Chapter 59 Beach Party: Truth or Dare

The tennis team has been training intensively at the beach courts for four days straight, leaving early and returning late.

Meanwhile, Asuka, Chinatsu, and Yuzuki spent their time in the waves, except for helping out at the seaside diner during peak hours.

With filming for "Blue Bird" about to begin, Risa is either studying the script in her hotel room or analyzing the subtext of her character under a parasol, the script covered in colorful highlighters.

As evening fell, the afterglow bathed the entire room in an orange-red hue.

Where must I fly to find my own blue sky?

Risa was practicing in front of the mirror when there was a knock on the door.

Thump thump thump—!

"Risa-senpai~" Chinatsu's energetic voice came from outside the door, "The beach party is about to begin!"

"If we don't go now, Kirihara-kun will eat all the watermelons!" Asuka added.

"Okay! You guys go ahead, I'll be right there!"

Risa closed the script, slipped on her sandals, and went to the 28th floor first.

"Pocky sticks, orange soda, Ponta, and even canned yellow peaches, that's rare..." My fingertips kept pressing the selection buttons, and I bought a whole bunch of snacks.

On a July night, the sea breeze, carrying the salty taste of the tide, swept across the beach.

Risa stood at the edge of the beach, clutching a bag of snacks she had just bought, looking around.

"Ah, here they come!" Kirihara's boyish voice mingled with the sound of waves.

All eyes immediately turned to them.

Risa looked up and saw a group of boys and girls sitting in a circle.

Warm, fine sand beneath our feet, and a deep blue sky studded with stars overhead. The streetlights along the nearby seaside promenade cast a soft glow on everyone's silhouettes.

When Yukimura looked at her, she was also looking at him. Their eyes met in mid-air, then simultaneously looked away.

That night on the 28th floor, after sharing a secret, the two had been busy with their own lives and had barely seen each other. The subtle distance that had arisen after four days of not seeing each other made her heart skip a beat.

"Risa-chan~" Asuka patted the empty seat next to her, a glint of light flashing in her glasses, "I saved this seat especially for you~"

"Here, here! Risa-nee, sit over here!" Kirihara waved his Pocky stick like an enthusiastic large dog.

The two branching paths are like a game panel unfolding in front of Risa:

A. The scheming area reflected in Asuka's glasses (Next seat: Yukimura Seiichi)

B. Akaya's safe zone (next seat: Niou Masaharu)

Risa chose option B without hesitation.

"Sorry, Asuka." She jogged across the beach to the empty seat next to Akaya.

They didn't notice the momentary dark look in Yukimura's eyes, or the sly smile that suddenly appeared on Niou's lips.

Risa was wearing a light pink sleeveless hooded sweatshirt with a slightly long hem, revealing only a bit of her pleated skirt.

As she sat down, she tugged at the hem of her overly long sweatshirt, crossed her legs, and let the hem of her pleated skirt fall onto the sand.

"You really want to sit next to me that much, Risa-chan~" The silver-haired boy tilted his head, his dark blue fox eyes narrowing slightly.

Risa rolled her eyes and retorted to the white fox with a single, unceremonious word: "Get lost (ノ｀Д)ノ".

"Whoa, how scary~" Niou pretended to be scared and leaned back.

"Now that everyone's here, well~" Asuka pushed up her glasses, raised her soda bottle, "Hell Game, let's begin!"

...

After several rounds of the game...

The bottle spun on the fine sand, and the glass refracted light spots.

Glug...glug...

The soda bottle traced the final half-circle on the fine sand, stopping precisely where it landed on Risa.

"Eh—it's me again?" Risa cupped her face in her hands, blinking her big eyes in disbelief.

This is the eleventh time.

The scene of punishment just now is still vivid in my mind.

Asuka laid out a stack of punishment cards, and the one she drew was: "Confess to your favorite person of the opposite sex present."

Fortunately, she cleverly found a loophole and chose seaweed: "Akaya is the cutest, Risa-nee loves you so much!"

He successfully moved the innocent seaweed to tears, and she vowed to protect him for the rest of her life.

Those who had come expecting a good show were instead treated to a tale of "sibling affection." Asuka, in particular, was greatly disappointed and quickly revised the rules of the punishment cards.

At that moment, Asuka's ghostly voice rang out again: "This is fate, Risa-chan." She pushed up her reflective glasses and laid out the punishment card she had prepared beforehand.

Risa felt a chill run down her spine. Her gaze swept over the crowd:

Sitting to her left, Xiao Haidai looked at her with a worried expression. Sanada remained expressionless as always, and Yanagi Renji had already opened his notebook.

The jackal was holding a piece of cake, while Marui Bunta next to her was blowing on his chewing gum and looking at her with a gossipy gaze.

Yukimura sat directly opposite her, his purple eyes smiling, yet he inexplicably made her feel pressured.

Yuzuki sat between Asuka and Chinatsu, Chinatsu grinning mischievously with a gossipy expression. Niou Masaharu tilted his head, his fox-like eyes narrowing, his wicked intentions all too obvious.

If I choose dare again this time, I'm afraid these guys will exploit me to the point of ruin.

“...Truth or dare.” Risa raised her hands in surrender. “I choose truth or dare.”

Asuka clicked her tongue and put away the punishment card in disappointment.

"Hey, Matsuno-kun—"

Marui Bunta asked, "What kind of guy do you like?"

Risa paused, her ears inexplicably burning: "Eh? Why are you asking this all of a sudden... I... I hadn't thought about that before."

"Then think about it now!" Niou Masaharu leaned in, only to be slapped back by Risa.

Even if I suddenly think of...

"You don't have to answer." Liu Lian'er calmly brought out a cup of green liquid. "Drink the punishment tea."

Risa swallowed hard: "...Please spare me."

"Older or younger?" Niou Masaharu waved his phone flashlight, the light shining on his already pale face, making the little seaweed next to him tremble in fear.

"Hmm..." Risa finally gave in to Yanagi Juice, "An age difference of up to three years is fine."

“But they must be adults,” she added.

"Wow~" Marui blew a bubble gum and glanced at the frozen boys. "Congratulations, everyone, you're all out of the game."

The waves crashed against the beach, and the sound of the tide murmured in the distance.

"Anything else?" Yukimura asked abruptly.

"Ah...do I still need to say it?" Risa bit her lip, racking her brains as she counted on her fingers.

"It has to be beautiful... gentle, strong... able to withstand my brilliance, and also willing to embrace my messiness."

"OK, that's it for this part." Asuka didn't hear what she wanted to hear and continued with the Q process.

The soda bottle continued to spin on the sand, and after several rounds, when the bottle stopped, it once again pointed at Risa.

Risa: "..."

She suspected she had been set up.

"Truth or dare?" asked Yanagi Renji. "Or... Yanagi juice?"

Risa: "...Can I not choose?"

Liu Lian'er exuded an overwhelming sense of pressure: "No."

Risa clicked her tongue: "Truth or dare."

Liu Lian'er opened the notebook and said calmly, "Please tell me a secret that no one else knows."

Wow!

Asuka gave Renji Yanagi a thumbs up: "As expected of the strategist, that's a really explosive question!"

Everyone joined in the commotion, and even the usually composed Sanada raised an eyebrow slightly.

Risa put down the half-eaten watermelon and took a tissue to wipe her mouth.

“If I were to say it…” She lowered her eyes, her long eyelashes obscuring the emotions within them, “it might cause some unforeseen consequences.”

"Could it be some kind of R-rated content?" Marui Bunta blew a pink bubble, then quickly inhaled it before it burst.

Niou Masaharu tilted his head, a playful smile on his lips: "Puri~ Please feel free to speak up, don't disappoint us."

The sea breeze suddenly intensified, blowing the girl's hair into disarray and obscuring half of her face.

When Risa raised her head again, everyone was stunned—

Her eyes were vacant, and an unnatural smile curled at the corners of her mouth. In an instant, her entire demeanor transformed from that of a bright young girl into that of a cold machine.

"Hey, have you ever thought that there are countless parallel worlds outside of our world?"

Risa's voice was mechanical and cold, completely lacking the natural pitch variation of human speech.

The air seemed to freeze for a moment.

Kirihara Akaya, standing beside him, gaped. Marui Bunta's bubblegum burst, smearing his face with it. Yanagi Renji's pen stopped on the paper, leaving a small blot of ink. The others also widened their eyes slightly.

The girl's mechanical voice continued:

"In the vast universe, parallel worlds are as numerous as the bubbles in this bottle of carbonated drink. Some worlds are engulfed in war, some are filled with peace and prosperity, and some... are like puppets, controlled by beings of higher dimensions."

The sea breeze suddenly became fierce, making the air rustle.

"Perhaps in some higher-dimensional world, our existence is nothing more than a work of entertainment for them: a comic book, a novel, an anime, or a movie."

"Actually, my secret that no one knows is that I have memories of my past life."

The girl's head suddenly tilted to one side, and her eyes blinked a few times at a fixed frequency.

The flickering beams of the coastal lighthouse amplified the eerie atmosphere, making it even more unsettling.

"In that world, the world we live in is just a comic book, a sports comic book about tennis, and all of you here..."

Her gaze, devoid of its former brilliance, swept blankly across everyone's faces. That mechanical coldness made everyone unconsciously hold their breath.

"All of you here are fictional characters created by a human named... a comic artist..."

Each keyword was preceded by a subtle pause, accompanied by her blinking, much like the delay in the output of code.

The July night breeze suddenly stopped for a moment.

The lighthouse beam suddenly swept over and struck the girl. Her face was deathly pale, her eyes were empty and lifeless, and she remained motionless in that eerie posture.

The silence lasted for about five seconds.

"Aaaaaaaahhhhh!"

The seaweed closest to Risa emitted a piercing roar and frantically rubbed against the vice minister next to her.

"How terrifying—Risa-nee is broken!"

Sanada frowned, but did not shake him off.

The others were initially shaken, but Kirihara Akaya's startling scream made them breathe a sigh of relief.

"What a wonderful impromptu performance, Matsuno-kun," Yukimura said with a smile, drawing everyone's attention.

"However, you can't just make up such a scary story to frighten everyone!"

"Yukimura-kun thinks..."

Her head turned towards Yukimura at an odd angle, her hair falling down to cover half of her face.

Am I lying?

"Puri~" Niou leaned against the sand behind Risa with one hand, a sly smile on his face. "If this is the case, then every word we say now is part of some 'author's' script?"

Renji Yanagi: "From a probabilistic standpoint, the likelihood of this hypothesis being true is 0.00001%. However, if we introduce the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, theoretically—"

“…Wait!” Marui Bunta interrupted Yanagi Renji, his tone unusually serious. “If that’s really the case, then what about our wins and losses in the various competitions we’ve participated in…”

"It was all destined." The girl turned her gaze to the red-haired boy, a strange smile playing on her lips.

Sanada's brows furrowed deeply, his jawline taut. His Adam's apple bobbed violently, as if he were forcibly suppressing some surging emotion.

"If that's really the case..." Niou lazily trailed off, "I'll definitely be the most popular character~piyo~"

"Narcissist," Asuka muttered, pushing up her glasses.

Hearing his seniors say this, Kirihara Akaya forgot his earlier fear. He grabbed Risa's arm and shook it, his emerald eyes shining brightly: "What about me? Risa-nee? Am I going to become Japan's number one tennis player?"

"And me," Marui Bunta grinned, pointing to himself, "Will I open an amazing dessert shop in Ginza in the future? Preferably one that wins an international award!"

"I'm sorry, everyone..."

The girl's voice remained emotionless, only her eyelashes trembled slightly.

"In that world, I didn't live to witness your future."

She paused for a second, then the mechanical voice continued:

"I didn't even get to see your current future."

A deathly silence.

“In other words,” Liu Lianji said quietly, “you cannot provide any verifiable evidence.”

"Yes...it cannot be proven."

“I see.” Liu Lianji closed his notebook. “This hypothesis seems reasonable. But there is a fundamental paradox.”

Everyone: "???"

Liu Lianer slightly opened her eyes: "If this world is a creation of a higher-dimensional being, then why are you, also a higher-dimensional being, bound by the laws of this fictional world?"

The girl did not answer. Her gaze slowly swept over everyone, finally settling on Liu Lian'er.

"As expected of a strategist. He found the loophole so quickly."

In an instant, the girl snapped out of her "mechanical mode." The warm-smiling Risa returned to everyone's sight once more.

Niou Masaharu narrowed his eyes. "So, Risa-chan was just playing a trick on us?"

"Huh?" Risa spread her hands and blinked innocently. "Mr. Conman only realized it now? That's surprising."

"What?! It was all an act?!" Kirihara Akaya clutched his chest, panting heavily. "Risa-nee, you're so mean! I really thought we were living in some horror movie!"

Sanada crossed his arms and nodded, a rare occurrence for him. "Your acting has improved; it's more natural than during the ambassador selection competition."

Risa: "......"

(This way of praising is just... so Sanada-esque.)

Jackal Kuwabara scratched his bald head, seemingly lost in thought, and said, "However, this setting is quite interesting... If the world really was created by some higher-dimensional being, then wouldn't our lives be like a script that's been written at will?"

Yukimura adjusted his coat over his shoulders and smiled slightly. "But whether this world is real or fictional, at least we who are sitting here right now are real."

“That’s right,” Sanada replied in a deep voice. “Instead of getting caught up in vague assumptions, we should focus on the present.”

“So—” Yukimura clapped his hands lightly, a gentle smile appearing in his eyes, “Based on the above reasoning, Matsuno-kun’s round of the ‘game’ is invalid.”

He leaned slightly forward, his voice soft yet firm: "As punishment, for the next round... you must choose Truth or Dare."

"Eh—" Risa protested, drawing out her words. Seeing everyone's uncompromising expressions, she had no choice but to compromise. "Okay, okay, dare it is."

The bottle spun again, and when it stopped, it pointed at Liu Lian'er.