Mo Wang watched her with a fond, knowing smile.
He'd figured out about an hour ago that the girl sitting across from him wasn't his Kiana.
The difference was small, but once you noticed it, it was impossible to miss. They had completely different flavors of dumbass energy.
Kiana was "Idiot then Proud." She'd do something incredibly dumb, like trying to cook a steak with a hair dryer, and then proudly declare it a revolutionary culinary technique when it inevitably caught fire. She was a paramecium, pure and simple, running on one-and-a-half brain cells.
This girl, however, was "Proud then Idiot." She carried herself with the arrogance of a world-conquering monarch, puffing out her chest and looking down on everyone... right up until the moment she tripped over her own feet or got flustered by a simple compliment, at which point she'd devolve into a stammering, blushing mess. She was a pufferfish—all puffed up with a bloated ego until someone gently poked her, causing her to deflate completely.
It was Sirin. It had to be.
And honestly? Mo Wang was having the time of his life.
He'd been a fan of the Queen long before he'd ever met Kiana. He still remembered the day he first saw that animated short, "Queen's Descent." (Will of the Herrscher) The sheer, unrestrained power, the elegant destruction, the way she single-handedly dismantled 70% of Anti-Entropy's mecha forces... He was pretty sure that one animation was responsible for Anti-Entropy's bankruptcy for the next decade.
That was the character that made him install the game. In a way, he'd been the Queen's knight long before he became Kiana's boyfriend.
So seeing that same terrifyingly powerful & Proud-full Herrscher trying her absolute hardest to play the role of "normal girl on a date"? Watching her get flustered over the smallest things?
It was the cutest damn thing he'd ever witnessed, and he was going to enjoy every second of it.
---||---
"Hmph. This body requires fuel," Sirin declared, her stomach letting out a very un-queenly growl. "My... escort will now provide me with a meal."
That idiot Kiana's memories indicate that this is a primary function of a 'date', she thought, trying to follow the script. A proper ruler must maintain their vessel's energy levels.
"Right away," Mo Wang said with a mock bow that earned him a glare.
At the food court, Sirin put on a masterful performance of being Kiana. She ordered with wild abandon: a giant pizza, a bucket of fried chicken, three hot dogs, and a large soda. It was a feast fit for, well, Kiana.
They found a table, and Mo Wang watched in amusement as she began to eat. Unlike Kiana, who would have inhaled the food like a human vacuum cleaner, Sirin stared at the greasy slice of pepperoni pizza with a look of disdain. Then, with the dignity of a surgeon about to perform a critical operation, she picked up a knife and fork and began carefully sawing off a perfect little square.
"You know, you're going to get weird looks eating pizza like that," he commented, taking a massive, satisfying bite out of his own slice.
"Commoners lack refinement. This is the proper way," she said haughtily, though her eyes kept darting towards the mountain of fried chicken. A few minutes later, her earlier refinement was completely forgotten as she gnawed on a chicken leg.
"Hey," Mo Wang said, trying to suppress a laugh. "Hold still."
"What is it now, human?" she asked, mid-chew.
"You've got a little something... right there." He pointed to the corner of her mouth. A small smear of barbecue sauce marred her otherwise perfect porcelain skin.
Sirin's eyes widened in horror. She frantically grabbed a napkin and started wiping at her face. "Where? Is it gone? Did I get it?"
"Nope. A little to the left. No, your other left. You're just making it worse."
With a frustrated sigh, she threw the napkin down. "Then you get it!"
"My pleasure."
Mo Wang leaned across the table. Sirin instinctively tensed up, her mind going blank. He was so close. She could see the flecks of gold in his dark eyes, feel the warmth radiating from him. Before she could process it, he gently cupped her chin with one hand and used the thumb of his other to wipe the sauce away. His touch was surprisingly soft.
"There," he said, his voice a low murmur. "All clean."
He pulled back, leaving Sirin completely frozen, her face burning.
Stupid heart! Why is it pounding like this? she screamed internally. This body is so weak and easily influenced! Stop it!
She quickly turned her head away, taking another angry, flusttered bite of her chicken to hide her expression.
---||---
After her 'dignified' meal, Sirin, feeling the need to reassert her dominance, pointed a dramatic finger towards a grim-looking, skull-faced building.
"I will conquer that fortress of horrors!" she declared. "Its pathetic attempts at fear will surely be amusing."
Mo Wang's grin widened. "As you command, Empress."
Inside the dark, musty queue, her bravado was in full force.
"Mere human tricks and cheap plastic skeletons will not frighten one such as I," she announced to no one in particular. "This will be laughably easy."
"Of course," Mo Wang said, his voice laced with amusement. "I'm sure the fake cobwebs are trembling in fear of your presence."
The moment they stepped through the creaking doors into the pitch-black corridor, her confidence began to evaporate.
A sudden, loud BANG from a hidden speaker made her jump a foot in the air, letting out a small, undignified squeak.
"It's just an air cannon," Mo Wang said calmly from beside her.
They walked a few feet further. A ghoulish figure with glowing red eyes dropped from the ceiling on a string, right in front of her face.
"Eeep!" She stumbled back, bumping right into Mo Wang's chest.
"Just a mannequin on a rope," he chuckled, placing a steadying hand on her shoulder. "Don't worry, I'll protect you from the scary dolls."
"Hmph! As if that would scare me!" she hissed, her voice trembling slightly. "I was... making sure you were paying attention! A knight must always be vigilant!"
"Naturally," he said, not even trying to hide his laughter.
The rest of the haunted house was a complete rout of Sirin's royal dignity. She yelped at holographic ghosts, shrieked when a staff member in a zombie costume grabbed her ankle, and nearly blasted a hole in the wall with her Subspace Lance when a fake spider dropped onto her head.
The grand finale was a dark, open room where a chainsaw-wielding maniac (a very committed part-timer, probably) burst out from behind a curtain, roaring and waving the (thankfully chain-less) chainsaw around.
That was the final straw.
Sirin let out a full-blown shriek and, without a single thought, spun around and buried her face in Mo Wang's chest, her hands clutching the front of his shirt in a death grip. She was trembling like a hamsters crying meme.
Mo Wang froze for a second, surprised by the sudden, desperate contact, before wrapping his arms around her protectively. He could feel her heart hammering against his ribs.
"It's okay," he murmured into her hair, stroking her back gently. "He's gone now. See? The scary man is gone." also why you even scared with this thing?
She stayed like that for a solid ten seconds before she seemed to realize what she was doing. She pushed away from him abruptly, her face the color of a ripe tomato.
---||---
They spent the next few hours in a whirlwind of rides and games.
Sirin, desperate to reclaim her lost dignity, challenged him to the bumper cars, declaring that she would crush him utterly and grind his vehicle into dust.
She slammed the pedal down and drove like a maniac, her eyes blazing with competitive fire, aiming for him with the fury of a true(fraud) Queen. The only problem was, Mo Wang was a ridiculously skilled driver (D MAN!), even in a clunky, slow-moving bumper car.
He weaved and dodged her every attack with infuriating ease, occasionally giving her car a gentle, playful tap on the bumper before zipping away again with a little wave.
Her royal conquest ended with her spinning in circles in a corner after a particularly well-timed bump, while Mo Wang did victory laps around her, laughing.
By the time the sun began to set, casting long shadows across the park and painting the sky in shades of orange and purple, they were both loaded down with prizes. Sirin was still clutching the giant King Homu plushie, which she now seemed to have accepted as her royal scepter. Her earlier arrogance had been replaced by a quiet, flustered pout that Mo Wang found infinitely more endearing.
They walked in comfortable silence for a while, the cheerful music of the park washing over them. The neon lights of the rides began to flicker on, turning Homu Land into a magical, twinkling wonderland.
Mo Wang stopped, and Sirin followed his gaze upwards.
Looming over the park was the Ferris wheel, its massive frame outlined against the twilight sky. Each cabin was lit from within, looking like a tiny, floating lantern ascending into the heavens.
He turned to her, his face unusually serious, his eyes catching the mix of colorful lights around them.
"The day's almost over," he said, his voice a little softer than before. "We've conquered nearly every corner of this kingdom."
He gestured with his head towards the slowly turning wheel.
"So..." he asked, his lips curving into a gentle smile that made her breath catch in her throat. "Care for one last ride?"