The Grandcypher

[Bloodedge]

And carry on, he would. This was easily the most immersive 'puzzle' he'd ever worked on. So long as he could continue working to solve it, he would take a great deal of satisfaction in doing so. As it seemed now, perhaps he could continue doing so outside of his own head. This one was even interactive in a way, throwing new curves his way at every opportunity. She had apparently been keeping track of his eyes' movements, or rather... their lack of movement after finding her form a few times. Sure, he could take the blame for that. He couldn't, however, avoid throwing the situation back at Miki herself. The simple fact that she didn't deny her end, was confirmation itself. Not to mention, she then took a very tsundere approach to admitting just that. "Figuring out if I was looking could have been a lot more simple than that, you know? That was almost a display. Jinx did the same thing, and that─" Again, he paused. He was just about to mention how the scene he referenced ended, but thought better of doing so. Instead, he cleared his throat as if he intended to veer away from the clause's conclusion with that.

[Apollymi]

While Kou was content to try and figure out Miki, the blonde lass had been doing the same to the lad. In fact, she was less surprised by the things he said than before. He made the claim that she could have gone about figuring out if he was looking in a much simpler way. And though that might have been true, the way she'd done it did a few extra things. She managed to remain playfully huffy. "I mean there might have been an easier way, but it wouldn't have told me what I needed to know... madness comes with methods, even Jinx's," she said firmly. Of course, she realized Jinx's methods led to some pretty drastic situational changes. Especially the ones he avoided mentioning presumably on purpose. Even so, this was real life and she didn't have to worry about such extremes. Instead the methods of extremes allowed her to find a place of comfort to approach this lad's avoidance from. She found herself looking back at him and then she couldn't even keep in her fake indignation. "Admittedly, I might have gotten a bit carried away, but I can't be blamed for that. It was kind of... nice knowing I could create such a situation. It's come quite a long way considering..." the lass said calmly. Kou was exactly the type who initially avoided all extra contact with her, even past their 'sketchy' phase. With that in mind, she was beginning to wonder if she wasn't his type aside from having a pretty face. As such she couldn't help but take advantage at least a little when it was serving her other purposes.

[Bloodedge]

It seemed Miki was content to have achieved an additional feat with her excessive approach. That was all fine and dandy, but it left Kou wondering if she intended to make something of that development, or if she was simply doing the same thing he had been. Time would tell, as far as he knew. "Sure, but nothing irrational can exist. There's always some deeper meaning to everything. That's what I think." If nothing else, he would share this philosophy. He thought it was a fair trade, considering what he'd been granted in the form of a view and some... titillating banter, so to speak.

It could be said that Miki had gotten a bit carried away. Obviously though, Kou didn't mind at all. For a moment, he had almost been able to treat the situation just as he would have in normal game scenarios. Alas, this was no game. His choices would affect his actual future, and being reprehensive about things would only take him so far in such a case. Still, the direct approach was not quite part of his nature. So long as he couldn't tell what was going on in Miki's mind, he would remain so to some extent. "Considering what? Anyway, it's not like I minded or anything. I'm just a guy, remember? No doubt you didn't forget that mix-up when we met. I thought you were an NPC at first, and I was gonna... well..."

[Apollymi]

After speaking, Miki was rewarded with some philosophy by Kou. It seemed the lad saw deeper meanings in everything, that explained quite a bit about how his mind worked, so the blonde could do nothing but accept it. As they conversed, she seemed to get more comfortable. Her body settling in a bit more atop their shared bed and her back leaning against the wall. "Sou ka, that's one way to think about it... I'll keep that in mind," she said and not very surprisingly she meant it. She kept a lot of things this lad said in mind, for the simple sake of enjoying the novelty of the things he presented to her.

They were having some very interesting conversations. It was initially very similar to early game interactions between characters, but they weren't actually characters. They were people who played such games and who looked into them a bit with critical minds. One such critical moment would come from the blonde lass in this moment. After of course, Kou relayed that he didn't really mind her getting carried away in the way she had, and even brought up on his own his earliest reaction to thinking she was an NPC. "Considering I can't really tell what is going on in your head," said the girl her expression becoming thoughtful. "I don't really pretend to be a people person or anything, but I can usually tell a pretty straightforward way to progress any given situation, but that wasn't as clear with you..." she mentioned carefully. "You might just be a guy, to you. But you're definitely unique as an existence. I mean even past the initial sketchiness of our interactions, I couldn't really tell if you were interested in me or not... I thought that you might only see me as a friend so I tried to back off a bit. But I couldn't really let it go after all. It's kind of a bad habit," she admitted her own slightly obsessive behavior. She wasn't sure what it was, but her words felt strangely decisive. "With everything that's happened since Atlantis though, I was considering that we were likely on that first path again. This time with a lot more knowledge of each other than we had initially and that... excites me." The girl confessed that the idea of proper romantic endeavor with Kou was something she considered worthwhile and even managed to confess whatever misgivings and strange behaviors she'd had before.

[Bloodedge]

"It's a good way to think. Even if it's wrong, it never hurts to consider a deeper meaning. Maybe even... something deeper can be added by thinking it up," he said. In truth, that was very much a thing Kou had done himself. A few situations here in this world, he'd thought of without rationalizing the true depth behind them... but had applied said depth during consideration. As a simple matter of fact, all of these situations revolved around Miki.

Miki wasn't a people person; that much was clear. She could be considered a businesswoman rivaled by few, if any, but she had yet to show any true ability to deal with people outside of such scenarios. Nevertheless, their discussion would take a rather serious turn. Miki expressed a certain amount of confusion regarding his opinion of her. As strange as he found that, he supposed they were in a world of virtual perfection. "To be perfectly honest, I didn't see you as anything," he said, though it was a lie in all technicality. "Well, if anything, you proved yourself to be a valuable comrade at first. Once I started to recognize who you were, that changed. I'm surprised, though... an idol who doesn't assume someone would be interested? That's odd, but then... you're never in a group either. Either way, I think I'd be the only one to be having questions like that─" Ah, he was thinking aloud again. This time was just a bit different. He wasn't accidentally speaking his thoughts aloud, but instead... he was speaking already, and he was accidentally reverting to his puzzle-solving pattern of thought.

[Apollymi]

"Hm... I am pretty sure I can keep it in mind," the blonde lass said of looking for deeper meanings. As far as she was concerned figuring out the motivations of people besides the obvious were a bit unnecessary. Because of this, she didn't often get along with other people. Since coming to this world, she'd managed to make a few friends. This lads thoughts on things tended to make up for some gaps in her own ability to see things from the human perspective. Numbers were one thing, people and the situations surrounding them were something completely different.

As their conversation progressed to points more serious, Kou clarified that he'd not really felt anything surrounding her initially. He went on to claim that she'd simply proved herself to be a worthy comrade in their adventures pretty early on. He even stated that his actual interest in her only seemed to develop as a consequence of figuring out who she was. This was to be expected, along with figuring out with certainty that she was an actual girl, which was likely one of the moments of sketchiness surrounding the lass. He mentioned that she was always alone as well, giving away a few key pieces of information about himself in the process. But apparently he thought that he'd be the only one having the sorts of issues she'd mentioned. "Sou ka," she said before speaking a bit more. "Iia, I am usually alone socially because it is less annoying. Well... it isn't exactly a choice, being famous is lonely. Being an idol just means I can't trust the motivations of people who speak to me," she said softly. To be technical she'd experienced a wide variety of different person to person interactions and had them go astray for various reasons. As a point of fact, middle school had been hellish as an experience for her socially, and as such by the time she made it to high school, she'd taken on a different approach, but it was one which left her well outside of anyone's social circle. Though it didn't change her popularity, if anything she became more of a commodity. "So in that way, it isn't just you having trouble interpreting interest. You are different from the kind of person who normally shows interest in me. You didn't seem to want anything from me, so I had no comparable experiences."

[Bloodedge]

Second by second, the conversation became more serious. It wasn't quite negative, but it was a far cry from their usual chats. Now that they were in seclusion, however, Kou had no issue finally having a real discussion. This was a thing he'd been missing out on, in a way. Miki made it clear that she preferred loneliness to the annoyance of being social. In that way, they were kindred. "No need to explain that to me. I lived with an entire hidden identity to avoid people latching onto me for being Geno Killer. And... even that's just a habit that came from my prime puzzle-solving days," he explained. He had taken to gaming as an outlet when he could no longer openly solve the puzzles he enjoyed, only to work hard at avoiding the problem repeating itself in a new habitat. Their similarities in that regard were clear, though there was one other thing that needed to be addressed. Miki thought it pertinent to mention him not wanting anything from her when they met. Again, this was a similarity of theirs... albeit somewhat different. Now was the time for Kou to admit something about himself, if it hadn't become clear to the lass already. "I'm different from a lot of people, except maybe... you. People want stuff from me when they know what I'm capable of, and that's why I hide who I am back home. Solve this puzzle, play this level for me, give me build advice in this RPG. On the other hand... If I want something from someone else, I always have the ability to get it. Most times, I can get what I want without making any sacrifices myself..."

[Apollymi]

Since they'd met, most of their conversations had been either world related, or light in topic. Right now, the tone of this conversation was rather serious. But strangely, it was still enjoyable for Miki. There weren't many people she would talk to freely, and even fewer who would understand the nature of her plights. Those who were young up and comers like herself had taken the easy way out of socially normative interactions, and those outside of it, couldn't see the kind of problems she was having. In this moment, Kou was indeed a spirit kindred to her own, able to understand her more distrusting nature and commiserate in a manner she hadn't known was possible. Kou had even gone so far as to hide his identity to retain his peace. "Sou ka," she said giving a tiny nod and feeling a great deal of relief about not having to try to explain to someone who would never understand about the nature of her social life.

"Yeah, I know what that is like, you have no idea how many upperclassman wanted to be introduced to my parents when I started high school, the really bold ones asked me for references when applying or mentioned knowing me. Though I do get the added benefit of being a girl playing a game, so people don't look to me innately for advice. In fact, I get ignored even when I am right and I get trolled a lot for not being the type of person who responds to being given random things, I already have because I play the freaking game," Miki sighed, her problems in playing video games were a bit different but they all stemmed from the same thing. It's why she'd been so gentle in her initial approach to things when they'd first started adventuring together. "But, knowing I can get most things myself, means I don't actually mind sharing or anything... It's nice to know someone isn't just trying to use me or buy me. It's why I never really thought about splitting off from you, it's fun now... in a way it wasn't before."

[Bloodedge]

She understood. Well, that much was to be expected. If anyone was going to follow along aside from Hikari, it would be her. The interesting thing was, she didn't understand simply because she had seen events happen to him. She understood simply because she could relate. "Trust me, I have an idea and a half. I'm guessing the number is somewhere up there with the requests for me to start Guilds, join raid parties, yadda yadda. Take my advice, and don't build a reputation for something you don't want people pestering you about every day. That's what I'll tell anyone." Truth be told, there was much more to Kou's reasoning. His ability to solve puzzles and excel in games was less about the games themselves, and more about the human minds that went into crafting them. He 'felt' puzzles by gradually putting himself in the mentality of their creators, and he made such incredible character builds in RPGs by realizing the intents of creators, then exploiting the holes between thought processes.

His current Avatar, for example, had no weaknesses to speak of. The physical weakness he lost for not being a Warrior, was made up for by the strength of his spells. On the other hand, the lack of magical versatility he would have suffered by being a Saber, was easily negated by his Spirit Origin and identity as a Celestial. These things all came from realizing what developers would have been missing. "You're right, though. This has been more fun than I've ever had just gaming, or anything like that. That's why I decided to cash in that perv moment before the fan showed up, ya' know?" he joked... sort of.

[Apollymi]

Kou understood. Of course he would, he was hiding his identity in order to keep himself off people's radar. Such a thing also explained his initial reaction to being called out as the Geno Killer. He claimed to have a piece of advice for her, and anyone else, and it was very interesting advice to say the least. She'd technically already followed it, her online identity was very separate from her general life. And because she ended up playing AoE with Kaiba Corp enhancements, she wasn't even using the account of hers which had the most presence. She'd get to live this particular life as a relative unknown. Or rather that would be the case if she wasn't currently using her own face. "That's pretty sound advice. I kinda followed it already, not intentionally of course... but at least I've managed to outrun my online presence by a bit. Though I'm using my own face so I can't really distance myself from that, well not without getting weird," she said with a bit of a chuckle. Though she wasn't as well-known as the Geno Killer, her alternate username was a staple in several RPGs known almost exclusively for not using a mic but being a lead group member. To be technical she was something of a chart topper with that name and appeared with it all over the place. She was a bit relieved that she mostly managed to keep that part of her separate from her current incarnation and away from her face. It would be bad if anyone who didn't already know found out about her other self.

Whatever the case, that wasn't really something she had to consider anymore. Instead the lad, had to make the claim that he too found their arrangement to be fun. He even made a joke about cashing in on his perv moment early due to how fun he found it. A grin crossed this lass' face, and she managed a teasing tone soon after. "Hoh? Well, don't let something as silly as a fan get in the way. Take another, make sure it's really fun," the girl said, and it appeared to be a joke. But... Miki had already mentioned that she wasn't really joking around when she said things like this, whatever the case, she'd watch for his reaction and maintain that grin for quite a few seconds.