Takeda Himeko was rather satisfied with the way her life had turned out, working at a tender balance between her secretary work and visiting her family with decent frequency. 

Family came first, which was exactly why Himeko put her surname first. No one else in the highly Americanized family did, but Himeko was quite the oddball in her family in many ways.

However, she had been called into the boss's office today. The man was a mystery, for an understandable reason: No one ever seemed to see his face after the interview. He conducted each one personally, but after that he demanded to be left entirely to himself at all times. Himeko handled everything via text and email, with occasional Skype conversations for the more important things.

Being called into the man's office was unheard of.

This could not be good.

---------

Within moments, Himeko had straightened her skirt and stood in the doorway. She had certainly misremembered the man: gone was the well-groomed professional. 

Christopher Knoll was dressed in a fairly typical suit, rather poorly maintained. He was also reading "The Nine Romances of Lumine", and Himeko had a sinking feeling it wasn't the censored version. 

It was quite the interesting book, actually- exactly eighty-one chapters, nine upon each other deity in the pantheon. Despite its concept, which sounded like the plot to a bad porno (notably, that Magia, King of the Gods, makes a bet with Lumine that she cannot sexually satisfy every deity in the heavens within a month), the novel was extremely well-written, considering the twist that Lumine explicitly romance all of the other members of the pantheon rather than simply using her great strength to achieve her goal. 

Himeko had not actually read the uncensored version since she was a horny teenager, but remembered it catering to every major fetish under the sun at the point in time it was written. It was interesting as, despite being an ancient book from a culture that vanished extremely quickly, it had been translated into every major language the world over. Good pornography was universal, she supposed. 

"Ah, Ms. Takeda," Mr. Knoll said quietly, not looking up from his book, "a lover of books?"

"It stems from a love of knowledge, sir," Himeko nodded.

"Well, then it seems I chose the right person for this assignment," Mr. Knoll said. "We have . . . issues with the Research and Development rooms being responsible for massive leak into several of the office suites. I need you to determine how much I am to be sued for, inevitably."

Takeda Himeko found the offer interesting, and pressed further. "What, exactly, would I be doing?"

"Asset management," Mr. Knoll replied, his voice dull. "Our . . . Unbound assets. Just saying that word disgusts me."

Himeko knew when she took on a career here that Knoll had no sympathy for the Unbound, and clung to outdated belief that they were monsters. In fact, his bigotry spread so far as to repeatedly propose that Unbound be stripped of human rights. But referring to them as assets . . .

"You can't exactly call them 'assets' unless we own them, Mr. Knoll," Himeko said cautiously. 

Mr. Knoll smiled darkly. "But I do own the assets," he replied.