"I have a question for you."
Lin put down his chopsticks and asked the ravenously eating young woman.
"The taste is very good. Your cooking skills are already better than the vast majority of humans. I enjoy eating it very much." The young woman maintained the speed at which she was devouring the food while still narrating in an orderly manner. She chewed and swallowed some shredded meat, then pointed at the food on the table and offered a strained smile.
This was the first time Lin had seen a woman with such a... wild way of eating.
And her praise was so direct that Lin didn't know how to comment.
"Why is your smile so strange?" Lin had actually wanted to ask her this question for a long time. Her smile was too deliberate; it felt like she was pulling the muscles on her face to form an expression resembling a smile, but from the outside, it looked like a delicate doll molded into an extremely bizarre expression.
"...Is it strange?"
Hearing Lin say this, the smile vanished from the young woman's face, restoring her clueless appearance.
"Then what is a normal smile? Can you demonstrate it for me?"
"..."
A normal smile...
Lin had seen many smiles, most notably Elysia. She was probably the most cheerful person Lin had ever met, and every one of her smiles never made Lin feel that she might be phony or pretentious.
But he himself couldn't genuinely smile from the heart.
Seeing Lin not respond, the young woman tilted her head twenty degrees and said, "You and I are so similar."
Perhaps this was an inexplicable fate. From the moment Lin first met the young woman, he did feel an ineffable connection between them. This connection prevented Lin from feeling much aversion toward her, and they quickly established an unspoken understanding, even without knowing each other's names.
Did two similar souls really exist in this world?
"I also have a question I want to ask you." The young woman seemed unwilling for the atmosphere to lapse into silence. She leaned one hand on the table, her slender figure moving closer to Lin. A blank, pretty face pressed against his visual display. "What do you think it takes to become human?"
"..."
Lin froze.
It was so quiet by his ears.
"Hmm... Just making a knife is too boring. How about trying to make it look like a lipstick? It could fire something just by twisting the tail end..."
"Dr. Vil-V."
"Ah, alright, alright, I know. I won't mess around... but I think the lipstick..."
Vil-V was bored while drawing blueprints. Matching her style, she had a strong love for classical design, and sketching on paper was one of the most interesting parts of her work.
Prometheus was monitoring her from the side to prevent her from messing with the Divine Key design and adding her own... interpretation.
"Vil-V."
"Waaah—"
Lin appeared behind her without a sound, startling her enough to nearly throw her pen. She nervously leaned against the table, steadying her top hat.
"Lin? When did you get here?"
"Lin arrived at the Spiral Contraption one minute and fifty seconds ago," Prometheus reminded him.
"Uh, then why didn't you say anything?"
"You were immersed in your lipstick Divine Key plan."
"Alright, Unit 1, next time someone comes, you absolutely must tell me!" Vil-V adjusted her hat and coughed, asking, "What is it, Lin? If it's about the marriage seeking, it might currently be..."
"Do you still have yesterday's recording?"
Lin spread his hand and asked.
"The recording? Oh, the recording documenting the marriage-seeking process. Here, I haven't had a chance to watch it yet..."
"Give it to me."
Lin decisively snatched the recorder from Vil-V hand and turned to leave before Vil-V could react.
"Hey, wait! What do you need the recording for? I still want to watch it!"
"..." Lin paused for a few seconds, seemingly thinking about something. He said coldly without turning his head, "Elysia and Sakura don't want anyone else to see this recording."
"Oh... so even Elysia cares about what happened yesterday?"
Lin didn't answer. Before Vil-V could ask another question, he was already gone.
"Tap."
Lin raised his hand and then put it down, seemingly hesitating to speak.
"What's wrong?"
Through the helmet, the young woman's voice sounded like it was coming from behind a wall.
And with two helmets between them, it was more than just distorted.
Lin looked at the young woman, who was wearing a helmet identical to his, with a complicated expression. She looked up at him nonchalantly. This was the first time he had seen the visual display from this perspective.
"...Why are you wearing the same helmet as me?"
"If we are husband and wife, our style should be the same, right?" The young woman explained her reasoning logically. "Also, since we can't smile, covering our expressions with a helmet and letting others imagine what kind of expressions we should have would be better."
"I wear a helmet just for... no, you're right."
Lin had been about to say he only wore the helmet for combat, but upon reflection, concealing his appearance was a factor, so the young woman wasn't wrong.
Her thought process was indeed quite similar to his own.
"What should we do next?" the young woman asked Lin.
"...You're probably not familiar with the Headquarters yet. I'll take you around to familiarize yourself and introduce you to the people I know," Lin quickly replied.
The young woman nodded and followed closely beside Lin with small steps. The two people, wearing identical helmets, walked toward Mobius's laboratory.
For some reason, the young woman, who had been relatively quiet the day before, seemed unable to stay idle today. She asked Lin, both reserved and curious: "Aren't you going to ask me where I got this helmet?"
"You got it from the R&D Department," Lin said coolly. "It's not some secret technology."
The young woman was silent for three seconds before nodding: "Yes, that's right."
"What about your previous outfit?"
"..."
"Did you accidentally lose it?"
"Yes, I did."
"Do you know where your room is?"
"I..."
"Let's just stay together for now."
"Okay."
Lin spoke more than usual, and the young woman responded with stiff compliance.
"You asked me what it takes to become human, but you probably mean how to become a normal person. Neither of us falls into the category of 'normal people,'" the helmeted man's voice was devoid of emotion. "I believe that to become human, one must first understand human emotions."
"Emotions..." The young woman seemed to recall something. She muttered the word softly.
"The most complex aspect of humanity lies in the emotions between individuals: love, hate, joy, sorrow, respect, jealousy... It's impossible to generalize what emotions are, but it's emotions that often influence humans."
"The body is the firewood, emotion is the match. The bright flame after ignition is what humanity is."