Hearing that familiar voice, both girls turned around almost simultaneously.
"Ah... Shiki-san."
There was a hint of surprise in Yamamura Miki's voice, and those pretty eyes of hers were full of delight — she clearly hadn't expected to run into Shikime Natsu here, of all times and places.
Morishita Ai, meanwhile, dropped whatever strange pose she'd been holding a moment ago, crossed her arms over her chest, and looked Shikime Natsu up and down with those violet eyes of hers. Her expression remained perfectly blank as she spoke with characteristic indifference.
"Well, if it isn't Shikime Natsu."
"For someone who already has three girlfriends, instead of being off cuddling with them and doing all sorts of shameless things right now..."
"Why are you wandering all the way out here to chat with the two of us?"
At that, she tilted her head slightly, her tone taking on a perfectly deadpan seriousness.
"Don't tell me... Shikime Natsu thinks three isn't enough, and wants to add Yamamura Miki and me to your harem as well?"
That was about as blunt as it gets — one might even say it crossed the line into shamelessness.
If anyone else had heard Morishita Ai say something like that, they'd probably have been mortified — feeling like they'd walked headfirst into a wall of their own making. After all, how was that any different from telling someone to get lost? Since when do girls talk like that?
Standing nearby, Yamamura Miki went rigid the instant Morishita Ai's jaw-dropping words landed.
Her face flushed a deep crimson all at once; her hands twisted together anxiously as her gaze darted back and forth between Morishita Ai and Shikime Natsu, as if terrified that the words had left the situation beyond salvaging.
"Mo... Morishita-san..."
She quietly tugged at Morishita Ai's sleeve, trying to stop her incorrigible friend from saying anything further.
And yet.
The man in question, Shikime Natsu, showed not the slightest trace of embarrassment.
He continued walking over at his unhurried pace, that same easy smile on his face as always — treating Morishita Ai's words as casually as if she'd just said "good afternoon." Well, you'd need thick skin to run a harem, and thin-skinned people needn't apply.
He stopped a few paces in front of the two of them, meeting Morishita Ai's gaze with those light-gold eyes of his, the corner of his mouth curving upward as he shot back:
"And what if..."
"I said yes?"
"?!"
Those words hit Yamamura Miki like a thunderbolt. She froze completely.
Her pupils contracted slightly; the flush on her face spread all the way to the tips of her ears in an instant. She was thoroughly enveloped in steam, utterly at a loss.
Shikime Natsu... he's — he's joking, right? He has to be joking.
But... what if it wasn't entirely a joke?
In an instant, the quiet, unassuming girl's mind turned into a swirling mess. She fumbled and stammered but couldn't get a single coherent sentence out.
Morishita Ai, on the other hand, had been relatively composed up until those words — but the moment she heard them, her expression turned deadly serious. She fixed Shikime Natsu with a look of righteous indignation and delivered her verdict in a grave tone:
"Shikime Natsu... I never would have thought you'd turn out to be such a greedy, insatiable man."
"How utterly disappointing. It seems I had you completely wrong."
She then whipped her head around, locking those sharp eyes onto Yamamura Miki — who was already too mortified to lift her head — and interrogated her with equal gravity:
"Yamamura Miki!"
"Don't tell me... in the face of such an outrageous demand, you actually have thoughts of your own on the matter?"
"?! I... I..."
Blindsided by Morishita Ai's sudden interrogation, Yamamura Miki fell into an even greater panic.
She waved her hands frantically, eyes darting every which way, desperate to explain herself but not knowing where to even begin:
"N-no..."
Taking in the scene before him, Shikime Natsu let out a quiet laugh and turned to Morishita Ai, speaking in an unhurried tone.
"Alright, alright."
"Morishita-san, stop teasing Yamamura-san already."
Having said that, Shikime Natsu shifted the topic back to what the two of them had been doing before he arrived.
"So... what were you two up to out here?"
"That pose just now... were you practicing some kind of new strategy?"
After all, in that laser tag game before, Shikime Natsu had essentially dominated — only "accidentally" losing to Yamamura Miki — while Morishita Ai had been the very first one he'd eliminated.
Hearing Shikime Natsu's question, Yamamura Miki — who had finally recovered a little — seized the opening.
She explained quietly:
"Um... Morishita-san, she..."
"...was in the middle of a roleplay."
"Oh?"
Shikime Natsu raised an eyebrow, his gaze settling on Morishita Ai, his tone carrying a hint of amusement:
"Isn't Morishita-san always in the middle of some roleplay or another?"
"So... were you just locked in a life-or-death struggle against some imaginary alien monster?"
"Shallow."
Morishita Ai shot him a sidelong glance and retorted with mild irritation:
"I am not some hopeless chuunibyou case."
"If anything, Shikime Natsu, you're the one whose chuunibyou delusions seem to run pretty deep."
At that, she tapped her chin thoughtfully and mused:
"Could it be that now that you've started dating, your head is so full of dirty fantasies that even the chuunibyou virus inside you has mutated along with them?"
Listening to Morishita Ai's increasingly outrageous commentary, Yamamura Miki once again felt a wave of profound helplessness wash over her.
She mustered her courage and offered a feeble protest:
"Um... Morishita-san... that's... that's a little much, isn't it?"
"Hm?"
Morishita Ai snapped her head around at those words and stared Yamamura Miki down.
The sharpness in that gaze made Yamamura Miki instinctively take half a step back.
"Yamamura Miki."
Morishita Ai asked in utmost seriousness.
"Whose side are you on, exactly?"
"The side of your comrade Morishita Ai, who has always been by your side and protected you..."
"Or the side of that Shikime Natsu, whose head is stuffed with nothing but dirty thoughts?"
"Choose. Right now."
"?!"
That was way too much to ask?!
Yamamura Miki looked at Morishita Ai with a pitiful expression, then glanced over at Shikime Natsu, who stood to the side with a quiet smile, saying nothing.
Her heart was in a genuine tangle, pulled helplessly in two directions at once.
On one side was her best friend; on the other was Shikime Natsu — someone she admired and respected, and... maybe liked just a little...
But after her gaze lingered on Morishita Ai for a moment, it drifted, almost of its own accord, toward Shikime Natsu — and stayed there, on that gentle, handsome face, for noticeably longer.
She hadn't said a word.
But that single unconscious action spoke volumes all by itself.
"Tch."
Morishita Ai had clearly noticed too.
She pursed her lips with a hint of displeasure, sensing that she'd somehow ended up at a disadvantage.
So, with a quick shift of her eyes, she abruptly changed the subject:
"Since Shikime Natsu has so much free time on his hands..."
"How about you show us that ability of yours again?"
"The ability to control animals."
Hearing this, Shikime Natsu let out a quiet laugh and corrected her:
"It's not the ability to control animals, Morishita-san."
"It's... the ability to communicate with animals."
"Communicate... with animals?"
The bashful expression Yamamura Miki had been wearing was replaced by pure curiosity in an instant.
She widened her eyes and stared at Shikime Natsu in disbelief, asking softly:
"Really... you can really communicate with animals?"
If it had been Morishita Ai saying this, Yamamura Miki would have assumed she was just bragging, or had gotten lost in one of her strange roleplays again. Morishita Ai was always saying bizarre things, after all.
But...
Right now, it was Shikime Natsu saying it.
Which meant... she had no choice but to believe it.
A girl's intuition told her that what Shikime Natsu said was definitely true. In her experience, he had never been the type to say things he didn't mean. If he said it, he could do it.
"Of course I can."
Shikime Natsu nodded with a smile, his tone utterly certain.
His gaze swept the surrounding area and quickly settled on the trunk of a large tree not far away.
"Come, follow me."
He beckoned the two girls and walked straight toward the tree.
Morishita Ai and Yamamura Miki exchanged a glance, then dutifully followed.
They reached the base of the tree.
Shikime Natsu pointed to a colony of ants busily at work on the trunk, then extended one slender finger and rested it gently against the bark.
His eyes settled on three of the crawling ants, and he spoke in a calm, gentle voice:
"You three."
"All of you — come to my fingertip."
At this sight, Yamamura Miki was completely dumbfounded.
If you're going to communicate with ants... shouldn't you use the language of ants? Or some kind of special frequency?
How... how is he just speaking to them in Japanese?!
Can... can ants even understand that?
And yet.
Just as she was questioning the very fabric of reality.
Something utterly unexpected happened.
The three ants that had been scrambling about in every direction — upon hearing Shikime Natsu's words — actually acted exactly like soldiers receiving an order. They immediately reversed course, lined up in a perfectly neat formation, and marched straight up onto the tip of Shikime Natsu's finger without a moment's hesitation!
"That..."
Yamamura Miki gasped and clapped a hand over her mouth, eyes blown wide.
It actually... actually worked?!
"Pretty impressive, Shikime Natsu."
Morishita Ai raised an eyebrow too, a genuinely interested look crossing her face.
Mimicking Shikime Natsu, she extended one finger and rested it against the trunk, then addressed several other ants nearby in an equally authoritative tone:
"Hey, you lot!"
"Get over here for this Morishita Ai!"
However.
The ants paid her absolutely no attention, continuing their busy work as if she didn't exist. One of them even crawled right past her finger without so much as a pause.
The moment was exquisitely awkward.
Morishita Ai withdrew her finger with obvious dissatisfaction and turned her suspicious gaze back on Shikime Natsu:
"Strange..."
"We basically said the same thing..."
"So why do these ants only listen to you and completely ignore me?"
At that, as if she'd just uncovered some great cosmic truth, she pointed at Shikime Natsu and declared loudly:
"Just as I thought!"
"You're a fraud, aren't you, Shikime Natsu?"
"What you have is literally a superpower to control ants — not this so-called 'communication'!"
If it really was control...
Yamamura Miki thought quietly to herself:
Wouldn't that be even more impressive than mere communication?
In the face of Morishita Ai's accusation, Shikime Natsu simply smiled, gave his finger a gentle flick, and returned the three ants to the trunk.
"Not at all."
He spread his hands with an expression of perfect innocence:
"I genuinely just have the ability to communicate with ants, nothing more."
"As for why they listen to me and not you..."
"Probably because my words have a certain warmth to them. They just happened to understand."
That brush-off of an explanation clearly didn't satisfy Morishita Ai — his explanation last time hadn't been satisfying either. Sure enough, this guy Shikime Natsu was something else entirely, hiding depths she couldn't quite see through.
She narrowed those lovely violet eyes slightly, studying Shikime Natsu with a thoughtful, appraising gaze.
After a moment, she spoke up again:
"So..."
"Can Shikime Natsu communicate with all animals?"
"Yes."
Shikime Natsu nodded without hesitation and looked at Morishita Ai with a playful gleam in his eyes, as if to say: Well? Jealous? This is something you can't do, you know.
Picking up on that obvious provocation, Morishita Ai puffed her cheeks with mild indignation.
"Hmph."
She turned her head away and muttered under her breath:
"Shikime Natsu is so childish."
"A high schooler showing off tricks like this — honestly, it's elementary school behaviour."
Of course, if she herself had an ability that impressive, Morishita Ai would absolutely have shown it off without a second thought — proclaiming herself the next great Animal Whisperer, a living bridge between the animal kingdom and humanity.
Casting aside the jumbled thoughts in her head, Morishita Ai turned back to Shikime Natsu and picked up where the conversation had left off:
"Getting back to the point..."
"Since you're not off spending time with your three girlfriends, and instead wandered over here to kill time with the two of us..."
"You really are incredibly idle, Shikime Natsu."
"At a time like this..."
"Couples are supposed to be all over each other shamelessly, aren't they?"
For some reason.
As Shikime Natsu listened to Morishita Ai say this, he couldn't shake the feeling that there was a heavy undercurrent of resentment and displeasure buried in her voice.
Like... a child who'd had a favourite toy snatched away.
A low chuckle escaped him.
Shikime Natsu couldn't hold back a laugh as he looked at her.
"Morishita-san..."
"It seems like you have some complaints about me."
"Quite a lot, actually."
Morishita Ai nodded without the slightest hesitation, crossing her arms over her chest again and speaking with complete seriousness.
"Because of your sudden appearance, Commander Shiki..."
"You interrupted the progress of the game I was playing."
"And made me get a Game Over."
"Now..."
"If I want to clear it, I'll have to start all over from the beginning."
The corner of Shikime Natsu's mouth twitched slightly.
Was she talking about that "roleplay game" she'd been playing by herself, swinging at thin air, just a moment ago?
But...
Since when did roleplay have a thing called "game progress" and "Game Over"?
That was ridiculous.
Still, looking at how utterly earnest Morishita Ai looked, Shikime Natsu chose not to call her out on it.
He smiled and played along.
"In that case..."
"As an apology for inadvertently ruining Morishita-san's mission..."
"Let me treat the two of you to a meal."
"As compensation. What do you say?"
"Really?!"
The moment those words reached her ears, the displeasure that had been written all over Morishita Ai's face vanished in an instant. Her violet eyes lit up brilliantly, and she looked very much as though she found this new proposal of Shikime Natsu's to be extremely appealing.
She fixed those violet eyes intently on Shikime Natsu and confirmed:
"That's what you said, right? Shikime Natsu."
"Not a single false word."
Shikime Natsu nodded with a smile:
"I did say that, yes."
"Then..."
He turned to Yamamura Miki, who had been quietly listening throughout, and glanced over at Morishita Ai as well:
"What would you like to eat?"
Yamamura Miki didn't say anything, instinctively deferring her gaze to Morishita Ai — making decisions entirely on her own was still too difficult for her. She was far more accustomed to looking to others first.
She wondered what Morishita-san would decide to have. The school cafeteria? Or one of the restaurants at Keyaki Mall?
Under both their gazes.
Morishita Ai crossed her arms over her chest once more, tilted her chin up slightly, and spoke with an air of complete entitlement:
"Since Shikime Natsu has already said so..."
"Then I won't stand on ceremony."
"I want..."
She extended one finger, pointing it directly at Shikime Natsu, and spoke with deliberate emphasis on every word.
"A meal personally prepared by Shikime Natsu himself — and it absolutely must be delicious."
"?!"
Yamamura Miki's jaw dropped in shock. Going straight to the source and asking Shikime Natsu himself to cook?
If they were going to Shikime Natsu's dorm room... wouldn't they run into his three girlfriends? That could be incredibly awkward.
And besides... Kamuro Masumi was on good terms with them. If Kamuro Masumi saw the two of them having Shikime Natsu cook for them, what would she think? Probably nothing good.
After all... asking someone's boyfriend to cook a private meal for the two of them was a bit too presumptuous, wasn't it?
Whether Morishita Ai didn't know or simply didn't care, she looked at Shikime Natsu with an utterly earnest expression and said:
"Shikime Natsu, you need to properly fulfil your duty as Chef Morishita Ai's personal cook — understood? If you want to win a girl over, you have to win her stomach first. So if you want to add Yamamura Miki to your harem, you're going to have to satisfy her appetite."
Yamamura Miki once again transformed into a walking steam engine. How did the topic circle back around to her so quickly?
____
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