After a while, Damian stood up and took Anya by the hand.

"Feeling better?"

"Yep! All charged up and ready to study!"

Damian gave her a smile as he grasped her hand and they exited the school, walking down the sidewalk.

"That's good. So, are we headed to your place as always?"

Anya was about to nod, but stopped herself halfway through, an uneasy expression appearing on her face.

"Something wrong? Want to lie down again?"

Anya shook her head, giving a shrug.

"No, it's not that, it's just that my parents aren't home."

Damian merely raised an eyebrow.

Ah… Yeah, that could be an issue.

"Then, my house? I don't love the place, but unless you can think of a better place…"

Anya closed her eyes, deep in thought.

"Hm…"

"Uh, Anya? You should probably-"

*yank*

Damian pulled on Anya's arm hard, yanking her out of the way of a streetlight. She opened her eyes, blinking twice at the worried expression on his face as she stood upright again.

"You've gotta be more careful, Forger-san."

Damian stated this matter-of-factly, eliciting a nod.

"Yeah, sorry. Thanks for the save, Sy-on boy. You were very cool back there."

Anya couldn't help but smirk a little at the blush that appeared on Damian's face and the She called me cool… coming from his mind.

"Fufufu…"

"What's funny?"

"Nothing!"

Anya began to sweat as Damian gave her a confused expression before seemingly letting the moment pass.

"So, anyways, do you have a better idea than my house?"

"Let's see…"

Anya's mind got to work, trying to filter out any poor decisions to get to the optimal location.

Hm… we could always try a public library, or a diner, or something…

Her thinking was cut off by Damian's voice coming from beside her.

"By the way, we'll probably be there for a while and it's already a little late, so you should be able to stay over for dinner."

Anya's expression immediately lit up, stars beginning to swim in her eyes.

"Really?!"

Damian couldn't help but chuckle at her expression of pure joy.

"Yes, really. Honestly, the chefs here are probably even better than the ones I had back in Ostania."

Damian felt as though it would be too cruel to wipe the smile off of Anya's face, so he kept his mouth shut.

Though, I can't help but wonder if she forgot that we need to study before eating.

Shock!

Damian was slightly taken aback at Anya's expression of utter despair.

I didn't say anything, though?!

Eventually, they made it to the Shijo estate.

"Woah, this place is huge!"

"Eh. It's pretty similar to the Desmond estate. I forgot that this is your first time here…"

Anya stared in awe of the whole place, the gardens seeming as though they were taken straight out of a storybook and the mansion itself towering above the street almost like a castle.

"Now remember, Forger-san, please try to stay formal, ok?"

Anya gave a smug grin.

"Oh, come on! I'm the essence of formality!"

Anya let go of Damian's hand and ran in front of her, giving a brief curtsy along with a toothy grin. Damian's cheeks went a little pink as he tried and failed to suppress a grin.

"You can say that all you want, but don't go around calling the other Shijo's 'the big boss' or 'dead-fish eyes', ok?"

"Hey, I thought we agreed not to talk about that again!"

Damian gave a laugh at her indignant expression before several attendants showed up to escort the 2 of them inside.

"Rich people really pull out all the stops for guests, huh?"

Damian shrugged.

"Eh. This is nothing compared to what they do for the other Shijos."

The 2 of them made their way up the stairs, Anya continuing to marvel at the intricacies of the mansion. She spotted various different things as she walked, seeing a chandelier here, or a painting there until they finally made their way to Damian's room.

"Huh. This place looks smaller than last time."

Anya wasn't mistaken. While his room in the Desmond manor was lavishly decorated with various trophies, medals, and other prizes, this one was more muted with a simple wooden desk that had a stack of books on it accompanied by a pencil cup filled to the brim with supplies. The bed was also noticeably smaller, going from king-sized to queen-sized. All in all, it was much more extravagant than anything that Anya had experienced outside of sleepovers at Becky's, but to the best of her memory, it was less expensive-looking than Damian's previous room.

"I guess so. In any case, I'll look around here for the textbooks. Make yourself at home."

Damian quickly pulled the stack of textbooks down and started sifting through them.

"Hm… I'm pretty equal in all of these subjects… What do you want to study-"

Damian froze when he saw Anya sitting right in the middle of his bed. He briefly went red before composing himself, clearing his throat.

*ahem* "A-as I was saying, what subject did you want to do, F-Forger-san?"

Why is she sitting on my bed?! She never did that back in Ostania!

DId I mess up? Uh… uh…

Anya began to panic for a moment, her cheeks going red as her hair as she stood up off of the bed.

"Uh, sorry, Sy-on boy."

"Hah? What for?"

After a brief moment of confusion, Damian gestured for Anya to come to the desk.

"So, which subject do you want to do?"

Anya eyed each of the textbooks before pointing at one.

"Math."

Damian rolled his eyes.

"Just because you're way ahead of the curriculum in math, doesn't mean you get to slack on everything else. I mean, we've got a whole bunch of new languages here, this place has a pretty different history too. You can't get complacent just because it's strangely similar to our own country."

"Ok…"

Damian noticed the dejected look on Anya's face. He thought for a moment about what to do before cautiously giving her a few pats on the head.

"Look, I'm not your mom or anything. I can't force you to study stuff you don't want to."

Anya shook her head.

"No, you're right."

Anya grabbed at a biology textbook and opened it up, throwing a determined expression on her face.

"After all, if I want to stay at the best school in Japan, I'll need to get the grades to prove it."

Damian gave a smile as she got to work.

She's surprisingly cool when she gets serious.

Sy-on boy complimented me~

Anya stole Damian's chair and stared at the textbook with a blank sheet of paper and pencil ready, reading the text on the page with supreme levels of confidence.

Let's see here… "Each cell in the human body has 46 chromosomes." Ok then… "During interphase, the cell doubles its chromosomes." Alright, so that makes 92. "Then, the 46 chromosomes climb up the spindles during anaphase and split." Hah? Weren't there 92 before? "Each new cell then unpacks the 46 chromosomes it has into DNA." Wait, what? But if you divide 46 by 2, then you get 23, not 46 again. How does this work? What's a spindle? What's anaphase?

Tears began to well in Anya's eyes as she slowly turned to Damian for assistance.

"Sy-on boy…"

Damian, who had been watching her the whole time and waiting for when she would inevitably break down and ask for help, gave a sigh as he leaned down over top of Anya.

"Alright, so first, we're going to go over the difference between chromatids, chromosomes, and chromatin…"

###

"Why does biology have to be so hard?"

"Hey, it's not my fault that this place is decades ahead of Ostania."

At this point, Damian had gone to get another chair and they had been steadily making their way through the textbooks. Damian found that Anya was actually surprisingly capable at chemistry, math, english, economics, journalism, english, and modern japanese, though she struggled with biology, physics, and history. As they went, Damian began to notice a trend in Anya's strengths.

"You're pretty good at all the subjects that are similar to what we learned in Eden, but weak with all the stuff that's different."

Anya gave a nod.

"My dad tells me that. He told me about how he had to go through this special program for more 'up to date' education."

Damian leaned back in his seat, staring up at the ceiling.

"Still, I'm a little shocked at how well you're doing. Back at Eden, you barely passed all of your courses up until about 4th grade."

"Which is about the time you started teaching me."

They exchanged nostalgic smiles as they began to reminisce.

"Only because you were about to flunk out."

"So you invited me over to your dorm after school everyday? Ewen and Emile must've been pissed!"

Damian gave a laugh, speaking with mock indignance.

"Yeah, they were! Because of you, they stopped hanging around me 24/7 and got friends they didn't idolize! I'm not sure if I can ever forgive you! By the way, that was sarcasm."

Anya breathed a sigh of relief when Damian clarified this before mumbling out an apology with a wistful smile.

"Sorry about that. I'm not good with that kind of stuff."

After all, how am I supposed to know people are lying when my mind reading says that they're not?

Damian shrugged.

"No need to apologize."

He seemed to hesitate before speaking further which elicited a smile from Anya as she heard his thoughts loud and clear. Eventually, Damian looked away, his cheeks going a little pink.

"After all, you're the one I'm choosing to spend my time with."

Anya gave him a cheeky grin.

"Weren't you going to say 'the one I love'?"

Damian flushed bright red.

"How did you- ugh, nevermind. Let's get back to history, ok?"

"Ugh, fine…"

Result: Anya's loss.

###

"We're finally done!"

Anya shoved her books aside, giving a big stretch as Damian looked on with an amused expression.

"You seem happy about it."

Anya stood up and out of her seat, her smile not faltering as she picked up the metal chair she was sitting in.

"Well, duh! I feel like I've studied so much that my brain's about to fall out…"

"Let me get that for you."

Damian took the chair from Anya's arms before nearly collapsing from the weight.

What the heck?! She was carrying this by herself?

He put the chair back down before taking the stool that he had been sitting on and heading out of the room, gesturing for her to follow.

"Still, I didn't think that you'd be running on empty for the last bit. Back at Eden, we'd stay up all night studying and we were only 11."

Anya shrugged.

"I haven't really studied much since I got here, so maybe that's it?"

The 2 of them went down the stairs and Damian put the stool back in the kitchen before meeting up with Anya in the doorway.

"It's already dark out, isn't it?"

Anya looked out the window.

"Mm. It's getting that way real early these days, isn't it?"

"Winter's almost here…"

The 2 of them went silent as they stood at the doorway, neither of them quite knowing what to say. Anya debated what to do and was about to simply leave without another word before she began to look around with a bemused expression.

"Something up, Forger-san?"

"What's that smell?"

Damian turned around and when he didn't see anything, he checked his watch.

"Oh, I think that that's the chefs. It's almost dinnertime."

Anya's face lit up as she clasped her hands in front of her.

"Can I…"

Damian gave a sigh at this display.

"Yes, you can stay for dinner, Forger-san."

###

"World-class chefs~ World-class chefs~"

Anya was happily seated next to Damian who seemed to be slightly concerned as he scanned the table.

"You seen Maki anywhere?"

Anya nodded as a server set down 2 bowls of cashew udon with mushrooms in front of them.

"Yeah, she was here just earlier, right?"

"No, I mean, like, do you know where she is?"

Anya closed her eyes as if deep in thought for a moment before speaking in a matter-of-fact tone.

"I heard that she's on a date with Shindou."

"Oh, I see-"

Damian stopped mid sentence, whipping his head around to stare blankly at Anya who was about to dig into her udon.

"Hah?!"

Anya nearly jumped out of her seat, hastily constructing an explanation.

"Uh, I, uh, heard her say that she was worried about her date with Shindou while we were studying, so…"

In case you couldn't tell, she's lying.

"What?!"

Anya began to panic at the look of disbelief on Damian's face.

Crap! Did he find out?

Maki has a boyfriend?!

Anya breathed a sigh of relief.

"Wait, who's she on a date with?"

"That would be Shindou."

She's… actually telling the truth?

Damian wracked his brain for this name but came up empty.

"Who's that?"

Anya gave a look of pride, bumping her fist against her chest.

"He's the guy who gave Mikaido the esteemed title of 'boyf*cker'."

"That doesn't sound very esteemed."

The conversation slowly moved to other topics such as the upcoming finals, the plans for the culture festival, and various other topics that didn't feel particularly impactful, but felt enjoyable nonetheless.

"By the way, this is really good, Sy-on boy!"

"Thank the cook, not me."

"You must be lucky to eat like this everyday!"

"You think?"

Anya noticed a tiny bit of sadness leak into Damian's expression before he quickly took a bite of his food. While his face was impassive, his thoughts were a different story.

It might be nice to have a home cooked meal every now and then… Gah, what am I saying? There's plenty of people who would kill to be in my position! Honestly…

Anya looked at Damian's well put together expression before patting him on the back.

"Eh? What's that for?"

"You know, Sy-on boy…"

Damian watched and waited as Anya debated over whether or not to continue with what she was saying before getting out:

"You know, you could come over for dinner sometime. My dad's a really good cook, and my mom can be sometimes, and we could also make lunches together again!"

Damian stared at her wide eyed for a moment before turning away, causing panic to seep into Anya's mind. She stared at the back of his head in nervous anticipation as she strained her ears to hear his thoughts. Damian, meanwhile, was hiding his face with a hand over his mouth as he directed his gaze to the ground.

Why does she always know what to say?

Anya giggled to herself, slinking out of her seat and sneaking around before popping up, catching a glimpse of the blush on Damian's face.

"Wha- Forger-san?!"

"Oh, wow. You're really red right now, Sy-on boy~"

Damian tried to compose himself, but his expression broke into a blushing mess when Anya leaned right into her face, her eyes almost sparkling along with her cheeky smile as their faces sat mere inches apart. He scooted back, feigning indignance as he turned away with a haughty expression.

"Geez! You really need to watch yourself, Forger-san!"

Anya's smile did not falter one bit.

He says that, but what's he thinking now?

This girl is gonna kill me…

Anya's face immediately went pale as she silently returned to her seat.

Hah?! I'm gonna… wait, hold on. Sarcasm. Right. But why would you be sarcastic to yourself? Gah…

Is she ok?

Gak! Right!

Anya shot straight back up, devouring her food much to Damian's confusion.

"You ok, Forger-san? Actually, wait. Swallow, then talk."

Anya nodded, quickly chewing and swallowing her food.

"Well…"

…

Wait, what was I going to say, again?

Anya thought for a moment, mulling over her options while Damian sat with rapt attention.

I mean, we've been studying for a while, and we just ate, so maybe I should just head home? But we haven't really spent much time together this week so that means that, uh…

"By the way, Forger-san, d'you want to do anything in particular after we finish eating?"

Anya stopped her train of thought, looking up at Damian. When she said nothing, he continued.

"I mean, we haven't spent much time together this week, so I wanted to spend some more time with you."

Anya stayed silent for a few moments, rapidly blinking to recollect herself before saying:

"Are you an esper?"

"Eh? What's that supposed to mean?"

Today's result: Damian's win.