In the sterile halls of Sunshine Toys, where plastic dreams are manufactured for children worldwide, Akira Yamamoto has mastered invisible competence. For three years she has run quality control with detached precision, long past believing in the products she inspects. Her solitude is disrupted when Rei Sato, a mathematically gifted but secretive new assistant manager, arrives. Soon, money vanishes from company accounts in precise increments, and suspicion falls on both women. Forced into an uneasy alliance by their paranoid manager, Akira and Rei must survive constant surveillance while unraveling financial manipulations that prove far deeper than theft. As they close in on the truth, the boundary between ally and adversary begins to dissolve in unsettling ways. Set against Japan's industrial landscape, "Quality Control" traces the strange mathematics of human connection: how two people circle each other in patterns of attraction and distrust, never fully colliding yet never escaping. The warehouse's strict systems echo the geometries of their own guarded hearts, where loyalty, suspicion, duty, and desire form equations that refuse to balance. Written with psychological depth and existential weight, this five-chapter novella explores what happens when isolation collides with the risk of intimacy. In a world where toys are engineered to perfection, Akira and Rei learn that authentic bonds cannot be manufactured but they must be chosen. At its core, "Quality Control" is about what people steal from each other: time, trust, the fragile defenses we build to keep others away. It asks what authenticity costs in environments built for efficiency, and what intimacy looks like between two people who dare to be seen. For readers drawn to nuanced characters, workplace tension with hidden stakes, and stories that uncover meaning in ordinary places, "Quality Control" offers a meditation on alienation, corporate culture, and the radical act of trust.

☆DISCLAIMER☆ THIS STORY ISN'T MINE IM POSTING THIS SO NOT ONLY EVERYONE ELSE CAN READ THIS BUT I CAN TOO. THIS IS MY FAVORITE BOOK SO I WANT TO KEEP IT ALIVE. PLEASE DON'T TAKE THAT AWAY FROM ME also there are a few tiny typos in this that I fixed I hope that's okay There is now a new cover (credits at the end of description) if there are ANY problems with the cover, please let me know what's wrong with it and I'll fix it. Thank you all so much for taking as much interest in this story as me! ☆END OF DISCLAIMER☆ Also I don't have the original description so I'll just elaborate and use one I saw on another book "Two whole months of free laundry in exchange for two weeks of being my fake boyfriend. Deal?" Keith hesitated for a moment. Was this really worth it? Hardly. Lance was an asshole, and he wasn't sure what fake dating would entail. But, free laundry was free laundry, right? "Alright, it's a deal." Or: Lance makes the mistake of telling his mom he has a boyfriend coming home with him for Christmas. Keith makes the mistake of agreeing to be Lance's 'fake boyfriend' Credits to k-lance for the description If you see any typos you can comment of them and I'll fix it Credits to Ren for making the cover and wayward.mw for the art. I love this story more than life itself and my heart just can't get enough. I've read this story so many times and now you can too.