Click.
The sound of the door opening, as faint as a mosquito's buzz, was like an oasis in the desert to everyone's ears.
Alain stared at the girl who gracefully emerged from the bathroom.
She was wrapped in a pure white bath towel, her figure prominent, holding a pair of glasses in her hand.
As if driven by some latent muscle memory, his gaze would focus on her face for three seconds before shifting thirty centimeters down, then back up again—
"Alain! Don't look!"
Misha ran over and covered his eyes.
"You idiot! That's so rude to a girl!"
But to everyone's surprise, she completely ignored them, walking past the girl's shoulder, leaving Miluo standing there in disarray.
"Huh?"
Miluo let out a sound of surprise, turning her head in a daze.
The other Mita's gaze was vacant, as if their figures didn't exist at all.
"I... was ignored?"
The girl's lips trembled, her big eyes filled with incomprehension, as if her entire worldview was collapsing.
Alain, of course, couldn't bear to see Miluo like this. He quickly walked over to the girl and took her in his arms.
"It's okay, I'm here."
"Wah... Sir Knight!"
"...I'm sorry." It wasn't his fault; his genes made him do it.
Seeing Miluo defeated, Millie's expression darkened.
"Hey! You're so rude! How dare you ignore—Whoa?!"
But then, after changing her clothes, the Mita girl didn't even glance at her and walked straight toward Millie.
"H-Hello!"
Miluo was the first to speak, wanting to strike up a conversation with the girl in the towel.
In the nick of time, she quickly dodged aside, avoiding a collision.
"This..."
Watching the back of that Mita as she pushed open the door and left, the anger she felt for her friend being snubbed cooled down.
Millie was no longer angry that the other girl had ignored her along with Miluo.
Instead, she had realized something.
The cap-wearing girl looked at Alain, who was still consoling Miluo, and he gave a slight nod.
"Alright, alright, I think I know what's going on now."
Gently comforting her, Alain dotingly stroked the girl's back and said softly, "That Mita... she probably can't see us."
"C-Can't see us?" The girl blinked her big, vacant eyes.
"Yeah. I have a pretty good idea." Alain explained what he had discussed earlier with Misha and 2D Mita.
"Oh, so that's what it is!" Miluo breathed a sigh of relief, realizing she had almost misunderstood a good big sister.
"Besides—" Alain tapped her little nose, "there's one more thing that convinced me she can't see us."
"Okay, Alain, tell us."
Miluo's curiosity was reflected in Alain's eyes as he said with a smile,
"Because no one in this world could possibly ignore such a cute little princess."
"W-Wha! Alain, you're saying embarrassing things again!"
While Miluo's pretty face was flushed red, her small hand couldn't help but grab the fingertip Alain had just used to tease her.
The other girls smiled knowingly at the sight.
"Alright. Then, according to what Alain said—" Misha began, her gaze turning toward the door where the other Mita had left,
"If we want to find the source of the reality distortion within Version 1.0F, we need to go to the living room or the kitchen, right?"
"Right." Alain was also eyeing the door. The understanding girl had already moved out of his arms.
Millie raised a question of her own. "But that brings another problem. If she can't see us, how are we supposed to communicate with her?"
"Me, me, me! Miluo knows!" Miluo raised her hand high, grabbing everyone's attention.
"What is it?" Misha smiled at her, noticing that Miluo's hand was pointing at the book on the desk.
"If we had a pen, could we write down what we want to say to get our message to that Mita sister?"
"Ooh!" The cap-wearing girl clearly had a flash of inspiration. "Expanding on that idea, we just need to get the text to her!"
She quickly walked over to the computer, clicked the mouse, and opened Notepad.
The clack-clack-clack of the keyboard echoed.
"Great, it works!"
Alain and the others gathered around Millie. On the Notepad screen were the words, 'Alain is an idiot.'
"You're the idiot." He routinely messed with Millie's cap.
"Damn it! Don't mess it up, you jerk Alain!" She puffed out her cheeks in annoyance, then looked toward the door.
"But we have no idea when she'll be back."
"Hmm..." What Millie meant was, if they waited too long, who knew when they would be merged into the game world.
Just as Alain was pondering a solution, his gaze inadvertently focused on the computer.
"Gulp, gulp, gulp... ahh."
Mila set down the empty glass. A white droplet slowly trickled from the rim, leaving a crooked trail.
A lonely drop of milk slid down the side of the glass, silently dripping onto the table.
Mila watched it and couldn't help but sigh softly.
At least it had the glass for company. As for her, even her position as a game's heroine had been taken away.
How long had it been? Trapped alone in the cage of Version 1.0F.
Her eyes gazed at the side of the glass, the surface reflecting her placid expression.
Have I... gotten used to this by now?
Mila asked herself, looking up at the windowsill glowing with white light, her lips murmuring,
"Its gaze, from the endlessly passing bars, has grown so weary it can hold nothing more. It seems there are a thousand bars, and behind the thousand bars, no world."
She couldn't see any bars, but how was this not a cage?
The girl shook her head. After washing the glass, she walked back to the living room, planning to pick out a few books to read at random.
"Thump."
But just then, a knocking sound came from the bedroom door, as if something was tapping on it.
"?"
Mila, holding her books, glanced at the title The Panther on one and didn't think the sound meant anything.
Perhaps something of mine wasn't put away properly?
Just as she was about to sit on the sofa and open a book...
A familiar tune began to drift from the bedroom.
"...?"
It was from the game she played to pass the time—Mita Love Story.
She swallowed, her lips trembling.
Mila remembered that after the game's heroine disappeared, she... she shouldn't have opened it again.
Besides, her computer was still on the desktop...
She stood up and walked slowly toward the bedroom door.
She opened the door. At the same moment, something fell to the floor with a clatter.
She looked over and saw it was a caster, one of the components of her computer chair, which had fallen near the desk.
And on the monitor was the title screen for Mita Love Story.
"What... what's going on?"
She walked over to check the game's status. Unfortunately, the heroine hadn't returned.
After closing the game, she noticed a box was still open in the taskbar.
"Notepad?"
Mila rarely used the digital version of Notepad; she usually preferred to write by hand.
She clicked on the Notepad icon.
Only a few words were written inside. The rest was blank.
[Hello□]
___
🔥 New stories are available now! 🔥
✅ Access up to 40 advanced chapters of ALL stories!
✅ Receive exclusive content and updates!
Help us hit our community goals:
🎯 100 Powerstones = +1 Bonus Chapter for everyone
🚀 140 MEMBERS = +5 extra chapters of ALL STORIES!
👻 P - Walnutchan