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If there’s one thing Adler liked more than driving Ulrich mad, it was driving him mad by making fun of his height.
Generally speaking, Ulrich is not short— he’s roughly around 1.68 ‘average’ one might say. But compared to most of his coworkers, who are usually more than 1.70, he doesn’t quite stand out. Especially when next to Adler, who is 1.92, the second tallest after Lucy.
It seemed as if being one of the shortest people on his work circle turned into an insecurity of his, one that was rather silly, because no one cared that much besides him. Slightly mentioning anything related to his height would turn the ferrofluid into an irrationally angry, overly defensive machine due to his need to defend how he was, in fact, not short at all. And Adler really liked to tease him about it.
That was, until one day Ulrich came into his office looking almost completely different.
“Good morning, substitute director.” The awakened said casually, as if his entire attire and body weren’t redesigned from one night to another.”I wanted to continue my proposition from yesterday, about the budget request…”
But Adler was not listening— He was too shocked by the sudden change, looking at him from head to toe. His clothing was of the same fabric, but a part of his robotic chest and hips were showing, leaving the ferrofluid in his body exposed. The gloves and boots looked more detailed upon a closer inspection, the only thing that remained the same was the glass tank for a head.…are those shorts? What is he even wearing?? the human murmured to himself. Thankfully, the awakened was too focused on his own project to notice his rambling.
And last but not least, Ulrich looked taller, more than the man next to him, he was almost 2 meters tall now. Did he really decide to change his body out of nowhere because of his height?
“Adler. You’re not listening.” The awakened’s voice got Adler out of his thoughts, he sounded irritated already, the ferrofluid shifting around angrily. “This is an important matter you’re not paying attention to.”
“…Why do you look like that?” was the only thing he could come up with.
“hmm? Like what?” Ulrich was playing dumb, pretending not to know what the human was talking about, his new ‘make over’, to put it in a way, was kind of obvious.
“Do not act obtuse now! Where did this new body come from? And that weird new outfit you’re wearing.” Aside from Ulrich looking huge now, his appearance still makes Adler confused, and fairly nervous. He even got what seems like a tail for a charger.
“I don’t see anything wrong with my uniform, and my body was just upgraded with my personal desires in mind.” That was the closest the awakened could ever be to acknowledging the new added centimeters to his height by his own will. He wanted the other man to mention it first, as if it wasn’t so scandalous everyone could notice.
“Well I don't know how you don’t see it. Aren’t you supposed to be an intelligent being? It feels…innapropiate.” whether it really is inappropriate or not, what Adler said was incredibly biased. The more he saw Ulrich’s outfit, the more flustered he got. At least he did look quite good.
“From the way here, not a single laplace worker thought of that considering the lack of criticism or judgement I got.” In all honesty, the ferrofluid was not expecting so much focus on his clothes; at least it was not the intended idea. Maybe he underestimated how revealing it might look. “You are looking at it from the perspective of a boyfriend, of which I am flattered, but it is not professional at all. Don’t include our personal life during work hours so we can go back to discussing my request..“
“..Your request is bullshit, I already told you that yesterday.…” Adler was ignoring what Ulrich just said— Even if they were a couple, almost nothing between them had changed; maybe because it was really recent and they weren’t exactly open about it, so the label always felt out of place when said out loud, at least for the human. Not knowing how to respond to it, he slightly changed the topic.
“And about that update-“ his commentary on the awakened’s appearance seemed to be never ending. Although the original intention was for the new height to be noticeable, so it looks like it’s working for Ulrich. “-is it even one if you only stopped being short? You can just do that?”
“I was NOT short! I was average, above average in some parts of the world, even.” There he goes, again, getting overly defensive. “And yes, if I get an upgrade; which I must clarify was not for my height, I can request a change without the need of approval. In fact; the last time I did that was when I had my first body, because it was closer to a female’s.”
“I was… Not aware of that.” Not a crazy thought, considering Ulrich never changed his body at the time they’ve been knowing each other, neither mentioned his original body until now. “I still think this is unnecessary, you’re almost two meters tall! It looks ridiculous.”
“Well, what I personally consider ridiculous is calling being 1.68 short. And it’s just 30 centimeters more, not as much as you’re making it out to be. You were the only one who noticed or cared at all, like I said before.”
“I don’t care. It is an exaggeration, one cannot grow this much in one day.”
this whole conversation, Adler’s eyes were glued to the awakened’s body; clearly fixated on more than just his new gigantism, but neither of the two bothered to mention it, like it was a normal thing for them.
“Is that a challenge? What if, to prove you wrong, we hold an experiment to see how much the average arcanist can grow in a day? You might be talking from a humanocentric perspective, substitute director.” There was a peak of interest in Ulrich’s tone, as if the idea he suddenly thought of captivated him.
Adler, on the contrary, had the same confusion as when he first saw Ulrich. “I am not doing that and neither are you.”
They did end up doing the experiment, some incantations and a poll just to make sure.
That day, it was discovered that 1. Ulrich and Adler are a couple, 2. They are insufferable together no matter their relationship status and 3. Arcanists do grow at a faster rate than most humans, but the most they can grow does not reach 30 centimeters in a day. So now, at least Adler has a new thing to drive Ulrich mad about.