Dawn has come on the eastern horizon when Rio wakes up feeling tired all over his body. Of course, He was still sleepy, but he quickly got up and got ready for work.

“Haah,” he grunts as he reaches his desk at the office. The sun is long appeared to give its warmth to the city, yet his eyes are still heavy, his body is quite hot, and overall, Rio feels like a dead fish. This morning is definitely not his day as he still struggles to turn on the computer.

“So what did you do last night so you almost comparable with a sloth? Are you not sleeping at all?” Valerie teased by gently patting Rio’s shoulder.

“No. A lot is going on at home, one of which—”

“Whatever, just make sure you’ll be okay this whole day. After this, we have to make a visit to the forestry division,” Valerie concludes while walking back to her desk and tidying things up.

But I’m not done talking yet, said Rio with annoyance. He also doesn’t understand why they suddenly have to make a visit.

“I can guess your thoughts. Why do we have to visit today of all days?! Do not worry. I, Valerie, are indeed quite sensitive to my surroundings,” he commented out of nowhere while clearing his desk, “my suggestion to visit was approved by my superiors effective by today. Hence, we have a full day to be there.”

“Wow, so that’s the case. Is this one of your steps to undertake a collaborative project with the forestry division? Considering they are a division formed due to the influence of the scientists’ records of the past that shouldn’t exist in this timeline originally.”

Valerie smiled stiffly and looked away.

“No, I’m just looking for an excuse to keep us from working here. I need some moment to breathe, you know.”

“Wha–I feel betrayed.”

“There’s no need to think about unnecessary details. C’mon, let’s go!”

“You two, are you ready?” Mr. Rudi, the superior of Rio and Valerie in the division, comes out from his room and greets the two, followed by several other division members behind him.

In short, Valerie and Rio were in a specially created chamber for the forestry division. Instead of being called a chamber, this place is more appropriate to be called a greenhouse because it more or less consists of fertile soils for planting research. Roughly around 20% of this place is used for an office and other administrative things. This place is definitely the only one that is different from other divisions’ workplaces.

“By the way, this is the first time we see a room for the forestry division,” said Rio.

“Well yeah. We barely got any time to check out other places here.” Valerie looked excited.

“Welcome, city planning Division. Have you been well, Mr. Rudi? Fine?”

“Mr. Rubert! It’s been a while. Of course, I’m usually alright. Just usual stuff, you know.”

A middle-aged man greets Mr. Rudi and the division members at the entrance of the greenhouse. Behind that man, all the other division members follow to exchange greetings, including Rita. Roughly counting, it’s about ten people there. Mr. Rudi and Mr. Rubert shake hands before going for the day’s main activity.

“We, the forestry Division, welcome you. I think the group would be better divided into several groups to be more efficient and not idle around for too long. Each group will be guided by the person in charge,” he explained kindly. Before long, they split into separate groups and began to disperse.

A girl with her usual short dark hair smiles and pulls the uniform on Rio’s arm. When he turns around, a sweet smile greets him like a transparent river that quenches thirst in a prolonged drought. There was a quiet and calm feeling coming from her for some reason. Perhaps, because there’s a lot of green vegetation that could be seen directly behind the smiling girl’s figure.

“Want me to guide you, just the two of us?” Rita offered.

Rio, who saw no reason to be always in the group, nods. “Certainly. I don’t think I can look around at my pace and gather the information if I have to always follow the group. Being around them, especially my division’s head can be unnerving.”

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“Haha, alright then. Follow me.”

The two of them slip from the group when the others focus on explaining a particular plant from the other. Rio thought that Valerie might want to come with them. However, since he was in another group and had already walked quite a distance, Rio felt there was no need to call him to join. In that case, it’s fine if it’s just Rio and Rita this time.

As the girl steps forward to guide, the boy follows her behind. Rio doesn’t take long to find various objects in this greenhouse which makes him interested in knowing more. Vertically positioned tubes lined up at a calculated distance, and several shelves filled with greenery could be seen as Rio strolls around.

Several soils are still empty, and some have been planted. A few people check the plants by taking notes on the wooden pads there waves a warm gesture to Rita. The girl smiled and waved back in response.

For some reason, Rio no longer feels tired and is replaced by a sense of awe seeing all of this. The green objects around him that are being nurtured using various media are pretty eye-catching to look at.

“Is it really okay to let the people from the City Layout Division tour here? This Forestry Division shouldn’t have existed in the past, right?” Rio asked, which was responded to by Rita’s nod.

“It’s okay. Actually, none of the agricultural technology we currently use here uses technology from the future. We only use agricultural technology already implemented today and improve it to be more efficient to achieve our current goal. Suppose we happen to use the technology from our era, we keep it hidden in the laboratory,” Rita explains while pointing to one corner of the place covered by a green wall.

“Is that where the laboratory is located?”

“Yup.”

“That’s great to know. But sometimes, I wonder, what are you actually doing here to contribute to the mission?”

“Our activity here is officially to support your division related to layout planning for the greenery and water infiltration. Meanwhile, our agenda as a volunteer from the future is to do genetic engineering on the plants in this city so that they will become vegetations that are quite helpful in the earth’s ecosystem in the long term,” Rita explains in a lower tone.

“Interesting. Basically, collaborating with this division can significantly achieve what we have to do. Can you tell me more about that?”

“No problem. So, specifically—”

His attention is solely attached to the girl in front of him, who explains various things related to plants and future technology and how they can be implemented for the mission. The greenery behind him carries the atmosphere as if they were walking in a beautiful valley, somewhere out there. Plus, it’s interesting for Rio to see how Rita is immersed in her specialty while carefully explaining it to him.

Rita also showed some of the products she had manipulated. To be honest, Rio didn’t understand the difference between the said plants compared to the non-manipulated ones. Because of that, he kept quiet and listened to every detail of Rita’s explanation with pleasure.

Talking with Rita about plants can indeed take days, isn’t it? Rio laughed inside.

“Ah,” the dark-haired girl covered her mouth reflexively, “I… talk too much, didn’t I?”

Rio giggles. “No big deal. It’s just the usual you. I still remember that when we have a discussion in the school library, it will be night in no time.”

The girl’s memory brings her back to when the two of them spent together in a room full of information for students stored in a few big servers. They always meet there because Rio is often there to study architecture and city planning independently. Meanwhile, Rita was looking for references related to botany and often drowned in the data without caring about the world.

It didn’t take long for them to notice each other’s presence. So, Rio invited Rita when he needed some opinions from other people. Since then, Rio will ask her to discuss something related to Rita’s science field whenever they meet in the library.

Her face turns red. She turns away as Rio is busy taking a closer look at every plant he comes across with his fingers without really noticing that he got a little bit close to her. Rita doesn’t want Rio to see her, even just a glance.

Taking almost more than half a day, today’s tour ended simultaneously with office hours. So all the City Layout Division members give their regards to the Forestry Division and leave one by one. Except for Rio, Valerie, and Rita.

“I’m still glad that my proposal got accepted. Doing things outside of routine is quite fun too. What do you say about it, Rio? I did a good job, didn’t I?” said Valerie with his usual smirk as he relaxed his shoulders.

Rio laughed sneeringly, “I think it will be quickly discovered if you do it too often.”

“Hahaha…” Rita chose not to speak her mind.

“Time to go home, guys. You two aren’t going to hurry up right away?” asked Valerie, who was going to get ready.

The girl suddenly remembered something. “Any of you will be going to be busy this evening? I need someone for company.”

“Sadly, I already got a schedule coming up. Yes, you guessed it right. I have a date,” Valerie refused, “how about you, Rio?”

“There isn’t any. I can go straight home if there’s nothing else to take care of.”

“There you have it, Rita. You got Rio there,” Valerie suggested.

Rio and Rita look at each other for a moment.

“Alright, sure,” replied Rio.

“Okay! I’ll go first. Have fun, you two. See you!”

Seeing Valerie, who had disappeared, Rio tidied up his stuff and stood up. “Come on, Rita.”

“O-Okay,” the girl replied with a slight blush.

Deep inside, Rita bounces joyfully to have this moment with Rio.