My OP Minion System in the Apocalypse

Chapter 188 Who Hurt You? [Chloe]

I probably should've worn a hat or something. Despite the cold morning chills, the sun had decided to bless me right at this very moment with its glaring rays of light and heat. I made my way down the sidewalk as a broken, irregular stream of cars travelled by.

After a decent journey, I eventually arrived at the front entrance of the Keyton Shopping Centre. I was greeted by a myriad of bright colours and moving lights, advertisements were slapped pretty much all over the entire entrance. 'Buy one get one free, vanilla ice cream!' was one that seemed quite eye-catching, beside it was a, 'Ask your doctor about breast cancer today," I wasn't really in the mood to ask my doctor about breast cancer, but I'll keep it in mind, I suppose. There was basically no order to the great screens of consumerism.

I walked through the automatic glass doors, splashing me with a wave of cool air as I entered. There was a great rush of people, it reminded me of lunch times at school... anyways, I came to get a hair clip or something so I began making my way around the stores, glancing at the accessories through the glass displays of the stores. Eventually I decided to enter one of the stores I always entered, a clean, minimalistic environment, 'Hepta', they had quality and aesthetics.

All the accessories were displayed in little glass boxed on various pedestals around the store. It was really a treat for the eyes. I looked through and picked out a small red hairclip, it was more extravagant than what I usually got but standing out is what I needed. '$34.99' yikes, it seems there's always a price on beauty. Whatever, I had a decent amount of money anyways so I took the hairclip off of the display and made my way over to the cashier.

"Good choice, honestly, it's one of my favourites in this store." Some friendly small talk with the cashier was not exactly something I wanted to do, but then again, if I wanted to become the Main Character, I'd have to begin by becoming another brainless Neanderthal... I mean extrovert. "Yeah, I really liked the bright colour of it." I simply replied. She observed it for a little while before scanning the barcode and placing it into a little cute box sealed with a small panda sticker. "Just $34.99, cash or card?"

"Card please," I replied. I unlocked my phone and tapped it on the top of the scanner. After checking that it the transaction had been processed, she lastly placed the box into a small carry bag and passed it over to me. "Thank you, have a nice day!" With the bag in hand, I walked out of the store, towards the food court.

I was a little hungry, although I didn't usually eat out. Mostly because I rarely felt like hanging in the shopping centre alone like this. I suppose I'd treat myself today since I was already here. I had a quick look around and decided to eat at a Japanese place. There didn't seem to be too many people in the store so I decided on it for dinner.

I was greeted with a, "Hi, how many people?" by a short male worker. I was never embarrassed by stuff like this but for some reason my usual, "Just the one," was a little less confident. He showed me to the seat and handed me a menu.

The big images next to each of the menu options were very helpful. I hated it when some restaurants would just fill the menu with words and abstract descriptions like 'truffled elegant white bean cassoulet, braised in fresh rainbow chard', just say it's lamb with some sauce, it's especially annoying when you know the meanings of the words and the language is so brutal butchered into jargon.

I liked the look of one of the bento boxes. It had pork katsu with rice, some salad, a few pieces of fried tempura with some sushi all separated into their own separate sections of the container. The middle had a little box with some ginger and wasabi. All together, it looked like quite an appetising meal. I raised my arm and waited for a waiter to approach me. I did wonder if I would be able to finish it all however.

"Hey, what can I get for you today?"

"Just a pork katsu bento box."

"Alright, any drinks with that?"

"Uh, I guess I'll take a sprite."

That marked the end of the fleeting conversation with the waiter. After a nod, he walked off, back towards the kitchen or wherever he was going. He didn't take the menu away though, so I decided to continue flicking through, having a look at some of the pictures. For some reason, a white-haired girl approached me and awkwardly greeted me with a "...hi". She looked at me from across the table. "Um, hello? Do I know you?" Could this be someone from school who I forgot the look of? It took her a little while before I heard her response.

"So... uh, I just need to make a friend!" Huh? I wasn't exactly following, was this how people made new friends these days? It sounded more like a confession. "Okay...? Come sit down here then." I gestured towards the other seat on this two-seated table. She hesitantly took and seat and looked up towards me. She didn't say another word for a significant amount of time.

"Are you getting anything to eat?" I asked her. I was stuff kind of confused by the whole situation, I wasn't exactly a professional at making friends either though... "U-uh, yeah." She pulled the menu towards her and scanned through the meals. I attempted to make some conversation with her since she went to all this effort to speak to me. "I see you're trying to make new friends." She responded with a quiet, "...yeah."

Honestly, I didn't have much I could talk to her about, I was not a very social person and she was incredibly shy. "What's your name?" I asked.

"Yui." She responded. Eventually, I signalled over the waiter and he took her order. She got some tonkatsu ramen and a bottle of orange juice. She was fiddling with her clothes as she looked down under the table. "So Yui, what do you like doing?" She appeared a little shocked by the question and thought about it for a little while.

"Um, I like reading..." She gave as her response after significant thought. Not to be stereotypical but I predicted that her hobbies would be something like that. Well it was alright since I also liked reading a little bit. "So what books do you like?"

"Uh it's embarrassing but my favourite romance novels..." What a development. Then again, this entire story is a romance story so I guess this was to be expected. What was I even meant to do with her? I wondered why she just came up to me out of the blue, did I really look like such good friend material? Is the author trying to give me some character development or something?

"Don't worry, that's not embarrassing, I like them too." I assured.

"Really?" She seemed intrigued in the conversation now.

"Yeah, my favourite is 'Apathy at Gifted Academy' by H.Z."

"Oh! I've read that one too!"

The two of us discussed romance novels for a little while.

"So, Yui, why exactly did you decide to become friends with me?"

"Well my sister told me..."