Even Today, the Genius High School Programmer Cashes In on Day Trades, Completely Flustered by Beautiful Girls' Growing Affection. - Chapter 48: I Had Forgotten Something Important.

I Had Forgotten Something Important.

Telegaram was different from Lime or any other messaging app. Its confidentiality level was extremely high. Once a message was deleted, no logs remained on the server or anywhere else. Because of that, it was frequently used by criminal organizations and scammers for communication… but that only made it more suspicious.

For an ordinary high-school girl to have something like this installed on her phone was unnatural.

“Smells fishy…”

I tapped the Telegaram icon.

There was only one contact registered: “Takayuki.”

Mizuno Takayuki, without a doubt. I opened the message screen.

***

Takayuki: Got some good stuff~ Hits instantly, seriously flies. Wanna do it next time?

Nanase: Sure, but is next time okay? Last time you ended up throwing up at the end.

Takayuki: It’s fine. This one’s mild and long-lasting.

Takayuki: I wanna fuck you after taking this.

Nanase: That’s fine, but… more importantly, there’s a girl I want you to punish a little.

Takayuki: Is she hot?

Nanase: She’s a refined beauty. But she uses those seductive eyes on guys and acts super arrogant.

Takayuki: For real? Then we definitely need to teach her a lesson. I’ll gather some buddies.

Takayuki: If we record a video, she’ll behave herself after that.

Nanase: I’m counting on you.

Takayuki: Or should we do it with three people again?

Nanase: Not with that girl. No way.

***

“…These bastards…”

My nails dug into my clenched fist. I could feel the blood in my entire body boiling over. I had never felt anger like this before. These people were rotten to the core!

Yukina had never even dated a guy before!

There was no way in hell I would let scum like them—filthy from drugs—lay even a single finger on her!

“I’ll make sure you can never show your faces in the light of day again!”

What should I do?

Go to the police? The school?

Spreading the information would be easy.

But how could I drag them straight down into hell?

No good. My head was too hot; I couldn’t think straight.

Calm down. Just calm down.

I took a deep breath.

Strip away all emotion.

This was the same as trading.

What am I doing right now? For what purpose? For whom? What is my objective?

At that moment, something gently floated up in my mind.

It was Yukina’s smile.

The bento she had made for me, handing it over with a shy, bashful expression.

Wearing a yukata, her eyes sparkling as she watched the fireworks.

Propping her cheek on her hand beside the bed, happily gazing at my face.

Yukina’s adorable smile had always been there.

Ah… that’s right.

I had forgotten something important.

The purpose of what I was doing right now.

There was only one.

To protect Yukina.

To shield her from every single disaster and misfortune.

I organized the problem once more.

If I publicly denounced Nanase and Takayuki, what would happen?

A desperate Nanase might do anything. Takayuki probably had connections to anti-social elements. There was a chance their retaliation would be aimed at Yukina. In that case, I might not be able to protect her completely.

So what then?

What were the other options?

From my cooled-down mind, the optimal solution emerged.

Personally, I didn’t like it.

I wasn’t fond of this method at all.

But it was probably the best way to keep Yukina safe.

I let out a small sigh.

“Carrot and stick, huh…”