The Heroines Want to Confess.

Chapter 118: The Right Way to Gossip Over the Phone

Tuesday night.

Hayasaka Ai was still doing her usual maid duties—chatting with her Ojou-sama.

However, today Kaguya-sama was acting a little strange.

It was clearly Tuesday night, with a test coming up on Wednesday, yet she gave up on studying.

Before entering the room, Hayasaka Ai adjusted her maid outfit, then pushed open the door.

At the study desk, she saw her mistress—Shinomiya Kaguya.

She had a book in her hand, her mouth murmuring key points, but her eyes were subconsciously glancing over at her.

As expected, this person wasn't studying seriously at all.

Normal students would never skip a last-minute "sprint" study session, but Ai-chan's mistress wasn't normal. Right now, she was about to do something that would hurt someone else without benefitting herself.

That was: making Hayasaka Ai call Sakurai Saki to chat, thereby disrupting his study schedule.

As for whether Hayasaka Ai's grades would be affected—the answer was probably no.

Ai-chan's academic performance was always stable, consistently right in the middle of the rankings. Sakurai Saki sometimes suspected that she was deliberately "controlling her grades."

Everyone knew being good at studying didn't mean being formidable, but someone who could consistently keep their scores perfectly average was usually a hidden master—like one of those protagonists pretending to be average.

Ayanokouji Kiyotaka: ദ്ദി(˵ •̀ ᴗ - ˵ ) ✧

However, the reason Hayasaka Ai controlled her grades was simply to match the persona she had built. At school, she played the role of a "gyaru," and a gyaru who worked part-time every day yet still had excellent academic results—well, that just sounded too unrealistic.

"Hayasaka, you're here," Shinomiya Kaguya said with a face full of excitement.

Kaguya: ₍₍⚞(˶˃ ꒳ ˂˶)⚟⁾⁾

She was really looking forward to doing something bad.

But mostly, she was curious about the content of the conversation between her maid and her boyfriend.

In a way, she was the most enthusiastic "shipper" of the Hayasaka Ai and Sakurai Saki couple in the entire school.

(੭˃ᴗ˂)੭ (っ˶ ˘ ᵕ˘)ˆᵕ ˆ˶ς)

"Kaguya-sama, he's my boyfriend..." Hayasaka Ai reminded her.

Why are you so excited?

Anyone who didn't know better might think you're the one dating Sakurai-chan.

"I'm not stealing him from you, Hayasaka, what are you so scared of?" Shinomiya Kaguya recalled having once said something like "this is the person I like."

A bit too possessive, aren't you?

What if one day she broke up with General Affairs Sakurai, and this crybaby maid of hers showed up at the door with a gun to seek justice? And General Affairs Sakurai couldn't handle a gun—at that point, they'd probably end up on the front page.

The headline would be—[Scumbag boyfriend shot dead by girlfriend – Should Japan's gun control laws be loosened? If boyfriends had guns too, could they defend themselves and survive?]

Hayasaka: (≖ - ≖)

The more Kaguya spoke, the more suspicious Hayasaka became.

[Ara, we're just joking, Hayasaka, don't worry.]

[We're as close as sisters, borrowing your boyfriend to play a bit won't hurt.]

[Just going out for a meal—do I really need to give a reason?]

Those kinds of situations… weren't entirely impossible.

"Come on~ Hayasaka, give me the phone!" Kaguya commanded.

"Kaguya-sama, do you even know how to use a smartphone?"

"Nope!" Shinomiya Kaguya answered without hesitation.

She was still using a flip phone. She'd used it since she was little, and it contained many of her memories.

She had taken quite a few photos over the past year or two.

"Now that you mention it, has Kaguya-sama ever thought of changing phones?" Every time Hayasaka Ai had to contact her, it was a hassle.

Flip phones couldn't use LINE, so communication outside of phone calls was limited to email.

These days, who the hell uses email to talk with friends?

"My phone still works fine," Kaguya was a nostalgic type of person.

"The student council has a LINE group—it makes communication way easier."

"This app?"

"Yeah."

Hearing that, Kaguya tried opening Ai-chan's LINE and then saw the nickname she gave Sakurai Saki, reading out loud: "Sakurai-chan, the one I love love love the most… uaa, this name is so cheesy it's killing me."

She got goosebumps all over.

Does Hayasaka have no shame?

"Uh… this picture, so revealing." Shinomiya Kaguya tapped on the photo and commented, "Also, the dimensions are all wrong."

"I heard there's an app called Photoshop… Huh?"

The phone in Kaguya's hand was snatched away.

(//Ò///Ó//) Ai-chan's face turned beet red as she grabbed her phone back.

"Nooo~ I was just getting to the good part." Kaguya started whining.

"I have size C! That's way bigger than Kaguya-sama's A!"

<(ꐦㅍ _ㅍ)>

Hayasaka Ai said through gritted teeth.

"Huh?"

ʰᵘʰ (ꐦ○_○）✧

Kaguya's expression changed—she was a bit pissed.

That thing, when it comes down to it, weren't they just two lumps of excess fat? A little less meant a more slender figure anyway.

Besides, she wasn't that far behind!

"I heard Fujiwara has an F…" Shinomiya Kaguya muttered softly.

"A..."

"C..."

After saying that, both fell silent at the same time.

Kaguya and Hayasaka: (ᴗ_ ᴗ.)( .ᴗ _ᴗ)

Better not hurt each other any further.

"Call him! Or else there won't be enough time." Shinomiya Kaguya reminded.

It was already 8:30 p.m. by now—Sakurai Saki was definitely studying!

Interrupting his studying was only part of the goal—what mattered more was to fill his head with thoughts of love, so that when he entered the exam room tomorrow, he'd be racking his brain with memories of tonight instead!

Hayasaka Ai very rarely called Sakurai Saki directly. The two were more used to chatting while "killing people" in-game.

Under Kaguya's urging eyes, Hayasaka Ai pressed the call button.

Just a few seconds later, Sakurai Saki's voice came through.

"Ai-chan~ why are you calling at this hour?"

"..." Because my annoying mistress wants to listen to us talk, that's why.

Hayasaka Ai sighed inwardly.

Kaguya, meanwhile, was gesturing beside her, signaling for her to turn on speaker mode.

[Let me hear too!]

Hayasaka Ai turned on speaker and raised the volume.

"Why aren't you saying anything? Shy?" On the other end, the sound of a pen scribbling on paper could be heard.

Kaguya heard him working on homework and instantly felt uneasy!

She wasn't doing any studying, but he was—converted relatively, for every question he solved, she was falling two behind! This was the theory of relativity applied to exam prep!

Kaguya nudged Hayasaka Ai in the waist, signaling her to say something already.

"I missed you~" Hayasaka Ai's face flushed red, now suffering double the torture.

( //>///

Being lovey-dovey with her boyfriend was already embarrassing enough, and now she had to do it while her mistress stared at her?

What the hell kind of humiliating play was this!?

"Ai-chan, have you been reviewing properly? The monthly exam is tomorrow, you know."

The topic took a sharp turn straight away from romance.

If this continued, their phone call would turn into a study session!

Kaguya shook Ai-chan's shoulders like mad.

"I did some reading earlier, now I just want to relax and chat with you for a bit." Ai-chan didn't want to keep talking about studying either.

"Umu, then I'll relax a bit too." The sound of a pen being put down and a book closing could be heard from the other end.

Shinomiya Kaguya was so happy she nearly jumped up.

"Let's go watch a movie on Saturday—do you have anything you want to see, Ai-chan?"

"Um, there's nothing in particular. But as long as I get to watch it with you, I'll be happy." Hayasaka Ai naturally acted sweet with her boyfriend.

Then she instantly noticed Shinomiya Kaguya's face looked like she just swallowed a fly.

"..." Ai-chan was speechless.

If you didn't want to see people act lovey-dovey, why come spy on them?

Kaguya-sama, are you some kind of M who enjoys being emotionally abused?

Hayasaka Ai turned the phone's mic volume down to the lowest setting and whispered:

"Kaguya-sama, don't you want to be first place this time?"

That snapped Kaguya back to her senses.

Now was not the time to be slacking off!

She rushed back to her study desk and started reviewing again.

But behind her, the syrupy sweet chatter between Hayasaka Ai and Sakurai Saki made it impossible to focus.

Just like that, Shinomiya Kaguya spent a completely useless night in terms of studying.

[Today's victory: Shinomiya Kaguya's? (Successfully dragged Sakurai Saki down too—neither of them studied properly)]