Chapter 73: Going to work is to get off work

“Nyx, you extracted a little bit of data from Sista before, right?”

After sending off the two from Sigma Heroes Company, Clara asked inside the descending elevator:

“Do you know what exactly is going on with him?”

Nyx only replied: 【This involves the other party’s privacy. Unless it’s an urgent and necessary situation, Nyx cannot disclose his secrets. Please learn to respect that.】

“If you won’t say, fine. But why do I have to be lectured by an AI?”

Clara sighed as she stepped out of the elevator.

“Ah! How could you sneak a bite!”

When she returned to the office, she saw the other three gathered in the meeting room, having tea and eating the small pastry gift box that Ogata Daruma had brought.

Only a few exquisite handmade pastries remained…………

Cecilia, licking powdered sugar off her fingers, said, “I left some for you~ Be grateful, livestock!”

“…….”

Dealing with the willful and reckless Cecilia was exhausting for Clara.

If it were an ordinary kid, Clara could at least speak to them as an adult, but Cecilia was her own company president, and her age was probably not as young as she appeared. Clara didn’t even dare to defy her…………

Suddenly, Cecilia said, “I’ve set time aside tonight. You’re all coming out to dinner with me.”

“Huh?”

The other three looked toward the little boss, who continued:

“To celebrate the official launch of Dream Witch Temp Staffing, to celebrate our magical girl Clara’s glorious debut, and of course to celebrate Lucia’s recovery… We’re going to have a victory banquet!”

Cecilia looked at Clara with admiration and added, “As livestock, you did pretty well, Clara. Look forward to next month’s bonus~~”

●Hmm!

Actually, President Cecilia wasn’t all that bad…………

“Of course, we still have to wait until after work. Now, everyone back to work!”

Clara, with no tasks, returned to the office to slack off.

Other heroes usually tried to find ways to improve their abilities, but Clara had no such thoughts and didn’t even know how to go about it…………

Dr. Fran was still tinkering with her laboratory equipment.

To study the NIX-01 driver and avoid another accident like the one in the Modification Department, it was necessary to upgrade the current equipment, with Nyx personally conducting the hardware evaluation…………

In other words, she was helping Fran hack herself.

Even so, whether it would succeed remained unknown.

The company’s only intern, Lucia, was assigned to switchboard duty.

Requests requiring magical girl Clara’s deployment would contact the company directly by phone or online consultation.

Requests were usually issued by the Hero Association, but sometimes personal requests came in.

The difference was that the former could not be refused…………

Not that they couldn’t refuse, but doing so would affect their hero rankings.

Although she was on switchboard duty, Lucia’s main job was logistics and maintenance.

But if she couldn’t even handle connecting to the driver, how could she talk about maintenance?

Besides, she didn’t understand “magic” either…………

“No requests all morning?”

Lucia’s workstation was right next to the lab, and the underground garden had few walls or partitions, so Fran could talk to her freely—even loudly enough for Clara to hear.

“A whole day without requests isn’t unusual.

Think about how many incidents happen in Central City in a day.

How many heroes are officially registered here?

Why do you think those heroes go on patrol?

Is it to uphold justice? No, they’re just trying their luck, hoping to intervene at the first moment a crime occurs.”

Fran was shattering the children’s beautiful illusions about heroes.

Luckily, Lucia never had those illusions and had early on recognized the reality that the hero industry was all about profit.

“Why not let Senior Clara go out on patrol too?

She’s so popular now, maybe some organization will start watching her, then we’ll have work to do…… and some bounty coming in!”

Lucia silently expressed her desire to make money.

Being backed by Nitemare, the Dream Witch, she even began to worry about the company’s income.

Fran simply said, “If she goes out now, she’s more likely to attract media attention.

Those ‘crows’ can fly everywhere… If investigating heroes’ true identities wasn’t illegal, they’d probably follow them even off work hours~”

To protect heroes legally, anyone investigating their true identities—no matter who they are—faces severe punishment…………

In an era where death is not the end, there are punishments far worse than death.

If serious consequences arise, like the death of a hero or their family, the punishment could even be a continuous death sentence until the soul is completely erased….

Yet even so, faced with enormous profits, many still take the risk.

Otherwise, there wouldn’t be so many heroes or their families killed in attacks by criminals.

“So boring. Can’t the evil organizations act a little more often?”

Though she had only just joined, Lucia’s mental state was already close to that of veteran staff.

Only a chaotic era needs heroes, so they didn’t really hope for peace.

Fran sighed, “It can’t be helped.

The evil organizations have to coordinate multiple departments for an operation.

The monsters and henchmen they deploy number in the dozens or even hundreds.

But even team-based heroes number only five to seven at most.

That’s a manpower cost difference of tens or hundreds of times.

And there are many other factors to consider…………

“Being a monster isn’t easy either.”

Lucia said this, involuntarily thinking of her older brother.

Not long ago, she almost mistook Clara for her brother, nearly causing a ridiculous scene.

She claimed she had figured it out, but then immediately got a call from her brother.

If she hadn’t been severely injured and immobile, she really would have wanted to crawl into a hole and hide…………

But since that hospital visit, she hadn’t seen her brother.

He seemed very busy and went out on field duty again this week.

He said he was doing fieldwork to earn more money, but as a monster, he was weak.

Even as a hero on the surface, he might not stand a chance.

There were monsters and heroes on Earth too.

But compared to Central City, competition there wasn’t so fierce.

The scale of evil organizations and hero strength felt like child’s play…………

Especially in Lucia’s rural hometown, the organization leaders might even stop by a hero-run butcher’s stall after work to buy groceries.

Still, being monsters and heroes there was simply because it was “necessary.”

“I wonder when my brother will come back again…………”

Lucia’s quiet mumbling reached Fran’s ears.

Fran silently glanced at the locked safe in the corner of the lab.

“Don’t worry, evil organizations usually don’t have long-term missions.”

Fran comforted her and, through the fence, handed her a lollipop, poking it gently against Lucia’s cheek.

“Maybe he’ll be back in a few days?”