kscans

Chapter 61 - Moving In Together

After returning home, I changed from Eleanor-san back to Okita-kun and went out shopping. Since it was my last day in this apartment, I bought a ton of snacks for no reason and started drinking alone in the evening.

"Ah, drinking alone like this reminds me of that time..."

Back when I was drinking my sorrows away after being fired from my company. The anxiety about the future, the frustration of being fired, my own incompetence... that was probably the worst time of my life.

But then I saw a commercial recruiting adventurers late at night, and my life changed. I reunited with Kaede-chan, and I obtained the ridiculously overpowered skill, Alchemy.

Now, here I am with close to two billion yen, and starting tomorrow, I'll be living with my cute junior. I'm drinking alone in the same situation as back then, but my feelings are like Heaven and Earth.

I'm drinking while looking at my phone. Messages from Kaede-chan keep coming in.

'The living room is so big.'

'I'll put some flowers in your room, Senpai!'

'Look, look! My room is done!'

Kaede-chan is giving me a running commentary with pictures. I'm starting to think we might as well just call.

But the picture of the flowers she sent was beautiful, and Kaede-chan's room was adorable.

'The bath is so clean! It feels great!'

It seems Kaede-chan took a bath. But there's no picture this time.

'Did you forget to attach the picture?'

Kaede-chan is so clumsy.

'I can tell you're drunk, Senpai.'

Along with that message, a picture of a yellow chick was sent.

I thought, what am I, a child?, but it was cute, so I'll let it slide.

'I'll be there before noon tomorrow.'

'I'll make soba!'

Apparently, Kaede-chan is going to make soba for me.

'Looking forward to it!'

'You can count on me for noodle dishes!'

Well, you just have to boil them. I get it, I get it.

Deciding I could explain the Nanapon kidnapping incident tomorrow, I continued drinking while exchanging trivial messages with Kaede-chan.

Naturally, the alcohol tasted many times more delicious than the drinks I had on the day I was fired.

◆◇◆

The next morning, after storing all my belongings in my Item Bag, the landlord and a person from the management company came to inspect the condition of the apartment. After the move-out inspection was complete, I gave the landlord a box of snacks, told him how much I appreciated his help, and left the house. Then, I pressed the doorbell of the apartment next door.

After a short while, a tough-looking old man came out. His bedhead was terrible, so he might have been sleeping.

"Huh? Oh, it's the kid from next door..."

My neighbor seemed to be in a bad mood.

"Good morning. Were you sleeping?"

"Yeah. What do you want?"

"Actually, I'm moving out today. Thank you for everything. Oh, here, these are some kind of expensive snacks."

I handed him the box of snacks in a paper bag.

"Ah, you're moving... Thanks for going out of your way."

My neighbor took the snacks and thanked me.

"Want to know why I'm moving?"

"You know, you can be really annoying sometimes. Are you moving in with that girl from the other day?"

Oh? So he knows.

"That's right."

"Congratulations. You two have been pretty loud recently."

"Oh, you could hear us?"

"The walls here are thin, and you guys were making too much noise. I was wondering when you were going to get it on."

Hey, hey.

"I won't let you hear Kaede-chan's cute voice!"

"So annoying... Hey, are you not scared of me?"

My neighbor asked a strange question.

"To be honest, I am. I'm not getting any of your shared nikujaga. That really had me racking my brain."

Isn't it usually a female university student or a lonely housewife whose husband doesn't pay attention to her who gives you nikujaga? And when you return the container, they invite you into their room? That's what I learned from my textbooks.

"Not that... Anyway, that was just leftovers from something a woman made for me. I just gave it to a poor, pitiful guy like you."

Poor!? Pitiful!?

"Did I look that bad?"

"You had the eyes of a dead fish... And you were in a bad way for a while there."

"A bad way?"

"You'd start making noise in the middle of the night, and you were shouting in the bathroom. 'I'll cut him to pieces,' or 'I want to die,' and stuff... It was seriously loud."

I have no memory of this.

"Huh? A ghost? It wasn't me, was it?"

"No, it was you. On bad days, you were banging on the walls."

"Hmm, I don't remember. Maybe it was the alcohol?"

It must have been when I was depressed.

"Well, compared to back then, you making noise with a woman was no problem at all. I was just thinking, 'they're taking their sweet time getting started'."

Stop eavesdropping!

"I seem to have caused you a lot of trouble in various ways, I'm sorry."

Even if our positions were reversed, I wouldn't want a neighbor like me either.

"Well, don't worry about it. Stay well. She was a cute girl, wasn't she?"

"You can tell? She's so cute."

Incredibly cute.

"I wanna punch you, hey."

"Please don't."

I'm against violence!

"Well, I won't punch you. You look strong."

"You can tell? I actually used to practice swordsmanship."

"So that's why you're not intimidated... In that case, your shouting 'I'll cut him to pieces' is scary. I think it's a good thing you quit your job. You seemed like you were going to cause an incident sooner or later."

I certainly did imagine cutting down that bastard of a boss at the company many times.

"I'm fine now. My heart has healed."

"Then that's good. I wouldn't be able to laugh if I saw you on the news. Well, good luck."

"Thank you. Thank you for everything."

I bowed my head and thanked him again.

"Yeah! Oh, wait a second!"

My neighbor stopped me and went to the back of his room. I wondered what it was and waited for a moment, and he came back right away.

"Here, take these."

My neighbor handed me two card-like pieces of paper.

"Business cards? Huh? You're a company president?"

The business card had a company name, a name, and a title, but the title was President.

"Well, yeah."

"You're not a Yaa-san?"

Not from the something-or-other gang? Well, in that case, they wouldn't have business cards, I guess.

"It's that kind of thing. You don't need to know."

"Hmm... But why two? I'm not giving one to Kaede-chan. If you try to make a move on her, I'll lop off your head."

"You really seem like you'd do it, which is scary. No, give this to the woman from the other day. The one with long black hair who was wearing your tracksuit."

Eleanor-san, he means.

"Hmm."

Well, if she's on TV that much, I guess he'd know.

"If anything happens, let me know. I'll help you out. As a neighborly gesture, I'll give you a discount."

"Understood. I'll let her know."

"Yeah. See you. I'm going back to sleep."

"Good night. Thank you very much for everything."

"Yeah!"

My neighbor closed the door.

Well, that's it. Let's go... to my new home!

I left the apartment complex, walked to the station, and got on a train. When I arrived at my destination, Nerima Station, I left the station and headed for my new apartment building.

A few minutes' walk later, I arrived at the apartment. I went up the stairs, stood in front of the door, and pressed the doorbell.

"Coming."

A moment after I pressed the doorbell, the door opened. Of course, the one who opened it was Kaede-chan. Today, Kaede-chan was wearing a light pink shirt and a skirt. But today's skirt was a little short.

"I'm here."

Ta-da!

"Seriously, what's with the annoying girlfriend act... Just come in normally."

Kaede-chan looked exasperated.

"It would be bad if you were changing, Kaede-chan."

"That kind of lucky pervert moment won't happen. I change in my own room."

"Well, I might go into your room."

"That's not a lucky pervert, that's an intentional pervert... Honestly! I'm boiling the soba, so stop saying stupid things and come in."

Kaede-chan went inside, so I went in too and headed for my room. I put my luggage down and went to the living room.

"Senpai, it'll be ready in a little bit, so please sit and wait."

As Kaede-chan said that, I sat down at the table in the living room.

In the living room, there was a dining table next to the kitchen. By the window at the back, there was a TV and an L-shaped sofa.

As I took my seat and looked around the living room, Kaede-chan brought over the soba.

"Sorry for the wait. Here's your moving-in soba. We're eating it ourselves."

Kaede-chan placed the soba on the table and sat down across from me.

"It's tempura soba."

My soba had two shrimp tempura on it. Kaede-chan's only had one. Because she's a girl.

"I made it."

"Liar."

There's no way she'd go to the trouble of frying tempura just for soba.

"I took it out of the pack and put it on top. It's not an exaggeration to say I made it."

It is an exaggeration. But whatever.

"Let's eat."

"Let's eat."

We started eating the soba.

I was fired from my company, but I gained the overpowered skill of Alchemy and a culinary-skilled (future) wife who can take shrimp tempura out of a pack.