When we arrived at the hot spring, Kaguya and Yuzuru were already waiting for us.
“Kaguya? Yuzuru?”
“Hieta, Shido. I shall allow you to purify the filth of darkness that has accumulated upon your souls.”
“What are you even talking about...?”
“Ah, she means take a bath.”
It was something I intended to do anyway, but with them standing right there, I couldn’t shake a weirdly unpleasant feeling.
Still, I needed to bathe, so I headed through the entrance marked with the blue curtain that read 男 for men.
“Oh, wow. It’s wide open.”
The bath was an open-air space, save for the entrance and the wall separating it from the women’s side.
Of course, the area was surrounded by rocks and landscaping to ensure privacy from the outside.
Even so, the ocean was clearly visible; it seemed the designers wanted guests to enjoy the hot springs while taking in the scenery.
Looking at the bath, I felt that coming here had been the right call.
“Shall we go in now?”
“Yeah. Let’s go.”
We washed ourselves first, then stepped into the bath.
The moment I entered, I let my body go slack and groaned, “Aaaah... It feels like my mental fatigue is just melting away...”
In Dark Souls, HP is essentially a measure of mental fortitude. In other words, when a player controls the protagonist and takes a hit from an enemy, the reason the HP bar drops is that the character's mental strength is being chipped away.
And Estus is the recovery item that restores that mental strength.
So, what happens when those mechanics are mixed with reality?
I lose HP if I get hit, and I lose HP if I’m mentally worn out.
Pure bullshit, plain and simple.
But looking at it another way, when my mental state recovers, my HP recovers too.
Right now, after Kaguya and Yuzuru had clung to me earlier, the HP that had been dropping in real time was now climbing back up just as quickly.
“Huh? Hieta, you’re glowing faintly.”
Shido's question wasn’t strange at all.
In Dark Souls, when HP is restored, the character emits a faint glow.
“Ahh... That’s because I’m being healed...”
“No, what kind of fantasy is that? You heal and light just pours out of your body?”
“Isn’t the existence of spirits already fantasy enough...?”
“...Yeah, fair.”
Shido said that as if he’d just realized something.
Only now? To me, this place already felt no different from a fantasy world.
Anyway, I spent a little while enjoying the bath while chatting with Shido, until the entrance door opened and two figures stepped inside.
“Why are you two coming in...!”
The two figures who had entered the men’s bath were Kaguya and Yuzuru.
They sat down beside me, wearing nothing but a single towel.
Naturally, that meant my HP started dropping in real time again.
“Shido, help me...”
“Sorry.”
I tried to send out a desperate plea for help, but Shido had already drifted far away from me.
“How is it? No matter how much you struggle, you’ll have no choice but to kneel before my charm.”
“Mockery. Charm? Kaguya possessing such a thing is news to me.”
“Hmph. I’ll make you cry soon enough.”
“Acknowledged. That is exactly what I wish to see.”
“Please!!!”
It was bad enough that both of them were pressed up against me, but then they started bickering, causing my HP to plummet even faster.
“This is the men’s bath...!!! Even if it's empty this early, women aren't supposed to be in here!”
Even Shido, who had retreated to the other side of the pool and was staring intently at the ceiling, quietly nodded in agreement.
But as if enjoying my reaction, they clung to me even tighter and whispered in my ear.
“You’d better prepare yourself, Hieta. I’ll drown you in my supreme charm and turn you into a man who can no longer be satisfied without me.”
“Denial. Hieta will become a captive of Yuzuru’s body.”
Between the pressure of their arms wrapped around me and the whispers in my ear, my HP was now dropping as if I’d been poisoned.
I hurriedly tried to pull my arms free to pull an Estus from my inventory, but they were gripping me too tightly. All I could do was watch my HP get shredded to pieces.
“Please, please let go of my arms...”
“I cannot. If I did, I wouldn’t be able to make Hieta fall for my charm.”
“Denial. As I said, Kaguya has no charm.”
“Stop putting ‘charm’ in quotes!”
Ah, I was reaching my limit.
I could see my HP inching closer and closer to zero.
Fssshhh...
“H-Hieta?!”
“Shock. Hieta has turned to ash.”
In the end, with all my HP gone, I turned to ash and floated on the surface of the hot spring.
“W-what do we do...?”
“Hieta, snap out of it!”
Somehow, even though I’d become ash, all my senses except touch and taste remained intact.
“Wow, the sky is really beautiful. Unlike my current situation.”
My field of vision was now angled up at the sky from the spot where I’d disintegrated, and sound reached me from my original position.
But then, the movement of the water as Shido rushed over to me caused the sound to drift, and my vision began to spin until I felt like I was going to throw up.
“Good thing I don’t have a mouth. If I did, I would’ve puked.”
As I was thinking that, the scenery in front of me suddenly shifted.
The sky was yanked away at high speed, and before long, my vision returned to what it had been before I turned to ash.
“Ah, I’m revived.”
“Yuzuru, does it make sense for a normal human to turn to ash and then just revive...?”
“Denial. That is not a human.”
The two of them seemed shocked by seeing me revive for the first time, and they began questioning each other.
Taking advantage of the distraction while my arms were free, I secretly pulled an Estus from my inventory and held it in my hand.
“Come to think of it, it’s kind of like a phoenix.”
Shido muttered this after watching me reappear.
The problem was that his comment drew everyone’s attention back to him.
Feeling the stares, he scratched his cheek and continued.
“I mean... A phoenix leaves ash behind after it dies, right? And then it revives from that spot... Hieta’s the same, so...”
Hearing that, the two of them looked at each other, nodded, and then turned to me.
“As expected, the human chosen by this body is no ordinary man. A phoenix, of all things! More than enough to serve me!”
“Denial. Hieta will choose Yuzuru, not Kaguya.”
Now I wasn’t being mistaken for a spirit anymore. I was being mistaken for a phoenix.
I already hated being mistaken for a spirit, and now I’d become something even more fantastical.
I was starting to think I should just let them believe it, because correcting them sounded like far too much work.
“Hmph. In any case, Hieta will serve me. So I shall be merciful. Yuzuru, I permit you to tempt Hieta first.”
“Denial. Not necessary. If anything, Kaguya is the one who needs a handicap.”
“Sigh... Can’t someone just go first?”
I desperately wanted this to end so I could go back to the room.
I’d come to the hot spring to relieve mental fatigue, but thanks to these two, instead of easing up, the stress was only piling higher.
“Fine. Watch closely.”
In the end, Kaguya decided to tempt me first.
Kaguya stood up, placing one hand behind her head and the other over her chest.
That unexpectedly alluring pose made me immediately bury my face in the bath water.
Splash!
“H-Hieta?!”
“Heh heh.”
“W-what! Why are both of you acting like that!”
Kaguya, apparently embarrassed by the pose she’d just struck, wrapped her arms around herself and hurriedly sat back down.
“Mockery. So Kaguya’s charm is different, huh? Hieta couldn’t bear to look and buried his face in the bath.”
“W-what?! You’re the one who doesn’t even know how to do it!”
When I lifted my face out of the water, Yuzuru looked irritated by Kaguya’s words.
“Denial. That is incorrect.”
“Then show me!”
“Acknowledged. Very well.”
Yuzuru came over to me and brought both hands up to her lips.
“Nosebleed. Chu.”
Then she reached those hands out toward me, and honestly, I had no idea what she was trying to achieve.
“Kya-hahahaha! What was that! Was that supposed to cause a nosebleed?”
“Disappointment. Is that really something Kaguya should be saying?”
The moment Yuzuru’s attempt at seduction ended, the two of them looked ready to fight again. I stepped between them to stop it.
“That’s enough. Everyone has their own charm. In my eyes, both of you are beautiful, so please stop fighting.”
At my words, both of them stopped mid-sentence. I felt Shido looking at me with a very dry expression, but I ignored him and finished what I had to say.
“And also, this is the men’s bath, so please leave.”
“What are you talking about, Hieta?”
“Denial. There’s no need to worry.”
“What do you me—”
Before I could finish, the door opened and a woman’s voice rang out.
“Mm! I’m first!”
It was none other than Tohka, who had just barged into the men’s bath.
“Kyaaa!”
“Aaaagh!”
“T-Tohka! Why are you coming in here!”
I was about to yell at her for the intrusion, but after hearing her response, I was speechless.
“W-what are you talking about! I came to the red side like the girls said! Why are you all here, then? Shido, Hieta!”
A terrible feeling washed over me.
The curtains at the hot spring could be switched.
“No way...!”
“I switched the curtain at the entrance before you came in.”
“Correction. I switched it back after we came in.”
Which meant this had originally been the women’s bath.
“Whaaaaat—!”
And just as I realized that, the door opened again and the voices of the other girls came flooding in.
“Damn it! Itsuka-kun! I’m sorry!”
“H-Hieta?!!!”
I immediately hoisted Shido over one shoulder, grabbed a longsword in my other hand, and jumped off the cliff.
“Aaaagh!”
“Please hold on!”
As we fell, I drove the longsword into the wall.
Kakakakakak!
With the sound of stone and metal grinding together, our falling speed gradually slowed, and our plunge finally came to a stop.
“Huuuu...”
“How are we supposed to get back now...?”
The problem was that the ocean was directly below us; if we fell, we’d have no choice but to swim back to the room naked.
And our clothes were still in the changing room.
“Forget it. I’ll just tell Mr. Murasame.”
If it was Mr. Murasame, our capable interpreter, he’d figure something out.
“No choice! Itsuka-kun! We’re diving!”
“W-wait a secaaaaaa!!!”
With Shido’s scream, we plunged into the sea.
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