Chapter 34: Angel and the Christmas Present (1/2)

There were a few situations where the Angel nearly kicked up a fuss, but once she got back to gaming, she discarded all these thoughts and reverted to looking serious again.

She was starting to get used to the game, after stumbling around in the beginning, and finally could play a little, catching up to the pace.

It was because it was a different game from the one she played at first, a game of controlling a car.

She often crashed out of the course, into the mud  or into the wall, but she could drive the car forward.

He was worried that Mahiru, being bad at games, would have driven off in the opposite direction, but she was doing better than expected, and he felt relieved.

So he split the screen in half, joining in the game, but the subconscious gestures she did left him a little uncomfortable.

She seemed to have a tendency of tilting her body about, sometimes putting her head near his elbow, and then turning aside, repeating over and over again.

And whenever that happened, there was a nice smell , leaving him unable to remain calm.

Well, they were still racing at the lowest difficulty, so he was winning the entire time.

“…How are you so fast?”

“Got used to it.”

After playing a few times, he memorized the track, and the turns were easier. Even when the opponents were trying to obstruct, he could adjust his camera angles or the obstacles to stop them.

He showed a wry smile while Mahiru looked incredulous, before switching back to single player mode.

Considering her lack of experience, he felt she should practice more on a large screen. It was better for her to race against the CPU than to race him and lose confidence.

Luckily, she was still motivated, and kept staring at the monitor intently even in single player mode

If she kept this up, she should be able to deal with the CPU players, somehow.

He was relieved to see that her status as a hard work applied on games too, and snickered away. It seemed Mahiru had realized this too, as she slapped him on the thigh a few times.

The humorous reaction had him chortling, and so she frowned, muttering “Amane-kun no baka”.

“I won.”

It took her at least two hours.

Mahiru stared intently at the glowing words indicating she was first, and looked towards Amane proudly.

After a long battle against the TV, she won the glorious first place.

After countless experiences of being last, she kept standing on the race tracks despite coming in last several times, slowly improved her rankings, and finally won. Surely she was really moved.

I finally did it, so the proud expression on her face, and Amane earnestly applauded her.

“That’s great. I saw your hard work.”

“Yes.”

She was happy to be praised, and looked bashful, her usual expression softening a little.

It was not a simple obvious, smile, but one filled with utter, faint elation. It was so unimaginably sweet compared to the usual aloofness she showed.

Recently, her aloof face would show an expression befitting a girl her age, but on this day, this expression was more fitting than usual, and was overwhelmingly adorable.

It was an innocent, pure smile, eroding away at Amane’s sanity, and the desire to pat her on the head arose.

His mind unwittingly ordered his arm as it went along with the impulse to pat her like a kitten…before he hurriedly retracted the hand he unwittingly raised.

“What is it?”

“Ahh not. Just think that you played too much.”

“Have I improved?”

“Yep yep. A lot better than when you first started.”

“Thank you very much. I enjoyed myself, and started working hard.”

Fufu, so Mahiru chuckled, but Amane could not continue to look at her as he tried to disguise his motive, taking out a little box from a basket in a cupboard.

“Here’s your reward for coming in first.”

“Eh, erm, there is no need for that.”

“If you don’t want a reward, just take it that you got it from a certain fat white bearded grandpa.”

Yes, it was the Christmas present he had forgotten to give the previous day.

It was difficult for him to choose a present, given how close her birthday was to Christmas, but he so happened to fancy an item, and did not suffer as much as he did for her birthday.

Once she heard the words Christmas present, it appeared she was reminded that it was Christmas as she blinked away a few times, before cautiously receiving the item.

You can open it now, so he said, and she cautiously unpacked the item.