Chapter 35
I had secretly made plans for an off-campus date with Millie, envisioning us relaxing at a stylish cafe, sipping on some incomprehensible drinks, and as it got dark, finding a spot with a great view of the night scenery—or so I planned.
This date was such a secret that even Millie didn’t know about it, so the biggest hurdle was getting her consent to go along with it. But I intended to play my trump card here: “I need to explain some things.” With this, I planned to skillfully lure Millie to a secluded location.
As a result, Millie ended up in my room.
I had set the suspicious condition that a secluded place would be best for the explanation, intending to guide her to a secluded cafe on the edge of town. But for some reason, either our dorm rooms or the Old School Building basement were the options Millie came up with.
And since it’s difficult for a guy to go to the girls’ dorm, and the basement was a bit much even for me… we ended up in my room by process of elimination.
“Heeh~. Geld-kun’s room is like this.”
“It’s normal, isn’t it? Is the layout different in the girls’ dorm?”
A small room of about five tatami mats, with a single bed, a desk, and a chair. Plus a small closet. That’s all there is to it. I haven’t added or removed any furniture since moving in.
“Hmm, if you say so, it’s mostly the same. But the atmosphere might be different.”
Millie looked around the room with great interest, as if there was something to see in this small space.
It’s kind of… unsettling to watch. Is this how Millie feels when she sees me using Fire Magic? She comes to a guy’s room without any wariness, and I worry if she’ll be okay in the future.
“Ah, just sit anywhere… you can sit on the bed.”
“O-Okay.”
Millie, who seemed to have thoroughly enjoyed looking around the room, looked a bit lost, so I suggested the bed. I don’t have anything fancy like a sofa or cushions in this room, so the bed is the only option while I’m sitting in the chair.
Millie is sitting primly on the bed in the room where I always spend my time, on the bed where I always sleep.
Millie probably thinks that since I didn’t do anything in that situation, I’m a safe, harmless guy who won’t do anything even if she comes to my room. That perception is greatly mistaken.
The sight of Millie tied to that bed had a certain immoral charm that was very arousing, but the sight of her sitting on the bed I usually use is actually even more appealing. Just because I didn’t do anything that day doesn’t guarantee I won’t do anything today.
“…”
“Geld-kun?”
“Huh?”
“Not ‘huh’… weren’t you going to explain things?”
“Explain…? Ah, right. That’s what we were talking about.”
“What did you think I came to your room for?!”
“Well, I thought you came to see my room… you seemed to be having fun.”
“Of course not! I’m going to make you talk today!”
I see, the explanation, huh…?
The truth is, there’s almost nothing I can talk about. I don’t intend to talk about the original game or the loop, so at most, it would take a minute to explain everything. I avoided telling her on the way to school, hoping to be alone with her in a secluded place, but I never expected her to come all the way to my room… What will happen if the story ends in about thirty seconds?
“Well, I don’t mind talking…”
Millie is waiting for my words with a cute face that shows her firm determination. Her expression seems to say, “I won’t leave until I hear the story!” If I keep being vague, will she stay here forever?
“Well, it’s about the kidnapping.”
“Yes.”
“To be honest, I had decided to kidnap you before I even enrolled.”
“Before you enrolled? Did you know about me back then?”
“No, I just knew that I would kidnap the most e… cute girl in the school and lock her up somewhere.”
That was close. I almost blurted out “the most erotic girl.”
“Cute? Not Melissa-chan or someone else—”
“Okay, stop right there. Don’t be unnecessarily modest.”
“But… I’m nothing special.”
“Just accept that you’re the cutest girl to me. So, I investigated the Old School Building because it seemed suspicious, and I found a suspicious room, so I thought, ‘Is this where I’ll lock her up?'”
“O-Okay… What do you mean by ‘knew’? Did someone ask you to do it?”
I knew she’d get hung up on that. But I don’t really want to talk about the original story… Should I just gloss over it?
“You might not believe this, but it’s like an oracle or a divine revelation. If I kidnap the cutest girl and lock her in a suspicious room, she’ll be rescued by a Harem Party.”
“A-Again with the Harem… It’s not like that…”
“It’s not really like that, it’s just a superficial thing.”
Okay, I’ve said everything I can say. I hope she doesn’t get angry at me for bringing her to my room with just this much to say.
“But, I see… Okay, I understand.”
“Huh? I don’t mean to brag, but how can you believe such a tall tale?”
“Well… you see, Shizura-chan told me that dropping the shoe was a good move.”
“The shoe? Ah… that.”
“She said that she was able to find the basement because of the shoe. It was hard to play along.”
“Well, yeah. Sorry for the trouble.”
That shoe was placed there to guide them to the basement. It took them two hours to find it after finding the shoe… Could it be that they missed the footprints I painstakingly left behind?!
“I was asleep, and it wouldn’t have fallen off by chance. So I thought Geld-kun must have done it, but I wondered why you would do such a thing.”
“To make them save Millie.”
“Right. And when I thought about it later, Geld-kun always seemed to be in pain. I thought you didn’t really want to do such a thing.”
In pain…? I only remember having a lot of fun playing the villain. Was there anything painful…? Well, I was troubled because the lustful idiots didn’t come at all in the end. And it might have been a desperate effort to resist Millie because she was too erotic. Either way, it’s a misunderstanding, but it’s a good misunderstanding, so I’ll leave it as it is. I didn’t really want to do such a thing! But I had no choice!
“Of course. It seems better to be a bad person, but Millie is a good girl, and she’s always been helpful… I didn’t think she would cry so much…”
“Geld-kun! That’s not it anymore! It’s no good! Forget everything!”
Millie suddenly stood up from the bed and grabbed me with a fairly desperate look. Now that she knows it was all an act, she might be embarrassed that she cried so much.
And I’m desperate too. This must look like we’re flirting from the outside. I have to resist the urge to grin.
“Come on, calm down. That was, well, it was my fault. Okay?”
“That’s right! It’s Geld-kun’s fault! You said such terrible things… It’s Geld-kun’s fault…”
After desperately trying to calm her down for a while, I managed to calm her down, but it’s hard to say that the situation has improved much. She just keeps muttering that it’s Geld-kun’s fault. I have to change the subject…