Tokyo: Idol Girls have absolutely no bad intentions!

It's definitely a shill, I'm sure of it.

"How about..." Mori took out a purse from her skirt pocket, "and give me another thirty game coins!"

“There’s no need.” Ito pressed down on her hand as she reached for her money.

Morishi looked up and met his gaze, her eyes beneath her eyelashes sparkling in the shop's lights. "Then... let me try?"

The game coins clattered away as they fell from the machine, and Chinatsu Mori's fingertips danced on the joystick.

Ito looked at her tightly pursed lips. If she was so worried, she probably wouldn't get it.

As the claw struck the Hachi doll for the fourth time, Mori suddenly closed his eyes. The machine made a soft "click," and the surrounding breathing instantly froze.

Ito watched as the claws firmly gripped Hachi's black and white dress, rising at a visible speed.

"D-It's a success?" Chinatsu Mori's voice was filled with joy, her beret remaining in its original position.

Xiaoba's doll fell into the retrieval slot. She squatted down, picked up the doll, and then showed it to Ito.

"Senior, look!"

Looking at Xiao Ba's terrible expression, feeling like he was being mocked by a doll, he twitched his lips slightly, "Very impressive."

It just so happens that it's reached the required number of times.

"Senior, how about I teach you?" Mori-gami Chinatsu placed the plush toy on the claw machine platform, while Xiao Hachi sat in a crooked posture.

Ito raised an eyebrow, looking at her serious expression, and became interested as well. He really didn't believe that she could succeed through sheer ability.

After inserting the game tokens, he placed his hand on the joystick, waiting for Mori-gami Chinatsu to provide guidance.

The expected technique didn't come; instead, the familiar floral and fruity scent wafted in, followed by a delicate and soft touch—it was Mori's hand placed on his.

Soft hair brushed against Ito's cheek as she looked to her right. Mori was staring intently at the doll inside.

She wore light makeup.

In terms of the development of animation, isn't the situation reversed now?

"Don't look at me, senpai." Mori seemed to have guessed his thoughts. "If you can't even play the claw machine, you can't become a promiscuous scumbag in a romance harem anime."

I don't want to become that kind of person.

Chinatsu Mori's fingernails gently dug into his tiger's mouth, guiding the control lever to move to the left, her claws aimed directly at a small, round, chubby buttock.

"Now..." Chinatsu Mori's breath tickled behind his ear, "gently tap here—"

As the button was pressed, the claw wobbled down and accurately brought Hachiko to justice.

"Arrest successful!" Chinatsu Mori shouted.

A round of applause rang out behind them. Turning around, they saw the couple. The boy gave Ito a "good job" look.

Mori held the pair of dolls in her hands, her voice filled with excitement, "See them?"

This makes no sense at all. Ito stared into deep thought as he looked at the doll in Mori's arms.

Before he could think further, a shop assistant came over with a pink camera.

"Couples who win a plush toy at our store can have their photos taken for free!"

The couple readily agreed, but Ito wanted to refuse, as he and Moriue Chinatsu weren't in that kind of relationship.

“Okay!” Mori answered first.

As Ito instinctively tried to back away, she grabbed Ito's wrist with one hand and held the two little octopuses in her other hand.

The shop assistant led them to a place filled with plush toys. Without the shop assistant's prompting, the couple posed intimately for photos, their bodies pressed together.

The photos were taken quickly, and it was Ito's turn. He walked up, and as the boy brushed past him, he whispered something.

"It took me a week to discover the secret of the machines in this store, and you didn't even need to, yet a girl taught you step by step. I was too shallow, bro."

"What? There really is a trick?" Yuujin Ito looked surprised and wanted to ask more, but Mori pulled him away.

They stood in front of the doll wall, and Mori-sho stuffed a small Hachi doll into his arms.

"Come closer~" The shop assistant raised the camera, and the pink filter softened the shadows of the two people into soft color blocks.

Chinatsu Mori's beret brushed against his chin, and her fingertips gently pinched his waist.

The moment the shutter clicked, Mori-gami Chinatsu suddenly stood on tiptoe, the ribbon from her bun brushing against his nose.

The two people in the photo are very close together, and the little Hachi doll in her arms has wide, frightened eyes.

The shop assistant handed over the printed Polaroid photos with stickers featuring heart patterns on the corners, and Chinatsu Mori reached out and took them.

Ito stared at her slightly pursed lips in the photo, trying to ignore the tightness of her fingers that were still not loosened.

Chinatsu Mori put the photo away, her white beret gleaming like mother-of-pearl under the light: "Your expression makes it look like I'm pointing a gun at you, senpai."

She shook the doll in her arms. "Now I have two photos with my senior."

“But I don’t have a single one,” Ito said.

"What does it matter? You can come to me whenever you want to see them!" Mori gave Ito a playful smile. "I'll keep the photos forever, and you can look at them whenever you want."

Ito followed her out of the store, Mori-gami Chinatsu's skirt billowing and falling as they stood in front of the zebra crossing.

"Is there a secret to that machine?" Ito asked, voicing his doubts.

"A secret? That's a secret~" Mori's words mingled with the noise of Shibuya.

Pigeons fluttered in the clear sky, and the cherry blossoms on Omotesando were in full bloom, with pink and white petals falling on the shoulders of passersby and being swept by the wind into the outdoor seats of the coffee shop.

The traffic light at the intersection turned green, and Mori grabbed Ito's hand and quickly crossed the road.

"Let's go to the fortune-telling shop next!"

Chapter 64 Tarot Cards in the Restaurant

"So that's what Komori said."

The well-dressed middle-aged man placed the omelet rice with ketchup on the table in front of Ito, then took off the apron with a cat pattern and casually draped it over the back of the chair.

"This place has always been a restaurant, yet it's being called a fortune-telling shop," the uncle said with a smile and a shake of his head.

"You can't blame me for this. If it's a restaurant, it should at least look like one!" Mori retorted, unconvinced. "What restaurant keeps its curtains drawn in broad daylight and has a crystal ball on the table as a vase?"

She placed the white beret on the crystal ball, inside which dried flowers floated.

"That's what you think too, senior!"

Ito nodded. He only began to believe it was a restaurant after the food was served. The main reason was that the interior, apart from a few tables, showed no intention of serving customers, and there were hardly any people in the restaurant.

Business seems to be very slow...

It's rare that Chinatsu Morikami could find such a place. There's even an amethyst cluster on the bar, and the shop manager, Seihei Kitajima, is also wearing amethyst jewelry.

“This is all from last year’s Halloween decorations.” Kitajima added a slice of lemon to Ito’s glass. “We originally set up pumpkin lanterns, but the guests thought we had turned into a haunted house, and no one dared to come in for three days, so we changed it to amethyst.”

"It's not much better, is it?" Ito looked around at his surroundings.

"Isn't amethyst supposed to bring good luck?" Bei Dao said, wiping the glass. "It's useful after all."

Will it really be useful?

Yuji Ito couldn't help but wonder if they would be the first, or even the only, customers in the shop today.

Even if someone does come, it's probably with the intention of having their fortune told.

Just like them.

“It’s clearly just that Uncle Kitajima likes the occult.” Mori bluntly exposed him. “Even cooking is just a hobby, but he doesn’t want to be too tired.”

"So that's how it is, that's why they came up with this 'half restaurant, half fortune telling' format." Ito cut open the omelet rice, and the golden egg liquid cascaded over the fried rice like a waterfall.

He scooped a spoonful and put it in his mouth. It contained dried shrimp and chopped shiitake mushrooms, with a savory and slightly sour taste from the tomato sauce.

"How is it?" Mori-gami Chinatsu looked at Ito, anticipating his reaction.

"It's really well done; it's a shame it's not a restaurant," Ito commented honestly.

"Uncle Kitajima is just too lazy, otherwise his wife wouldn't have run away," Mori said while eating freshly fried popcorn chicken.

"My wife ran away. Is this something I can say to her face?" Ito cautiously observed Kitajima Seihei's reaction out of the corner of his eye.

Bei Dao's cough came from the bar. "My restaurant is right below you. And my wife didn't run away; she's just busy with work. She'll be back tonight."

Chinatsu Mori rolled her eyes, clearly disagreeing with Kitajima's statement.

"You're only doing this because Aunt Riko is busy with work and doesn't have time to deal with you. Once she has free time, she'll definitely throw all your things away."

"Here's a serving of fries for you." Kitajima placed a plate of salt and pepper fries on the table with a sigh. "Don't say anything that pulls me back to reality."

Chinatsu Mori reached out and picked up a French fry, salt grains falling onto the plate. "Before your precious thing gets thrown away, help us with a fortune telling."

“This is a restaurant!” Bei Dao’s voice came from deep behind the bar, with a defiant attitude. “Besides, it was just a fortune telling last month, less than ten days ago.”

Ito took a bite of a French fry, the spicy aroma of salt and pepper mixed with the soft texture of the potato, and couldn't help but feel regret once again that the catering industry had lost such a figure.

"Senior, aren't you looking forward to the divination results?" Mori suddenly pointed at Ito with French fries. "Uncle Kitajima's divinations are quite reliable."

"There's no such thing as accurate or inaccurate when it comes to this kind of thing. If you believe, it's true; if you don't, it's not." Uncle Beidao came out from the inner room and went behind the bar. "Come and have your fortune told."

Mori walked over with Ito, carrying a basket of fries. They sat at the bar and watched Kitajima prepare them.

Bei Dao opened the card box, and seventy-eight tarot cards lay quietly in a velvet lining, their backs printed with faded star trail patterns.

He took out the tarot cards, shuffled them, cut the cards, and laid them out from left to right.

"What do you want to know?" Bei Dao's voice carried the composure of a mature man, and the amethyst pendant around his neck added to his credibility. "Be specific."

This activity wasn't in the plan, so we didn't think about the issues in advance.

If you were to ask what I most want to know, it would definitely be something related to money.

It was just a simple divination, so Ito planned to ask a few random questions and then end it.

“Then…” Mori spoke up for Ito first, turning to look at him, “Let’s predict your love life for the next three months! Specifically, will you meet someone who makes your heart skip a beat?”

Without a doubt, in his planned future, romance will only happen after he achieves financial independence.

He was too lazy to ask any other questions and decided to just go along with Mori-gami Chinatsu's wishes.

But just as Bei Dao looked up, he caught a glimpse of cunning behind the other person's glasses.