Sakurasou no Pet na Kanojo:Volume 4

Chapter 1 - Sakurasou’s Culture Festival

Part 1

With the light of the sunset shining down on them, Sorata Kanda was standing face to face with Mashiro Shiina at the observation deck of Narita Airport.

“What happened to me.”

As if she was trying to suppress her nervousness, Mashiro clenched her hands that were resting on her chest. The action gave off such a slender and detailed feeling; making Mashiro appear to be even more fragile than she is.

“Hey, Sorata.”

Her usually certain voice now sounded somewhat weak.

“W-What is it?”

“Is this…”

Mashiro’s cheeks glowed red as she looked down. Sorata could feel that it wasn’t just because of the sunlight.

“S-Shiina?”

Sorata wanted to speak further, but when Mashiro looked at him with her crystal clear eyes, all he could mutter out was her name.

“…”

The sudden silence was hard to put up with so Sorata gulped. However, no matter what he tried, his heartbeat wouldn’t slow down and neither did Mashiro back off.

“Could …”

“… Shiina.”

“This be…”

“…”

His heart screamed out for Mashiro to stop, but no sound escaped from his lips. However, a short sound squeezed out from Mashiro’s thin lips.

“Love.”

A quiet sound. It was a quiet yet certain voice. Sorata’s heart was beating crazily and every cell of his body was raging. His emotions suddenly lit up.

“I- I…. I…”

A voice inside him echoed ‘Say it… just say it’

“… Sorata?”

“I- I’ve thought of you… that’s, uh….”

Say it. Just speak out our thoughts boldly…

“I… like!”

“I know.”

“Huh?”

What do you know?

“I know how Sorata feels.”

“Shiina…”

Shiina wore a natural smile that took away all of Sorata’s strength. She looked at him with a loving gaze. His heart beat uncontrollably and he wanted to jump up and down.

“I- I!”

Just when Sorata had gathered enough courage to say it, Mashiro stopped Sorata with her hand.

“But I can’t accept Sorata’s feelings.”

“…Huh?”

What did Mashiro just say?

“W-What are you saying? W-we feel the same way, right?”

“Right.”

“T-Then why?”

“A painful past is necessary to pilot Nyaboron.”

“… Huh?”

What was Mashiro saying.

“But it’s OK.”

“No, no. I don’t think your head is OK at all.”

“By losing my precious Sorata, my negative engine will forever go on.”

“Yep, you’re not OK at all!”

“I will destroy every single Nyangolownians out there.”

“Saying that doesn’t make me feel any better!”

“Then, farewell.”

“No, wait…!”

Chasing after the disappearing figure, Sorata grabbed her shoulders and turned her around.

“Huh?”

As if using she used magic, the person who had been Mashiro until just now, turned into his school senior, Misaki Kamiigusa.

“W-What happened?!”

“That’s so unmanly of you, Kohai-kun! For you to be this weak! Straighten yourself up for the sake of humanity!”

Misaki widely swung her hand around.

“Ah, hold on, Senpai!”

“No!”

With a manly response, Misaki presented Sorata with a strong slap. The clear slap sound rang out.

“What the hell~!”

Shouting ‘What the hell~!’ at the nonsensical development, Sorata regained his senses. Until now, he was at the airport but the sight that he saw was his familiar 3 tatami sized room.

Sakurasou, one of the dorms of Suimei High School of the Arts. And this was the Room 101. Exciting sketches of 「Galactic Cat Nyaboron」 covered the walls and the seven stray cats that he picked up were sound asleep on the bed.

It was a room that Sorata knew quite well.

“… So I’ve been dreaming ‘till now and this is the reality.”

He was somewhat glad but he was also feeling let down at the same time.

“Anyhow, to think that I slept while standing.”

When Sorata opened his eyes, he was standing up inside his room for some reason. But it wasn’t that strange to him because he didn’t have time to sleep over the past week due to the production of 「Galactic Cat Nyaboron」 in order to meet the deadline.

His eyes teared up when he loudly yawned. It covered his eyes.

He was able to come back from the dream world for now, but he felt like sleeping again.

“And what was I dreaming about in the first place…”

Even if all of his focus had been on the production, to think that Nyaboron would take over his dreams…. And the same could be said about Mashiro. What was he making her do in his dreams. Things between them has gotten awkward ever since Rita, Mashiro’s former roommate, tried to take her back to England…. Thinking about the time Sorata shouted “Don’t go” as he hugged Mashiro tight still made him blush furiously. After that dream just now, it’ll be even harder to face her again.

“Kohai-kun, you awake?”

He rubbed his closing eyes. The one who spoke to him was the alien from Room 201- Misaki Kamiigusa. Now that he thought about it, Misaki slapped him in his dream. No, he could feel his left cheek still throbbing.

“This may be a sudden question, but how did you wake me up, Misaki-senpai?”

“I woke you up according to the customs of the land.”

“I don’t think waking someone up by slapping him can be considered to be a custom of any land!”

“I didn’t slap you! I was practicing my signature!”

Misaki spouted out some nonsense as usual.

“Signature?”

“Here, mirror.”

Sorata unwillingly checked his face’s reflection on the hand mirror that Misaki handed over.

“We~ll, this is how it looks on the front, so what do you think?”

Sorata decided to ignore the hair salon-like act. That was because he had something to say to her.

On his left cheek, there was a handprint of sticky red paint. Of course, Misaki’s right hand was covered in red paint as well.

“Who do you think you are to have a signature like this! And don’t have a signature like this in the first place!”

“I’m glad that Kohai-kun is happy.”

“I’m not happy, I’m being angry because I was slapped!”

“It was Kohai-kun’s fault for sleeping while standing up.”

“Giraffes in savannas sleep while standing still! Don’t look down on nature!”

“They sleep while wrapping their neck around in the zoos!”

“That’s because they’re being lazy since there are no predators after them! They lost the nature’s touch!”

“I get that you’re a professional when it comes to giraffe trivia, so pipe down. I can’t hear anything.”

The one who told Sorata that was the person who was checking the screen of the TV- Jin Mitaka. He was the handsome third year who lived in Room 103 and was the childhood friend of Misaki. The reason why his eyes were glued to the screen was because he was in the middle of debugging 「Galactic Cat Nyaboron」’s drama parts.

“And go to school, Misaki. You need to promote our work and make the preparations.”

“Yep! I’ll come and pick it up at lunch, so finish it by then!”

Misaki ran out as soon as she finished saying that. How can she have that much energy. Just like Sorata who was tired enough to sleep on his feet and Jin who was yawning every 3 seconds, Misaki hadn’t slept either. Did she have an unlimited energy source in her? If she did, it would be nice if she used it for the good of human kind.

As Sorata watched the door that Misaki just went out of, Jin muttered to himself.

“I never would’ve thought that we would finish this off on the day we present it…”

“I feel the same way.”

Sorata agreed with Jin and slumped down next to him.

Today was the 7th of November.

It was the 5th day into the culture festival, which started on the 3rd of November. The culture festival which was held along with the associated university lasted for a whole week.

「Galactic Cat Nyaboron」 should’ve been completed nearly 10 days ago…. No, according to the schedule, it should’ve been completed 10 days ago. However, Misaki ordered for the 3D model data to be rewritten because she wasn’t satisfied with the quality, and that fired up Mashiro to increase the scenes for the drama part. When Ryuunosuke should’ve stopped the two, he said that there was a shadier technique that he wanted to try out so he extended the deadline as well…. They were going to present it on the opening day of the festival, but 「Galactic Cat Nyaboron」 still hasn’t been completed yet.

Thanks to that, the sleeping hours of the Sakurasou tenants decreased each day, ever since the start of the culture festival. Needless to say, they couldn’t participate in the festival at all.

However, all of their hard work was finally going to pay off. After a few hours, the 「Galactic Cat Nyaboron」will finally be done, and they will be able to present it.

Having said that, they were already worn out, and they were just about to be tempted to sleep even at the slightest whisper.

“Jin-senpai.”

“What is it?”

“I want to let my upper and lower eyelids reunite sometime soon.”

“Go and wash your face to wake yourself up. Get that leaf off your face while you’re at it.”

“Ah, you’re right. I forgot about it.”

Sorata couldn’t sleep yet. When Jin finishes debugging the drama part, it was Sorata’s time to shine and check for the battle parts by doing a test run. He then had to hand over the results to Ryuunosuke, who was silently typing away on the keyboard, so that he can do the final fix.

If the final production was up to a satisfactory level, their work 「Galactic Cat Nyaboron」 would finally be complete- after 2 months of desperate efforts.

Reflecting back on it, it has been a long, yet short time. A lot of things happened especially during October.

One day, Sorata got into a heated argument with Ryuunosuke over the battle parts.

“Kanda’s suggestion of adding extra movement isn’t considering the crowd at all. It goes against the director’s heat. So it’s refused.”

Sorata was completely looked down upon like that, and when Misaki was pouring out countless of suggestions and ideas,

“It would be great if we can do all that, but we can’t do it because the lack of time!”

And lost himself like that.

One time, they had to remake the graphic the data due to missing the ordering of them, and there has been an instance when an important part of the production wasn’t completed on time. They were able to be where they are now after all those efforts.

Thinking of those days, Sorata let out a

“Hupp,”

Sound and walked into the hallway.

Swaying while walking, he leaned on the wall and went inside the bathroom. Not thinking that someone would be occupying the bathroom, Sorata opened the door without thinking.

“Kyaa.”

Hearing the short yell, Sorata looked up and made eye-contact with the tenant of Room 203, Nanami Aoyama. Facing her back towards him, Nanami hugged her shoulders with her hands and covered her chest up. She didn’t have anything on her as she stood on top of the scales. Her school uniform was heaped up in a small mound on the floor. Since it was only normal to take off clothes from the upper layers first, a pair of sky blue underwear were placed at the top.

“K-Kanda?”

Switching to her dialect, Nanami looked at Sorata in surprise.

“H-Hey.”

Even if they were on friendly terms with each other, Sorata had to be formal. He greeted her first.

“…”

But unfortunately, Nanami didn’t answer back. Instead, her well developed figure started to tremble and she breathed in deeply.

“Whoa~! Hold on, Aoyama!”

Sorata’s attempt to stop her and Nanami’s yell took place at almost the same time.

“Kyaaaaaaaa!”

As expected of a voice actress student. The yell that came from the stomach was strong enough to make the atmosphere tremble.

If he didn’t block out his ears by instinct, he would’ve been stunned by that yell.

“W-What are ya looking at~!”

Blushing bright red, Nanami grabbed a washing basket near-by and threw it at him.

Sensing the danger, Sorata quickly caught it with both of his hands.

“Good.”

“D-Don’t catch it~!”

“O-Oops!”

He should’ve backed off a long time ago.

“S-Sorrry!”

Shivering from the rage and the embarrassment building up inside her, Nanami let out a scream again.

“Kyaaaaa!”

“I’m really sorry!”

Sorata quickly closed the bathroom door. He apologised to Nanami again through the door.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t do it on purpose!”

“I-If an apology is enough, then why are there the police force!”

“That’s a good point… but the sign that says it’s being used by girls isn’t on!”

“No way, that’s… wait… because I didn’t plan to take my clothes off….”

“Huh? Then why were you all naked?”

Sorata remembered that Nanami was standing on the scales. He could guess why she was naked.

“I-It doesn’t concern you, does it.”

“Did you lose a kilo after taking your clothes off?”

“I-I gained a bit because I haven’t weighed myself in a while, so it’s not like I’m blaming my clothes. I-It’s not like I gained weight anyway! It’s just all in the head…”

Nanami was fairly desperate. It seemed like she wasn’t able to see the figure that she wanted to see even after weighing herself stark naked…

“There’s an urban myth that says that you’ll weigh less if you lift up a leg.”

“…”

As soon as Sorata jokingly said an advice that no-one would believe, Nanami quietened down for a moment.

“… Aoyama?”

“Y-You liar! It increased instead!”

“Isn’t it because you shifted your centre of gravity?”

Imagining Nanami trying to balance herself on her leg… while standing on the scales stark naked, Sorata couldn’t help but to laughed out loud.

“D-Don’t laugh!”

The readings on the scale must’ve been very important to Nanami.

After waiting for a while, the bathroom door opened from the inside. Nanami came out after wearing her school uniform. She was certainly discomforted. No, she could be just embarrassed.

“What’s with your face?”

She pointed at the handprint on Sorata’s face.

“I was attacked by the alien.”

Nanami didn’t ask for anything else. She must’ve thought that it was going to be a pain to listen to it.

“Uh… sorry about before.”

“It’s all right…. Actually, it’s not all right…. It was my fault for not hanging up the sign…. But it’s not all right… but it was my fault….”

She looked at Sorata with the accusing look while pouting.

“Could you do something about that face?”

“I was born like this.”

What did she dislike so much about his face?

“Aoyama’s upset because you didn’t make a move on her even after seeing her naked, Sorata.”

The one who approached them while yawning was Jin. He was probably getting sleepy as well, because he walked inside the bathroom first and the splashing sounds could be heard as he washed his face.

And when he was done, he wiped his face as he walked out and poured out

“But I guess it’s too much to ask a 16 year old single youth to take the main stage.”

Cruel comments like above.

“W-What do you mean, main stage! Mitaka-senpai, please don’t say those things!!”

“Then sex.”

“T-That’s even worse!”

Blushing up to her ears, Nanami retorted, but Jin paid no attention to it. “A boy in his teens is simple enough to fall for a girl who’s simply willing to hold his hand, so why don’t you start from that?”

Jin straightened his glasses, which he had taken off before.

“What are you saying! Also, I’m not that simple!”

“So he says. Aoyama, Sorata seems to be over himself, so I’ll leave the rest to you.”

Messing up the mood like that, Jin yawned again and walked into Sorata’s room, where they were debugging.

“Geez, that person is really… right, Aoyama?”

“…”

Aoyama was looking at her hand with a serious expression.

“He~y, Aoyama~.”

“W-What is it?”

Even after coming to her senses, Nanami avoided Sorata’s gaze.

“Are you all right?”

“Y-Yeah… I’m fine.”

Something wasn’t right.

“T-That’s right, it’s time to wake Mashiro up!”

“Ah, yeah. You’re right.”

“Now, hurry hurry!”

In the end, when Nanami urged him on, Sorata wasn’t able to go into the bathroom and walked up the stairs to wake Mashiro up without washing off his humiliation.

The room placed at the centre of the second floor. Room 202 was Mashiro Shiina’s room.

Standing before the door, Sorata knocked on the door.

“… No answer.”

She must be fast asleep.

“I’m coming in.”

No response came from the room again, so Sorata opened the door. As usual, an astonishing amount of clothes and underwear were scattered across the floor. Making sure that he isn’t stepping on anything, Sorata made his way to the fascinating animal which was fast asleep under the desk and shook its shoulders.

“Shiina, wake up.”

“… I’ll let Sorata wake up.”

“I’ve been awake for 48 hours already!”

Mashiro showed her puffy unsatisfied face. She crawled out from the space under the desk.

“It’s morning. Hello.”

“…”

Mashiro silently looked at Sorata.

“W-What?”

When Mashiro looked at him like that, Sorata’s heart started to beat faster. After all, that did happen just a month ago… he was still thinking about what Mashiro said on the observation deck.

Although he wasn’t able to hear what she had said after due to the sound of the airplanes, nor did he ask her what she was going to say, he knew that Mashiro certainly was going to say 「- Love」…. And being fully aware of that made it difficult for him to control his emotions.

Since he was already busy enough with the culture festival preparation, he was able to distract himself from the issue but in situations like these, he couldn’t look at Mashiro’s face properly.

While still troubled, Mashiro touched Sorata’s cheek.

“It’s Misaki’s signature.”

“Huh? How did you know?”

Mashiro extended her hand towards a piece of coloured paper on the desk. On it, there was a small handprint, and the name 「Misaki Kamiigusa」 was written on it. It was truly like her to do so.

“What’s with that?”

“She gave it to me.”

“… I see.”

Well, let’s not ask for the reason. There probably wasn’t a significant reason for Misaki or Mashiro.

“Shiina, we have no time, so just hurry up and get changed.”

He passed the uniform set to Mashiro. In a dazed state, Mashiro started to undo the pyjama buttons in front of Sorata.

“I don’t mean get changed right now! … Not that you’ll listen to me anyway!”

Sorata tried to act nonchalant and fled the room while sighing. Closing the door behind him, he leaned on it.

“Haaa…. How should I say this, this is quite hard on many levels.”

A deep sigh escaped from him again.

Ignoring the immense pressure that he was feeling from his shoulders due to the lack of rest, he tried to summarise the things that he had to do that day.

Today was the fifth day of the culture festival. It was also a Sunday. The reason they chose that day to present Nyaboron was because there were going to be a lot of people since it was the weekend.

And the reason why they were only going to present it for a single day was because they haven’t received permission from the school to participate.

“Well, it can’t be helped…”

They had the chance to receive permission from their school. After all, Nanami did secure a proposal slot with the student council of both the high school and the university. However, due to some circumstances, they lost their only chance and Sorata wasn’t able to give his proposal presentation.

Afterwards, Sorata bowed his head and begged for another chance, but they wouldn’t listen to him.

“I guess I really shouldn’t have said 「Shut up! Keep your mouth shut!」 to the president of the school council…”

As he was thinking these thoughts, Mashiro’s room door opened from the inside.

“Oops.”

Sorata quickly distanced himself from the door and turned around.

When Mashiro, wearing her school uniform, walked out of the room, she was holding a piece of thin cloth in both of her hands for some reason.

“What’s with those?”

“They’re panties.”

“I can tell!”

“Which one do you prefer, Sorata?”

The one in her right hand was pure white with lacings on it which made it appear to be neat yet sexy. The one in her left was pink that gave off a cute feeling, yet the shape of it made it appear to be erotic.

He’d already seen countless of Mashiro’s panties over the last few months, but Sorata had never seen those two before.

“So, what are the panties meant to be?”

“Battle panties.”

The atmosphere froze.

“…”

“…”

“What?”

“They’re battle panties, Sorata.”

It seemed like he wasn’t hearing things.

“Why are you showing your battle panties to me today!”

“Today is an important day.”

“What are you going to trying to do?!”

“…”

Mashiro glanced towards Sorata.

“D-Don’t tell me….”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“Y-You’re going to confess or something?”

Sorata blushed at his own words and looked away from Mashiro. The scene at the airport a month ago replayed itself in his head just like how it was in his dream.

“Today’s the Nyaboron presentation day.”

However, Mashiro’s words were against his expectations.

“Huh? ... So, what was important was that?”

“Nyaboron is important.”

“Well, yeah, that’s true.”

“So, battle panties.”

“I get that we need to raise our spirits up for the presentation, but don’t speak so ambiguously! And you’re misunderstanding what battle panties are!”

“Panties that are worn on important days. That’s what battle panties are.”

“That’s enough…. So, where did you get those panties?”

They seemed to be brand new. It didn’t appear to be worn by anyone before.

“Rita gave them to me.”

Mashiro turned her head and looked at a small parcel in her room. Now that Sorata thought about it, a parcel came yesterday from Rita- Mashiro’s roommate back in England who stayed at Sakurasou about a month ago. The contents of the parcel must’ve been the battle panties.

To think that she would send something like that.

“Rita taught me.”

“… About the battle panties?”

“Yes, she told me to wear it on important days.”

“… I see.”

Although he didn’t know what exactly Rita was hoping for, but Mashiro probably wouldn’t be able to figure out the true purpose of battle panties with her level of understanding.

“Sorata, which do you prefer?”

Mashiro appeared to be indifferent as she shoved the two panties into Sorata’s face.

“But aren’t you already wearing panties though?”

“I’m not.”

“Why not?! You should’ve worn panties yesterday after showering! Did they disappear while you were sleeping? What kind of mystery is that!”

“They were taken off by my pyjamas.”

“You mean you took them off!”

“You could say that.”

“That’s the only way to say it!”

“So, which one?”

“H-How should I choose your battle panties! And why are you asking me to choose!”

“Because Sorata always chooses them for me.”

“You’re making me sound like a pervert!”

“I’ll wear the one that Sorata prefers.”

“What does my preference have to do with it!”

“It’s important.”

“Then will you show them to me when you put it on?”

“What will you do when you see it?”

“I’m going to get hyped up!”

“Sorata’s already hyped up.”

“Whose fault do you think this is, hah!”

“Someone who’s not me.”

“No, it’s your fault!”

As if she couldn’t understand what Sorata was saying, Mashiro tilted her head to a side.

“Anyways, just choose one yourself.”

Mashiro looked at the panties on the right for a while and turned her head to look at the other one in her left hand. Sorata expected her to choose one, but she simple threw both of them back into her room.

“I can’t be bothered, so it’s OK.”

“I thought you might do that! Pink! Just wear the pink one!”

Sorata walked into Mashiro’s room, picked up the pink one off the floor and handed it to Mashiro. He thought to himself ‘Is it really OK for a guy to give battle panties to a girl?’….

“If you liked the pink one, you should’ve said so from the start.”

“S-Shush!”

“Sorata, your face is red. Do you have a cold?”

As soon as she finished talking, she quickly touched Sorata’s forehead with her own.

At the sudden close contact, Sorata backed off hurriedly.

“Sorata, you’re hot.”

“It’s your fault!”

“Why?”

“Because, I-I’m! I’m a guy! And you’re a girl! S-Shiina, you’re too defenceless! What kinds of thoughts do you think will go through my head if you do something like that!”

He said more that what was necessary out of the excitement.

“What kinds?”

Mashiro asked blankly.

“Y-You don’t need to know!”

“Sorata, you’re weird.”

“… It’s understandable that anyone would go weird in a situation like this.”

Sorata whispered that to himself.

“Sorata is….”

“W-What?”

With his back turned on her, Sorata replied bluntly.

“Sorata is a guy.”

“…”

“I’m a girl?”

“I-Isn’t that obvious?”

“… Yeah.”

In the end, Sorata couldn’t see what expression Mashiro was wearing as she said that.

“Mashiro! We need to go to school!”

They heard Nanami’s voice from downstairs.

“Let’s go.”

“Y-Yeah.”

Part 2

After seeing Mashiro and Nanami off, Sorata head into the bathroom to wake himself up. He was able to wash off Misaki’s handprint easily with some water, but his tiredness wasn’t so easy to wash off.

When he was feeling slightly better, he returned to his room which was being used as the debugging room.

Sitting down next to Jin, Sorata watched the screen as the drama part was being created at great speed. The images were being stringed together to form flash animation and with the addition of slide movements, BGM and theme music, it was starting to have the real anime-like effects.

“Hey Sorata.”

“Yes?”

“Today’s the fifth day of the culture festival.”

“I guess so.”

“We couldn’t participate a single day of it.”

“I guess so.”

“Hey, did you know that there was a beauty contest yesterday? And this year, it was held at the pool and the outfits were obviously swimsuits.”

“I heard that a popular idol band done a live show at the gym on the opening day.”

“The acting club from the university apparently held some girlfriend lending café thing. They pretend to be your girlfriend when you walk in. Asami invited me to go and have a look.”

“The food venders from the shopping district were great as well from what I’ve heard. The Hashimoto Bakery showoffed their newest 「The Greatest Melon Bread」 as well.”

“I want to go around the festival while eating. Yakisoba, okonomiyaki, takoyaki and oden…. Apparently they have represented dishes from the individual districts.”

“A~~ah, I really wanted to go to the special seminar yesterday. I could’ve listened to the game creator Kazuki Fujisawa who’s an alumni of Suimei University of the Arts. …. The culture festival must’ve been really fun as well this year….”

“… Haa, too bad we don’t have anything to do with it.”

“That’s right. We need to finish Nyaboron…. But let’s stop talking about this, Jin-senpai. I’m about to cry!”

“OK, we’ll refrain ourselves from talking about the culture festival.”

Sorata and Jin continued to work on debugging the drama parts while talking about other things. They didn’t take their eyes off the screen even for a moment.

“So, did something happen between you and Mashiro?”

At the unexpected question, Sorata coughed like crazy. He had to regain his breath.

“Something’s not right between you two.”

“Shiina is always like that.”

“I’m talking about you.”

“R-Really?”

“Hm~mm, something’s not right.”

“Not right?”

“Uh huh.”

Even Ryuunosuke, who had been typing away at the keyboard wordlessly until now, piped in.

“To be precise, it feels like you’re desperately trying to hide your feelings about Mashiro.”

Jin was spot-on.

“If you can tell, then just leave me alone!”

“Can’t do that.”

“Why!”

“Don’t you think its fun to tease someone who’s worrying about these trivial matters?”

“Whoa~! Don’t analyse it like that!”

“And whenever I look at you, I really feel like doing something. So that’s why I’m calming that urge down by doing these things to you, got it?”

“T-Then don’t you feel shy around Misaki-senpai at all?”

“Being all shy whenever I looked at her face was a long time ago. There was even a period of time when I didn’t even talk to her. Must’ve been in my first year in middle school. I didn’t talk to her for nearly half a year, or at least, I didn’t try to talk to her first.”

Sorata expected Jin to avoid the question, but Jin answered more than he thought.

“And when I finally matured, Misaki was always by my side and the people around us noticed that. Since then, I just didn’t want to think of Misaki as a woman, sort of.”

“What does it feel like to be a childhood friend of hers?”

“I guess it’s a status that’s too distant because it’s too close…”

“That seems to be exaggerated.”

“It’s quite appropriate.”

Jin quietly laughed as if he was trying to hide his real thoughts.

“How should I know what I mean to Misaki. We’ve been together for this long. Misaki exists even in my longest memories. Even when I look at photo albums, no matter which page I turn to, there are always pictures of me and Misaki together… that’s who she is to me.”

“But she’s different to your family though.”

Jin did think of Misaki as someone of an opposite gender. The same could be said about Misaki as well.

“That’s why it’s so complicated.”

“We’re chatting a lot today.”

“Only because I think I might fall asleep if we don’t. Can I sleep?”

To wake himself up, Jin stood up and stretched his body.

“Of course you can’t. What are you saying.”

However, as soon as Sorata said that, Jin’s eyelids closed. After a second, Jin’s rhythmic breathing could be heard.

“Senpai, don’t sleep on your feet!”

Jin opened his eyes straight away.

“Hmm? Ah, sorry. Then I’ll take your offer and lay down to sleep.”

“What a positive way of thinking! But you can’t! If you lay on the bed, then you won’t be able to return!”

Jin showed no signs of listening and he lay down on the bed.

“I’ll leave the rest to you, Sorata.”

“No! We’re just getting started!”

“Not to worry, the fun part of the culture festival is the preparation, so I’ve already enjoyed the festival to the fullest. And Sorata, you were the one who told me not to sleep on my feet.”

“But I didn’t mean that you can sleep while laying down!”

“Hey, hey. Don’t be rude to your senior.”

“I’m at my limits since I’m tired as well. But we have no time.”

“Why don’t you use the same mentality to take down Mashiro?”

“I’ll say the same to you, senpai.”

“You’re letting me take down Mashiro?”

“I’m talking about Misaki-senpai!”

“How long do you plan to waste time with your girl talks.”

Ryuunosuke cut in again.

“But it’s the most important topic to us.”

With a cry, Jin lifted himself up.

“What about you, Ryuunosuke. How’s it going with Rita?”

“Please listen to me, senpai.”

“Hey, Sorata, I’m talking to Ryuunosuke now.”

“Akasaka made the Maid to reply to every single email that Rita sends. So the complaints end up with me!”

Rita’s emails were extremely formal, but when reading between the lines, the sentences emitted poisonous aurora. Sorata could imagine Rita typing heavily on the keyboards as she wrote the emails with a smile on her face…

“Tell her to be grateful that I’m not blacklisting her.”

“Why don’t you?”

“So that it doesn’t affect us with our productions. I’m being generous to her.”

As promised, Rita helped to develop the Nyaboron game. The illustrations for the drama parts that Sorata and Jin were looking over just now where drawn by Rita.

“Yeah, that’s very like you.”

“Hey, don’t you have anyone that you like, Ryuunosuke?”

“I don’t.”

“Then why don’t you just date Rita? It’s rare to meet a beauty like her. Her boobs are big as well.”

Sorata could agree with those points.

“I have no interest. I don’t like women.”

“I’ve wondered for a while, but do you have a reason to hate them, Akasaka?”

It probably wasn’t because he was vulnerable to women, and it was strange to hate women without a reason- enough to faint when one touches him at least.

“It’s got nothing to do with you, Kanda.”

“Is that so.”

“Then don’t you ever wish for a girlfriend?”

“I don’t.”

“Amazing. Sorata, you always wish for one, don’t you?”

“Well, as a healthy, male high school student, I do.”

“See, that’s what it means to be a normal male. Don’t you have any sexual urges, Ryuunosuke?”

“I can suppress it by eating tomatoes.”

“Tomatoes can’t do that much!”

“Enough of the chit-chat. It’s done.”

“What’s done….”

“Kanda, this is the last test play.”

“Okay, leave it to me!”

Part 3

The clock hands pointed to twelve o’clock.

The TV in Sorata’s room displayed the word 「The End」 at the same time. It was the last scene of the ending roll.

“Kanda, was that enough?”

Looking stressed out due to the lack of sleep, Ryuunosuke asked him. Jin glanced at Sorata as well.

“Ahh, I think it’s enough. It’s finally complete….”

At that moment,

“Humph~, it’s really done. Ah~ so tired~.”

Jin yawned and stretched at the same time and lay down on the bed.

“Whew… that took a while.”

Ryuunosuke sighed out of relief and achievement.

As Sorata basked himself in the freedom, he heard a sudden braking noise of a car. It was pretty close. It was probably right in front of Sakurasou.

“Misaki must’ve come to pick us up.”

Bitterly smiling, Jin said ‘there’s not a moment to rest huh’.

Ryuunosuke already started to sleep in his chair.

“Wake up, Akasaka! We’re going straight to school.”

It was slightly over midday.

They were planning on using the theatre room, which was a shared facility with the university, and the only available spot was from half past 1- for exactly an hour.

The film club had the theatre booked before then, and the film studies club afterwards.

If they followed the correct steps to receive permission to participate in the festival, they could’ve booked the spot for sure, but unfortunately, the Sakurasou members were not allowed.

So they had to use that period to take over the theatre room, set up the equipments, and present it guerrilla-style all within the hour.

They had to rush to the rendezvous even a second earlier.

Everyone at Sakurasou should’ve understood that, but Ryuunosuke refused to get up from the chair.

“… Forget about me. I’ll leave the rest to you, Kanda. You remember how to set up and operate the hardware right? Then there’s no problem. You can do it, Kanda.”

Since he used the hardware every single day since it arrived, Sorata knew how to use it perfectly well. However, he couldn’t leave Ryuunosuke behind. Sorata felt that they had to do this together when they’ve come this far.

Sorata plugged out numerous cables from the hardware after turning it off and placed them in Ryuunosuke’s hands.

“You’re coming with us.”

“First and foremost, what I need to do is to sleep. It’s not ideal to kill off any more of my brain cells.”

“Stop whining, and let’s go!”

Holding Ryuunosuke by his arm, Sorata dragged him out of the room.

“Let me go, Kanda. The culture festival is a dangerous place that’s infested with women. Are you planning to kill me?”

“Don’t worry, I’ll protect you.”

“That sounds like something that everyone would like to say at least once in their lives, but say that to a woman.”

Saying his honest thoughts, Jin cut in while lifting the small fridge sized hardware onto a trolley and proceeded to carry it out of the room.

“Hurry~!!”

Oh no, they could hear her voice.

“Get changed and meet up at the doorway.”

Jin went inside his own room.

“Understood. Akasaka, you should hurry up as well! I’ll strip you!”

Sorata threatened Ryuunosuke and started to pull at his T-shirt.

“S-Stop, I’ll do it myself.”

Blushing slightly, Ryuunosuke fled to his own room.

Sorata quickly took off his pants. As he changed into his school uniform, he checked to see if he left anything behind. The hardware, cables and the laptop were all packed up. All that remained was for the three of them to get ready.

Misaki beeped the horns to rush them.

“If you don’t come out now, I’ll go back to school!”

“We’re coming!”

As Sorata yelled and ran into the hallway, Jin and Ryuunosuke did the same. It didn’t take long for males to get changed.

“Then let’s go.”

“Yeah!”

Putting on his shoes, Sorata pushed the trolley and took the lead. Ryuunosuke followed behind him with an unsatisfied expression. Lastly, Jin walked out and locked the door behind him.

Misaki’s voice could be heard from the white mini-van in front of Sakurasou.

“Put the stuff in the back!”

Sorata folded the third row of seats and lifted the game hardware into the space with Ryuunosuke’s help. Throwing the trolley on top of it, Sorata and Ryuunosuke sat on the second row.

Jin followed behind and sat in the front passenger seat. As soon as he closed the door with a slam, Jin let out a strangled yell.

“What’s with your outfit…”

The vehicle started to race towards the school.

And Misaki, who was behind the wheels, was certainly wearing a ridiculous outfit.

“Isn’t it nice? I’m a rabbit woman!”

She was wearing a leotard that accentuated her figure, black tights and a pair of sexy high-heels. The outfit was complete with makeshift ears made out of a headband.

This was clearly a bunny girl, not a rabbit woman. “Really now….”

Exhausted, Jin took off his jacket and threw it around Misaki’s shoulders.

Their sights had now been cleansed.

“Senpai… what’s with the bunny girl?”

Since Jin sat at the front, Jin didn’t have anywhere else to avoid his gaze. The legs that were stepping on the accelerator were dangerous. If Jin lost his concentration, he would be sucked into the valleys of breasts.

“Every member of the Arts department are doing a forest themed exhibition! I’m one of the guides today.”

“That’s quite a provocative forest guide…”

“I… sometimes think that you’re too willing to help.”

“Who cares, it’s cute.”

Misaki didn’t seem to notice Jin’s worries.

“That’s the problem….”

Jin sighed.

“What should I do, Kohai-kun, Jin said that I’m cute.”

“Isn’t that nice.”

“Ughhh!”

Sorata decided to tell Jin this afterwards: ‘It looks like your worries will continue’. Not that it’ll cheer Jin up in any ways….

“That’s right. Mashiron’s acting as the guide on the last day, so make sure to check it out Kohai-kun.”

“What? Shiina will? Wait… s-she’s going to wear that?!”

“Mashiro’s costume will be a cat woman.”

“That sounds somewhat fiendish, but I’m probably wrong right? You’re talking like a bunny version of a cat right? Something like a kitty girl? Although, I’m not sure if the term actually exists.”

“Get excited Kohai-kun! I saw Mashiron’s costume at the dress fittings and she is uber cute! I got a runny nose from it!”

Shouldn’t one normally get a bloody nose from something like that? That aside, did that mean that Mashiro was going to wear something that was on the same level as Misaki’s outfit? If it’s Mashiro, she would wear it without a care in the world. And she already wore it once at the dress fittings….

If that was the case, Sorata wanted to see it. However, Sorata didn’t want anyone else to see something like that. He should warn Mashiro next time. But if she was enjoying it, she could say

“Sorata, you’re annoying.”

No, maybe it didn’t matter if she said that to him. It would be better than other people seeing her in that outfit.

As Sorata was racking his already tired brain with these thoughts, Ryuunosuke came closer next to him. Ryuunosuke was breathing regularly with his eyes closed…

“I forgot I was sleepy. I want to sleep for a while, so please wake me up when we get there.”

When Sorata yawned defencelessly, the van suddenly came to a halt at the red lights.

Both Sorata and Ryuunosuke banged their heads against the back of the seats in front of them.

“Drive safely! At this rate, I’ll fall into an eternal sleep!”

Ryuunosuke said ‘What is it, who’s attacking us’ as he groggily opened his eyes.

“It’s your fault for being sleepy Kohai-kun! Now then, drink this! Jin and Dragon as well!”

What Misaki handed to Sorata, Jin and Ryuunosuke were small bottles that were easy to grip in the hand. The label said 「Full of nutrients! The last bottle you’ll ever need to get you over even death itself」 on it.

“What’s this?”

When the lights turned green, the van started to race again.

“It’s a potion to recover your HP.”

“No, but it says that it’ll get you over even death itself? That sounds like a cheap catchphrase!”

Sorata looked to see what was inside the bottle, but he noticed the price first.

It was 2500 yen.

“Expensive! What on earth are these?! Huh? Really?!”

“They’re my treat, so just drink it without complaining.”

“I don’t want to die yet, and if you’re treating us, then treat us to something better like beef!”

“Just drink it for now.”

Looking straight ahead, Jin drank it down in one gulp.

“W-Will it be OK?”

“The last time I had it, my body felt so light like I have wings on my back for the first three hours.”

Why did Jin’s smile seem to be so bitter?

“…. What happens after those three hours?”

“You’ll fall asleep like you’re dead!”

Misaki’s bright smile could be seen on the mirror’s reflection.

“We can wake up after we drink that right?!”

Well, if Jin drank it before and he’s still alive, it should be fine.

Ryuunosuke nonchalantly drank the drink next to Sorata.

“Then should I try to go beyond death itself…?”

Twisting the cap open, the sweet smell of the contents ticked Sorata’s nose. He brought the bottle to his lips. The sweetness grew stronger. Closing his eyes, he drank it down and it reminded him of the taste of cold syrups that he used to take when he was young. It didn’t taste bad.

“How is it, Kohai-kun. Getting some strength?”

“I doubt it’ll work straight awa…”

No, what? It may just be his feelings, but he thought his body became hotter.

“I’m full of strength for some reason!”

“That’s the way, Kohai-kun!”

“I feel like I can respond to every one of your nonsensical remarks! I can do it!”

“What’s terrifying about Misaki is that she can stay in this mode without taking one of these.”

As expected of the alien. Their foundation itself was so different. So was she really a step ahead of them at all times…. No wonder no one can play along to her rhythm… Sorata could finally accept it.

While they were talking like that, their conversation suddenly stopped. Regathering his thoughts, Sorata noticed a change in his lower body. He was shivering. The empty bottle in his hand also shook as well.

He must’ve been nervous.

That was to be expected. For Sorata, 「Galactic Cat Nyaboron」 was his first notable work. And he was going to present it to the people today.

“Will people come to watch it?”

They couldn’t advertise it out in the open because they had to avoid the festival organisers and the student council.

“Don’t fret, Kohai-kun! The Hashimoto Bakery owner told me that the shopping district was all excited for it when I went shopping yesterday. Also, I advertised it in a sneaky fashion, so don’t worry about that!”

“We need to worry about all the people that we won’t be able to fit inside the theatre.”

Ryuunosuke sounded quite frank.

“Akasaka…. What kind of a situation are you imagining?”

“A situation where we have to pack people inside like little seedlings.”

He had an expression that said ‘what else would there be’.

“You’re really amazing.”

“Consider our loyal development efforts. That’s only to be expected. It’ll be a full house for sure.”

“No, well yeah, but….”

“If you’re that worried, then should I spur something up?”

Taking out his smartphone, Ryuunosuke tapped it around with his skilful actions.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m going to leak information via the festival organiser’s SNS account. Don’t worry, I’ve made it so that the members won’t be able to prevent it.”

“What I’m worried about is you knowing the password for their account.”

“They had the worst security. It only took 5 minutes for Maid-chan to hack in.”

So the automatic response AI can now hack. How much further was she going to grow? Sorata was concerned that the AI might continue to grow and take over the world some day.

“I might as well plan out the seating arrangements then.”

Thanks to the immediate effects of the energy drink, Jin and Ryuunosuke were very energetic.

“Am I the only one who’s worried?”

Since Sorata was the only one of the three who has never showcased his own work before, that was to be expected.

“Ehh~ what’s wrong~? Kohai-kun, did you think that it was a boring game?”

“No, that’s not it.”

If he did, he wouldn’t have gone through all the trouble of getting the balance just right this morning.

He had a sense of self satisfaction to it.

“It’s not that I’m not confident about it… but there’s no guarantee that everyone who sees the work will enjoy it.”

“Well, that’s true.”

Jin agreed with him for the first time.

“I do think that the plot is great and the quality of the animation is superb. The same can be said about the battle sequence, but….”

“I also have those thoughts as well. But isn’t that what’s so fun about it? Isn’t it exiting? We can present the work that we’ve all been working on for the last two moths like ta-da! And people will see it. If you can’t say that this is fun, then what is?”

Right, so these shivers that Sorata has been feeling so far were exactly that…. It wasn’t just nervousness or worries. He was feeling excited as well.

“That’s right, Kohai-kun! We should enjoy it from here on!”

The car entered through the back of the school… originally the exits of the university, and headed towards the western gates.

The theatre room was just at west gates. The main entrance was full of people, so they didn’t have anywhere to park their van.

“Whoa, what’s with all these people…”

“I leaked out Kamiigusa-senpai’s name among the information before. It’s only to be expected.”

“As expected of her…. Is all I can say.”

“I guess so.”

Unlike Jin, who agreed to Sorata, the person in question didn’t show any reaction to it. Concentrating on driving, Misaki turned the van around and parked it in front of the gates that were off limits.

The four of them quickly hopped off the car. Ryuunosuke carried the game hardware on the trolley and went inside the trolley room via the back entrance.

Sorata was about to follow behind Ryuunosuke, but his feets stopped at the sight of all the people waiting around the main entrance. The crowd noticed Sorata’s group at the back and they started to rush towards them.

“Jin-senpai, what should we do?”

“What do you mean… ah, found our helper.”

“Huh? Helper?”

Jin was looking over the people and straight at someone who was trying to control the crowd.

“That’s the school council president.”

The president must’ve noticed Jin’s gaze, because he turned around and looked towards Sorata and Jin.

“Mitaka! We didn’t permit Sakurasou members to participate in the culture festival! Stop it at once! I know you’re listening as well, Sorata Kanda!”

“Ehh, why does he remember my name?! And my full name at that!”

“Well~ it’s only natural for him to remember your name if you said something like 「Shut up! Keep your mouth shut!」 to him.”

“I suppose… that’s what it means to be a human. So, what are you going to do with this situation?”

“Obviously, we’ll do this.”

As soon as the words left his mouth, Jin breathed in deeply and shouted this at the overflowing amount of people.

“Please follow the student council president’s instructions if you are unable to go inside the theatre room!”

“Ah! Mitaka!”

The president’s face turned bright red in an instant. At the same time, the crowd started to ask the president on what to do.

“I’ll leave it to you, president~.”

Jin waved at the president of the student council. However, he probably wasn’t able to see Jin anyways. Paying no attention to it, Jin walked inside the theatre room, and Sorata followed behind. As Sorata locked the doors, he apologised to their student council president in his heart.

“… Senpai, you’re the devil.”

“Hmm? What? Isn’t it the committee’s job to maintain order at the culture festival? I only entrusted his own job to him- he should be grateful.”

“I can see why the president looked at you that way now.”

“I’m not happy that I’m loved by a man.”

“He totally hates you!”

“Then no problem. Now then, let’s go.”

In the audio and visual monitoring room, Ryuunosuke was setting everything up by himself.

“Anything that we can do to help?”

“It’s all good.”

Ryuunosuke returned his trustworthy reply.

“I’ll check out the main doors.”

Without waiting for an answer, Jin quickly went towards the entrance.

Left behind, Sorata took deep breaths and headed towards the backstage next to the main screens. The closer that he got towards his goal, his breath became louder and louder. He could sense things that he hasn’t sensed before.

Holding back his excitement, Sorata approached the short stairs and stepped up forcefully.

However, he couldn’t quite see the seats yet. He needed to go up three more steps… two more… one more…

He slowly looked around the theatre room.

People.

People were there.

He could feel the presence of nearly 300 people there. The chatters could be heard all the way on stage. Sorata could feel their anticipation for the 「Galactic Cat Nyaboron」.

Thanks to the shopping district people making a way for the near-by primary school students, the front rows were filled with little customers and their eyes were lit up with excitement.

Some groups of students in Suimei High uniforms and university students came into Sorata’s view- some of them who he could recognise. There was a kindergartener who brought his father along.

The place was packed.

Sorata’s heart raced at the sight of the filled up seats.

But nothing has even started yet. So Sorata bit down on his lips to hold back his overflowing emotions.

“Sorata.”

Inhaling deeply, Sorata turned around to see Mashiro behind him.

“… There are a lot of people.”

“Yeah, it’s so full.”

“I’m so happy that I’m about to go mad.”

“Yeah.”

“But I’m glad that they were able to fill up every seat.”

There weren’t anyone in between the columns. That meant that every one of the 300 people was sitting down. Since it was going to be dangerous when people waves their hands and bodies around, the viewers were warned beforehand not to make exaggerated actions.

“Nanami helped out.”

“Where is she?”

Mashiro turned her head and looked towards Nanami, who was trying to get into a rhythmic breathing. Her nervousness could be felt all the way to Sorata. That was because Nanami had an important job to do today.

Since 「Galactic Cat Nyaboron」 had a unique game-play, Nanami was going to stand on stage and lead the crowd through the game in an enjoyable way like a singer.

Originally, Sorata or Misaki were planning to do it, but Nanami volunteered for it three days ago, since she felt guilty for not contributing enough to the Nyaboron project.

Sorata approached Nanami slowly.

“Aoyama.”

“Kanda.”

Nanami nodded her head. Her expression was frozen stiff.

“Even you get nervous?”

“Of course I do. I heard that even professionals get nervous during a live.”

“Then I guess it’s OK to be nervous.”

“Don’t say it like it’s not your problem.”

Nanami smiled as she said that.

“You seem to be cheerful today, Kanda.”

“Really?”

“Don’t tell me you’re feeling better because you stayed up all night or something.”

That phrase has already passed a long time ago. In fact, Sorata was about to die from the lack of sleep until some time ago.

“I’m surpassing my limits right now… my life will be over in two and a half hours though.”

“What are you saying?”

“Nothing, never mind.”

“You’re so weird.”

It seemed like Nanami was finally feeling slightly better. Her expression softened up.

“The hardware is all set up.”

Ryuunosuke came onto the backstage as he reported that.

“The place is good to go!”

Misaki approached them as well. Jin also came back after checking the entrance.

“How’re things outside?”

“The student council president has everything under control.”

“And his grudges grow stronger…”

“Well then, gather around everyone! Come together now, my magnificent comrades!”

“We’re already here.”

Sorata, Mashiro, Nanami, Misaki, Jin and Ryuunosuke hurdled in a circle.

Suddenly, Misaki extended her hand towards the circle.

Wordlessly, Jin placed his hand on top of Misaki’s. Nanami followed suit, and Sorata grabbed Mashiro’s hesitant hand along with his own. Lastly, Sorata forced Ryuunosuke’s unwilling hand on top.

“Now, we’ll hear a wonderful speech from Kohai-kun.”

“Ehh? Me?!”

“Well, Sorata is the director for now.”

Jin giggled.

“For now indeed….”

“We made the game according to Kanda directions. So if it flops, then it’s all Kanda’s fault.”

It was hard to tell how much of Ryuunosuke’s words were true.

“Wow~, don’t say those kinds of things now.”

“Whatever, just go Kanda.”

Nanami urged him on. Mashiro quietly waited for Sorata to speak.

With everyone’s gaze fixed on him, Sorata left behind his embarrassed feelings and put all of his thoughts into his words.

“Please enjoy it for the next 30 minutes!”

Sakurasou resident members’ reaction varied a lot.

Part 4

“Well then, here we go.”

At Nanami’s words, full of revolve, Sorata nodded strongly.

The lights in the theatre room turned off and the curtains onstage rose. As it did, the chatters in the crowd stopped as if it had been prepared before hand, and the crowd looked in anticipation.

Nanami stepped onto the stage, into the anticipation.

When she stood towards her designated spot towards the right hand side of the screen, the spotlight shone on her. Jin was controlling it from the monitor room.

Sorata and Mashiro were on standby next to the stage to keep an eye on the crowds’ reactions.

Nanami was explaining the game-play and some safety measures in a clear voice while acting out the actions with her body. The parts that the crowd were actually going to be part of were 「Stand」, 「Sit」, 「Raising Both Hands In The Air」 and 「Clap」. The rest was just shouting out the name of Nyaboron’s final attack, so it was fairly simple.

They decided on these simple actions because 300 people were a lot of people and it could be dangerous if people started to jump up and down while waving their hands, even if the seats were spaced out as much as a normal multi-complex theatre, or even more.

Sorata actually wanted to add in some more actions, but Ryuunosuke stressed the safety issue and said that they should be more considerate towards the players.

“What will you do if someone gets injured?”

“…That’s… you’re right. Yeah, injuries are no good.”

As a result of that, they ended up with their current movements after recognising that Ryuunosuke was right.

Nanami warned the crowd to be aware of the people around them as the final instruction.

“Now then, please enjoy 「Galactic Cat Nyaboron」.”

Nanami said in a cheerful voice and she bowed to the crowd.

The spotlight turned off and a low, deep sound that shook the ground started to play. On the screen, a visual of something large flying towards earth from outer-space was shown.

The visual was a static one, but thanks to the projectors and the small dust particles helped it to look like a video. The sound effects and the BGM helped it to come alive a lot.

The one who contributed the sounds was someone named Hauhau who was in charge of Misaki’s previous animation. Sorata has never met this person before, so he didn’t know what kind of person she was…

The falling object from space passed through the stratosphere and showed itself as it pierced the clouds of Tokyo sky. When the rows of tall skyscrapers came into view, one could see how big the falling object was. The height of it reached nearly 500 meters.

People looked up at the object from the ground. As soon as they saw what it was, their expression quickly turned into despair.

However, that was only for a moment as the object quickly done a turn in mid-air just before it landed and landed on its four legged attached by strong springs.

A sound effect similar to a volcano exploding surrounded the theatre. The ground screamed as it caved into the weight of the object and at the same time, the devastating shockwave flattened out the surrounding buildings into mountains of rubble.

The coastlines were being devoured by their own tidal waves and the floating dust clouds blocked out the sunlight. In the middle of the dust cloud, a cat shaped alien slowly raised its body up. Its front paw stepped on the Tokyo Tower and destroyed it, leaving no traces.

「What an unpleasant sight.」

One of the leaders of the Nyangolownians 「Ein the Cat-back」 let his presence be known.

A satellite camera zoomed on Ein. Tens of kilometres around him has turned into a wasteland.

The united force started to attack Ein with missiles.

Ein looked at the hundreds of missiles flying towards him and

「Nyaaaaaaaaaa!!」

He destroyed them all with a single cry.

What appeared next was a fleet of fighter jets. They fired numerous amounts of missiles, but they couldn’t inflict damage onto Ein’s gigantic figure. Ein’s fur were slightly burnt, but it recovered itself quite shortly afterwards.

When Ein cried again, the fighter jets were obliterated.

The giant cat monster had immense power and presence.

Mashiro’s drawings were impressive as expected. They could capture the viewer’s heart. As a proof of that, the viewers were captivated by 「Galactic Cat Nyaboron」. A primary school student in the front row forgot to eat his popcorn. Some university students in the middle rows had their eyes glued to the screen. People in the last rows were leaning forwards in their seats.

Their concentration was remarkable.

The scene changed to the introduction of the protagonist Nekoko. A town that was destroyed by Ein. Pillars of flame flew up here and there. It was like the world was coming to an end. Even the sky was dyed red. During a time like that, Nekoko held up her lifeless love of her life, Nekosuke.

「Nekosuke-san—!」

Nekoko’s shoulders, arms and lips shook as she repeated Nekosuke’s name over and over again. However, Nekosuke no longer said Nekoko’s name. He didn’t smile. He didn’t pat her head. He didn’t ask her why she was being like that. His eyes… didn’t open.

「Nekosuke-san!」

Nekoko’s spoke with her blocked nose. Nekoko’s voice has been acted out by Nanami. This scene had to be redone numerous times at Nanami’s request since she didn’t find it to be satisfactory.

Sorata remembered it being hard to talk to Nanami when she finished recording the final take because she was teary and she couldn’t talk.

In the rubble, Nekoko wiped her tears from her dirtied cheeks and stood up. And she stared at a far away mountain… that was the back of Ein. Nekoko clenched her shaking fist and droplets of blood flowed down as her nails dug into her hand.

Before Nekoko’s eyes, the last hope of humanity- the cat robot 「Nyaboron」 landed next to her.

「Fine. If you need my anger, then I’ll let you use it. But I swear to send every single one of those Nyangolownians to hell.」

As if Nyaboron was responding to Nekoko’s resolve, its eyes lit up.

And at the same time, the title logo 「Galactic Cat Nyaboron」 came up on the centre of the screen.

The opening sequence wasn’t long, but it was enough to capture the hearts of the crowd. Everyone gulped and waited for the next scene to start.

The explanations on how Nekoko and Nekosuke were loves and they were once married but Nekosuke divorced Nekoko- after his brother Nekochiki was killed by a Nyangolownian- to avenge him.

The game then explain about how the humanity had been preparing for the Nyangolownian attack by building the fighting robot Nyaboron.

Originally, Misaki already had enough plot of Nyaboron to create a 52 episode anime series. However, due to the lack of time, Jin summarised the story so that it can fit in a 30 minute show- up to the defeat of one of the 6 leaders: 「Ein the Cat-back」.

While Sorata was amazed at the reaction of the crowd, he felt Nanami looking at him from the stage.

The first battle scene was coming up.

The first battle was just fighting Ein’s subordinates. In a full game, it was the equivalent of a tutorial level.

The screen switched to a 3D scene. However, there was no inconsistency in the visuals when the scene changed. Using the newest technology to animate the scenes, Misaki and Ryuunosuke cooperated together to reduce the textures and smoothen out the images. They put in much effort so that the 3D images didn’t look different to Mashiro’s drawings.

The quality of it was so high; it was hard to tell if it was really 3D imagery when looking at a static shot. This was only possible because they delayed their deadline by a week, but their hard work paid off. This was the image quality that Misaki was aiming for.

Misaki was able to pull off something that was never been done before. Misaki’s skills and abilities were undoubtedly good, but the idea of even attempting something that she’s never done before was amazing. Over the last two months, Sorata realised that there were things in the world that cannot be overtaken by efforts alone.

It only made sense for Jin to be fired up when looking at Misaki. After all, he was the closest one to her.

The past two months has proved to be a valuable learning experience for Sorata.

On the screen, the fight between Nyaboron and Nyangolownians started.

In an empty field, a fight between Nyaboron and a Nyangolownian broke out. That meant that it was time to do a synced game play. Sorata wondered if the crowd would participate accordingly.

As Sorata gulped, the screen changed to display the words 「Get ready to Stand」.

“One, two, let’s go! Stand!”

As Nanami yelled towards the seats, 300 people stood up at the same time. Sorata quickly looked towards the Nyaboron on the screen. If the camera sensors recognised the crowd’s movement, then Nyaboron should’ve blasted off its opponent.

However, the screen showed no reaction. The crowd’s reaction was appropriate…. Sorata started to worry, thinking camera might be broken.

At that moment,

「Go and look around hell first!」

With Nekoko’s yell, Nyaboron sent the Nyangolownian flying with a brain buster. A text telling people to raise their hand shortly followed.

Again, the people followed Nanami’s actions and raised both of their hands up.

When they did, Nyaboron grabbed Nyangolownian’s tail and started to spin it around.

The next instruction was to clap while they had their hands up in the air. On the screen, it displayed a clapping timing metre. Slowly, the icon started to blink faster. The thundering clapping sounds from the theatre grew faster along with the icon.

Nyaboron started to increase its spinning speed along with the raising rhythm.

And when the people put their hands down at the signal, Nyaboron let go of the Nyangolownian and sent it flying.

Now, it was time for the finishing move.

On the screen, the name of the finishing move came up. Nyaboron was gathering it’s energy on the screen. The countdown for the finishing move started.

3…. 2…. 1….

「Meatball Beam!」

300 people yelled it out at the same time.

The atmosphere in the theatre shook, and Sorata could feel the pressure of the yells from the side of the stage.

Nyaboron held its front paws up and fired a jelly shaped beam. The Nyangolownian took the attack midair and exploded. It was gone without a trace.

Nyaboron defeated a Nyangolownian in an awesome manner.

Sorata was worried about how reactive the game was, but he thought that it should be fine if it was at this level. The action processing speed was quite good, so things didn’t slow down.

When Sorata looked towards the monitor room, his and Ryuunosuke’s eyes met. Those eyes had a confident expression. It seems like Ryuunosuke wasn’t worried about it at all.

When Nyaboron and Nekoko defeated the Nyangolownian, it was finally time to battle it off against 「Ein the Cat-back」.

Nyaboron measured 333 meters in height, but Ein was much taller. Like shown at the start, a cat punch from Ein was enough for Nyaboron to be flown off to a neighbouring prefecture.

The fate of humanity really did depend on this fight.

The primary school students in the front row cheered for Nyaboron.

「Do you remember how many people you have killed?」

Nekoko asked Ein in a voice shaking with anger.

「I’m tired. You know, my shoulders hurt because they’re always hunched like a cat’s. Ah~ so tired.」

Misaki provided Ein’s voice and it sounded all right. It was surprising how Misaki can be good at anything that she does.

「I wonder if I’ll feel better if I bash you up? Ah, why don’t I do that?」

Ein bashed up two of his near-by subordinates just because he was tired. At the cruel act, Nekoko finally snapped.

「You don’t have the right to be alive!」

「I don’t need you to understand me. Humans are tiny creatures that are worse than my poop, but they can entertain me. OK, that’s it, get angry and come at me. Entertain me out of my tiredness. Now!」

Nyaboron blocked Ein’s cat punch. However, a third of its body sank into the ground.

「Weak~, weak~ I’m telling you! You think you can take me on with something like that! Nyaaaaa!」

At Ein’s terrifying yell, Nyaboron flew backwards.

Some people from the crowd naturally said “Nyaboron!” as it got knocked back.

For some reason, even Sorata clenched his fist.

Although it wasn’t responding to the noises from the crowd, Nyaboron landed on its feet.

As soon as it did, the scene changed to a 3D battle one and the battle began.

This time, Nanami didn’t need to show the actions.

At the signal on the screen, everyone stood up.

Ein used cat punch. On the screen, the Hand Up sign came up. When the crowd raised their hands, Nyaboron quickly avoided the attack. Ein didn’t stop there and used its yell. This time, the crowd shouted 「Meatball Beam!」 and fired off the special attack.

「Is that all you’ve got! Entertain me!」

Becoming serious, Ein started to perform combos after combos onto Nyaboron. Cat punches flew to its left and right side and finally, a headbutt.

The cat punches were avoided thanks to the crowd movements, but the headbutt landed square on Nyaboron’s head.

With that attack, Nyaboron’s HP dropped to zero. This was a planned power balance. Sorata thought that it would be better if Nyaboron was to be defeated at least once.

On the screen, the instructions to revive Nyaboron came up- to clap and say the keyword. The BGM changed to something that was more befitting to the situation.

Like they were cheering for their favourite sports team, the crowd stood up and started to send their energy to Nyaboron.

Ein started to approach Nyaboron to land its final attack.

Nanami peeked at Sorata.

It was hard to tell if Nyaboron will revive on time.

If they lost now, then it would be a game over. Even if they continued, they had to beat Ein from the start. The Sakurasou members debated over this point, but Sorata felt that it would be pointless if it was a game that was a completely beatable game. So, he added the game over feature while trusting on his instinct.

He really did feel that a game that was easy wasn’t that fun, and that one can’t get the thrill of beating a hard game. Also, there wouldn’t be a point to their interactive feature of the game.

The theme that Sorata was aiming for was 「You can win even if you have failed once」.

They were at the crossroad now.

Sorata felt like that they wouldn’t be able to make it by his experience with the test game plays. The cheers were out of beat. The claps were loud, but they weren’t clapping to the right rhythm.

So the energy gauge was recovering slowly.

Ein was just in front of Nyaboron.

Grabbing Nyaboron’s head, it picked Nyaboron up easily. And it lifted its arm to deliver the final cat punch.

No, it’s too late. As soon as the thought went through Sorata’s head, the energy recovery sped up. The final key word of “Nyaboron!” came just in time.

The screen froze for a moment. Then, the thrilling music stopped and silence crept upon them.

But suddenly, Nyaboron’s eyes lit up with a sharp sound effect and a fast paced battle music started to play. It was impactful orchestra music recorded thanks to the university’s music club. Also, it was complete with vocals that belonged to a student who was training to become an opera singer. The music pumped up your blood even if you didn’t want to get excited.

Filled with the energy from the crowd, Nyaboron grabbed Ein’s head with its arms and sent a knee kick to Ein’s face.

Ein fell backwards while sporting a bloody nose. At a chance that would never appear again, the logo for the voice command appeared on the screen. The 300 people breathed deeply. And,

—Meatball Beam!

The beam hit Ein at zero distance.

「Nyaaaaaaaaaa!」

The painful yell echoed through the theatre. Misaki’s acting was superb.

Down on its fours, Ein glared at Nyaboron in fury. And after focusing on its target, it opened its mouth and shout out an energy beam.

Nyaboron got into its position and shot out a beam as well.

However, Ein’s beam was overpowering Nyaboron’s and was pushing Nyaboron back.

On the screen, the clapping command and the key phrase came up again.

The crowd united once more and cheered on for Nyaboron.

Nekoko answered their cheers strongly.

「Mendoryaaaaaaaaaa!」

The Meatball Beam became stronger and pushed Ein’s beam back.

Using the energy from the theatre room, Nyaboron overpowered Ein.

「How can this beeeeeeee! M-M-My bodyyyyyyyy!!」

And being swept up by the giant Meatball Beam, Ein was destroyed as it yelled and screamed.

Only Nyaboron remained in the chaos. The fast battle music faded out and a quiet sentimental one started to play.

Sunlight shone through the clouds and onto the messed up Nyaboron.

「Nekosuke-san, I avenged you.」

As Nekoko looked up at the sky and put on a bitter smile, the scene faded away and started to roll the credits.

Although the crowd didn’t need to clap any more, their claps and cheers continued.

Someone shouted for encore. Some shouted that they wanted a sequel.

Being overwhelmed by the positive feedback, Sorata could only stand there in a daze.

Everyone was happy. They were clapping. Sorata was really happy about that. He felt that they done really well. All that he felt in his heart was his gratefulness to the viewers.

The crowd’s clapping didn’t stop even when the credits finished rolling and 「The End」 came up.

“Sorata, we did it.”

Mashiro placed her hand on Sorata’s clenched fist.

“Yeah… we’re, awesome… I-I think I’m going to go crazy…”

“We did it Kanda!”

Nanami cheerfully ran down the stage.

“Yeah…. That was the best.”

Swept up by his emotions, Sorata high-fived Nanami.

But he couldn’t stay in that mood for long.

“Sorata, hurry up and pack up! The student council president brought the teachers!”

Jin’s voice could be heard from behind the screen.

Looking at the monitor room, Sorata saw that Ryuunosuke already finished packing things up.

Although he didn’t want to, Sorata grabbed Mashiro’s hand and started to run.

Nanami ran past him. Jin helped Ryuunosuke to move the game hardware and Misaki had already ran outside. The van engine starting up could be heard.

When all of the members boarded the van, they set off while ignoring the yells from the teachers and the student council president behind them.

“We’re the greatest in the universe!”

Swept up by Misaki’s enthusiasm, Sorata also yelled that they were the greatest in the universe.

Sorata can’t remember what happened afterwards.

But it felt like he dreamt the happiest dream that he’s ever had. That was all that he could remember. But that was enough.

7th of November

The following were recorded on the Sakurasou meeting log.

— I declare this here! From today onwards, you will mark this date as the Nyaboron Day. Kohai-kun, Mashiron, Nanamin, Dragon, Jin, Ritan and Hauhau, thank you! I achieved my dream thanks to you guys! I can’t sleep tonight! By- Misaki Kamiigusa

— Misaki-senpai, if you don’t sleep, you might really die! By- Sorata Kanda.

— So let’s hurry up and make Episode 2. By- Misaki Kamiigusa

— I don’t want to die by overworking at this age, so please let me rest. By- Sorata Kanda.

— Umm, since when did this meeting log become an exchange diary? By- Nanami Aoyama.

References

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