This is a Win-Win!

The darkness, which even the flashlight beams couldn’t fully penetrate, slowly coiled around us like a suffocating, living fear.

I quickly analyzed the situation, my brain kicking into overdrive: “If someone just came in for a casual look, leaving a mineral water bottle is understandable. They bring it in, drink it, and toss it. But to leave behind an eaten instant noodle cup… that means the person also ate a meal here?”

Yukino, in a very feminine gesture, tucked a strand of her silky hair behind her delicate ear. She looked at the noodle cup with a detective’s calculating gaze. “No one just wandering in would be bored enough to eat a cup of noodles here.”

Saber, however, offered a different, more… enlightened perspective. She adjusted her shirt collar like a European gentleman, her brow slightly furrowed. “What if… this person finds it more satisfying to eat a cup of noodles in a girls’ dormitory than anywhere else?”

“Huh?” I didn’t get it. “What’s so satisfying about that?”

“For example,” Saber said, imitating a possible scenario in her moonlit-lake-like voice, her expression one of profound understanding, “the person might think, ‘With this fragrant scent of a girls’ dormitory, I can eat three more bowls of rice!’; or ‘I haven’t had much of an appetite lately, but a girls’ dormitory really has a better atmosphere for eating!’; or maybe, ‘Thinking about eating in a place where so many girls have slept makes this cup of noodles taste like it was made by a five-star chef!’.”

I was dumbfounded. “Only you would think that, right?! That’s a level of perversion beyond human comprehension!”

Saber puffed out her unremarkable chest, looking rather proud. “This is a pleasure that only a gentleman of culture can appreciate. You wouldn’t understand.”

“That’s not something to be proud of, is it??”

“Getting back to the point,” Yukino said, tossing the noodle cup aside and letting it roll into a corner with a clatter. “While we can’t rule out Saber’s possibility—after all, Saber is definitely not the only pervert in our school—the greater possibility is that someone is living in this abandoned girls’ dormitory, eating and drinking here, which is why they left behind the noodle cup and water bottle. It’s likely a homeless person or someone similar.”

“But,” I said, pointing my stream’s camera at the noodle cup for dramatic effect, “didn’t we just run into a guard? If a homeless person has been living here for a long time, there’s no way that guard wouldn’t have noticed, right?”

“So that guard is also a problem,” Yukino said, pushing up a pair of non-existent glasses on the bridge of her nose in the manner of a certain great detective. “It all happened so suddenly before, I didn’t put much thought into it. But thinking about it carefully now, I realize there are many problems with that ‘guard’. First, our school’s guards have uniforms, but that ojisan was wearing a faded T-shirt. Second, he told us, ‘What are you kids doing out here so late instead of being in your dorms?’, implying we should go back immediately. But in reality, it was midnight, and the dorms locked at 10. We couldn’t go back even if we wanted to, and he didn’t seem to know that. How could a guard not know? Lastly, this is an abandoned dormitory area with no infrastructure around. If he really was a guard, what was he doing patrolling such a desolate place?”

“You mean…” I had a sudden realization. “That ojisan wasn’t a guard at all, just a homeless person living here?”

Yukino nodded, her expression grim. “There’s a high probability of that.”

I glanced at the stream. The number of viewers was increasing, heading towards the 1000 mark. Many comments were floating by, all urging us to be careful:

[There’s a homeless person there? What if our onii-chan and nee-chan get captured by him?]

[“When we arrived at the scene, only this phone, still streaming, was left.”]

[I hope the stream stays on, so if that homeless person does something to our nee-chan, we can watch a little more.]

[Are you a pervert?! The homeless person is doing something to our nee-chan, and you’re just watching? At least send a donation!]

Damn it, are they really warning us?!

Why do I feel like all these comments are hoping for some kind of… JAV plot development?

“Actually,” Yukino’s faint voice came again, “I’ve been wanting to ask, why are you two hugging?”

“Huh?” I was flustered, looking left and right like a guilty character in a sitcom. “Who? Who’s hugging?!”

“You are!” Yukino raised her eyebrows and whisper-shouted, before immediately returning to her normal voice. “You and Exu, why are you secretly hugging? Is there something going on?”

Exusiai was not happy to hear this. She waved her hand and quickly denied it. “What are you talking about… I’m hugging him openly, where’s the ‘secretly’ part?!”

You’re not denying the ‘something going on’ part???

Isn’t your focus a little off??

“Forget it, I won’t get involved in you two’s business,” Yukino said, touching her smooth black hair with a hint of resignation, as if giving up on her degenerate friends.

It was Saber who offered a better suggestion. She looked at Yukino with her monocle-adorned, verdant eyes. “Yukino, I think as companions, since they’re already like this, we definitely can’t be the odd ones out.”

Yukino also turned to Saber. “…What are you trying to say?”

“Let’s… hug too!” Saber said with the solemnity of a wedding vow.

“Allow me to refuse! You’re just lusting after my body!!”

Yukino was utterly helpless. She felt that living in such a dorm, it was only a matter of time before she couldn’t escape her fate. But on second thought, it wasn’t exactly a loss for her either.

She once again held the flashlight’s beam like a sword of light and plunged into the darkness ahead. After a few steps, the light flashed, and a room on the right-hand side was actually open. The old wooden door was not only unlocked like the others, but wide open, as if inviting people in. On the far wall of the room, a square window was tightly shut, and the ghostly moonlight could be seen outside.

“Hm? There’s an open one?” I was slightly surprised, but also a little pleased. It was getting a bit boring being in a corridor with all the doors shut. Now we finally had a new environment to explore.

I walked in front, holding the phone that was streaming. Correction, I walked in front with Exusiai’s arm wrapped around my waist, the three bright flashlight beams illuminating the way for me.

This was an old-style dorm room, not like ours with loft beds, but with three sets of iron bunk beds, enough to sleep six people. Two bunk beds were against the left wall, one against the right. In the empty space was a metal locker, and in front of the locker was a trash can.

The beams of light shone quietly in the abandoned room. Wherever the light went, my phone’s camera followed. And when the pale beam pointed at the plastic trash can, my stream’s screen showed something dark inside it.

“Hm? The trash wasn’t emptied completely?”

I was a bit curious. I crouched down, holding my phone, and got closer. In the bright flashlight beam, at the bottom of the dark blue plastic trash can, was a tangled clump of…

…girl’s hair.