Inside the trash can, Firefly stopped munching bananas and climbed out, worriedly walking up to Pei Guang: "Are you okay?"
Pei Guang: "Not okay. Himeko's coffee—down by a bottle!!"
Firefly: "You mean… that tasty coffee?"
Pei Guang shook his head: "No. It's extremely bad coffee. Wanna try?"
He handed her the nearly empty bottle. Firefly scraped a bit with her finger and put it in her mouth.
In an instant, even Firefly's pupils shrank.
If she hadn't tasted Pei Guang's own coffee before, maybe she wouldn't have noticed. But with its flavor still lingering in her mouth, drinking Himeko's brew made her brain tremble.
"I… I…"
She shivered, the bottle slipping from her hand.
Frightened, she stared at Pei Guang: "This coffee is terrifying… the person who made it is terrifying…"
Pei Guang nodded: "Exactly. The scary thing isn't that she made it: it's that she brewed it seriously, following normal coffee-making steps, and it still turned out like this. And now one of my limited bottles has been wasted because this person drank it all!!"
Sparkle wanted to explain, but couldn't.
How did it become her fault? He was the one who forced it on her!
Firefly: "But… he looks like he's in so much pain…"
Pei Guang sighed: "Yeah. No normal person can drink Himeko's coffee. Sigh… though he was tailing us, that's not a crime worth this. Brother, open your mouth. I'm really sorry, I grabbed the wrong bottle. It hurts me too."
Since Sparkle hadn't dropped her disguise, Pei Guang didn't know what she really looked like beneath Sampo's face.
Still, no matter her intentions, her crime wasn't death, nor torture. Better to give her some normal coffee, let her sleep, and forget the pain.
This kind of ultimate brew was meant for true enemies: Pei Guang had even planned to mix it with special materials for a future lethal strike against a real boss.
Pei Guang once again pulled out a bottle of coffee, and this time it was his proper coffee.
He pinned 'Sampo' down, ready to feed him.
But the moment she saw the coffee in Pei Guang's hand, alarm bells went off in her heart.
After dealing with Pei Guang a few times, she had completely lost faith in Sampo's words.
Close friend? Delicious coffee?
Lies! All lies!
This guy definitely just wanted to torment her because she refused to talk.
As a member of the Masked Fools, being caught—worse, tortured—was humiliating. She had to resist. She had to teach Pei Guang a harsh lesson.
Plans? To hell with them! Right now, she only wanted to make Pei Guang understand the terror of the Masked Fools.
But unfortunately, Sparkle's emotions had no effect on Pei Guang. Instead, Pei Guang straddled her, grabbed her chin, and said, "Stop struggling. Drink!"
One hand held the bottle, the other gripped her jaw. With a squeeze, her mouth opened. Firefly wanted to resist, but the instant the coffee touched her tongue, her struggle stopped.
"So tasty…"
That was her final thought. She finally tasted the delicious coffee Sampo had talked about. The intertwining of fragrance and bitterness, it truly deserved the word "delicious."
As the flavor spread through her mouth, she felt all motivation slip away. Even though this was the dreamscape, her body just wanted to sleep.
She fell into slumber, and in her dream, Sparkle saw a purple laughing century egg quietly standing there.
It was strange: clearly the egg was "smiling," but it didn't feel like a smile, just silently staring, at she knew not what.
But none of that mattered to her anymore.
All she wanted was to sleep… sleeeep…
As Sparkle sank into sleep, the disguise over her body faded away.
Watching Sampo suddenly transform into a beautiful girl, Pei Guang froze.
"My Sampo turned into a girl?"
Pei Guang stared wide-eyed, while Firefly pulled him up and said, "Sitting on top of a girl isn't very polite, you know~"
When he was riding on "Sampo" to feed him coffee, Firefly hadn't minded.
But once Sampo turned into Sparkle, and into such a cute girl, for some reason she felt uncomfortable.
Yet just as she pulled Pei Guang up, he crouched back down beside Sparkle.
Seeing this, Firefly's eyes widened.
"Ah Guang…"
She didn't know how to stop him. The frustration of being upset but unable to speak out made her feel even worse.
But Pei Guang rubbed his hands together expectantly and said, "A transforming magical girl? That face, those legs, those feet—perfect~"
"???"
Huge question marks popped up over Firefly's head, while Pei Guang sighed: "Too bad she's wearing too little… looks like even her pockets are tight against her. Forget it, I'll leave this looting to Stelle."
It wasn't that Pei Guang avoided touching girls, but randomly looting without raising favorability first would lower their opinion of him.
Not just theirs: even his companions' opinion of him would drop.
And if nothing else, he had to consider March 7th. He couldn't just mess around with a pretty girl.
Of course, if a pretty girl messed around with him, that was different.
Thinking Stelle should handle it, Pei Guang pulled out his phone and contacted her in the group chat.
Pei Guang: "Caught a nice one, come loot the corpse!"
Stelle: "No problem! But wait a bit, I found something interesting here."
Pei Guang: "Fine, I'll go watch a movie in the meantime."
March 7th: "Movie? What movie?"
Pei Guang: "'Mint-Colored Galaxy.' Don't know if it's good, if it is, let's watch it together?"
Stelle: "Sure!"
March 7th: "Sure!"
Pei Guang: "By the way, Seven, what are you up to?"
March: "Obviously shopping~"
At this moment, March 7th was already hopelessly addicted to shopping.
The things sold in the dreamscape were just too pretty: she liked every single one. And thanks to Pei Guang, she didn't need to go through the process of turning dream items real like normal people.
As long as she bought them here and stuffed them into her storage space, they were hers. That meant she could even take home things that normally couldn't leave the dreamscape!
That set off March's shopping frenzy.
She planned to buy everything she liked, take advantage of the difference in value, and bring it all back. After all, they had only been in the dreamscape for what—just a few hours?
For a beautiful girl, spending an entire day shopping was nothing.
But when she thought about that, March 7th suddenly shivered. She felt a bad premonition, though she couldn't place what it was.
It wouldn't be Pei Guang or Stelle, so it had to be her.
Could it be that she was going to spend all her money? Yeah, that was possible.
Besides, they had only split up for a few hours. No way Pei Guang could have already picked up a cute girl in that short time, right?
…Wait. Actually, maybe he could.
March's face froze mid-thought, but she gave up on it immediately. Such things couldn't be stopped. Anyway, with Stelle around, there was no need to worry about Pei Guang being snatched away.
But March forgot one thing: that there was always the possibility Stelle wasn't by Pei Guang's side.
After chatting idly in the group for a while, Pei Guang closed the call.
Firefly: "So… what should we do with her?"
Pei Guang: "Hold her for now. When Stelle's done over there, she'll come here. Then she can do the looting."
Firefly: "Phew, I thought you were going to do something to her."
Pei Guang: "You're clearly overthinking it. Look here: no chest, no butt. As for good skin, the people I know all have it better. Doing anything would only lower the affection of my companions. Not worth it. But before that…"
Though he wouldn't do anything to Sparkle, some safety measures were still needed.
Pei Guang pulled out a trash can, took out an IV bottle, and stuffed the bottle's pacifier directly into Sparkle's mouth.
Sparkle fell asleep inside the trash can, sucking on a pacifier!
Seeing this, Firefly's eyes widened, at a loss for words. All she could do was silently give Pei Guang a thumbs-up.
One thing was certain: after this whole ordeal, Sparkle's favorability toward Pei Guang would definitely be in the negatives.
But then she thought about how practiced Pei Guang was at this, and she couldn't help wondering—just how many people had fallen victim to his hands before…