Miss Heir wasn't very kind to me.

Chapter 67:33. "Hot Spring Trip: Ending"

"call--"

The sound of even and long breathing filled the room.

Asami was lying on the tatami with her arms and legs spread out, wearing a yukata, and snoring.

The window of the room was open, and several cicadas were chirping outside.

Rinyin bent down and knelt in front of the bed, applying a cold towel to Mami's forehead. Then she turned around and glanced coldly at Masumi who was sitting at the door.

"Are you still there?"

She frowned slightly, revealing a cold and contemptuous look.

"...Well, I can explain."

"What do you want to explain?" Rinyin brushed her slightly damp hair off her shoulders. "Explain why you were in the women's bath changing room, stacked on a sashimi platter with naked Mami-san?"

"Niigata... blackthroat fish... sushi..."

Asami, who was sleeping soundly, murmured softly in her sleep, with a line of crystal clear saliva hanging from the corner of her lips.

On the other mattress, Hanekawa Kaizuki had recovered from his dizziness and murmured softly:

"I'm not... jellyfish sushi..."

"..." Linyin pressed her temples nervously and sighed deeply.

In the gap between her sighs, Masumi immediately seized the opportunity and blurted out everything that had just happened: "Let me explain..."

"...That's just the way it is."

Masumi finished speaking everything he wanted to say, describing the entire incident in detail, and finally shut up. Perhaps because he was too excited, he was out of breath.

"So it really was just a misunderstanding."

After regaining his composure, he looked at the black-haired girl with a look of unease.

"..."

Linyin still had a cold expression and said nothing.

The unsettling silence built a transparent wall, and the darkness of the summer night seemed to come alive, gradually climbing up Masumi's tired heart.

At this moment, Linyin's sigh came faintly.

"...It's my job to keep an eye on Mami-san."

"Thank you for rescuing Mami-san and Haiyue in time. Otherwise, if they were delayed too long and needed to be sent to the hospital, it would be troublesome."

Hearing this, Masumi let out a breath quietly and said, "I'm glad they're okay." Then he slowly raised his head and met those beautiful eyes.

His sharp gaze was like amethyst shining in a glass window, and a few inches of cold light flashed in his eyes, expanding and shrinking from time to time.

"...You didn't take advantage of others' misfortune and do something strange, did you?"

"Absolutely not!"

Masumi broke out in a cold sweat and firmly denied it.

"so."

Lin Yin nodded slightly with a blank expression, "I believe you are not that kind of person."

A simple and direct sentence, expressing trust frankly, is always touching.

It wasn't unconditional, blind trust, but rather a willingness to side with him after understanding the situation. This was a feeling of respect, not favoritism, that made Masumi put aside his uneasiness.

"but……"

As the topic changed, Masumi's originally fluctuating emotions suddenly froze like a glass ball, falling rapidly from mid-air. He asked nervously, "But what?"

"..."

After a long silence, Linyin turned her face away to avoid the main point.

"……nothing."

The girl uttered these words lightly from her lips.

Masumi cautiously peeked into her face, which had the same cold expression as always, except for her lips which were pressed into a rather unhappy curve.

What is this?

Not only Masumi was confused, but even Rin was confused by her current mood.

If I were to give a name to my current mood, which word would best describe it?
She thought, maybe because she cared, she had so many emotions for no reason.

But what do I care about?
Unspeakable thoughts entangled Rinone.

Answering a question that is not asked is an answer, and so is turning a blind eye.

Masumi was completely confused as he saw the girl's expression changing from mood to mood. Suddenly, a stern gaze swept over him.

"What does it feel like?"

"Ok?"

"What did you feel when you walked into the women's bath and saw Mami-san and Haiyue?"

"This..." When asked this question suddenly, Masumi scratched his ear guiltily. He wanted to make a perfunctory answer, but facing those clear eyes, he always felt that his lies would be seen through. So he had to take the courage to break the jar and said awkwardly:
"Well, I'm a man after all."

The frank words were spoken without any reservation, and the atmosphere in the air seemed to become tense.

Rin's eyes flickered slightly, and then she spoke in a calm tone:

"...It was my negligence this time. I will take good care of those two people and prevent this from happening again."

"It's getting late, you should go back to your room and rest."

"Oh, okay."

Masumi responded woodenly. Does this mean he passed?

He then stood up and left the room. When the paper door was halfway open, he suddenly remembered something and turned back to Rinyin and said:
"Good night."

Her long black hair swayed slightly up and down, and Rinne responded to him in a soft voice.

"Good night."

The paper door was pulled shut securely.

Masumi breathed a sigh of relief. What a big deal... Then he tiptoed back to his room.

After soaking in the hot springs and washing away his fatigue, he should have fallen into a comfortable sleep. However, a series of unexpected circumstances made it impossible for him to sleep.

In the deep mountain town with little light pollution, the deep night creeps into the room through the window lattice, bringing with it a subtle heat.

Masumi closed the window and blocked Xia Ye from entering the room.

It was only past nine o'clock, but he could already feel the depth of the night.

The rustling of leaves in the wind, the chirping of summer insects, and the chirping of birds, these subtle sounds that can only be noticed at night, deepen this impression.

Although the sounds are mixed, it is not noisy at all. It is a completely different feeling from the bustling city night.

A sense of quiet amidst the clamor.

Masumi made the bed and lay down on it, waiting to fall asleep.

Because it is quiet enough, any tiny vibration can be clearly detected.

Wait… Tremor?
It's not an illusion, there is indeed a slight tremor on the ground.

Someone seemed to be passing through the wooden corridor.

Masumi frowned in confusion: Everyone should be asleep at this time, right?

The moonlight shone on the thin paper door like a flock of silver migratory birds about to drown, vaguely reflecting a swaying figure.

It swayed as if floating through the corridor, and then huddled into a small ball in front of his door.

what is that?
Since it is indoors, it must not be something like dead silver grass or willow trees.

Could it be... a ghost?

Masumi raised himself up from the bed.

Summer, ghost, country hotel, these words appear together quite often.

Although he was complacent and not afraid of ghosts because he believed in their existence, and he was never troubled when visiting a haunted house, he had never seen a real ghost with his own eyes, and he always felt a subtle sense of being like Ye Gong who was unaware of the dragon's existence.

...Let me see the true face of the hot spring hotel ghost.

Holding his breath unnaturally, he crawled on his knees to the paper door, hesitated for a moment, tightened his fingers, and opened the door with a "swish".

A pale face suddenly came into view.

“Wow—Wuwuwu!!”

A chilling chill ran up his spine, and Masumi suddenly let out a strange, useless cry.

The pale face suddenly approached and pressed him down on the tatami, then reached out and covered Masumi's mouth, preventing him from making any sound.

The ghost's long hair hung down, and the ends of the hair touched her cheeks. The cold temperature gave Masumi goosebumps.

Oh no, this is a female ghost that harms people, my life is over!

Driven by the instinct to survive, Masumi struggled desperately, and the ghost's voice sounded slowly.

"Shh—don't move, don't make any... noise..."

The warm words made Masumi pause. The voice seemed a little familiar.

He slowly opened his eyes, and in his dim vision, those familiar blue pupils radiated a gloomy light.

In addition, this ghost lady seems to have an amazing figure.

The full curve is held up by the clothes, rising and falling in front of the face, conveying a heavy sense of weight.

Masumi blinked and asked tentatively.

"Hanekawa?"

"Don't...make any noise..."

"It's really you." Masumi exhaled quietly, and said with lingering fear: "You scared me, get up quickly."

"Shh—I told you...don't be so loud..."

Hanekawa Kaizuki hissed at him, her body naturally leaning forward, pressing Masumi with all her strength, her plump shape passing dangerously in front of Masumi.

To be precise, it was only one or two centimeters away from Masumi's face.

If the tip of the nose were a little more upturned, it would almost pass through the groove in the middle of the yukata.

"Stop! I get it. I'll keep my voice down. Don't move forward anymore." Masumi said hurriedly in a low voice.

Haiyue then slowly moved away from him, picked up the phone that had just been thrown to the floor, and unlocked the screen.

The screen emitted a faint white light, which made the girl's face appear pale. It turned out that this was the true appearance of the female ghost.

It looked like a ghost, but it was actually the light from a cell phone.

Masumi pressed his chest to calm his pounding heart and asked:
"It's so late, why are you in the corridor instead of sleeping in your room?"

"Today... I've slept enough..."

"So you were just playing with your phone in the corridor?" Masumi said helplessly.

"Well... because Rin... doesn't allow me to stay up late playing with my phone..."

As Haiyue spoke, her fingers tapped rapidly on the screen. On the horizontal screen, she seemed to be playing a mobile game that was very popular recently.

What a disobedient child this is.

Masumi pressed his temples and sighed in frustration.

He made a move to stand up, but Haiyue stopped him softly, "What are you going to do?"

"Don't... tell Rinne..."

"Don't worry." Masumi glanced at the girl who was playing with her phone without looking up and said, "I just couldn't sleep and wanted to go out for a walk."

"Wait a moment……"

"what happened again?"

"You have to...promise me."

The girl stared straight at him and spoke with extreme seriousness.

"Okay, okay." Masumi said in a coaxing tone, "I promise not to complain to Kamidai..."

He was interrupted by Haiyue halfway through his words.

"Not... this kind..."

Masumi was confused: "What kind of guarantee do you want?"

"come here……"

Seeing the girl put down her phone and wave, Masumi was stunned for a moment, then slowly approached her.

Haiyue tilted her head, her flaxen hair hanging on her shoulders, and her empty eyes were like the gaze of a deep-sea fish.

Just when Masumi was at a loss as she stared at him, the girl suddenly held his hand and then leaned her body towards him.

In an instant, the plump and voluptuous shape overflowed from between Masumi's fingers.

"Woooa ...

"Click——"

Masumi's scream and the camera shutter sounded almost at the same time.

The latter withdrew his hand as if he had been electrocuted.

"I promise... I got it..."

A faint smile played on the girl's lips.

"If you go and complain... then I'll also complain to Rin'in... Masumi molested me..."

Haiyue shook her phone and said, "This is... the evidence."

"What kind of guarantee? Is this a threat?" Haiyue nodded silently, "You could say that."

Masumi's heart began to beat weakly. Wasn't this girl too unguarded?

"No...I only do this to Masumi..."

"Because Masumi... is a good person..."

Haiyue turned the phone sideways as if nothing had happened and continued the game.

"So you're just bullying good people?"

Masumi looked at the girl in front of him with a headache.

After playing silently for a while, she stopped operating her phone, rubbed her eyes sleepily, the corners of her lips trembling slightly, and tried hard not to yawn.

"Since you're sleepy, go to sleep."

"No..." She shook her head: "Today is the last day...reward event..."

Even if you are extremely sleepy after staying up late, you still want to play. This is already an obsession.

Masumi walked to the edge of the wall and turned on the room light. "You can play in my room. The light in the corridor is too dim and it's not good for your eyes."

"After you finish playing games, hurry back to the next room and sleep. Do you hear me?"

"Um……"

Haiyue responded softly, but the volume was not even as loud as the summer insects chirping outside the window.

Masumi shook her head and planned to go for a walk outside, but suddenly remembered that she was still wearing a yukata.

"Well, you should stay in the corridor for a while while I change my clothes."

He said to Haiyue.

"It doesn't matter." The girl stared at the phone screen and murmured without looking up: "I don't care."

"I still care."

"..."

Haiyue was silent for a while, then said quietly, "Obviously... you've already seen mine..."

"I didn't see it, okay? You were wrapped in a bath towel at the time, right?"

"My usual underwear... is also that length..."

The lights in the room were on, and Masumi could clearly see a faint blush on the girl's fair cheeks.

Oh, Hanekawa said she doesn’t like clothes that expose her skin, and it turns out that even her underwear is a one-piece.

Masumi couldn't help but imagine that if it was a one-piece style, it would probably be very tight to wear, which would be quite uncomfortable.

--etc!
Suddenly, a flash of inspiration flashed through my mind like a swift bird.

He recalled the round and plump arc of Haiyue when she was pressing on him just now.

"Are you wearing anything underneath now?" Masumi blurted out without thinking.

"..."

In the sticky silence, he saw Haiyue shrinking and hugging her body, moving closer to the edge of the room.

Soft words floated through the air.

"……satyr."

Sighing helplessly once more, Masumi could only say to her, "Then turn around and face away from me."

This time Haiyue finally turned around obediently.

The room was filled with the rustling sounds of changing clothes. Masumi took off her yukata and quickly changed into her daytime clothes.

"I'm leaving."

"Ah."

Gently closing the paper door, Masumi tiptoed down the stairs, careful not to wake up the people sleeping upstairs and downstairs.

After changing your shoes at the entrance, walk out of the hot spring hotel.

There were no artificial lights in the town at night, only the moonlight faintly flowing onto the ground.

Masumi walked along the moonlit road, strolling at his leisure.

My thoughts dance along the mottled light and shadow. I always feel that a lot of things seem to have happened today, and time seems to have passed particularly slowly.

The people and events of the day flew past my eyes like a series of film frames.

Seno and Hanekawa who gave him a headache all day long, Kamishiro who was hesitant and had strange reactions in the room at night, the warm and thoughtful Ms. Kuon Ryoko, and Mr. Kuon Yusuke who had a dull personality but excellent cooking skills.

Finally, there is the distant future, which seems to be full of worries.

Masumi suddenly stopped.

A figure appeared before my eyes.

"old?"

He whispered the name of the man in front of him.

"Mr. Masumi?" Hearing the voice, the girl with long brown hair showed a surprised expression.

"It's so late, do you want to go out for a walk?"

"Yeah." Masumi nodded: "I can't sleep for a bit."

"Is it because you have trouble falling asleep in an unfamiliar environment?" asked Jiuyuan Mirai.

"Um……"

Masumi couldn't answer for a moment, but he forced himself to sleep. Taking a walk was probably an excuse, as he just didn't want to stay in the room. So he nodded indifferently.

"more or less."

After thinking for a moment, he added, "I also want to see the night view of Xiangchi Town."

If I have to say a special purpose, this is it.

"That's it..."

Kuyuan Mirai quietly lowered her eyelashes, then suddenly raised her head and volunteered, "Then I'll take Mr. Masumi for a walk."

"Although there's not much to see here. It's just a rural area after all."

"Don't say that, at least the natural scenery here is beautiful."

Masumi signaled with his eyes that she should lead the way, "Thank you."

"Ah."

The two of them took a leisurely stroll on the street wrapped in the summer night.

The stars filled the dark night sky like white sugar, twinkling above their heads. Masumi couldn't help but sigh:

“The stars here are beautiful.”

When was the last time you saw such an astonishing number of stars?

It probably dates back to the forest school in high school.

Whether it's Tokyo or Kobe, with its stunning nightscape, both are heavily light-polluted. Looking up at the sky, all you see are a few scattered stars, like those depicted in astronomical atlases.

"That's it."

Jiuyuan echoed, "In places with less light pollution, the stars appear brighter."

"However, when I was young, I didn't like this starry sky very much."

"Why?" Masumi asked curiously.

"Because there are so many of them, so many that it seems like the entire sky cannot hold them all and they are about to fall down."

“No matter how beautiful something is, if there is an excess of it, it always makes people feel uncomfortable.”

It was the first time that Masumi heard such a statement, and it sounded very interesting. When he pursed his lips and wanted to speak, he heard the girl speak softly.

"But... rather than saying the stars are about to fall, it's more like saying the people on Earth are about to be sucked into the sky and drowned in the stars."

In the distant future, he looked up at the sky, his pupils reflecting the starlight trembling slightly.

"So when I was a kid, every time I looked up at the starry sky, I would feel uneasy, as if I was being sucked down there little by little."

"It's a stupid idea, right?" She turned her head and looked at Masumi and asked.

"Well, he's just a kid after all," Masumi replied with a smile.

"That's right."

Jiuyuan also smiled faintly: "At that time, I thought, "Ah, if I really get sucked into that place, I will never be able to come back."

"There are so many stars. If they stick to my body, I won't be able to wipe them off with my hands. I will slowly be submerged by the stars and become a part of them."

"There was a time when I would go to sleep as soon as it got dark, or I would keep my head down and refuse to look at the night sky."

As she spoke, she seemed to be amused by the silly stories she recounted, and a hydrangea-like smile bloomed on her cheeks.

Masumi stared at the smile on her lips, and suddenly, he showed a dazed emotion.

"This feeling of unease gradually faded as I grew up, until I left Kochi-cho for the first time at 15 to go to Kobe to study alone, when I felt the unease I had as a child again."

"The lights of Kobe are bright even late at night, and the buildings are incredibly tall. The pitch-black shadows can swallow up a person's shadow. It's like the starry sky of Kochi Town has been inverted on the ground."

“Being in it, I couldn’t help but feel like I was being drowned and suffocated.”

“That was the first time I realized that the things I looked forward to also had a side that frightened me.”

Masumi listened to Kuon's story in silence, feeling no room for interruption. The words that tumbled from her lips faded slowly into the early summer night, surrounded by the crisp mountain air.

The night wind gradually weakened, and the rustling of branches and leaves stopped, as if the entire forest had pricked up its ears to listen carefully, afraid of missing any of her words.

After a pause, Jiuyuan took a deep breath and said.

"I really like the name my parents gave me."

""future"."

“To me, it’s a word that holds so much potential.”

"In some futures, countless exciting things await you. In some futures, every day is no different from the present."

"Since I have to imagine it, I hope I can have a bright future...but I have a vague feeling that the future is more than just this."

Suddenly, Kuyuan stopped and Masumi also stopped.

"Mr. Masumi."

"Ok?"

"That matter...I decided not to tell my parents for now."

Kuon Mirai stared at Masumi firmly with her eyes, which were slightly drooping at the corners.

Her eyes are always gentle, and to everyone she looks like a young and beautiful high school girl, cute, beautiful, and fragile.

But at this moment, the girl made a resolute decision, and her stern voice was filled with a strong will that would never waver.

For a moment, her image seemed to overlap with someone in Masumi's mind.

He then realized that Jiuyuan's choice to conceal it temporarily was not out of escape, but the result of careful and thoughtful consideration.

After saying this, Jiuyuan spoke to him softly again.

"Thank you, Mr. Masumi."

"I didn't do anything." Masumi felt unworthy of this very meaningful thank you.

"Please don't say that. If it weren't for you and Sister Rin, I wouldn't have realized it so quickly..."

"Even if this realization comes from my cowardice."

Jiuyuan Weiwei raised his head, the expression on his face suddenly became clear, but he seemed a little lonely.

"I've always longed for Sister Rinone."

"The Age of Gods?"

"Well, Rinone-san is always so straightforward about how she feels. I think she's really dazzling."

She then quoted: "She was at ease among the crowd—as if the crowd were the butter and she were the knife."

"What is this passage?"

"'The Ministry of Pain' by Dutch author Ugresic," Jiuyuan said with a smile, "but it doesn't seem quite right here."

"As expected of an excellent student."

Masumi said this with a gentle smile on his face, his mood wavering like the leaves at the end of his sight. Before he knew it, he had walked a long way out of the hotel.

"Yeah, we've come this far."

Jiuyuan seemed to have just realized it, shook his head and said to Masumi, "Let's go back to the hotel, Mr. Masumi."

"Ah."

After a faint response, the two began to walk back.

On the way back, the two of them didn't chat anymore.

They walked until they could see the outline of the hotel. As this impromptu night walk was coming to an end, Masumi felt that his mood was beginning to take shape.

future.

I always feel that this word has a sense of loneliness, perhaps because it implies saying goodbye to the present and the past.

Now in the summer night in Mount Tajima, the subtle heat has become more obvious. When we return to Kobe, the temperature will probably be even more exaggerated. Masumi can't help but think -

The plum rain season is really coming to an end.

　Thanks to Frozen Orange for the tip to Seno Mami, and thanks to everyone for the subscriptions, monthly tickets, recommendation tickets and comments.
　　happy New Year!

　　
　
(End of this chapter)