With the knowledge he needed for the demon-instrument-golem in mind, Inkaro was working on something entirely unrelated to that request, and instead, was putting the finishing touches on the pope's request, which took the form of a spherical curio, covered in runes all across its surface, save for the golden diamond-shaped nodes jutting from it, spaced at around ninty degrees from each other. Anazenpha had recently fallen asleep, feeling that spending a moment in the less physical world would help get her thoughts in order.

  Enetha, having been napping on Lizu's tail but migrated to the other chair next to Inkaro when Lizu went off to procure something the youngest teen of the gang had no interest in bothering to remember, sat presentably in the chair. She was wrapped up rather snuggly in her own cloth-like appendages. The little princess resembled an egg, one whose occupant had recently emerged from its top, or a wrapped-up baby. Either of the two worked for her. Despite being in the current state of her own making and effort, Enetha was bored and so much at that that she couldn't keep herself from sneaking glances at the happenings of the guy beside her, which Inkaro noticed.

  Given the girl's repeated actions of interest, Inkaro presented the device, right in front of Enetha's face, offering it up for her to hold if she wished. Enetha refused on the spot, not out of an attempt to be rude, but from her instincts keeping her from risking the damaging of something that seemed too precious to occur at the wrath of her butterfinger grip.

  "What is it?" Enetha asked as she remained fixated on keeping herself wrapped up. Making her grand but silent return that much grander, Lizu swooped in to answer the question on Inkaro's behalf, knowing a migraine was all that awaited the little princess should Inkaro be the one to answer. Such a fate wasn't ideal for Lizu, since Enetha wouldn't be able to eat if she weren't conscious.

  "Do you really care that much?" Lizu teased quietly, carrying a blueberry slushie that was covered in strawberry slices in each hand. Unfervently so, Enetha shook her head, sporting her usual unexpressiveness, belieing the amount of thought she'd put into her decision with how quickly she answered. "Thought so. Now, Inkaro, might you do me the pleasure of being our judge?"

  Enetha turned slightly red in the cheek, although not displaying any signs or intentions of pouting, after having figured out Lizu had left to procure resources for the duel, which resulted from that embarrassing outburst she'd had the night prior. Squirming a little bit under her cloth-like appendages, Enetha straightened out and fixed any issues with her clothing before slowly unfurrowing that which encased her lithe body. She shuddered, feeling the cool swoosh of air seep in through the growing gaps in her clothy shell that pierced right through the warm atmosphere to strike at her skin. The thought of having to eat a slushy also didn't help with her body tremors.

  Placing one of the slushie cups right in front of the little princess, Lizu curved her tail into the practised shape of a 'C' underneath herself before resting her weight on it so she could sit directly next to Enetha for their impending battle of endurance.

  But before that, Lizu decided that letting Enetha go into the challenge completely blind would be very unsportsmanlike. So, to eliminate any chance of the bout between them being nulled, Lizu willingly divulged some background information on the confection she acquired: "This. Is the Ultra Freezing Delight. Guaranteed to give a brain freeze, or you get a free refill or a refund. I've always wanted to try them, but they change when they sell them every day, so I'm never around to get any."

  "Are you going to praise it endlessly, or are we going to commence with the duel?" Enetha stated bluntly, trying to put on a flair of confidence by crossing her left leg over her right one. Flexing her fingers, the girl braced herself as best she could, whether it be mentally or physically. Not wanting to appear apprehensive about the whole thing all of a sudden, Enetha reached out a hand to pick up the cup. Only to recoil in a timid jolt, as the chilled cup's surface bit at her fingertips and drained the tiniest bit of colour from them. The sensation had her flapping her hand wildly to try to shake the coldness out of it. The little princess faintly and indignantly huffed at seeing that her sensitive hands would do her no good in this endeavour, so she elected to use one of her cloth-looking limbs to lift the slushie container. "Do not think you shall win this so easily on the basis of experience."

  Lizu lightly scoffed as she lightly jostled her slushie from side to side, doing so to wind up Enetha. It worked. Enetha was annoyed. Lizu was pleased with herself.

  Moments later, after one sip from the both of them, Enetha had all of her clothy appendages tightly wrapped around her dome, trying to squeeze the pain out of her brain. While Lizu was face down on the floor, motionless. But different as their reactions might've been, the both of them groaned from the panging brain freezes plaguing their brains. Inkaro declared it a tie, which the two girls didn't dispute, because they were too distracted by their brain freeze to care.

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  "Urrr... I see why only snuhalio with frost resistances... eat this stuff," Lizu muttered with a frosty breath so icy that a trail of frosty mist snaked out of her mouth, while Enetha's mouth was utterly freezing, leaving the little princess unable to move her jaw in the slightest, let alone talk.

  "So this is where you lot have been hiding...." As she marched over to the group, Yuuvia noticed Lizu out of sorts on the floor. The noble girl would've laughed at the state of her archrival, had she not been in a library and knew she'd likely break the world record, should she attempt laughing. So instead of breaking any world records, Yuuvia subtly shuffled her way over to Inkaro, knowing he'd give her an objective answer; that, and he was the only one who could answer her in the moment, and whispered to him. "What happened here?"

  Briefly raising his gaze from the new core for the church's infux mana converter, Inkaro tapped it against his golden agate storage curio, storing the device within. "Brain freeze."

  Hearing something as trivial as a brain freeze had gotten the better of Lizu. Yuuvia sported a cheeky, self-indulgent grin that bordered on the look she got when caring for her pet snakes. She felt her soul was truly vindicated at the thought alone.

  "Hah, with my motaboisim, I've never had to worry about something like that without going out of my way," Yuuvia whispered, bragging about how she could eat five Ultra Freezing Delights before feeling anything, only to stop as she realised bragging about a biological trait about herself wasn't all too glamorous.

  "That is impressive," Inkaro stated with genuine serenity, catching Yuuvia somewhat off-guard. She turned a little red in the cheek. Yuuvia averted her gaze from the guy, deciding that looking at Ana's dumbly cute face as she slept was the better call than letting Inkaro see her blushing. But to make sure the guy couldn't potentially leak her physical disposition to Lizu, Yuuvia repeatedly slapped herself on the cheeks. Although it was clear the slapping was superficial, due to the lack of any sound from all the finger-on-cheek action. However, Yuuvia didn't really care, making it appear her blushing was just the result of very mild bruising for her own comfort, which was more important to her than convincing Inkaro.

  "Silver tongue..." The noble girl's quiet comment went unnoticed by Inkaro, not G.Galore, however, which became all too apparent to the humalian of the glass-textured variety as the sentient grimoire played a soundbite that resembled the volume of a TV being rapidly turned up.

  The snake lover silently gasped, that was more reminiscent of someone's jaw dropping, but only reaching the point it could only be compared to a lower case 'o.' Yuuvia scoffed before scooping up Anazenpha and going slightly red in the face, before she hobbled away using her suddenly shaky legs that could barely carry the extra weight, not that her heart minded the extra work on a double front.

  Watching Yuuvia meander away with Anazenpha in her clutches, Inkaro looked to the time and noticed the break would be over in a couple of minutes. He sighed, not out of disappointment, but... indifference. Indifference was the best word to describe it; after all, the rest of his classes were practical combat lessons, meaning no room for theory or experimentation.

  It was truly vexing in its own tedious way. Practical classes were the only time he could see other people's magic in action, but it only ever amounted to roughly at most fourty-five percent of the current capabilities. If he had it his way, Inkaro would gladly act as a target to get a better opportunity to examine the magic of his peers. But no matter how much he wanted to go with that idea, it wasn't like he didn't understand that safety came first. However, he was sure Alureino had a few curios that could block usually lethal damage if the worst were to happen. He continued to mull over all the more sensible options, lightly swaying his foot back and forth as he considered something, until unintentionally tapping his foot against Lizu's butt, causing the girl to faceplant on the floor. It jolted the dragolyte back to her senses, lightly giggling as she hopped to her feet. "Sooo... who won?"

  "It's a draw."

  Lizu widened her eyes, followed by slumping her tail against the floor weakly. Looking upon the hands that brought the slushies to the library, she clenched her fists tightly, unable to believe such an outcome had occurred. It was the worst one because it was tantamount to her plans for getting Enetha out of her shell being needlessly extended. So she just had to know Inkaro's reason for being an unintentional pain in the butt for her right now.

  "Wha? But why?

  "Because I'm the appointed judge, and first to get up from a double K.O. is only for professional matches in my books. So, it's a draw," Inkaro explained, leaving Lizu with a smug grin on her face as she side-eyed the guy, knowing it was just the guy being lazy. Lizu could respect that, even if it went against her interests. She found it a little amusing that he had the nerve to be the only one not taking this very serious duel between her and Enetha seriously.

  "Always a stickler for the rules, ey?" Lizu teased defeatedly.