"Yukino, that's too much. We're engaged, after all—and you won't even let me stay the night?"
Lin Ye put on a feigned look of sorrow, his eyes fixed on the girl before him.
He just wanted to see how resolute Yukinoshita could be.
"I won't,"
"But I've already stayed over before,"
"The past is the past, the future is the future,"
"Then I'll stay tonight,"
Lin Ye said,
"As I recall, a certain girl personally admitted it—that once we became engaged, we'd be sharing the same bed,"
"..."
Yukino Yukinoshita wanted to argue, wanted to refuse, wanted to say something, but faced with that fact, she truly couldn't bring herself to deny it.
If she played the cheat and broke her word, she wouldn't be Yukino Yukinoshita anymore—she wouldn't be that girl who pursued justice and correctness.
She didn't want to take that step.
"Looks like a certain girl does remember after all,"
"..."
"So, tonight..."
"Lin Ye..."
Yukinoshita lifted her head and stared at Lin Ye, her navy-blue eyes like lake water. "I will not break my word. The promise I, Yukino Yukinoshita, have given will not be broken."
"That's Yukino for you,"
Lin Ye stuck up his thumb. "This is exactly the kind of promise-keeping girl I like."
She very much wanted to say she would fulfill the promise tonight, but those words simply wouldn't come out. As long as she didn't say them aloud, she felt she still had a chance to slip by; but if she said them, Lin Ye would probably calmly accept sleeping with her.
Just imagining what might happen tonight filled her with worry and fear.
They'd only just held hands, and now they were to sleep together—it was far too fast, so fast that she was utterly at a loss.
"You're allowed not to like it."
"If I, as your boyfriend and fiancé, didn't like Yukino, then wouldn't Yukino be miserable? A future with no love, only days of gloom and misery."
"That won't happen,"
"Really?"
"It won't,"
Her gaze was composed. "Besides, we won't necessarily end up together, and we won't necessarily get married,"
"Looks like I'll have to go propose to the Yukinoshita home right away. Uncle and Auntie should agree, won't they!"
Agree? They'd do more than agree—they'd want the wedding held this instant, packing her off to Lin Ye's home.
Yukino Yukinoshita knew this, and was utterly certain of it. Her parents undoubtedly wanted something from Lin Ye, and her sister—considering her sister's position—would certainly comply with their parents' arrangements.
And she herself... would she object?
A thought of resistance rose in Yukino Yukinoshita, but in the end it sank back down. She realized she really couldn't bring herself to defy her parents' arrangements.
She was a daughter of the Yukinoshita home; for the sake of the Yukinoshita home's interests, sacrifice was only natural.
"So, shall I go ahead?"
The girl with long black hair stared at Lin Ye, and faced with his mischievous smile, she drew a deep breath and slowly let it out. "If this is a joke, please stop here,"
"I'm serious,"
"Don't make me hate you, all right?"
Her tone was somewhat firm, yet carried a trace of pleading.
Lin Ye shrugged to show he understood. "All right, it was a joke, I'm not forcing you. I just wanted to see Yukino's cute reaction,"
"You've seen it now, haven't you! Satisfied?"
She was helpless, and angry too.
"Satisfied, but not entirely satisfied. If Yukino were willing..."
"Refused."
Yukinoshita refused at once.
"To me, Yukino really is cold,"
She was already plenty un-cold toward you—anyone else would have been turned away with an icy face long ago, given no quarter at all.
"A cold Yukino is too hard to get close to. I'll be off first, then. Goodbye,"
Yukino Yukinoshita didn't stop him, but after Lin Ye had taken a few steps, something occurred to her and she quickly said, "Wait, Lin Ye."
"Oh? Yukino, have you changed your mind—ready to let me stay the night and treat me tenderly?"
The girl with long black hair ignored those words of Lin Ye's and instead spoke up. "Lin Ye, did you do something to Hayama today? Did you use some special power on him?"
Lin Ye smiled. The moment the girl asked this question had finally come.
Hayama's behavior had been far too abnormal. Someone unaware could only treat Hayama's reaction as an accidental act, but Yukino Yukinoshita, who knew of his special ability, would surely connect the two.
If Yukinoshita didn't connect them, Lin Ye would have started to suspect the girl's intelligence had a problem.
"If I said no, would you believe me?"
The girl stared for a moment, then shook her head.
She didn't believe it. She didn't believe Hayama would directly answer Lin Ye's question—there had to be something behind it, it had to be Lin Ye's power that made Hayama reveal that secret hidden in his heart.
"Since you don't believe me, there's no point in anything I say."
This only made the girl feel that Lin Ye didn't want to answer head-on.
She bit her lip. "I want to know—that's the point. As your fiancée and girlfriend, I want to know. Please tell me,"
She had grown clever too, now using her status to make demands of Lin Ye.
"Sigh, both my girlfriend and my fiancée, and yet she won't let me stay the night,"
"You can stay. You can sleep in my room,"
And then she'd go sleep in the guest room—that was Yukinoshita's idea.
"And then you'll go sleep in the guest room, right?"
A single sentence laid the girl's plan bare. Yukinoshita kept as composed as she could, so as not to let it show that she'd guessed wrong.
"That's your guess. Please answer my question,"
"You're right. I did indeed do something to Hayama, made him tell the truth."
"Did what?"
Tell Yukino about the Hypnosis ability? Lin Ye thought it unwise—he felt the girl would immediately make associations.
The smarter the girl, the more she'd associate, and she might even at some point connect it to the fact that the very establishment of his relationship with her was perhaps due to the Hypnosis ability.
"That'll stay a secret,"
"An ability that influences a person's mind,"
The first thing Yukino Yukinoshita could think of was the 'Hypnosis' that had appeared countless times on Tanuki-ban.
Lin Ye could use perspective, which was also a superpower from Tanuki-ban. So Hypnosis, mastered by Lin Ye, didn't seem entirely impossible after all.
"All right, it's about time, so I'll be off first,"
Only, the girl blocked Lin Ye's path. "Is it... Hypnosis?"
"If I could use Hypnosis, I think I'd immediately hypnotize Yukino into a hot weapon."
As the words fell, Yukino Yukinoshita's face flushed red. The hand she had instinctively raised to hit Lin Ye, she set back down.
She held herself back.
"Men,"
"Who told Yukino to be so pretty and cute? Isn't it perfectly normal that, as a man, I can't help myself?"
"Hm?"
"How about... Yukino satisfies me a little, satisfies her fiancé's needs a little, and then I definitely won't have to use this ability."
"In your dreams,"
"How heartbreaking."
This time Lin Ye bid the girl farewell, and Yukino Yukinoshita didn't keep questioning him. At least she knew Hayama had revealed the secret because of a special ability.
"What ability can make someone reveal the secrets in their heart?"
She began recalling what Lin Ye had said at the time.
Could it be an ability where, faced with Lin Ye's questioning, the one questioned finds it hard to refuse to answer?
She couldn't figure it out.
The elevator opened.
Only after watching Lin Ye step into the elevator did Yukino Yukinoshita, after a good while, close the apartment door.
"Whew..."
She gently exhaled a breath.
Yukino Yukinoshita turned and went back to the living room, sitting down on the living-room sofa.
Now, having confirmed that Lin Ye had truly left, her heart gradually settled.
To be honest, she really had been worried that Lin Ye would stay.
The sensation of that mischievous hand still lingered.
"Thank goodness—in the end he didn't stay. He's all talk, but he didn't actually do anything."
"He still knows his limits."
As she sighed,
Yukino Yukinoshita's gaze drifted involuntarily to her own hand, and the feeling of Lin Ye holding her hand and copping a feel just now surfaced unbidden in her mind.
A brand-new experience, utterly different, leaving her in a mood she couldn't quite put into words.
The sensation now lingering on her hand brought Yukinoshita more palpitations—it felt more real to her than the question of how Lin Ye had gotten Hayama to talk.
Comparing the two, Yukinoshita cared more about the former.
A little while later,
Yukino Yukinoshita rose, took out her pajamas, and headed for the bathroom.
She'd take a bath and then rest.
She was a bit tired today too.
...
After leaving Yukinoshita's place, Lin Ye first went over to Ryou Fujibayashi's.
These past few days, he went over to Ryou Fujibayashi's place every single day—it was his way of caring for and looking after the girl.
Though text chats and voice chats could also put the girl at ease, in the end it was always a little better for Lin Ye to meet her in person and talk.
"Come in!"
Faced with Lin Ye's arrival, Kyou Fujibayashi had grown accustomed to it as well.
This time, after opening the door, she actively gestured for Lin Ye to enter.
In the past, this would have been absolutely impossible.
Even now, Lin Ye still felt the slightest sense of unreality.
After all, Kyou Fujibayashi had no memory of the time in the instance, no memory at all of his rescue actions within the instance, yet now, on the strength of words and some information, she chose to believe and accept.
When it came down to it, Kyou Fujibayashi was after all a kind and reasonable girl.
Otherwise she'd have made a fuss and picked a fight unreasonably.
"Lin-kun,"
Ryou Fujibayashi was in the living room; she hadn't stayed in her room.
Just now, she rose to her feet, though her steps were a touch uncoordinated.
"Is your body still not feeling well?"
"I'm fine!"
Ryou Fujibayashi raised a smile.
"How could she possibly feel fine? Don't you realize that day was Ryou's first time, you..."
Kyou Fujibayashi rolled her eyes.
As the older sister, she too had experienced it that night—every sensation she had personally gone through and experienced—except for the after-pain; that, she didn't have.
Her little sister was different: hers was the real experience, and all the traces left after a first time remained.
"Sister, don't say it!"
"What's there to be shy about? We're all family here."
Ryou Fujibayashi was stunned, because this was the first time her sister had spoken of Lin Ye this way, calling Lin Ye family—did that mean she'd completely accepted Lin Ye?
And Kyou Fujibayashi realized her sister's thoughts too. "Don't get the wrong idea, don't overthink it. 'Family' is relative—I mean closer to us than other people, that's all."
"I understand, I understand,"
Lin Ye's attitude made Kyou Fujibayashi's face flush red, not knowing what to do with herself.
"I'm going to the kitchen."
With that, Kyou Fujibayashi's 'tap-tap-tap' footsteps headed toward the kitchen. She opened the refrigerator and took out the dessert inside.
"Eat yourself to death,"
She carried the dessert to the living room and set it on the coffee table.
"Just bought today,"
She then poured Lin Ye a glass of water.
But Lin Ye didn't drink; instead he pointed at it. "You didn't slip something into it again, did you!"
Kyou Fujibayashi gritted her teeth.
That night she had indeed slipped something in, which ultimately led to Lin Ye and her little sister getting together.
"There's no need for that. The promise between us is already over, I have no need to drug you. I'm not about to hand myself over to you—you're not worthy of having me yet,"
She lifted her little head, and instead seemed a bit self-assured.
"Not interested. Having Ryou is enough,"
His disdainful look made the corner of Kyou Fujibayashi's mouth twitch, her expression turning sour.
Meanwhile, her little sister Ryou Fujibayashi was smiling like a blooming flower. She wanted to laugh, yet felt laughing wasn't quite appropriate.
"Ryou is mine,"
Kyou Fujibayashi hugged Ryou Fujibayashi, her eyes carrying both warning and showing off.
"Sister, it's hot,"
"It's not hot at all, not the least bit hot."
She suspected even more that this was her little sister's excuse—she must want her to let go and then go into that man's embrace.
So she could less afford to let go. If that really happened, she'd be heartbroken, truly heartbroken.
Ryou Fujibayashi was helpless.
A few minutes later,
Kyou Fujibayashi finally let go.
By then Lin Ye had finished the water and the dessert. With a complicated expression he looked toward Kyou Fujibayashi. "Kyou Fujibayashi, I never thought you were this kind of person."
"Hm?"
Kyou Fujibayashi slowly put out a question mark.
What was going on? What did Lin Ye mean by that look?
"You didn't slip something into the water, but in the cake..."
"Huh?"
She let out a sound of astonishment.
"Sister, you, you..."
Ryou Fujibayashi glared wide-eyed at her own sister,
and at the same time she thought of herself—her body had recovered quite a bit, not completely, but if needed, she could manage.
That night's experience left Ryou Fujibayashi now both nostalgic and afraid.
There was no helping it—what came after that experience had truly been too terrifying for her.
But for the person she liked, she could manage.
"No, no, I absolutely did not, it has nothing to do with me."
Kyou Fujibayashi waved her hands in repeated denial, not wanting to be misunderstood.
"But..."
"It's a joke,"
Lin Ye smiled. "Looks like Miss Fujibayashi didn't slip anything in after all."
"You... jerk,"
Kyou Fujibayashi suddenly caught on, her face revealing anger,
"Compared to a certain someone who really did slip something in before, I seem a lot better,"
"..."
"Hmph,"
Kyou Fujibayashi was still displeased.
Ryou Fujibayashi breathed a sigh of relief, but with a touch of regret as well.
"It's about time, I should be going too."
"Eh, do you still have to go back?"
Ryou Fujibayashi had actually intended for Lin Ye to stay.
"A certain girl isn't exactly going to welcome me."
"Hmph,"
This response counted as Kyou Fujibayashi's attitude—she really had been worried Lin Ye would stay. What if the night turned out like that again? What would she do then?
The soundproofing at home wasn't bad, but it could probably still be heard!?
She thought.
"I'll come see you again later, Ryou. Be sure to rest and recover properly,"
"Mm."
Lin Ye said goodbye to the two sisters and left.
"Sister,"
After Lin Ye left, Ryou Fujibayashi's reproachful voice rang out.
"You forget your sister the moment you have a man—I really will be heartbroken."
"No, that's not it!"
"Isn't it, though? And the reason he didn't want to stay today clearly wasn't because of me—it was because he had something to do. He must have gone to find another woman,"
Kyou Fujibayashi had this intuition, and dared to stake everything on it.
It was her intuition as a woman.
...
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