"What's with you? You look like all the fun's been sucked out of you. Are the doujins not doing it for you anymore, or have the pretty girls stopped being cute?"
Eriri glanced at Mio beside her. Back when they'd first arrived at the venue, the girl had been bubbling with excitement—and then, for no reason Eriri could figure out, she'd suddenly turned into this, like she'd lost interest in everything around her.
"It's nothing. I'm just a little curious about what's going on between you and Aki-san, is all."
"Eh!? Wh-why are you suddenly asking about that?" Eriri shot a nervous look at Aki Tomoya not far off, and only let out a quiet breath of relief once she'd confirmed his attention was on the surrounding booths.
"Because he knows your secret identity. And here I thought I was the first person ever to find out Eriri was Kashiwagi Eri." Mio looked at Eriri with a wounded, reproachful expression.
"B-because we're childhood friends, so it's not that strange he'd know, is it?"
"It's plenty strange. If it were me, I'd never let anyone find out I was an 18X doujin artist—not even a childhood friend."
Then Mio put on a face like she'd just remembered something. "Oh, right—Eriri, weren't all your earlier works childhood-friend-themed? Don't tell me—"
"N-no! You're reading way too much into it." Before Mio could even finish, Eriri cut her off without a second's hesitation, her inner thoughts plain as day.
In truth Mio already knew the answer perfectly well; she was mainly just teasing the other girl to pass the dull time in line.
Mio propped her chin on Eriri's shoulder, eyeing the long queue stretching out ahead, and said listlessly, "Feels like all our time's going into standing in line."
Feeling Mio's breath wash over her ear, a faint blush rose to Eriri's fair cheeks. A little stiffly, she said, "These big events only come around twice a year, so you'll get used to it. More to the point—could you not talk right next to my ear?"
"Hm? Is Eriri's ear a sensitive spot? What a coincidence—mine is too~"
"Wh-who wants to know where your sensitive spots are!"
Even as she said it, though, Eriri quietly filed the information away. It might just come in handy someday.
Then again—what was Mio's angle, volunteering one of her own weak points like that? She didn't actually want Eriri to do something weird to her, did she?
I'm not gay! There's no way I'd ever let myself get seduced by Mio!
Just as Eriri was busy feeding herself these mental reassurances, Aki Tomoya, up ahead, finally noticed what was going on behind him.
Watching Mio whisper so intimately into Eriri's ear, he was reminded once more that Mio was a dangerous individual.
He'd found a chance to talk to Eriri about it before, but Eriri hadn't seemed to care much—and between the lines, she'd let slip that she already knew Mio was a yuri girl.
Looking at them now, though, there seemed to be some murky, hard-to-pin-down something between Eriri and Mio.
He wasn't interested in the 3D world, but watching Mio and Eriri being all cuddly still stirred up something odd in him, like it or not.
Catching Aki Tomoya's gaze, Mio let out a soft laugh. If she weren't worried Eriri would blow her top, she half wanted to stick out her tongue and lick the girl's ear.
At that very moment, the System's voice abruptly piped up in her ear. "Host, why do I get the feeling you're the blond bastard from one of those doujins?"
"No. I'm not. I didn't."
"This System couldn't care less whether you are or aren't. Please have the Host proactively kiss Eriri before parting ways with Aki Tomoya—location restricted to the face. Success may grant the Eriri Series Card Set or an item reward; failure will require drawing the Penalty Card Set."
"Why is every Eriri-related task restricted to 'before Aki Tomoya leaves'? You're trying to railroad me straight onto the blond-home-wrecker route, aren't you!"
"Heh heh." The System merely gave a cold little laugh, with no apparent intention of humoring Mio any further.
Not that Mio minded. The event had only just gotten going—there was no way Aki Tomoya would up and leave this soon—and besides, the System hadn't said she had to do it right in front of him.
Catching him off guard and ambushing Eriri would clear the task just fine. Given where the two of them stood now, all she had to do was peck Eriri on the cheek quick as a thunderclap—faster than she could even cover her ears. Worst case, the girl would bristle a little; nothing more.
Looking at Eriri's fair cheek, Mio licked her slightly dry lips, weighing whether or not to make her move.
As if sensing Mio's gaze, Eriri suddenly put some distance between them and eyed her warily. "You... what are you up to?"
"I haven't done a single thing. Why are you so on guard around me?"
"My gut tells me you were just scheming something against me."
"If I really wanted to scheme against you, I'd have done it last night while you were asleep—why would I wait until now? You're overthinking it."
"And most importantly: a weakling like me, combat power of five at best, only ever gets to be on the receiving end of Eriri scheming against me."
"Wh-who would ever do that to you!"
"Alright, alright, quit staring at me—we need to move up."
"Ah—oh."
At Mio's prompting, Eriri finally noticed the gap that had opened up between her and the line ahead, and hurried to close it. Mio used the moment to lean against her once again.
Granted, with a build like Mio's, having her lean in actually felt rather nice—but Eriri was still inexplicably put out. This white-haired little bitch—she really isn't doing this on purpose just to show off, is she?
After they'd finally finished queuing and buying their things, the three of them set off again in search of booths that caught their eye.
Just as Eriri was mulling over what else might be worth grabbing, she felt someone tug at the hem of her clothes. No need to guess—it was Mio.
"What is it?"
"Eriri, look over there—doesn't that one look just like our Club President?"
Following the direction Mio pointed, Eriri recognized her at a single glance despite the distance: that was none other than the Art Club's President.
She really hadn't expected to run into the Club President of all people, in a place like this.
What made her even more curious was what the President was selling.
After the two exchanged a glance, Eriri called out a quick word to Aki Tomoya—who was still busy looking around—and then started toward the President's booth.
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