Chapter 1: Biological Madness
"That f***ing bastard—he... he thinks everyone is like him?!"
Souta Tachibana slammed his keyboard with all the fury of a man one email away from turning feral. A few nearby desks flinched. Someone peeked over the cubicle wall but quickly ducked back down like a prairie dog sensing danger.
No, Souta wasn’t having a mental breakdown.
Not yet, anyway.
But his manager had just "voluntarily" asked him to work overtime for the fifth time this week. Again. With no bonus. No dinner break. Not even a fake "thanks." Souta was one caffeine crash away from legally qualifying as a war criminal.
"I hope that bastard stubs his toe," he muttered. "Thrice. No—ten times a day. On the same corner. Barefoot."
He hunched over, typing like he was hacking into the Pentagon purely out of spite. "Slave labor should be illegal. I’m gonna throw this whole company into—"
"HEHEHEHEHE... they’re gonna bond~!"
The giggle came from his left. A high-pitched, devil-possessed noise that made the hairs on his arms stand up.
He froze. Slowly turned.
Aya Nakamura—his coworker, best friend, and chaotic demon in human skin—was sitting at her desk, cackling like she’d just been personally proposed to by a 2D anime man with abs for days.