Chapter 169: Sleeping with Yumiko!
After hearing more from Yumiko, Luke gained a rough understanding of how far her precognitive ability extended.
She could see different possibilities that might occur, along with brief glimpses of the distant future.
Most images faded once she woke, leaving only fragments behind. However, the emotions carried back from those futures never seemed to disappear.
"So you really forgot everything?"
Luke asked curiously. He was naturally interested in anything involving the future.
"I said I forgot, so I forgot!"
Yumiko snapped with an irritated expression.
"Ugh, this is so annoying. I still haven't told Mom I'm not coming home tonight."
She quickly climbed past him, grabbed her phone, and started messaging her mother.
"Seriously, you should've told Mom earlier."
"Stop calling my mom 'Mom'!"
"Isn't that just a matter of time? Don't tell me you're planning to abandon responsibility. Hypocritical, cold and heartless woman..."
Luke suddenly paused.
'Huh?'
'Have I said something like that to someone else before?'
"Stop talking nonsense and go turn the rain off already!"
Yumiko shoved him with both hands.
"Okay."
Luke threw on some clothes and prepared to use his item to stop the rain.
Summer was hot enough that rain could make the air pleasantly cool, but too much rain created another problem.
The humidity would become unbearable.
Clothes would take forever to dry, and even your skin would feel sticky.
That was hardly comfortable either.
Humans really were troublesome creatures.
They hated inconvenience while constantly wanting contradictory things at the same time.
When Luke opened the bedroom door, he immediately spotted two suspicious figures lingering outside.
Naturally—His two maids.
"What are you two doing here?"
Luke closed the door behind him and stared at them speechlessly.
"Taking a walk..."
Petite Annie, wearing an oversized T-shirt, stretched lazily.
"Mm~ I'm sleepy. Going back to bed."
She immediately fled as though nothing had happened.
Unlike Mikasa, Annie did not possess overwhelming martial skill. If their master caught her snooping, who knew what punishment awaited her?
Seeing Annie escape, Mikasa also began calmly walking away as though absolutely nothing unusual had happened.
Luke grabbed her arm.
"You were taking a walk too?"
"I saw Annie standing here and got curious."
Mikasa's naturally expressionless face became extremely useful.
Her words and actions obviously did not match, yet her blank expression almost made the excuse believable.
Almost.
Under Luke's prolonged stare, however, Mikasa eventually shifted her eyes away.
"Seriously. Go sleep and stop wandering around here."
Luke sighed.
"It's late. Be careful or you'll run into something unclean."
"Oh."
Luke decided he could deal with the two wall-crawling maids later.
After chasing them away, he pulled the [Five Thunder Command] from his storage and opened the front door.
A blast of cold wind immediately hurled rain into the house.
"Brrr!"
Even with Luke's constitution, he shivered.
This storm really had become absurdly cold.
He hurriedly raised the command tablet.
'So... how am I supposed to stop the rain?'
The item description had not explained that part.
By ordinary functional logic, maybe striking it twice more would turn the effect off?
Treating the thing like an air-conditioner remote, Luke lightly tapped it.
WHOOSH!
The wind grew stronger.
He tapped it again.
WHOOSH!
Again.
WHOOSH!
The storm intensified, throwing even more rain directly into his face.
'Oh.'
'I'm screwed.'
...
Yumiko lay on the bed, her soft white feet raised high, supple toes curling toward her soles, forming an exquisite arc.
After finally surviving her mother's endless questioning, she wearily placed her phone on the bedside table and propped the pillow upright in front of herself.
"Ugh! Mom is definitely going to lecture me to death when I get home!"
She buried her face and upper body into the pillow, groaning while repeatedly kicking the mattress.
Creak.
The bedroom door opened.
Yumiko turned her head and saw Luke walk inside looking as though he had just taken another shower and dried himself off.
He said nothing.
He simply lay down, pulled the blanket over himself, and covered even his face.
"Eh?"
Yumiko glanced toward the window.
The storm was still raging.
In fact, it seemed even worse than before.
"Didn't you go fix the weather?"
She pulled the blanket away from Luke's face.
"Possibly, probably, barring unforeseen circumstances..."
Luke paused.
"Something unforeseen happened."
"What does that mean?"
"The rain isn't stopping anytime soon."
He had tried striking the command tablet upright, upside down, sideways, and in practically every other position imaginable.
The heavens responded to every experiment by making the storm stronger.
Not once had the rain weakened.
Truly chilling.
"Hah?! At this rate, won't school be canceled tomorrow?!"
Alarm rapidly filled Yumiko's eyes.
If she had to remain here another entire day, her mother would absolutely kill her when she returned.
Outside, the roaring wind drowned out nearly every other sound.
Even from inside the house, they could feel the sheer force of the rain hammering the ground.
"No idea."
Luke shrugged.
"It might come quickly and disappear quickly. Or maybe the rain never stops and civilization ends."
"Stop saying stupid things and think of something! Mom is seriously going to kill me!"
Yumiko lightly punched him.
Luke thought for a moment.
"Relax. The rain should weaken tomorrow during the day, then become heavier again at night."
"Eh? Really?"
"Of course. I checked the weather forecast in the living room."
"…Weather forecast?"
Yumiko froze.
"In this situation... does the weather forecast still work?"
"Yumiko, you need to believe in science."
When Luke was little, he remembered forecasts often being wildly inaccurate.
But weather prediction had apparently improved considerably with modern technology.
Besides, even if the [Five Thunder Command] could forcibly create rain while ignoring natural conditions, Luke doubted it could sustain the effect forever.
Yumiko still stared at him strangely.
"…Hearing you say 'believe in science' feels really weird."
Luke, an action-oriented exorcist firmly rooted in the supernatural side of reality, also felt that statement sounded rather strange coming from him.
"Anyway, stop worrying."
"If it's still raining tomorrow, I'll have the ghost driver take you home. For now, just get some sleep."
He pulled Yumiko's body toward himself again.
"Eh?"
Watching with her own eyes as her body drew ever closer to his, the matter of the weather was instantly flung from her mind.
Yumiko's gaze began to wander, her entire face burning hot.
"J-just sleeping?"
He did not answer, harboring ulterior motives.
His nose and mouth rubbed and gently breathed against her slender, tender neck, occasionally planting kisses just as they had done before. Though the sweetness of candy was absent, the pleasant sensation lingered between their lips and teeth, carrying a faintly tingly, numbing feeling.
Yumiko, her mouth sealed and her breathing growing increasingly short, barely managed to break free from that soul-stirring way of confessing love. Her face was flushed blood-red, and she buried her head deeply in the crook of his shoulder, not daring to lift it again. Maintaining this close-pressed posture, she shyly murmured:
"Didn't you say we were going to sleep? This doesn't count..."
Luke gently blew against naive Yumiko's adorable earlobe.
Sharing the same weakness, under the soft brush of breath, Yumiko felt her ear tickle and couldn't help but shrink her shoulders, burying her ear against her shoulder.
"It can't be helped. My girlfriend is just too tempting... How about it? How does your body feel, is it okay?"
"I-it's okay, but just for a little bit... just a little bit, okay."
Yumiko's gaze drifted.
"Mm. Just a little bit."
Luke nodded, looking at her tightly drawn arms and legs — truly a perfect defense system.
"Then I can continue, right?"
Yumiko quietly averted her gaze and murmured, "You don't have to ask permission for that kind of thing one by one. You already said I'm your girlfriend..."
"That won't do. If I made you dislike me, I'd be sad."
"Mm, is that so..."
Yumiko couldn't help but cover her face.
Her inner wish, just as Luke understood, was to hear the honest thoughts of her friends. So hearing such genuinely sincere words from her boyfriend left her overwhelmed by the rush of embarrassment, leaving her powerless.
So this time, she didn't forcefully tighten her body again. Enduring the shame, she went along and parted her defenses.
Misdeeds in the secret garden...
Being with the person she liked, at this moment she only felt her body going so soft it was about to melt into a puddle of water. That sensation made her body tremble continuously... Mm, so comfortable.
Between the fingers covering her face, Yumiko would occasionally let slip a sliver of a glance. After colliding with his gaze, she'd quickly hide again like a startled little animal...
Utterly adorable.
"Mm, it's inside."
"Wu wu wu~ Don't say such embarrassing things!"
Yumiko's shy expression was something he never tired of seeing.
And so his body and mind were wrapped in gentle, soft warmth.
He didn't know how much time had passed.
Yumiko tightly pinched her own cheeks, her other hand gripping his hand for dear life, fingers interlocked.
The rainstorm outside pounded the earth, emitting continuous pattering sounds. In just this short while, the rain's falling speed had dropped significantly. It seemed the command tablet's rain-summoning effect wouldn't persist indefinitely — this rain was probably just a shower that would last a little while.
Luke looked down.
That exquisite, adorable face, though fatigued, still carried a residual afterglow. Her eyes glistened with moisture, her cheeks bore a rosy hue, and dew-like beads of sweat surfaced on her forehead and body.
More importantly, the eyes on that cute face, though hazy and unfocused, still stared tightly at him.
Luke exhaled softly.
Suddenly...
Having the rain continue for a little longer did not seem so bad.
…
(Don't forget to vote, review, and leave a comment below! :D The more you vote, the more chapters I upload.)
...
Read more chapters(25+):
patréon.com/U22
(Note: Replace "é" with "e" on your web browser.)