When Atem decides that understanding life means more than growing plants, he arrives at a new conclusion:
He wants a cat.
Kaiba Seto immediately recognizes this as a potential disaster.
What begins as a simple request turns into sheep encounters, AI-monitored cat cafés, behavioral analysis reports, philosophical debates about feline free will, and a growing realization that cats prefer calm logic to overwhelming affection.
As Atem searches for a way to connect with animals, Kaiba quietly builds entire systems to support him—from experimental cat spaces to data-driven companionship programs.
Unfortunately for everyone involved, the public discovers the story.
Soon there are photographs, publishing offers, celebrity cats, and a bestselling book that somehow becomes known as Quantum Marriage and Cats.
A tale of love, logic, animal psychology, and one king slowly learning that sometimes the best way to love a cat is to leave it alone.
This is a translation of an original work on Pixiv.
Original Title: 愛と理論 16 王、動物と触れ合う
Original Author: 葉人(@Hathor₋yuki)
Personal site: https://prideshipping.sakura.ne.jp
Life — not something you understand through theory, but something you feel only by touching it.
That was the conclusion he'd arrived at when, one morning, he spoke up without warning.
"Seto, I want to keep a cat."
Seto had seen it coming, and yet he closed his eyes and exhaled slowly.
Atem's moments of inspiration always set either natural law or world affairs in motion. He could only hope this one would stop at the former.
"…Nothing about that sentence gives me a good feeling."
Atem smiled.
"In ancient times, cats lived in temples as well. That graceful form, that free spirit — a truly sacred presence."
"By that logic, you yourself qualify as sacred. Don't add more sacred things to the house."
"But wouldn't it comfort the heart? Simply having a small life nearby."
Seto pressed a hand to his forehead. The word "comfort," coming from Atem's mouth, never boded well.
"Wouldn't the cat be the one who needs comforting? Knowing you, you'd start an observation notebook declaring that its sleeping posture embodies the golden ratio."
Atem's eyes lit up, just slightly.
"…You know me well."
"That's not a compliment."
Seto sank into the sofa with the air of someone half resigned.
If Atem set his mind to it, any living creature would be theorized. The plants had already proven that.
"In that case, Seto — you could just be the one to look after it."
"Why would that follow."
"I observe, you manage. That's the collaborative work of love and theory."
"Love and theory is not something you test this way."
Atem laughed — just slightly, like a child.
"And yet, you're already searching for how to keep one, aren't you?"
"…Quiet. It's the AI's fault."
"Ha. I'm watching, you know."
His voice carried more warmth than mischief.
Seto stood, resigned, and closed the tablet screen.
"…The cat tower blueprints first, then."
In the end, the King's wishes were always granted.
But their realization was always built on Seto's theory.
And so the preparations for a golden-ratio-designed cat space quietly took shape in the Kaiba mansion.
As he readied the space for the small, unseen life to come, Seto thought:
In this house, the creature hardest to manage was still, undeniably, Atem himself.
A few days after Atem's declaration that he wanted to live alongside animals.
Seto decided to show him the real thing first.
Experience over words. The actual scene over theory.
That way, Atem's drive to act could be steered in a safer direction. At least in principle.
"Here."
A green hill spreading across the top of a mountain.
Wind moving through, and the sound of sheep calling like bells.
A certain farm. For a king and a company president to visit, it was an almost comically peaceful place.
Atem blinked at the sheep lined up in their fluffy rows beyond the fence.
"Seto… I never saw anything on this scale in the royal palace. The wool… it's moving."
"They're animals. Moving is to be expected."
"But these — they're not pets, are they?"
"In the modern era they're called livestock. Primarily raised for wool and milk—"
"So humans depend on the gifts they give."
Atem's voice had started slipping into his philosophical contemplation mode.
Seto sounded an internal alarm. If he launched into a treatise on life and civilization here, the entire day would be gone.
"Think later. Touch them first. Theory can wait."
At Seto's prompting, a farm attendant came over with a smile, bringing a small group of sheep.
A white, fluffy wave pressing in from all sides.
Atem took one step back — and the next instant, was completely surrounded.
"…Seto, they've got me encircled."
"They like you. Whether it's the King's authority or the smell of hay, I couldn't say."
One sheep sniffed at the hem of Atem's robe; another pressed its face against him.
In moments, the distinctive scent of lanolin had enveloped him entirely, and even Atem's hair caught the soft light and shimmered.
"Atem… You're completely covered in lanolin."
"So this is… the oil of life."
"No, it's grease."
Seto held out a towel. Atem took it and smiled.
"Even so — not bad. I can feel the warmth. Sense the breath. Like scattered fragments of stars, living and breathing in the grass."
"Don't cover it up with poetic language. The sum total of what's happened so far is that you're sticky."
"Ha — but Seto."
Atem continued, unhurried, running his fingers along a sheep's back.
"Unlike plants, these respond when you touch them. Not through theory — through feeling."
Seto exhaled, brief.
"…Another argument for the supremacy of love, then?"
"Yes. It seems that love and theory are running neck and neck again today."
Far off, the wind sang, and the sheep chewed their grass without hurry.
The afternoon on that hilltop flowed past — more gently than theory, and full of something like love.
From that day on, whenever Atem came across a photo of a sheep, he would offer his verdict: "their wool is like clouds."
And it had become a morning ritual — standing before the green curtain to say, "Good morning, sheep."
There were no sheep anywhere in sight, but he was completely in earnest.
"…Should we just get the real thing at this point?"
In the president's office, working through documents, Seto pressed a hand to his head.
The King's desire to raise sheep was growing by the day.
There was the same dangerous air of impending action as when he'd planted the bitter melon without asking.
The company AI was thorough — it had already run projections on the profitability of running a farm, and had even completed site selection.
That speed was alarming.
From the moment Atem had said "I want to raise sheep," multiple departments had independently begun moving toward establishing a farm.
Whether this was the fruit of staff training, or simply an overreaction, was difficult to say.
"…Buying a farm is not the same as raising something yourself."
Seto reached his conclusion and closed the terminal.
Rationally speaking, Atem would end up not as a livestock keeper but as something closer to a patron deity of the farm.
That was already outside the realm of management and well into mythology.
But Seto had no desire to deny Atem's wish to exist alongside living things.
He had watched, more closely than anyone, how the King had come to feel for the cycle of life through his plants.
"…Can't be helped."
Seto glanced at the terminal on his desk and opened a specific project file.
There it was: Project CAT — progress report on the development of a feline bio-contact space.
The day Atem had first said he wanted a cat, Seto had immediately put a plan in motion.
And now, it was ready.
Location: one section of the relaxation floor in the Kaiba Corporation headquarters building.
There, under a high-performance air purification system, several cats lived under AI health monitoring.
In a space suffused with soft light, they purred quietly.
"…Come, Atem."
Seto murmured, low.
"Your love and theory meet a new life today."
His expression was calm — and somewhere, satisfied.
He believed, still, in the love that lived inside theory.
That day, the relaxation floor of Kaiba Corporation headquarters was wrapped in a particularly soft light.
The newly established feline interaction zone. Unofficially: the cat café.
The space Seto had been quietly planning since Atem first said he wanted a cat.
"Seto… this is where the cats are!"
Atem's voice was already bright with anticipation.
Even stepping onto the disinfectant mat at the entrance had taken on a solemn, ceremonial quality.
"Calm down. This is not a temple. It's a sanitary zone."
Seto noted it evenly. Beside him, Atem was already pressing his face to the glass, eyes shining.
The cats, as if sensing a king's arrival, turned to look at them all at once.
Their expressions, however, were entirely unmoved.
The door opened. A dozen or so cats moved freely about the room.
Atem dropped to one knee, spread both arms wide, and called out:
"Come, beloved children of the sun!"
At that instant, the cats glanced away — and every one of them took three neat steps backward.
Silence.
The hum of the air purifier rang out with strange clarity.
"…Why, Seto. They're looking at me — but they won't come."
"Too much energy. You called them in the tone of a divine proclamation."
"That's not so. I'm speaking gently — come, my friends."
The cats took another small step back.
As if to say: yes, yes, we know you're magnificent.
Meanwhile — the moment Seto sat down quietly on the sofa.
One by one, then all at once, the cats drifted toward him as if drawn by a magnet.
"……"
"……"
Atem went still.
Three cats on his lap, one on his shoulder, more curling up at his feet.
Seto had become the complete center of a cat kingdom.
"Seto — what exactly is happening here."
"I don't know. Probably they prefer a stable temperature."
"Temperature… so theory reaches cats better than love does?"
"No. Cats choose stillness — something beyond theory."
"…So I talked too much."
"As usual."
Seto stroked the cats and answered without missing a beat.
The cats leaned into his fingers, purring with drowsy ease.
Atem watched the scene and let his cheeks puff out, just slightly.
"But Seto."
"What."
"Your theory is, after all, built to be loved."
Seto paused his hand for just a moment and looked at Atem in silence.
In that instant, one cat rose from Seto's lap and walked toward Atem.
Atem held his breath and reached out, slow and careful.
"……!"
Contact. Soft fur, a quiet pulse.
Atem's expression eased, slowly, into a smile.
"At last — theory and love have met!"
"Coincidence."
Seto's reply was level, but his voice had gone somewhere soft.
The cat's throat sounded again, quiet.
That sound resonated like a chord — of love and theory, together.
After the first day at the cat café, Atem was now entirely under the cats' spell.
From then on, he would frequently turn up on the floor during employees' break time, watching the cats and offering philosophical commentary.
From that point on, there was not a single day when Atem's clothes were free of cat hair.
His white shirts, his jackets — all of them carried a soft light, as though they'd been treated with fur.
"…Atem, that is no longer clothing. It's a shed cat."
Seto said it, exasperated. Atem squared his shoulders.
"This too is proof of life."
"Wash it."
"If I wash it, I lose it. This is a record of living together."
Seto exhaled, small.
The moment he recognized that Atem had begun processing something as a concept, the argument was already over.
"Seto, look at this one. Truly beautiful."
Where Atem was pointing: a cat that was, by any measure, male.
The broad nose, the full cheeks, the bone structure of the paws, the slightly rough-edged movements.
Seto raised an eyebrow, lightly.
"…Do you know what you're saying? About the gender?"
"Of course. Beauty has nothing to do with gender. But this graceful bearing — the word beautiful is the only one that fits."
"He's male."
"But—"
"Male."
Seto's voice was quiet, but without mercy.
Atem lost his words for just a moment — then immediately composed himself with perfect calm.
"So the axis of evaluation differs when it comes to beauty."
"No. Your powers of observation are simply lacking."
Seto indicated the cat beside him with a tilt of his chin.
"Bone structure, posture, movement. Every one of them shows the sex. One look at the form and it's obvious."
"Mm… Seto, can you actually tell a cat's sex from how they look?"
"Can't anyone, if they look?"
"…Perhaps in a past life you weren't a priest but a scholar…"
"Quiet."
Atem turned back to the cat and spoke to it gently.
"Beautiful or handsome — your worth is unchanged either way. The gender of the heart—"
"Stop. The cat is backing away."
As Seto pointed out, the cat twitched one ear and retreated half a step.
Atem's intensity had once again exceeded an animal's threshold.
This cat café had also been designed as an experimental space — a test of whether Atem could actually keep a cat.
The AI analyzed Atem's behavior in real time, producing a running report: "approaching too close," "eye contact duration excessive."
"Atem-sama, your distance from the cat exceeds the ideal range by thirty percent."
The AI voice stated it without inflection.
"…I see. My love was too much."
"Less love, more fixation."
Seto folded his arms and looked at the data without expression.
On the graph: feline stress index and Atem's energy level, displaying a textbook negative correlation.
"The closer you get, the further they move. As an experiment, it's perfect."
"I understand it in theory. But Seto — my heart doesn't accept it."
"That is what coexisting with cats means."
The cats gathered at Seto's feet again and curled up, satisfied.
Atem watched the scene and murmured, quietly:
"…Is love the courage not to draw close?"
"Your learning speed isn't bad."
There was, unusually, the faint trace of a laugh in Seto's voice.
On the AI monitor, the text blinked evenly: Suitability for Cat Ownership — Under Observation.
Love and theory. Today, as always, their balance was being tested.
A few days later.
Atem appeared at the cat café again.
Seto already had his laptop open, sorting through the AI's cat behavior logs.
"Seto, I've made a decision."
Atem said it the moment he walked in, with a serious expression.
"…What experiment have you thought up this time."
"I want to know the cats' language."
"…What?"
"I want to understand what they're thinking, what they're trying to say."
Seto stopped his hands and looked at Atem in silence.
His expression was the quiet resignation of someone thinking: here we go again.
"Seto — can you tell what a cat is feeling?"
"Yes."
The answer came without hesitation.
Atem blinked, caught off guard.
"…You understand cat language?"
"Not language. I can tell from their face."
Seto turned his gaze to the cats.
"That one is about seventy percent asleep right now. That one is hungry. That one over there is, generously, keeping an eye on you. Eye focus, ear angle, tail movement — all of it shows clearly."
"…So even in a past life, that observational eye of yours—"
"Cats have nothing to do with ritual."
"But that composure is suited to an owner."
Atem said it, looking pleased.
"Seto — you should just be the one to raise them after all."
"No."
"Why? You'd make a perfect owner. The cats trust you and come to you."
"I have no interest in pets."
Seto answered, evenly.
Not a trace of hesitation in his voice.
"I'm simply good at reading biological responses. Not just cats — humans, AI, anything."
"…So you can understand without having any interest."
"That's right."
Atem exhaled, quiet.
"Seto — that's a talent, but… at the same time, it must be lonely."
"I don't get close enough to cats to feel lonely."
Atem lost his words.
The wall of theory. A transparent barrier that no amount of love, however freely given, could cross.
Seto stood, and glanced down at the cat rubbing against his feet.
The cat purred, satisfied.
"Atem — what you're looking for isn't understanding. It's empathy."
"…Is that different?"
"Cats don't want that. Humans are simply projecting their own emotions onto them."
Atem fell silent.
But in his eyes, the light of wanting to know hadn't gone out.
"…Then at least — let's build a translator. Taking meaning from the sounds cats make—"
"Pointless."
"Why."
"You talk so much, the noise drowns everything out. Can't filter it."
"…I see."
At Seto's calm observation, Atem gave a small nod.
Love and theory. At odds again.
Even so, the two of them were in the same room today.
As Atem spent more time with the cats, he arrived at one conclusion.
"Seto. Cats run because you try to control them."
"……?"
"In ancient times, I never gave cats orders. I simply permitted them to be there. That was coexistence."
"So you were approaching the cats as a king?"
"No. As a subject."
"…How does one arrive at that."
Atem laughed and shrugged.
"No one defied the cats. It's the same now."
And indeed — in the room, the cats had taken bold possession of the desk, curling up on top of Atem's notebook.
Seto had already given up. If a cat walked across the keyboard, the autosave function would handle it.
Then one day, something happened.
An image appeared on social media.
A single frame: the King leaning his forehead toward a cat, smiling with quiet tenderness.
The light, the composition, the soft atmosphere — it spread instantly, like a work of art.
"…Who took that."
Seto frowned.
"It's a capture from the security camera. The cat's-eye-view mode."
"Cat's-eye-view mode?"
"A program that analyzes the cat's line of sight and automatically frames the subject."
"Atem… In the end, you built an AI for the cats."
"To understand them."
Seto lost his words, and then thought:
The line between love and research had already disappeared.
A few days later.
Someone claiming to be a manager contacted the Kaiba Corporation PR department.
"We'd like to propose a photography book. A series called King and Cats."
Seto closed the documents without a word.
Beside him, Atem said brightly:
"It seems the world has moved again."
"…You. Stop moving it."
"But Seto — this is art."
"To me it's a natural disaster."
The one cat that would keep Atem company was curled on his lap, and a single hair drifted lightly through the air.
That one hair would later be put up for auction under the name "The Miracle Hair" — but no one knew that yet.
"Turn down the photography book."
Seto said it as he closed the documents.
"Why?"
Atem asked, as though the answer were obvious.
"Look at the facts. The cats avoid you."
"That's not—"
"It is."
Seto operated the monitor without expression and played back footage from the cat café.
There it was: a clearly defined cat-free zone, radius two meters, centered on Atem.
Even when Atem smiled at them, the cats turned their gaze uniformly in the opposite direction.
"…They're simply being reserved."
"No. Your tension is too strong."
"Tension?"
"Pressure. Cats sense it on instinct and keep their distance."
"So cats too have the ability to recognize a king?"
"…There's no reasoning with you."
The editor in charge, having overheard the exchange, still refused to give up.
"I'd really love to see it in person!"
"The natural distance between the King and the cats — that's the real story!"
Seto tore the memo in two, without a word.
"Reality? Then I'll show you reality."
The following day.
The editor and Atem appeared at the cat café once more.
Atem was impeccably dressed, posture perfect, waiting with composure.
The cats, as expected, were all silent — two meters away.
The sound of the editor's camera shutter was the only thing cutting through the dry air.
"…They really won't go near His Majesty…"
The editor murmured, quietly.
"They are simply humble."
Atem was unmoved. But the cats kept their eyes averted, like soldiers afraid of a king's presence.
A stretch of silence.
Atem exhaled slowly, and spoke.
"…Call Seto."
"Pardon?"
"When Seto is here, the cats settle. He is the embodiment of theory. A being that knows no fear."
While the editor looked on in bewilderment, Atem was already operating his smartwatch.
An emergency summons — sent to the President of Kaiba Corporation.
Some ten minutes later.
The café door opened, and Seto appeared.
At that instant, the cats' response changed.
One, then two, moving closer — and before long, gathering at Seto's feet.
Seto sat down without so much as a frown.
"…There, you see."
Atem said it, pleased with himself.
"Was it necessary for me to come?"
"Necessary. When you're here, the cats settle. The way a king is supported by theory."
"That may be, but don't summon me for that."
The editor stared at the scene in silence and raised the camera.
The cats at ease on Seto's lap, Atem smiling gently beside him.
A composition like something out of a fable.
"…This is the aesthetics of distance."
The editor said it, voice trembling.
"No. It's the division of labor between authority and trust."
Seto.
"What poetic words!"
The editor.
"It's theory."
The photographs taken that day spread with the baffling caption: "The President, Trusted by Cats and King Alike" — and the world, once more, began to stir just a little.
Several days after the cat café shoot.
The editorial team's persistence was, in every sense, impressive.
"…So you're saying the composition should be not 'Atem and cats' but 'me, Atem, and cats'?"
Seto set the stack of documents down on the desk — firmly.
"Yes! Showing the relationship between the two of you makes it stronger as a product!"
The editor's voice carried a strange mixture of enthusiasm and fear.
"As a product."
Seto said it, cool.
In the chair beside him, Atem was nodding.
"From a business standpoint, it makes sense."
"What are you saying."
"Seto — read the flow of the world. People are seeking the harmony of love and theory."
"I don't recall signing on to carry that brand to this extent."
"But you created it, as a result."
"…Don't think that because you've started to grasp business, you can talk me into things with words."
Atem raised the corner of his mouth, just slightly.
"If it's 'from a business standpoint' — you can't argue against it, can you?"
"When I act, it's not 'from a business standpoint.' It's 'from a rational standpoint.'"
"Most people can't tell the difference."
"…Making that difference understood is what management is."
After a quiet exchange, Seto leaned back in his chair.
"So what is the actual goal here. Don't tell me you're planning to title this something like 'The King, the President, and Their Daily Life with Cats.'"
"No — it's Quantum Marriage and Cats."
Seto's eyebrow moved, just slightly.
"Who authorized that."
"I did."
"…Don't go authorizing things on your own."
"But I am a co-author and a model. I should hold some portion of approval rights."
"How far did you actually read the contract."
"All of it. While you were eating your lunch."
Silence.
Several seconds later, Seto pressed a hand to his forehead.
"…What is my legal department doing."
"They probably made a business judgment."
"Don't use my own words back at me."
Several weeks later.
Quantum Marriage and Cats was actually published.
On the cover: Seto with a cat on his lap, Atem smiling at his side.
The composition was flawless, the light in golden ratio, and the subtitle read: The moment theory finds comfort.
On release day, sold out across the world.
Online, the tag "The One King and President Chosen by Cats" trended immediately.
On the large monitor in the president's office, the sales graph climbed toward the ceiling.
Seto watched it in silence and exhaled.
"…You really have started doing nothing but things that make good business sense."
Atem folded his arms, satisfied.
"The fruition of love and theory."
"Before long I'll be treated as some kind of rational mascot…"
"You already are."
"…Correction. You understand business too well."
Outside the window, the green curtain at the Kaiba mansion had grown a little longer.
Beneath it, the one cat that would keep Atem company was basking in a patch of sunlight, on a whim.
