CH 42

Well, since last Monday, Yuuichi has been eating Tojoin-san’s handmade bento everyday.

I bring my own bento, unlike Yuuichi who eats two Bentos. He has the strength of a professional eater so I’m sure he’ll be fine.

“If I’m going to be Yuuichi’s wife, I’m going to have to learn how to cook.”

“W-Well, I’ll appreciate you even if you can’t cook, you know.”

“Fufu. Yeah, I know.”

Tojoin-san chuckled as she looked at Fujise.

“If you can’t even make your own bento, how can you ever be Yuuichi’s wife?”

“Uuu, Sh-Shigemoto-kun, I’ll make one for you one day. I promise.”

“W-Well, just take it easy.”

“Yeah, I’ll do my best!”

Fujise looked happy being cheered on by Yuuichi but the man himself had a very tense look on his face.

Yuuichi hasn’t tasted Fujises cooking yet but it seems that her inability to cook was very well known to everybody.

Fujise did various things during her high school cooking class venture after all.

“Haa~. It seems like I’ll have to work hard.”

Sei-chan, who was eating her bento next to me, sighed and said that in a voice that only I could hear.

I whispered to Sei-chan quietly so that the three of them in front of us couldn’t hear.

“Have you practiced cooking with Fujise before?” 

“Just once during the weekends. Let’s just say, I did my best to stop Shiho from making a bento for Shigemoto today.”

“Yeah, it doesn’t seem to be working for the long term.”

Well, it’s not something that can be managed in a day though.

“I’ll help out next time, okay?”

“Ahh, yes. I’d be happy to have Hisamura help as the Sacri- Taste tester.”

“Ehh, hold up. Did you just say sacrifice?”

“I think you misheard me.”

No, I don’t think I did.

I’m probably going to be invited to taste Fujise’s cooking.

If that were the case, I’m sure that I would absolutely hate it.

“Have you tried Fujise’s cooking before? Sei-chan?”

“One bite-”

“How did it go?”

“The scary thing is that I don’t remember what happened after. Right after I ate it, I started to fall unconscious and the next thing I knew was that I was lying in bed with Shiho nursing me.”

“Poisonous maybe…”

That’s the usual symptom of food poisoning.

How did you survive that, Sei-chan?

Is Fujise’s first aid skill actually that amazing?

No, it’s more than nursing, it’s amazing that Fujise has the alchemy power to somehow make her food that poisonous, even though she didn’t put any poison into it.

“I’m sorry, Sei-chan. I said I’d help out but can I like… not?”

“No, you can’t. Because next time I’m going to need you to sacrifice yourself for me.”

“You’re not even trying to hide it anymore… You straight-up just said I’m the sacrifice.”

“Who wouldn’t think a taster wasn’t a sacrifice after hearing the story about how I passed out right after eating it?”

“Right.”

Anyone who asks her after that will know that the tasters will definitely be sacrificed.

“We’re going to be doing it again. This time, it’ll be at my house.”

“Eh…? Sei-chan’s house?”

I didn’t expect it to be at Sei-chan’s house.

Well, if you think about it, that’s normal since Sei-chan is going to teach her how to cook, it would be more efficient to teach her in a place where she is familiar with.

“S-So, will you come?”

“I’ll go.”

“R-Really? I thought you were gonna say no based on how you reacted just now.”

“I really wanted to say no, but I can’t reject a request by Sei-chan.”

“I-I see… Please take care of me.”[TLN: She said yoroshiku, a commonly used phrase in Japanese conversation. ]

Sei-chan looked a little embarrassed and turned away to take her gaze off of me.

I don’t think I should tell Sei-chan that my ears are turning red either.

“Hey, Shimada-kun, Hisamura-kun.”

All of a sudden, we were called by Tojoin-san. She was right in front of us which shocked both me and Sei-chan.

“AH! W-What is it Tojoin-san?”

“You two were flirting and talking a bit earlier. So what were you talking about?”

“WHAT?! T-There was no flirting going on. We were only talking.”

“Ahh, I see. I thought you were making out with each other.”

“O-Of course not!”

Sei-chan denied it so loudly that her voice reverberated through the entire class.

Our group has always attracted attention in class, but now all of the eyes were on us.

Normally, those gazes would usually be directed at Yuuichi, Fujise, and Tojoin-san, but this time it was directed towards me and Sei-chan.

Especially all the men’s gazes, they were definitely staring at me very intently 

“Oi, is he a traitor just like Shigemoto…”

“Shimada-san seems to be saying they’re not dating. So it should be fine…”

“Calm down, you fools. First of all, If you’re able to speak so intimately with Shimada-san, you are pretty much already branded as a traitor, right?”

“Right… Got it. BLACKLIST HIM!”

Hold up. I’m hearing some pretty scary shit right now.

What does blacklist mean? Are they going to kill me?

Perhaps, no rather, I’m sure that Yuuichi’s name is definitely over there.

Please don’t put my name in that horrible place.

No, since I’m actually dating Sei-chan, I deserve to be on that list more than Yuuichi, but please don’t do that.

“Ahh, I see. Not being lovey-dovey, huh?”

“W-What are you saying? ”

“Fufu, no. It’s nothing.”

Tojoin-san grinned as she muttered something to herself.

Sei-chan stared at that grin as if she wanted to say something back to her.

Speaking of which, Does Tojoin-san know that we’re dating?

I didn’t tell her nor do I think that Sei-chan is close enough with her to tell her about it.

But judging from her reaction, I’m pretty sure that she found out somehow.

“Ah, by the way, there’s a ball tournament this week, right?”

While Tojoin-san and Sei-chan were busy having a staring contest, Fujise popped in with that, trying to change the topic.

“Ahh, right.”

Yuuichi said as he ate his lunch.

He must have seen Tojoin-san and Sei-chan having a go at each other, but Yuuichi didn’t seem to be that bothered about it.

He’s dull in that way too, and I envy that about him.

Fujise was right, there was an inter-class ball game this week.

It’s been a month since I started my second year, and the school had already begun such events, perhaps it was for us to get to know our classmates better.

“The boys will play baseball right?”

“Ahh, the girls will play basketball.”

“Mhm.”

“I wish we played basketball instead.”

Yuuichi is the ace of the basketball team, so if it were basketball, he would probably be able to stomp the competition and win the championship. Then the boys in our class would have a guaranteed ticket to victory.

“Shigemoto-kun, can’t you play baseball?”

“No, well, I can play it about just as well as anyone else.”

“You hit two home runs in a row from one of the top pitchers in the prefecture in gym class in junior high.”

“EH? THAT’S AMAZING!”

“Ah, that might have happened once before. Wait hold up, how did you know about it? We had separate gym classes for boys and girls at the time.”

“It’s just Yuuichi that didn’t know about it, it became quite a hot topic in the school. I even have footage from that time in my possessions.”

“I didn’t know it became a hot topic… Hmm? Wait a minute, what did you say at the end?”

“It’s nothing.”

No, it’s not something that you can just brush off now, is it?

Why is there still footage of Yuuichi during gym class in junior high…?

I’m afraid to ask about it, so I won’t.

“Well, that means that the boys will win the baseball tournament since they have Shigemoto-kun.”

“What about the girls then? There doesn’t seem to be anyone from the basketball team here.”

“Our class has Sei-chan.”

“Hm? Is Shimada an experienced basketball player?”

Yuuichi asked Sei-chan.

Ahh, so Yuuichi still doesn’t know about Sei-chan’s skill in sports.

“No, I’ve only played basketball before in gym class.”

“Then are you good at sports?”

“I’m pretty good if I say so myself.”

“I think you’re being too modest, Sei-chan. When you were in junior high school, you never lost a one-on-one match to the ace of the basketball team.”

“Eh? You’re that strong?”

Yuuichi’s eyes rolled as he shouted.

“That may have happened once before. Shiho has a good memory.”

“Fufu, it was because Sei-chan was so cool.”

“Y-Yeah…”

Sei-chan got a bit embarrassed when Fujise complimented her directly.

Ahh, when the ball game starts, does that mean we’ll get to see the cool side of Sei-chan?

That’s the best event to ever happen so far.

“My, Shimada-san, you’re good at sports too huh? I’m pretty good at sports too.”

Tojoin-san said with a smile.

Yes, if I remember correctly, Tojoin-san in the original story was also blessed with Brains and Brawn.

She was first in every test so she definitely could study, but how about sports?

I don’t think there was much of a sports scene in the original story.

“So Tojoin-san is good at basketball too?”

“Yeah, I played basketball one-on-one before in middle school, but I never lost.”

Wow, we’ve been talking about Yuuichi and Sei-chan and the others in that club like it’s normal for them to be winning, but it’s not usually like that.

One-on-one basketball is a sport where the difference in skill very much shows, especially between the experienced and inexperienced players.

“Oh. By the way, isn’t Tojoin-san the only one not from this class?”

“Ehh? Yeah.”

Tojoin-san comes to our class during lunch break without fail, even though her class is different from ours.

In other words, the ball game is between classes, so Tojoin-san is on the enemy team.

“I’m looking forward to the ball game.”

“Ahh, yes. I look forward to the day when I can break a certain Ojou-sama’s nose.”

“Fufu, I’ve never lost a game in my life and that’s not going to change even after this ball game.”

“I don’t know about that, we won’t know until we try.”

Ehh… This is some spicy development.

I didn’t expect that the topic of the ball game would confirm that the two of them would go at it.

Fujise, the person who brought up the topic, didn’t seem to expect it either, but she was smiling very happily.

“Fufu, I’m looking forward to it, Shigemoto-kun.”

“Ahh, I wish our class would win in both the boys and girls departments.”

“Yuuichi, you may be able to do it for the boys, but definitely not for the girls. Because my class will be the winner this time.”

“That’s a lot of confidence. But, well, I’m afraid that’s just not possible.”

“Fufu, I wonder.”

“Ojoujama” wasn’t actually a sports manga, right?

It was just a regular romantic comedy, right?

It looks like a lot of sparks are flying between Sei-chan and Tojoin-san’s eyes right now.

The ball game is this Wednesday, the day after tomorrow.

I’m really looking forward to it because I’ll finally get to see how cool Sei-chan is in person.