After parting ways with Haruka, Ryunosuke let out a long, mournful sigh.
"That's six now, isn't it? I wonder if my kidneys can hold out."
On reflex, he pressed a hand to his lower back and groaned. Then he pulled out the three remaining letters, sorted through them, and considered the order. He intended to respond to each of them properly, at the very least by explaining his situation honestly. If they still wanted to accept him after that, then he would simply have to resign himself to it.
He decided to deal with Yotsuba's letter first. His reason was simple: he needed to find out what exactly he had promised that girl when they were children. If it was what he suspected, some kind of childhood marriage promise, then...
Even imagining it made him shudder. How was he supposed to navigate a relationship involving quintuplets? He stopped thinking about it. He would get his answers tomorrow when he met her, and that was soon enough.
◆━⊰✿✧✿⊱━◆
The next day, Sunday.
Ryunosuke arrived at the lakeshore and waited for Yotsuba.
Before long, a girl appeared in a white dress and a wide white sun hat. Long straight hair the pale pink of cherry blossoms and a broad forehead, the shared features of the quintuplets, making it genuinely difficult to know at a glance which one he was looking at.
(This should be Yotsuba. Or is it one of her sisters in disguise?)
He didn't dare assume. He knew the five of them well enough, not from recovered memories but from his previous life's knowledge. They were entirely capable of swapping places to test him on Yotsuba's behalf.
Then the girl spoke. "My name is Rena. It's been such a long time, Akasaka-kun~"
The figure presenting herself as Rena greeted him warmly, whichever sister she actually was.
The weather had turned properly cold, but she was dressed lightly, apparently recreating something from ten years ago in hopes of triggering his memory.
Ryunosuke took off his jacket and draped it over her shoulders without a word. Rena flinched slightly at the contact, then accepted it. Her exposed shoulders had already gone red from the cold. A faint blush crept across her face as she murmured with awkward shyness.
"Th-thank you."
(Right. That's definitely not Yotsuba. Yotsuba would never react like that. That kind of reaction is either Miku or Itsuki.)
His guess was on target. The girl in front of him wasn't Yotsuba at all, but one of the other sisters in disguise. Meanwhile, the real Yotsuba was hidden in the bushes nearby, watching everything unfold.
The green ribbon on her head was twitching like a pair of rabbit ears; she was clearly overwhelmed with feeling. She had been so desperate for Ryunosuke to remember their shared memories that she had asked Itsuki to play the role of herself. Itsuki had already figured out who Ryunosuke really was.
Back at the lake, Ryunosuke and Rena, who was actually Itsuki, decided to go out on the water. They climbed into a white swan-shaped paddleboat, and Rena twirled a strand of hair around her finger, speaking in a voice full of nostalgia.
"When we were little, we used to ride boats and play at the lakeside too."
Ryunosuke stopped pedaling. "What were we doing at the lakeside in a boat back then?"
"Oh~" Rena pressed a finger to her chin as though trying to recall. "I think you were being chased by debt collectors, and you grabbed my meat bun. I kept chasing you to get it back. Then somehow we both ended up in a boat and escaped together."
The corner of Ryunosuke's mouth twitched.
(You just gave yourself away completely, Itsuki. Only you would bring up the meat bun.)
He already knew exactly who she was. The detail was too characteristic to belong to anyone else. But he kept the act going and pedaled them out toward the middle of the lake.
From shore, Yotsuba and Miku were watching through binoculars. Miku, who had also remembered who Ryunosuke was, puffed her cheeks out in indignation.
"Akasaka deserves to suffer. Harakiri!"
Of the five sisters, the only ones who still hadn't remembered were Ichika and Nino. That was understandable; a lot of time had passed. The three who had spent the most time with Ryunosuke back then were Yotsuba, Itsuki, and Miku, while Ichika and Nino had only overlapped with him briefly.
Miku grumbled, "If we're talking about timing, we knew him ten years before Sakayanagi Arisu ever showed up. On what grounds does she get to take him from us?"
Yotsuba lowered the binoculars and said quietly, "But Akasaka-san has forgotten all of us. Including the promise."
Miku fell silent, unable to argue with that.
Out on the water, Ryunosuke went straight to the point. "What exactly was the promise I made with all five of you when we were children?"
Itsuki, absorbed in her storytelling, didn't catch immediately that he had said "all five of you." Her cover was already blown, but she kept talking without stopping.
"The promise was that when you grew up, you would marry all five of us as your wives."
She said it with a note of pride, then realized what she had done and went completely still. Her eyes glistened as she looked at him. "C-can I take that back? Is it too late?"
"What do you think?" Ryunosuke felt genuinely at a loss. "You've already been caught. Don't bother hiding it. I know it's you, Itsuki."
Itsuki puffed her cheeks out in dissatisfaction and turned her face away in a sulk. Ryunosuke, somewhere between exasperated and fond, reached over and ruffled the dark reddish-brown ahoge at the top of her head, exactly the way he apparently used to when they were small.
"I'm sorry. I genuinely don't remember any of it. The promise included." He pointed at his own head. "I think my skull got hit with a brick at some point. A portion of my memories disappeared with it."
The explanation was weak and he knew it. Itsuki clearly didn't believe a word. Not long after, the boat reached the shore. Ryunosuke stepped out first and extended a hand to help her.
Itsuki took it without hesitation.
He pulled her up onto solid ground, and then, without any warning, pulled her into a hug. "If I really made that kind of promise back then, I'll take responsibility for it. But can you give me a little time to get ready?"
Itsuki's face went the color of a ripe tomato. Her thoughts came to a complete halt, and her eyes spun in slow, dazed circles. Yotsuba and Miku, watching from the bushes, couldn't take it anymore and came bursting out into the open.
Yotsuba immediately pulled the thoroughly flustered Itsuki into her arms like a mother hen gathering a chick. She stared at Ryunosuke with a look that was equal parts wariness and jealousy.
(What's this? You're not like that with me, but you go and hug Itsuki? That's not fair. Yotsuba wants a hug too.)
Miku puffed her cheeks out. "You were always like this. Who exactly taught you to charm girls this way?"
Ryunosuke scratched the back of his head awkwardly. Growing up in his mother's care had put him through enough that most of this was pure instinct by now.
Miku pointed at him. "You're guilty. Go do harakiri!"
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