Meanwhile, the female students all turned around to the direction of the voice, and they saw three more girls approaching them. One of them was Sakayanagi Arisu, and walking beside her were Shiina Hiyori and Sakura Airi.
It was a sight that surprised almost all of the Class D students who were there, simply because one of their classmates was with someone from another class.
"Sakayanagi-san..." Horikita muttered upon seeing the rumored leader of Class A.
Kei couldn't stop her eyes from widening as she saw her friend walking side-by-side with the Class A student whom they only met earlier this week. It wasn't because Airi was with Arisu, though.
"Sakura-san? You're gonna take a bath here as well?" she asked, feeling more surprised at the possibility of the redhead having even a quick rinse at a public bath.
To be fair, it was surprising because Airi is the last person whom you'd expect to do such a thing.
"U-Uhm..." the shy redhead tried to answer despite the heavy blush on her face. It was a miracle that she hasn't fainted from sheer embarrassment, especially with Kiyotaka around. "I-I-I guess..."
"Why are you with her?" Kei continued to ask, now wanting to find out why her friend was with that smug girl who looked more like a loli now that she thought about it.
"T-That's... I-I'm not..."
At this point, Kiyotaka had turned around and wasn't surprised to see Arisu there. He also wasn't surprised to see Airi and Hiyori with her, though it did make him curious on how the lilac-haired girl got the two to walk with her, especially his red-haired classmate.
"Shiina, are you here for the same reason as them?" he asked the silver-haired girl.
"Yes! It's nice to see you again, Ayanokouji-kun," Hiyori smiled warmly. She was happy to see her friend again more than anything else.
"It should be illegal to be that innocent and cute..."
Oh, how he wanted to give her the same response right now... unfortunately, he wasn't in the mood to do so. His mood was ruined by the system and now he was in dire need of a steamy bath in the onsen more than ever.
Suzune turned towards him with an eyebrow raised. This was yet another student whom Kiyotaka seems to be acquainted with, even though she wasn't part of their class. It made her wonder if he was actually bad in social interactions, because he seemed to be doing fine in that aspect.
"You know her, Ayanokouji-kun?" she asked.
"Not on a personal level. I just saw her at the library one day and helped her get a book from a shelf."
"You forgot to mention that you were supposed to be tutoring us that time," Kei pointed out with a pout, still feeling a little angry with him for that.
Kiyotaka ignored her.
Honestly, there are other things she could be mad about, yet Kei chooses the moment when he had an innocent interaction with someone from another class...
"Who is she?" Suzune continued.
Hearing the conversation between them, Hiyori decided that now would be a good time to tell everyone her name since it was obvious that they were all going to the same place for the same reason.
"My name is Shiina Hiyori from Class C. It's nice to meet all of you," the girl bowed her head and smiled as she introduced herself.
While the other girls performed common courtesy and introduced themselves in return, Kiyotaka turned his attention to the lilac-haired girl. fre(e)webnovel.com
"Why are they with you, Sakayanagi?" he asked.
"I simply found them heading to the same destination a few minutes ago. Then I suggested that we could head to the public bath together. I first came across this one," she gestured towards Airi, "oh, she was hard to convince at first. She was really shy and kept on stuttering like a malfunctioning robot."
Airi's face turned redder than her own hair at this point, yet she couldn't really deny anything that came out of Arisu's mouth because one, it was true and two, she was too shy to say something.
"...but in the end, she agreed to accompany me. Shiina-san, on the other hand, was an easier case. One question was all it took for her to agree to walk with me."
"Sakura," he shifted his attention to his classmate. "How did you find out about this place?"
The girl blushed deeper upon being put on the spotlight, but she quickly took a deep breath in order to calm herself. Believe it or not, Kiyotaka was someone whom she was always with in the past weeks, so she already got used to his presence at this point.
It was still a work in progress, but she was close to being able to speak without any difficulty... around Kiyotaka, at least.
"I-I came across S-Sakayanagi-san while I was on my way back to the dorms. S-She recognized me from our last meeting then told me about t-this place. She then asked if... if I wanted to go here b-because... I looked like I needed it..."
Kiyotaka gave a satisfied nod. "What about you, Shiina?"
"I just came from the library earlier when I saw Sakayanagi-san and Sakura-san together. She asked me if I wanted to see a bathhouse inside the school premises. I've never been to one before and I've only read about them," Hiyori explained with a smile that radiated wonder and excitement. "I was curious about the whole thing, so I decided to go with them."
So, it appears that Sakayanagi and Shiina knew each other before this. This is definitely something to take note of.
"And you? How did you know about this place?" he asked the other girl who was with them.
Arisu only smirked. "Ayanokouji-kun, have you forgotten who you're talking to?"
Kiyotaka immediately regretted asking that question. Right, her father is the chairman of this school. A dumb question on his part.
"I'm surprised Hoshinomiya-sensei isn't with you, Chabashira-sensei," Honami spoke as she realized something interesting. "When she heard the news of a bathhouse being opened near the gymnasium from someone on the phone, she wanted to leave the teacher's lounge right away and even tried to push all her remaining work to me just to go here."
Chabashira's eyes widened for a moment, before a look of disappointment appeared across her face. It was totally like Hoshinomiya to act like that and she wasn't surprised to hear her fellow teacher do such a thing.
"That idiot... of course she would do something like that," she groaned and palmed her face afterwards. "And what happened?"
"Mashima-sensei was there and told her to finish checking her set of test papers first and told me to carry on. Since I had nothing left to do, I decided to head to the bathhouse that Hoshinomiya-sensei was talking about."
"A good choice, Ichinose," Sae nodded in approval. Oh, and she's definitely going to give Chie a proper scolding for attempting to ditch her work when they meet at school again tomorrow.
Arisu then rolled her eyes and spoke again, which quickly gained everyone's attention.
"We are only wasting time. The more time we spend out here, the more chances of other students seeing us and getting curious. Let us go inside already," the girl then headed to the entrance but before she could step inside, Arisu turned her head to look at her childhood friend. "I hope you don't think of leaving, Ayanokouji-kun. I honestly think this will be more interesting with you around."
Afterwards, the lilac-haired girl went inside. It was enough to remind everyone else that they have yet to actually go inside the building and see what it's like. Before the eager girls like Kei and Kikyo could rush inside though, their teacher stopped them for a moment.
"All right, before we go in..." Chabashira shifted into 'teacher mode' and turned her attention to the two newcomers. It was fairly obvious that Sakayanagi had no qualms about Ayanokouji's presence, which only left her two other companions. "Shiina, Sakura. Are you two fine with Ayanokouji being here? The only thing that this place offers is a mixed bath, which means that you'll be washing yourself in the same place as him."
"I don't mind," Hiyori shook her head while never losing her smile. "Ayanokouji-kun is my friend. There's nothing wrong with friends bathing together."
Everyone else sweat-dropped at the answer that she gave, even Kiyotaka himself. On the other hand, Sae wondered just how innocent was this girl to not think of anything inappropriate after the obvious implication.
"Oh you poor, innocent soul..." she said in her thoughts, before turning to the other girl with her. "What about you, Sakura?"
Airi froze for a brief moment, before snapping out of her stupor so she could give her response.
"I-I... I'm... fine with it..."
Sae gave a satisfied nod. "Since nobody seems to have a problem with a boy taking a bath with us, let's head in."
And with that, the entire group finally went inside the building.
New novel 𝓬hapters are published on (f)reeweb(n)ovel.com