LIGHTNOVELONLINE Arc 3, Ch.3: Kittens are a nice topic
“...I want a shower”, he mumbled, and I froze.
In the end, did he think of it as disgusting after all? Too far to accept for him?
There is a considerable difference between kissing and this kind of thing...
Maybe he sensed that I was thinking up a misunderstanding since he explained.
“I feel sweaty and I want a reason to avoid you seeing my face for at least ten minutes.” His voice was beyond embarrassed.
“...I can’t look at you?”
“No.” He growled, and buried his head farther in my neck. “Not allowed. Not today.”
I sighed, long. Wistfully. Half in relief. If he was talking like this, I really wanted to see.
Alas, making Mizuki mad would just end up with me regretting it. And this reason was a much, much better one than what I had feared for a moment.
“Got it, I’ll close my eyes. The shower is in the room on the right of this one. I’ll… bring you towels and underwear. Should fit.”
“Wh-” He stopped mid-word. Not ‘why’, we obviously got dirty. He just pulled back without another word and I closed my eyes as he had said, disappointed at feeling his warmth leave me.
Steps, slightly wonky, went outside the room. Only then did I open my eyes and looked down at my hand which was covered in the thick, whitish fluid.
“...And I should probably wash up in the other bathroom”, I mumbled to myself, awkwardly stumbling forward and hoping that nothing would drip down my hand until I had washed it.
Sluggish with my returning sense of shame, I stumbled into the guest bathroom and scrubbed my hands under the running water. I needed to change my underwear, too, and honestly, I also wanted a shower-
My thoughts were running and running, jumping to meaningless topics, just away from what had just happened. I glanced up to the mirror - my face was flushed and from beneath my shirt, red marks peeked out where Mizuki had bitten me. I shuddered.
For some reason, I had a feeling that the peaceful balance of a pure relationship had broken down completely. Breaking past a barrier of wondering how Mizuki, who wasn't usually interested in guys, would react. The system whispered sweetly into my ear, even without a voice.
[The target does not mind the host taking the lead. He enjoys it.]
...Be quiet. Leave me alone.
[The host has no need to hold back. That much was obvious, wasn’t it? You can’t hurt him easily. His tolerance of what you can do far exceeds yours. You're more careful than he is.]
Yes yes, be quiet now!
[It’s fine to take your time, but there’s no need to wait forever, is there? In the end, dear host, what is the goal of a dating sim?]
[Tie your target to you so that they will stay with you forever.]
[To desire someone is not a bad thing. Prove that you want all of him, even all the weaker sides that he would prefer not showing.]
The system went back into hiding. I splashed my face with cold water and shook it until I was dizzy. Only then did I reach for a towel.
Since when did dating systems try to tempt you into jumping the target??
...Well, maybe the porn games did. But those were less focused on romance, in return.
The system’s words troubled me, mostly because I kept on feeling like it was taking some words too literally. Added to that, the sounds and imagery from just now and the fact that Mizuki reacted strongly to light pain and my logic went out of the window.
If you tell a virgin that their lover, whom they love greatly, would enjoy being 'tied' up and pushed into a complete defenseless situation…
I’m not the only one who is tempted here, am I?!
System, you’re turning me crooked! What are you trying to make me do to the guy I couldn’t even talk to a few weeks ago!
I felt like it snickered evilly, all with rubbing its hands together. Like Haru when she’s about to write a fanfiction.
I wandered back to my room to change underwear, then slowly walked to deliver some plus towels into the bathroom. The shower was behind an additional partition and had thick curtains, so there was no seeing behind it. (That was because Haru had started to complain about us guys sometimes mindlessly running into the bathroom even if the girls were in. Our lock had been broken for quite some time and Dad kept on forgetting about it. We all felt it made sense.)
“Mizuki”, I called out to warn him. “I’m leaving the stuff here.”
“Hm”, came from behind the curtain, the sound almost drowned by the loud splashing of the water.
My feet dragged me back to my room, where I fell onto my bed. God, I needed to get all of this out of my head or my family would see instantly that I had done something with my boyfriend. I absolutely didn’t want that.
While Mizuki was in the shower, I grabbed my phone and scrolled through my chats. The group chat with my friends was buzzing with action.
“Having a relationship is too tempting orz”, was what I wrote into it. The reactions came promptly.
‘Bragging.” “Bragging +1” “Bragging +2”
“Shut up. This is an actual problem”
‘Well I can see Mizuki clawing your throat out if you don’t control yourself’
‘Lol’
‘Am I the only one who thinks going out with a guy would be so much more uncomplicated than with a girl’
‘Nah I agree’
‘I should turn gay. Kaoru, be my girlfriend.’
‘Why am I the girl?!’
‘Cause you’re smaller, weaker and cuter than me’
‘Lol good luck in your new relationship’
“Congratulations. I’ll come to the wedding.”
‘Shut up!’
‘You could put him in a wedding dress. No one would know it’s a gay wedding’
I didn’t open the ten seconds voice message from Kaoru - very likely just very harsh curses - in favor of turning around to look at Mizuki who had just come back in.
The fresh-out-of-shower look was…
His icy expression had me break off the thought immediately. I winced and rubbed my neck.
“You allowed it. You can’t get mad now.”
I was being fully on the defensive again. Not a rare situation between the two of us.
“New rule”, he forced out between gritted teeth. I couldn’t tell whether his flushed cheeks were embarrassment or the shower’s temperature. Either way, I didn’t like where this was going. “Nothing beyond kissing unless it’s in a dark room.”
“...Translation: You’re not allowed to see me?”
“Exactly.”
"Whyyyyy!”
I dragged the word, long. A stupid question, of course, I had felt and heard his reaction first-hand so obviously, it would show on his face. He didn’t want to show me such an embarrassing thing, I could understand that. But understanding doesn’t mean I wasn’t unhappy with it. We had had that discussion before.
“I mean, are you going to hide it for the rest of your life? I’ll see it sometime, anyway!”
Mizuki jolted, then turned his eyes to me. They grew wide, his lips parted. Suddenly, deep crimson grew all over his face and he gritted his teeth.
The towel he had around his shoulders was thrown at me.
“What did I say?!”
Something else - probably a pillow from the ground - was thrown at me, as well.
Hmmmm, thinking about it, I maybe shouldn’t have said ‘for the rest of your life’? Does that count as a proposal?
Whoops.
I stopped struggling and let him throw stuff at me.
Go ahead, bury me.
You can’t see me, I can’t see you.
Yep. That sounds like the best solution for right now. Great idea.
The room was full of the weird, immaturely embarrassing atmosphere. I hadn’t intended to talk like that, it was the system’s fault. It kept on repeating that Mizuki was someone I would keep by my side for my whole life, so often that I had gotten used to it. It just slipped out.
“I think we should find a safer topic. Like… kittens. Or the weather”, I mumbled from below a pile of pillows.
“Kirumi wants a kitten”, he spat out from somewhere close to me.
Oh yay, we changed the topic. Thank god.
