"Hey, if you tell me honestly, I"ll forgive you, ok?"
"What do you mean by "honestly"?"
After finis.h.i.+ng lunch, I was chatting with Sudou and the others in front of the vending machine.
Suddenly, Ike came close.
"…. We"re friends, right? Buddies that"ll stick together for the next 3 years?"
"Uh… yea. That"s right, but…"
"Then… you"ll tell us when you get a girlfriend, right?"
"Hah? Girlfriend? Well, if that ever happens."
Ike put his arm on my shoulder.
"You"re dating Horikita, aren"t you? We won"t forgive you if you steal a march on us."
"… Ha?"
I noticed that Sudou and Yamauchi were looking at me suspiciously.
"Stupid, we"re not dating. Not at all. No, seriously."
"Then what were you guys talking about stealthily during cla.s.s? It was something we"re not allowed to hear about, isn"t it. It was about dates, or about dates, or about a promise to go on a date, right!? Aahh, I"m jealous!"
"No, no. Horikita isn"t that kind of girl anyway."
"I don"t know that. We"ve never had the chance to talk anyway. If it wasn"t for Kus.h.i.+da, we might not even know her name. She has no presence, and doesn"t talk at all."
Is that so? Well, I"ve also never seen her talk to anyone other than me or Kus.h.i.+da.
"Not even knowing her name, that"s cruel."
"Then do you know all of your cla.s.smate"s names?"
… I tried to recall, but I could only remember half of my cla.s.smate"s names. Point taken.
"Her face is cute though, right? So we were paying attention to her."
They were nodding their heads.
"Her personality is difficult, though. I don"t like that kind of girl."
Sudou said after drinking his coffee.
"Yea, her personality is—how should I put it—harsh and snappy? I"d like to date someone who I can hold a good conversation with. Of course, someone cute. Someone like Kus.h.i.+da-chan."
Of course, Ike"s favorite is still Kus.h.i.+da.
"Ah~ Date Kus.h.i.+da-chan—then do ecchi things!"
Yamauchi cried out.
"Stupid, you think you can date Kus.h.i.+da-chan? Fantasies are also prohibited!"
"You also dream about dating her, don"t you Ike? In my dreams, I"m already sleeping with Kus.h.i.+da-chan!"
"What! She"s doing a s.e.xy pose in cosplay in my dreams!"
The two fought over their delusions. Hey, hey. You can fantasize whatever you want as a high school student, but that"s just being disrespectful to Kus.h.i.+da.
"Sudou, who are you aiming for? Are there any rumors of cute girls in the basketball club?"
"Huh? Oh, there"s no one. There isn"t much room for girls in the club anyway."
"Really… ? You better not be hiding that you"re dating someone, absolutely not!"
"Yea, yea."
He just nodded his head at his disgusting words. Talking about girlfriends, I remembered Hirata.
"Hey, isn"t Hirata dating Karuizawa now?"
"Oh, right." The other day I saw the two of them holding hands at the main hall."
"d.a.m.n, those two really are dating. Walking with shoulders touching."
"So they were, huh. I wonder if they did ecchi things already."
"Of course they did. Ah, I"m so jealous~!"
It feels unbelievable that first year high school students are already being ecchi. But I guess it"s true.
… I feel embarra.s.sed for thinking the same way as these guys.
"Hey, you better listen to what I"m about to say—I"m the most experienced in that sort of thing."
Yamauchi sprawled on the ground and started to talk.
"Let"s listen from Hirata instead."
"Do you even think Hirata will tell us truthfully when we ask?" "How are her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, is she a virgin, or did you like that?"—did you really think he"d answer?"
What kind of experiences did you want to hear about…
I went to the nearby vending machine to buy a drink. Yamauchi called out with a request.
"Get me cocoa—"
"Don"t push that onto me. Buy that yourself."
"No, I"ve almost used up all my points. I have about 2,000 left."
"… How the h.e.l.l did you use up more than 90,000 points in 3 weeks?"
"That"s because I bought what I wanted to. Here, look. Isn"t it great?"
Yamauchi took out a handheld gaming device.
"I went to go buy this with Ike. It"s a PS Viva, a PS Viva. It"s amazing that the school sells these things too." (T/N PS Vita)
"How much are they?"
"About 20k points. With all options included, about 25k."
Hey, don"t spend your points that quickly…
"Usually I don"t play games, but since we now live in the dorms, I can play with others. Also, you know that guy Miyamoto in our cla.s.s, right? He"s really good at games."
Miyamoto is the slightly chubby boy in our cla.s.s. I"ve never talked to him, but he seems like the guy to talk about games and anime all the time.
"You should also buy one and join us. Sudou said he"ll be buying one as soon as he gets next month"s allowance."
They started to gang up on me. Yamauchi handed me his game console to try it out. It"s a lot lighter than I thought it would be. On the monitor, there was a soldier carrying a big katana while stroking a pig. What a weird world…
"Eh, to be honest, I"m not really interested. Is this… a fighting game of sorts?"
"By any chance, have you never heard of Hunter Watch? It"s sold 4.8 million copies around the world! Ever since I was young, I"ve always had really good game sense, so I"ve been scouted by pros overseas. Well, I"ve refused those offers though."
I"m not sure whether 4.8 million is something amazing or not. There"s about 7 billion people in the world.
In other words, the people who have bought this game account for less than 0.1% of the population.
"Also, why is that dainty girl wearing all that heavy equipment? Is that stuff made of plastic? If it was made of iron, even Sudou would have trouble with it."
"… Ayanokouji, you seem to want a realistic aspect to your games.
Are you a foreigner? Then, are you ok with automatic life regen? Do you like those Western games where you shoot someone, hide somewhere, and instantly get your stamina back? Those games are even more unrealistic."
I could not understand anything Yamauchi was saying.
"People say that seeing is believing, right? Buy it and play with us. Ok? Ok? When you start playing, we"ll farm for materials with you. Collecting honey is hard too, you know? So, you can buy me a cocoa in advance~"
"Good grief…"
I don"t really need the honey or whatever, but I just bought the cocoa to appease him.
"This is what friends.h.i.+p is for! Thanks~!"
I didn"t wish for this kind of friends.h.i.+p. Throwing the bottle at him, Yamauchi caught it with his belly.
Well then, what should I drink? As I was hesitating, I noticed a b.u.t.ton.
"Oh, so this is here too."
There was an option for mineral water, free of charge.
"Anything wrong?"
"Ah, no. Hey, does the cafeteria offer any set meals that are free?"
"Are you talking about the vegetable set? Those are free. Ah, I don"t want a school life just eating veggies and drinking water~"
While drinking his cocoa, Yamauchi laughed.
Having used up all his points, he had no choice but to eat vegetables and drink water every day.
However, it"s a situation that"s easily avoidable if you"re careful. If you don"t spend all your money like Yamauchi.
"… Hey, there are a quite a few people that eat the free meal."
Since I went to the cafeteria often, I remember seeing a lot of students eating the vegetables.
"It"s probably because it"s the end of the month."
"If that was the case, it would be fine…"
Feeling slightly anxious, I decided to get milk. I took the bottle from the slot.
"Why can"t it become next month any faster, I want my dream-like school life back!"
The three of them shouted in frustration.