A weekend morning.
Asakura changed his clothes and walked out of his room, only to step on something soft. He looked down and, sure enough, saw a dirty dress.
He sighed and looked up, spotting Hiroi Kikuri slumped on the sofa in a heap, moaning painfully due to a hangover.
Although she was only wearing underwear, her figure was so meager that it failed to arouse any desire at all.
In fact, this fellow's condition was even worse a while ago. Because she spent all her money on alcohol, she relied entirely on free meals and celebratory banquets after every live performance to get by. This led to malnutrition, leaving her so thin she was practically skin and bones. Her skin had a sickly paleness - it was truly a mystery why her fans would call such a person a "Drunken Angel."
If the angels under God's command were like this, the old man would have probably issued a divine decree long ago telling them all to get lost and become fallen angels.
However, because she had been eating quite well at Asakura's place these past few days, Hiroi Kikuri's complexion had improved a lot, if nothing else.
This person seemed to have turned his home into a temporary base lately. Not only did she frequently come over to stay the night while drunk, but she also started bringing some personal belongings here, making the living room quite a mess.
"How much did you have to compensate yesterday?" Asakura raised an eyebrow and asked her with ill intent.
This, of course, wasn't referring to Pachinko. After all, though Hiroi Kikuri's life was extremely degenerate, Asakura had at least never seen her go to those kinds of places - though it might just be because the money in her hands was always at a level where even normal life was difficult - but rather because this fellow always ended up damaging equipment due to being over-excited during or after a live performance, resulting in a significant portion of the reward from each live being squeezed out for compensation.
"This many... this many."
Hiroi Kikuri held up both hands in a "V" gesture. If it weren't for the fact that her expression looked like she was about to cry, it might have given someone the wrong idea. "Clearly that pickup had been used for a long time, it shouldn't have been worth that price..."
"Just think of it as updating their equipment. Those funds would have just turned into alcohol in your hands anyway." Asakura walked toward the kitchen with indifference.
"Damn it, I originally wanted to try some Unagi Festival after getting paid this time." Hiroi Kikuri muttered to herself in self-pity, then said to Asakura: "Asakura-kun, today I want to drink miso soup with clams~"
"Don't order food so naturally. And unfortunately, I have business to attend to today, so breakfast will just be something simple."
Asakura walked to the sofa and looked down at her from above. "And since you've turned my house into this state, don't you have anything you want to say?"
"...Uh, poor hospitality?" Overwhelmed by his aura, Hiroi Kikuri's head was filled with cold sweat.
"Oh, then let me 'entertain' you first." Asakura distorted the dress he had just stepped on into a rope shape, and with a smile that didn't reach his eyes, he made a 'strangling' motion.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry!" Hiroi Kikuri immediately folded and apologized repeatedly on the sofa.
Asakura threw the dress in his hand onto her face. "Go wash up. I didn't make breakfast, so just settle for cereal."
Cereal was just what he habitually called it. In reality, it was the kind of grain rings common in American TV shows, which could be bought in large bags at the supermarket. Sometimes when he was too lazy to eat breakfast, he would use this to get by.
"Just asking, you aren't lactose intolerant, right?" Asakura took milk out of the refrigerator.
"No problem! As long as it's food, I have no problem!"
Hiroi Kikuri answered unclearly while scrambling to shove her head into the dress.
Hearing this, Asakura satisfiedly poured the milk into the cereal bowl and finally added a few drops of honey to enhance the flavor. The simplest breakfast was complete.
It was a pity there wasn't a toaster at home; otherwise, he could have put in two pieces of toast to bake slowly. By the time the cereal was finished and the milk was half-drunk, the freshly toasted, crispy, and delicious toast would be ready. Paired with the honey-sweetened milk, it would be quite a perfect breakfast.
"I'm digging in!"
Having changed her clothes and washed up, Hiroi Kikuri finally looked somewhat presentable as she sat opposite Asakura. She scooped up a large spoonful of milk and cereal and stuffed it into her mouth. The originally dazed expression on her face immediately relaxed.
"Even though I haven't eaten this much before, this kind of cereal in milk is surprisingly great - it's rich and milky while having a crunchy texture."
"Instead of that, shouldn't you be about ready to move out of my house?" Asakura said casually while eating his own cereal. "If this continues, my home is going to turn into a landfill."
Clearly, a while ago, his living room was empty with no sense of being lived in, creating a sharp contrast with its current state.
The sense of life was there now, but it felt even worse than the clean state at the beginning...
"Hm, I see. Has it already reached that time?"
Hiroi Kikuri swallowed the milk in her mouth and spoke with a deep expression.
"Huh?" Asakura looked at her, puzzled.
"Based on my experience, the duration of staying at someone else's house varies. Some people kick you out after a day or two, but some can let you stay for about five days... but basically, it never exceeds five days."
Hiroi Kikuri said with a serious face: "I've stayed at Asakura's house for exactly five days... I call this the 'Kikuri Law.' Yes, it's very profound. With this discovery, I might be able to win the next Oscar..."
"You mean the Nobel Prize, right?" Asakura deadpanned. "You can't get that, you can't even get an Ignobel Prize."
"Sometimes I'm clearly told I can stay for a week, but around the fifth day, they can't help but kick me out. Why is that exactly?" The purple-haired bassist pondered while eating cereal.
"Mainly because you're too sloppy, right?" Asakura continued to roast her. "I feel like if I let you keep living here, the house might start breeding cockroaches and things like that."
"That's just how rock musicians are!"
"You're lying to yourself!"
By comparison, the living habits of Kawaragi Momoka, also a rock musician, were much better than Hiroi Kikuri's.
When Asakura occasionally went upstairs to take a nap at the Ama-usa-an, he would pass by her room. Even a casual glance was enough to see that her bedroom was kept quite tidy.
Rather than saying anything else, other than the fact that she would unknowingly fill the refrigerator with beer, Asakura really couldn't find any faults with Kawaragi Momoka's private life...