“Um, could you give me some time to clean up…?”
“Don’t worry about it, don’t worry about it. I’m coming in~!”
Well, I care, though.
After buying some random ingredients at the convenience store, the blonde gyaru came straight to my apartment. It seemed like she was serious about cooking dinner. Without giving me a chance to stop her, she walked right into my room.
“Wow, you keep it pretty clean in here.”
She shook her smooth, golden hair and looked around the room with her blue eyes, her uniform slightly disheveled. For some reason, I felt nervous.
“Alright then. Let’s get cooking. Wait, you haven’t even opened the plastic wrap on the cutting board yet?”
When I first started living alone, I was all fired up about cooking and bought a bunch of kitchen tools, but I ended up never using them. I’ve been surviving on convenience store meals and the nearby diner.
“Well, just kill some time and wait for me.”
As the gyaru started chopping ingredients while humming a tune, I obediently fiddled with my phone and waited.
After a while, a delicious smell started wafting through the air.
“Here you go~! A quick stir-fried meat and veggies set~!”
“That was fast.”
In less than thirty minutes, she had whipped up a stir-fry and some soup. Since I didn’t have any rice, she used instant microwave rice.
“All you gotta do is chop, wash, and stir-fry. Easy, right? Well then, let’s dig in~!”
“Thanks for the meal… Wow, this is good.”
I was a little worried since it was a gyaru’s cooking, but it was actually really tasty. Salt, pepper, and… something else I couldn’t quite place, but it was delicious. A little spicy, too.
“How did you season this?”
“Salt, pepper, chicken bouillon, soy sauce, and a bit of doubanjiang.”
“Are you a pro or something…?”
“Don’t underestimate me. But hey, I don’t mind the compliment~!”
She grinned and stuffed a big mouthful of stir-fry into her mouth. She wasn’t just cute—she was cool.
“But, is this okay? Don’t you have family waiting for you at home? Oh, are you living alone too, Gyaru-chan?”
“Gyaru-chan? What’s that? My name’s Naruse Suzuka. I’m a second-year in high school. Just call me Suzuka.”
“I’m Mura Tatoya. Same age as you. I’m also a second-year.”
“Nice to meet you, Tatoya.”
Her way of closing the distance is kinda scary.
“I’m kinda living alone too. Well, something like that. Right now, I’m living by myself.”
Her wording was a bit roundabout. It seemed like she didn’t want to talk about it too much, so I changed the subject while we finished dinner.
“Ahh, I’m stuffed~!”
“Thanks for the meal. I’ll clean up the dishes.”
“Ah, don’t worry about it. I’ll take care of it to the end. More importantly…”
As I stood up to start cleaning, Suzuka pushed me back down with a thud. I fell onto the bed, and she climbed on top of me, her face filling my vision. She smelled nice, and her thin blonde hair tickled my cheek.
“Mind if I take some experience points?”
“Uh…”
“You shouldn’t let girls into your room so easily. You can’t complain if you get taken advantage of, you know?”
“Well, but I don’t have any experience points…”
“Even if you say you don’t have much, it’s not zero, right?”
“I hate to break it to you, but…”
I showed her the mark on my arm without touching her. The character 【無】 (mu), meaning “none.”
“It’s zero…”
“…Huh?”
She blinked in confusion, staring at the 【無】 mark for a moment before…
“Seriously~?!”
She buried her face in the bed.
“I thought you always wore gloves because you had tons of experience points. I got my hopes up for nothing.”
“Uh, sorry about that…”
“No, it’s not your fault, Tatoya. This is entirely on me.”
As expected, experience points are everything for a guy. Seeing Suzuka so disappointed made me feel really guilty.
“Um, I’m really sorry.”
“I told you, it’s not your fault. But still, huh? Zero experience points, huh?”
A guy with no experience points isn’t attractive. If he had even a little, there might be some hope, but a guy with absolutely zero has no appeal.
Suzuka sat up abruptly and looked at me, opening her mouth to speak.
“Well, let’s put the experience points thing aside for now. How about we just get a little naughty?”
