Chapter 7: Megumi & Library!
A nice day filled with scorching hot sun.
Rito looked at the road filled with the shadow of the trees and a nice cooling breeze from the different alley alleviating the temperature to a bearable level; he took his note from Ayaka-san.
Rito's mind recalled the soft sensation he had grabbed. It was pure instinct, but his hand did grab her ass at that moment for sure.
In addition to the loose shirt, her button suddenly opened up to reveal two gentle mounds of pink bra covering his eyes and nose.
One side of the bra slipped, revealing a glimpse of the pink thing that dealt the final blow to his psyche.
'Hah! Forget it. Or else, it will only make it hard for us to talk in the future.' Rito shook his head, but his fruitless attempts to forget it only served to reinforce it in his mind as he walked to the bookstore where Ayaka usually gets her books.
It was not a small shop at all.
He could see, however, from the outside that the bookstore is fairly large, with a small building-like structure that has three floors, each of which is stocked with books and a reading area where people can rent books and read.
'Wow! Something like this is probably something I haven't seen in any anime. So, stores like this exist in reality.' Rito's thoughts drifted as he gazed at the shop and entered to inhale the lingering scent of paper, ink, and wood, which brought back many fond memories.
'Let's read something and then bring that book back home.' Rito decided to pay an hour's rent because he had plenty of time, and he went inside to get another novel from the popular ongoing.
'This is...' He picked a nicely titled book. 'Reincarnation as a monster.' Rito recalled the slime story from his world as the title was shown, and it was very popular in the reincarnation and isekai genre.
Although his writing was not very good at the time, he still wanted to see if he could write it down quickly because, as long as this monster reincarnated story continues to generate hype for this kind of story, it will be a popular genre.
"Eh!" Suddenly, Rito, who was busy reading while standing beside the bookshelf, felt someone coming from the side.
The thing that surprised him the most, though, was that he had not noticed the attractive girl until she had unintentionally slipped the book down.
With quick reflexes.
Rito picked the book before the girl, as he looked at the girl, who was staring down at him with a surprised gaze.
He stood up from his position and pushed the book in front of the girl with a smile.
"Here! Sorry, I did not notice. Also, I am reading the first part; if that is what you need, you can have it." When Rito picked it up, he noticed the book's title and the cover image was identical to the one he was reading, so he wondered if the girl was looking for the first volume.
"No! It's alright, Yuki-kun." Rito was stunned by the girl's next words because he literally could not recall anything from his past life.
He was obviously unaware of Megumi, and he was shocked to learn that she knew his name.
He remembered the girl sitting next to him in class, but his former self did not even notice her because of her thin presence.
"Sorry, Katou-san." Despite his dedication to Haruna-san, Rito was rendered speechless by the fact that he could not even recall the name of the girl sitting next to him. This level of insanity is truly insane.
"It's alright! Also, I don't need the first volume but the 4th one." Rito felt as though he would not even hear her if he did not pay attention to what she was saying because of how serene and elusive her voice was.
He finally began to recall the old anime from his former life, and as a result, a picture of a character with comparable characteristics began to form in his mind.
"It happens a lot of the time."
"No, it's not okay. I'll try my best to see you from now on." Rito responded, which surprised Megumi a little because she thought that this might have been the first time someone had shown such an interest in getting to know her.
"So, it's nice to meet you, Katou-san. I hope you will take care of me from now on." He ended up greeting.
As if meeting for the first time, and later he got embarrassed thinking how he might have made the girl angry, but only found the girl to be smiling at him.
"Nice to meet you too, Yuki-kun. Also, call me Megumi from now on." Even though she was dressed in an entirely standard outfit and had a slender build, when she smiled like that, many of the men in the area noticed that she was a cute girl and watched her for a moment, all of them thinking the same thing.
Megumi rarely smiles like that. Plus, she is certainly not the popular type, but if one were to help her in dressing up a little, Rito knew that she had the right potential to be the female lead of a story, and even at this moment, she just garnered such attention with just a smile.
"I was thinking of leaving now. Then see you in the class, Rito-kun." Megumi finally found the volume she was looking for, and with that, she bid her farewell and left.
While Rito also continued to read, and after some time when his time was already over, he decided to leave to find another character from the same anime walking in.
'She is also wearing the same high school dress from my school.' Rito, though looking at Eriri Spencer's dress code.
All of that allowed Rito to finally forget about Ayaka's moments. He smiled as he bought the book he had come for and walked out of the store, oblivious to the blonde girl who was staring at him from inside.
'He took the book.' Since the volume she had come to buy was already sold out and the previous boy had taken two of them, Eriri thought, she felt very sad and glared at him for a moment before shaking her head.
'I'll ask Jia to buy one for me.' She thought about her butler and smiled before leaving the shop, as she considered how she ended up wasting her time on such a small task.
Not noticing how she was just being lazy and nothing else, which the butler Jia had a clear idea of, and that is why he asked her to get them herself, to change his master's attitude toward small tasks like this.
Well! Jia had a lot coming for his plan.
'Ahh! He did see it...' On the other hand, Ayaka, back in her room, looked completely wiped out, as she remembered the falling incident, and she was certain that at the moment, her bra definitely slipped off, and Rito had his face planted on it.
'This is my fault to begin with. Plus, he even tried to help me by catching me.' Rito's skill combined with Ayaka's troubled mind made it impossible for even a grown woman like her to avoid thinking about that foolish boy, and she began to feel a strong desire to make amends.