Escaping from the crowd chattering about exams and comparing answers, I strolled lazily toward Kyoto’s busy district. The place I’d agreed to meet her was a café tucked right into that bustling maze of streets.

I still had plenty of time before our appointment, which was why I could afford to walk this slowly.

Compared to taking a bus or train, I preferred wandering the city on foot, letting myself look forward to whatever random events might happen.

Walk too fast and you end up seeing less. Once your eyes lock only on the destination, you don’t know what to do with yourself after you get there.

In short, don’t live life like a total hardhead.

Just from that point alone, Eiji Hayamizu counted as someone who knew how to enjoy life. Well, if you ignore how he kept courting death in his love life.

While I was silently praising myself like that, a small crowd gathered at the entrance of a 24-hour convenience store caught my eye.

To me, the situation looked roughly like this:

Three male high schoolers were smoking at the store entrance. One of them flicked his cigarette butt away, and it just happened to land on a girl in a junior high uniform walking out of the store. The girl clearly didn’t want to make a fuss and tried to hurry off. But another junior high girl with her immediately picked up the butt, flung it back into the boy’s face, and ordered him to apologize. The boy got pissed. Not only did he refuse to admit he was wrong, he and his two buddies moved in to surround the girls. The clerk watched through the glass but didn’t dare come out, standing by the landline phone like he was hesitating about calling the police.

It took a long description, but the situation itself wasn’t complicated. For me, it could be summed up in one sentence: the classic “hero saves the damsel” setup.

Normally, I would step in. One, because saving girls in trouble is every teenage boy’s dream. Two, because even if it’s cliché, this kind of thing is basically a once-in-a-lifetime event in real life.

Once you run into it, you jump in without hesitation. What better way is there to win a girl’s heart?

Only, today wasn’t “normal.”

I knew the girl who wouldn’t back down. Her name was Bai Xuyu. Which meant that unless those three ordinary high school boys had knives or stun batons or some kind of hidden weapon, the three of them together still weren’t enough for Bai Xuyu to beat on.

Someone might say women are naturally weaker than men. And since she was just a junior high girl who’d barely started puberty, going up against three almost fully grown high school boys, there was no way she could win.

I agreed that women are naturally weaker in terms of physical build. But putting martial arts aside, the gap between someone who knows how to fight and someone who doesn’t is as big as the gap between a guy with a gun and an unarmed guy.

Plus, girls who’ve just started developing have another advantage: the blessing of a flat chest.

What’s more of a handicap to movement than having two balls of fat hanging off your chest?

Well, strictly speaking, Bai Xuyu’s chest probably no longer qualified as flat.

And so, while I was lost in this string of totally useless thoughts, Bai Xuyu had already knocked all three boys down, stacked them on top of each other, then stood on their bodies with her hands on her hips, laughing happily.

In real life, girls who could fight like that—other than Yu and Ran Jingyu—this was my first time seeing one.

Since the matter was clearly over, I decided to pretend I hadn’t seen anything and kept on walking.

Right now, it was best not to have too much contact with Bai Xuyu.

Her family name put me on edge.

After another peaceful stretch of walking, I sensed someone tailing me.

After walking a bit more, I confirmed who my shadow was.

I thought it over and decided there was no harm in letting her keep following me.

When you’re a guy and someone is tailing you, it usually comes down to three possibilities: thugs after your money, a gay guy after your body, or a thug who’s both after your money and your body.

That’s why people say you don’t fear a thug acting like a thug; you fear a thug who’s gay.

If I ran into that kind of situation, I had several ways to deal with it. But the current case was a bit special.

The one following me was Uesugi Yui. From the short time we’d spent together, I already knew she suspected me. So seeing her tail me now wasn’t exactly shocking.

What I wanted to say was, being tailed by a pretty junior high girl is about as likely as your dad suddenly bringing home a beautiful fiancée for you after you’ve holed up at home for years.

Even I had to admit this was the kind of perk reserved for light novel protagonists.

So I decided to just let her tail me. It’s not like I was on my way to do anything bad.

And don’t get the wrong idea. It’s not like I was secretly getting off on being followed by a girl, okay?

In this strangely (pleasantly) thrilling little stalking session, I arrived at my destination without even realizing it. By now, the sky was dark. And since this was a busy downtown area with cars and people everywhere, I deliberately and as naturally as possible slowed down so Yui wouldn’t lose me.

The café we’d agreed on was already in front of me. I pretended to check my phone for a moment at the door to give Yui time to catch my movement, then walked inside.

Compared to the agreed time, I was thirty minutes early. It was the perfect amount of cushion. In that waiting window, I could sip some water, sneak glances at Uesugi Yui sitting not far away after following me in, and also at the young women passing outside the window.

Twenty minutes later, Souren Manranyama’s personal attendant, Van, arrived ten minutes ahead of schedule.

Van was dressed as always in her work uniform: a pure black women’s suit. Her hair was neatly tied back, pinned in place. Her expression was icy, as if nothing in this world had anything to do with her.

I waved at her. She nodded, walked over quickly, and sat down in the seat across from me.

At the same time, I also noticed another customer sitting at a nearby table. She was wearing a baseball cap, her hair pulled into a ponytail, and flat black-rimmed glasses on her face—but I still recognized her at a glance as Souren Manranyama in disguise.

In this café that was just a little short of truly busy, I found myself in a strange four-way relationship.

Uesugi Yui tailing me still made sense. But why had the ever-busy young lady Souren Manranyama gone out of her way to come too? I didn’t think she was the type to not trust Van. Which meant the remaining possibility was that she didn’t trust me.

In a public place like this, was she afraid I’d try something criminal with Van…? Or maybe she just wanted to observe me from a different angle. Even if you could, in some sense, call what we had “friendship,” that “friendship” was as thin as paper; it could tear at any time without being strange.

I figured Souren Manranyama had only entrusted Bai Yaxin’s matter to me because she had no other choice.

If I betrayed her, she’d lose everything, no chance at a comeback.

That aside—did Van know that Souren Manranyama had come along with her?

“Sorry to trouble you with the trip. I hope I haven’t caused any inconvenience for Souren Manranyama?”

Skipping all those useless couple-only openers like “Did you wait long?” “No, I just got here,” I tested the waters with Van, hoping for some clue that would confirm my guesses.

“It did cause inconvenience. This is the last time. Please contact me by phone for any future matters.”

Van answered almost without thinking. Her face was a total poker face, and she met my gaze calmly, not showing the slightest crack.

“Oh, that’s good then. I wonder what Souren Manranyama’s busy with tonight?”

“That has nothing to do with you. Time is precious. Please get to the point.”

After another round, I still didn’t get anything useful. Van was like a perfectly sealed high wall, grinding down my hopes bit by bit.

So I decided to assume Van and Souren Manranyama were actually coordinating this. It was the likeliest scenario anyway. No matter how they’d grown up together, in terms of status, Van going out on business couldn’t possibly not report to her employer.

Either way, it didn’t really hurt me. The one issue was that if I got home late, I’d have trouble explaining it to Aunt Uesugi, so I might as well end this quickly.

“So, about you—no, about the matter Souren Manranyama asked me to investigate. I’m hoping you can give me some help.”

“Please go ahead. We’ll provide help within the limits of what’s possible.”

Van sat bolt upright, her straight back giving off an invisible pressure. In contrast, I was lounging pretty casually. I really didn’t like sitting like I was in some etiquette class.

“I don’t have any reliable intel sources here. If I investigate personally, my identity might cause unnecessary trouble. So I want you to provide me with information.”

“Of course. We’ll do everything we can to assist you. After all, this is our commission.”

I pretended to check our surroundings for safety, when in fact I was confirming the positions of Souren Manranyama and Uesugi Yui. Then I lowered my voice and said to Van, “I want a dossier on Bai Yaxin. The more detailed the better. From his birth up to now—no matter how trivial, I want everything.”

As I spoke, Van took out a pen and notepad from her bag and wrote down what I said.

“Understood. Once the investigation is complete, may I send it directly to your email? Also, is there any specific time requirement?”

“With something you can’t really quantify, all I can say is: as soon as you can.”

“Understood. Anything else?”

“Mm… that’s all.”

“Very well, then. Goodbye.”

With a crisp snap, Van shut the notebook and slipped it back into her bag. She stood up cleanly, gave me a slight bow, then turned and left.

Come to think of it, she hadn’t ordered anything. We were in a café, yet in the end it felt like a cold, emotionless office meeting.

If Katagiri Mai’s personality was icy and sharp-tongued, Van’s performance was straight-up robotic.

So emotionless that I couldn’t tell whether she was only like this because she was “on duty,” or if the Manranyama family had already trained her into a complete robot.

I shifted my focus back to the table to give Souren Manranyama the chance to leave. When I looked at her back as she walked out, of course she had no idea.

After I watched Van and the disguised Souren Manranyama leave, the ever-patient stalker Uesugi Yui finally chose to show herself.

One battle had barely ended, and round two was already starting. My life history might as well be a history of wars.