After that, time passed slowly. Since there was still time until dinner was ready, the residents drank tea and chatted, or read shoujo manga, or watched the news on the TV.
“Koutarou, what is that you're reading?”
Sanae hadn't had anything to do for a while, so she had been clinging onto Koutarou's back, but that alone was getting tedious so she peeked at what was in Koutarou's hands.
“It's this”
“Monthly Professional Wrestling Magazine? So it's about professional wrestling?”
“Yup”
Sanae used her spiritual energy to manipulate Koutarou's hand to flip the pages. And after gazing at the contents of the magazine, she stopped on a certain page.
“Koutarou, I wanna try this move”
“The Scorpion Deathlock, huh?”
Sanae wanted to try out a certain wrestling hold.
The Scorpion Deathlock was performed by grabbing the legs of an opponent lying face down, and the bending your body. It was a relatively easy technique to pull off, even for an amateur, so it was an easy technique for Sanae, who knew next to nothing about professional wrestling, to try.
However, putting too much strength into this technique would cause the opponent to lose their breath, so it was important to be careful not to overdo it. But that wasn't a problem for Sanae. If the opponent was in pain, she could tell right away thanks to the change in their aura.
That was yet another reason why this technique would be a good choice for Sanae's first step into the wrestling world. Koutarou quickly agreed with her.
“Sounds fun. Let's try it”
“Yes!”
When Koutarou agreed, Sanae happily gave him a big nod.
“Okay, Koutarou, lie down”
“Okay”
Sanae smiled as she pointed at the tatami. Koutarou followed her directions and laid down on top of it.
“Hehehe~”
Sanae straddled down around the area over Koutarou's waist and peeked at the wrestling magazine lying down on the tea table. She then moved her hands as she began thinking of how the technique was pulled off.
“Sanae-chan, if Satomi-kun has a hard time breathing you have to stop right away, okay?”
Shizuka was well versed in martial arts, so she decided to at the very least give Sanae a warning. She knew of the risks involved in this technique. It was a technique that would cause injuries from time to time.
“Aha, it'll be fine. I won't do it to the point where Koutarou will be in pain”
However, Sanae had no intention on hurting Koutarou. In fact, she was fine as long as she could stick to him.
As of late, there had been drastic changes in the relationships between Koutarou and the people around him. On the surface, almost nothing has changed, but by looking at their auras, Sanae could see big differences in Theia, Ruth and Kiriha. The auras they were emitting were always gently enveloping Koutarou. Sanae couldn't tell what had caused this change, but she imagined that Theia and the others had deepened their bonds with Koutarou. Sanae couldn’t help but feel envious of them.
She felt like she was being left out, and she felt lonely about it. That was why she wanted to get along with Koutarou just as much as the others did, why she wanted to attract Koutarou's attention by sticking to him during this playful wrestling session.
“Here I go, Koutarou!”
“Yeah, give it all you've got”
“Ei!”
Sanae held Koutarou's leg and pulled, mimicking the magazine. As a result, Koutarou's body started looking like a scorpion's with his legs as its tail. But even then, Sanae took great care in managing her strength so that she didn't hurt Koutarou.
“How is it?”
“I can feel your back stretching and it feels great. But... I feel like it's a little different”
Sanae had tried hard, but she was still a girl and an amateur. She didn't have a good grasp on the technique and her hold was weak. The reason for this was because Sanae was using her spiritual energy to pull off the technique. Since the effects were played out the way she recognized them, she had a hard time properly reproducing a technique she wasn't used to.
“You have to interlock the legs”
“Like this?”
“No, not like that, like this”
“How about this?”
“Hmm... you're a bit on the way there, but...”
Koutarou tried to tell Sanae how to pull off the technique, but it was hard to explain while he was under her hold.
“Sanae, let's stop for a moment”
“Okay”
So Koutarou asked her to undo her hold for a moment so he could properly explain. He believed that would be faster.
“Yurika, Yurika”
Koutarou beckoned over Yurika who was nearby.
“Yef?”
Yurika stopped reading her shoujo manga and looked up. Since she was eating a rice cracker, her answer came out muffled.
“Could you lend me a hand for a moment?”
“Whaf ish iht?”
Since Yurika had been focused on her shoujo manga, she hadn't noticed what Koutarou and Sanae were doing. She approached the two while still eating her rice cracker.