Chapter 7: Sakura Airi's Little Hobby
"Phew, this should be about enough. Realistic slice-of-life style, fantasy world style, sci-fi style... there's all sorts of genres! And they're all games I've never seen before! The girls inside are waiting for me! I must not let them down!"
Katsuragi Keima looked at the shopping cart full of game cartridges with a look of pure satisfaction.
"Kami-nii-sama... honestly..." Elsie sighed.
One shopping cart had already been filled to the brim, and for Keima's sake, she had been forced to push a second one.
"Kami-nii-sama, although 100,000 points is a lot, buying this many games must consume a fair amount of points, right?"
"The total consumption will be 39,412 points."
At that moment, Keima pushed up his glasses and answered with a serious expression.
"Eh?! You already calculated the price?!"
Elsie looked at Keima in surprise, her eyes darting back and forth between the contents of the two shopping carts. The number of items added up to quite a lot, and the prices were all different; Elsie felt the points spent would be massive, but she had no concept of exactly how much.
Even though they hadn't checked out yet, Keima had been noting down the price of every item while picking them out and calculating the sum.
"It looks like a lot, but some of the daily necessities are the cheapest varieties. Moreover, the prices in the school should be slightly lower than outside, so the points spent aren't as much as one might imagine."
"But that's definitely not a small number! You've spent nearly 40% of your points in one go!"
"It's only 20%!"
"20%? ...Wait a minute, you didn't count my points too, did you?!"
"I'm helping you guys retrieve the power fragments; it shouldn't be a problem to have a bit of a salary, right? Or do you just want to freeload off my labor!"
"When you put it that way, it does seem to make some sense!"
"Don't suddenly get that look of realization! And I was just speaking casually; under normal circumstances, I wouldn't actually touch your points."
"Don't worry, Kami-nii-sama! My points are your points! Just give the word and I'm willing to give you all of them!"
"Don't make me sound like a kidnapper!"
While Keima and Elsie were talking, his gaze seemed to catch something, and he looked toward the other side. A familiar figure had appeared near them.
Sakura Airi.
Sakura Airi had her hands pressed lightly against her chest, looking somewhat nervous as her gaze swept across the rows of products.
A spark instantly shot from Keima's eyes.
'Could it be... Sakura Airi is a fellow enthusiast?!'
However, Sakura Airi's gaze didn't linger for a moment in the gaming section; instead, it focused on a row of cameras.
"Ah, I remember you... Sakura-san, right?"
Keima walked slowly to her side and softly greeted her.
"I, I... you... I... You're, you're Katsuragi-kun..."
Sakura Airi recoiled a step like a cat getting an electric shock, seemingly not expecting to be recognized by a classmate.
Although Sakura Airi had also performed a self-introduction today, her voice had been so weak due to extreme nervousness and shyness that others could barely hear her; most people hadn't even managed to remember her name.
Keima, however, was the exact opposite. His utterly bizarre speech had ensured that almost everyone remembered his name. Including Sakura Airi.
"Hello, Sakura-san! I am Kami-nii-sama—I mean, Nii-sama's younger sister! Katsuragi Elsie! Please treat me well! It wasn't my turn during the self-introductions earlier!"
Elsie also walked up to Sakura Airi's side with an incredibly enthusiastic smile.
"P-please... please treat me well too..."
Sakura Airi pursed her lips and nodded slightly, her voice so small it was almost just a breath.
Unlike the cold aloofness of Horikita Suzune, Sakura Airi was a complete case of social anxiety. Communicating with people she didn't know felt like sitting on a bed of needles or having a fishbone stuck in her throat. Even at her previous school, Sakura Airi was a "transparent" existence with almost no social life and no friends.
Now, Sakura Airi's body was even trembling slightly.
'Should—should I just walk away? It's the first day of school... if I just leave, it will—it will seem very rude... What—what should I do...'
Sakura Airi's face turned bright red from the tension. At that moment, Keima's voice rang out again.
"Sakura-san, do you like photography?"
Keima's gaze swept over the row of cameras nearby and then focused on Sakura Airi's face.
"Yes."
Only when answering this did Sakura Airi seem to have a hint of determination that hadn't been there before.
"I've met a girl who liked taking photos before. She liked using a camera to record all sorts of things, and she had very in-depth knowledge of various cameras!"
As Keima spoke, he observed Sakura Airi's reaction. Upon hearing things related to photography, the sense of alienation around Sakura Airi seemed to weaken slightly.
"Oh, it's getting late. We won't disturb Sakura-san any further. Elsie, let's go!"
"Eh? We're going back already?"
Before Elsie could react, Keima grabbed her hand and left directly.
Sakura Airi watched the backs of Keima and Elsie as they departed, dazed for a moment. Only then did she let out a long sigh of relief, feeling a sense of liberation. She turned around and projected a gaze full of anticipation toward the rows of cameras.
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"Kami-nii-sama, was it for the same reason as with Horikita-san that you didn't chat more with Sakura-san?"
After paying the bill, Keima and Elsie were each carrying heavy bags on their way back to the dormitory.
"More or less. Both are the types that are not easy to get along with, though the difference between Sakura and Horikita is quite large. Rather than saying she's hard to get along with, it's more that she doesn't know how to get along with others. I felt how nervous she was while talking to her, so I chose to leave first."
Keima answered seriously.
"Then who was that girl who liked photography you mentioned earlier?!" Elsie asked, her eyes full of curiosity.
"A character from a certain game I played before."
"Huh? So in the end, it was just a lie?"
"What are you saying! That wasn't a lie! To me, every character in a game exists for real, and I interact with them with the most sincere heart!"