In my opinion, you have to pay a price to get what you want.
It might not be a basic equivalent exchange.
You might pay more and get less.
But if the price is something insignificant to me, I’m more than willing to pay it.
That’s why I skipped the teacher’s evaluations and general subjects like math to come to the Beginner Dungeon.
There were no students around, probably because it was class time.
It wasn’t quite the season for desperate students to skip morning lectures just to explore the Dungeon, so the lack of crowds made sense.
I pulled out my student ID and infused it with magic power to make the text appear.
When I showed it to the man at the reception desk, he clamped his mouth shut, staring at the letters on my ID with an expression that screamed he wanted to say something.
Was he making that face because he was conflicted about letting a first-year student enter the Dungeon alone, even though it was confirmed safe?
Or was it because he was wondering why I was exploring the Beginner Dungeon when I had already cleared the 10th floor?
It was probably a bit of both.
As usual, he looked like he had a fishbone stuck in his throat, but he let me pass without a word.
I prepped my Tsukuyomi Traveler before stepping into the magic circle.
I opened the stopwatch app and hit ‘Start’ the moment the teleportation circle activated.
The most important thing in a speedrun is eliminating waste.
One of the biggest wastes of time in the game is fighting trash mobs.
Sure, if you need experience points, you can grind them, but the standard strategy is to ignore them and only fight where you can farm efficiently.
In this case, I didn’t need to gather any magic essence or experience points along the way, so I planned to bypass every enemy and rush straight to the next floor.
“Gyo gyoo!”
A Gyoblin looked surprised as I sprinted vigorously past it, but I just kept running.
I did, however, make sure to snatch any items along the way.
Incidentally, in the game, you can sprint through the Dungeon without taking a single break, but in reality, that’s impossible.
It’s physically impossible to run for kilometers without stopping.
Your breathing gets ragged, your legs turn as heavy as lead, and your dropping concentration leaves you wide open to surprise attacks.
That’s why breaks are necessary.
So, where could I take a break?
The spot where the three of us ate and chatted last time?
No, that’s wrong.
I’d have to make a detour to get there.
So…
“Just as I thought, the boss room, right?”
I regulated my breathing while taking down a Goblin Knight—a goblin wielding a sword and shield that served as the 5th-floor boss.
By maneuvering my Third and Fourth Hands correctly, I could defeat it, and after a while, the monsters would respawn, allowing me to collect magic essence and dropped items.
I didn’t need the essence or experience points, but if I had to take a break somewhere, this was a good spot.
Unless I had a vehicle I could ride while resting, which I didn’t, this was the best option.
Starting from the 6th floor, the trash mob problem escalated a notch.
Flying monsters.
If Senpai or Ludi were here, it would be manageable, but they had poor compatibility with my current solo playstyle.
I was unlikely to lose since their attacks couldn’t hit me, but I needed to avoid wasting time.
Naturally, my strategy was to just run away with everything I had.
I blew past the 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th floors, finally arriving at the 10th floor.
This wasn’t the same room where I had fought the Hobgoblins alongside Senpai and Ludi.
Pulling out my Tsukuyomi Traveler, I stopped the stopwatch.
“One hour and twenty-six minutes.
Looks like I can clear this place in under two hours with time to spare.”
This was a special floor you could only access by arriving within a specific time limit.
Apparently, I had made the cut.
Incidentally, the normal 10th floor was just a boss room, while the special floor was a labyrinth.
It was an incredibly tedious process; a gentleman playing for the first time would have had to map it out on paper, taking notes as he went.
However, once the routing data was available and speedrunning became viable, a labyrinth with fixed patterns was essentially just a straight line.
There were eight possible map layouts for the special 10th floor of the Beginner Dungeon.
They all featured numerous branches, and some even had infinite loops, making them extremely vicious.
I’d had a lot of trouble my first time through when routing data wasn’t available.
The only saving grace was that there were no monsters on this floor.
To reach my true target—the 11th floor—I had to clear the special 10th floor and reach the 10th-floor boss within two hours of entering the Dungeon.
There was also a stricter checkpoint: you had to reach the special 10th floor within 1 hour and 40 minutes, or you’d be forcibly teleported to the regular Hobgoblin boss room.
I took a deep breath and started sprinting.
The first fork was a T-junction.
I went east without hesitation, leading to a four-way crossroads.
I headed north and hit another crossroads.
Alright, confirmed.
Pattern D.
In that case, from here it was southeast, southwest, southeast, then northeast.
I navigated the forks without a single pause until I reached a teleportation circle at a dead end.
“Bingo.”
I checked the time and stepped into the circle.
A Wood Golem was waiting for me at the teleportation point.
It was a giant, standing three meters taller than me, made of several thick trunks bound together in a humanoid shape.
It looked like something a giant child would build out of logs.
The light brown leaves sprouting from its head gave it a slightly more human silhouette.
So, how was I going to clear this floor?
Using items, of course.
I pulled out the fire Carved Circle magic stones I’d collected earlier, aimed at the Wood Golem, and activated them.
I didn’t hesitate to use the ones I’d found with Ludi and Senpai, or the ones I’d just grabbed.
The two magic stones glowed, spawning magic circles that launched two vigorous fireballs straight at the Wood Golem.
The moment they struck, its entire body erupted in flames.
There were three types of Wood Golems: those with dry, tea-colored leaves, those with green leaves, and those with no leaves at all.
Wood Golems were generally weak to fire, but the dry-leaf variant was exceptionally vulnerable; you could easily defeat it just by spamming beginner-tier fire magic.
I couldn’t cast it myself, and a speedrunning protagonist might not have the MP for it either.
However, the game specifically placed Carved Circle magic stones in this Dungeon just for the hidden boss.
Naturally, I wasn’t going to pass up the chance to use them.
I coated my Third Hand in an Earth enchantment and struck the burning Wood Golem.
With just a single punch, the massive construct crashed to the ground.
It rolled around repeatedly, trying to smother the flames, while I rained down countless, relentless strikes.
It took less than a minute to finish it off.
After collecting the dropped magic stone, I headed to the back of the room.
A statue of a winged woman stood there.
As I stopped in front of it, a voice echoed directly in my mind.
—You have done well to reach this place.
As a reward, I shall grant you a skill—
My body began to glow softly.
—It is the Thought Acceleration skill.
Good luck—
The moment the voice faded, a magic circle materialized beneath my feet.
Before I knew it, I was teleported back to the entrance of the Beginner Dungeon.
“Hell yeah!”
I clenched my fist and pumped it toward the sky.
Having acquired one of the absolute must-have skills, I was one step closer to my ultimate goal.
I pulled out my Tsukuyomi Traveler and checked the time.
I had entered the Dungeon at 8:00 AM, and it was now 9:40 AM.
It took about 100 minutes.
A solid record.
“Now then.”
Since I had successfully cleared the 11th floor of the Beginner Dungeon…
“Let’s run the Beginner Dungeon again!”
If this world followed the game, there were five types of skills that could be obtained in the Beginner Dungeon.
Three of them were useful to me, one of which was the Thought Acceleration I had just acquired.
Thought Acceleration was a god-tier skill that boosted overall stats and was an absolute must-have if you wanted to min-max a character.
It was no exaggeration to say that every character in the endgame party had mastered this skill, and it was one that anyone could learn.
Incidentally, the skill I acquired on my second speedrun of the Beginner Dungeon was Physical Resistance Increase (Small).
It had almost no combat effect in the game, merely boosting physical stamina slightly.
Honestly, in a pure combat sense, it was pretty useless.
However, it was incredibly useful for the peculiar nighttime scenes in bishoujo games.
There was one heroine who couldn’t be romanced without a certain level of physical stamina, meaning many gentlemen had to grind this specific skill just to conquer her route.
But in this world, where the game had become reality, I imagined it had become a genuinely super useful skill.
“I’ll have to test how much my running distance has increased later.”
I checked the time on my second run: about 110 minutes.
Was I a little tired from doing back-to-back laps?
It was slightly slower than the first time.
“It’s almost noon.
I’ll grab something to eat… and then dive right back in!”
Having secured my target skill on the second consecutive run, I headed triumphantly toward the cafeteria.
For lunch, if Marino-san wasn’t busy—which was rare—she would make me a bento.
But usually, I either bought food from the campus shops or ate in the cafeteria.
Lately, with the Majin incident, both Marino-san and Nee-san had been incredibly busy.
“What were you doing this morning, Kousuke-kun?”
“What?
Training, obviously.”
I slid into the seat next to Iori, who had actually attended his morning classes, and used my Tsukuyomi Traveler to pick up the meal I’d pre-ordered and paid for.
Iori had apparently done the same and retrieved his food immediately.
“Eeh…”
Iori stared at me, stunned, and let out a sigh.
Well, skipping class to train wasn’t exactly normal behavior.
Glancing at his tray, I noticed his lunch was a bit more luxurious than usual.
“Oh, your meal tier went up!”
“Yeah, I got a ton of Tsukuyomi Points from the Majin subjugation.
Though we only survived mostly thanks to Monika-kaichou.”
Tsukuyomi Points functioned like currency within the Tsukuyomi Magic Academy.
You earned them when the school purchased items and magic stones you brought back from Dungeons.
You also got bonus points for first-time dungeon clears, record-breaking runs, and published research.
By clearing the 10th floor on my first try, I’d racked up a massive amount of points for a first-year.
“So that’s why you’re eating the premium stuff, huh.”
I felt it was a bit of a waste, but spending points on good food was well within the acceptable margin of error, right?
Actually, I wasn’t paying with Tsukuyomi Points at all; I was using a separate allowance account Marino-san had set up for me.
The balance was high enough to order the most expensive meal on the menu thousands of times.
It was supposedly meant to last me a whole year.
There’s no way I’m going to spend all of that, right?
Incidentally, regular money couldn’t be directly exchanged for Tsukuyomi Points.
However, you could buy magic tools with cash and then sell them to the school for points.
I was actually surprised to learn I could use cash so freely, since I’d basically only relied on Tsukuyomi Points in the game.
“Kousuke-kun’s meals are always so luxurious…”
Well, just chalk it up to the lottery of birth and give up.
When you thought about it, the system heavily favored students with wealth or political power.
Most of the parents of the top-tier students were nobles or wealthy merchants.
“I’m in my growth spurt, after all.”
I deployed my standard strategy of spouting nonsense to change the subject.
I could just say Marino-san gave it to me, but that would inevitably lead to questions about my real parents’ deaths.
There was no need to make the atmosphere heavy.
“Speaking of which, how were your classes?”
“Hmm.
How should I put it… Normal?
Oh, that reminds me.”
“Reminds you of what?”
Iori stopped eating, his mouth snapping shut as if he’d touched on a difficult topic.
“Well, you know.
Some people were saying some pretty nasty things about you, Kousuke-kun…”
“Oh, I can guess why.
It’s about Ludi, right?”
One thing you couldn’t truly experience in a game, but felt acutely in reality, was the weight of people’s stares and hostility.
Ludi had a massive fan club—the Imperial Knights, or LLL—and her popularity on campus was staggering.
As the guy constantly seen hanging out with her, I was naturally viewed as an enemy and a nuisance.
Maybe it was because Ludi kept her elegant, untouchable Ojou-sama facade up for everyone else, but for some reason, she dropped it and talked casually with me.
Well, given everything we’d been through, it was inevitable.
Because of that, I was on the receiving end of jealous glares, hostile whispers, and occasionally even stray magic spells from freshmen, sophomores, and seniors alike.
“That’s part of it, but… you know, you skip class like you did today, you rarely show up for afternoon lectures… People are starting to call you an underachiever…”
There was no lie there; it was the absolute truth.
“Well, that’s fair.”
I had no excuse, and it was an evaluation I had to accept.
Skipping class made me a pariah in the lecture halls.
“And after that, I heard some guys saying that anyone who corrupts public morals should be expelled… Apparently, they were from the LLL…”
I see.
They wanted to get rid of the guy who was getting too close to their precious Ludi, huh?
Well, I highly doubted Ludi would suddenly start acting friendly toward them just because I got expelled, but… they hadn’t actually done any real harm to me, so I was almost relieved.
“I see.
Sorry about that.
It must have made you uncomfortable, right?”
“No, it’s not me I’m worried about, Kousuke-kun…”
This kind of harassment could easily be avoided if I held a high rank in the school’s social hierarchy.
But I couldn’t deny the facts: I was an underachiever, I skipped class, and I hadn’t bothered to befriend the rest of my classmates.
Still, all the girls in this school were gorgeous, so I wanted to get along with them eventually.
Why are all the background mobs in eroge and anime so ridiculously beautiful?
Ultimately, the jealousy over Ludi wasn’t just a classroom issue; it was a campus-wide problem.
Unless I had serious political clout, there was no avoiding it.
“Well, I don’t mind.
I’m the guy who’s going to become the strongest in this school, after all.
This kind of adversity is nothing.”
“I see… Man, Kousuke-kun, you’re mentally tough, huh.”
“Yep.
The strongest.”
Iori laughed, giving me a look that said, What are you even talking about?
But he seemed genuinely worried about me.
I’d been thinking about it since I first played the game, but the protagonist was actually a pretty cool guy.
If Iori were a girl and an eroge heroine, I would have made her one of my waifus without a second thought, regardless of her face.
As I was eating my parfait, I noticed Iori staring intently at me.
I scooped up some cream with my spoon and moved it to the right side of his face.
His eyes tracked it to the right.
Then, I moved the spoon to the left, and Iori’s gaze followed it to the left.
What is this adorable little animal…?!
─Ludi’s Point of View─
I had caught wind of the nasty rumors circulating about Kousuke.
The people around me had probably tried to keep them out of my earshot, but their consideration was useless; someone had inevitably spilled the beans.
But was it really out of consideration?
Honestly, it felt more like they were just bracing themselves for my anger.
That said, Kousuke himself was partly to blame.
Even if his academic scores were low, he blatantly skipped morning lectures, rarely showed up for afternoon classes, and always wore a carefree expression that probably infuriated the serious students.
Furthermore, Kousuke’s own logic made it incredibly difficult to argue with him.
“To begin with, I can’t think of a single reason to attend afternoon classes.
The guys who are good at close-quarters combat don’t go to afternoon lectures; they’re at the dojos or in clubs on and off campus.
I’m just exploring the Dungeon.
Though sometimes I stop by a sweets shop.
Plus, I only skip the classes I’m already good at.
In exchange, I’m getting my training done properly, so there’s no problem.”
He wasn’t wrong.
There were far more students than I expected who rarely attended afternoon classes.
And he specifically skipped the subjects he had already mastered, like math and physical education.
But putting his logic aside, the current issue was his reputation.
“In short, he’s standing out in all the wrong ways,” Kousuke’s friend, Hijiri Iori-kun, pointed out.
“You’re right, I think so too,” Katou Rina agreed.
“In other words, it’s pure jealousy!
When there’s a guy they envy, they want to drag him down.
You know the type of losers I mean.
They think they win by tearing their opponent down?
They haven’t won anything.
Instead, they should be improving themselves to become worthy of the person they admire.”
She said it with a strange, bitter sense of realism.
“Kousuke-kun doesn’t seem to care much about it.
If anything, his classmates seem more angry and shocked by it than he is.”
“It’s just like us right now, isn’t it?”
Did he really feel nothing while making everyone else worry about him?
In his case, he might not even realize we were worried.
He could be incredibly sharp one moment, and unbelievably dense the next.
“If they knew even a fraction of how hard he trains, no one would have the guts to badmouth him,” I muttered.
Rina-san frowned at my words.
“I don’t know Kousuke that well, but just how much effort does he actually put in?”
“Well, we know someone from the Public Morals Committee, and she called his work ethic ‘abnormal.’ She said he’s an eccentric, relentless grinder.
She praised him for never complaining about the grueling basics or repetitive drills, just pushing himself like a madman and producing results that honestly leave her in awe.”
“To me, it sounds like she’s actually terrified of him…”
“He told me, ‘It’s way more efficient than speedrunning a super kusoge.'”
I didn’t understand half the words in that sentence.
Apparently, neither did Rina-san or Hijiri-kun.
“Well, if we, his actual classmates, don’t fully get it, there’s no way people who barely interact with him would understand his effort.”
“True.
I only ever see the usual, laid-back Takioto-kun at school, so…”
Hijiri-kun agreed with Rina-san.
I wondered why he kept up that facade at school when he was training and studying so intensely at home.
“Even at home, he’s always so—”
“Home?”
“Home?”
I quickly cleared my throat.
“I mean, he seems like the type to act like that at home too, right?”
I had completely forgotten that our living arrangement was a secret known only to a select few.
“?”
Hijiri-kun tilted his head in confusion, while Rina-san raised a skeptical eyebrow.
Despite my internal warnings to be careful around Katrina-level intuition, I had just made a massive slip-up!
“What does he actually think about the rumors?”
I swiftly changed the subject to steer the conversation away from my blunder.
Hijiri-kun took the bait.
“Ah, about that.
He really didn’t care at all.
He kept eating normally, didn’t even pause, and was happily devouring a parfait that looked incredibly delicious.
After that, he bought me an ‘apology for making you worry’ parfait, and it was amazing!
The strawberries were huge and so sweet!”
Did the parfait just hijack the conversation?
I stared at Hijiri-kun, whose eyes were practically sparkling at the memory.
Maybe Kousuke hadn’t bought it out of guilt for causing worry, but simply because he couldn’t resist Hijiri-kun’s puppy-dog eyes.
…Actually, knowing Kousuke, that was exactly it.
“You don’t need to worry about a thing.”
That was the Vice President of the Public Morals Committee, Mizumori Yukine—the Senpai Kousuke adored as his master.
“Takioto isn’t an idiot.
He definitely anticipated this would happen.
That’s why he doesn’t see it as a problem.
Even now, he’s still heading to the Dungeon like nothing’s wrong, right?”
I nodded in agreement.
“I’ve been keeping an eye on things, but it seems I need to be even more vigilant.
In my opinion, humans are incredibly sensitive to the stares and whispers of others.”
I completely agreed with that sentiment.
“Certainly, you can’t say Takioto’s behavior is exactly praiseworthy.
As the Vice President of the Public Morals Committee, I’m technically in a position where I should be scolding him.”
However, Yukine’s tone grew firmer.
“But if his goal is to gain strength, his actions make perfect sense.
He should be praised for training so efficiently and refusing to bend to the opinions of others.
Besides, Takioto isn’t directly causing trouble for anyone, is he?”
I agreed.
It was exactly as Yukine-san said.
He wasn’t disrupting the lectures or bothering anyone; he just wasn’t attending them.
“Should I file a formal complaint against the LLL?” I asked.
Senpai shook her head.
“No, it’s better to leave the LLL alone unless things escalate.
The MMM and the SSS learned that the hard way.
Some fan clubs get more jealous and radical when you complain about them.
President Steph deliberately throws gasoline on their flames just so she can crush them herself and make an example out of them.”
Right… Those two have it rough too, huh.
“I can understand the urge to just sigh and give up.
Well, you can sympathize with Monika-kaichou, but President Steph… Ah, I let my tongue slip.
Forget I said that.”
Stephania-sama, the current Saint, had a flawless reputation.
I’d only ever heard wonderful things about her.
But for some reason, I always felt a slight sense of unease around her.
There were times when her usual, gentle smile felt like a carefully crafted mask.
“Let’s summarize.
Takioto understands the current situation, right?”
“Kousuke’s friend confirmed that he does.”
“Hmm.
It’s Takioto.
If he’s not panicking and is just going about his day as usual, he’ll handle it.
More importantly, we need to train hard so we don’t get left behind by him.”
“It’s true.
Ever since he started diving into the Dungeon, his strength has grown at an abnormal rate… I feel like I’m about to be left in the dust.”
No, I am being left in the dust.
His sparring sessions with Claris proved it.
There were times when Claris ended up on her knees while Kousuke remained standing.
Claris probably had her own thoughts on the matter, too; after her loss rate started climbing, she had drastically increased her own training hours.
“I’m frustrated too.
I’ve never seen anyone improve so drastically in such a short amount of time,” Yukine-san said, though she looked genuinely happy.
Then, as if suddenly remembering something, she added, “Speaking of which… Ludi, you live with Takioto at Director Marino’s house, right?
I’m so jealous of you.”
“Jealous?”
“Yeah!
Just being around him has to boost your motivation to train.
Plus, you can ask Marino-san and Hatsumi-san for magical advice.
It’s the absolute best training environment.”
I let out an involuntary sigh.
Now that I thought about it, Senpai was just as much of a training maniac as Kousuke.
“Back to the topic: if the gap in strength is bothering you, why not just ask him directly?
Ask him why he’s gotten so strong.
I think Takioto would actually answer you pretty casually.
In fact, I want to know too, so do you want me to ask him for you?”
Imagining Kousuke chatting amiably with Senpai, I quickly replied, “No, I’ll ask him myself.”
Senpai nodded in understanding.
“…Takioto is probably going to face even more jealousy and envy in the future,” she said, her tone shifting.
“In some cases, it might get much worse than it is now.
It’s just a possibility.
If Takioto navigates it well, it might not happen.”
“But Kousuke doesn’t seem to care about his reputation if it’s for his goal.”
I felt the exact same way, and his actions were proof of it.
“Exactly.
And that’s not all.”
That’s not all?
“He wouldn’t even care about his own life if it meant protecting someone precious to him.
Ludi, you know that better than anyone, right?”
A soft gasp escaped my lips.
“The more time I spend with Takioto, the more I like him.
That’s why I can say this.”
Yukine-san stared at me, her expression so fiercely serious I could almost feel her bloodlust.
“No matter how much the rest of the student body hates Takioto, my stance will never change.
I am on his side.”
After saying that, she held my gaze for a long moment before suddenly blooming into a bright, flower-like smile.
“He just doesn’t seem like a bad guy, after all.”
Her words sank deeply into my heart, wrapping around it tightly.
Kousuke had said he hadn’t known Yukine-san for very long, which made the absolute trust they shared all the more remarkable.
“Ludivine Marie-Ange de la Trefke-dono.
What about you?” she asked.
My thoughts immediately drifted to Kousuke.
He had casually told me that even if he knew my true, unguarded personality, it wouldn’t be a problem—in fact, it would make it easier for us to be close.
Was there anyone besides my family and Claris whom I could show my true self to?
Then, I remembered the incident at the Hanamura Hotel.
The betrayal of a man who had served the Trefke family for over a decade.
In that desperate situation, Kousuke had become our shield, completely unafraid of death.
“Kousuke…”
And that wasn’t the only time.
The same thing happened when I was thrown into the Dungeon.
Especially against that Ogre.
When I realized I couldn’t escape, I had despaired and given up.
But Kousuke was different.
He stood in front of me and fought, dodging by a hair’s breadth attacks that would have killed him instantly if they connected.
All to protect me.
Now that I thought about it, he always saved me whenever I was in trouble.
So, what about me?
What would I do if he were cornered?
What would I do if he were in trouble?
The answer was obvious.
“I will continue to be Kousuke’s ally, too.”
If he was in trouble, I wanted to be the one to save him this time.
I wanted to keep standing by his side.
As I finished speaking, Yukine-san looked at me with a gaze so gentle it reminded me of the Virgin Mary.
Feeling suddenly embarrassed, I averted my eyes.
“A-also, I’d be really lonely if my ramen buddy disappeared, you know?”
Yukine-san burst into laughter.
“Hahaha!
You’re right.
Then everything will be fine.
If something happens, we just have to support him.
Though, honestly, he doesn’t seem to need any help right now.
Takioto will probably handle this on his own without us having to lift a finger.
I just can’t predict how he’ll do it.”
There were many people who valued Kousuke.
Marino-san, Hatsumi-san, Claris, and me.
But I felt that Yukine-san valued him more deeply than anyone else.
“Alright, I’m going back to training.
Want to join me, Ludi?”
Yukine-san stretched energetically, her eyes sparkling.
I gave her a wide smile.
And then I shook my head horizontally.
I firmly refused.
It was absolutely impossible to survive the masochistic training regimes of Yukine-san and Kousuke.
They’d say something like, “Let’s go for a light jog!” and then drag you on a full marathon.
They both had screws loose in their heads.
A small pang of guilt hit me seeing Senpai’s disappointed expression, but impossible things were impossible.
“Ah, this is delicious.”
Marino-san lowered her cup, savoring the coffee Kousuke had brewed for her.
Ever since the Majin incident, she and Hatsumi-san had been incredibly busy.
On the rare occasions they finally had time to sit down with us, Kousuke would just brew some coffee and tea, then immediately head out to practice his katana swings.
“Truly delicious,” Hatsumi-san agreed, taking a sip of her own cup.
“Kuh…” Claris sipped her tea, looking thoroughly mortified.
He really was exceptionally good at brewing coffee and tea.
When I had asked him why his drinks were so perfect, he’d casually deflected with, “I was thinking about opening a café after I retire.” It was a joke, obviously, but what was the real reason?
Maybe his late parents had loved coffee?
If that was the case, it was a heavy topic to bring up.
Knowing Kousuke, he was probably just using humor to keep the atmosphere light out of consideration for us.
“I was thinking about scolding him if he skipped too many classes, but it seems he’s carefully calculating his attendance, and he makes sure to show up for the subjects he struggles with…”
As Marino-san pointed out, Kousuke actively attended the classes he was bad at.
A truly delinquent student would skip the exact classes they were failing.
“More than that, Kousuke’s growth rate is staggering,” Hatsumi-san stated plainly.
“Hah…” Claris let out a dry, exhausted laugh.
As his primary sparring partner, she felt his growth more acutely than anyone.
“He’s improving so fast I half-suspected he was taking dangerous performance-enhancing drugs.”
“I’d like to get my hands on some, too,” Hatsumi added, though she knew perfectly well no such drugs existed.
“He must be doing something extreme while he’s skipping classes, right?” Claris asked.
Marino-san nodded.
“Yes, he is.
It’s all firmly logged in the academy’s access records.
But those records are… abnormal.”
“Abnormal?” I asked.
Marino-san continued.
“Yes, it’s bizarre.
Kou-chan keeps challenging the Beginner Dungeon, which I understand, since the academy hasn’t opened the main Tsukuyomi Dungeon to first-years yet.”
The difficulty of the main Tsukuyomi Dungeon was on a completely different level compared to the Beginner Dungeon.
Because of that, students were only permitted to enter it after completing a mandatory safety seminar.
The seminar was scheduled to finish early next month, but unfortunately, it overlapped with midterms, meaning we wouldn’t be allowed to explore it until after the exams.
Marino-san lowered her voice.
“This is private information, so keep it strictly confidential, okay?
Kou-chan is exploring the Dungeon multiple times a day.
Multiple times, you know?
Normally, running it once a day is exhausting.
He’s doing it every two hours, only stopping for meals.
That alone is abnormal, but the truly abnormal part is that he’s successfully clearing it every single time.”
Marino-san let out a heavy sigh.
Claris blinked in shock.
“Clearing it?
Multiple times a day?
Excuse me, but isn’t the Beginner Dungeon a ten-floor labyrinth?”
Claris, who had never personally run the Beginner Dungeon, asked.
“Yes, that’s right.
Ten floors.
We haven’t officially timed it, but he’s undoubtedly set the fastest clear record in the school’s history.”
Claris’s question echoed the exact doubt everyone at the table was feeling.
“If I knew what he was doing in there, I could explain his growth.
Daily running, thousands of sword swings, and constantly maintaining the enchantment on his Third and Fourth Hands… even all that doesn’t fully explain this leap in power.
Though, I admit, just listing those things already sounds insane…”
Marino-san smiled bitterly.
Even she, the Witch of Tsukuyomi, couldn’t maintain an enchantment indefinitely without resting.
Only Kousuke, with his monstrous, bottomless reserves of magic power, could pull that off.
Just what is going on with the Hanamura family right now?
The Hanamura bloodline had produced legendary mages throughout history, but this current generation might be the most blessed yet.
Marino-san, Hatsumi-san with her space-time magic, and Kousuke.
There used to be rumors mocking the family, saying the Hanamuras had devolved from great mages into mere merchants, but no one dared to whisper that anymore.
“Kousuke’s greatest strength… might be his foresight,” Marino-san mused.
It was true.
Kousuke carried a calm, weathered aura, as if he had lived far longer than his years.
He might have looked like a slacker to his classmates, but beneath the surface, he possessed an unshakable core.
He adapted his persona to fit the situation perfectly, and the occasional melancholic expressions or mysteriously heavy words he dropped made it feel like he was hiding his true age.
Given the tragic loss of his parents, perhaps he had been forced to grow up too fast.
“…To me, it looks like he’s living in a rush,” Marino-san murmured softly.
A heavy silence fell over the room.
She was right.
Normal people didn’t train themselves to the brink of collapse every single day.
“I’m sorry.
I shouldn’t have said that,” Marino-san added, looking directly at me.
She was apologizing for bringing up his tragic past.
But I didn’t want her to apologize.
I wanted to see him, understand him, and help him.
“I actually envy Kou-chan a little…” Marino-san murmured, looking at us.
“I’ll ask him why he keeps running the Dungeon.
Knowing him, he might just be having fun watching his own stats go up.”
When I suggested that, Marino-san smiled and nodded.
“With Kou-chan, anything is possible.”
I couldn’t agree more.
Clap.
Marino-san clapped her hands together.
“Anyway, Kou-chan is working incredibly hard to improve himself.
So, let’s give him a reward for all his effort!
Especially since he’s dealing with so much hostility at school.”
She winked playfully.
Hatsumi-san was the first to nod in agreement.
But if we were rewarding him, I felt like I should be the one doing it, considering the LLL fan club was causing him so much trouble because of me.
Though, if Kousuke told me it wasn’t my fault, I wouldn’t be able to argue.
“What kind of reward would be good?” I asked.
“Let’s see… ‘Praise him,’ ‘give him a massage,’ ‘buy him something he likes,’ ‘sleep together,’ ‘pat his head,’ ‘sleep together,’ ‘clean his ears,’ ‘sleep together,’ ‘sleep together.’ How about those options?”
Why did she keep recommending sleeping together?
Was she trying to lighten the heavy mood with a joke?
Knowing what a pervert he was, I smiled wryly.
“He’d definitely be thrilled with any of those,” I replied.
Realistically, a massage sounded nice.
It would be a good way to help him recover after his intense post-dinner katana swings.
I’d have to ask Claris for tips on how to do it properly.
As I pondered this, I sipped the royal milk tea Kousuke had brewed.
Speaking of which, after Hatsumi-san left the room earlier, Marino-san had muttered, “The future of the Hanamura family is secure.” What on earth did she mean by that?
After washing off my sweat, I returned to my room and grabbed an iced latte from the mini-fridge.
Blessing the convenience of having a fridge in my room, I sank into the expensive desk chair and picked up the grimoire resting on the table.
Just as I was about to turn the page, there was a knock at the door.
The rhythm of the knock told me exactly who it was.
Ludi and Claris-san always announced themselves after knocking.
Marino-san would just barge in.
So it had to be…
What if she walks in while I’m doing something perverted?
A slight thrill of excitement hit me.
I slipped a bookmark into the grimoire and called out, “What is it, Nee-san?”
The door opened, and Hatsumi Nee-san walked in.
Without a word, she sat on the edge of my bed and patted the mattress beside her, gesturing for me to sit.
Unsure of what she wanted, I sat down exactly where she pointed.
“So, what’s up?”
“Hrm.
Nee-san.
What exactly are you doing?”
She placed a hand on my head and patted it lightly.
Pat, pat.
“Like this?”
Then, she began gently stroking my hair, pressing her hands against my scalp.
“Um… what’s the occasion?”
I was completely caught off guard.
She had come into my room unannounced and was now stroking my head.
She was sitting so close that her scent filled my nose, and our shoulders were brushing.
I couldn’t help but get flustered.
“Kousuke is working so hard.”
Was Nee-san praising me?
Encouraging me in her own unique way?
I couldn’t think of anything I’d done recently that warranted head pats.
“Does it… feel good?” she asked.
“I-it does.”
Was I feeling good, or was I desperately trying to hold myself back?
I was a gentleman, so I was trying my hardest not to let my reaction show.
But with her sitting this close, all my blood was rushing straight to my lower half.
This is bad.
“Muh…”
She stared at me, letting out a soft sound.
Did she notice my flustered state?
Or did she notice what was happening down there?
The situation was getting incredibly dangerous.
Was it because I was looking down?
“Do you want me to stroke your thighs, by any chance?” Nee-san suddenly asked.
Is this a cabaret club?!
Did I accidentally wander into a hostess club while reading?
In a world where you could be transported to an eroge dimension, I supposed anything was possible.
Taking my stunned silence as a ‘yes,’ she reached over and began gently massaging my thighs.
“How does this feel?”
“N-Nee-san, wait a second!”
I quickly grabbed her hand to stop her, speaking in a rapid panic.
“I’m fully relaxed now!
Thank you so much, Nee-san, I’m good!”
I took her hand off my thigh and tried to place it back in her lap.
“I see…”
But instead of letting go of my hand, Nee-san stood up.
“Alright…!”
With her free hand, she pulled back the covers of my futon.
It was no exaggeration to say my brain had completely short-circuited.
What on earth was she doing?!
Even if she said ‘Alright,’ there were many contexts for that word!
Was it the ‘Alright, I’m getting in bed with you’ kind, or the ‘Alright, go ahead and eat your dinner’ kind?
Calm down.
Just ask her directly.
“N-Nee-san, what exactly does this mean?!”
“It’s best to sleep when you’re tired.”
So it was the ‘getting in bed’ kind.
Given the situation, it couldn’t be anything else.
And she wasn’t wrong; sleep was vital for physical and mental recovery.
But why was she saying that while still gripping my hand?
“Y-you’re right.
Well, I’ll go change into my pajamas and get in bed…”
I glanced pointedly at the door, silently pleading with her to leave so I could change.
“Understood.”
She said she understood, but she clearly didn’t.
She showed absolutely zero intention of leaving the room, her feet planted firmly on the floor.
“N-Nee-san!
It’s a little embarrassing, you know, having you watch me change!”
Hearing that, Nee-san’s cheeks dusted with a faint pink, and she lowered her gaze.
“I’m embarrassed too…”
THEN PLEASE LEAVE!
She clearly had no intention of walking out that door!
“It’s fine.
I’ll close my eyes.”
Saying that, she let go of my hand and covered her face with both palms.
However, I could clearly see the gaps between her fingers.
Speaking of which, when I walked in on her in the bath, Marino-san did the exact same thing!
Like mother, like daughter!
Wait, that’s not important right now!
“R-right.”
I didn’t know what I was agreeing to anymore, but I started changing anyway.
I tried to ignore the eyes peering through her fingers.
Maybe a sudden earthquake will happen and force her to cover her eyes.
I grabbed my pajamas from the closet and glanced back at her.
Her fingers had spread wider than a gaping doorway in the dead of winter.
Screw it, whatever happens, happens!
I gave up and stripped off my clothes, keeping an eye on her.
Um… the gaps between her fingers are getting wider.
She’s staring without even blinking.
“Um, Nee-san?”
“I didn’t see any green underwear,” she stated flatly.
You’re watching way too closely, dammit!
Once I was dressed, I climbed into the futon she had turned down, thinking the ordeal was finally over.
That’s when Nee-san started taking off her clothes.
“N-Nee-san, w-what are you doing?”
Her cheeks flushed a bit deeper, though her expression remained as deadpan as ever.
“Sleeping together,” she murmured, slipping off her outer tunic and setting it aside.
Do you have to strip to sleep together?!
While I sat there in sheer panic, Nee-san stripped down to her undergarments and pulled a massive, oversized nightgown out of nowhere.
She slipped into the futon beside me and, for some reason, pressed her body tightly against my side.
My brain was about to boil over.
What exactly is happening right now?
Why was I sleeping in the same bed as Nee-san?
Had she been mind-controlled by a demon?
“Kousuke.”
“Yeah?”
“Look at me.”
I shifted in the futon and turned to face her.
Nee-san immediately wrapped her arms around me.
I get it now.
This is Eden.
It was wonderful.
Every ounce of happiness I had ever experienced condensed into a singular, towering peak and enveloped my mind.
I was flooded with a euphoric bliss, like a potent drug injected straight into my brain.
What is war?
What is religion?
What are eroge?!
This right here is paradise!
…No, wait a minute.
Calm down and return to reality.
How did it come to this?
First, she patted my head.
Then she massaged my thighs.
And before I knew it, my eyes were locked onto the twin peaks right in front of my face.
This is bad.
My inner monologue had devolved into pure sound effects.
But the more I thought about it, the more it felt like she was actively seducing me.
But I wasn’t her boyfriend!
If I turned into a beast right now and she angrily reported me to Marino-san, my life was over.
I needed to think logically.
Remember the game’s speedrun strategies.
Stay calm, stick to the stable route.
Right.
Let’s review Nee-san’s capture route in MagiEx.
There had to be a way out of this.
Nee-san’s route… She’s the character who just gives the protagonist a special spatial magic spell to stimulate his cheat ability, right?
Hatsumi Nee-san wasn’t even a capture target in MagiEx!
What do I do?!
What the hell am I supposed to do?!
The demon on my shoulder whispered, “Hey, isn’t she practically throwing herself at you?
Just go for it, who cares about your status in the Hanamura family?”
No, I need the angel on my other shoulder to shut the demon up!
Angel, save me!
The angel whispered, “Let’s do it gently and treat Hatsumi-san with the utmost care.”
There was no angel!
The jury was unanimous!
Screw the stoic warrior enduring temptation to preserve his dignity.
It was a man’s shame to let a feast go to waste right in front of him.
My heart was made up.
I tightened my arm around Nee-san just a fraction.
“N-Nee-san…”
I braced myself and spoke.
But there was no response.
I lifted my head and realized…
“…Zzz… Zzz…”
“She’s… asleep…”
What was I supposed to do with all this pent-up adrenaline that now had nowhere to go?
“…I’m going to sleep.”
I squeezed my eyes shut.
But then…
“Nn…”
Nee-san shifted slightly.
She tightened her grip around me, her breathing settling into a deep, steady rhythm.
“You know…”
I couldn’t help but be hyper-aware of her body pressed against mine, the steady rise and fall of her chest, her sweet scent, and the incredible softness of her skin.
“…I can’t sleep.”
And to make matters worse, my brain was still trying to plan my Dungeon speedrun for tomorrow.