“He was the one who confessed to me,” Yui answered confidently without a moment’s delay. Since this was all one big lie anyway, Yuuki didn’t particularly sweat the details. However, he did notice that Yui seemed particularly set on that specific part of their fake relationship.
“It was Yukkie who confessed? Really? Hmm. Oh, oh! Does this have something to do with those texts you guys were sending each other the other day?!”
“Nope,” Yuuki promptly refuted. He figured that Mina wouldn’t let him hear the end of it if she thought that her questionable texts were the catalyst for their brand-new relationship. Ultimately, he decided on denying it altogether, “Oh actually, speaking of those messages—”
“Th-Those texts had nothing to do with it! Nothing at all!” Yui suddenly interrupted. Yuuki wondered why her face was flushed, or why she had gotten so worked up about it. After all, those texts had actually been just between their sisters.
“So I guess Yukkie really did end up confessing, huh? How’d you break it to her?” Mina asked yet another dreadful question. Yuuki turned to Yui for help a second time. However, it appeared that he’d used up all of his lifelines, and Yui looked away from him.
Guess I’m on my own, he thought before saying, “I went up to her and said something along the lines of: ‘I love you, Yui. Please go out with me.’”
Out of the corner of his eye, Yuuki saw Yui do some esoteric gesture involving her chin and her hand. Clearly she was giving him some sort of sign, but he couldn’t understand what it meant. Unfortunately, the pair had failed to get their stories straight prior to meeting Mina.
“Oooh! And she accepted your confession right away?” Mina continued.
“Y-Yeah... He was pretty persistent, and eventually led to me giving in to his enthusiasm,“ Yui explained.
Yuuki didn’t exactly appreciate the fact she kept adding peculiar details about how exactly it happened. He suspected that she thought it made the story sound more believable, but whatever the case was, he was about to lay down the truth for Mina.
“So yeah. That’s how we ended up as a couple. I kept my part of the deal. Now it’s your turn. Make some friends, Mina,” he said.
“Hmm. I dunno if I believe it.”
“What’s so hard to believe?”
“Talk is cheap, Yukkie. I need to know if she’s worthy of being your girlfriend in terms of soul, skill, and body. So I’ll be testing her now,” Mina explained, then asked them to follow her. She never once looked at Yui when saying that, so Yuuki assumed that she still felt uncomfortable having a conversation with Yui.
“Sounds fun!” Yui exclaimed. She sounded willing, as opposed to a certain unamused Yuuki. Yui was in such a great mood, in fact, that she’d already followed Mina in a brisk trot before Yuuki had managed to register what was going on.
Where is she gonna lead us to? Yuuki wondered as he caught up with them. They had arrived in front of Mina’s room, and Mina flung open the door and pointed inside.
“I will test the purity of your heart first. In other words, I want to make sure there is no underlying darkness looming deep within your soul. Soyeahpleasecleanmyroomthanks,” Mina said.
Yuuki couldn’t for the life of him understand how cleaning her room was a good purity test. It had been a while since Yuuki had properly been in Mina’s room, and he was unpleasantly surprised by the amount of clutter and junk scattered about. There were dirty tissues everywhere, leftover candy dispersed atop the desk, some food scraps on the carpet, not to mention issues of manga and random magazines tossed onto every available surface. It was more mess than room at this point. Mina was obviously just trying to trick Yui into tidying up her room for her.
“You think you’re up for the task? Hehe,” Mina chuckled with her chest puffed out, apparently proud of her unclean room.
“This is nothing compared to my sister’s room,” Yui nonchalantly revealed, not showing even a hint of surprise while she looked around the space.
“Seriously?” Yuuki questioned, just as taken aback as his sister was.
“Yup. I just have to clean it, right?” Yui got to cleaning without so much as waiting for a response. Yuuki was impressed by how fast she was able to stuff all the garbage into a big plastic bag that Mina had so helpfully provided. “It’s best to tidy up books and such before we start to vacuum.”
It was apparent that she was used to cleaning, and before long, she had collected all the trash and piled up all the manga and magazines in one place. She noticed that she missed one that had been tucked under the table and squatted down to retrieve it.
“Oh, is that the The Fission Quintuplets? Are you into it, Mina?” Yui inquired.
“Y-Yeah, so?” Mina responded.
“Me too! I didn’t know the latest volume dropped!” Yui said excitedly.
Mina had just bought this volume yesterday. According to her, it was one of her favorites. She’d spoken very passionately about it on their way home yesterday, but since Yuuki hadn’t read it himself, all he could do was just nod along to whatever she said.
Mina was extremely timid by nature, but that often got thrown right out the window once she found someone she could chat about her hobbies with. Yui also remained engaged in the conversation, keeping true to her self-proclaimed title as the kind and caring older sister. They were having tons of fun as their lively discussion continued, so much so that the indifferent Yuuki himself wanted to take part in the action.
“So what’s it about?” he asked.
“Some guy wakes up one day to find that his little sister has split into five different people! I still haven’t finished it, but it’s pretty fun so far!” Yui explained.
“Very unrealistic. How can one brother take care of five rascals? Poor guy would die from exhaustion.”
“Hey, what’re you lookin’ at me for?!” Mina protested, whacking her brother on his shoulders with both hands.
Yuuki delved into deep thought for a moment and wondered what would become of him if that same blow was multiplied fivefold. I’d probably be plunged into the wall and end up severely and irreparably injured, he concluded.
“Don’t knock it ‘til you try it, Yukkie!” Mina admonished. She plucked a volume from the bookshelf and thrust it at Yuuki.
“Aww, I want to read one too. Can I?” Yui asked, pointing at the volume in her hand.
“Sure can! I’ll read it with you!” Mina happily agreed as they both took a seat on a cushion to read the latest volume together. “You start with that first volume, okay, Yukkie?”
Yuuki did as he was told and sat down to read the manga. They had long forgotten about cleaning Mina’s room and became immersed in a good reading session, as if they had just formed an impromptu manga reading club.
“Now then,” Mina declared after a while, slapping her manga volume shut, “let’s move on to the next test. Chosen One, now that I know your soul is pure, I need to ensure that your skills are honed. And by skills, I of course mean... cooking!” It looked as though she’d gotten so engrossed in reading that she’d totally forgotten about the trials that she’d meant to put Yui through. And so everybody returned to the living room again.
Mina concluded that anyone who could enjoy manga must possess a pure soul, bringing that portion of the test to an end. Besides, it appeared that bonding over manga worked surprisingly well as an ice-breaker; Mina was now able to look Yui in the face and speak to her directly.