ICHIBAN USHIRO NO DAIMAOU - Volume 6, 2 — I Want to Eat Rice Pudding

Volume 6, Chapter 2: I Want to Eat Rice Pudding

 

“Could you teach me how to have sex?”

Keena Dorons suddenly stuck her head in front of Akuto’s face.

They were inside his dorm room during a day off. He had only just woken up.

Akuto had half sat up when he heard the door open, but Keena had jumped onto the bed.

“Eh?”

“I want you to teach me how to have sex,” repeated Keena.

—Um…

Akuto calmed down his heart.

She did not seem to be trying to seduce him. He knew from Fujiko that a girl would act more suggestively if that were the case. Keena’s face was pure innocence.

“I saw it in this magazine. It has a special feature on becoming beautiful with sex. I want to be more beautiful, so let’s have sex.”

Keena displayed a magazine on her student handbook’s mana screen and showed it to Akuto.

It was a women’s fashion magazine. It had precisely the special feature Keena had described.

“Well, if you read it…I guess you know what it entails…” said Akuto while feeling troubled.

Keena nodded in understanding and said, “I understand the theory behind it, but not enough to actually do it myself.”

—The theory behind it? What theory is that?

“How much do you know?”

Akuto was unsure what to say, so he slid his finger across the mana screen to flip through the pages.

—Sure enough. It doesn’t actually talk about the important parts.

It was an all-ages magazine, so it avoided any direct descriptions. The farthest it went was showing the naked upper bodies of a couple in a manga-style illustration.

“It seems to use a lot of technical terms. I didn’t understand any of them, so I want you to tell me what they mean, too. For example, fe…”

Keena started to say a dangerous term, so Akuto frantically drowned her out with a word of his own.

“Vermeer[1]. Johannes Vermeer is famous for The Milkmaid.”

“That’s it. Vermeer. Now that I think about it, it did say something about milk. It said guys loved it when you did it. And the opposite is cunn…”

“Kundalini yoga. I believe it is supposed to revitalize the body. But it is also said to be dangerous.”

“Ohh, you know a lot about this. Now I know why everyone calls you an expert at sex.”

—People call me that?

This depressed Akuto a bit, but driving Keena out of his room came first.

“Um, well… Anyway, it isn’t something you should do first thing in the morning.”

“Eh? But this says you will become even more beautiful if you occasionally do it all day long.”

—Honestly, what kind of magazine is this?

“You’re supposed to do this after getting married.”

“That’s odd. This says nothing about being married first. In fact, it says the dangerous thrill of doing it with people married to someone else makes you even more beautiful.”

—This is getting more and more outrageous…

“Both people have to agree to it.”

“Then please just tell me how to do it!”

Keena stuck her head out toward Akuto.

“Um, but…”

Akuto was at a complete loss for an answer when a voice spoke from above.

“I have heard the problem.”

Korone stuck her head out past the door of the storage shelf near the ceiling. She slept there in Akuto’s room during the night.

—I get the feeling this is only going to get more complicated.

But before Akuto could stop her, Korone hopped down to the bed and pulled a single rape flower from her bag.

“Are you listening? A flower has parts known as the stamen and the pistil…”

Korone began elementary sex education with a perfectly serious expression and Keena nodded with a serious expression of her own.

“Oh. And what do they do?”

“The stamen has pollen in it and that pollinizes the pistil.”

“Okay, that’s enough!”

Akuto got up and shoved Keena and Korone out of his room.

“Oh! How cruel, darling.”

“I have barely begun with my explanation.”

“Please give me a break. I want to think alone today,” said Akuto.

He was not making up this desire to kick them out. That was what he really wanted to do.

“You want to think alone?” asked Korone and Akuto nodded.

“Sorry. Could you leave me alone during the morning at least?”

“But I am your observer, so I would like to know what you are thinking about.”

Akuto thought on Korone’s words before answering.

“A problem concerning my future. You could say it has to do with whether I will be able to graduate from this academy or not.”

“That is serious. In that case, I will not let anyone in here during the morning,” said Korone.

“Then I’ll have Korone tell me how to have sex in that time! I’ll be back in the afternoon to have sex!” announced Keena cheerfully.

“No, you don’t have to do that. And…I would prefer it if you skipped on the explanation too,” said Akuto.

Korone could obviously hear him, but she gave no response.

“You can become even healthier by using this,” said Korone as she showed Keena a rod-shaped object that vibrated when she pressed a button.

Keena had fun waving it around while it vibrated.

“Oh! I get the feeling this could make you really healthy!”

Akuto’s room was on the first floor. A yard existed outside his window. Korone and Keena were sitting there. They were of course discussing Korone’s careless sex education.

“Wait… What are you doing with such an indecent object?” asked Fujiko as she walked over.

“This is not indecent at all. It is a massager.”

“True. Those types of toys usually are labeled as joke goods.”

Korone bringing out some strange object was nothing new, so Fujiko asked no further questions and changed the subject.

“Is Akuto-sama in his room?”

“He is, but he told me to keep everyone out until the afternoon.”

“Is he still mad?”

“No, he said he wanted to think about an important decision concerning his future. I believe it includes deciding whether he will quit the academy or not.”

“What?” Fujiko was shocked and she spoke the first thought that came to mind. “Then has he finally decided to become the demon king and unite with me!?”

“That I do not know.”

Korone’s response was cold, but Fujiko was not listening.

“Ho ho ho ho! This is my victory! Now, I must think about the future as well!”

“The future?” asked Keena curiously.

“Yes. Akuto-sama is certainly thinking about his future with me!”

“I don’t know about the future, but darling is going to have sex with me this afternoon,” said Keena innocently.

Fujiko froze over. Her cheek twitched as if she had heard something unbelievable.

“Wh-what did you say?”

“He’s going to have sex with me! He’ll put his seed inside me to impregnate me!” Keena was grinning. “We’ll use tons of toys, too! And I’ll perform fe…fe…whatever it’s called and then drink his milk to make my skin glossy!”

“Wh-wh-whaaaaaat!?” shrieked Fujiko. She shook her head as if to deny it and pointed forcefully at Keena. “What are you talking about!? If you continue with this nonsense, I will tie you up and throw you in the Amazon River, you b*tch!”

Keena looked completely confused.

“Oh! Where did that come from!? All I did was tell you my afternoon plans!”

“Those plans are obvious lies! If I go and ask Akuto-sama…”

“No. He said no one can go in his room during the morning,” said Keena.

Fujiko glared at the girl with bloodshot eyes. She then clapped her hands in realization and muttered to herself with the eyes of a crazed killer looking at her prey.

“That’s right. If I can eliminate you during the morning, I do not need to check what Akuto-sama’s intentions are.”

“Wait. What’s going on?”

Keena must have sensed the danger because she stood up and began backing away.

“Be a good girl and let me kill you! It is all for the sake of my future with Akuto-sama!”

Fujiko swung up her right hand.

But an instant beforehand, Keena let out a cry and fired a ball of light. Fujiko had not been expecting resistance, so she was late to respond. She was blown away in an explosion.

“Kyaaah!”

Fujiko was blasted across the yard.

However, her wounds were light. The explosion had only burned away a portion of her clothes.

“Now you’ve done it!”

As she stood up, Fujiko fired the same type of attack at Keena.

Keena avoided it just before it exploded and frantically ran off.

“Noooooo! What is going on!?”

“I came over because the boys’ dorm’s courtyard sounded noisy. What happened?”

Junko arrived in the courtyard a while after Fujiko began chasing Keena Dorons around. Korone alone sat in the courtyard.

“A conflict related to Sai Akuto began between Etou Fujiko and Keena Dorons,” explained Korone.

“In that case, we have no choice but to have him stop them.”

Junko pointed toward Akuto’s room.

“No. He said not to disturb him during the morning.”

“What a troublesome person. What is the problem with interrupting him?”

“This conflict is merely a trivial issue, but Sai Akuto is holed up in his room contemplating an important decision that includes whether he will quit the academy or not.”

“Is that true?” asked Junko.

“Yes,” replied Korone with a nod.

“Wait a second. What is he so troubled about?”

“I do not know the details. He would not tell me,” said Korone.

—I see. We may have put too much of a burden on him. But I wish he would discuss it with me… Come to think of it, any normal person would end up holed up in their room if they were treated the way he is. I should probably try to help support him here.

“What are you muttering about?” asked Korone.

Junko looked up in surprise.

“Nothing! I was just thinking we could get along well if I consoled him now…”

Junko then realized what she had said without thinking and she blushed.

“I see. You are free to do what you wish, but I will not let you in until the afternoon,” said Korone.

Junko waved her hands in an attempt to avoid the issue.

“No, no, no! I was not… I was not planning anything like that. I swear. Anyway, I just have to wait until the afternoon. No, first I need to stop those two. Ha ha. Ha ha… Ha ha…”

Junko began walking away.

—I need to fix this habit of speaking my thoughts aloud. No, that does not matter. Right now, the fight between those two comes first… I-I know. If I find out what caused it, I should be able to stop it easily. Okay. That is what I will do. And to do that… I do not like it, but I need help from that stealth human. She can slip past Korone and get into his room.

Junko nodded to herself.

That stealth human was alone in her room with a tense expression on her face.

“Heh heh heh heh heh. I won’t give anyone this valuable cup!”

She was grinning despite looking so nervous. Her red hair was waving around excitedly.

It was of course Soga Keena.

She was sitting in a chair looking at a white gelatin in a ceramic cup.

“This is the rice pudding made with the legendary Uonuma-made Koshihikari rice! They make so little of it that it’s almost impossible to find! I finally got my hands on some!”

There were various recipes for rice pudding, but the simplest one was to make a rice porridge using milk that had sugar dissolved into it and then to cool it. When made that way, it tasted exactly as one would expect. It was commonly eaten in other countries, but it was not all that popular in the empire where rice was a staple food.

What Keena was looking at had the rice completely dissolved and used coconut milk, so it was quite well suited as a dessert. However, it was still not exactly popular. Keena had called it valuable, but one could also say so little of it was made because it was not popular.

However, almost everything had someone obsessed with it. On the rice mailing lists, rice message boards, and rice communities that Keena browsed, this maker’s rice pudding was considered a legend. Keena had not been present for the incident at Café Bakhtin because she had been running around trying to acquire this.

“The deciding factor for rice pudding is the harmony between the sweetness of the rice and the sweetness of the sugar. But this adds in the sweetness of the coconut milk and the sweetness of fruit to bring out an exquisite harmony! Heh heh… Eh heh heh… I haven’t even eaten any and I’m already drooling…”

Keena picked up the spoon.

“Now, without further delay…”

In that instant, the door to her dorm room opened.

“Keena, I have a favor to ask of you! Can you give me a hand?”

Junko entered the room.

“Fweh?”

Keena had been so focused on the rice pudding, that she misheard what Junko said. Or rather, she had not heard everything she said.

Keena, I have a favor to ask of you! Can you give me…?”

Can you give me…?

Can you give me your rice pudding?

“Eeeee! Noooooo!”

She would not hand over the rice pudding. Keena quickly grabbed the cup and charged toward Junko who stood at the entrance.

“Hey, what are you…?”

Junko tried to stop Keena, but Keena threw her right leg forward, lowered her body, and used that dropping motion to throw her body forward. When her right foot reached the ground, her body did not rise back up. She dragged her left leg around in a half rotation and slipped right past Junko.

“Wha!?”

Junko was utterly shocked.

She had been absolutely confident in her non-magical combat ability and yet Keena had slipped past her.

“Th-that was the Kobudo technique, Shukuchi!”

Shukuchi was a technique that allowed one to instantly move a distance of several paces by putting all of one’s body weight on a leg that was brought forward.

Junko doubted Keena had mastered that technique. Later, Junko decided that the focus provided by Keena’s attachment to the rice pudding had led her to instinctually choose the most suitable method of using her body in that moment. At any rate, Keena had slipped past Junko and she began running down the dorm hallway.

“Tch!”

Junko chased after her. Junko was of course the faster runner. However, Junko knew it would not be that easy.

“I knew it!”

Junko lost the instant Keena turned a corner.

Once Junko made it around the corner, she found Keena’s clothes on the ground.

Now that the girl was invisible, Junko had no way of tracking her.

“damn… But wait. Why did she run away?”

Keena hid behind a wall of the boys’ dorm. She was naked except for the curtain wrapped around her. She had removed it from a random classroom window while fleeing.

“Junko-chan shouldn’t pursue me to the boys’ dorm. Now, I need to eat this rice pudding! I didn’t expect to eat it outside, but rice pudding eaten under the blue sky has to be amazing.”

While clearly almost drooling, Keena began to stick the spoon into the white pudding. But then…

An explosion occurred right next to her.

“Keenaaaaaa!” came a shout of anger in Fujiko’s voice.

Fujiko herself then charged toward Keena.

“Ehhhhh!? Why!?”

Keena ran away. Fujiko had of course been shouting at the blonde Keena, but the red-haired Keena had no way of knowing that from the name alone.

“Wh-why is senpai after me, too?”

Keena stripped off the curtain, turned invisible, and ran off while holding the rice pudding cup.

“Keenaaaaa! Where did you go!?”

Fujiko searched for the blonde Keena with a monstrous look on her face.

“Sh-she really is looking for me… Ah! It can’t be!”

Keena looked down at the rice pudding in her hand.

“It must have gotten out that I have this! I didn’t know Junko-chan and senpai were both after it, too.”

“Why are you chasing me!? If you want to join in on the sex this afternoon, the three of us can do it together!”

Keena Dorons fired spheres of light and lightly jumped around as she fled from Fujiko.

“A threesome? That might not be a bad idea… No, I cannot do that! Akuto-sama is mine and mine alone!”

Fujiko was not about to lose either. She was fiercely fighting back while pursuing Keena. By this point, Fujiko had gotten serious as well. Instead of using those spheres of light she was naturally unskilled with, she pursued Keena by using the small bottles of potion she walked around with. She put a chemical on Keena’s clothes to act as a marker, used that to locate the girl, and fired spheres of light that automatically followed her.

Students began to gather as they noticed the commotion.

“What, what?”

“Fujiko-sama and the new student are fighting?”

“We have to help her! Our gentle Fujiko-sama would never begin fighting without a good reason!”

“That new student must have made some kind of mistake!”

The gathering students made comments like that and began assisting Fujiko.

“Wh-why are so many people gathering here?”

Keena was even more confused, but Fujiko’s attitude suddenly changed.

“Everyone! This is dangerous, so please stay back! That girl suddenly attacked me! And while shouting obscene words no less! She is no different from a dangerous wild animal!”

Fujiko decided to feign innocence.

And of course, the gathered students believed Fujiko completely.

“I’ll never forgive her!

“How could she do that to our graceful Fujiko-sama!?”

More people began shouting angrily and pursuing Keena. The fact that it was a day off meant the students still in the dorm had nothing better to do, so they began to take part in the festival.

“Wh-wh-what? Why? No! She’s lying!” protested Keena, but no one was willing to listen to her.

She was like a hare being hunted by hounds.

“Nooooo! Why is this happening!?”

Keena continued to flee.

But something happened just as she stood still, conflicted over which way to turn at a corner.

“Hyah!”

Something invisible ran into Keena.

Needless to say, this invisible something was Soga Keena.

But Keena Dorons did not have time to stand around in confusion. Her pursuers were approaching. She frantically ran off.

“Ow ow…”

Soga Keena had fallen to the ground, but she had managed to not drop the rice pudding cup. She was lying on the ground completely naked and with her legs spread wide open, but that was no problem because she was invisible.

“Wh-whew… That was close.”

Keena stood up to run away from the blonde Keena who was looking around wondering what had happened.

Then a crowd of students led by Fujiko arrived. They were of course after the blonde Keena, but the red-haired Keena was unfortunately not the type to think of that kind of thing.

“A lot of people are after this rice pudding!” said Keena with great force and conviction. “My only choice is to eat it as I run away…”

She gulped.

But then she shook her head.

“No! It would be rude to the artisan that that made it if I didn’t eat it in the optimal conditions! A lot of effort went into making this ultimate snack!”

Keena then began focusing on running away.

“I need to find somewhere no one will go… I know! The roof is locked, so no one can go there!”

Keena gave up trying to run and flew into the air.

“Eating rice pudding on the roof! That has to be the best! Ahh, it will be white, smooth, and just a bit sweet. It will be like eating a cloud! Yes! The blue sky will suit that best! It will be like grated radish and sudachi on pacific saury! No, thinking about other foods will only dull my sense of taste! I know! It’s as perfect a match as dew on a ladybug! I need to get as close to the sky as possible!”

Keena flew up into the sky as she spoke on and on.

“Ugh. They do nothing but cause problems.”

Lily Shiraishi, the student council president, used the secret key only she had to open the door to the roof. She had wanted a large empty space. She had received a lot of complaints from the nearby townspeople due to the commotion in the town the day before. The knights had also gotten angry at her. All of it had irritated her, so she planned to let off some steam on a sandbag she had brought with her.

Most of the students could use flight magic, but they were honest enough to keep off of the roof when it was off limits. The roof had only been made off limits because a large hole had been created in it during the war. The rumor of Suhara’s high priest dying there had conveniently made the area creepy enough that even those that could fly kept away from it.

“Good. No one here. Maybe I can just leave this here.”

Lily lifted up the sandbag with telekinesis and hung it down from a pole stretching from the fence. She threw a few test punches into the air and then held her hands up.

“It’s that guy’s fault for going out into the town.”

Lily hit the sandbag once.

It creaked and shook back and forth.

“I don’t know what exactly happened, but I can make a pretty good guess. Etou Fujiko must have done something.”

Punch, punch.

“And the knights!”

Punch, punch, punch!

“They have guts to blame a student in order to hide their own scandals!”

Punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch!

“Ahh, it pisses me off! Chewing calcium everyday just isn’t enough!”

Punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch punch!

Lily sent a barrage of punches at the sandbag with tremendous force.

And then Keena flew to the roof while invisible.

Keena had only heard the end of what Lily had said.

“Chewing calcium everyday isn’t enough? And she’s so focused on punching that sandbag. She must really want this! But how did word of this spread through the entire academy?”

Keena hid behind the water tower on the roof.

“That way, Fujiko-sama!” shouted a student while pointing toward the roof.

“So she ran that way.”

Fujiko began running up the stairs.

Fujiko and the others were following the marker placed on Keena Dorons’s clothes. However, that marker was now attached to Soga Keena’s body. And Fujiko and the others were completely unaware of this fact.

“She went to the roof? But it’s off limits.”

Fujiko and the others realized the door to the roof was locked.

“That does not matter. It is off limits because the large hole is being repaired. If she is hiding here, she is as good as cornered!”

Fujiko’s words motivated the students to blow down the door with magic.

With an explosion, the door slid out onto the roof.

“Let’s go!”

Fujiko and her followers surged out onto the roof. Her followers numbered exactly twenty.

“Where are you!?

“Come out!”

“We won’t let you escape!”

The twenty of them spread out across the roof. One of them stepped on the door that had been blown away a moment before. He realized the door felt odd under his feet. The door then began to move.

“Wah!” he cried out and jumped off of it.

A figure slipped out from under the door. In other words, this person had been pinned under the door when it was blasted from its hinges.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

It was of course Lily Shiraishi who lifted the door up and slipped out from under it.

The veins in her forehead were bulging out. She glared at the students with a lovely expression that would have made even a starving wild dog run away.

Lily was the most skilled in the academy (in fights) and was the student council president, so she was obviously not your average student. Her fearsomeness was well known throughout the school. The students’ all had the expression of someone who found out the supposed friend they teased was actually a yakuza member.

“Wait… We didn’t realize you were there. We never would have thought you would be here.”

“What? Are you saying you didn’t notice me because I’m so small?”

The student had meant nothing of the sort, but Lily was extremely bothered by how short she was.

“No… I didn’t say that… Sorry. I’m the type of person that doesn’t think about little issues like that…”

The student accidentally hit Lily precisely where it hurt.

“You bastards…”

She had been irritated even before any of this happened, so Lily was already reaching up for the brim of her stylish hat. Turning that hat backward was the sign that Lily was truly angry.

“You aren’t leaving here alive!”

She reversed the hat.

In the very next instant, twenty students flew up into the air. Lily’s arms grew in number like the thousand-armed Avalokite?vara and each one stretched out like it was made of rubber. Every one of the students was. hit by about 10 punches instantly.

“If it were night, you would have all become new constellations. You’re lucky it’s daytime.”

As soon as Lily finished speaking, the students slammed down headfirst onto the roof.

Lily then glared at the one remaining person.

“Ho… Ho ho ho… I think you have made a sma…slight misunderstanding.”

Fujiko tried to laugh it off.

Fujiko was not about to pick a direct fight with someone stronger than the three student council officers.

“You almost said small just now, didn’t you?”

Lily continued giving herself a reason to fight.

“Heh…heh heh… In that case, you leave me no choice. Everyone is unconscious, so I can go all out!”

Fujiko grew defiant when she realized she could not flee. In the span of a breath, she removed her school uniform. A bondage-style leather suit appeared underneath.

“Cerberus!” called out Fujiko and a giant dog quickly appeared on the rooftop.

The demonic beasts had quieted down quite a bit since the war, but Fujiko was raising one she had grown fond of.

“damn you. You have guts to oppose me.”

“This may not have been my intention, but I will not hold back! Oh, I know. If I win, I will take your position as student council president!”

Both of them had already forgotten why they were fighting.

Lily and Fujiko glared at each other while the latter straddled the Cerberus.

Tension swelled up in the atmosphere between them. If someone had given a sign, they would have moved simultaneously. However, someone entered through the broken door before that happened.

“Senpai! I heard what is going on from Korone and Dorons! What are you doing!?”

Junko stepped out onto the rooftop along with Keena Dorons.

Junko had run into Keena Dorons while pursuing Soga Keena and had asked the blonde girl about the situation. Keena had simply said that Fujiko suddenly attacked her.

Junko could not make heads or tails of how Lily and Fujiko had ended up glaring at each other.

“Wh-what are you doing?” she asked again.

Incidentally, Lily and Fujiko also no longer knew the details behind this fight.

“Hmph. We were arguing over what to eat for dinner.”

That was one of Lily’s first class jokes. And Fujiko enjoyed sarcasm, so she joined in.

“It seems the president is the type who insists on eating quite a lot. She said she wants her breasts to grow as soon as possible.”

“That’s it. You’re dead.”

Lily’s expression grew even more ghastly. Any child that saw it would have been traumatized for life.

“Wait, you two. I cannot overlook this.”

Junko tried to cut in between them, but Lily threw a jab with an extended arm.

The fist struck Junko’s forehead. She had held back in order to warn Junko away.

But…

“Stop it. You couldn’t stand up to me when we fought underground.”

Junko had been staggering and crouching down, but Lily’s words brought flames to her eyes.

“President. Take back those words! I am not the same as I was. I will take part in this fight over what to eat for dinner!”

Junko smoothly drew something at her waist. It was her family’s treasure, the Sword of Sohaya. The sword had been given transcendent power from the God Suhara. Its power had dropped quite a bit with the God gone, but it was still a first class sword. Its ability to boost its user’s mana still worked just fine.

A rainbow-colored sparkle ran across the blade and Junko’s body was surrounded by mana.

That extraordinary intimidating atmosphere made Lily get serious as well.

“I like the look in your eyes! And that power! This looks like fun! You can both come at me at once!”

Wind blew wildly through that concrete hill. Three beautiful girls stood among several unconscious students. They were all enveloped in different types of elegance and strength and their bodies were tense in preparation for the coming battle.

The scene made quite a nice picture. All of them had forgotten why they were fighting. However…

“Yaaaaahh!”

Unsurprisingly, Lily threw the first blow. She had not been lying when she said she would fight both of them at once. Repeated attacks from her extending arms flew toward both Fujiko and Junko.

“Avoid them!”

Fujiko gave an order to the Cerberus and left the rest up to the beast’s reaction speed. The giant three-headed dog did not falter when faced with multiple simultaneous attacks. It splendidly stepped to the left and right to avoid them.

Meanwhile, Junko created multiple copies of herself with mana. Four copies were destroyed by Lily’s fierce assault. However, the real Junko was no longer there.

“Tch!”

Lily searched for Junko.

“Normally, she would be up above…but she’s actually below!”

Lily managed to sense the flow of mana and locate Junko at the last second. She hopped up to avoid the attack meant to sweep her feet out from under her.

“Can you avoid this!?”

Junko had used mana to create a sheet camouflaged as the concrete floor and attacked while hiding underneath it. After that supposedly surefire attack was avoided, Junko’s crouched position left her open to attack.

“Heh!”

Lily tried to throw a punch straight down, but Fujiko took action before she could.

“You have more than one opponent!”

Fujiko swung her whip toward Lily. She had waited until Lily had jumped into the air, but that was not a true opening for someone who could use mana to fly. Lily stopped in midair and sliced through the whip with a mana-covered karate chop.

“Oh, no! …is what you wanted to hear, isn’t it? But I am not the physical type.”

Having the whip cut was part of Fujiko’s plan. She threw the whip toward Lily. The whip wrapped around the president as if it had a will of its own.

“What!? You had this prepared ahead of time!?” cried Lily in surprise.

The whip wrapped around her body and she groaned in pain.

“Ho ho ho ho! You cannot win if you simply come straight in for the attack!”

Fujiko laughed victoriously.

“You coward! Don’t rely on tools! Use your bare hands! Come at me with your bare hands!” complained Lily.

She could still extend her arms, but she could not create the speed needed for a punch because she could not use her shoulders. Fujiko used the Cerberus to easily evade the attacks.

“Using one’s bare hands is so uncivilized! And when you are bound like that, you are supposed to provide some fan service with your breasts being squeezed out through the gaps in the whip, but it looks like that is impossible with your body type. Ho ho ho.”

“Ugaaah! I’m gonna cry! I really am!” wailed Lily, but Fujiko only laughed.

But then her laugh froze over.

“Know some shame!”

With that shout, the whip was sliced apart and Lily’s body was freed. Before Fujiko could even be surprised, someone was suddenly standing atop one of the Cerberus’s heads even as the beast moved around. Junko stood in an imposing stance looking down at Fujiko.

“I have wanted to tell you a few things for a while now!”

“Yes. And how seriously you take everything really pisses me off!”

Fujiko quickly tried to attack, but the Cerberus staggered and Junko had to move away.

“Either way, I just have to take both of you out!”

Lily sent her fists flying randomly toward both Fujiko and Junko.

“Please do not joke!” roared Fujiko as the Cerberus dashed around.

“If you want a battle, you have one!”

Junko created copies of herself so she could face both Lily and Fujiko. Lily responded to them head on and Fujiko had the Cerberus move around throughout the fray.

The battle intensified, the situation grew more confused, and chaos filled the rooftop.

And two people were watching over it all.

They were the two Keenas.

The red-haired Keena had made a strange misunderstanding as she watched it all from her hiding spot.

“Ahh! This rice pudding is causing so much trouble! This must be the dinner they were talking about! Ahh, what am I supposed to do!? This wonderful rice pudding is causing friends to fight each other! I never knew how painful it was to not have peace throughout the world!”

As Keena acted like a tragic heroine, she held up the rice pudding cup while in the pose of a praying maiden.

“How did this end up happening!?”

Meanwhile, the blonde Keena stood dumbfounded where she had been left on the roof after arriving with Junko.

And to make it worse, the effects of the battle reached her.

“Kyah!”

Concrete fragments rained down on her.

She covered herself with her hands, but a small stone still struck her forehead.

“Ow!”

Keena brought a hand to her forehead and a small amount of blood stuck to her fingers.

“Blood! Noooo! Ow! Noooo!”

Keena began shouting and crying as soon as she noticed the blood.

However, the three fighting did not notice.

Lily deflected some fire the Cerberus breathed out and a portion of it flew toward Keena.

“Watch out!”

Keena’s body was knocked to the side. The red-haired Keena had tackled her while invisible to protect her from the spray of flames.

“Kyaaah!”

The sudden action had surprised Keena. Finally, the other three noticed what was happening.

“Hm?’

“What?”

“What is it?”

The three girls turned toward where the blonde Keena had fallen to the ground. The red-haired Keena was also beginning to appear.

“Stop!” cried the red-haired Keena as she spread her arms in the pose of a maiden stopping a war. “Stop fighting! Please! I beg you!”

She was crying. The other three may have been girls as well, but a girl’s tears still held some power.

“But I am fighting to right a wrong,” mumbled Junko.

“But Doro-chan is hurt!”

Keena’s rebuttal silenced Junko, but Fujiko refused to give in.

“This all started with her attitude!”

Lily had merely gotten wrapped up in it all, but she was not going to back down so easily.

“I can’t sit idly by after being suddenly blown away.”

“Stop! I know what you’re fighting over! So…” Keena kneeled down and held out the rice pudding cup. “Let’s share this! Isn’t that good enough!?”

The three girls looked at the cup suspiciously.

“…What are you talking about?”

“Also…”

“What is that?”

“What are you saying!? This is the rice pudding! It’s the ultimate product made from the legendary Uonuma-made Koshihikari rice! The rice has been filtered until it is smooth and has been perfectly matched with the milk! Its sublime flavor is said to make you feel like you’re ascending into heaven! Its flavor is superb! Even that Rosanjin praised this ultimate meal by saying ‘every day should begin with rice pudding and every day should also end with rice pudding’! It received 1st place on a newspaper sponsored survey of the final thing you would want to eat before dying!”

As Keena lost herself in explaining, the other three could do nothing but exchange a glance.

“Rice…pudding?”

“I’ve never eaten it.”

“Simply put, it is milk rice porridge. The unsweetened ones taste exactly like that while the sweetened ones are made like candy, so they are not much different from a normal pudding,” explained Fujiko indifferently.

Lily looked toward Fujiko mockingly.

“That’s what caused all this? You blew down the door to the roof for that?”

“Of course not! This is obviously another one of that girl’s ridiculous misunderstandings!”

“It probably is, but… Ahh! This all seems so foolish now.”

Junko sighed and sheathed her sword.

“We can leave this until later.”

Lily’s shoulders drooped.

“Yes. You can leave now, Cerberus.”

Fujiko sent Cerberus back to its lair and put on her uniform.

“Thank goodness! You all understood! Now, let’s eat it! Together!”

Keena began trying to figure out how to cleanly divide the rice pudding into five equal servings, but the other three passed right by her.

“I will be going now.”

“You can have it all yourself.”

“If I really wanted some, I would buy it with the student council’s budget.”

Keena glanced around in confusion.

“Eh? Then I can have it to myself? Oh, but you want some, right, Doro-chan?”

Keena turned toward the blonde Keena who had been crying. The blonde Keena’s eyes were now glittering innocently as she looked at the rice pudding. As usual, she could be ridiculously pure. It seemed she had believed every word of the red-haired Keena’s explanation.

“You’ll really share something that amazing with me!? You really will?”

“Sure. Let’s eat it together.”

The two Keenas nodded at each other.

And then someone else appeared on the roof.

“Huh? I thought I heard a commotion. Is everyone okay?”

Akuto stuck his head out of the broken door. Junko, Fujiko, and Lily were surprised to see him.

“Ah.”

“Akuto-sama!”

“What are you here for?”

This did not change much for Lily, but it reminded Junko and Fujiko of the original reason for the fight.

“Hey, I heard you were worried about your future! Why did you not come ask me about it?”

“Akuto-sama! You decided on a happy future with me, didn’t you!?”

Junko and Fujiko rushed toward Akuto.

Akuto then gave a confused apology.

“Eh? I apologize if you misunderstood something. I just wanted some time to think on my own. That was all.”

“And what did you want to think about? I heard it was an important issue related to your future.”

“No. I felt bad about what happened to the owner of Café Bakhtin. His café was destroyed because of me and he might still be unemployed because of it. I was thinking about sending him some money.”

“But Akuto-sama, you are not wealthy, are you? Wouldn’t that be quite a large sum of money?”

“That’s why I was thinking about asking the headmaster to lend me the wages I would earn after graduating. I wouldn’t be able to stand it otherwise. I took some time to think and drew up a tentative schedule for repaying the loan.”

“What!? I cannot allow you to work, Akuto-sama! If this is what you want, then I will pay! I can pay 100 million or even 200 million if need be!” said Fujiko as she embraced Akuto.

Junko then spoke loudly to drown out and oppose her.

“I-If that is the case, then some of the responsibility lies with me. I can have my family pay for it.”

As both girls insisted on paying, Akuto shook his head.

“No. I thought about it and decided we can’t rely on our parents’ money just because we are students. Also, I do not want to use any money dyed in the colors of a certain family. Relying on the Hattori family was part of what caused everything that happened before.”

“Th-then…”

“Unless I earn it myself or acquire it by chance, any money I use will be dyed in certain political colors, right? It has to be me that does something about this.”

Despite what Akuto said, Fujiko and Junko refuse to back down.

“No! I will gather money for you in secret!”

“Senpai, I don’t think anyone wants that kind of dirty money.”

“What are you talking about!? It is better than using our parents’ money, isn’t it?”

“Maybe, but I still think it is my personal responsibility to make up for what happened to the café.”

“No, it is not! That was all Keena Dorons’s fault! Speaking of which, it was Dorons’s ridiculous attitude that caused this fight as well.”

“That reminds me! I heard you were bullying Dorons, so I came to stop you.”

Fujiko and Junko looked like they would explode at the slightest provocation.

Akuto looked troubled. In hopes of help, he turned toward Lily who had the most authority of those on the roof. However, she shook her head in annoyance and quickly left as if to say, “Not my problem.”

Fujiko and Junko were still shouting back and forth when Soga Keena stepped between them. She was naked except for the top layer of a school uniform.

“Don’t fight! If we all eat the rice pudding together, it will solve everything! We can all get along!”

Keena’s point of view was as ridiculous as ever.

Fujiko and Junko had no intention of responding to her, but when they glanced over, they saw Keena Dorons eating the rice pudding they were sharing.

“Ohhh! This is delicious! Who would have thought there was a way to make rice this delicious! This really is lovely! Now we can all get along!”

From what she was saying now, it seemed Keena Dorons had completely forgotten about the topic of sex.

The piece of clothing Soga Keena wore belonged to Keena Dorons. It seemed she had lent it to her after they started to get along.

“C’mon, let’s get along! It’s really good, so try some!”

Junko and Fujiko took the cup and spoon held out to them and each took a bite in turn.

And they both made wonderful grimaces.

“This is an…odd taste,” commented Junko.

“No, just come out and say it. This is terrible,” said Fujiko.

“Ehh? It’s good? Right? Right?”

Keena passed the cup to Akuto. It had only one bite left.

Akuto hesitated and then took a bite. He shook his head.

“Sorry, but this is a strange flavor… Huh?”

Akuto had spotted some writing at the bottom of the cup.

“Winner?”

The word “winner” was indeed written on the bottom of the cup.

“Ahhh! We did it! We won!” cried Soga Keena ecstatically. “Another reason this rice pudding is so popular is because of the contest. You almost never win, but the prize is huge.”

“The prize?”

“Yeah. The amount of money accumulates as long as no one wins. Right now I think it’s…50 million.”

Keena casually made that amazing announcement.

Keena put the cup in Akuto’s hand as everyone else looked on in shock.

“You said money you acquired by chance is fine, right? You were the last one to eat it, A-chan, so this is yours.”

Akuto was completely dumbfounded, but Keena was completely calm.

“See, the rice pudding brought peace. That’s why everyone should eat rice pudding together!”

Afterwards, rice pudding became incredibly popular among the students who had heard the rumor.

However, none of them were able to eat rice pudding every day. The two Keenas were seen as useful because they were the only two in the academy able to eat the rice pudding.

A large quantity of rice pudding was brought into the school, but no one won the prize and the boom passed.

“They call it the mysterious rice pudding…”

Akuto had managed to send a letter and the winning cup to the owner of Café Bakhtin. He felt bad making this comment after benefiting from the rice pudding.

“…but isn’t it because it tastes so bad that it became known as a mystery and that the prize accumulated so high?”

Notes

Jump up↑ Vermeer is written as Fermeer in japanese.