Vol 1 Chapter 4 – Starting to Feel Something?【Volume 1: The Road to Romance】

Sandai settled onto the living room sofa and waited for Shino to finish, half-watching the typhoon coverage.

The newscaster and a meteorologist guest went back and forth in that endless, practiced way of theirs. From what he gathered, the effects would drag on until morning.

“The storm has slowed somewhat in its northward track…”

“A reduction in speed after landfall isn’t particularly unusual. We can expect heavy rain and strong winds to continue through the early morning hours.”

He sat there with his chin in his hand, staring at the screen without really watching it, until about twenty minutes later, when Shino came back.

Her face was still faintly pink — but nothing like the moment right after the underwear situation had come to light. She’d recovered. The color had gone from alarming to merely noticeable.

“…All done?”

“Yep. Oh — sorry for not asking first, but I used the dryer. I saw it was there.”

“I don’t mind. Use whatever you need.”

“Thanks. …Still, a dryer built right into the apartment. That must have cost something.”

“No idea if it’s expensive or not — it came with the unit. Rental properties have gotten a lot better about amenities lately, so it’s not that unusual. …Anyway, what did you do with the uniform after?”

“Smoothed it out so it wouldn’t lose its shape, then hung it over there.”

She pointed to the corner of the room, where she’d managed to hook a hanger onto a small ledge jutting from the wall.

“You didn’t have to tuck it all the way in the corner.”

It wasn’t like space was an issue. There were perfectly reasonable spots to hang something. He was about to say as much — but then he caught Shino looking down at her feet, fidgeting slightly, and this time, unlike during the laundry incident, he understood immediately.

Her underwear was hanging there, too. She’d wanted it somewhere out of the way.

“Actually — that corner might be the best spot. It’s close to the air conditioning unit. Even with the dryer, the uniform might still be a little damp. Hanging it there with the dehumidifier running should sort it out completely.”

He said it casually and reached over to adjust the AC settings. Shino quietly let out a breath.

I’ll make a point of not going near that corner. He filed the resolution away without ceremony.

☆

“Uuugh~”

“Groaning at it won’t change anything.”

Past eleven, with the typhoon making direct landfall outside, the two of them were playing a video game.

Sandai had been drifting through typhoon coverage when Shino announced she wanted to do something, so he’d dug the old console out of the storage closet.

The hardware and the games were both about ten years old — nowhere near current — but playable enough.

(I begged Dad for this when I was little. Told him I’d play it with friends once I made some. Friends never happened. Couldn’t bring myself to throw it out either. …Funny that it’s actually getting used now.)

Sandai was technically an otaku, but his habits ran more toward late-night anime than games. Playing alone had never appealed to him much. For anything single-player, he’d usually just watch someone else’s playthrough online and call it enough.

“These NPCs are way too strong, aren’t they?”

“I did set them to the lowest difficulty. They’re still surprisingly aggressive.”

The game was a party board game — the kind with minigames scattered throughout — designed to be approachable for newcomers. Both settings were as easy as they went. And yet somehow one of the NPCs had taken an insurmountable lead and was lapping the board.

It was the kind of dominant, sustained performance that made a person wonder if something had broken.

“This stage is rigged. Start over and pick a different one.”

Shino had clearly decided she would not lose to this and was now loudly petitioning for a reset.

“…Fine, we can switch.”

No particular reason to say no. Sandai restarted and let her pick the stage.

This time, the NPC immediately became much more manageable.

So it had been a bug after all — not that it mattered much, because by the midpoint of the new game, Shino had taken the lead and was now running away with it herself.

“Yes! This is basically my win already!”

“My turn now, let’s see…”

“You might as well be playing for second place at this point. Tough luck~”

She was grinning and insufferable about it. Sandai rolled the dice.

He landed on an item square and picked it up—a rare one — the kind that let you swap positions with another player.

“Well, well…”

He glanced at Shino. The easy confidence had vanished from her face. She had both hands pressed over her mouth, making a small, panicked noise.

“Y-you’re not going to use it… right?”

“I’m not really that fussed about winning or losing, so.”

“Oh, thank goodness…”

“But it’d be a waste to get something like this and not use it.”

He pressed the button.

Their positions on the board swapped. He vaulted straight into first place.

“You liar~!”

She was half-laughing, half-wailing, and had started hitting him on the shoulder in a quick, light flurry of protests.

It was — honestly — kind of cute.

He felt a smile pull at the corner of his mouth before he could stop it —

— and then the room went dark.

A crack of thunder, close and violent, and every light cut out at once.

A blackout.

Both of them went still, eyes wide, staring into the sudden dark.