I Got Dumped by My Childhood Friend Fiancée Who I Didn’t Even Like, I Thought I Could Finally Have a Peaceful School Life… But Then I Got Targeted by SS-Class Beautiful Young Ladies - Chapter 8

Chapter 8: [Yandere] So You Exchanged LINE with Another Girl…

“So it really was that puzzle game you were practicing super hard on before, huh.”

“Y-Yeah…”

Senpai gave a tiny nod.

She was probably the weakest at games out of those three by a pretty big margin.

And yet—after I started coaching her, she suddenly showed this crazy, abnormal improvement.

That’s exactly why Tachibana and Shiramine got suspicious about her growth curve. Totally understandable. It’d honestly be weirder if they didn’t find it fishy.

“…Why’d you go and tell them I was the one teaching you?”

“Um, well… it’s like…”

“…I told you, right? I hate standing out. If you dropped my name to those two, I’d end up right in the crosshairs… You didn’t think about that?”

“I… I did think about it… yeah…”

Her voice kept getting smaller and weaker.

Her eyes drifted away from me and dropped down to her own hands, which were clenched tightly in her lap. She looked exactly like a little kid getting scolded.

But what’s done is done. Yelling at her now wouldn’t change anything, and I knew that. Still, I really wanted to know the reason. I just couldn’t believe she’d spilled it out of malice.

“I’m not mad or anything, okay? I just wanna know why.”

I softened my tone a little and asked again.

For some reason, she looked kinda disappointed and went,

“…Huh? You’re not gonna get mad?”

“Uh, yeah… I mean, getting mad now wouldn’t really do anything…”

“Oh… um… but it’s totally fine if you wanna scold me? If you’re still super pissed, you can even hit me or whatever…”

Those eyes—like she was actually hoping for it—and those words.

Seeing that hungry, wanting look on her face made me feel a tiny bit of danger as I opened my mouth.

“I’m not gonna do that. What do you even think I am…?”

“You’re… not gonna…? Hmm, okay… That’s too bad…”

For a second I thought I heard something weird, but I ignored the soft little “too bad” she tacked on at the end and locked eyes with her properly.

“So… you gonna tell me?”

“Y-Yeah… um, so…”

“Yeah?”

“I… kinda… wanted to brag about you a little bit, Yoichi…”

Her cheeks flushed just a tiny bit as she said it in this super quiet, almost vanishing voice.

I blinked, taking a second to even process what she meant.

“…Brag?”

“Y-Yeah…”

She nodded awkwardly, still not lifting her eyes, and kept going.

“‘Cause… like, when they suddenly ask why I got so much better out of nowhere… right?”

“Well… yeah, I guess so.”

“And then… I was like, ‘Actually, this super amazing person taught me!’ …and when I said that…”

She paused there, squeezing her fingertips even tighter.

“…It gave me this little rush of superiority… and it just felt really nice…”

It was way lighter—and way more human—than any reason I’d been expecting.

My shoulders relaxed just a bit without me realizing.

“So that’s how you ended up getting cornered by the two of them and spilling everything…?”

She nodded over and over while I let out a sigh.

Looking at this conglomerate heiress reacting like that, I couldn’t help but give a wry smile inside.

—Minase-senpai is actually way more airheaded than people think.

From the outside, she seems perfect, unapproachable, impossible to read—at least that’s the image.

But in reality, she gets seriously upset when she loses at games, sulks over dumb little things, and right now she’s feeling weirdly smug about something and then self-destructing because of it.

Just… a totally normal girl her age.

…Okay, maybe “totally normal” is pushing it.

In her case, everything’s just dialed up to an extreme.

While I was thinking that, I glanced out the car window and noticed we’d entered a familiar area.

“…But,”

Minase-senpai suddenly murmured, almost like she was talking to herself.

She kept going in this quiet voice.

“…The one who actually connected the rumors to you… wasn’t me or Azucchi, okay? And the one who started pushing to get you into the club? That was all Charlotte-chan.”

“…Got it.”

“So the real details of why… only Charlotte-chan knows that part. That’s… the truth, okay?”

Yeah, when they kidnapped me earlier, Tachibana herself said she was the one who told the other two to go full forceful mode.

So the reason they linked the rumors to me… that’s something only she knows, huh.

Including how hard she is to pin down, maybe she’s actually way more capable than I give her credit for. Since I’m gonna be stuck dealing with her from now on, she’s definitely someone I can’t let my guard down around.

As I quietly tightened my mental alert level toward this person I’d be forced to interact with going forward, my phone buzzed in my pocket with a notification.

When I checked—good timing or bad timing, the sender was exactly the person I was just thinking about being cautious of.

On the screen was just one single stamp that politely said “Looking forward to working with you!”

If you only looked at this, she seemed like a completely normal high-school girl, and I couldn’t help letting out a little tired laugh.

I sent back a single stamp just like hers, and right then I felt this creepy vibe coming from the side…

When I turned to look, Minase-senpai was smiling with just her mouth while tilting her head, her eyes completely empty.

“Um, senpai…? What’s up?”

“You look like you’re having fun chatting with someone… That LINE… is it a girl???”

“Y-Yeah… I mean, having fun? The person I’m talking to right now is Tachibana-san—the one we were just talking about…?”

I was trying to say I wasn’t actually enjoying it since it was her of all people, but conversations are hard, and it didn’t seem like that came across.

The light vanished from deep in her eyes as something like irritation seeped through. Slowly, she opened her mouth.

“You never exchanged LINE with me even though we’ve known each other forever… but you immediately exchanged with another girl?”

As she said it, she dropped a cold stare onto my phone screen.

“N-No… when you say ‘another girl,’ I haven’t exchanged with Shiramine-san either? I only swapped with Tachibana-san just for club stuff going forward…”

I had no idea why I was suddenly making excuses like some cheating boyfriend, but the bad feeling was so strong I blurted it out anyway.

But judging from senpai’s face right after I said it—even without understanding why—I could easily tell I’d just poured gasoline on the fire—

“That’s exactly why it’s a problem.”

She muttered that under her breath.

And right after—

She suddenly closed the physical distance, pushing me all the way against the window.

“S-Senpai…? What’s with the sudden—?”

I asked, totally lost, but she didn’t answer right away. Instead she wedged her knee between my legs, then spoke with this pasted-on smile.

“Hey, Yoichi… don’t tell me… you like Charlotte-chan?”

“…Huh?”

“Yeah, right? She’s got that classy vibe… and she’s super cute, isn’t she?”

“W-What are you even talking about? Your face is way too close…”

She kept saying random stuff with no connection while slowly bringing her face closer and closer.

The insane distance made me instinctively reach for the door handle, but the second she flicked some kind of signal with one hand, the door locked with a click.

Now that I had zero escape in this space, Minase-senpai smiled in satisfaction.

Then she lightly tugged on my tie,

“I’m not letting you get away, Yoichi♡”