The long kiss lasted for who knew how long. No one could know what kind of scenery existed within the hearts of the two people locked in that embrace.
The only thing certain was that after Ayani Kika gently kissed Kotomi Izumi's lips, the side effects of the Queen of All Females constitution inside Kotomi Izumi finally eased considerably, allowing her consciousness to gradually awaken from the deep sleep she had fallen into.
When Kotomi Izumi woke up, Ayani Kika was still tenderly kissing her. Whether it was because of Ayani Kika's gentleness, or because Kotomi herself did not reject this at all, after regaining consciousness, Kotomi did not immediately push Ayani Kika away. Instead, she opened her beautiful eyes and looked at Ayani Kika with a somewhat complicated expression.
Ayani Kika also knew that Kotomi Izumi had already awakened, but she did not stop kissing her. She merely responded with a meaningful gaze before placing her hands on Kotomi's shoulders and continuing the kiss.
One minute, two minutes...
The kiss lasted for a very long time.
Kotomi Izumi, who had originally been leaning against Ayani Kika's embrace, eventually ended up lying down on the tatami.
Lying there on the tatami, Kotomi Izumi's snow-white hair was slightly disheveled. She calmly looked at Ayani Kika without blushing shyly, without angrily pushing her away, and without loudly questioning why she had done this.
Kotomi Izumi simply had not fully recovered from the shock yet. She had never expected that a kiss between her and Ayani Kika would happen so naturally.
From their first meeting until now, less than a month had passed. The number of times they had met could still be counted on one hand...
I was just kissed by Ayani Kika?
Does she... like me?
Kotomi Izumi quietly asked herself these questions internally. Lying on the tatami and staring at Ayani Kika up close, she never spoke first. The bedroom curtains had long since been drawn shut, and the room's lighting cast the shadows of her eyelashes across her cheeks. One could clearly see her eyelashes trembling slightly.
In the end, Ayani Kika was the first to speak.
"You woke up pretty quickly..."
"Maybe I'm Cinderella. After falling into a deep sleep, I woke up because someone kissed me. It's just... I don't know whether the person kissing me right now is actually my lover."
A faint, exhausted smile rested on Kotomi Izumi's lips. Although the side effects had weakened significantly, they still remained. At this moment, Kotomi still felt completely drained of strength.
"I don't know whether I can become your lover either..."
Ayani Kika lowered her gaze and softly spoke while looking at Kotomi's face. At the same time, the distance between their lips slowly shortened once more.
At the exact same moment, the same thought surfaced in both Kotomi Izumi and Ayani Kika's hearts.
Perhaps this time, things would not end with just a simple kiss.
"Kotomi..." Ayani Kika softly called out. Her somewhat slender hand pressed gently against Kotomi Izumi's wrist. "If you don't want to continue, you can tell me to stop at any time."
A faint blush covered Kotomi Izumi's cheeks. Facing Ayani Kika's gaze and words, she merely turned her small face to the side as though too shy to maintain eye contact, then quietly replied,
"At least... right now, I don't want to stop."
"Is that so?" Ayani Kika's lips curved into a smile. "That's good."
Before the words had even finished leaving her mouth, Ayani Kika reached out to caress Kotomi Izumi's cheek. With a slight amount of force, she turned Kotomi's face back toward her.
Their eyes met for only a few fleeting seconds before Ayani Kika kissed Kotomi Izumi once again.
It was a gentle and peaceful kiss, one that required no purpose and no words. It was like gazing from a balcony at rooftops glittering in the sunlight, shaved ice and soda from a beach house, red dragonflies fluttering their wings through the air. After witnessing something beautiful, a warm and intimate feeling naturally arose in one's heart, making them unconsciously wish to preserve both the beauty and the emotions of that moment in some form.
The kiss shared between Kotomi Izumi and Ayani Kika was exactly that kind of kiss.
Ayani Kika spoke first.
"Kotomi, are you still okay?"
"I'm okay... but could we lay out the bedding first? The tatami... is a little cold."
"Okay."
Ayani Kika nodded. At this moment, no matter what Kotomi Izumi said, she would agree to it.
Ayani Kika hurriedly pulled open the closet doors, taking out the bedding, pillows, and blankets before quickly spreading them across the tatami.
Kotomi Izumi knew that at this point, there was no longer any way to say they should stop. Besides, if they did not continue, the side effects would never be fully resolved.
Blushing deeply, she walked over to Ayani Kika.
This time, it was Kotomi Izumi who took the initiative to kiss Ayani Kika's lips.
Evening, five o'clock.
Chiba.
The Kato household.
Megumi Kato sat on her bed, staring blankly at the phone resting on her pillow. Ever since Kotomi had hung up earlier under the excuse that "the restaurant signal is bad," Megumi had remained sitting there, waiting for Kotomi Izumi to call her again after returning to the hotel as promised.
Time slowly passed.
The hands of the clock gradually moved from twelve onward, and now the number beneath them had changed from twelve to five.
It was not merely the numbers that had changed. The passage of time itself had passed along with them.
From noon until evening, nearly half a day had gone by, yet Kotomi Izumi still had not returned her call.
At first, Megumi Kato comforted herself by thinking that maybe Kotomi and the others had simply run into traffic on the way back from the restaurant to the hotel. After all, they were in the city center. Walking might be tiring, but taxis often got caught in traffic jams.
But as time continued to pass, even that excuse could no longer support itself.
No matter how bad downtown traffic was, it could not possibly last for half an entire day.
Sitting on the bed, Megumi Kato clenched her hands so tightly that the wounds on them, which had already scabbed over, tore open once again. Yet she did not seem to notice the pain at all. With blood staining her hands, she picked up her phone and directly opened the call screen.
This time, Megumi Kato did not call Kotomi Izumi.
Instead, she directly called Yui Yuigahama.
A feeling had begun to form in Megumi Kato's heart.
She felt that Kotomi might not actually be staying together with Yui and Yukino.
Megumi Kato desperately did not want to believe that feeling. She hoped she was simply overthinking things.
Because if it were true...
Then it would mean Kotomi had lied to her.
Megumi Kato did not want that to be true. She hoped that after calling Yui Yuigahama, she would hear Kotomi Izumi's voice from Yui's side.
While waiting for Yui Yuigahama to answer the phone, Megumi lowered her head and muttered to herself in a trembling voice that gradually revealed traces of madness.
"Kotomi... as long as you let me hear your voice from Yui or Yukino's side, then I won't care whether you say your phone died, whether you fell asleep after returning to the hotel because you were too tired, or whether you simply forgot to call me back. As long as I can hear your voice, as long as you didn't lie to me, no matter what excuse you use to explain why you never called me back... I'll believe you..."
After a brief wait, Yui Yuigahama quickly answered the call.
"Megumi, good evening."
"Yui, good evening."
Megumi Kato did her best to make her voice sound calm, temporarily hiding the madness from her earlier muttering.
"It's so rare for you to call me first, Megumi. Ever since we exchanged phone numbers, I don't think we've really talked on the phone," Yui Yuigahama said with a laugh.
"Yeah. After all, we see each other at school every day. Even when we contact each other, we're used to using LINE," Megumi Kato replied with a cheerful smile.
What she most wanted to know right now was where Kotomi Izumi was and what she was doing.
But if she asked directly right away, it would definitely make Yui Yuigahama feel that something was strange. Exchanging a few pleasantries first was necessary.
"Right, right. Kotomi even said before that the longest she ever went without using her phone was an entire month. She basically just used text messages and LINE to keep in touch. When she checked her phone bill the second month, she looked completely confused. She was like, 'I didn't make a single phone call this month, so why do I still have to pay several thousand yen?'"
Whenever Yui Yuigahama mentioned Kotomi Izumi, her tone would become especially cheerful.
At that moment, Megumi Kato noticed something.
After thinking about it carefully, she realized she did not know when it had started, but whenever Yui mentioned Kotomi, her voice would instantly brighten.
It was as though simply saying the name Kotomi Izumi made Yui feel happy.
Megumi Kato's gaze sharpened slightly. Silently, she took note of this change in Yui Yuigahama's tone, planning to find a time after Yui returned from Kyoto to have a proper, private conversation with her.
Right now, what Megumi Kato wanted to know most was what Kotomi was doing.
Since Yui Yuigahama had just brought up Kotomi Izumi, Megumi smoothly followed up and asked,
"Speaking of which, Yui, I wanted to ask—what is Kotomi doing right now? There's something I need to ask her."
Megumi asked with a casual smile.
She did not elaborate. She only directly asked what Kotomi was doing.
After hearing this, Yui Yuigahama subconsciously glanced toward the kotatsu. A few days ago, whenever they were in the guest room, Kotomi liked staying inside the kotatsu.
Since Kotomi had said at noon that she was going to her third uncle and third aunt's house, she still had not returned. Yui had considered calling her, but thinking that Kotomi might be busy and that calling might disturb her, she had put her phone down.
Now that Megumi Kato was asking, Yui Yuigahama herself felt confused, because she had not seen Kotomi at all until now.
"Sorry, Megumi. Kotomi isn't here right now."
"Not there right now?"
Megumi Kato's heart instantly turned several degrees colder. Yet her tone remained forcedly calm as she asked, "Then what did she go to do?"
"She got a phone call this morning and then said she was going to her third uncle and third aunt's house."
"Her third uncle and third aunt?"
"Yeah. They live in Kyoto."
"I see... She's never told me about that before... I didn't know. You knew, but I didn't. And I'm only finding out from you now..."
Megumi Kato's voice gradually lowered, growing softer and softer.
"Megumi, what are you saying? I couldn't hear you clearly."
Yui Yuigahama asked in confusion. She could hear Megumi's voice getting quieter and quieter, as though she was muttering something, but she could not catch the whole sentence.
Megumi Kato did not answer her. Instead, she continued in a cold voice,
"Yui, I have another question for you."
"Huh? O-Okay."
Yui Yuigahama did not know what was happening. She suddenly felt like Megumi's entire mood had changed.
"What did you and Yukino have for lunch?"
Megumi asked, her tone carrying a trace of chill.
Hearing that, Yui Yuigahama could not help but shiver slightly. But the innocent Yui did not think too much about it. She simply assumed she had suddenly felt cold. Sometimes that happened—despite being in a warm room, one might suddenly feel a chill.
At the same time, she answered,
"Yukino and I had stir-fried pork belly with kimchi for lunch. For the main dish, I had a beef bowl, and Yukino had minced meat eggplant rice. It was too cold today, so we didn't go out. We just ordered delivery to the hotel."
After Yui Yuigahama finished speaking, she did not hear any response from Megumi Kato.
Only a long silence.
So long that Yui Yuigahama did not know whether she should continue waiting or hang up the call.
"Megumi? Are you there? Megumi?"
After a long pause, Megumi Kato finally realized Yui was calling her name. She forced a smile back onto her face and tried to return her voice to normal.
"Yeah! I'm here. Sorry, the signal was a bit bad just now. It was cutting in and out, but I got the general idea. Thanks for telling me.
"When you get back from Kyoto, come over to my place and try my cooking. Recently, I learned a new dish for Kotomi—meat sauce lasagna~"
"Okay, okay! Once we're back in Chiba and have time, I'll definitely come!"
Yui Yuigahama nodded happily and agreed. Simple and pure-hearted, she did not think much about it, assuming Megumi truly just wanted to treat her to meat sauce lasagna.
After hanging up the phone pleasantly, the forced smile on Megumi Kato's face vanished instantly.
Only then did she notice the pain in her hands.
Looking down, she saw that both hands were already covered in streaks of blood.
But she did not immediately go to the bathroom to rinse them with water, nor did she go to the living room to get the first aid kit and disinfect the wounds.
Instead, she lowered her head. After glancing once at her blood-soaked hands, she let out a completely emotionless laugh.
"I've lost this much blood, and yet I don't feel any pain at all. Is it because the heartbreak I've been drowning in just now and even now is millions of times more painful than the wounds on my hands? Saying the signal was bad while eating out, saying you'd call me as soon as you got back to the hotel... Kotomi, when did you become like this? When did you start loving to lie to me so much?!"
Megumi Kato gripped her phone with trembling, blood-covered hands and cried out hoarsely.
Kotomi had lied to her.
To Megumi Kato, that was something billions of times more painful than being killed.
She would rather die right now than accept that Kotomi had lied to her.
Megumi Kato's phone wallpaper was a photo of her and Kotomi together. When they took that picture, their smiles had been so sweet. The blood on her hands naturally smeared across the phone screen, which meant it also smeared across the wallpaper.
At this moment, Megumi Kato's face on the wallpaper was completely covered in blood.
The wounds split open on her hands continued to bleed, drop by drop, gradually staining Kotomi Izumi's face red as well.
—
—
40 Advanced Chapters Available on Patreon:
Patreon.com/DaoOfHeaven