Chapter 256: I brought a man home, so let him stay < What the fuck!?

256 – I brought a man home, so let him stay < What the fuck!?

These days I want to go home as early as possible. No really, for a middle-class girl like me, I’m really bad with bastards who glare at you like they want to kill you. See, from the point of view of a good citizen, even a “delinquent” is an annoying existence right? Normally you’d avoid them, right? So naturally I’ll return home.

「You just gonna return hey!?」

Ack!? How did he know?

Ugh. Look, my communication skills are weak okay. I’m bad at dealing with intense types like you okay. “Delinquent” types and so on, well, I’ve not really had much to do with them. Until now those around me have mostly been composed types, so they can generally understand me when I say very little, so I’ve been able to get by, but THIS guy is no good. Really, he just comes at me without the slightest regard for my situation.

「Hey, seriously what do you want?」

See, just like this. When talking with the Demon King for example I can just talk, but she’s the exception where I can talk to her normally. Vampire girl doesn’t really want to talk to me in the first place. Argnar and the like will patiently wait for me to begin to talk. But, THIS guy is always forcing me like “speak already, speak right now”.

Umm, what did I come to ask again?

「Hey! We’re busy here okay. State your business already.」

There! Don’t rush me!

「Oni, freeloader, OK?」

See! If you rush me then I can only manage to say a list cryptic words!

「Huh? What’s that mean?」

That’s your fault, yours! Please let me talk at my own pace!

「Blow, you’re crowding Shiro-san and bothering her. In the first place, she did not come here to see you, but me, right?」

「Uh, no, that’s...」

「Back down, okay. Shiro-san, I am sorry about my brother.」

「If you say so, aniki.」

Nice, Balto. You’re not being overworked by the Demon King for nothing. The nice guy who can read the mood.

「Well then, please allow me to hear your request once more.」

Umm, just a moment. Oni, doesn’t make sense so, man? Sheltered, or rather, picked up a man? He’s downhearted so I want to let him recuperate for a while. Yup.

「Thank you.」

At my thanks, Balto shows a surprised expression. I can show gratitude at least you know.

I’ve gotten Balto’s permission, so there’s nothing else here for me. I’ll clear out before the hoodlum recovers from his freeze.

*************************

「Blow.」

「Uwah!? Aniki, where is she?」

「She left long ago.」

「I, I see.」

「From the look of things, it seems he’s not her boyfriend.」

「Well, it’s not like, I particular care about that though!」

「Blow, I can’t really recommend her, but what is good about her?」

「Wh, what are you talking about?」

「Sigh. My little brother who wasn’t interested in romance all this time, to think he’d then go for someone so incredibly difficult.」

「You’re wrong! It’s just that, when I see her, I suddenly get these intense palpitations!」

「Sigh.」

Author’s comment:

The suspension bridge effect: This is that when encountering the opposite sex in moments of anxiety or fear that those are mistaken for romantic feelings. Particularly when anxiety or fear leads to intense palpitations, that is said to become mistaken for feelings of love.

Translation notes:

This is quite an interesting title, though hopefully it makes more sense on reading the chapter. Basically, the “<” character is an arrow indicating that the “what the fuck” part is a reaction to the rest of the line.

It’s hard to keep the distinction in the translation but there’s a very big difference between how Blow and Balto speak with Shiro. Balto is smooth and polite while Blow is more like a yakuza and refers to Balto as “aniki” which is like a “rougher” (street tough) version of “onii-san”. When it’s just them together, Balto speaks more casually.

“Sheltered, or rather, picked up a man” – the word for “picked up” that Shiro uses here is rather more generic and can also mean “take care of” but it normally means something like “picked up” as in “picked up a stone”.

“Dear maid, there’s an idle god here” – most likely a reference to D (last seen being dragged away by maids). btw, note that the quoted line above uses[...]rather than 「...」to differentiate between real spoken text and made up lines.