“Guh—!”
Eriri’s face instantly turned bright red, and she could practically feel steam rising from the top of her head.
[Doujin Artist]: W-What date?!
Who would ever go on a date with a married-woman-obsessed pervert like you?!
This is compensation!
I already told you, you’re compensating me for emotional distress!
[Deathwish Count]: Oh?
Your compensation is having him accompany you to an amusement park?
[Doujin Artist]: I’M the one going there to have fun.
He’s only coming along to carry things and buy me snacks!
[Riku-sama] [Group Owner]: Hiss…
You look so sweet and innocent, yet your heart is unbelievably cruel.
[Doujin Artist]: Hmph.
Why else would it count as compensation?
So, are you coming or not?
[Riku-sama] [Group Owner]: Only if you ride the carousel with me.
Otherwise, no deal.
Eriri quietly breathed a huge sigh of relief, then deliberately replied in a mocking tone.
[Doujin Artist]: How old are you, exactly?
You still want to ride a carousel?
Are you in elementary school?
She knew perfectly well that she had a bad habit of refusing to be honest with herself.
She wanted to ask him on a date.
That was all.
Instead, she had wrapped the invitation in layers of excuses and called it compensation.
But what could she do?
Her personality was not something she could simply change overnight.
Besides, Riku could be infuriating in his own way.
On the rare occasions when she actually did manage to say something honestly, the bastard would immediately become suspicious and ask whether a transmigrator had replaced the real Eriri.
It was ridiculous.
After calming herself, Eriri took out her phone and started searching for guides to Kyoto Amusement Park.
The stupid group owner might have a preference for mature women, but mentally he was clearly still a child.
Haunted houses and roller coasters were probably too intense for him.
If that was the case, their normal route through the park would need some adjustments.
Eriri enlarged the map and drew several red crosses over attractions along the left side of the park.
“Oh?
No thrill rides?” a teasing voice suddenly asked from behind her.
“Why not try the children’s park in the south district instead?”
“Eek!”
Eriri had been so focused that her entire body jumped.
She nearly dropped her phone before whirling around and finding Kasumigaoka Utaha standing behind her with an amused look.
“Are you a ghost or something?!”
“You were simply too absorbed in your research, Lady Goddess.”
“I told you I’m not the Goddess!” Eriri snapped, visibly irritated.
I genuinely have no idea what kind of bad liquor all of you drank to come up with something that ridiculous!”
Utaha pulled out the chair beside her and sat down, casually crossing her legs.
“Your explanation is even more ridiculous.”
She gave Eriri a sidelong look.
“You told us you joined a chat group that connects countless different worlds, that you’ve known its group owner since childhood even though he lives in some shinobi world, and that the reason you suddenly became strong enough to kill that monster was because he possessed your body.
A light novel editor would reject that plot for being too absurd.”
“But that’s what happened,” Eriri replied flatly.
“Fine.
You’re the Goddess, so whatever you say goes.”
Before Eriri could start hissing at her, Utaha smoothly changed the subject.
“So why the sudden interest in amusement parks?
Going on a date with your boyfriend?”
“It’s not a date!”
“Oh?
You didn’t deny the boyfriend part.”
“Mind your own business and go write your novel!”
Eriri glared viciously at her before turning her attention back to the group chat.
[Riku-sama] [Group Owner]: Hahaha!
That old bastard Sarutobi Hiruzen came into my office today and said he’d find me a medical-ninjutsu teacher.
The whole conversation was basically him reminding me, without saying it outright, that HE’S the Hokage!
[Deathwish Count]: He is being that accommodating because he wants to draw you to his side against Shimura Danzō?
[I’m Not a Hair-Gel Guy]: Obviously.
[Doujin Artist]: Wait.
Sarutobi Hiruzen against Shimura Danzō?
Aren’t those two basically partners in crime?
[Riku-sama] [Group Owner]: I already told you about Danzō secretly contacting Hanzō to arrange Hiruzen’s assassination.
Did you forget that quickly?
[Doujin Artist]: I thought that hostility only went one way.
[Riku-sama] [Group Owner]: And where do you think hostility like that comes from?
Interests.
When Konoha faces rebellion or invasion, Hiruzen and Danzō are both part of the village leadership, so their interests align and they cooperate.
Once the external threat disappears, their competing interests create internal conflict instead.
[Doujin Artist]: I see…
[Riku-sama] [Group Owner]: And you called ME an elementary-school kid when you don’t even understand something this basic about conflicting interests?
[Doujin Artist]: Shut up!
You ARE one!
[I’m Not a Hair-Gel Guy]: An analysis based on conflicting interests…
Riku-kun, you really are unusual.
[Riku-sama] [Group Owner]: Nothing special.
I’ve just read a few books written by people much smarter than me.
[I’m Not a Hair-Gel Guy]: If you can apply what you have read appropriately to a real situation, then the knowledge has already become your own.
Seated behind his desk, Aizen Sōsuke finished reviewing the last document and set down his brush with a satisfied smile.
Aizen rather enjoyed it.
People could lie.
Their writing was much more difficult to disguise.
From phrasing, structure, omissions, and even the way someone presented an ordinary report, Aizen enjoyed inferring what kind of person had written it.
To him, paperwork was merely another form of entertainment.
“Aizen-sensei.
Tsunayashiro Seri requests an audience.”
A slightly weary young woman’s voice came from outside.
The door slid open.
Cool moonlight spilled into the room, casting a silver sheen across Aizen’s figure.
In the courtyard beyond, a girl of sixteen or seventeen stood beside the flowerbed in wooden sandals and bowed her head respectfully.
“Good evening, Aizen-sensei.”
Tsunayashiro Seri had long black hair falling over her shoulders and wore a blue-green kimono.
She was petite and strikingly pretty, with the unmistakable bearing of someone born into one of Soul Society’s great noble houses.
“What can I do for you, Seri-san?” Aizen asked with a gentle smile.
Seri did not answer immediately.
Instead, she reached into her sleeve and withdrew several irregular fragments of crystalline material, then held them out toward him.
“As I expected.
You really are quite intelligent.”
Aizen’s smile did not change, nor did he show the slightest surprise.
“You were able to determine that I killed those members of your family merely from these fragments of the Soul King?”
“I didn’t determine it on my own.
You left me enough clues to reach the answer,” Seri replied with a respectful bow.
Those Soul King fragments had been scattered beside the bodies of her deceased relatives.
Her uncles and the other senior members of the clan had paid them almost no attention.
Was it because they had no interest in fragments of the Soul King?
Of course not.
They simply could not see them.
They had already fallen under Kyōka Suigetsu, and within the reality Aizen showed them, those fragments did not exist.
Seri had noticed the discrepancy.
Afterward, she searched through the Great Spirit Book Gallery several times, following every clue she could find until all of them eventually led back to Aizen Sōsuke.
“Then let us return to my original question, Seri-san.”
Aizen regarded her with the same pleasant smile.
“What do you want?”
“Everything, Aizen-sensei.”
Tsunayashiro Seri dropped to her knees and lowered herself into a formal dogeza.
“I want everything the Tsunayashiro Clan possesses.
Its authority, its wealth, its position—everything.
Whatever price I must pay to obtain it, I am willing to accept.”
Aizen’s lips curved upward.
“Then I have received your wish.”
Moonlight reflected across the lenses of his glasses, turning them brilliant silver.