Chapitre 210: The Secret Base
※~・Arc 15: To A Fantasy World, Or Not…?・~※
Hey, Shun here!
Secret bases have always been some people's romance, especially men. I remember trying to make one such thing when I was a child at a nearby forest through the use of branches and fallen leaves, creating a makeshift tent that would always need repair whenever a horrible rain comes, or when winter comes.
I remember coming back to it at times with Miu and Shizuka-nee and finding out that it has become the home of some wild animals like stray pups and such.
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(Third Person's POV)
It was just yet another 'normal' day for the Sakaki household, maybe except for the fact that the middle child of the Sakaki husband and wife brought a classmate with him back home, and it was even a girl for that matter. While Ms. Sakaki has already known about her son having a girl as a friend right after he was hospitalized a few weeks ago, she didn't expect him to bring him back home.
Unknown to Ms. Sakaki, this cute-looking pink-haired girl who have the aura of a ponkotsu radiating off of her, is in fact, a vampire. She's, in fact, the Vampire Princess, no less.
Only a few people knows of this, and that includes Sakaki Yuichi, a Worldview Holder, and his Big Sister, Sakaki Mutsuko. Everyone in the family are in the dark about this, even the youngest child, Sakaki Yoriko, who is close with her siblings.
She actually have a pretty huge brother complex, simply due to the fact that she has set her bar for men that she would even consider a love interest a bit too high. Yoriko having a huge brother complex aside, let's go back to the main topic at hand.
Ms. Sakaki went to go shopping for food ingredients fast after knowing that a friend of her son, and a pretty important one at that — based in her own interpretation. She even bought more food ingredients, for good measure.
She just have a feeling she'd need many ingredients.
Why? It's just a woman's intuition.
Sure enough, after going back home, her eldest daughter came inside the house along with eleven people in tow. Good thing many of the girls who came with her daughter are knowledgeable at cooking. If not, there's no way she could prepare that many servings of food.
Whilst the kitchen is busy, turning into something akin to a battlefield, the living room have a very comfy atmosphere around it. The reason for that is because of the sight of two young girls singing along as they watched an anime on a smartphone.
These two young girls are Pochi and Tama, and on their laps are Fenny and Tsuka. Since they were feeling a bit too nervous, Shun told them to watch an anime for now on their smartphone to help them dispel their nervousness. Based on what's happening right now, it seems to be quite effective.
After introducing themselves to one another briefly, the atmosphere inside the living room has calmed down a bit for a minute or so. The next moment though, Yoriko began asking questions that are seemingly just out of curiosity at first.
However, a few questions in, Shun finally realized that she was just subtly gathering some information about him. She just asked about songs that Shun like before expounding on it and leading the conversation on by asking more questions based on his answers to her questions.
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(Shun's POV)
While we waited for the food to be done, I engaged in a conversation with Yoriko-san, Mutsuko's younger sister. I would sometimes talk to the others but the one who mainly led the conversation was Yoriko-san.
It honestly felt like I was having a conversation with someone like Irina-sensei or Touka-san. Unlike her sister who's not exactly good when it comes to her conversational skills — not like I'm one to talk since I'm not as well — Yoriko gave off this feeling of someone who's pretty crafty or even foxy in nature like Irina-sensei.
I just have this sinking feeling that she have the potential to become the greatest student of Irina-sensei if she were to undergo her training. She also seems like a great fighter just based on what Mutsuko has told us.
"…So yeah, we pretty much all met by accident." I said, answering Yoriko-san's question about how our group all met.
"Hee… big sis already said something like that but I ignored it since she talked about other worlds and stuffs." Yoriko-san said, seemingly recalling that past event.
Oh yeah, so Mutsuko did talked to them about the [Group Chat] that day. It doesn't seem like they believe her up until now though.
I mean, if I were Yoriko-san, even I would find it unbelievable if I were to be told that in the past out of the blue. That being said, I also have my previous experience about supernatural stuff, so I guess it would just be a matter of time before I begin to believe what Mutsuko was saying.
While Yoriko-san talked about the other world and supernaturals that her older sister, Mutsuko, told her, her older brother who's sitting beside her and the pink haired girl next to her began breaking in cold sweat. Looks like they haven't told Yoriko-san about the oddities and such that they have been facing since their school year started, huh.
Aside from talking to me though, Yoriko-san seems to be fond of talking to Rinka-san and Ritsu, people who are nearest to her age. Rinka-san wasn't really that vocal when it comes to talking to others so it was mainly Ritsu who engaged with her enthusiastically aside from me.
"Say, did you study martial arts too? I feel like you also know how to fight!" Yoriko-san asked to Ritsu who nodded her head while showing a wide smile on her face.
"Un! It's kinda like assassination arts but I did learn some!"
When Ritsu mentioned this, Yoriko-san was obviously elated, probably because she met someone who knew martial arts that's around her age group. On the other hand though, her brother once again flinched when the word 'assassination' was mentioned.
'Is it because of that girl who seems to be a self-proclaimed serial killer that Mutsuko talked about in the past?' I thought to myself.
It was then that the previously quiet Satania-san finally spoke.
"Hey! You're a vampire, aren't you?"
She threw this question at the pink haired girl sitting beside Yuichi-san. The girl was obviously caught off guard by how this question came out of left field.
"E-Eh? V-Vampire? What might you be talking about? I'm clearly human, you know?" Just based on the tone of her voice and her stuttering, you could clearly tell that the girl was shaken.
"Hmm… You feel like a vampire to me. I can't be wrong since they are also dwellers of the underworld like us devils… You also smell like that guy beside you. Did you drink his blood?" For the first time, Satania-san seems to be bringing up some pretty good reasonings and such, surprising even me.
Mutsuko never really told us anything about this girl, probably because she just entirely forgot to tell us about her or something. She's kinda chatty and she's the type of older sister to spill the beans about her younger brother's habits as a child or something to her friends.
Actually, I kinda feel pity for the guy. Unlike Mutsuko, I consider myself lucky to have an older sister like Shizuka-nee.
"T-That's because we're near each other. A-Also, I'm one of the people who brought Yuichi-kun to the hospital when he got wounded in a fight so…"
The girl tried to counter Satania-san's suspicions with a reasoning of her own but, her reason is kinda weak and at most slightly believable. Thankfully for her, this was more than enough to mislead Satania-san.
"Hmm… Is that so? It's probably just my imagination then. I thought I met a vampire here, who is one of the species that are once the enemy of us devils…" For someone who calls herself a devil, she's one innocent and gullible devil alright.
"…I was this close to burning her with my Flames of Hell but it looks like I was mistaken about her being a vampire. Hmm…" Satania-san murmured to herself.
I couldn't help but just smile wryly at this girl. Thankfully, the other troublemaker in our group is too shy to even talk to Yoriko-san, or else, I don't know if I should just up and leave in order to avoid suffering from second-hand embarrassment.
After a few more minutes of wait, the food was finally done and we could finally start eating. While the meal was more than delicious enough, I couldn't say I enjoyed the experience of eating it.
That's mainly because I was constantly asked by Ms. Sakaki about the progress of my relationship with Mutsuko.
This is the main reason why I didn't call Mutsuko as 'Mutsuko' inside this house. This mother seems to be like my mother who likes to tease the younger ones, one way or another.
What came as a surprise to me was Mutsuko also getting red on the face because of that talk. That was definitely a welcomed surprise.
Anyway, back to Ms. Sakaki's teasings. I wasn't the only one to get teased by her. In fact, I'm happy to not be the only one.
Aside from me, there is the pair who arrived here before us, Yuichi-san and his friend who seems to be named Noro Aiko. The two were totally acting like those heroine and protagonist straight out of a romcom anime, with the boy getting embarrassed and the girl getting all red and furthering the misunderstanding.
Thankfully, I was thick-skinned enough to deflect Ms. Sakaki's teasings with compliments like about her cooking and such.
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After what felt like an hour, we finally finished eating and we were then invited by Mutsuko to go to their house's backyard. There, we were met with different equipments and such that seems to be built for training purposes.
"Hee… You bought so many equipments. Is it for your training?" Kaede-san asked out of curiosity. She was walking around, touching different equipments along with Rokuko, Pochi, and Tama.
Yukiko-san, Rinka-san, and Touka-san were also doing the same, with Tsuka and Fenny within their arms. As for Satania-san and Ritsu, they are completely busy looking at the beautiful garden just beside the house itself.
When Mutsuko saw them, she immediately raised her voice to warn them.
"Ah! Don't destroy the plants there, okay? Mom really likes her flowers and plants. She's really scary when she's angry…" Mutsuko warned seriously.
Looks like even her is scared of her mother. Even her two siblings nodded their heads in agreement.
"So anyway, what are we going to do here? Are you going to bring us to your secret base?" Rikka asked, bringing the topic back to the matter at hand.
"Eh? Secret base? There's a secret base in here, big sis?" Yuichi-san asked.
Meanwhile, the little sister Yoriko-san was clearly in doubt as she said…
"There's no way a secret base could be in here. This is just our normal backyard, you know?"
The moment she said that, Mutsuko raised her index finger and waved it in front of her while clicking her tongue and showing a smug smile.
"Tsk, tsk, tsk, tsk. I taught you so much, Yori. What did I tell you about hiding things when we were kids?"
"Umm… It might be much better to hide things in plain sight… or something?"
At her answer, Mutsuko immediately clapped her hands as she showed a radiant smile. It's as if she was proud of her sister for remembering that or something.
"That's right! Well, let me take you all to my hidden base! This will be the base of the Survival Club!"
Right after that, Mutsuko deliberately stepped on the grass beneath her hard and the grassy ground beneath where all of us are gathered literally opened up and swallowed us whole.
""""AHHHHHHH!""""
While everyone was literally screaming for dear life, I was thinking to myself…
'Just where on Earth did she get that pressure plate?'
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※~To be continued~※
Author's Remarks:
※ End of the first chapter for this Arc. I was out for a few days dealing with other stuffs and thinking about which way I would steer this new Arc. Man, I've always had a hard time thinking of how I should start things off xD.
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