This is a Beta Test?! - A Literally Broken System

A few hours passed, and all of us were finally up and running as we convened on the bridge. Shizu and Shen were conspicuously together again in one corner, and Maruki was by the door as the latter stood by his usual guarding spot. Shade was further out on the bridge almost right next to the windows, while I myself was standing on the elevated console with my back leaning on the thing. All in all, we were all back in our usual spots.... All except for one person.

"What're you doing, Guidance?"

I sighed as I looked at our dev-slash-healer. For some reason, she refused to look at me. I mean, I knew that she might have some different feelings about what we just did a few hours ago, but I at least had the decency to act all professional. Or, well, as professional as I could be, hopefully. I still got flashes of her glorious naked beauty playing in my head every once in a while, but that was only because of the recency of it all. Surely, we'd move on from this. And if we did become an item somehow, we should at least not be obnoxious about it.

Unfortunately, that wasn't the case right now.

"I'm just... admiring the scenery, is all," Guidance hesitantly replied, her hands jittering behind her even as she refused to turn around. "I can still talk to you all like this anyway, right? So let's get to it."

I let out another sigh. This was really starting to get annoying now.

"Did something happen between you two?" Shade scoffed, crossing his arms over his chest as he leaned his back against the wall. "While I understand that you and Lady Guidance are pretty close, I would've expected that you two manage to keep your professionalism even if you two are having a spat."

A-A spat?! What even brought that on?!

"Oh? Guidance and Moriya are fighting?" Shen curiously cooed out. "I bet on the old lady to win!"

Wait, seriously?!

"That's ridiculous," Shade followed up with a smirk. "It's clearly a rigged vote. Moriya doesn't stand a chance."

Oh great... Was this really happening?

"Well, maybe Moriya can actually win, you know?" Shizu defended, actually taking my side even if she was clearly conflicted by her own words. "He might get absolutely beat up, but maybe he can take Guidance down with him?"

...I take that back. Thanks for the vote of confidence there, Princess...

"N-Nobody's fighting here, okay?!" Guidance suddenly chimed in, thankfully stopping the nonsense as she turned around. "And no, Moriya and I aren't fighting. We're just... Well..."

For some reason, the dev looked at me as if I should be the one to finish her sentence. As much as a part of me wanted to just blurt out that something significant did happen between us, I knew better than that. This called for a diplomatic answer. An answer that would hopefully end this ridiculous situation and have us focus on the more important things in life.

"We had a bit of a talk last night," I neutrally began, my own nerves suddenly rising even as I fought to keep my cool. "One thing led to another, and we've..."

Oh dear....

"What? You two fought, yes?" Shade smugly chuckled.

"We did not!"

"We did not!"

Guidance and I's combined voices rang across the bridge, effectively smothering the conversation to a halt as we then looked at each other with a knowing look on our faces. We had to push past this awkwardness, especially if we didn't want anybody else to get the wrong impression.

"E-Eherm... As he was saying, we just had a friendly talk," Guidance took control, the blush on her face hopefully not apparent even as she put on a brave front. "I couldn't sleep last night, so we bonded for a bit."

"Exactly," I quickly followed up. "It's really nothing. It's just something being blown out of proportion, okay?"

At that, everyone in the room looked at me like I said something that maybe made sense. Maruki non-withstanding, Shizu and Shen seemed to be satisfied with my answer, while Guidance herself looked at me like I just barely managed to dodge a literal asteroid. Shade, meanwhile, only stared at me with a look that promised more questions in the future, his eyes showing that... That he might know more than what he let on...

Okay, that's kind of concerning...

"Right!" I burst out, resetting the situation on the bridge as I took command of the discussion. "Today's a new day, and we don't know where we're going." I then turned to Shizu, smiling as I asked, "Shizu, where are we heading next?"

Thrust into the spotlight, the Princess flinched as I gestured for her to speak. She was clearly caught off-guard and the pensive look on her face showed that she also didn't know where we were going.

Joy. Now we could both look clueless in front of the masses.

"I did say that I wanted to go to Marquee to investigate that 'Sun' superweapon," Shizu pondered, placing a finger on her lip as she hummed. "I suppose we could go there?"

"Keep in mind that we also don't have a lot of resources aboard the [Rig]," Shade reminded from his side of the bridge. "For some reason, Moriya hold all of our Leafs instead of spending them for supplies."

I blinked at the accusation. "I'll have you know that you all-"

"Have no money at the moment," Shade scoffed. "At best, we have what the Postmaster gave us, which would last for around five days before we have to resupply at the next port. Which, if we're not in Imperial soil, would mean that our Leafs would be useless."

Ouch... Did he really have to lay it on that thick?

"If I recall, there are some independent ports that can buy the Leafs of us and exchange them for whatever currency we need," Guidance added, much to my relief. "The exchange rate wouldn't be favorable depending on the world state, but it's still something."

"We can do that then," I quickly added. "From there, we can decide on where to go next."

I let out a nervous chuckle. It was a stopgap, but it was better than nothing.

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