Chapter 313: Coming to an Agreement!

“You weren’t supposed to go out with Shiina?!”

“I only went because I trusted Onii-chan!”

Akiko was full of regret. She never imagined that in just this short while, her brother would have undone his pants…

How infuriating! When dealing with her, his pants hadn’t been that loose!

Shouldn’t they be extra tight?!

“I should never have trusted Onii-chan!”

Akiko put her hands on her hips, eyes wide, extremely unwilling.

“No! Akiko, listen! It’s not like that!”

“Then what is it like?”

“Ah… it’s complicated…”

Himekoji Tadashi had no idea how to explain. Sweat beaded on his forehead.

“If it’s not like that, what else could it be? Coming out of Nanami’s room naked? What other reason could there possibly be?”

Whoa, right! He almost forgot he was still naked!

Himekoji finally realized and quickly covered his private parts.

“I was sweating heavily from carrying Nanami upstairs earlier, wasn’t I? I was planning to take a bath… Since Nanami was already asleep and the house was empty, I just took my clothes off. Yeah, that’s exactly what happened!”

The more Himekoji spoke, the more passable this spur-of-the-moment excuse seemed. So he felt more confident, and his voice lost its initial shakiness.

“Oh?”

However, his sister was much harder to fool than he imagined. She squinted at Himekoji, scrutinizing him carefully.

“Don’t believe me? Give me a sniff! I really am sweaty.”

“Who wants to sniff that?! The smell of a virgin!”

The… smell of a virgin?

Seriously? His own sister, with her Brother Complex, saying something so blasphemous?

Himekoji’s heart ached!

What happened to the Brother Complex? Are you still complexing or not? Calling your own brother smelly?

“Virgins don’t smell!”

Only this time, Himekoji couldn’t let it slide. He argued back righteously.

“Apologize to all virgins out there, hey!”

“Huh, so defensive? Looks like you didn’t have time to do those things to Nanami after all.” Akiko patted her chest, slightly relieved. “Hmph! Good thing I came back quickly!”

Whoa, based on what she just said…

Could Akiko be tricking him into talking?

But no worries! He stood straight and wasn’t afraid of his shadow doing him wrong!

He hadn’t done anything… except taking Nanami’s clothes off!

He wasn’t afraid of probing questions!

…

“Sniff sniff!”

Himekoji was showing his sister his brightest, most innocent face to prove his innocence when a faint sniffling sound came from behind him.

“Not smelly. Akito isn’t a virgin anymore.”

The voice was familiar. The words were idiotic.

It was Mashiro, that dummy!

“So I told you! Virgins don’t smell bad! And compared to those filthy Normie scumbags, virgins probably even emit a fresh fragrance!” While saying this, Himekoji kept one hand covering his private parts. The other shot back like lightning to cover his bottom. “Also, Shiina, can you tell me why you’re behind me?”

“Because Akito is in front of me?”

“I don’t want to hear that kind of nonsense!”

“Because going from the editorial office to the bookstore passes right by our house, so we decided to pop in.” Mashiro was useless, so it was Akiko who ended up explaining. “Lucky we did! Otherwise, we wouldn’t have caught Onii-chan in the act!”

“Stop looking at me like a criminal, okay? I’m innocent! Didn’t do anything, hey!”

“Innocent or not, I’ll know after checking the crime scene!”

Akiko would never take Himekoji’s one-sided story at face value. She tossed out this sentence, stepped forward, and reached out to open the bedroom door directly.

Doomed!

Himekoji suddenly remembered something very bad—

Nanami was in there… just as naked as him!

…

“Sniff… sniff…”

“Shiina, have you sniffed enough?!”

“Akito smells weird.”

“What’s weird about it?! All guys smell like this, okay!”

Mashiro leaned closer, sniffing and huffing all over Himekoji’s bare body, making him blush furiously.

“Move! Get out of my way! I’m going to take a bath right now!”

Himekoji pushed past Shiina and fled in haste.

He’d barely escaped into the bathroom when Akiko, having inspected the crime scene, arrived right on his heels, banging “Bang! Bang! Bang!” on the locked wooden bathroom door.

“Onii-chan, and you say you didn’t do anything?! You took all of Nanami’s clothes off! Is that doing nothing?!”

“No way! She took them off herself! Because, well… she was feverish and sweaty. Her clothes were sticky against her skin; of course she couldn’t keep them on! So she took them off!”

Whoa, this reason was perfect! No flaws whatsoever!

Himekoji grew more confident as he spoke.

Damn, he was a genius!

“Nonsense! If Nanami undressed herself, she’d at least put on pajamas afterward! She doesn’t sleep naked! Especially not with a pervert like you in the house!”

“Huh?”

Himekoji froze, soap in hand…

No way? Such a perfect lie didn’t work? Give him a break, will you, fate?!

“If you ask me,” Akiko accused, “Onii-chan definitely took advantage of the situation! While Nanami was unconscious with fever, he secretly stripped her naked!”

Holy crap! Were you there?

How could you be this accurate? Guessed the truth to a T?

Nice job, Imouto!

Panicking as his lie was exposed, Himekoji instinctively squeezed the soap too hard and it flew out of his hand.

“Y-you can’t falsely accuse me! Where’s your proof?! All of that is just your baseless speculation!”

“You want proof? Tch! Fine! We’ll just wait for Nanami to wake up and confront you directly!”

“A face-off? You think I’m scared?”

_I couldn’t lose a fight without putting up a good show._ At the very least, I had to keep up my fierce act and show them how stubborn I could be!

But just as Himekoji finished saying that, he immediately heard Akiko shouting outside the bathroom door, “Nanami—”

Himekoji instantly dropped to his knees with a thump.

“Please let’s talk this over, boss! Aoyama has a fever right now and needs to rest!”

_Just to be clear, it wasn’t that he was backing down!_

Himekoji’s surrender was entirely for Nanami’s sake!

Someone with a fever needed rest!

He was kind, really…

“Fine, but I have one condition.”

“Agreed!”

Wasn’t it natural for an Onii-chan to fulfill his Imouto’s request?

Making it a condition felt way too distant.

This had nothing to do with secrets or leverage. It was purely a brother-and-sister bond!

Yes, exactly!

Having an understanding with my ‘accuser’ was necessary and inevitable. A happy solution indeed!

…

True to her word after getting Himekoji’s promise, Akiko didn’t expose him to Nanami. Instead, she cleaned up his mess—

Akiko dressed the sleeping Nanami in her pajamas.

Now, even if Nanami woke up, she wouldn’t notice anything unusual.

The embarrassing truth—that her clothes had been completely stripped off by the Pervert Himekoji during her fever—would be buried by the sands of time.

That same day, to prevent Himekoji from taking advantage and doing anything else perverted, Akiko and Mashiro kept watch by Nanami’s bedside the whole afternoon.

Mashiro even gave up her planned trip to the bookstore.

They stayed until evening. Only then, worn out by exhaustion, did Akiko yawn and head back to her room. An even sleepier Mashiro just lay down on the floor and fell asleep instantly.

…

9:13 PM.

Himekoji figured it was about time Nanami should wake up. He went to the kitchen to warm some porridge.

Nanami hadn’t eaten properly these last few days because of her fever. With nothing in her stomach, she’d definitely be hungry when she woke up.

After preparing the porridge, Himekoji carried the bowl to Nanami’s room. He was surprised to find the door slightly ajar.

Voices were coming through the crack—

“Torajirou… Tell me, what should I really do?”

It was Nanami’s voice.

Who was she talking to?

Himekoji was a little curious. Nanami’s phone was cut off for non-payment, so she clearly couldn’t be on a call.

Besides, who was this Torajirou?

“How would I know? Sort out the mess you made yourself!”

Judging by the accent, the speaker was also from Kansai, using a strong Kansai dialect.

But as Himekoji listened, he started to sense something odd.

Though Torajirou sounded like a boy, there was a hint of a congested, nasal tone to the voice.

And there was only one person in that room with nasal congestion right now…

Meaning…

The so-called Torajirou was actually Nanami?

_Impressive! Truly a Seiyuu!_

Was she a monster?

Himekoji could imitate voices of the opposite sex with ‘Voice Copying,’ which wasn’t that strange. But Nanami didn’t have that skill—she relied on pure talent!

These thoughts flashed through Himekoji’s mind as the conversation inside continued—

“You’re right, but… what happened during the day was so embarrassing…”

“Idiot! Fool! Embarrassing? Haven’t you already lost all face in front of him? Eating his bento because you were starving… moving in because you couldn’t pay rent… even letting him see you naked… Isn’t it way too late to worry about embarrassment now?”

“N-no, it’s different! He saw me crying like an ugly mess today. After that, my head was fuzzy and I don’t remember clearly, but I think he carried me like a princess? He even held my hand! I said I wanted to rely on him… Argh! I’m such an idiot! Oh, oh, earlier while I was sleeping, did he see my sleeping face too?”

“Of course he did! Who told you to be careless enough to show it? It was practically begging someone to take advantage.”

“Wh-what are you saying!”

“Why hesitate now? Since it’s already come to this, why not just muster your courage and pounce on him!”

“Th-that’s reckless!”

…

Having stumbled upon this conversation, Himekoji felt too awkward to push the door open now. Instead, he peeked through the crack.

He saw Nanami sitting on the bed in her pajamas, facing a tiger-shaped pillow.

“So that’s Torajirou…”

Himekoji muttered it out loud without realizing.

“Huh? Wh-who’s there?”

Nanami immediately noticed.

_The atmosphere instantly became super awkward!_

“A-ah… Nanami, you’re awake?”

“N-no! I’m still asleep! Fast asleep!”

…