Author’s corner: HELLO HELLO! Some small adventure on the real world. Get it? Small, mall?
ANYWAY, not much happening this chapter, and no chapter yesterday because I was working on that other FF I told you guys about. Kind of funny, because the last chapter I wrote was downright depressing to write…
ALSO, as you might have noticed, the releases have been more spaced this time. The other story is mostly the reason behind that. I can’t say when I will feel satisfied with the other story enough for me to go back to full time on Insania and Beepy, so it might take some time.
Have a good read!
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The taxi slowly started to pull up to the sidewalk as we approached our destination. Truth to be told, it was almost a waste to take a taxi here so close it was to my home. Well, it was a bit far to say that it’s on a normal walkable distance and we would also need to cross the highway, but besides that, but if you ignore these small details, I still find taking a taxi here a bit overkill.
Well, I am a stingy person when it doesn’t come to games, so I don’t have much say in this matters, I guess.
Anyway, the driver quickly showed us the price to pay and I quickly translated to Yuu. She nodded while opening her wallet and taking a few reais from it. For those who are wondering, Real, plural reais, is the Brazilian currency.
The taxi driver quickly made some calculations in his mind before giving her back the change. Afterwards we quickly left the taxi to wait for the others, but before he drove off, I saw the driver giving me the thumbs up. I smiled awkwardly at that while the taxi made its way through the driveway.
Sighing at the man, I turned back to the mall’s entrance, seeing Yuu look around in curiosity for quite some time as people went in and out of the mall. I motioned towards a few benches that the mall left in front of the entrance so that people could wait for taxis and other things. Yuu nodded and made her way towards there.
“You seem awfully excited, did something happen?” I asked when I noticed that even while sitting down Yuu kept looking around.
“Hmm… It is just that…” She said while thinking. “I’ve never been to a place like this before.” She excited. “Not without the bodyguards, at least.” I raised my eyebrows surprised at her words while being unable to help but think that she truly is a princess. “What about you, Shishou? Do you often come here?” She asked me excitedly.
“Not really.” I said with a sigh. “I come here mostly for two stores, so I can barely say that I’m a regular.” I said while shrugging.
“Ehh? Really?” Yuu asked surprised, and I nodded heavily. “Which stores does Shishou come here for?”
“Well…” I said with a wry smile. “The cinema and the gaming store. That’s it.” I said with a shrug. “There’s not even a bloody bookstore in here!” I said angrily. “And since the gaming store and cinema only have new things occasionally, I don’t have much reason to come here constantly.”
“Eeh! There isn’t a bookstore?” Yuu asked surprised.
“Yup.” I said sadly. “Firstly, this mall is actually pretty small compared to others. Second, Brazil in general doesn’t have as many readers as other countries, so we don’t have that many bookstores, which is kind of sad.”
“I see…” Yuu said while nodding. “What kind of books do you read, Shishou?”
“Mostly fantasy and historical fiction.” I said after some thought. “I also like sci-fi, but there aren’t as many as there are from these two at either father’s or my house.” As I said that I turned to her. “What about you?”
“I like historical ones.” She said briefly. “I like to read about the exploits of my ancestors and their allies.”
“Hee?” I said with a raised eyebrow. Somehow, that was an expected answer. “So, you don’t read many fiction books?” I asked curious, and she shook her head.
“No. I don’t see much use on reading about stories that never happened.” She said seriously for a moment before turning to me hurriedly. “Not… Not that I mean that you shouldn’t, Shishou! It’s just that…” She started to apologize, but having my weird switch flipped, I smiled evilly at her.
“It seems that I might need to teach you how wonderful the world of fictions can be.” I said while staring at her.
“Shi-Shishou… You look scary!” She murmured lowly.
As I planned on which books I would force her to read, I saw from far away as Paul’s car arrived, entering the parking lot and started to look for a place to stop. Since it would still take them some minutes to reach us, I turned my attention back to Yuu who for some reason was back into her cold looks with a slight frown on her face.
Confused, I wondered if my joke made her stay like that, and as I wondered what happened, I noticed with the corner of my eyes something. Looking around, I couldn’t help but chuckle a little as I started to get what was happening.
Yuu noticed my smile and pouted a little, immediately removing the cold look she had.
“Why are you laughing?” Yuu asked me angrily.
“I just find it funny what’s happening.” I said with a shrug, but Yuu only got even sullier.
“Muu… I don’t like this.” She said annoyed. “Why does everyone always look at me when I leave home?”
“You really have no idea?” I asked a bit dubious, but she simply looked at me confused.
I didn’t explain it to her, but simply smiled, which left the poor girl confused. She started bugging me for the answer, but I kept dodging her questions while wanting to bully her a little.
“Okay… What did we miss?” Mary asked confused when she saw Yuu looking away from me angrily.
“Just teasing her a little.” I said with a shrug.
“Shishou is being mean.” Yuu complained besides me, and I simply widened my smile.
“Ookay…” Mary said with a slightly confused look.
“Well, since we are here already, why don’t we go in?” Barbara said with a happy tone. However, I couldn’t help but notice a slightly playful tone in her voice.
Well, I soon found out the reason.
Strangely enough, the moment we entered the room. Maya suddenly exclaimed in perfect monotone that she had forgotten to pack some swimming clothes for herself, so she quickly called for Red to show her where she could buy some.
Mary suddenly decided that she wanted to watch a subbed movie to train her Portuguese reading, so she and Paul went to the cinemas to see what was on-screen at the moment, and I’m sure that they conveniently forgot about the incredible creation that is known as Internet.
So, we reunited for exactly forty six point seven seconds, and they already left me and Yuu alone again.
They could at least try to make it look coincidental. And this is meant mainly to the ero-maid who blatantly looked backwards while giving me a thumbs up. Sighing loudly, I held myself back so that I wouldn’t rebuke her and turned to Yuu, who looked as surprised as I was.
“Seems like it’s just the two of us again.” I said to her, making Yuu blink surprised and start a nod, but remembered our little scuffle and she looked away with a pout.
As always, I ended up smiling kindly at the girl while petting her head lightly. Caught by surprise she let herself enjoy it for a moment before finally shaking her head so that I would remove my hand from her head.
“So, what are we going to do?” I said noticing that she didn’t want to talk too much. This made her blink surprised for a moment before tilting her head.
“I don’t know, why don’t Shishou does what he always do?” She asked confused before blinking and pouting.
If I had to say, she wanted to be angry, but was having a hard time doing so, and the result was downright adorable. To give me the killing blow all that she needed would be her kitsune avatar, with her ears and fluffy tails then, I would end up being unable to control myself.
Well, since she told me to chose something myself, I started walking away towards a random direction in the mall so that we could find something interesting. Well, interesting for her at least, since I had absolutely nothing that would get my attention in this mall.
Oh! That jacket looks good! How much for it?
Hmm, seventy? A bit expensive… But it looks so good…
But… Money… Money…
Ghh… The doubt.
No. Not worth it. Too much money…
But… I really want that jacket… LOOK AT THE SIZE OF THOSE POCKETS!
But, it’s so expensive…
In the end I gave up and walked away from the store with my heads down. After some time, I heard someone jogging and Yuu suddenly appeared besides me while pouting. She probably didn’t hear the moment I left, so it took her some time to reach me again.
“Muu… Why did you leave me?” She asked angrily.
“Well, I thought you were angry at me…” I said tauntingly, and she simply mulled over it quietly.
“And what were you doing there…”She asked after some time.
“Hmm? Oh, it’s just a jacket that caught my attention.” I said with a sigh.
“A jacket?” She asked curious while giving a look back to the store I was watching. “Which one?” She asked me.
“The one in the…” I stopped when I noticed he question and looked at her with an incriminating gaze. “You don’t plan on buying it for me, are you?” I asked her with an incriminating gaze.
Yuu flinched for a moment and gulped down nervous before looking away. I stared at her for a moment, unable to help but think that she actually looks really cute when she’s trying to lie.
“No. Shishou has been mean to me.” She said with a fairly bad lying tone.
“Hmm… Good. I would be really mad if someone went and bought it for me…” I said to her, making her flinch slightly before giving me a surprised look.
Well, how can I say it… I would feel really guilty if she were to spend her money to buy something that I have more than enough condition to buy myself, but decided not to just because I’m being stingy with myself. I mean, not that I dislike presents. But getting something just because I decided to not get it myself is a bit too much.
Well, this left Yuu with a conflicted face for some time as she looked back into the store.
Still, I ignored it and took her to a tour around the mall, showing her to one or another shop that I thought that would get her interest. Most of them were some clothing shop, but a bit against what I expected, Yuu didn’t show much interest in those, except for one or another simple blouse that somehow matched her tastes.
On the other hands, some miscellaneous stores actually managed to get her attention. Things like wristlets and silly decorations to put in her house. Mainly, what caught her attention was a large fox plushy. She bought it immediately without even stopping to think about it.
When I asked her about it, she said that she had never seen something like that before in Japan. Followed by saying that all her trips in japan to a mall was to go in, buy what she needed and get back.
You know, I’m starting to think that she was even more of a shut-in than myself… Oh well.
Leaving that aside, after buying the plushy that she liked, we put it into a plastic bag and prepared to leave the shop. But, on the way out, something caught my sight with the corner of my eyes, and looking at it in wonder, a mischievous smile appeared in my face.
This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.
“Yuu… Go ahead that I’ll just see something…” I said to her, but she turned to me confused.
“Why do you want me to go ahead, Shishou?” She asked me confused.
“It… Will only take a short time.” I said to her.
“Then I’ll wait with you.” She said turning back, but I grabbed her shoulders and turned her away.
“No. You’ll wait out there. I’ll be with you shortly.” I said while pushing her out of the store.
Luckily for me, she didn’t try to resist, or else she would easily start a situation of public humiliation with me, but she did become sullen.
Once I managed to drag her out of the store, I turned back and quickly asked the price of the item that caught my attention to the clerk. Seeing the item, she told me the price. It was very low, but since it was mostly a trinket than anything, it didn’t surprise me.
I bought it and put it into another plastic bag before leaving the store. Out there I saw Yuu leaning against the wall with a sullen look in her face. I approached her with a mischievous smile, but right before I caught up with her someone else did.
“Hey there lady. What brings a cutie like you to this place?” A random good-looking guy said in Portuguese.
Seriously, since when does Campos have so many suicidal playboys? It’s the first time I’ve seen something like that, and it’s the second time today!
I mean, seriously, I was starting to think it only happened in movies or something!
Well, Yuu, as expected, completely ignored the guy while looking down to the ground annoyed. This made the man slightly surprised, as she showed literally not reaction to his flirt. Probably a huge blow to his morale.
He tried once again talking to Yuu, but the princess normal socialization skill were around the same level as mine, so she didn’t even spare the guy a glance, but I did notice that she was getting a bit more annoyed. Deciding to go for the save, I approached the guy with a serious face and put my hand on his shoulder, making him jump in surprise.
“Excuse me, sir.” I said in a low tone. “But I must ask you to remove yourself from the filming grounds. You are hindering our work here.” I said briefly to him. He turned to me confused and tilted his head.
“Filming? Here?” He asked surprised.
“Yes. Look there…” I said pointing at a random location. “If you pay attention you will notice a couple of cameras there. But with you in the way we can’t get a good shot from our main actress.”
“Oh! She’s an actress?” He asked surprised. “I don’t think I’ve seen her before…”
“Of course you haven’t!” I said angrily. “She’s an foreign actress who came here for this single episode!” I face palmed myself as if to make a point.
“Oh… Sorry… I didn’t…” He said surprised, but stealing a glance of admiration towards Yuu.
For a moment I was worried that she might suddenly get happy with seeing me, but from the looks of it, she was still annoyed at me because of earlier and leaving her behind, because she looked away from me in annoyance.
The man seemed to misunderstand the situation, because he quickly apologized to her in a slightly broken English and then to me. After that, he left with his face contorted in surprise and shock, and he didn’t take more than a few steps before taking out his phone and typing something.
I turned to Yuu and gave her my best smiled.
“And the knight in… Leather armor, I guess, makes his entrance to save the princess!” I said teasingly.
“And what did he want?” she asked me confused, I simply shrugged in response.
“He was trying to hit on you. Simple as that.”
“He wanted to hit me?” Yuu asked surprised before turning to the man with furious eyes. But the moment she took a step forward I grabbed her by the neck. “Why are you stopping me, Shishou?”
“He wanted to hit ON you, not hit you.” I said annoyed.
“Hit on me?” She asked me confused.
“You are so innocent that it’s adorable.” I said absentmindedly, which made her blink confused. “What it means is that he was flirting with you.”
“Flirt…” She blinked surprised for a moment before widening her eyes in shock. “Eeh? Watashi?” Well, she slipped into going back to Japanese, so I couldn’t understand what she was speaking.
While we were like that, I heard a couple of footsteps approaching us from behind, and after turning back I saw that it was Paul and Mary.
“What happened to leave Yuu so flustered?” The half-japanese asked surprised.
“I just explained her the meaning of being hit-on.” I said with a shrug. Mary blinked surprised for a moment, and just as she was about to smirk and say something, I went on. “Another guy was trying to hit on Yuu, I tricked him into thinking that she was some kind of actress and that he was bothering the filming.”
“What, not even a brawl or something for the right of courting the girl?” Mary asked me teasingly.
“The pen is mightier than the sword.” I said in a proud tone. “Well, that and he would end up beaten black and blue by Yuu here if I didn’t do something.” When the two looked at me confused, I shrugged and went ahead. “Well, Yuu has been pretty pissed off for some time now.” I said with a smile.
“And why would Yuu-dono be pissed?” I blinked surprised when Maya suddenly appeared besides me, carrying a small bag in her hands. Red following her close behind. “And yes, this is a skimpy bikini that shows all of my curv…”
“Whatever you bought will never beat what I have in my hands right now.” I interrupted the ero-maid with a triumphant smile.
“Oh…?” She said with curious gaze. “And what could possibly be better than my attractive body?” She asked me with a taunting gaze.
I smiled at her in victory and approached Yuu, who was breathing deeply to calm herself down. But when I approached her and pulled her to the middle of the group, she looked at me confused. I simply prompted her to move ahead. Once she was in the best place, I made her put her back towards me and took out what I bought in the store.
With delicate movement so as to not hurt her, I gently put the thing on her head, and saw as the others widened their eyes for a moment, before starting to giggle, chuckle or face-palm, varying from person to person.
Maya widened her eyes in shock before tightening her fists with a an angry appearance. In the end, she sighed loudly and lowered her head in defeat.
“You… Have bested me.” She said in defeat between her teeth.
Yuu turned to me confused while raising her hands to feel what it was that I put in her head, but Mary immediately stopped her by grabbing her hands and making her stand still.
“Yuu-chan. You HAVE to let me take this photo.” She said with shining eyes.
“Milady, if you would allow me.” Maya said while taking out her cellphone.
Mary nodded cheerfully while jumping besides Yuu and hugging her waist. Yuu blinked surprised for a moment before turning back to the camera and smiling awkwardly. Maya simply nodded satisfied before taking the photo.
After that, Yuu had to take a photo with each one of us, and then one alone. By then she had already forgotten about the thing I put in her head, so me and the others exchanged some glances as if asking if we should tell her or not.
In the end, none of us said anything, so we walked around the mall with Yuu still wearing it.
We strolled around the mall for a bit longer, spending most of our time simply following Mary and Maya as they went to buy clothes for them and for Yuu. Afterwards we ended up watching the movie that Paul and Mary had chosen. An action one and it was fairly good. It wasn’t excellent, but it was worth it.
When we left, my gaze wandered around the stores and saw a banner about the game store that I usually went to in the mall.
Me and Paul convinced the girls to take a look at the gaming store so that we could take a look if a game we were waiting had arrived or not.
And talking about game, I took a look on my cellphone that had been oddly quiet for some time now. For some reason, Cyg had kept quiet this leave, and when I actually tried to contact her, she told me that she was doing something important at the moment.
We went to the store, spoke with a friend of ours that worked there and introduced the girls to him.
“So, do they play games too?” He asked us, and I nodded.
“Yeah, Both play Insania right now, but Mary also plays other classics, like monster hunter.” I said while pointing at the girls.
“Oh, the taller one doesn’t play it?” He asked surprised.
“Nah, she’s slowly being introduced to gaming.” I said with a shrug.
“Oh? Not even a console or something? Portable at least?” He asked surprised.
“Is that what you use to play games, Shishou?” Yuu asked me curious.
“Well, yes…”
“Then I’ll buy one.” Yuu said with a nod.
“Huh?” I asked surprised.
“… Any model you want in particular?” He asked going into business mode.
Well, in the end Yuu bought a portable gaming console plus a few games just like that. According to her, she wanted to learn more about how to play games. An odd way to put it, but it’s not me who is going to complain.
Well, after that it was already getting late and my legs were already hurting. Besides, we had already walked through the entire mall twice already.
As a final note of our trip around the mall, the guy that was trying to hit on Yuu earlier ended up finding out that I was just fooling with him, so he came angrily at me wanting to get into a fight.
Well, he tried to get a fight with me, and even got to the point of grabbing my shoulder and trying to drag me out of the mall, but he really regretted his action when Yuu grabbed HIS shoulder. He blinked surprised, and then, shocking everyone in the vicinity, Yuu actually forced the guy to the ground only holding his shoulder.
And I had the feeling that he would end up much worse than a simple sore shoulder if I didn’t stop Yuu in time.
Seeing that it was getting late already, and that Yuu and Maya were getting tired, despite the late being at most seven o clock, we decided to call it a day, so we left the mall and took our ride back home.
To please Yuu, we took a taxi back home once again, so we left ahead of Paul and the others.
During the middle of the ride back home, Yuu started to yawn repeatedly as, according to Mary, the jet lag started to get to the girl. We didn’t even ride for more than five minutes before she started sleeping. Sighing loudly, I decided that it was about time to take it off, so I gently pulled off the thing I put in her head.
A small tiara with a pair of pointy black furry ears atop of it, just like the ones she had in Insania.
And with a sigh, I laid back on the taxi’s bench and waited until I could get back home, and maybe find out what Cyg might be doing…