So Sis and Lin Ye had been playing in the guest room again today?
Yukino Yukinoshita turned a look of pure sympathy on her older sister, Haruno.
The memory of how her sister had been wrecked the night before was still vivid — so vivid that Yukino didn't dare examine it too closely, afraid the scene would prove too stimulating and provoke an even more obvious, uncomfortable reaction in her own body.
Every time it surfaced, her body stirred a little. Especially her sister's voice, screaming her throat raw for help. Those shrieks had branded themselves into her memory beyond erasing.
That particular punishment was one Yukino had absolutely no wish to sample.
"Yukino, what is that look supposed to mean?"
Haruno found the pity in her sister's eyes deeply unpleasant.
Being pitied by her Sister was, for someone in the position of elder sister, close to unbearable.
All this time it had been her Sister chasing after her footsteps; it had been Haruno pitying her Sister. Since when did it run the other way?
But last night —
Last night she really had lived through the darkest, most brutal experience of her life.
She had lost her freedom. She had screamed herself hoarse. She had wept and begged for help, and no one had answered. All she could do was take the punishment and feel every jolt her own body threw at her.
And the Sister she had wanted to protect had stood there watching, doing nothing, and in the end had even settled into a chair, closed her eyes, and fallen asleep.
"Doesn't Sis already know?"
The reaction alone showed that Yukino had already read exactly what Haruno was thinking.
"Know what? Know nothing about what?"
"Sympathy. Every time I think about what happened to you last night, I feel a great deal of sympathy."
"Yukino, you're cruel. You pity your poor Sis and yet you do nothing at all — you don't say a single word to talk Lin-kun down, you just let him bully me. I'm... genuinely starting to wonder whether I'm still your Sis."
Haruno's tone was earnest, but a faint, teasing glint hovered in her eyes, there and not there at once.
She was probing, testing what her Sister's frame of mind had become.
"Yesterday's punishment was entirely of your own making."
Haruno's mouth twitched.
"I did try to talk him down. I tried from the very beginning. If I hadn't, I'm confident the punishment you faced would only have been worse."
"Is that so!" Haruno put on an exaggerated show of enlightenment. "Then it seems Yukino's influence over Lin-kun isn't very strong."
Yukino's eyelid gave a twitch.
"Now, if it had been Miss Mai — with Miss Mai's charms, she could surely have made Lin-kun drop my punishment altogether."
Yukino did not like that at all. She regarded Mai Sakurajima as her single greatest rival, and here was her sister praising Mai Sakurajima while belittling her.
Even knowing it was deliberate, the irritation still sat there, sour in her chest.
"If you'd simply stir up less trouble, Lin Ye wouldn't punish you."
"At the root of it, you brought this on yourself. Otherwise how could any of it have happened?"
"Ah, that. Well, that depends on my mood going forward."
"Ha."
Yukino let out one soft, flat laugh. Since her sister clearly hadn't given up on causing trouble and fully intended to keep at it, Yukino saw no point in wasting more breath.
Her sister stirs things up, Lin Ye punishes her.
Not her problem, and certainly not worth arguing about.
"Suit yourself."
"Yukino... you're really not going to look out for your Sis anymore?"
Yukino ignored her, turned, and walked out of the room.
Haruno followed after her on unsteady legs.
"You can clean the guest room yourself. You made the mess, you deal with it."
"Absolutely not."
Haruno refused in a single breath.
"I'm not the one who made the mess in the guest room."
Yukino's brow creased.
"The one who made the mess was Lin-kun..."
For a moment Yukino had no counter. Lin Ye did bear a share of responsibility for the state of that room — but her sister was certainly responsible too.
"Sis, you're responsible as well."
"No. The other share of the responsibility belongs to Meguri."
Meguri?
The President?
It took Yukino Yukinoshita a moment to process. Then her eyes went wide and she strode straight to the guest room, reaching out to open the door.
Click...
With a small click,
the door swung open.
Through the opened door, Yukino Yukinoshita saw the figure lying on the bed inside.
A familiar figure, eyes shut, deep asleep, with a faint glistening trail at the corner of her mouth. Drool.
Yukino Yukinoshita's stomach sank.
What... exactly had gone on in here?
"When Lin-kun was bullying Meguri, he really went at it. Meguri kept crying that she didn't want it, but in the end..."
Under her sister Haruno's narration, a scene assembled itself in Yukino Yukinoshita's mind.
An instant later she shook her head hard, flinging the image back out of it.
She trusted Lin Ye. Lin Ye would never do something like that.
This was one of her sister's schemes. But then why was the President in that state?
Punished by Lin Ye?
And why would he suddenly turn a punishment on the President?
Yukino Yukinoshita remained puzzled, but she didn't dig into it.
All she needed to do was choose to believe that nothing intimate had happened between Lin Ye and Meguri Shiromeguri.
Beyond that,
she had nothing to say at all.
Holding hands, looking at someone's body — perfectly ordinary. She could accept that much completely by now.
"Then the President can clean the guest room herself."
With that,
Yukino Yukinoshita turned and left, pulling the guest room door shut behind her.
Inside the room, Meguri Shiromeguri waited a good while before slowly opening her eyes.
She'd woken the moment she heard the door, but she was far too embarrassed, so she'd kept her eyes closed to avoid being seen by Sis Haruno and Student Yukinoshita.
Now that the two of them were gone, she couldn't hold it in any longer.
"Nnh..."
A faint tremor ran through her body.
The lingering sensations still hovered on her skin.
The memories kept coming at her in waves, and the trembling grew more pronounced.
Never, ever again.
Not once more, not for anything.
Meguri Shiromeguri felt she would rather die than go through that a second time.
If she went through it again, she would break for good.
"Click..."
Not long after,
the door opened again.
Meguri Shiromeguri shut her eyes in a hurry, playing at being asleep.
"Meguri, stop pretending. Get up already."
It was Haruno's voice.
But Meguri Shiromeguri kept her eyes closed, refusing to open them, still hoping to bluff her way through.
"If you don't get up, Lin Ye-kun is going to come in here, and then he'll..."
In a flash,
Meguri Shiromeguri's eyes snapped open and she pushed herself half upright on her right arm.
She was terrified.
Her face had gone white. Lin Ye had left quite a shadow over her.
"Meguri, so it really is Lin-kun who gets a rise out of you."
A faint smile hung at Haruno's lips as she stepped into the guest room. "Now I'm genuinely going to be hurt."
"Sis Haruno. Sis Haruno... actually, um, that is..."
Meguri Shiromeguri stammered, feeling ever so slightly in the wrong, as if she'd let Haruno down.
"What?"
"I was just startled, that's all. Really, honestly!"
"Oh! And that's why you were pretending to be asleep, is it?"
"..."
Meguri Shiromeguri squirmed.
Haruno added another line. "Anyway, Lin-kun left ages ago. It's just the three of us here now — me, you, and Yukino."
Lin Ye was gone?
Meguri Shiromeguri absorbed that at once,
and the news let her breathe out and go limp with relief.
"Sis Haruno, please don't scare me like that again."
"Scare you? Meguri, are you afraid of Lin-kun?"
Haruno feigned astonishment.
"That's... um, that is..."
Meguri Shiromeguri hesitated all over again. Should she tell the truth here, or lie?
She honestly didn't know.
Lying went against her principles, but the truth made her feel humiliated — that particular flavor of humiliation.
"It seems Lin-kun really did give Meguri a thorough lesson. He truly has no tenderness for a woman at all. Being rough with me is one thing, but how could he be rough with Meguri too!"
Haruno launched into complaints on Meguri Shiromeguri's behalf.
"Meguri was crying out so loudly, it broke my heart."
"Ohh, ohh..."
Meguri Shiromeguri grew more mortified by the second.
She felt she had truly disgraced herself.
Only once Meguri Shiromeguri's face had gone bright red did Haruno continue, grinning. "All right, all right, get up. Yukinon's already making dinner. We'll eat here tonight."
"Mm."
"And stay the night here. I'll let your parents know."
"Mm."
"Oh, and this room needs cleaning. Yukino has spoken: whoever made the mess cleans it. Lin-kun isn't here, so that leaves you."
"Mm."
She didn't mind. Cleaning was something she did at home too.
Except this time,
what needed cleaning was a little bit different.
Looking at the damp patches on the sheets, her cheeks burned hotter still, shame prickling all through her.
So, before dinner was ready,
Meguri Shiromeguri pushed through her body's discomfort and set about a quick tidying.
When she'd finished, she took a fast shower to rinse off, changed into the loungewear Haruno had laid out, and stepped out of the bathroom.
Yukino Yukinoshita had dinner more or less finished; it was nearly time to eat.
"Meguri, come on over!"
Haruno called out to her.
Urged along by Haruno, Meguri Shiromeguri made her way slowly to the dining room.
One look at the beautifully arranged meal on the table and her appetite roared to life.
The punishment had, in the end, burned through an enormous amount of her Stamina and energy, and it was properly mealtime now. She was genuinely hungry, genuinely eager to eat her fill.
"Grrrrmble..."
Her stomach betrayed her with a loud growl.
Meguri Shiromeguri's face went scarlet, so mortified she'd have crawled into a crack in the floor if she could find one.
This was too much. Far too much.
Why on earth was this happening to her?
Why should something like this happen at all?
Face flushed crimson, Meguri Shiromeguri could only conclude her luck today was terrible — as if the entire world had it in for her.
"Eat up! Hahaha, Yukino's cooking is delicious."
At Haruno's urging,
Meguri Shiromeguri finally picked up her chopsticks.
She started with the tempura.
The shell was crisp, the shrimp inside springy with bounce.
The texture was superb.
She was reaching for a second piece almost at once.
She was genuinely satisfied — the flavor really was excellent.
Of course, Meguri Shiromeguri also realized this wasn't purely a matter of technique. The ingredients mattered too.
The flour, the shrimp — every bit of it had to be top grade.
The Yukinoshita family, exactly as advertised: even the ingredients in their everyday cooking were on another level. This was what a great household looked like.
Meguri Shiromeguri marveled at it.
Then she moved on to everything else — the rolled omelet, the cauliflower, the popcorn chicken.
Meguri Shiromeguri ate very happily that evening.
"Thank you, Student Yukinoshita."
When the meal ended, Meguri Shiromeguri volunteered to wash the dishes, and Yukino Yukinoshita didn't turn her down.
Yukino Yukinoshita helped alongside her, though, and the two of them talked as they worked.
"President, today's business and yesterday's business — both were my Sis's fault."
"Er..."
"You only need to think of it as my Sis's fault. It really has very little to do with Lin-kun."
"But..."
Yukino Yukinoshita knew perfectly well that an explanation with no reasons attached wouldn't satisfy Meguri Shiromeguri, but she couldn't actually tell her about the Body Swap.
"Nothing like this will happen again."
"..."
Honestly,
Meguri Shiromeguri wasn't quite able to believe that anymore.
"Lin-kun asked me to pass this along. His condition was that you end that relationship of yours with her. What happened at school before was not what he wanted."
"..."
Meguri Shiromeguri's view of it didn't change.
But Yukino had said all she intended to say.
"Please trust Lin-kun one more time."
Since it was Yukino Yukinoshita asking, Meguri Shiromeguri couldn't very well push her objections any further.
"Mm. All right. I'll trust him once more."
She finally said the words, agreeing to it.
Let the future supply the answer. Let what came next do the answering.
Even if she wasn't entirely willing to believe, she had at least accepted, for the moment, the explanation Yukino Yukinoshita had offered.
The dishes were done soon after.
The three of them sat in the living room a while, and then Yukino Yukinoshita rose, said her goodnights, and went back to her own room.
That left only Haruno and Meguri Shiromeguri in the living room.
"Tonight it's me and Meguri sharing a bed again."
"I... could sleep on the floor," Meguri Shiromeguri said.
"There's no sense in making a guest sleep on the floor. Hee hee hee. Tonight Meguri sleeps with me in the guest room, hahaha..."
That laugh set Meguri Shiromeguri's nerves jangling.
But whatever came, it couldn't possibly be as terrifying as Lin Ye's punishment.
The guest room.
Only the bedside lamp was still on, spilling a soft orange-yellow glow.
"Meguri."
"Mm?"
"I'm sorry."
"Er?"
Meguri Shiromeguri blinked, lost. What was this about?
What did she mean?
Why was Sis Haruno apologizing out of nowhere?
"This afternoon, it was my fault Lin-kun bullied you."
"It's nothing. It's over now. Compared with what you went through, Sis Haruno, I got off far, far easier."
Meguri Shiromeguri meant every word of it.
"You really are a kind, gentle girl. If I were... a boy, I'd marry Meguri and take her home as my wife."
"Sis Haruno."
Meguri Shiromeguri's face went red.
A warm, satisfied happiness filled her — the feeling of being recognized.
"I'm serious. I really am serious."
And Haruno did mean it, straight from the heart.
"But I'd have to marry Yukino as well."
"Oh, and Shizuka too. If I don't step in, she'll probably never get married in her whole life."
"Hahaha..."
Meguri Shiromeguri couldn't hold back her laughter.
And her mood really did lift, a great deal.
The afternoon's ordeal, too, began slowly to fade.
____
Gift for Everyone: Once we hit 50 Powerstones, I'll release +1 bonus chapter
________________________________________
If you want more chapters, please consider supporting my page on (P). with 50 advanced chapters available on (P)
👻 Join the crew by searching Leanzin on (P). You know the spot! 😉