"Sawamura-san, are you all right?"
Mio sat up slowly and looked at Eriri, whose expression had gone a little dazed. She asked it with practiced innocence.
"N-Nothing. I just… I was just wondering why you're so devoted to this kind of reference gathering." It wasn't entirely a deflection—she genuinely found Mio strange. And it struck her that Mio was always the passive party whenever they did this. Very M energy.
"Because experiencing it firsthand is the best way to really feel it~"
"Does that actually help your work?" Eriri was skeptical.
"It does. If Sawamura-san ever hits a creative wall, you should try it—you might be surprised~"
"What about you? When you're drawing your doujins, do you find people for that kind of research too?"
"I'd honestly love to try," Mio said, completely straight-faced. "I'm not exactly the casual type, though. But if it were Sawamura-san… I might actually consider it seriously."
Lying through her teeth with a completely straight face—that was Shirai Mio right now.
Since transmigrating, the most she'd ever done was experiment on her own. As for that kind of thing—she genuinely hadn't tried it yet. And she was, if she was being honest with herself, a little curious what it would feel like.
Eriri avoided Mio's gaze—that smile of hers was saturated with something that made Eriri's thoughts go somewhere inconvenient. She knew perfectly well Mio was messing with her. But being looked at like that still made her uncomfortable. Or rather: made her brain conjure up completely unrealistic scenarios.
System update:
Task complete. Eriri's conquest rating increased by 3 points—now sitting at exactly 25. Difficulty tier advancing.
Future Eriri-related tasks will be considerably harder.
As for the reward, Mio selected [Eriri's Drawing Technique]again. A few more levels and she'd be able to draw even lewder—
Ahem.
Mio carefully flipped through the printed sample one last time, closed it, and slid it into her bag. "I don't see any problems. I'll go over it once more when I get home, and I'll message you once I've confirmed everything's fine."
"You're heading out already? Why not stay for dinner?"
Eriri actually enjoyed talking with Mio. In real life, Mio was the only person she could talk to this freely and openly without holding anything back. Her childhood friend Aki Tomoya knew her identity too—but he was a guy, and some topics just didn't translate well across that gap.
Mio hesitated. Then made up her mind.
"I'm sorry, today probably isn't the best day. Next time, when I have the time, I'll come back. As long as Sawamura-san doesn't get tired of me by then."
"As long as you keep the reference gathering requests to a minimum, I won't."
Eriri delivered the light complaint with a perfectly straight face, then walked Mio out of her room and downstairs to the front door. She stayed there until Mio's white hair disappeared from view, then turned back inside.
She barely made it into the living room before she found her mother sitting there, watching her with an amused smile.
"What? Why are you looking at me like that?"
"Oh, nothing. I was just curious—what were you and that lovely white-haired girl doing up in your room? And why were you so bent on locking the door?"
"How do you know I locked the door?" Eriri's eyes narrowed. "Don't tell me you were standing outside eavesdropping. At your age."
She kept her voice assertive—but inwardly, she was a little worried. There'd been some conversation about reference gathering. The doujin talk would be fine. It was the research topics that could very easily sound like something else entirely.
Sawamura Sayuri blinked, looking rather caught out. "Of course not. I was just going to bring some tea up for you two, and found the door locked. It made me a little curious, that's all."
"Nothing to be curious about. We were just talking. And we're both girls—what could possibly happen?"
Sawamura Sayuri tilted her head.
"Well… who knows about that kind of thing?"
...
The next morning.
Mio arrived at the classroom with five minutes to spare before class, as usual. The moment she stepped through the door, her eyes went straight to Yuigahama Yui's seat.
It was empty.
She let out a small, quiet sigh.
She was reaching for her phone to send a quick message when a familiar voice came from directly behind her.
"Morning, Mio~"
Mio spun around on reflex. Yuigahama Yui was standing there, beaming with her usual radiant energy.
"Yui—your fever's down?" Mio couldn't hide the surprise in her voice.
Yui's smile brightened even further when she saw Mio's reaction. She nodded. "It broke. I'm feeling a lot better, so I came in."
"Really? Don't push yourself."
"I promise I'm fine." Still speaking, Yui stepped closer and pressed her forehead gently to Mio's—mirroring exactly what Mio had done to her the day before.
Mio hadn't expected that. For a half-second she'd thought Yui was about to do something far more dramatic.
Even so, she was surprised—surprised that Yui would do something like this in the middle of a classroom, of all places. Wasn't she worried about people getting the wrong idea?
As it turned out, more than a few classmates had already taken notice. Miura Yumiko among them. When she'd first seen Yui move in that close, she'd assumed they were about to kiss. She hadn't even realized how tense she'd gone until the moment she saw it was only a forehead touch—and quietly let out the breath she'd been holding.
"See? Fever's gone, right?"
"Yeah. Much better than yesterday."
Looking at Yui's face from this close, Mio couldn't quite shake the feeling that she was still about to do something.
...