Seiji still didn’t get any of what was happening. And Yuki didn’t seem to be able to make up any reasons why to satisfy Seiji. So he just kept walking up the steps towards the two women with a very confused expression on his face.
Before he even made it the last ten steps, Aoi leapt down at him. She hung off his neck, settling in very close to him. Confusion didn’t override his personal fears. Even though he grew more used to Aoi being a ghost, it didn’t change how his body felt when she got too close to him. Seiji leapt almost ten meters into the air and landed more than a safe distance away.
His body still was shaking with chills, which he tried to cover up. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?!”
Yuki sweated a little bit watching things play out. ‘Huh, that’s an oddly strong reaction. I know he wasn’t really that familiar with girls before, but still…’
The ghost worked up a mix of disappointment and affection, naturally the second being completely missed by Seiji. “You’re being so cold, dear. Getting embarrassed being in front of company?” She floated back over to Seiji trying to stick close to him only to get him to finish running the rest of the distance into the main grounds of the shrine.
“What the hell’s wrong with you?! Why are you acting so weirdly?” Seiji bolted a little more to get some extra distance. Ever since she came in contact with him, his body’s sensitivity heighted. “Weirder than usual,” he corrected, remembering that Aoi was already a strange one.
While Aoi ended up chasing Seiji around the grounds, Nerine just watched it all play out. She kept her composure during the whole thing, never saying a word.
Or so it seemed. Yuki finished his own walk up the stairs, taking things more at his own pace. ‘Even the stoic one’s looking a little shaken. Well it’s not like she wasn’t already getting a little heated earlier.’
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Yuki recalled when he walked into the shrine. He found Shoji poking his head through the door as though he didn’t really belong in his own home. “Your brother and grandfather fighting again?” he inquired, hoping that he didn’t startle the boy with his sudden arrival.
The little boy looked back, pulling his head out, holding up a finger to mouth. “Quiet, we’ve got a visitor.”
“A visitor? So your grandfather’s doing some ceremony or advice giving session.”
Shaking his head, he pointed in motion for Yuki to look inside. “Something much more interesting.”
Now Shoji had his curiosity. The boy was naturally excitable and curious about almost anything. So it made Yuki wonder what had Shoji so interested. He carefully leaned over top of Shoji to line up his eye. Since their home was small, the main living space was immediately open to the front, making it incredibly great for peeking or spying. “Hmm…I don’t see…I see a woman, a ghost?” It didn’t take long for Yuki to piece together enough of Aoi’s appearance to understand what she was.
However, Shoji insisted on him looking a little further. ‘What’s got him so excited, a ghost is pretty neat, but as I heard from Seiji they already knew about ghosts. Must be the one he was saying was a deadbeat mooch.’ Then he saw another figure that forced his head to tilt around further. “Nerine!”
“Shh!” ordered Shoji pulling Yuki away from the door.
“What’s Nerine doing here? She should be back in her homeland.”
“So you know the tall lady?” The thought of more information made Shoji lean in closer. He seemed to understand immediately that there was a story there.
Sweating a little, Yuki stammered a bit in thought. ‘I had forgotten how excited he gets at these things. He eats up all of our stories.’ Panning around the site of the shrine grounds reminded Yuki again of their situation. ‘I keep forgetting Shoji’s their pride and joy. He must be locked up here whenever he’s not in school.’ However, he couldn’t think for long. Shoji kept leaning in more pressing for information. “Um-erm…Seiji knows her better than me.”
“Ooh!” Shoji’s eyes lit up so fast it seemed like they would ignite into stars on the spot. “My brother has a hot foreign girlfriend! He’s two-timing!” The notion seemed to make him giggle.
The whole conversation turn floored Yuki. He wasn’t sure where to start. ‘Where’d he learn such words…kids these days…’ Yuki sweated further, not certain how he should actually respond. ‘I had thought so too, they did seem to be close, but Seiji’s so dense. He only seemed to be treating her like a friend rather than something more special. Though Nerine’s rather hard to read herself, not exactly sure how she feels on the matter either.’
Sneaking back to the door, Yuki checked back in on the room. Now that he knew the situation better, he could read the temperature. It was ice cold almost when he peeked inside. It felt like even the air was stale from holding its breath.
He pulled back to look at Shoji. “Yikes, this is bad…I know this setup all too well and Seiji’s not going to understand and barge straight into the middle of a hurricane.”
Shoji grinned with excited nodding to Yuki. “Should be really fun to watch!”
“Since when were you so precocious?”
image [https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/pw/AP1GczO3GYpFnztj1BbpkS3q54IvfTTkmomiczykk245PNn5rgs1JBnZ3qbueNS3yoaIXa8qyzyKOtPc45DaGtEPyJFD30xwBPuf7z8GAjZuFQIYAdPeg3QmYRSOcFZ8X4-g-PsWntEbcOZUudL9iCFupxndL9jk7IXhkDB8alb_nzk-7j5KgSP4Vid73nfQvy3sO1JFAFIEFcFDN3gbApUjM34prtitkDG1zUBCRY2yUqM9IP_bcsnkcbNTB4beb_GLqnOxkY6ksfhfsz6mUdiMtIX9owhyxGFAaBQudVihPAhikV0I1YQYKYg4KROfrEMVimS0plYLs-lVrR2t3yv5-fwrnlsJfCjNaeQf8AS6vHKubZPBanvT0qryQV9Rgx3JBsa-6VoIXah7GEARZMhaDg3VOdGjrffdlUmEOhHpPntz7s8GFSZNFOwDtBVqJgghRx8tVEyx-9QFOMYtBGvEM8Sx1UkLStYunrZ315C0HcLr9XopZ6YbRniKxiPlEBUqPyaA9XfTRk98qq1usDXUcjAu2hAmztd-2yhUlH6o8mzC4vFqBVMoVdGuyWjVyKnk_ikL2pxTgRnPT56TXONL8faILK_810Uhi8pBuCjaGSooouJyAL1Fi4TDGd9SmhZrtvRPB9QjYZV7iBLESzVp6ommBg8yYAL2_HE9wFjZvJf6hAkz30VEWle5jZC6uzMnMlBUMtkKmyymrGY86AyXjvHkReh6QYvwV-FEaUDLx8J4gqtvHkhwww4p0Dg09dNrFlkgM6HI1pkSbtUDl2bvDhcf1LKWKLCCzSUCW5UKnHTotItIGTRpwB4di36rER9Ucdga15FatrE8n-0qo1FJHNN76bnXx2qkLYtJWZB4Wg3iVeX4BCLxHW4EpEHzfzhqPsVFN7Wosg2OqjFlR8o=w500-h50-s-no-gm?authuser=0]
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
While Seiji and Aoi provided the physical comedy for the scene, Shoji resurfaced nearby Yuki. “It’s looking exactly like it does in those books!” He seemed to be getting more excited by the moment as though he was living a dream.
Yuki looked a little incredulous at Shoji, but he started to piece things together. “Have you by any chance been borrowing your friends’ manga?” It was starting to make sense for him.
Shoji nodded to him. “Yeah! They gave me all sorts of things! They are really interesting to read. Seeing things happen like in those fighting stories was so cool! I didn’t think I’d get to see more of them play out!”
Patting Shoji on the head, he understood the sentiment all too well. ‘I had the same sort of reaction, though it quickly disappeared when I realized that this was reality not a fantasy… Shoji seems to be young enough not to make that leap so quickly…’
“Big Brother’s already closer to having a harem than you, Yuki and you’re the main character!”
Yuki had to nod a little in agreement with his assessment. “You may be right about that. Though I do have more female friends than male ones, now that I think about it. Not like any of them other than Yumi has any romantic interests though.”
Actually becoming a sun from the excitement, Shoji looked up to Yuki. “Oh wow, so you do have a harem!”
“Chiharu’s a tsundere, but so is Seiji. This is a battle story, not a romance. So you’d have to bend pretty hard to try to make that work.”
The two boys’ conversation had drawn the attention of Nerine. While she outwardly didn’t seem to be making any intention, as Saki would to shut them up for their idiocy, her face was bright red. It seemed that she had finally cracked.
Yuki finally remembered he needed to lay off the fourth wall and tried to get a little more serious. Coughing a bit, he redirected the conversation. “Why do you know about harems? You’re too young for that!”
“Huh? But I was told that it was every boy’s dream.”
“Well I…” He saw Nerine staring at him further. She seemed to want to do what Saki normally did, but was held back by her sense of respect. Yuki was still the King, even if he was acting more like a child. The joke had run its course. “… reality and dreams are different. It’s best to focus on one!” He wasn’t really sure if he was helping things anymore. It wasn’t quite the type of conversation he expected to be having with Seiji’s little brother.
“But don’t some marry all of the girls?”
“Please help me escape this comedy skit…” The situation only became more difficult for Yuki to explain. ‘Shoji’s too young to understand romance and he seems to be having too much trouble sorting fantasy from reality… I need to do something…’ Yuki searched around the grounds for signs of anything. A distraction would be all he needed. Then it jumped out at him. “I think your brother’s gave you enough entertainment for now. He seems to be really scared and we need to progress the story again.”
Chapter 308 – Mixed Messages
It took a few minutes for Yuki to catch them. The only way he was able to end the chase was to use his powers to restrain Aoi enough that Seiji would calm down. Once Yuki actually made an effort, Shoji explained to him the real cause of Seiji’s actions. Surprised and amused, Yuki managed to settle it all and get them to sit in a room.
“…umm…” Yuki made sure to place Aoi and Nerine on opposite sides of the table and they still made the entire room unwelcome. Most of it came from Aoi, but Nerine only seemed to make it worse by providing almost no reaction to Aoi’s jealousy.
Brave and dumb, Seiji had enough of Aoi’s attitude towards Nerine. “She’s going to be our guest. So I expect you to be polite to her!” He still didn’t get the source of the problem though.
“Guest?! But I thought you said that you had no room for guests!”
Seiji’s eyes flattened a little as he looked at Aoi. “We have no room for ghosts. People that are actually living are a different story.”
Aoi took it about as anyone would expect. Her surprise hardly covered up well. When she glared over at the other woman, Nerine seemed to have a slightly smug look on her face. It only enraged her further. “Fine! I see how it is! I hope you have fun with your living woman!” Aoi then disappeared from all of them.
‘That could have gone better,’ thought Yuki. He looked over to Seiji to see if he planned to do anything. Remaining as blind as always to what was going on, he made no reaction to it. “Shouldn’t you go after her, Seiji? She seemed upset.”
“To hell with her! She’s annoying anyway.”
“But…” Yuki bit back some of his words knowing how this all looked. He tried to dial in how much he used his books to mirror reality.
“Besides, she’ll come back eventually. I can never be rid of her.” Seiji motioned dismissively to Yuki on the matter. More pressing matters came first in his mind. “What are you doing here, Nerine? Isn’t it forbidden to leave Atlantis?” Then Seiji recalled everything that happened with Yuki. “The Council hasn’t sent you to attack Yuki again?!”
Nerine leaned back a little as Seiji rose. He got a little too close for her comfort. Shaking her head, she wanted him to sit back down before she answered. It took him a few moments, but she had her space again. “No, I wasn’t sent by the Council. In fact, they shouldn’t know about my visit.”
A familiar sound for Yuki, he had a bit of an idea of what was going on. “Demosthenes sent you then.”
“That’s right, Your Majesty.” It pleased her to find someone that seemed to pick things up quickly.
Yuki held up a hand to interrupt her before she continued. “Drop the formalities. I’d like to keep that a secret around here. There may be ears listening that I don’t want to know. So just call me Yuki if you want to address me.” All the problems that he had to deal with seemed trivial, but it was just another thing he needed to keep under wraps. ‘If Demosthenes and my father are right, I don’t want her slipping while we’re out in the city.’
“But I can’t—“
“This is an order. Are you going to refuse an order from me?”
A complicated expression surfaced on Nerine’s face. She had to obey him, he was the King yet her training told her to give him the respect he deserves. The conflict silenced her.
Waving his hand like none of it mattered, Seiji downplayed it all. “It’s just Yuki. You don’t need to stand on ceremony for him. You don’t need to be so stuffy about these things, Nerine.”
Unknown to Seiji, the tension rapidly increased in the room. Only Yuki understood it. It made him sweat watching Seiji crashing so fast and he did not even understand it. “Seiji…that might have been…”
“What? We’re all friends here, no need to treat anyone differently.”
Sighing, Yuki knew he wasn’t going to get anywhere with him. Across the table, he saw how Nerine was taking it all. He could only defuse things. “So why are you here? Something Demosthenes needs from me?”
It took her a bit to respond to Yuki, but she focused back on the task. “No. I’ve been sent as an ambassador, though given the nature of the situation it might be better to say that I’m here as a neutral aid.”
“Neutral aid? What do you plan to do?” Some of it made sense. He had an idea of what Demosthenes planned.
“I’ll be here so that you’re able to communicate with the homeland. And if anything does happen I’ll be informed immediately of the situation.”
“So a messenger. It’ll be good to know what’s happening. I did everything I could to ease tensions, but it’s not a perfect setup. I expect future conflicts to still arise.”
“And if they do, I’ll inform you immediately.”
“Right.”
Seiji jumped back into the conversation, as it seemed the two of them settled their matters. “That explains Nerine’s presence, but what about you Yuki? I don’t see Saki with you. Just paying me a visit?”
Pressed on his own situation, Yuki quieted up quickly. His mind had nearly forgotten everything that was happening. Inside the shrine with them, it all seemed so far away. Unfortunately, he knew what had to be done. ‘All I’m doing is running away…’ It was something he had to face. “Things have gotten complicated back in my neighborhood.”
“What the UN doing something?”
“No, that’d almost be more welcome at this point. The best I can describe it…war has broken out and friends are killing friends…”