Ten days passed, and Yuzuru finally graduated from using crutches.
Naturally… that also meant Arisa stopped coming over to his house.
Now then—one week after that.
Having recovered enough that daily life posed no problems as long as he avoided strenuous activity, Yuzuru was eating in the cafeteria with his two close friends.
Yuzuru, of course, had no homemade lunch, so he was eating cafeteria food.
Soichiro Satake—sharp-eyed and handsome—commuted from his family home and had a bento.
Hijiri Ryozenji, who gave off a slightly flashy, playboy-ish vibe, also lived at home… but like Yuzuru, he was eating in the cafeteria.
(Yukishiro’s cooking really was good…)
While sipping the cafeteria’s miso soup, Yuzuru muttered that to himself.
The daily lunch set he usually ate wasn’t bad… but compared to Arisa’s cooking, it inevitably felt lacking.
“Yuzuru… you’ve been eating vegetables lately.”
Soichiro suddenly pointed that out.
Yuzuru didn’t hate vegetables… but he wasn’t the type who went out of his way to eat them either, so he normally avoided them.
But lately, he had been making a conscious effort to eat them.
“Well, someone will scold me if I don’t.”
“Who? Your parents aren’t the type to nag you about that. Did you get a girlfriend or something?”
“Nope. Sadly.”
Yuzuru denied Hijiri’s teasing question.
Then he thought for a moment… and asked the two of them something.
“Actually, there’s a female friend who helped me out recently. I want to thank her somehow, but what do you think would be good?”
Apparently they hadn’t expected the words female friend to come out of Yuzuru’s mouth.
Both of them widened their eyes in surprise.
“You don’t mean Ayaka or Chiharu, right?”
Soichiro asked first.
Ayaka and Chiharu were girls from the same school—and childhood friends of both Yuzuru and Soichiro.
When it came to Yuzuru’s “female friends,” those two were basically the only ones.
“If it were them, I wouldn’t be asking. It’s someone else.”
“What the hell, Yuzuru? I thought you were one of us, but spring has already come for you? Go die.”
“It hasn’t. It’s not like that. And I have no intention of dying.”
Technically speaking, he was engaged, so from the outside it might look like spring had arrived for him.
But that was just a façade.
In reality, it was still the dead of winter.
Though honestly, Yuzuru didn’t mind winter at all.
“Soichiro. You’re used to dealing with girls, right?”
“It’s not like that between me, Ayaka, and Chiharu…”
The fact that he immediately named those two sounded half like an admission.
Still, pointing that out might sour Soichiro’s mood, so Yuzuru kept quiet.
“Let me say this first—I don’t have close female friends besides Ayaka and Chiharu. I’ve given gifts through social obligations before, but that’s basically the same situation as you. So my experience with women probably won’t help.”
“Really?”
“Recently I got forced into buying a Tiffany necklace. Are you planning to give this girl something that obviously screams ‘I’m interested in you’ like that?”
“…Yeah, that’s not happening.”
Yuzuru immediately imagined Arisa’s reaction.
She would definitely find that creepy.
He didn’t know much about women’s hearts, but even he understood that much.
“Why not just ask her?” Hijiri said with an exasperated look. “You want to repay her, right? You don’t need to surprise her. It’s not like you’re launching a raid.”
When he put it that way… Hijiri had a point.
There was no reason to try and surprise Arisa.
“True. As expected of the heir to the Ryozenji family. A true master of returning favors.”
“Hey, Yuzuru. Aren’t you wildly misunderstanding something about my family?”
Ignoring Hijiri’s complaint, Yuzuru decided he’d ask Arisa that very day.
Strike while the iron is hot.
That same day, Yuzuru sent Arisa a message on his smartphone.
I’d like to thank you for helping me before. Is there anything you’d like me to do, or something you want?
A reply came almost immediately.
Could I play the games I saw in your room for a bit?
It was a slightly unexpected answer for Yuzuru, but he quickly agreed.
After a brief discussion, they decided Arisa would come to his house that Saturday.
It was early afternoon.
When the intercom rang, Yuzuru opened the door.
Standing there was a fair-skinned girl with flaxen hair and jade-green eyes.
Yukishiro Arisa.
“Thank you for having me today.”
Wearing a white blouse and beige pants, Arisa politely bowed her head.
This was the first time he had seen her in casual clothes, which made the sight feel a bit fresh.
“Come on in.”
Yuzuru invited her inside.
After stepping in, Arisa looked around the room and made a brief comment.
“You’re cleaning properly. That’s good.”
“Well… yeah.”
Since Arisa had gone through the trouble of cleaning his room before, Yuzuru felt bad about messing it up again.
So he had started cleaning every day.
And since he knew she would be coming today, he had put extra effort into it.
“The kitchen is clean as well. …Though it seems you haven’t been cooking.”
“Well… yeah, I can’t cook. But I have been eating vegetables. Convenience store salads, though.”
“It’s good to see you’ve reflected at least a little.”
It seemed his improved lifestyle had properly conveyed how genuinely grateful he was to Arisa.
She nodded with clear approval.
“Well then, let’s play some games like you wanted. So, what do you want to play? As you can see, I’ve got a lot. And if it’s not here, I’ve got PC games too.”
“Hm, let’s see…”
Arisa’s jade eyes were drawn toward the game cases.
Picking up several boxes, she began carefully considering them.
From behind, she looked oddly lively—almost fidgety with anticipation.
Apparently she had really been looking forward to this, which made Yuzuru feel a little relieved.
“I’ll go with this one.”
The game she chose was a famous fighting game where characters from various titles battled in a battle royale.
“Sure. Let’s play.”
Yuzuru inserted the game into the console and started it up.
Then he handed a controller to Arisa.
But Arisa…
“How do you control it?”
She asked, looking slightly confused.
She didn’t even seem fully confident about how to hold the controller.
“Ah… you haven’t played before?”
“I tried once in elementary school… at a classmate’s house…”
“The controllers are a bit different now.”
Yuzuru lightly touched her hands and showed her how to hold it first.
Arisa listened with a serious expression.
“And that’s basically the basic controls. You’ll get used to it as you play.”
“Thank you.”
They moved to the character selection screen.
Then Arisa asked another question.
“Um, Takasegawa-san… are there any characters I’m not allowed to use?”
“What kind of question is that?”
“When I played as a child, the classmate I mentioned earlier… they were a bit mean about things like that…”
“Ah, the classic elementary school experience. Don’t worry—just because it’s my game doesn’t mean I care about stuff like that.”
“I see. …Then which one should I pick? Are there beginner-friendly characters?”
“Beginner-friendly, huh… maybe this one?”
Truthfully, Yuzuru himself wasn’t much of a gamer.
This particular game was new to him too.
So he wasn’t really in a position to teach Arisa with confidence.
“Oh, right. Takasegawa-san.”
“What?”
Just after she finished choosing a character, when the match was about to begin—
Arisa looked at Yuzuru with a serious expression.
“No holding back. And no going easy on me.”
“I’m not good enough to do that anyway.”
Yuzuru shrugged.
Current Dere Level: 8% (She got to play games)
And for those of you who wish you could enjoy games with a beautiful girl like this…
If you buy a romance game, you can enjoy both the game and the beautiful girl at the same time.
Two birds with one stone.
…Or not.