"I thought it almost looked like a person," Fitoria said, still not convinced. They would've had to have been a pretty small person, or a child, in order to be able to hide in a bush like that and disappear with little trace. It was most likely just an animal, and Fitoria could not do much more than insist that she was right as I shook my head. SHe very well wasn't going to dive into the bushes to prove me wrong.

With that Fitoria and I returned back to my apartment.

Fitoria still seemed to be kind of frosty towards me, but she warmed up the moment she saw Filo again. It took about fifteen minutes for Filo as well as Melody to get their things in order and believe it or not, it took thirty minutes for them to actually finally say goodbye. I was actually kind of afraid that we might need to forcefully pry them apart before finally they seem to understand that they couldn't stay around each other forever.

Once both of them had left and the two limousines were out of sight, I collapsed onto the sofa, exhausted. It had been quite a tiring past few days. And I was just glad that it was all over and that things were back to normal.

"You seem completely fatigued," Raphtalia said walking over to me, concerned. For a moment, I'd actually even forgotten that she was still there. Why was she still here anyway? She could have left some time ago, but I wasn't going to complain about her being there for now.

The reason being was there was something I wanted to ask her. I thought about what Fitoria said, though I'd like to deny it the fact remained though, that what she said about us 'exploiting' Filo still stung a little. Had I really been in the wrong? I told Raphtalia all about it.

"Well, I guess that's not something we should have been doing," Raphtalia said. "But honestly, I'd never known anything like that about her."

She then took out her own phone and started looking something up before she showed it to me. "Ah, I knew I had seen her from somewhere." I looked up to see a photo of a younger version of Fitoria dressed up in an outfit that would suit a fairy princess. It looked like she had starred in a show quite similar to Magical Girl Kiiroi.

"It says here that she was in a musical with Filo at one point," Raphtalia said. "So maybe that's where they met and that's how she got to know her."

"I see," I told her. I then noticed something off. "Wait, isn't the quality of that show kind of... bad? Or is there something wrong with your phone?"

Raphtalia shook her head. "No, I think this was the common quality for something that was shot in the 1990s."

"Wait," I said suddenly sitting up in my seat. "Did you say the 1990s?"

"Yes," Raphtalia said.

"Wait, just how old is Fitoria?" She looked no older than nineteen when I had seen her. And quite honestly, if someone had told me that she was just fifteen years old I would have believed them.

"Oh, she must be around thirty-four by now," Raphtalia said.

"No way," I said holding my head in my hands. Granted, I had heard stories of such people who aged but still looked very young on otaku forums, of course. Much of it was just wishful thinking by creeps, but I'd never thought that I'd meet someone like that in real life.

Oh well, I thought to myself. Hopefully Fitoria would eventually come around to liking us if we were a positive influence on Filo- though to be fair, I was probably a huge negative influence on her, but I thought that Filo could definitely learn a thing or two from Melty and vice-versa.

It was far too late to stream or to do anything really so I was going to help Raphtalia pack up to go home when I thought that I probably owed her a bit more than that. There were enough leftover ingredients from everything to make something for two people, so I was about to get ready to get started on that when I heard the doorbell ring.

I groaned. I was not expecting any visitors, so this could not have possibly been anything good. Maybe it was the landlord, who after seeing the two limousines parked outside, had finally decided to increase my rent again. Or maybe it was one of the neighbors coming over to complain about all the noise we had been making. Or even worse, a door-to-door salesman. Thank god that at the very least we didn't get Jehovah's Witnesses in Japan.

Thinking this I opened up the front door only for someone to whack me in the face of the paper fan.

"Howdy ho, my bro!" came an enthusiastic voice. "Surprised to see me?"

It was someone who looked quite similar to me though he had a more rounded face, and his eyes were a shade slightly darker than mine. He was also dressed up in an oversized sweater and ripped jeans, and he stood a quarter of an inch shorter than me. I had thought of him quite a few times over the last few days, but I hadn't been expecting him to show up.

"Wait, why are you here?"

"Aww, c'mon, is that how you're going to treat me when I visit? Anyway, I was always planning on visiting, and there's this convention near here that I signed up for, so I thought that I'd drop by," he said.

"And you didn't think to call me beforehand, or even drop a text?" I asked him angrily.

"Hey, I wanted to make it a surprise," he replied with a huge grin on his face that said 'gotcha!'

"What if I wasn't home?" I asked him.

"Why wouldn't you be home? I mean it's not like you're doing anything outside," he said it with a smug look.

Yeah, I definitely should've gone outside for some reason for three hours just so he'd have to wait that long.

"Um, Mr. Naofumi who is it?" Raphtalia called out from behind me. She peered over my shoulder to take a look at the visitor, who was now in a state of total shock as he saw Raphtalia. His expression changed as quickly as a traffic light, and he went from smug to looking like he could not process what was going on. If he was a computer, it would be like if he had suddenly crashed and I'd have to restart the system.

"Hey, don't just stand there with your mouth open like an idiot, say something," I told him while glaring at him.

He finally seemed to find his voice, and then awkwardly did something that was between a bow and a spasm at Raphtalia before saying, "Hello... my name is um... uh... Iwatani... Iwatani Shindo. Pleased to meet you."