The person who likes me is a yandere.

"Search evidence?"

"On my way home, I left a few erotic books."

"Ah! I remember that... there was a magazine in its unopened packaging on the floor, and there were even scissors next to it."

"Although Qianyu noticed the presence of the pornographic books, she did not open the plastic bag. You are a gentleman."

That was just because I found it suspicious, so I ignored it...

"You clearly have no unsatisfied desires, you're clearly a gentleman, yet you'd rather be called a pervert than give up embracing Miss Sora... This is too suspicious. My detective instincts kicked in. There must be some significant meaning hidden in embracing Miss Sora. So I'll try actually embracing Miss Sora myself. Whatever it is, you won't know the outcome until you try. Why won't Asahi give up embracing her? To find out, I've embraced Miss Sora."

"Huh? You already hugged me? Where? How did you do that?"

"Because I'm a detective, I'm also good at disguise. Three days ago, Asahi and Miss Qiong went to the discount store together, right? I know you always go shopping on Fridays... When you were leaving the store to go home, didn't you see a cute cat doll?"

Cute cat plush toy?

No, all I saw was a zombie cat doll.

"...Could that person be Asuna?"

"That's right, you can't see through my disguise, right?"

Yes, if you were dressed entirely in a mascot costume, no one would recognize you. Nor would anyone want to know who you are.

"But it still feels unbelievable."

I find it hard to believe that those bizarre cat costumes actually exist in this world.

"Because my disguise is too perfect, you don't believe that the person inside is me... Come on, take a look at this."

Asuna slowly brought her face closer. The distance was so close that I could almost feel the radiation of her body heat.

"This is unbearable! Now you know I'm the one dressed as a cat doll, right?"

Why could I tell Asuna was wearing a cat costume just by looking at her chest? As I wondered this, I caught a glimpse of the shimmering necklace on her chest. I was astonished that my gaze had been drawn to her breasts. After suppressing my self-loathing, I looked at the necklace… a blue stone, like a lock of the clear sky within a rock, swayed gently with the pendant.

As someone who is interested in collecting natural stones believed to ward off misfortune and evil spirits, that stone looked quite familiar.

lapis lazuli.

"What a beautiful necklace! I really like that stone."

Asuna smiled innocently, like a primary school student being praised.

"Hehe, I made this necklace myself... because Qianyu gave me the stone."

I remembered.

Three days ago, because I was worried about the cat doll (the person inside) that was holding Sora, I gave her a teardrop-shaped lapis lazuli that is said to protect others from calamities.

"Oh, I see. That Ragdoll cat is Asuna? Are you alright?"

Although my question was ambiguous, Asuna seemed to immediately grasp the implication of my words. Her expression twisted.

“It was terrible… After that, unbelievable things kept happening to me.”

The longer the hug lasts, the more luck is absorbed, so I've decided to hug Sora once a day, for a maximum of five seconds each morning. Three days ago, Asuna hugged Sora for almost a minute.

I asked her tremblingly:

"……what happened?"

Asuna covered her mouth with her hands, as if even recalling the past was painful, and slowly began to speak:

"Three days ago, after I parted ways with Qianyu and Qiong at the shopping mall, I was possessed by demons, the god of poverty, and the god of plague... basically, it was like I was possessed by every ominous being except for the god of death... Would you like to hear me tell you about the 50 most unfortunate things that happened to me that day?"

I never imagined I'd encounter 50 unfortunate things in just one day...

"Yes, I'm all ears."

"The 50th tragedy. After I separated from Qianyu and Miss Qiong, I went to the inside of the discount store to change out of my mascot costume and encountered three naughty kids who were sticking all sorts of things on each other with adhesive."

How could there be such a person?

"Those naughty kids would yell 'Monster!' whenever they saw me."

That mascot costume looked exactly like a cat zombie. Even if people called it a monster, there was nothing they could do.

"So that's how it is. The 50th greatest tragedy is being called a 'monster'? How unlucky."

"What are you saying! As an expert on bad luck, would you consider that kind of thing to be bad luck?"

I don't remember becoming some kind of unlucky expert.

“Those naughty kids were yelling, ‘Get rid of the monster!’ and they were splashing adhesive all over me. The zipper part got splashed with adhesive too… The naughty kids ran away in a flash, but I couldn’t take off the mascot costume.”

"...Is that really the 50th?"

"Although I'm conflicted about whether I should be ranked 51st, this is actually 50th."

That's an extremely bad day.

"Asuna, although I really want to hear it all... anyway, can you tell me the first, second, and third most tragic things?"

"I see. Although I really want to talk about the scene where the police mistook me for a drug dealer and pointed a gun at me, saying, 'I'll shoot if you don't take off the mascot costume!' At that time, I wanted to take off the mascot costume but couldn't, and I panicked."

So, which story is ranked?

"The most tragic third place is..."

After that, I heard the story of a beautiful but unfortunate girl who was heartbroken and brought tears to my eyes.

After listening to the whole thing, I shed a different kind of tears.

"Thank goodness you're safe. I'm so glad I can see Asuna again."

"I also think it's great to be able to see Qianyu."

Asuna and I share the joys of life with each other.

"Alright, that's the end of my unlucky story... I discovered something because I was having such a bad day."

Is it a truth that luck is very important in life?

"At that time, there were two things about Qianyu that I was very concerned about."

First, the degree of bad luck you experience in your daily life is extraordinary.

Secondly, even when he was called a pervert, he didn't give up on hugging Miss Sora.

...Then, I tried to hug Miss Sora, thus aligning bad luck and the hug in a straight line!

When Asuna is deducing, she exudes the aura of a boy proudly recounting his past heroic deeds. While boys boasting about their past glories can be somewhat annoying and irritating, Asuna, with her beautiful girl appearance, speaks with such pride that it feels like watching a child perform a talent show, inexplicably making one laugh.

However, unlike the incident with the missing plaster hand, I have no time to leisurely admire Asuna this time.

I panicked.

Asuna's reasoning... was correct for some reason.

Chapter Twenty: Bad Luck

Asuna's reasoning... was correct for some reason.

"Based on the results of my reasoning, I know that as long as I hug Miss Qiong, I will lose my luck... No, saying I'll lose my luck might not be quite right. If hugging Miss Qiong will cause me to lose my luck, then I won't be able to understand why Qianyu hugs her even though she's being called a pervert."

...Miss Qiong absorbs luck...it's like her constitution, and if she doesn't absorb luck periodically, something might happen that would trouble her. That's why Qianyu let Miss Qiong absorb her luck. From Miss Qiong's angry outburst at Qianyu for being a pervert...we can infer that Miss Qiong didn't know she was absorbing Qianyu's luck. In short, that's roughly my reasoning.

"........."

Asuna, who made a wildly unexpected deduction during art class, made another messy deduction this time, which ended up revealing Sora's inexplicable special constitution.

I have a question about the famous detective (?).

"...Why do you think some people have the constitution to absorb luck? There shouldn't be such people in ordinary people, right?"

Asuna, seemingly puzzled as to why someone would ask her such a question, answered leisurely:

"Because, it can't be explained otherwise."

"...I never thought someone could see through Qiong's constitution...Your reasoning is all true."

"Huh? Huh? Really? What do we do?"

...Huh? Asuna was stunned for some reason.

"What happened to you?"

"...Although I said I was helping out at the detective agency, all I did was pour tea, make copies, do laundry, and cook."

...The last one was a family matter, wasn't it?

"My reasoning seems to lead me astray from simple events. Although I think this is a weakness for a detective... I quickly start to wonder if there's some huge organization plotting behind the scenes."

That weakness is too fatal.

"So this is the first time... I've solved a mystery using my own deductions. I'm so happy."

Although Asuna sometimes uses inexplicable reasoning to lead her thoughts far away from the truth when faced with mundane events...

But it is precisely because it is Asuna that she can use a seemingly random deduction to deduce that Sora has a special constitution that absorbs people's luck—something that ordinary people would never even think of.

"...Oh, right, Asahi, to commemorate my first correct deduction, let's go eat. If it's under 160 yen, I can treat you."

She was indeed short of money.

"To celebrate our reunion, let me treat you. I have so much to say to Asuna."

There's something I need to ask Asuna, who's beaming with joy because her reasoning was correct.

"By the way, Asuna... there's something I'd like to ask you."

"Any kind of request is fine. Have you ever encountered a locked-room murder or something like that?"

...She became completely carried away with her pride.

"Please don't tell anyone about Qiong's constitution."

This is a request that is more important than anything else.

"Huh? I didn't mean that. I never intended to tell anyone from the beginning—"

I interrupted Asuna and lowered my head deeply.

"Please! Don't mention this to Qiong either. To avoid Qiong discovering her constitution, please pretend you don't know anything about it."