Chapter 783: The Success Rate of Holding One in Each Arm
Chapter 783: The Success Rate of Holding One in Each Arm
Of course, as delightful as the idea of holding one in each arm was, although Kotomi Izumi had always yearned for it in her heart and had probed in various ways hoping to try it out, she had yet to succeed in openly and legitimately embracing two girls at once.
Kotomi Izumi currently had two girlfriends, Megumi Kato and Yui Yuigahama.
It wasn’t as though she had never considered holding both Megumi and Yui in her arms at the same time. She had even carefully calculated the probability of success in her mind.
To be honest, if Kotomi Izumi devoted even a fraction of the obsession she had for holding one in each arm to studying mathematics, she could probably win a Gauss Prize at the International Congress of Mathematicians after just four years.
However, Kotomi Izumi had no interest in winning any mathematics awards. She preferred researching how to naturally, successfully, and openly achieve the feat of holding one in each arm.
After all, even with her enhanced learning ability, she still disliked math class. The moment she listened to a math lecture, she felt sleepy.
Back to the point. After calculating the success rate of holding Megumi and Yui in each arm, Kotomi Izumi discovered that... the probability was minuscule.
Not to say it was 0%, but at the very least, the current probability didn’t even reach single digits.
In Kotomi’s view, Yui was actually manageable. Even without confessing her... ahem, more broad-minded approach to love, she could probably succeed just by making up a casual excuse.
For example: "Yui, I suddenly feel like trying the sensation of wrapping one arm around someone. Can you let me hold you for a bit?"
After holding her, she could smoothly add, "I’m using my left arm to hold you, but my right arm feels kind of empty and uncomfortable. Can I use my right arm to hold another girl? Don’t worry, I don’t have any ulterior motives. My intentions are pure. It just feels wrong to let my right hand hang there empty. After all, my right hand is my closest partner~"
Given Yui Yuigahama’s personality, although she would feel a little jealous, if it was something Kotomi requested, she would probably still nod and agree.
At most, after seeing Kotomi hold another girl with the same ease, she might feel jealous and overthink things.
But those were minor issues. Kotomi prided herself on having ample experience in dealing with Yui’s jealousy and tendency to spiral. Afterward, she could simply find a separate moment to coax Yui a little.
After all, Yui was very easy to coax~
So when Kotomi calculated the success rate of holding one in each arm, she barely factored Yui into the equation. Most of her thoughts and calculations were spent on Megumi Kato.
Even so, after extensive calculations and speculation, the final success rate she arrived at was—0%!
If Kotomi wanted to hold one in each arm, no matter who the two girls were, as long as Megumi Kato was one of them, the probability of success was 0%! Absolutely no room for negotiation! In fact, if Kotomi even brought up the idea to Megumi, whether she would be able to finish her sentence... and whether she could guarantee her own life afterward... were both questionable.
Experience shapes thinking. If she had never been stabbed by Megumi with a kitchen knife before, perhaps the success rate she calculated now wouldn’t be high—but it certainly wouldn’t be as low as 0%.
Kotomi considered many possibilities in her mind. At first, everything seemed fine, but the moment she thought of Megumi, what surfaced in her imagination was not a beautiful scene of holding two girls in her arms, but rather...
Blood and tears sliding down Megumi’s cheeks as she watched Kotomi collapse into a pool of blood, her life force gradually draining away, her eyes growing hollow and lifeless.
Megumi wore an expression that looked like she was crying, yet also smiling faintly, as she raised a blood-soaked kitchen knife.
The blade, drenched in fresh blood, occasionally let droplets fall to the ground, making a drip drip sound.
Then Megumi murmured softly:
"Kotomi, since when did you start becoming disobedient? But it’s alright. I’ll gently and patiently correct you, little by little, you naughty little angel, until you become the obedient baby you were when we first fell in love~ Hehe... I’ll need to apply some special treatment. After all, I still plan to keep holding you while we sleep in the future."
At that thought, Kotomi couldn’t help but shiver. It was clearly just a hypothetical scenario she had imagined, yet for some reason it felt so vivid, so immersive.
And so, driven by her survival instincts screaming constant warnings in her heart, Kotomi decisively gave up...
Of course, she hadn’t given up on the idea of holding one in each arm altogether.
She had merely temporarily given up on holding Megumi and Yui at the same time, planning to find a more suitable time and opportunity in the future to try again.
Kotomi thought to herself: If I find another girlfriend, wouldn’t I be able to hold one in each arm more safely?
It was fine before she thought about it. But once the idea entered her mind, the more she considered it, the more reasonable it seemed. She even felt that the flexibility of her thinking—being able to shift directions so cleverly—proved she was practically a little genius!
She was already starting to admire herself.
Wait, no. As a beautiful girl who could stand in front of a mirror admiring herself for an incredibly long time—her record being three full hours—and whose narcissism level was MAX, Kotomi Izumi had always admired herself. She even thought that if she ever learned how to create a clone, the first thing she would do would be to marry herself!
Incidentally, her favorite activity while admiring herself in the mirror was to repeatedly recite the "Three Poems of Qingping Tune," which she had already memorized countless times.
"Clouds imagine her garments, flowers imagine her face. The spring breeze brushes the railing, the dew glistens richly. If not seen atop Mount Jade, she would be encountered beneath the moon at the jeweled terrace."
As for why her record for admiring herself in the mirror was three hours?
Naturally, it was because after three hours, little Kotomi got hungry.
After all, she wasn’t just narcissistic—she could also eat a lot.
"Hehehe..." Kotomi let out a silly giggle.
Seeing this, Yukino Yukinoshita slightly furrowed her delicate brows. She could no longer endure it and spoke up:
"Stop giggling foolishly. How long are you planning to make Yui wait?"
The moment Kotomi heard this, she was so startled that she snapped back to her senses. For a brief moment, she couldn’t make sense of what Yukino meant.
She had been so immersed in thoughts of holding two girls and finding a third girlfriend that when she came back to reality, it felt like she had just woken from a dream.
Could it be... that her relationship with Yui had been discovered by Yukino?!!
At that possibility, Kotomi sharply inhaled. Her chopsticks nearly slipped from her hand as her mind raced, trying to figure out what to say to Yukino Yukinoshita.
After a moment of silence, Kotomi forced herself to remain calm and asked Yukino:
"What do you mean, make her wait?"
When Kotomi asked that, Yukino first seemed to have a small question mark floating above her head.
?
Then, sounding somewhat displeased—as if standing up for Yui Yuigahama—she said:
"Of course I mean eating. All the dishes have already been served. Yui saw that you hadn’t picked up your chopsticks, so she’s been sitting there the whole time, not touching her food, just waiting for you."
At this point, Yukino Yukinoshita glanced at Yui Yuigahama again. There was a hint of frustration in her eyes, as though scolding her for not living up to expectations, yet also a trace of jealousy.
"You really are hopelessly foolish. Kotomi calls you ’Dumpling, Dumpling’ all the time. Did your brain really turn into a smooth, round, perfectly polished dumpling too?"
When it came to sharp remarks, Yukino Yukinoshita was as consistently cutting as ever.
"Hehehe..." Yui Yuigahama responded with the same silly giggle.
For a moment, Yukino couldn’t even tell whether that foolish giggle had been passed from Kotomi to Yui, or from Yui to Kotomi.
Or perhaps people who giggled foolishly were simply drawn to one another.
Like Stand users being attracted to each other.
Once Kotomi realized what Yukino was talking about, she finally let out a small sigh of relief. So it was just that she had been spacing out, and Yui had been waiting for her before starting to eat.
"Such a good girl, such a good girl~"
Kotomi reached out and gently patted Yui Yuigahama’s head in praise.
Watching Kotomi praise Yui like that—and seeing Yui narrow her eyes slightly, enjoying the sensation of Kotomi stroking her hair—Yukino felt a surge of jealousy rise in her chest.
For some reason, an image suddenly surfaced in her mind: a master praising an obedient dog.
Kotomi was the master.
Yui was the dog.
Yukino first scorned Yui fiercely in her heart for actually enjoying having her head patted. In her view, only pets liked having their heads stroked!
But immediately afterward, seeing Yui’s slightly closed eyes and blissful expression, Yukino couldn’t help wondering inwardly whether being patted on the head by Kotomi really felt that good.
I want Kotomi to pat my head too!
The thought appeared in Yukino Yukinoshita’s mind without any warning.
The moment she realized it, she nearly bit her tongue in shock.
She quickly shook her head forcefully, as if trying to expel that thought completely from her mind, leaving nothing behind.
Yet the more she tried to drive it out, the more it felt as though the thought had been branded deep into her mind, impossible to shake off, ready to resurface at any moment.
If she had been alone right now, Yukino might have gone to wash her hair with cold water—colder the better. She just wanted to freeze her own brain solid. Even though the weather had already cooled, she was now thinking that after dinner, once she returned to her room, she might take an ice-cold shower.
She couldn’t resist glancing once more at Yui, who was still being patted on the head by Kotomi.
First she scolded her inwardly for being so spineless, yet at the same time a thick sourness surged up within her, like thousands upon thousands of lemons being crushed simultaneously in a massive juicer.
You two are really too much. How long are you going to keep patting her head?! Have some awareness, will you? I’m still sitting right here!!
But deep inside, another thought whispered:
Why does Kotomi only pat Yui’s head? I want that too! Oh... I’m not Kotomi’s girlfriend... Damn it, why am I not her girlfriend?! Is it just because Yui confessed to her before I did?
At this moment, Yukino Yukinoshita wasn’t even consciously aware of these deeper thoughts.
Of course, even if she did realize them, this cold and tsundere little tigress would never admit what she was truly feeling.
This only proved how accurate Kotomi Izumi was when it came to giving people nicknames. At the very least, the title "cold and tsundere little tigress" suited Yukino Yukinoshita perfectly.
Even Kotomi herself, as the author of that nickname, couldn’t help clicking her tongue in admiration whenever she thought back on it, feeling that it had been a stroke of natural genius.
To stop her emotions from spiraling further because of Kotomi and Yui, Yukino quickly lowered her head and began eating as if she were starving, stuffing mouthful after mouthful into her mouth. She even ate several pieces of braised pork belly in one go—fat and lean together.
Kotomi blinked in surprise. She distinctly remembered that although Yukino liked braised pork, she disliked the fatty portions. Every time she ate it, she would twist off the fatty part and eat only the lean meat.
In that regard, Kotomi felt a certain kinship. There had been a period when she, too, disliked fatty meat.
The reason was that when she was little, she had loved fatty meat far too much. Whenever she ate meat, she always chose the fattiest piece—whether it was braised pork, pork belly with preserved vegetables, or pork knuckle. She especially loved the fatty parts. Whenever she ate pork knuckle, the very first thing she ate was the skin.
Coincidentally, while she loved fatty meat as a child, she hated potatoes.
Then one time, little Kotomi was eating meat a bit too quickly and felt slightly overwhelmed by the richness. Just as she lowered her head and glanced at the piece of fatty meat in her bowl, for some reason it suddenly looked exactly like the potatoes she had hated most as a child.
In that instant, she felt as though she couldn’t breathe. When the sensation gradually passed, she found that she no longer liked fatty meat and would only eat the lean portions.
It was only recently, after watching too many food videos, that Kotomi had slowly started eating fatty meat again.
She no longer loved it as much as before, but at least she could enjoy it.
Looking at Yukino wolfing down her food now, Kotomi gave a mischievous smile. After Yukino swallowed a mouthful of rice, she teased her half-jokingly:
"Yukino, Yui knows to wait for me before eating. How come you didn’t wait for me~? You just started on your own."
Yukino’s chopsticks paused midair. That was precisely why Kotomi had waited until she finished swallowing before speaking. If she had said it while Yukino was chewing, she would definitely have choked.
Yukino froze for a moment, then replied coldly,
"I’m not as foolish as she is!"
After saying that, she lowered her head and continued eating.
The words she didn’t say aloud were spoken in her heart.
Just like now, as she kept her head lowered and ate, she thought:
Idiot Kotomi. If you made me your girlfriend, I would wait for you to start eating too...
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