CH 140

Seiji returned to the president’s residence.

He was rather nervous at what he was about to do next.

It felt almost like he was about to confess to a girl he was secretly in love with…

No, no, that wasn’t it! All he needed to do was inform Shika about what happened during the past two days! Since Natsuya let him know that Shika seemed to be curious about it, then all he had to do was casually bring it up during their conversation and explain things clearly to her.

After explaining things, he would tell her that if she wanted, they could be good friends… or something like that.

But upon further consideration, wasn’t this… exactly like a confession?

No, it definitely wasn’t! Although they were similar, this wasn’t a confession!

‘I merely awakened to becoming a sis-con! I like her younger form as a brother would, that’s all!’

…But didn’t this seem even worse than a normal love confession?

Seiji discovered this important fact.

Seiji received a huge impact.

Seiji prostrated himself on the ground.

“Just how should I say it, damn it!” He hammered the ground with his fists.

If he went and explained it like this, he felt that it was highly probable for him to be misconstrued as a simple pervert. He would be rejected while being looked down upon.

But he really didn’t have any improper intentions. He was simply a pure sis-con.

‘Hey, even sis-cons are considered perverts, aren’t they!?’

“No, no! Even sis-cons are separated into pure sis-cons and dirty sis-cons! I’m pure!!”

“Pure… what?” A gentle female voice sounded out from behind him.

Seiji was shocked to his core!

He hurriedly got up from the floor and turned around to see the maid, Mai, tilting her head slightly.

The Smiling Executioner… whoops, Houjou-san!

“What are you doing, Haruta-san? I seem to have overheard you saying something strange,” Mai said with a faint smile on her face.

Seeing such a smile on her face, Seiji recalled his earlier conversation with her as well as the legends he had just heard and almost broke out into a cold sweat.

“No… I didn’t say anything! I was just checking to see if the floor was clean or not! Yeah, I inspected it and found that it was extraordinarily clean! This must be Houjou-san’s doing! Houjou-san is incredible!!”

He attempted to justify his strange actions, but it was only after the words left his mouth did he realize how he idiotic he sounded.

Mai slowly stopped smiling.

“You can’t meet my eyes, your face is all tense, and your words sound clearly unnatural. I bet you wouldn’t even be able to fool an elementary schooler with this, Haruta-san.”

“Er… indeed…” Seiji awkwardly scratched his face.

“Lying children aren’t cute… If you don’t want to say anything, then just do that. As a mere maid, I won’t pry,” Mai said lightly before turning around to leave.

“Wait… please wait a moment, Senpai!”

“Hm?” Mai’s footsteps paused.

“Um… I want to ask how Shika is doing right now…”

Upon hearing this, Mai’s lips arced upwards slightly.

“Her body’s fine, but… her mental state isn’t that good,” she responded as she turned around again.

“Mental state?” Seiji became tense at hearing this. “Could it be… are there aftereffects?”

“I don’t know… she didn’t say very much, nor did she request for treatment… I’d really like to ask Milady what I should do, but she currently isn’t here right now. Her cell phone can’t be reached, either,” Mai stated calmly.

“Let me go take a look!” Seiji instantly started taking large strides towards Shika’s room. However, he paused after taking only two steps.

“Um… Senpai, just now, I’m… sorry!”

He left only after apologizing sincerely.

Mai’s smile reappeared as she watched his figure disappear into the distance.

“Honestly, him and her… they’re all so silly.”

‘Cute yet silly~’

The maid continued her work in a joyous mood and even began humming some songs.

Seiji paused in front of Shika’s room.

He wanted to open the door, but he stopped himself and knocked on the door instead.

“Shika, it’s me, Seigo Harano. May I enter?”

There was no response.

Just as Seiji was becoming even more worried, a gentle female voice spoke up from inside.

“Please enter.”

Seiji pushed open the door and entered.

He saw the petite girl inside clutching and looking at a sketchbook.

That was…

He raised his eyebrows in surprise as he scanned the room, finding that everything in it was the same as when he was playing together with Shika-chan!

‘Why wasn’t any of this cleaned up?’ Doubts appeared in his mind.

Did Houjou-senpai forget to do it? Or was it that she was busy with other matters, so she left it for later?

Neither of those seemed like they were correct.

‘Forget it; that isn’t important!’

Seiji approached Shika’s bed.

“Shika, I heard that your mental state isn’t so good right now, so how are you feeling?” he asked in a gentle manner.

The girl who currently had her back to him slowly closed the sketchbook.

“Seigo Harano… Your real name is Seiji Haruta, right?”

“Eh?” Seiji was surprised at this. “It… it is,” he admitted. “Who told you? President Yoruhana? Or Houjou, the maid?”

Shika didn’t answer him.

“This… I didn’t intentionally try to conceal it from you. I just… used an alias for some personal reasons.” Seiji awkwardly scratched his face. “If you’re unhappy due to this, I apologize.”

“You don’t need to apologize,” Shika responded softly. “Seiji Haruta… just like Seigo Harano, they’re both beautiful names.”

“Eh?” Seiji was confused at being praised so suddenly. “Er… thank you.”

This was the first time someone had said something like this to him… it was praise, right? He felt almost itchy and somewhat strange inside.

‘That’s right, this sentence…’

“Didn’t I say this to you when we first met? I remember I said something like ‘Shika Kagura… is a beautiful name.’”

Seiji smiled as he recalled the fond memory.

“So it’s been returned to me. I never knew what it felt like to have someone praise your name.”

It felt nostalgic, even though their first meeting was merely a few weeks ago.

“At that time… I could never have imagined that things would turn out like this,” Seiji exclaimed as he mused on the nature of the situation.

Watching the girl’s back, he felt like he had so much to tell her, but he didn’t know how to begin.

There was a momentary silence in the room.

Seiji slowly turned to look outside the window.

“Hey, Shika. That time… on that rainy night, you came. I told you that I would be there waiting for you at that time again… you didn’t respond, but you still came.”

‘And then, you died in front of me. Leaving behind… only those pure white dying words.’

Seiji recalled the bitter memories that only he possessed; the ones he would never be able to forget.

During that rainstorm, he swore to become her friend.

She accepted it, but still ended up dying.

Being unable to accept it, he loaded back time and saved her.

“…I was delighted at seeing you come that night.

“No matter if it was because you wanted to ask for help, or if it was simply because you didn’t want me to wait there in vain, or… even if you only went there coincidentally, I’m still quite happy.

“That’s because I was worried about you.”

Only when seeing her again did he notice that he cared so much for this girl, who, despite being lonely and struggling with intense pain, died smiling in the icy cold rain.

He sympathized greatly with her plight.

He truly worried about her.

“I… don’t quite know why I’m so worried about you, since we’ve obviously only met twice before that, and we haven’t even talked all that much. But I just… want to care for you.”

Before he said that would be her friend. This was a promise.

Even though these were words that she didn’t know about and hadn’t heard before in this timeline, a promise was a promise.

“I want to become your friend. I want to help you. I want to… see your joyous smile.”

‘Not sadness, and not a smile that only comes when you’re on the verge of death. I want to do so many things together with you.

‘I want you to experience the beautiful things the world has to offer. I made such a promise with you.’

Seiji closed his eyes and recalled that scene during the rain.

In order to fulfill his promise in the current timeline, he had to exert his full effort to make her understand his feelings!

“I… think that you’re a good girl, Shika Kagura. You deserve a blissful life… no, you absolutely must have one!”

‘For someone like you who never even complained about the world despite being in such a difficult situation, you have this right; you deserve it.’

“I want you to know the feeling of bliss; that’s why at that time I…”

His words were interrupted.

Even though there were so many things he still wanted to say—when he impulsively hugged her, and she mistakenly took him as her brother; how he decided to play the part of her fake brother, but didn’t anticipate the fact that she lost her memories and truly treated him as her “brother.”

He wanted to tell her about how she pleaded to be spoiled by him like she was a young child, and that he truly cared for her. He longed to tell her about his sadness when he saw all this disappear when she recovered her memories… and so on.

He wasn’t able to say any of that.

That was because he suddenly felt a warm, soft touch together with a faint and pleasant smell.

Seiji widened his eyes in surprise and saw… Shika Kagura hugging him tightly.

Her embrace was reminiscent of Shika-chan’s.

“You don’t need to say anything else,” she whispered in a soft, emotion-filled voice. “I already understand. I know everything now.”

Shika slowly raised her head.

She displayed a soft and cute expression, overflowing with gentleness and innocence, to the dazed boy.

“Seiji… Brother.”