Accelerator was looking up at an apartment building meant for teachers.
Residences in Academy City were primarily nothing but student dormitories, so students did not often set foot in this kind of apartment.
From the outside, the apartment building did not look that different from a student dorm building, but the small differences in the service side of things gave it an overall distinctive feel. The student dorms were essentially buildings meant to control children. In the name of security, the dorms were known to go a bit overboard with the positioning of the security cameras, but this apartment building gave more thought to the wishes of the residents in their placement.
"Which floor?" asked Accelerator to Yomikawa Aiho who had led them there.
With a smile, she replied, "The 13th. It's a pain when the power goes out and I have to take the stairs."
"Ohh," said Last Order as she looked up at the tall building.
It seemed she was trying to look at the 13th floor, but the sun got in her eyes and she shook her head dizzily.
Yoshikawa Kikyou supported her small shoulders from behind.
"Well, I suppose there is much less opportunity for attack than the 1st or 2nd floor," said the woman.
"The upper floors take a lot more damage when the entire building is blown away."
No one had ever gone that far while Accelerator had stayed in the dorms, but he had no guarantee that would remain true in the future.
Yomikawa pulled out a laminated card that was likely used to open the self-locking door and said, "Now then, now then. It's a bit late, but we still need to eat some lunch. Let's hurry up and get to the room."
The entrance to the apartment building was an automatic glass door that looked defenseless at first, but it appeared to be made to resist explosions. The lock appeared to only require a swipe of the card, but it actually scanned the fingerprints, the pattern of bioelectric signals, and other data from the fingertips holding the card.
Realizing this was quite a high-class apartment building, Accelerator looked at Yomikawa with suspicion in his eyes.
"I thought they were reducing the salaries of public servants."
"Even with the fairly low pay, I manage somehow. This place doubles as a practical experiment in construction, so the university pays some of the rent. But in exchange, the security measures will sometimes suddenly change," explained Yomikawa. "Also, Anti-Skill may not pay anything since it's a volunteer force, but enough people appreciate what you do that it comes with some nice perks. I can get meat at the supermarket really cheap."
"…You treat help on your apartment's rent the same as getting a good sale at the supermarket?"
As they spoke, Accelerator, Last Order, Yomikawa, and Yoshikawa entered the apartment building. Komoe-sensei was not with them because she had other business to take care of.
They rode a low-vibration elevator that was probably one of the prototypes being tested. It allowed them to reach the 13th floor without the odd floating feeling usually felt in an elevator. The door right next to the elevator led to Yomikawa's room.
"Come in," said Yomikawa as she opened the front door.
Inside, they found a 4LDK. The room was clearly meant for a family and was large enough that one would normally have to spend their whole life paying back a loan for it. No matter how much the university paid for cooperation with the experiments, Accelerator seriously wondered how anyone could afford it on a public servant's salary.
The living room's flooring was polished to a shine and it was overall much tidier than one expected of someone living alone. The bottles of alcohol and glasses were arranged decoratively on shelves and the magazines and newspapers were stored on special racks. The remote controls for the TV, air conditioner, stereo, video recorder, and other devices were neatly lined up at one corner of the table. Each individual cushion on the sofa was carefully placed in the proper spot.
Last Order's eyes opened wide.
"Wow, wow! There's almost no dust, praises Misaka as Misaka leaps onto the sofa," said Last Order in a cheerful voice.
As the girl sank into the soft sofa, Yoshikawa sighed and said, "You've gotten into trouble at work again, haven't you?"
Yomikawa's track-suit-wearing form shook in shock.
"Ah…Ah ha ha. What are you talking about?"
"What do you mean? says Misaka as Misaka rolls around and looks confused."
"She has always had a habit of cleaning up her room whenever she gets into some kind of trouble. And she just cleans like crazy without thinking of the consequences, so sometimes she can't find the room key afterwards. You need to be careful."
"Is that anything to say about the person who is helping you find a new job?"
Accelerator noticed Yomikawa and Yoshikawa spoke in a slightly childish manner when speaking to each other. It was possible they had simply been around each other for that long. If Yoshikawa played the role of the helpful class president, then Yomikawa played the role of the problem student who was always late.
Yoshikawa looked over towards the kitchen that connected to the living room.
"Since that habit is still there, I assume your habit in the kitchen hasn't changed either."
"Hey, hey! I'll admit I have a bad habit about cleaning, but don't bring that up, Kikyou! Not to mention that you seem to like my cooking well enough when you have some."
"As long as I don't know how you made it."
Accelerator and Last Order exchanged a confused glance. Yomikawa said, "My skills are improving every day. See for yourself!" and dragged Yoshikawa into the kitchen, so they followed the two women.
Yomikawa's kitchen had many different types of cooking equipment lined up in it that she had as part of the experiment. With a steam microwave oven, an AI-equipped high frequency automatic dishwasher, and other such devices, it all seemed very mechanical.
But it seemed Yomikawa did not use those things much.
Those cooking devices were overflowing with a sense that they just sat there without being used. The only items that really appeared to get used were the four or five electric rice cookers. From the steam coming from them, they all appeared to be functional.
With an annoyed look, Accelerator said, "One for each of us, hm? Are you fucking with us, you white rice obsessed freak?"
"No, no. That's not it at all." Yomikawa pointed at each of the rice cookers in turn. "These rice cookers can do anything you want: boil, simmer, steam, or bake. This one is baking bread, a stew is cooking in that one, and that one is steaming fish."
"…"
Accelerator felt he understood what Yoshikawa had meant.
Yoshikawa had been aware of the situation ahead of time, so she could only sigh when she saw nothing had changed.
"You're such a sloth."
"Don't treat me like some weird animal. And what's so wrong with this? If everything is prepared right, they'll do all the cooking for you at the push of a button. And it doesn't use any fire, so you don't have to worry if you take a nap."
"I remember when you bought a large hotplate saying you could make okonomiyaki out of any leftovers as long as you had flour. And let's not forget that nonsense about never needing anything but a pressure cooker because you can cook anything you need for the rest of your life with it. You just take everything to too much of an extreme. It's so bad that if you would probably get an antimatter reaction if you tried to average your two extremes together."
"It tastes fine, it's nutritious, and it fills you up, so what's the problem? Preparing a stock pot and a frying pan and everything else is such a pain. I just want one thing that can do everything."
"Sigh. You just need to learn the joy of putting all your effort into making something."
But Yoshikawa's comment was not as innocent as it might sound since she specialized in genetics and what she had "made" was just over 20,000 human clones.