Chapter 4-Life is precious.

Yuuki was a mature beauty. She was tall, but an inch or so below Tao. She would always have a mature yet playful expression on her face. She exuded a motherly aura, but not nearly as delicate as Tao.

She always wore a maid uniform and stood behind Tao. But her behaviour was anything but subservient, she was the head maid in this mansion which had an awful lot of people working. She seems more and more like someone to do things according to their mood, rather than a particular discipline, which made her a lot more difficult to read.

Nevertheless, she was an important person in Aito's life. She was the one who took care of him whenever Tao wasn't around. She always took him around the house and would take him outside the mansion, which Tao seems to disagree with. Aito was with Yuuki when he first encountered superhumans with meta-abilities fight.

She was the first one to take him across the skies and let him experience the wonders of meta-superhuman feats. But what made Yuuki an important person in Aito's life is another reason.

As far as Aito was aware, Yuuki was the first one to change his diapers. The sheer amount of indignation Aito suffered when he soiled himself was immeasurable, but that only multiplied when he was cleaned and changed diapers by a woman whom he had never seen or heard of before, only to soil the diaper again and be thrust into this vicious cycle of indignation and humiliation.

To add fuel to the fire, she had a particular knack for teasing Aito whenever she was changing him, something Aito had to get used to and something that gave Aito the particular drive to master the art of 'not soiling himself'.

To this day, Yuuki would continue to haunt Aito, telling him about her experience in changing diapers. She would bring this up whenever she was on the losing side of a banter or an argument, and would continue to do so till the end of days…

Aito had never seen Yuuki besides her usual mature yet playful smile, he had never seen her showing any other particular emotions. Needless to say, Aito had never even imagined seeing Yuuki's expression as frosty as now.

Aito was still in Tao's hands as she carried him to Yuuki's study, which Aito had no idea even existed. As soon as they opened the door rudely, without knocking, they were met with Yuuki's frosty expression while she was reading a letter. A subtle amount of killing intent lingering in the atmosphere was enough to send a shiver down Aito's spine which made all of his hair stand on end.

[­­__What was that?] Ciel asked, surprised.

Aito was particularly paralyzed when he came across such an atmosphere. He had only experienced this once in his life, and that was when he taunted Michael to such a degree that he was a second away from being shot to death by Michael himself. The brief second was more than enough to bring back bad memories, and that made him practically glue himself into Tao.

"Yuuki!" Tao called out while patting Aito's back. Making Yuuki look up from her reverie, with a hint of surprise in her eyes.

"Oh! Didn't see you there. My bad!" Yuuki hastily showed away the letter in her hands and sat up from her chair, making her way to them. Tao was looking at Yuuki with a frown, which Aito didn't notice.

"Be mindful of your surroundings, will you?"

"You're the one who barged into my office without even knocking. Besides, he seems particularly sensitive towards these kinds of things." Yuuki put on a smile while taking Aito from Tao's hand as if she found this situation ridiculous.

"That's true, but even still, we've talked about this before. You should be mindful of what you're doing when you're here, especially when the kid's around."

"I'm not a Kid." Aito protested, seemingly out of his stupor.

"Of course, you're not a kid, you're a tiny but independent gentleman. Isn't that, right?" Yuuki had no qualms about teasing Aito, and the knowledge that if he were to push her any further, she would bring up the diaper days made Aito shut up and sulk in her arms.

Aito saw from the corner of his eyes a name on the letter that read, Detnerat.

[__Aito!! That was killing intent! What is this, a martial arts novel?] Ciel said, practically squealing from excitement.

'No shit Sherlock! But what was that calm energy that flowed through my body? Was it your doing? I thought you could only affect my mind?'

[No, Tao did something, But I'm not quite sure what it is, and I can do something similar to ease your mind. And now they are communicating through the eyes? what the hell?]

'How'd you know that?'

[Now that you're in Yuuki's arms, I can trace the bioelectric signals from her brain, which is showing patterns similar to when someone is communicating. But they are so damn fast that I can't decipher a thing.]

Aito alternated his gaze between Tao and Yuuki. It was not the first time they had done such a thing, although Aito had asked them about the subject, they would simply say that they were discussing adult matters, and it was just a different application of their quirk.

[Pure intention of malice materialized into the surroundings, which can invoke fear and paralyze people. Did it even materialize? that butler or Tao doesn't seem particularly affected though. Are they immune? Is this like charisma? What did Tao do? Shouldn't People only have one quirk? But they've been showcasing different abilities though. Such a nonsensical yet fascinating phenomenon_____ Gaah, this is frustrating, I need more data.].

'Relax? If there is something we have in spades, that's time.'

[Think about all the things we could do if we can replicate that phenomenon. I miss those days when I could passively get information from the internet. Where's that stupid cat, lemme gut him. How dare he Interrupt my precious research time.]

Ciel's voice was getting impatient by the second, which was a development in her usual monotone.

Aito could understand her, but he was helpless. Although Tao was forthcoming with anything Aito asked for, there were boundaries, which a child's curiosity simply can't penetrate. And, behaving too much outside of how a child should act wasn't on Aito's agenda.

Which was why Aito was doing the research himself while trapping his tutor under an unfair wager. There were too many fascinating things in this world that Aito and Ciel were curious about, and being from different worlds didn't help their curiosity.

"Good evening, Mr. Kosuke!"

Instead, Aito decided to humor the man who was standing like a statue all this time.

"Very Good evening Young master Aito. How was your day." The old butler who was standing behind Yuuki like a statue replied to Aito with an amicable smile. He was Yuuki's personal assistant and butler. The irony of a maid having a butler only made Yuuki's character even more mysterious.

"It's been going well and all till that stupid Tommy ate my laptop."

"Is that so?

"And I wanted to spend some time with them, but as you can see, there doing a secret meeting while ignoring me." By this time Tao and Yuuki had been looking at Aito talking with amused gazes. Clearly, they were very fond of Aito's antics.

Aito leaned in on Yuuki's shoulder and talked in a whisper;

"Do you know how awkward it is to get stuck in between them when they are doing such meetings? Tsk, tsk. Truly, they don't even pause to consider the feelings of other people."

"I could only imagine!" Mr. Kosuke said, his amicable smile widening into that of an amused one.

Before Aito could continue to talk to the old butler, Yuuki started tickling him;

"Is my diaper baby grumbling right now?"

Aito started giggling uncontrollably, making the atmosphere warmer as the stiff atmosphere from before gradually relaxed.

Making a halt to Aito's suffering, Tao spoke with a relaxed smile.

"You should get Aito's laptop out of Tommy's belly before he digests it, we wouldn't want another childish Tantrum from our little gentleman here now, would we?"

"That's right, let me gut him pretty please!" Aito spoke while wiping away the tears from his eyes.

Yuuki simply waved her hands, ignoring Aito's request and Tommy who was floating beside Tao with a miserable expression flew over to Yuuki.

She held him by the tail and started shaking him violently while holding onto Aito with her other hand.

"Spit it out Tommy, How dare you interrupt Aito when he's doing things behind our back?"

Aito looked on without flinching, completely ignoring the accusation thrown at him.

The sight of a golden-furred cat being shaken violently and it spitting out things as if it had an entire warehouse inside its stomach was a comical, and fantastic sight to Aito. But here he was, someone was supposed to be dead, alive along with Ai in his soul to boot.

He didn't know why his birth mother abandoned him in such a remote mansion situated in the mountains, but it would be a lie to say that he didn't particularly care about what happened to his birth mother after. But one thing was certain, he wouldn't trade anything for the life he was living now.

Living as Okabe Tao's adopted son was way better than sitting on your couch alone, waiting for your parents to arrive, only to wake up on the same couch, haunted by the winter. Even though Tao knew that Aito knew he wasn't her son. Even though Tao didn't seem fond of the idea of letting her son anywhere near, supernatural's and meta-humans…

[…]

…

"You want me to emit killing intent like I did before?" Yuuki asked Aito with an incredulous face.

"Yes!"

"Wait, how did you even know what it was?" Yuuki asked raising an eyebrow, "It was only for a brief second, and I'm sure Tao covered up for that!"

"You know I've always been bright!"

Yuuki looked at Aito's proud face with suspicion.

"Very well. But I can't show you that."

"Why?" Aito looked dejected and looked at Yuuki with a pleading gaze.

"If you're as bright as you say, then you should've already guessed it."

"…"

Seeing that Aito's pleading gaze only increased in intensity, Yuuki avoided his eyes before speaking.

"Well, killing intent as you call it is simply the projection of one's willingness to malice. In my case, it was news about my subordinates getting caught in a villain attack. The momentary rage I felt towards the villain projected itself as my intention for malice."

"…" Aito's eyes lit up and was looking up at Yuuki with enough curiosity that Yuuki had to turn away her head.

"Ahem, you might have experienced Tao's presence itself increasing tenfold when she is in the presence of her subordinate___"

"Yes, her whole atmosphere changes when she's in her office."

"Right, there are various factors that come into play when it comes to the disparity between the presences. To put it bluntly, Strength, confidence, morale, health, conviction, experience etc.… can affect one's presence. Likewise, the recipient's conditions can also affect the presence felt by them. For example, if you and I were to stand in front of Tao when she's angry, like angry enough to through you out the window, you'll feel fear. It's only natural. But at the same time, if she's angry towards me as well, I won't feel a thing other than a slight sense of caution."

"Our personal strength is quite the same, so I won't feel fear. But since you're weak like a twig, you'll feel fear, which is just your flight or fight instincts taking action."

"…" Aito wasn't Amused.

[…] Neither was Ciel.

"But if she were to show her pure intention of malice, I can feel a threat to my existence. My flight or fight sense will flare up, and I will be on full alert. But you on the other hand, your flight or sight senses will overload, and you will just paralyze in fear. It can end with a lifelong mental trauma or if the presence is too overwhelming, you can faint, and your mental faculties can shut down. or leave you like an idiot for the rest of your life. Or in extreme cases, you can even die. Of course, I'm leaving out a lot of factors, which is not relevant at this point."

"___"

"___"

"So?..."

"Sigh, what I'm saying is. If I were to intentionally show my intent for malice toward you, your weak mind won't be able to handle it. You'd just be fear-stricken, or worse, become an even bigger idiot than you already are. If that happens, I'll have to hire someone else to change your diapers." Yuuki supported her chin up with her hand to emphasize the pity.

Aito felt his left eye twitching, but he ignored it and appeared cute while assuming a thinking posture, he had to make use if everything he had to weaken Yuuki's defense.

"Then, I can feel your intent even if your target were someone else?"

"Depending on the circumstances, sure!"

"Then you don't have to think about killing me, think about someone else you have enmity over."

"You're persistent, aren't you?"

"Of course, I'm stubborn, only for the righteous cause though."

"Hahaha, righteous. Yes! Making your tutor work as your maid is the most righteous thing I've seen in my entire life. How could I even forget about my little boy's sense of righteousness."

Aito completely ignored Yuuki's mumbling even though she deliberately made it louder for Aito to hear it.

"So, won't you help my righteous self?"

"Not possible."

"Now what?"

"Do you have any possible idea what your psychopathic mother would do to me if I were to make you an idiot?" Yuuki said while waving her hands in the air, exaggerating. "I don't want to risk that!"

"Is that so?" Aito looked at Yuuki with suspicion.

"…"

And As of realising something, he made an exaggerated gesture.

"Gasp! Don't tell me! My all-powerful Yuuki is actually scared of my mom? How weak are you even? Were you bluffing before?"

It was Yuuki's eyebrow's turn to twitch.

"Brat, I know what you're playing at, but don't push your luck."

"Do enlighten me on the immensity between heaven and earth senior!" Aito said assuming a ridiculous martial art's posture.

"I was wondering what you were doing all this time behind our backs, but to think you were spending your time reading some stupid Chinese novel!" Yuuki said, covering her mouth with her hands.

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Sigh, very well then."

"Are you going to do it?" Aito's eyes lit up, he had no hopes in convincing after he brought in Tao, but…

"Since it's my diaper baby who's asking…" Aito's excitement was palpable in his eyes.

"Nope."

"___"

[___] Even Ciel felt betrayed.

Squandering Aito's palpable excitement, Yuuki simply vanished from where she stood. Like a certain father who went to buy milk. Leaving Aito and Ciel equally dumbfounded.

…

Yuuki appeared on the rooftop of the mansion, looking at Aito who was standing their dumbfounded.

Yuuki had every intention of training him to become a fine warrior, and in their community, he was more than old enough to start training, but the unique situation of Aito's body made that impossible. Aito's situation right now was like that of a fragile glass, A slight shift in pressure can break him apparat like glass and Yuuki had no intention of being that pressure.

'If only his body were to choose between either of his sides.' Aito was a mixed-blood, but he was not a perfect hybrid. Normally a non-perfect hybrid would choose between either of their parental sides before they became 4. But Aito was already past that age and something was holding him back from achieving that.

Yuuki wanted nothing more than to find that wretched mother of his and strangle her for answers, but the restriction on her movement in the mortal world was holding her back from making that move. After all, neither she nor Tao wanted to be stuck in the limbo prison for the rest of their existence.

…

Tao was similarly looking out of her study at the dejected figure of Aito with similar thoughts as Yuuki, but some details were different. After all, she knew things that Yuuki, her mentor didn't.

…

The Next day, Aito found Yuuki to ask the same thing. Only for her to say nope and vanish.

This scene would repeat itself over the days, and many more days to come. And poor Mizuki will be the subject of all of Aito's and Ciel's frustration.