Chapter 6: I Envy Cats

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Bonus chapter! Big thank you to SadieWoods for donating!
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"Oh, he's not very nice to look at, but he's very friendly and nice to talk to."

Gin finished sweeping the living room, rested his chin on the long handle of his broom and told him absent-mindedly. Shun turned his gaze from the bookshelf that he had been cleaning to look at him. Noticing Shun's troubled expression, Gin began to babble about his complaints absent-mindedly.

"Well, I've never asked you to go with me to pick up a girl, and that's partly why it's such a pain in the ass. If Craig was here, I would be guaranteed success. Last night too."

"It's because I have a higher success rate picking up girls by myself than I do with you."

Shun couldn't ask him why he didn't sleep well. Evan, who had just come out of the washroom with a waste bin, started to make tea.

"Don't be so noisy....maybe."

"You're already an old man(1), and why don't you settle down instead of playing around?"

"I'm only twenty-six!"

With the cheekiness that only the young could have, Gin chased Evan around the room with his broom. Shun, who was beginning to understand that their quarreling was like a greeting for them, ignored them and moved on to the next bookshelf. If Gin was an old man at only twenty-eight, then Shun was as well, so he secretly supported Gin's efforts.

It had been three weeks since Shun had joined the Dawn Fog.

That aside, the calendar system was roughly the same in this world, and there was around thirty days in each month. Maybe it was just something that was automatically translated when someone transmigrated like he did.

However, there was now twenty-eight hours in a day, and thus, more time to sleep.

There were twelve members in the group led by Craig, the group's leader. Shun had been properly introduced to the other four, who were present at his interview, the next day. They were all men that were in the primes of their lives, and although they didn't look as good as their leader, they all had looks that would make heads turn when passing on the streets.

Some of the members were dismissive of him because he came from a well-off family. However, after he had been seen doing the bookkeeping calculations with sparkling eyes and a single-minded devotion, they now began to talk to him in a friendly manner.

Shun never thought the day would come when a mental arithmetic geek would be useful, except for when instantly figuring out the price per hundred grams at the supermarket. It was a bit unexpected.

Additionally, there was a big, female tabby cat. Carl, who had picked her up in the woods, had named her Sui(3). She didn't hesitate to climb into Shun's lap and purr loudly even when they first met.

With her large, round eyes, she easily gets rewarded secretly with snacks from everyone in addition to what Carl regularly feeds her, even the strongest of men couldn't resist her charms. Shun was more than happy to join her long line of tributes.

After finishing dusting off the bookshelf, Sui abandoned her efforts to remove a hair ball from her bed and approached Shun's feet, greeting him with a high, spoiled voice. Shun apologized to her for being empty handed, and her wide eyes suddenly turned half-lidded. She rubbed her tail across Shun's feet with her long, beautiful tail and then moved on to press up against Evan and Gin, who had seemed to have settled their disagreement.

Shun couldn't help feeling like she thought of him as a servant, but he couldn't help but like that about her. After all, she was just a cat, but he was a bit in love with the idea that paying tribute to her like that would bring him good luck in finding a woman.

At any rate, Shun had no complaints about his relationship with his coworkers.

Except for one thing.

How could someone who's "friendly and nice to talk to" warn him to not get to close to him?

Shun breathed a sigh at the image of Craig that did not match Gin's description of him. It was true that Shun's words and actions were incoherent, and he couldn't really remember the scary look on Craig's face, but he'd like to think that that wasn't enough to make Craig hate him... so much that he wouldn't even show his face.

From the exchange after the interview, I understood a bit more of Craig's personality, and it didn't seem like he was too narrow-minded.

Shun noticed Sui swishing her tail while begging for food from Gin. Gin, locked onto her, was rifling through his pockets to see if he had something to give her.

Now that he thought about it, Shun had never seen Sui approach Craig, who happily spoke to anyone in hopes of getting some food.

Instead, he had seen her react contrarily toward him when he was on his way to work that morning. Craig had been in the empty living room, eating and trying to pet Sui gently. However, Sui's hair suddenly stood up on end, and she ran away while yowling in a threatened voice that Shun had never heard before. Shun saw Craig's back through the gap in the door, and there was a sad slump to his shoulders that were usually so fine and broad, and even Shun felt a bit sad seeing this.

Shun had a feeling that this interaction had occurred with Sui several times before and ended in failure every single time. Although Craig was very strong and charismatic enough to be the leader, Dian and Carl were even stronger than him. Sui was a nuisance with those two, so it didn't make sense that she would instinctively avoid Craig.

"Why are you afraid of him even though he likes you?"

Sui, who hadn't gotten what she wanted from Gin, had returned to Shun and was lifted into his arms.

"I don't like you, but you get along with me just fine."

She huffed in front of Shun, who was pessimistic about his troubled future; it was an unfortunate loss.

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1. In the raws it says "ossan" (おっさん) which is a semi-rude way to refer to a middle aged person (generally someone 40+), so I used old man since that's like... the English equivalent that I could think of b/c of this line: "The future is now, old man." And all the other similar memes. Though saying something like "boomer" or "grandpa" might be just as good lol

2. Her name is written "スウィ" in the raws, and I'm terrible at figuring out names but we're going with Sui for now (partly cause it's the same name as the wonderfully cute slime from Tondemo Skill De Isekai Hourou Meshi)

TL Note: This chapter is a little short, but it is a bonus chapter! Luckily I was able to finish up my lab fairly quickly despite it lagging out several times x'D

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