The Heroines Want to Confess.

Wednesday, after seeing his mother off at the airport.

Sakurai returned home.

He needed a week to finish writing his self-criticism report — not too difficult, since it only had to be 3,000 characters total.

It was now the end of June; summer break would start at the end of July.

Just right to take advantage of the suspension period to finish his motorcycle license test.

He'd experienced living and studying alone at home before — in slightly chuunibyou terms, Sakurai Saki had long since become a strong individual who could endure extended solitude.

On the way home, he bought some vegetables.

After separating and storing the vegetables and meat properly, he headed to the living room and turned on the TV.

In a little while, he'd need to go to the Nakano quintuplets' house for tutoring, but for now, it was still morning — no need to rush.

Sakurai sprawled out on the sofa, hugging a blue orca-shaped pillow, and watched TV.

On the TV screen, a street interview program was airing.

[…Excuse me, you two — what are your thoughts on Japan's divorce rate staying high for so many years?]

The ones being interviewed were two high school girls walking together.

[…We're still high school students, so topics like this are a little too mature for us.]

[If you're going to get divorced, then why even get married? Isn't being single better? My boyfriend chews super loud, reeks like hell in the summer — I swear I'd rather die than marry a guy like that. Once I'm done playing around, I'll definitely switch to someone more reliable. Oh by the way, are you guys gonna blur my face out?]Said a girl dressed in a gyaru style.

Reporter: [We're broadcasting live.]

[...]The gyaru girl revealed a look of utter despair.

Sakurai pressed the button to change the channel.

[How to make ultra-delicious ramen…] — Tokyo TV.

Next channel.

[A fire broke out at a construction site near Minato, Tokyo. Fortunately, the blaze started around midnight, so no casualties were reported. The scene has been sealed off…]

Another channel.

[The new fanfic — "Fate: Love Game" — Translated by Curse Chef.…]

"So boring."

Unable to find anything interesting, Sakurai turned off the TV.

He hadn't slept well last night. Fortunately, today's superpower didn't have any side effects.

Today's power was Clairvoyance.

He could observe any location on Earth, but couldn't intervene remotely, nor hear any sound — fairly useless.

Bored during lunch break, Sakurai decided to use Clairvoyance to check the student council room.

In the vision that appeared, there were currently two people inside the student council room.

Ishigami Yuu and Shirogane Miyuki.

————

Ishigami Yuu was holding a manga volume, his face filled with deep thought.

"Myuu-senpai, in a shounen manga, is it normal to still not have any ecchi scenes even after chapter 50?"

( •̀ - •́ )

The manga in his hands — not only was there no fanservice, not even the edge of a pair of panties could be seen!

"Ishigami, this is the student council room. Bringing manga in here violates the rules." Shirogane Miyuki took a sip of milk, not quite catching what the other guy was saying.

"But, senpai, don't you find it weird? It's already chapter 50! And still no fan-service!"

Ishigami raised the manga above his head, trying to adjust the angle in the real world to somehow alter skirt gravity in the 2D world.

Clearly an idiotic move.

But Shirogane Miyuki didn't think so. After pondering for a moment, he asked in shock: "No fan-service at all?!"

And they call that shounen manga?

In anime, by episode 7 or 8 they should've already done a beach episode!

This manga doesn't even show underwear?!

"Show it! Author! Show the panties of the Heroines! What the hell are you even doing?!"

⁽⁽(੭ꐦ •̀Д•́ )੭*⁾⁾

Shirogane, holding a milk carton, sat down next to Ishigami.

Ishigami flipped a few pages for him to see.

"There's only thighs. Even though the area between the thigh-high socks and pleated skirt is indeed very seductive, and the author draws legs really well, but still…"

Shirogane followed up, "No panties."

"But it says it here…" Ishigami read word by word: "Full—boob—ex—posure."

"Don't talk about boob exposure while I'm drinking milk!" Shirogane shouted.

"I was talking about the bath chapter, but whatever, see for yourself," Ishigami said.

Shirogane took the manga and flipped through a few pages.

"Why is there so much fog?"

Not just the private areas — even the upper torso and thighs were completely covered in steam.

"This bathhouse has incredible quality!!"

‎(ﾉಥ益ಥ）ﾉ ┻━┻

Shirogane Miyuki gritted his teeth.

Before he could finish, the door to the student council room was knocked.

"Good afternoon, senpai. I'm here to deliver—" Iino Miko had just opened the door…

Behind the door—

"I CAN'T SEE ANY NIPPLES AT ALL!!"

ヽ༼ °益° ༽ﾉ

Shirogane Miyuki shouted at the top of his lungs.

Thud.

Miko: Σ(°Д°υ)

The stack of documents she was carrying fell all over the floor.

"P-… President Shirogane…"

Iino Miko was stunned, scared stiff, and collapsed onto the floor.

Shirogane turned his head around.

Cold sweat trickled down his forehead.

"That… Iino, we were just talking about…"

"Don't hurt me! My boobs are really small! My nipples are really tiny too!!"

(っ-ᯅ-ς)

Iino shrank back in terror, slowly crawling toward the door.

Shirogane looked at Ishigami — and realized he was frozen stiff too.

"Ishigami!! Quick!! Stop Iino!!"

"ROGER THAT!!"

Ishigami yelled and charged straight toward the door.

Just as Iino Miko was about to escape the student council room—

BAM!

The door slammed shut.

Iino clutched her chest, curled into a ball, her voice trembling like a frightened little deer:

"Yamete~…"

"That's illegal… My dad's a judge…"

"Don't come closer. Don't come near me!!"

༼;´༎ຶ ۝ ༎ຶ༽

Seeing things spiraling out of control, Shirogane quickly grabbed the manga and held it up in front of her:

"Iino!! Look at this!!"

—One minute later—

Miko, her face completely red, collected the manga:

"Bringing something like this to school violates the rules!!"

"And you two… actually dared to talk about… about girls' underwear and… nipples…"

The more Miko spoke, the redder her face became — steam practically rising from her head.

"This is terrible! This is wrong! This is shameless! Hentai!"

ᕙ( ᗒᗣᗕ )ᕗ

In front of her.

Ishigami Yuu and Shirogane Miyuki were kneeling on the ground, seriously listening to her moral lecture.

But… that manga wasn't even that bad.

If a manga doesn't have any fanservice, can it still be called manga?

This is shounen manga, for crying out loud! …Maybe Iino just doesn't get it?

"Why don't you two try being more like Sakurai-senpai! He never reads stuff like this!"

"Ishigami! Don't think just because you got a bit of attention at the sports festival, you can ignore school rules!"

Miko pointed directly at Ishigami's face and shouted.

Neither of them argued back.

To Miko, Sakurai-senpai was the image of perfection.

As for whether Sakurai Saki ever read weird magazines or manga like this… well, they weren't actually sure.

————

In the rented apartment.

Sakurai Saki had seen the whole scene just now. He more or less guessed what the conversation was about between the three of them.

It's just… why does Miko always seem to appear right when something bizarre is happening?

Was she the embodiment of a gatekeeper god or something?

"The novel I bought last time, I still haven't finished reading it," Sakurai muttered.

Then he got up and rummaged through the small bookshelf next to the sofa.

This was where he kept books for reading before bed.

Sakurai often read light novels to help himself fall asleep.

Grabbing the book, Sakurai lay back down on the sofa and started flipping through the pages.

Remembering how those two earlier had been flipping through manga like their lives depended on it, Sakurai tilted his head slightly, resting it on his orca-shaped pillow, and thought to himself:

"Why bother searching for something that doesn't even exist in shounen manga? It's clearly everywhere in real life."

He really couldn't understand the mindset of high school boys these days.