A week has passed since I started living with the Bete family.
A man came into the house and asked me:
"Who are you?"
Late at night.
A man with a face full of soot and clothes reeking of oil, looking like a thief, entered the Bete house. He was startled when he saw me and ran out of the house. Then he came back in with a puzzled expression.
"This is our house, right?"
It's understandable since there's an unknown girl here. I'm someone I know from Victoria's memories.
"You're Mr. Morris Bete, right?"
"Oh, yes. But who are you? My daughter's friend?"
"Something like that. If you're looking for Mrs. Beatrice, she suddenly got an urgent call from the company and left. As for Victoria."
I pointed behind me.
"Hey! I can cook too! Behold! This brilliant alchemical radiance! Oh? Dad?"
Victoria came out smiling, carrying some bizarre food, and waved her hand.
Originally, the food she was supposed to make was something in the ratatouille family.
That means a vegetable stew made by boiling eggplant, tomato, zucchini, onion, bell pepper, etc. However, there's a difference in that it has plenty of fruit and mustard sauce.
For reference, the recipe doesn't include the last two.
In other words, it's her own creation.
"That's our dinner."
Regret flashes across Morris's face. Since his daughter made it, shouldn't he eat it deliciously?
Anyway.
After a brief self-introduction, the three of us sat at the dining table and had dinner.
What's unexpected is that I ate it all because it was tastier than I thought, while Morris and Victoria barely ate a few bites and left most of it.
"Eat it all. Especially the one who made it."
"Boo-hoo."
I watched Victoria nibble on it until she finished.
Morris? I didn't say much to him since he's the victim, but how many family members wouldn't eat when their daughter begs for her life and asks to eat what she made together?
Unless you're a so-called genius daughter's dad, both parents work in this household, so Victoria was often alone.
Well, that says it all.
"Didn't I tell you to taste it while making it?"
"I did! It was edible, I tell you! And Belle ate it well!"
Well, that's because it contains mustard and other things used to season stew. But from the second bite, the flavors all clash and it becomes strange. And isn't tasting when you're hungry different from tasting when you're full?
And Victoria's point can be avoided like this:
"I lived in an era when it was difficult to obtain spices."
In the first world, I ate properly cooked food more or less, but in the second world, spices were almost impossible to obtain.
We could get them here and there because we had Heavenly Demon, but we couldn't use them as abundantly as now.
"So it was like that in the old days?"
"Oh, Tori. Is this person someone who lives for a long time?"
Somehow Morris seems restless.
I guess it's because he's been speaking informally to me all this time, thinking I was the same age as Victoria.
"Yes. She's probably older than you and Mom combined."
Morris hurriedly stood up and hesitated with a stiff posture, about to greet me, so I stopped him. Beatrice adapted easily, but this person seems to be struggling.
After making them both eat at least to a level that could be considered proper nutrient intake, I did the dishes. Meanwhile, Victoria told Morris about what happened with me.
Most of it means Victoria's adventure story.
A little later.
"So, you're saying you came from another world?"
"She's my life savior, Dad!"
She's a life savior, but she ruined her future, so overall it's probably bad.
I hid that part from Beatrice too, so I have no intention of telling it in the future either.
Anyway.
Victoria chirps while showing Morris the ability she gained. She doesn't show any aversion despite his clothes being soaked with the smell of iron and oil.
In the first place, Victoria chose the profession of clockwork knight as her future because of Morris. So it's not strange.
Rather, it might be even more so.
After the story ended, Victoria shows off her ability.
Bringing moisture from the surroundings to create water droplets, or conversely, scattering water droplets into the air.
Morris, who was watching this with fascination, suddenly stood up and ran somewhere. And a little while later.
He came back carrying an entire box full of various tools, and measures Victoria's ability together with her.
There are tools similar to ones in my memory, and tools whose purpose I don't understand. He examines the water floating in the air with them, or attaches measurement-like devices to various parts of Victoria's body and takes measurements.
"How on earth is this possible?"
"What is it, Dad?"
"There's no magic power used at all. I can't understand the power that creates this bizarre phenomenon. Even spirits create special phenomena through the magic power in the surroundings..."
Morris's gaze turned to me.
"By what law does this happen?"
He seems to have a curious personality often described as scientist-like. But I shook my head.
I have various memories and information, but I've never used them to do anything. If I scan through the Great Kraken's or Primitive Heavenly Lord's memories, there are several suspicious items, but it would be shameless to say I know them.
"I don't know either. Not everyone who contracts manifests superpowers, and even if superpowers appear, it's rare to get exactly the same superpower. Rather, it's different for each person."
And that superpower, at least at that moment, gains a function that can solve the problem the person is facing.
Or they gain the power that can most certainly fulfill their own desires.
Broadly speaking, it's the same meaning.
"Isn't it you who gives power by contracting with you?"
Morris looks at me as if it's strange. I can guess where he's misunderstanding. He thinks that if you make a promise with a god, the god grants you ability.
"I can't use magic power, which is a force that universally interacts with the biosphere and pulls one's will into reality. So the superpower must be a function that the contractor originally could have."
At that moment, Victoria raised her hand from the side.
"That's right, Dad. I think so too! I get incredibly hungry after using this ability! But it's not like I can't use magic either!"
For reference, Victoria can use magic. Of course, Morris can too. Since it's a world that uses magic power as an energy source, technicians who handle it can use magic to some extent.
However, since they're not people who study magic professionally, they only learn a little better than what ordinary people use and learn the technology.
For example, it's like someone studying earth science learning statistics.
Victoria floated a small magic orb in one hand, and created a mass of water in the other. Then she brought her hands together and put the magic orb inside the water mass.
They float without interfering with each other.
After separating them again, she turns the water into steam and retrieves the magic power.
Watching this, Morris grabs his head.
"Where did the heat that should have been taken away during the phase change come from..."
Isn't that just how the ability is?
Still, his mouth is grinning as if he's gotten a new toy.
"Ah, can I make a contract too?"
And Morris asks, pointing to himself.
Hmm. I don't have a problem with it. Rather, I want to. But if I say yes here, Beatrice would probably put a bullet in my head.
Maybe because she's made many contracts with others, she's suspicious of the contract made with me.
It's just a simple phrase, but she interprets it strangely.
But aren't all human contracts dirty in the first place?
I know there are also cases where they insert toxic clauses that cause great damage someday, even if you don't know it right away.
Human society is made up of such people gathering together.
What if I make variations to the contract text and get caught wrong and get completely cleaned out?
So I don't change the contract text.
Anyway.
"Not everyone gains abilities. And if it's a contract, I recommend doing it after talking with Mrs. Beatrice."
I made a gun shape with my fingers, then raised it slightly.
"Mom did react a bit sensitively. I think if you don't want to be nagged by Mom, I recommend talking to each other first before doing it. When Mom gets angry, no one in our house can win against her, right?"
"That's... true."
Victoria pats Morris's back as he sighs sadly.
I looked at the two of them and then threw out a new question to change the topic so they wouldn't think deeply about the contract anymore.
"By the way, do you two come alternately on purpose?"
In Victoria's memories, there were many of Morris. But when Morris wasn't there, Beatrice was.
In other words, when it became late at night, one of the two was with Victoria.
Both of them made time for Victoria, and Morris was the one who could regularly make time. When I asked to confirm this, Morris nodded.
"I received a letter saying she left because of an urgent matter."
"How long will Mom be gone this time?"
"It said three days for now."
"Ah, then the contractor must have made a mistake. If it's over 5 days, it's completely blown up."
The two of them whisper and understand on their own.
It's nice to see how family-like they are.
"Dad. You're going to work tomorrow anyway, right?"
"Hm? Yes. That's right. Why?"
For now, when I saw the news from the video receiver, I remember tomorrow was a holiday.
"Then can't we go visit where you work? Belle is here this time, and it wouldn't be bad to look around, right?"
At Victoria's words full of self-interest, Morris makes a troubled expression. As he glances at me, I shrugged my shoulders to mean do as you please, and he bows his head.
"Alright. Since we can't be together on weekends, that might be better. But you have to wake up early. If you can't wake up, I'll leave without you."
"Yes! Yes! Yes!"
Victoria smiled brightly with a satisfied smile.
It seems going to a place where clockwork knights work is a happy thing for a clockwork knight.
Or maybe she's happy that she can go to where her father works.
Or maybe both.
Tomorrow won't be boring.
As I was organizing what to do tomorrow like that, Morris suddenly grabbed Victoria's arm as she was grinning.
"Oh, Dad?"
"Daughter. First, let's examine that superpower in detail. The fact that you get hungry when you use the superpower means energy is entering and leaving in some way."
"Ah."
Perhaps sensing an ominous sign of what's to come, Victoria looks at me.
But I'm not on her side, and I'm equally interested in verifying the ability.
"I'll help restrain her."
"Oh, is that alright?"
"You can speak informally to me."
"No, then you should also..."
"My formal speech is a disability. I can't fix it, so please understand that part."
Morris, who suddenly made an expression as if he'd been punched in the solar plexus, nodded and started measuring again by putting various devices on Victoria's body.
And Victoria used her ability until late at night, and eventually ran away to her room.