Tokyo: Oreimo

At the Electric Town Festival, Ayano took the initiative to bite Ryosuke's crepe, and on the first day of Winter COMI, Ayano pinched Ryosuke's waist with her hand.

These images flashed through Ayumi's mind one by one, eventually piecing together a guess that made her heart skip a beat.

Those interactions didn't seem like a pure sibling relationship at all.

Is she overthinking it?

Ayumi hid her gaze behind her wine glass.

"Speaking of which," Tian Zhongxue suddenly spoke, his tone filled with pure admiration, "Gao Cheng's younger sister often spends time in the manga club and is always with Gao Cheng. She likes older men from outside the school, could it be...?"

Ling Nai's shoulders stiffened almost imperceptibly.

Ayumi's hand, holding the wine glass, swayed slightly as well.

"Could it be Takashiro?"

Tian Zhongxue spoke in a tone as if he had discovered something incredible, but his face was full of smiles.

He was obviously joking.

"Little sister Gao Cheng, aren't you always clinging to Gao Cheng? Could it be that you actually have feelings for him...?"

Tian Zhongxue's words were like a pebble thrown into a calm pond, but the ripples they created were much bigger than anyone expected.

Ling Nai lowered her head, her chopsticks resting on the edge of the bowl. She didn't hold them properly and they rolled onto the table with a soft thud.

She didn't pick it up, nor did she look up. The redness at the base of her ears had spread from her earlobes to her neck, standing out conspicuously under the warm yellow lights of the barbecue restaurant.

What? This seemingly carefree 'idiot president' actually figured it out?

Ling Nai suddenly felt quite flustered and subconsciously glanced at her brother beside her, noticing a look of surprise on his face as well.

There was silence on the table for about three seconds.

"Huh?"

Shota Okubo stared with his mouth agape, his gaze bouncing back and forth between Ryouno and Ryosuke.

"Wait, what did you just say, President?"

"I was wondering if it was..."

"President."

Ayumi's voice landed on the table, neither too loud nor too soft, cutting off Tian Zhongxue's words.

Her tone was calm, but her fingers, holding the beer glass, tapped lightly on the rim of the glass.

"There's a limit to jokes. Besides, isn't what you're saying impolite to Gao Cheng?"

"Huh? I was just joking..."

"This kind of joke is not funny to girls at all."

Ayumi placed her beer glass on the table, the bottom of the glass making a crisp sound against the surface. "Besides, they just said they didn't want to talk about this topic, and you still kept asking, Chairman. That's very rude."

Tian Zhongxue was stunned for a moment, then realized that he might have asked too much. He quickly put his hands together and bowed his head to Ling Nai and Liang Jie.

"I'm so sorry! I didn't mean that! Absolutely not!"

"It was just a joke. I couldn't help teasing you and your sister because you two are such good friends."

Misaki Asakura quickly chimed in to smooth things over, "Yeah, yeah, the president just doesn't know how to read the room. Don't take it to heart, Takashiro-chan."

“That’s right.” Shota Okubo chuckled dryly, reaching for a slightly charred beef tongue on the grill. “The chairman can’t control his mouth once he’s had a drink.”

"I only had one drink!"

"One cup is already like this, what would happen if you drank three cups?"

Yosuke Kobayashi pushed up his glasses, his tone indifferent, but the curve of his lips indicated that he was also trying to ease the atmosphere.

The subtle tension on the table gradually eased as the group chatted and joked, and the conversation returned to the winter COMI, club recruitment, and plans for next summer's COMI.

Okubo asked Kobayashi if he wanted to write something next year, and Kobayashi replied that he was not good at drawing but could help with copywriting. Asakura said he could help design new promotional cards, and Tanaka immediately took out his phone and started recording "Next Summer COMI Operation Plan".

The atmosphere returned to the lively hustle and bustle that a barbecue restaurant should have.

Ayumi picked up her beer glass and, through the thin glass, glanced lightly at the Takashiro siblings.

Ling Nai had already picked up her chopsticks again, but she was eating very slowly.

Ryosuke's expression remained unchanged throughout, and he even put two slices of freshly grilled pork belly on Ling Nai's plate. Ling Nai neither refused nor said anything, but silently put the meat into her mouth.

Ayumi looked away and lowered her eyes.

She wasn't sure how much of her guess was true; all she knew was that when Tian Zhongxue said those words, Ling Nai's reaction was definitely not that of a younger sister.

It's the kind of panic you feel when someone tells you your deepest secret and you can't refute it.

Ayumi finished her beer and gently exhaled.

Forget it.

Even if things were as she thought, it wasn't something she should interfere with.

All she could do was steer the conversation away from Tianzhong Middle School before it made another mistake.

Chapter 258 Official Recommendation (Combined Chapter)

At 10 p.m., Takashiro Ryou took a shower to wash away the grease and grime from the barbecue restaurant. She collapsed onto her bed and buried her head in the blankets.

"What?! That guy didn't react at all...!"

The blonde girl looked somewhat disappointed.

Feeling suffocated under the covers, she turned over and stared at the ceiling.

The curtains weren't fully drawn, and the streetlights from outside leaked in through the gaps, casting a thin streak of light on the ceiling.

I'm genuinely happy.

When Tian Zhongxue said, "Could it be Gao Cheng?" her heart almost jumped out of her throat.

Although Ayumi quickly smoothed things over, Ryosuke didn't defend himself at all, didn't say "How could that be?" or "Don't joke like that," and didn't even frown.

He didn't say anything.

This made Ling Nai feel as if there was indeed something between her and Ryosuke that didn't need to be explained.

But the disappointment is real.

And that's precisely because he didn't say anything.

He didn't glance at her again, didn't mention it on the tram home, and even after getting home, his last words were, "Go to sleep early, we're going to DongCOMI tomorrow."

It's as if everything happening in the barbecue restaurant is just someone else's excitement, and has nothing to do with him.

Ling Nai pulled the blanket up to her chin and stared blankly at the light streaks on the ceiling.

She was actually used to this kind of thing a long time ago.

That guy has always been like this. No matter how she hints, how she gets close, or how she sneaks into his room in the dead of night, he can always defuse everything with an almost cruel calmness.

He was like that when he tutored her, when he helped her organize her manuscripts, when she bit his shoulder, and when she fell asleep leaning against him.

Always gentle, always composed, and never overstepping boundaries.

But Ling Nai is not a fool.

The last time she slept in his arms, she could feel that his heartbeat was not steady. And even earlier, when she called him "brother" in a half-awake state, his arms tightened noticeably for a moment.

He was not indifferent.

He simply chose to do nothing.

This realization made Ling Nai both relieved and irritated.

What reassured her was that he didn't push her away or use phrases like "we're like siblings" to distance himself from her. What annoyed her was that he didn't close the distance either; he just stood there, leaving her wondering what he was thinking.

"Fool."

She muttered a curse under her breath at the ceiling, then threw back the covers and sat up.

The hallway was quiet. The lights in his parents' room had long been off, and Ryosuke's door was closed, with no light coming through the crack, so he was probably already asleep.

Ling Nai hesitated for a moment at the door, then gently turned the doorknob.

As with many previous nights, Ryosuke lay on his side in bed, breathing evenly. The streetlights outside shone through the gaps in the curtains onto the edge of the bed, barely revealing the outline of his profile.

Ling tiptoed to the other side of the bed, lifted a corner of the blanket, and moved so quietly that she made almost no sound.

She huddled under the covers, about a fist's distance from Ryosuke. The covers were warm and smelled of lingering soap from the shower gel, mixed with Ryosuke's unique scent.

Her heart was racing, but her body involuntarily relaxed.

As before, being near him would gradually calm her restlessness and unease, but tonight was different. The words Tian Zhongxue had spoken at the barbecue restaurant still lingered in her heart, making her feel compelled to speak them out.

"Do you know how outrageous you are?"

Ling Nai's voice was very low, so low that almost only her lips were moving.

"They've already said all that on the table, and you haven't even reacted at all."

Ryosuke's breathing remained steady. Ling stared at his profile. In the dim light, she couldn't see his face clearly, but she could vaguely make out the lines of his nose and the shape of his lips.

"You must have felt relieved when Ayumi-senpai helped me out, right?"

As she spoke, a hint of grievance crept into her voice.

"I don't need you to say anything in front of everyone. You just need to... just glance at me. Even if you just smile, I'll feel that at least you care."

Ryosuke didn't wake up. Ling Nai stared at him for a while, then sighed softly.

"But would you laugh? In that situation, you would probably just say 'Stop messing around' or 'Eat your food,' always in that serious tone, as if nothing has anything to do with you."

She pulled the blanket up a little and buried her chin in the edge of the blanket.

"Are you really not bothered? If I have someone I like, wouldn't you care at all?"

Her voice almost seemed to dissolve into the air.

"Or do you just think of me as your younger sister, so you don't need to care?"

She remained silent for a while, then spoke again, her voice even softer than before.