The person who likes me is a yandere.

"........."

She remained silent.

Is she throwing a tantrum? Is it because people said we're a newlywed couple?

"I said, Sora, shall we go find Mr. Shimazu?"

A slight blush appeared on Qiong's face. Blushing was a characteristic of her younger sister when she was angry.

"...Shimazu...teacher...is there such a...teacher?"

Hey, please pull yourself together. This teacher doesn't exist. Isn't this a teacher we made up out of thin air?

"You two are newlyweds, you must need energy at night, right? It would be good to eat more meat to replenish your energy."

I was terrified to hear a strange auntie tell dirty jokes without batting an eye. Dirty jokes told by boys in my grade feel frivolous, but dirty jokes told by middle-aged women without any restraint feel strangely heavy.

My heart wavered, but Qiong beside me said decisively:

"...Please give me two hundred grams."

Ok?

Qiong was about to buy the meat.

Is this a nightmare?

"Thank you for your patronage. Thank you so much. In addition to the 50g discount, I'll also give you some beef tallow. Our country's low birth rate problem depends on you two to solve it, hehe~"

The item must be returned as soon as possible.

But I didn't have the courage to disappoint a middle-aged woman who was beaming with joy.

We accepted the carefully packaged boxed meat, and the aunt waved goodbye, saying, "Wishing you happiness!"

Returning the meat to the aunt would require the courage of someone brandishing an air gun and visiting a yakuza agency—an act of utter recklessness.

Chapter Six Strange Dolls

I sighed and said to Qiong, who was walking beside me:

"For now, let's make do with bean sprouts. So tonight, let's enjoy the taste of meat to our hearts' content."

"Brother, you're speaking haltingly... I'm sorry."

"It's okay. But why did you buy it? Was it because you couldn't resist the temptation of the steak?"

Qiong lowered his head.

"...No, there's no reason...it just happened without me realizing it."

"Hey, shouldn't the limit for money that can be used under the pretext of 'unconsciously' be 30 yen?"

"Besides, didn't that auntie's aggressive sales tactics make Qiong uncomfortable?"

"..."

Qiong raised her head, pouting like a little duck, her face full of dissatisfaction.

“I’m not angry…on the contrary, she said something that made me happy.”

"Something pleasant to hear? What was said?"

"...I will absolutely not tell."

"What's going on! Tell me already!"

"No... I've already forgotten."

After Qiong finished speaking, she grabbed my hand.

"Let's go to the snack store."

We have a rule that when we go grocery shopping with Sora, each of us can only buy snacks worth less than 300 yen.

"I'm fine. Buy whatever Qiong likes."

"Huh? Why?"

"I still have some snacks left over from what I bought earlier."

"You're lying. Last time, my brother bought Häagen-Dazs, and ten minutes after stepping out of the store, he said something like, '...This is the taste of a winner in life, hehehe.' He ate it right there, right? When Qiong wanted to take a bite, my brother even licked the spoon and said, 'If you can tolerate indirect kissing, then eat it.'"

"...I'm such a lowlife for eating Häagen-Dazs. Sorry."

"Because I bought some very expensive meat today... so you want to... save money on snacks?"

No, that's not it.

"...Qiong must also be patient."

"Sora seems to really like sweets, right? You can go buy them. Whether you want to buy mead bars or five-yen chocolates, go ahead and buy whatever you like."

"...Being told that by my brother makes me even more embarrassed to buy it!"

After that, Qiong and I bought a large quantity of bean sprouts, which will be the main dish on our dining table starting tomorrow, and then we paid the bill.

Today's snacks are one vegetable salad flavor and one corn chowder flavored Delicious Bar, so I have to reluctantly give up the mentaiko flavor.

Just as we stepped out of the discount store with our own reusable bags—buying plastic bags would cost an extra five yen—…

"Wow, brother, look at that!"

Qiong shouted at the same volume she had used when she first tasted the dried fish.

I wondered what was going on and turned to look. What I saw standing before me was…

A person dressed as a cat doll.

It was standing at the main entrance of Ebisuya, distributing toilet paper to pedestrians.

"...That mascot costume...why does it look a bit ugly?"

The children, who would excitedly run towards the sight of a mascot costume, would suddenly stop as soon as they got close enough to see the costume clearly. The next second, they would either burst into tears or flee in terror.

"Brother, let's go take a look."

Qiong is a curious child.

When we eat out, she always wants to try anything she hasn't eaten before.

If you see a shop you haven't seen before on the street, you should go in and take a look.

Upon seeing the unfamiliar doll, she indeed wanted to get closer.

When we ran up to the doll, we could clearly see that its appearance was less about being ugly and more about being grotesque. I couldn't help but worry about the children I had never met before, hoping that those boys and girls wouldn't suffer any lasting emotional trauma.

From a distance, this plush toy looks like a cat silhouette, but upon closer inspection, a "cat?" question mark inevitably appears above its head. Its eyes, nose, and mouth are all asymmetrical in size and position, and cotton balls are sticking out from various places. If it were a cat with botched plastic surgery, this plush toy would be a perfect fit. It also looks like a cat zombie.

"..."

Of course, it's understandable that Sora and I were speechless after seeing this monstrous-looking mascot costume up close...

For some reason, the person dressed as a mascot didn't move at all, silently watching us.

I glanced to my side and saw that Qiong was staring at the doll with a look of rapture.

“…Qiong, maybe…you’ll find this doll…more and more pleasing to the eye the more you look at it.”

Sora possesses an appearance that is known as the goddess of cuteness, but her aesthetic sense does not match this nickname.

While she likes things that most girls find cute to a similar degree, there's something different about her. Although she likes small dogs like other girls, her favorite breed is the small bulldog. And while she has a girly fondness for buying small items with floral patterns, her favorite pattern is chrysanthemum.

Just as I was recalling the image of Kyō cooking while wearing a chrysanthemum-patterned scarf...

"..."

The motionless cat doll handed me a tissue.

I tried to accept it.

I wondered what kind of advertisement was printed on this piece of paper, then I looked down...

『Hoxybynepia』

There were only those few words on it. Nothing else.

The tissues distributed on the street usually come with advertisements for dating websites, mobile phone companies, or pachinko parlors.

But this... is a tissue without any advertising.

Wait, is this an advertisement for Nepia?

That said, these are just regular tissues sold in convenience stores.

Why is this cat doll handing out Nepia tissues? I don't understand its intention.

Is it trying to find fault with Nepia indirectly by distributing tissues while wearing this weird mascot costume?

Or should we judge its purpose by the position it is standing in, whether it is to obstruct the business of the "Ebisuya" discount store? While I was speculating about its purpose with a cynical mind, the cat doll put down the basket full of tissues in its hand.

What's wrong?

As I leisurely thought this, suddenly—

It hugged me.

Huh? ?

It rubbed its oversized plush toy head against the side of my head and hugged me tightly.

I don't understand.

Chapter Seven: Protecting Her, Forever

In short, I gripped the reusable bag tightly. It might be a thief stealing what someone had just bought. There was meat inside that I absolutely couldn't give away.

Just as a passing child saw me being hugged by the rag doll and started wailing, thinking I had been attacked by a cat that had transformed into a human, the rag doll spoke. It was the voice of a young woman.

"...Do you...hope for luck?"

what?

Let's...get...good luck together.