Modern Monster

Happy birthday to me in 10 years

It didn't take long before his house was in sight. Thankfully, this time, there wasn't a monster attack on his way home. Speaking of that, I need to talk to Kaiyo about what happened on her way here. He was still worried about her safety.

Going through the gate of his house, he realized that the lights weren't turned on. That was strange, to say the least. It was only a quarter to six. Did they decide not to celebrate my birthday after all? That would be a big relief on his part. He was almost hoping that was the case. Maybe they decided to go out for dinner or something. Whatever the case was, he was looking forward to relaxing for a bit and solidifying a plan.

He faced the door and triggered it to open by voicing a command.

"Sen Ano, unlock the door."

"Command successful, greetings Sen, unlocking..."

The AI built into the door recognized his voice and soon unlocked it without delay. Technology sure was helpful. No one could pick the lock of the door because, well, there was no keyhole to begin with. If a robber truly were desperate, however, they would most likely just smash the window to go in. But that wasn't the best course of action, considering if that did happen, it would trigger an alarm system that was built into the house.

That reminds me. If he recalled correctly, his house was broken into shortly after his father's "death." He didn't remember that day much. Everything was just a blur. Which was strange, considering he remembered quite a lot from his childhood. But from what his mother told him, a robber broke into the right side of their window, smashing it and sneaking in without much stealth.

It still bugged him that he couldn't remember that day at all, but he couldn't really change that. Break-ins were rare, but nothing too surprising given how densely packed the cities were. Not to mention the increase in homelessness and debt.

Turning the doorknob into his house, he entered. Right when he did, something felt off. The entrance was almost pitch black. No one had turned on the lights. He could at least see a few feet in front of him from the natural light that was coming from the windows, but at this time, his servant would have turned them on.

Weird. Deciding to ignore that, he slipped his shoes off and placed them neatly by all the others. While doing this, Sen noticed something. Another pair of shoes? he realized. From the looks of it, the shoes were quite large in comparison to the others. He also noticed that there was another slim and small shoe in the mix. Possibly Kaiyo's, he guessed. Sen wasn't so sure who the other one belonged to, but he would soon find out.

Turning on the lights in the corridor himself, he went into the kitchen. Surprisingly, no one was there to greet him. And yet again, none of the kitchen lights were turned on either.

"Does no one know how to turn these on or?" he murmured to himself with a sigh. Doing it himself, he realized that the table was set with all his favorite foods, including breaded chicken, curry, rice, miso soup, fish, vegetables, and much more. It was a pleasant surprise, and by the looks of it, the food looked relatively hot, telling him it wasn't made too long ago. Then where is everyone? They obviously didn't go anywhere since I saw their shoes in the corridor.

It didn't take long before Sen figured it out. Ah, I see what's going on.

The fact that none of the lights were turned on, and their shoes were still present, mixed with the food still being hot, made Sen realize what was truly going on. They're probably in the other living room, waiting for me to walk in so they can throw a surprise party, aren't they? Unfortunately for them, he had walked into the kitchen first. He couldn’t help but sigh. I don't want to do this, man.

Sen didn't want to celebrate his birthday, let alone have all of them come out of the shadows and surprise him with a barrage of party balloons and confetti. But then again, he knew they would be disappointed that all their hard work and planning were going to waste, so he at least needed to act surprised. Sen hated being the center of attention. He liked being in the background, observing others, not vice versa. Let's get this over with.

Sen reluctantly started to head into the other living room and acted like he was searching for his family. He just needed to act oblivious to what they were planning.

"Hello!? Hana, Mom? Where are you guys?" he shouted in the dark living room. Why am I even doing this? "Ah, looks like they might have left somewhere." Birthdays are such a nuisance.

...

"SURPRISE!!!!" a unified sound of everyone in the room suddenly exclaimed at the top of their lungs. At the same time, someone flicked on the light, making the room visible with all its extravagant decorations.

Gold and white balloons were all over the room, including cardboard letters saying Happy Birthday hung from the ceiling. No matter where he looked in the room, it seemed somewhere there were decorations hidden. Although he wasn't the type to like all of this, he could at least appreciate all the time they spent doing this for him.

"Happy birthday, Sen! WOOOHOO!" his sister promptly congratulated. By her side were his mother, Kaiyo, and a familiar stocky, broad, tall individual. Hyo. Sen was surprised he even came to his birthday. Hyo was Hana's good friend, with whom Sen was forcefully acquainted. He had simple buzz-cut brown hair with squared glasses, and his Super Sense was Sight.

When Sen thought of trying to convince his acquaintances who were also joining the Knight exams, Hyo was one of the people he was referring to. Mainly because he was joining Kaiyo and his sister. Sen wasn't as acquainted with him as Hana was, but he would call him close enough to be invited to his birthday. From what Sen has seen, Hyo was quite smart and very talented at his Sense as well. He was collected and mature for being just eighteen years old. Sen and Hyo had quite a lot of similar characteristics.

"Happy birthday, bro," Hyo gave a smile to him.

"Happy birthday Senju dear," his mother joined in.

Lastly, Kaiyo shyly looked up at him, her cheeks turning slightly red.

"Happy birthday, Sen," her soft voice said. Sen wasn't delusional; he knew Kaiyo viewed him as more than a friend. Sadly, a relationship was far out of his expertise. He wished he could read a book about it, but it wasn't that simple from what he was told. Kaiyo's interest in him made her more beneficial, so he didn't complain.

"Happy birthday, Sen," an old croaky voice added. He realized Mrs. Mika was also present too.

"Oh man," Sen acted shocked. "Wow, you guys outdid yourselves; you truly didn't have to."

"Come on, it's your birthday! This is the least we could do!" her sister embraced him.

"Yeah, man, you rarely ask for anything, so this really wasn't a lot," Hyo agreed.

"Thank you so much, everyone. This truly is amazing. I appreciate all the hard work you guys put in," Sen gave a thankful, forced smile. He truly was thankful, but again, he wasn't too happy about doing this.

"Ah shucks, well, you could say we did do a good job decorating everything," Hana bragged. "Only took a few hours, but it came out goo-"

"HANA! Stop bragging. That's not very nice!" Mrs. Mika scolded Hana.

"Uhh, I mean, it doesn't matter how long it took, HAHAHA!"

"That's more like it, dear," Jen let out a chuckle.

Sen let out an amused murmur. Well, that's alright. At least they feel proud of themselves.

He wasn't familiar with why people did good for others and felt proud of themselves. It wasn't wrong or anything, but if it didn't benefit Sen, he usually didn't do it. He had never done anything like that before. He guessed stopping a woman from committing suicide was close enough, but that was more because he didn't want to feel guilty about it afterward. It was a forced good deed.

But in the end, the philosophy of doing something good conflicted him. One might say that people do good for others just from the kindness of their hearts, but Sen wasn’t too sure if that was the case.

People only do something nice to feel good about themselves. Without the reward of a dopamine hit and a barrage of compliments, nobody would do good deeds. In the end, kindness was just another form of greed and self-regard. It almost felt like people were hiding their true motive behind a mask of selflessness. Or perhaps that was a negative way of looking at things. When Sen would help his mother when she was sick, he wasn’t seeking any validation or compliments; he was simply doing it because it was his responsibility and because they were his family. So even at this moment, Sen couldn’t help but ask himself their true reason for doing such a thing. Are you doing it out of love for me or greed?

"PUT ON THE MUSIC!" Hana ordered excitedly. The next moment, the room erupted with soft 1950s jazz music, which he had to admit he didn't dislike. The music would at least help with the awkward silence. Hearing the smooth jazz's static was reassuring to him. Maybe this wasn't so bad after all. It seemed like most of them were happy.

"Let's save the celebration for later, kids. I don't want the food to get cold now," Mika said.

"I'M STARVING!!!!" Hana's mouth drooled.

"Don't eat everything on me, Hana," Hyo joked.

"WAS THAT AN INSULT? YOU THINK I'M FAT??"

"Erm, no, of course not…" Hyo nervously coughed, adjusting his square glasses. Kaiyo softly let out a laugh beside him. But behind her laughter, he noticed a worried and solemn expression fall on her face. He guessed Kaiyo was still shaken up from the monster attack, but if she didn't want to talk to him about it, Sen didn't want to force it out of her.

He was still curious about this child she saved while the attack was transpiring, but from the look on her face, it appeared she didn't want to disturb his special day with sour news.

Can't be helped. She'll open up when she wants to. If that ever happened. If it didn't, he could always ask Brittney to hack into the security cameras for him.

"Alright, kids!" Mika smiled brightly, presenting the abundance of food on the table. "DIG IN!"

As everyone started to eat until their hearts were content, Sen contemplated his plan in the meantime. But it was a little hard to concentrate while everyone was laughing, not to mention the slow and static jazz music playing in the background. Well, I'll take a break from strategizing my next move for now. A good rest will make me sharper, I guess.

And so, Sen was forced into actually enjoying himself for the day… truly tragic.