative?"

He kept his tone as calm as possible as he answered his best friend who was nudging his cheek with a fist. Both Sakae and Saya cackled in delight.

The most convincing lie for living together was a familial relationship, so that story had worked its way into the class over the past three weeks. At first, there had been rumors they had three or four kids together, but now only their close friends teased them about it. And with how plain Mutsuki was, no one was going to doubt that they were just relatives.

"F-fine then!"

Everyone was laughing and Ange seemed embarrassed to be the only angry one, so she stopped complaining and moved away. She continued eating while avoiding the Salisbury steak.

Mutsuki made their lunches every day. It may have been a blessing in disguise that the class knew they lived together because now he did not have to fix two separate menus.

"What did you even cook that made her so angry? You said it was a Salisbury steak made with greens and seaweed?"

"Yeah. You know how they make Salisbury steaks with one or the other? Well, I mixed them together."

Mutsuki had a knack for all kinds of housework, but he especially liked cooking.

Back with his family, his mother and older sister had only let him make breakfast (and had limited the menu to toast, fried eggs, and salad), so he had a lot more chances to cook lunch and dinner now. That meant he could try out a lot more dishes.

"Want to try some?"

Sakae was peering into his lunch, so he held out a slice of the item in question.

"!!!"

Sakae leaned as far back as he could and vigorously shook his head.

Mutsuki was confused because this boy had a habit of asking for a bite whenever he was eating some kind of snack. But when it came to Mutsuki's original creations, people had a tendency of sweating a lot and declining.

"But it's really good."

He took a bite himself.

"It takes a generous heart to accept something like that. You are a virtuous person, my friend."

After Sakae muttered that, the smell of the seaweed and meat must have reached him because he pulled his chair back.

"Whoops. Sorry, Ibekusa."

His elbow hit the neighbouring desk where Ibekusa Machina was eating.

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I hope you like it.