In the royal suite on the top floor of the King's Apple, right on the king-sized bed, the red-haired Cranberry lying in the arms of the blue-skinned Zombie, opened her eyes and flinched as the light enveloping her ears slowly faded away.

"Haa..."

​​

She breathed out with concern.

"Say... You told me once before that you need to keep up the appearance, that your pride will not allow you to stand being looked down upon - and that's why you will never show any kind of weakness - showing intimate affection included."

The blue undead spoke curiously, looking down at the sad girl desperately seeking comfort in his embrace.

"I did. What? Did you stop liking that part of me after you completely regained your free will?"

Even though the red-haired girl's voice was sounding confident, her body stiffened, and with the nonexistent distance between them, she couldn't hide it at all.

"Yeah, right, as if that was possible by this point."

Zombie scoffed and shook his head with a laugh.

"It's just that... with all that, you should have known that showing that much affection will cause the exact reaction it did. Because it had to with how this world is."

"...are you trying to make me feel bad for hitting the waitress? I thought that you hated all living beside me."

Cranberry smirked mockingly but.

*pomf*

"...eh...?"

She got lightly bonked on the head with the side of the Zombie's palm.

"Don't try to use the side effects of the rotten brain against me. You know what I mean."

The undead frowned and shook his head again.

"You are extremely worried about what Patience has told us, aren't you? They got to you so much that you can't keep up your high and mighty attitude."

He pointed out.

"...haa..."

The red-haired girl breathed out and rubbed her forehead against his chest.

"...I don't know what to feel about the fact that someone with a rotten brain title has managed to figure me out..."

She sighed and shook smirked.

"Don't change the subject."

Zombie furrowed his brows and nudged her side.

"..."

Cranberry flinched and suddenly relaxed, as if she has given up.

"...yes. I am worried. I am worried about the fact that in this world there is a being that can still order us around and do everything they want with us despite how strong we got. I am also worried that they were speaking the truth about my -road to rule- quest. Its description does look warped as if there was something wrong with it! Should we actually try to complete it? It does sound too good to be true... I've been trying to figure out a way so that we could destroy the title itself without killing the avatar - I don't want to kill Claymore, they are my only friend except for Mary! But what if I will have to kill them after all, I will, and then the reward will turn out to be a lie?! Then there's that savior that's supposed to deal with me. The two of us gained our strength by completing quests, but let's be honest, most of the events that we've encountered - we probably didn't complete in the best way possible. What if that savior knows how to use the future events to her advantage? And has been messing with us from the very beginning?!"

"..."

As it turned out, Cranberry really had a lot on her mind, making Zombie's brain overload with to much potential problems.

"Let's slow down first. Alright? With Claymore - we have four more avatars of sin titles to go through - we don't have to go to them first - we can experiment on the others beforehand."

He proposed.

"...! That doesn't sound half bad..."

Cranberry finched and agreed.

"And about that savior - is it just me or did you sound a bit too specific for some reason... Do you know anything? Or do you maybe have someone in mind that fits the role?"

The blue undead tilted his head and asked.

"Well... Let's just say that Shanks and Mary had a peculiar conversation downstairs..."

The red-haired girl touched her ear with a concerned expression.

"Oh? What is it? Heard something interesting?"

The undead looked down at the girl and asked, furrowing his brows.

"Rather than interesting, it was something disturbing..."

Cranberry frowned and cuddled up to him with a worried expression.

"Do you remember when you told me about your past life? And that this world is the world of something called an otome game, but you have no idea about the details surrounding it?"

She asked while putting her hand on his chiseled stomach and tracing each muscle with her fingers, deep in thought.

"Yeah, of course, I do. You called me crazy when I did that - even though Patience had literally confirmed my story."

Zombie scoffed and tapped on Cranberry's forehead after he put his left hand on her head.

"Say, are those games by any chance something like a series of images showing up on the surface of a flat box?"

The red-haired girl asked with a frown.

"Flat box...? Oh! Do you mean the TV or a monitor? Yeah, sure, that description sounds like something someone who never had any contact with technology would describe it, but it isn't wrong. Wait... I haven't told you about the monitors or anything when we talked about my past life..."

At first, Zombie laughed, but then a realization managed to pierce through the wall of the rotten brain title and dawned on him.

"Yeah, you didn't... haa... but none other than little miss heroine was just talking about it with Shanks over the drink."

"She did WHAT?! We need to get her here immediately!"

At Cranberry's words, Zombie wanted to jump out of the bed immediately, but the red-haired girl stopped him.

"Cranberry...?"

The blue undead glanced disapprovingly at the hand pushing him down into the mattress.

"Give it a rest for today. Mary passed out dead drunk, we won't get her to say anything. Also, it sounded like she knows the details about this whole game - but the way she described her memories about it is completely different than how you explained it. It's like she was just shown particular memories instead of experiencing it all herself..."

"Huh? What does that mean?

The villainess voiced her concern and tightly wrapped herself around her confused corpse puppet.

"I'm not completely sure just yet, but I have a really bad feeling about it..."

She added looking up into Zombie's eyes.