Capítulo 27: Z-Zeno-chan?! Is that you?!

With the loud sound, all of us turned our heads towards the door.

A girl was standing there looking haggardly.

"Senpai! Look! I've found something!", the girl shouted.

But as soon, she said, she stopped as if she became frozen upon seeing us.

"Ehem", she coughed a little then her whole aura changed in a matter of seconds.

"Hello, I see that we have new potential members.", she then gracefully bowed at us.

What's with the bow, though?

I stared at her while contemplating if whether I knew her or not. The girl who seems to be a first-year like us, she got bright auburn hair... amber eyes... She seems familiar... Don't tell me... Is she really... There's no way! But, at a closer look, if I put on the mask and the glasses, they exactly look alike.

I leaned my head forward while holding my chin seriously, then her face went red and cast her head down.

But suddenly, I got stabbed at my sides.

"Ouch!", I hold my sides as I was grunting in pain.

Then, I looked at the culprit.

Naoki was looking at me while puffing her cheeks, "No. Bad Tatsu."

"Eh?", I looked at her in bewilderment.

Not only that, even Yokota and the two senpais are looking at me with puzzled faces. The two senpais that I was talking about were the girl and the unknown entity that is dressed up like a guy from earlier, the girl has the color green ribbon which is meant that she's a third-year, meanwhile, the unknown entity who's got a guy's clothes have the color red which is for the second-years.

"Eh? W-w-wait! You got all wrong! I was just looking at her because I thought she looks similar to someone I knew! I swear! That's my sole reason why I looked at her, like that!", I panicky exclaimed.

All of them are looking at me with doubt all over their faces, and the worst of them all was Naoki, she's not trusting me at all!

"I swear! I'm telling the truth! Look!", I proceed to take out of my phone and went to my messages with Zeno-chanღ, viewing the picture that she sent me, "See?!"

Naoki and the three except for the red-hair girl who was still standing at the door, all looked at the image that I had given to them. I was expecting that they would understand it but to my surprised, the three looked at me confused and blushing, while Naoki was looking at me with teary eyes.

"Oi, oi, oi, what's with the look?!", I looked at them with distress.

"Umm, I didn't know that you guys are in a relationship...", the third-year girl shyly said, following that, the other two agreed.

What relationship?! What are you guys talking about? Are they misunderstanding, something? How could one picture tell our relationship? I'm not even sure if she's really Zeno-chan.

While Naoki on the other hand went straight to me, and said, "Tatsu... Why are you exchanging pictures with her, while we aren't?", she was tugging my arm.

"Wait! Wait! What are you guys misunderstanding? I only told that she resembles the picture of this girl, and nothing more.", I exclaimed while massaging my glabella.

"Eh? Aren't you guys like that? You know? Sending someone...? You know... online 's' thing...? And what's more, this is clearly Shiori-chan...", the third-year girl shyly said, as she kept glancing at it.

"I didn't know Shiori-chan can do this kind of stuff...", she added.

Shiori? Is that her name?

"WAIT A MINUTE! WHAT ARE YOU GUYS TALKING ABOUT?! I HAVEN'T MET THIS GUY EVER IN MY LIFE?! AND WHAT ARE YOU GUYS LOOKING AT?! GIVE ME THAT!!", the red-hair girl shouted and snatched the phone.

After taking a look at it, her expression changed every second, first, she was confused, then she got angry, but after a while, her face flushed with redness all over her.

She then turned her face over me and pointed a finger at me.

"Y-y-y-y-y-y-y-y-you a-a-a-are X-X-X-X-Xeco?!", she was stuttering in bewilderment.

"Hm? Wait... Are you really, Zeno?!", I looked with my eyes widen.

"Y-y-y-y-yeah, AHHHHH!", she screamed then threw my phone towards me.

"Oh shit.", but I caught it.

Then after that, she quickly got out and ran.

She vanished...

I was just standing there, looking at the door perplexed.

"What just happened?", I said.

Then, I looked at my phone to know where all of their reactions came from because I'm pretty sure it's only a picture that she had taken to prove her gender. There's no way people could misunderstand that, right?

But, I've eaten my words as I froze while looking at the picture.

"W-W-W-W-W-W-W-W-W-W-W-W-W-WHAT IS THIS?!!!!!!!", I shouted.

All the people in the clubroom were surprised by my sudden shout.

I was bewildered by what I'm seeing. I didn't notice it earlier when I looked at it since I'm all focused on her face that I didn't bother looking at the whole picture, or maybe I'm just half-asleep earlier.

In both of the pictures that she sent to me— She's only wearing her underwear!! Even though she sent me a selfie, there's actually a mirror behind her that reflected her whole back body. To be honest, that's really hot as fuck, as a pubescent male my male hormones are on full turbo mode, right now.

Then I snapped, I remembered that I need to explain this.

"W-w-w-wait! This isn't what it looks like! I have an explanation! I-I-I was just asking her if she's really a woman!", I panicky exclaimed as I tried to explain to them as hard as I can.

"Don't worry, as my Kohai, I'll make sure that I will not say anything to anyone. People have few secrets here and there...", the third-year girl said as she pumped her fist to her chest.

SENPAIIIIII!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Y-y-y-y-yeah me too, I-I-I-I will keep it a secret too since you guys are friends with Yokota-chan...", the unknown entity second-year said while shyly avoiding my eyes.

NOT YOU TOO!!!!!!!!!

"Umm, even though we don't know each other that much yet, I'm not the type of person who likes gossips or spread it, that's why your secret with Iwamoto-san is all kept in my mouth, I will not tell a single soul.", Yokota said as her face was flushed in redness as well.

NOT YOU TOO, YOKOTA!!!!!

As for my last hope, I looked at Naoki but she is fidgeting her fingers, and said, "If you want Tatsu, I can send you some of mine later when I got home.", while shyly kept glancing at me back and forth.

THAT'S NOT IT, NAOKI!! AND, HOW COME YOUR FIRST THOUGHT WAS THAT?!

"Nooo! Look! I've been her online friend for a year! And this is our conversation!", I bought my phone and facing it at them while looking desperate.

All of them gathered around me, while I explain to them what really happened, mostly our conversation from earlier in the morning. And then, I added how I met her online which is only a brief explanation of how we met in an online game. With, all the explaining I did to them, come after that, they finally understood.

"And that's why.", I said with a tired expression.

"Oh, I-I'm sorry...", the third-year girl said.

""Yeah, me too."", the unknown entity and Yokota said.

"So, we're not doing that? B-but, I-I kind of want t-to...", Naoki said dejectedly.

What? You're really adamant about that picture thing?

"We'll talk about it later, Naoki.", I said.

"Really?! Okay!", Naoki's eyes widen, she looks like a child who got her new favorite toy.

She's too cute.

Meanwhile, the other three looked at us dumbfoundedly and only kept their mouths shut.

"Okay, now, where were we? Oh, yeah, the online 's' thing you mentioned, senpai.", I said.

"Eh? There's no need for that, you explained it to us so there's no need for that, right? Rin-chan?", the third-year girl said while tapping the unknown entity's back.

Wait? Rin? It made me more confused!! Why are you guys making it hard for me?!

"Y-yeah! What Fumiko said was correct! There's no need!", he or she said.

Yokota stayed silent.

"I know you said something, you whispered it...", I turned my head to Naoki, "... what is it, Naoki?"

The two whispered something earlier to Naoki and Yokota, and Yokota's face became expressive when they mentioned it, which I got a feeling that it's bad. Naoki got suddenly worried about it and she became jealous of it.

"Oh, they said it's about an online sex dating, you know like those what you get from dating apps? Well, I don't really know that much, but she said it's really lewd.", Naoki nonchalantly said.

Naoki said that without getting embarrassed when she said that I can't coup myself of wanting to hug her when she's acting so innocent, but I can't since there are people here.

"You know what, it's better if I don't know anything about that stuff."

The two senpais let out a relieved sigh.

"With all of that out of the way, I'm Okita Tatsuya.", I introduced myself.

"Hello, I'm Ikeda Naoki.", Naoki introduced herself.

"O-O-Oh yeah, I forgot to introduce myself, I'm the president of the Mystery Club, Maeda Fumiko."

"Hi! I'm the vice-president, My name is Oishi Rin.", he or she smiled at me, I still don't know the gender.

"I-I'm really sorry about earlier, I shouldn't have said that!", Maeda-senpai exclaimed.

"It's okay.", I said.

"I really am sorry, but are you guys interested in joining our club?"

"Oh, we're currently looking for one, but since Yokota is here we could consider joining here.", I responded.

"Yeah, it will depend on Tatsu's decision, I'm just following him.", Naoki added.

"Eh? Oh, right...", I said.

I remembered Naoki saying that no matter what the club is, as long I'm in there she will join.

"Ohh, I see, want to take a seat with us, first? I'll give you an explanation of what our club does.", Maeda-senpai said.

We all sat at the table.

Then Maeda-senpai spoke, " So, basically... We only do like puzzle games those kinds of stuff or maybe research some unsolvable stuff that is on the internet for fun."

"So, basically...?", I looked at her confused.

"Yes, we do nothing other than just play games or solve brain-teasing cases that we could find.", Oishi-senpai said.

For real though, what's your gender? I've been trying to find out Oishi-senpai's gender ever since I got here. Then adding, Zeno my online friend whom I haven't met is basically studying here. I can't even fathom how baffled I am, right now. A friend whom I met online a year ago is from my school, I can't really punch the idea in my head at how much of a coincidence that is, plus she literally just sent me a picture earlier which ended up, not going well.

"I thought this school is strict in terms of academics? Why are they allowing this club then?", I asked them.

"Eh? Where did that come from? Well, school club exists for extracurricular activities, it doesn't mean that it's only meant for academics purposes. The game club exists, right?", Oishi-senpai said.

"Now that I think about it... Yeah, sorry for the stupid question, I thought clubs exist for students to have extracurricular activities that could help them.", I said.

"Every club is helpful to every student, Okita-kohai, it helps the students to relieve some stress from our studies. Even though our club doesn't really do anything, we have mystery-solving cases that could test our intellect and logical minds. We, students, have our day-to-day stresses, that's why letting out some steam is very helpful. Stress can make your studies difficult as it can really affect your mood.", Oishi-senpai said.

"Ohh, I see, I'm very sorry about that.", I apologized.

"No worries.", Oishi-senpai smiled at me.

Suddenly a loud bang sound came from the door once again.

ANOTHER ONE?!