The Story Of How I, A Gloomy Guy, Ended Up Surrounded By the Top-Tier Beautiful Girls In Class After A Seat Change - Chapter 215-216

Chapter 215: The Dark Pot Party’s About to Start, Yo!

Anyway, the dark pot party kicked off.

First off, they chased the older sister—who’d brought in that ridiculous bomb of an ingredient—up to the second floor. Then they lit the gas stove on the big table, and the six of them sat around the pot.

“Alright then, after all that mess, let’s get this dark pot party started—!”

Airi made the opening announcement, her massive breasts bouncing up and down as she spoke.

They’re huuuuge… nope, focus—it’s dark pot time right now.

“So, what’s the rules for this dark pot thing? A high-class, total shut-in loner guy like me has zero knowledge about these flashy extrovert events, y’know.”

“High-class or total crap—which one is it?”

“Mostly crap loner. That’s me.”

No matter how you slice it, the only people who get excited about throwing random stuff together to make some weird soup are extroverts. No doubt about it.

“Alright, Airi will explain the rules!”

Airi, the one who’d suggested the whole event, puffed out her big chest and started explaining.

“In Airi’s version of the dark pot party, you first get a pot with hot water ready. Then everyone closes their eyes, and one by one you open them, put the ingredient you brought into the pot!”

Airi said that and pointed at the pot that only had hot water with a faint bit of steam rising from it.

“After that, you put the lid on and let it simmer until the pot’s done. Right before you take the lid off, everyone announces what they put in! How’s that? Sounds fun, right?”

I see… yeah, with those rules it really does feel like a proper dark pot party and kinda fun.

Surprisingly, even extroverts actually think stuff through when they plan parties (mysterious admiration).

Well, to be honest, when you’re putting your ingredient in you can kinda see what the person before you added.

“Let’s jump right in then! Order is—well, since it’s a special occasion, we’ll go left from Ryota!”

“What do you mean ‘special occasion’!?!”

But if I’m first, that means I won’t know anything until it’s time to announce what we put in.

Well, that actually sounds pretty fun too.

And so, it was decided that I’d be the first one to toss my ingredient into the pot.

While the other five stayed quiet with their eyes closed, I—the first in line—opened my eyes and dumped the ‘grated kelp’ I’d prepared just for this dark pot party straight into the pot.

Even if it’s a dark pot, when you think of hot pot, kelp is classic.

Plus, by using grated kelp, my strategy was to create that super slimy texture and freak the five of them out.

By the way, what the heck did the other five bring?

The one who suggested it, Airi, probably brought something crazy, but I was just hoping the rest brought normal stuff.

While thinking that, I closed my eyes again.

—

Chapter 216: Super Perverted Dark Pot and an Unexpected Turn

“Alrighty then! Now that everyone’s ingredients are in, how about we do the announcement of what we put in before we open the lid!”

Airi took charge like the host and, once everyone had finished adding their stuff to the dark pot, they all opened their eyes. What they saw was—a pot with a really weird smell drifting out of it.

The lid was still on, so they couldn’t tell what was inside… but no matter how you looked at it, the contents were definitely gonna be bad.

“Man, it seriously stinks though.”

Yuria pinched her nose with her fingers and spoke in a funny voice.

“I bet Ryota-kun dumped some weird liquid in there, didn’t he?”

“Why’s it automatically my fault!? The one who always does that is Tanaka! It’s you!”

“Why me!? That’s just prejudice!”

Tanaka suddenly switched to playing the victim.

It was just one prejudice slamming into another, that’s all.

“Whoa whoa~, okay everyone! Before we open the lid, let’s check what everyone put in, yeah? Starting with Ryota!”

“O-okay.”

Since Airi picked me first, I went ahead and announced my ingredient.

“I put in [Grated Kelp]. It’s simple, tastes good in a hot pot, and if it gets mixed with the other stuff it’ll add just a bit of that dark pot vibe, I thought.”

“Wow, for Ryota-kun that’s actually pretty normal.”

“Normal? What did you guys think I was gonna put in then?”

“Well, you’re such a super perverted Ryota-kun, so I figured you’d throw in something like drinkable lo●●●n or a really thick wiener or something.”

“I wouldn’t put that in! Hey Tanaka, there are juniors here who won’t get dirty jokes, so don’t say weird stuff!”

While listening to me and Tanaka talk, Nozomi just sat there looking totally blank.

By the way, Yuria had turned her face away, desperately holding back laughter. Airi seemed to kinda sense the mood and gave an awkward smile. As for Rui, she was staring at us with a cool, straight face.

“Um, seniors… lo●●●n means lubricant, right? So why does everyone look so awkward about it?”

“Ah—well, that’s… still a bit early for Nozomi, I guess.”

“Yeah, yeah! It’s an adult topic, so once you study properly, you’ll understand it someday, Nozomi-san!”

“Shut up, Tanaka. Go do your lube sumo by yourself.”

“H-hey, that’s mean!”

Once Tanaka’s solo lube sumo match was officially decided, we went back to announcing the ingredients.

“Next in order is Nozomi-chan!”

“Y-yes! Um, I brought Haribo that was at my house. I’ve loved it ever since I came to Japan and I eat it all the time.”

“Haribo, huh. You suddenly pulled out your returnee-from-abroad character again…”

“It’s not a character! I’m a proper returnee from abroad!”

Nozomi puffed out her cheeks in a cute-but-calculated way.
Just from stuff like that, the whole “I’m playing a character” vibe was super strong!

“Okay, Airi will announce too! Airi went to her favorite snack shop and bought a mystery snack assortment pack! I dumped the whole thing in at once, so who knows what’s in there!”

“For real!? Sweet ones and salty ones too?”

“Yup!”

Don’t just innocently say “yup!” like that!

Most of those cheap snacks are the kind that melt right away, so they’re gonna turn into the same slimy mess as the grated kelp!

“Alright, my turn. I put in condensed milk. I figured everyone would bring salty stuff, so I deliberately went for the opposite.”

“Ehh! Condensed milk’s gonna make it all super sweet!”

“That’s the fun part of a dark pot, right?”

Yuria explained her choice of condensed milk in that typical over-the-top extrovert way… but in this whole group, I was the only one who knew the real reason she’d picked it.

She probably saw the latest episode of [Milk-kyun] where Milk-tan kept splashing her milk-tan (very meaningful) all over the enemy, and chose it after seeing that super white stuff.

She’s completely under the control of [Milk-kyun]… this super perverted otaku gal.

“So? What about you, Rui?”

“Me? Hehe, mine’s a little embarrassing though.”

Rui said that with a shy little laugh and suddenly looked straight at me.
Huh? Why me?

“I… picked out only the alphabet macaroni letters R, Y, O, T, and A from the pack at home and brought them, Ryota-kun♡”

…Huh?
Just the letters from my name?

“H-hey, Ryota-kun! Did you do something to Kuroki-san again? The fact that it’s all boiled up means she’s seriously mad at you.”

Tanaka whispered into my ear, her face turning pale.
Even if she says that, I can’t think of anything I did to make Rui angry…

If there was something… maybe it was when I asked her to retake that selfie because her belly button—the thing she’s most proud of—didn’t show up in the picture I got? Or she got annoyed having to retake it with the belly button visible?

Or maybe during election season when I was too busy every day to write comments on the selfies she kept sending, so I just left them on read and saved them in a folder like some lawless perverted creep?

Crap, there are way too many things that could piss Rui off, so let’s skip that for now (honestly I just don’t wanna keep thinking about it).

“Guess I’m last then! I put in green juice! This really screams dark pot, right! Right?”

“Green juice… yeah, that does sound like you. Yup.”

“Why are you giving me that cold smile!”

With everyone’s ingredients now revealed, we decided to open the lid right away.

Airi grabbed a towel in one hand and lifted the pot lid.
Then…

“Guh… what the hell is this smell!”

The mix of sweet, salty, bitter, and astringent smells was so tangled together that the usual word “chaos” didn’t even come close to describing how perfectly it fit. The smell just floated everywhere.

The broth had turned a cloudy brown, the cheap snacks had soaked it all up, turning the whole thing into a sticky, slimy pot that definitely needed mosaics. The color looked like it would destroy your sense of taste if you ate it.

“Wow, so luxurious! There’s so much stuff in there, it looks delicious!”

“Where exactly!?”

To Airi, anything with a bunch of different ingredients apparently counted as luxurious.

“No no, Miyama-senpai is right, it is luxurious! When I was overseas, my mom used to make soup like this all the time by mixing random ingredients!”

What kind of soup was she making!?
Don’t tell me she got tricked into thinking it was turtle soup or something…

“Whoa… the alphabet macaroni and the Haribo bears are swimming in cloudy water, all wrapped in kelp clothes.”

“Don’t say it out loud, Tanaka. I’m gonna puke.”

“Alright, since we went through all the trouble of simmering it, let’s eat together! Here, I’ll dish it out~”

Airi scooped the contents onto six big plates with a ladle and set them in front of everyone.
This wasn’t a dark pot anymore. This was straight-up a ge● pot.

“This is bad, right? Totally.”

“You can’t say that after splashing condensed milk everywhere, Yuria.”

“Hey, no saying ‘splash’!”

The fact that she reacted to that word proved it really was because of [Milk-kyun].

“Anyway! Let’s all eat on the count of three!”

“Ah, wait a sec.”

Right as Airi was about to give the signal, Rui stopped them.

“Ah—sorry everyone. My parents just called. Go ahead and eat without me.”

Rui said that and quickly slipped out of the room.
No way… did Rui sense the danger and run away?

“Sorry to Rui-chan, but let’s eat first.”

“Y-yeah.”

“Alright everyone, let’s dig in!”

At Airi’s command, all five of us brought our spoons to our mouths at once…… huh…… this is.

“”””””Nnnnnnnngggghhhhhh!?!!?!?””” “””

The moment it touched our tongues, everyone clapped their hands over their mouths.

“This is… guh.”

Alright, I’ll tell it exactly as it happened.

The second I put that chaos in my mouth, it felt like an electric shock ran through me and my consciousness just flew away.

I don’t know what the hell I was eating, but even I couldn’t tell what the taste was.
My tongue felt like it was about to break.

This wasn’t some cheap ge● or ge● stuff.
I had tasted a glimpse of something way more terrifying…

“Hehe… I thought it smelled dangerous from the start, and my perfect danger-sensing ability was perfect after all.”

While the other four collapsed onto the table with horrible expressions on their faces, that voice came from far away.

That was… R-Rui’s voice?

“But in the end, Ryota-kun’s past is now… all mine to keep♡”

Somewhere a phone shutter sound clicked, but the taste was so awful that I passed out, and I had no memory from the moment I blacked out until I woke up.