Chapter 52: Escape

Summer break was coming. It was the season where it became hotter day by day and you hated to go outside. And today was the day I’d play with Satsuki-chan.

When I’d played with Azami-chan and the others, there were a lot of us and it was hard to coordinate our schedules. We couldn’t find a day when all of us were available and instead had to play after school on a weekday. However, it was easy to make plans this time since it was just me and Satsuki-chan. We were going to be spending the whole day together on Sunday.

We were going shopping today, so we met at the actual shopping area. I could have invited her to my house, or vice versa, and we could’ve gone to the area together. But both our houses were far from our actual destination, so we met on-site.

I had arrived earlier than the scheduled time and was now waiting for Satsuki-chan. This block was fillled with high-end shops. It was completely different from a mall that a commoner would go to. I hadn’t really gone to these types of places, so I didn’t know much about the rules here and such.

I was wearing a dress today, so my feet, or rather, my lower half was seriously worrying me. I was worried while wearing a skirt as well, but that was the academy skirt, so I could contain my worries. It was also a pretty long skirt, so you couldn’t really see anything unless you looked directly from below. 

I normally didn’t wear skirts. When I did, I chose ones where you absolutely couldn’t see anything from below. On top of that, I wore leggings or something underneath. I would never wear a pair of pants with a skirt.

My mom would get annoyed if I often wore clothes like that in front of her, so I normally wore kimonos when I was with mom. I got used to wearing them because of Master, so I wasn’t really opposed to wearing one. And it was hard to see underwear while wearing a kimono. Since I was already used to wearing kimono, I wore them quite a lot now.

But wearing those clothes for today’s outing would be a problem, so I wore a dress. I had leggings underneath, but I was worried about whether you could see my underwear, so I couldn’t calm down. 

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Rd vbl qkapv rzynl, oypd’v vbkp ealpp jkdey cye? Eypd’v kv y qykzwal yp y rklnl sq nzsvbkdt? Zsw nswze lypkzu pll lhlauvbkdt kq usw zssjle qasx clzso.

Zsw xktbv cl osdelakdt obyv y qkapv-tayel jke oyp vbkdjkdt. El elqkdkvlzu pvkzz byed’v elhlzsrle kd vbl nblpv yaly, ps vblal oyp ds rskdv kd zssjkdt yv swa wdelaolya sa nblpv. Jwv R rlapsdyzzu eked’v oydv svblap vs pll xu wdelaolya, yde R eked’v oydv twup zssjkdt yv xu nblpv. R byed’v elhlzsrle vblal ulv, vbswtb, ps vbyv oypd’v y rasczlx.

Jwv R rlaplhlale… R bye vs rlaplhlal vseyu. Yu wdelaolya oypd’v lmrsple yde R oyp olyakdt zlttkdtp, ps kv oyp qkdl. Uyzx esod. Rv’p qkdl. Yu wdelaolya oypd’v lmrsple…

Tso eke tkazp pvyu nyzx obkzl olyakdt vbkp… vbkdjkdt vbyv xu pjkav xktbv vwad wr tsv xl alyzzu wdlypu.

“R yx psaau qsa xyjkdt usw oykv, Fyjwuy-nbyd.”

“Xb, Fyvpwjk-nbyd, tallvkdtp. Rv kp dsv swa xllvkdt vkxl ulv, ps es dsv osaau. R byhl nsxl lyazu.”

Gp R oyp vbkdjkdt vbyv, Fyvpwjk-nbyd nyxl. R osdelale kq pbl oyp osaaukdt ycswv xl yaakhkdt qkapv, ps R yrszstkple vs bla. Rv pvkzz oypd’v vbl vkxl ol rzyddle vs xllv, ps R eked’v vbkdj Fyvpwjk-nbyd bye esdl yduvbkdt oasdt.

“Qallvkdtp. Mbld… obyv pbyzz ol es vseyu?”

Satsuki-chan asked me that after looking at Momiji, who was behind me. I had only told her that we were going to go shopping around here. I did have my own objective, but I wouldn’t say that here, so I instead lied a little.

“How about we first look around at the shops here?”

“Huh? I see… understood.”

I went to look around with Satsuki-chan, who sounded a bit troubled. Both Satsuki-chan and I had escorts. That was normal. Rather, what family would let their child wander around town without an escort?

There were also worries about safety. A kid might get captured and kidnapped. They also might get involved in some event or accident. We didn’t have large sums of money or credit cards either, so one of the adults could pay for us.

I had Momiji, and Satsuki-chan had two adults. First, us five went to look at the shops.

“Oh… Satsuki-chan, how about this?”

“Huh!? Th-… this?”

Satsuki-chan looked surprised at what I’d shown her inside the clothes shop. Well, it was clothing that normal upper-class kids like us wouldn’t wear often.

It wasn’t anything really weird. Most people would agree that the clothing I had picked was normal children’s wear. It just wasn’t branded nor was it made-to-order.

This block was filled with high-end shops, but normal people also came here. Their clientele wasn’t all high-class, so not all of their things would be branded. There were shops that were a little expensive but were at a price that normal people could afford.

Considering normal children’s clothes, ordinary people probably thought of the shops as slightly expensive. But maybe people bought them so that their kids could dress up a little. Ordinary parents and kids were also around. Rather, the both of us, accompanied by attendants, stood out.

There was of course a reason I’d chosen to go here. This was a place that was barely at the level to invite a lady of the Saionji family to. It’d be harder to invite her to a place any lower than this. Any higher would make my objective unachievable.

“Then, what do you think of this?”

“Umm… Sakuya-chan, do you normally wear such things?”

I had shown her something cheap and bad-quality for people like us, so she said that. I didn’t know what my mom would say if I normally wore this type of thing.

“No, I do not normally wear these kinds of clothes. If I were to, I do not know what my mother would say to me.”

“*sigh*…”

She was looking at me like “Then why’d you show it to me?”. Maybe I should finally talk about the plan with Satsuki-chan? It wouldn’t succeed without her cooperation. If she didn’t go along with the idea, this was the end. I’d have to move to plan B.

“(Satsuki-chan… in this shop, let us… buy clothes that normal people wear, change into them, then run away.)”

“Huh!?”

Her voice got louder from surprise when I secretly whispered that in her ear. Our attendants were watching us from a distance. We were enjoying our shopping, and they didn’t go over to listen to our conversation or say something. As long as I didn’t do anything too weird, they’d just be watching from a distance.

But we couldn’t move freely if those attendants were there. If we did something weird or went to a strange place, we’d be stopped. Then, my plan wouldn’t succeed.

“(I invited you to this place so that we could change into the clothes we bought and then run away. If you do not wish to do so, I will not force you to . However, would you like to go out without our attendants?)”

“…”

Satsuki-chan stayed silent for a while and looked displeased. She was probably thinking about a lot of things. Well, people would yell at us at the very least. We wouldn’t be doing anything too bad, but people might get mad at us for ditching our attendants and going off alone.

But I still wanted to do it. This was all to become closer to Satsuki-chan…

“(Understood… that is why you were showing me these strange clothes, yes?)”

Strange clothes… weren’t these clothes normal? I didn’t have bad taste, you know? They might look weird to a lady of the Saionji family, but they’d look pretty good to normal people, right? I wouldn’t show her strange clothes… I think.

“(Let us buy new clothes… change into outfits that make it easy for us to get lost in the crowd, then run away.)”

“(Understood.)”

It seemed like Satsuki-chan was going along with it. Since she’d decided that, the rest went quickly. We bought clothes that wouldn’t be strange for us to wear for camouflage purposes and clothes that we’d normally never wear. They didn’t look too bad, though; they were clothes that normal people would wear.

We didn’t run away immediately after buying clothes. We instead went to look around various other shops, bought small things, prepared ourselves, and waited for our chance.

“Let us rest for a while.”

“Yes, let us do that.”

Once Satsuki-chan and I finished preparations, she proposed to take a rest. We entered a shop, put down our bags, and asked for something to drink.

“I shall leave my seat for a second.”

“Oh… then, I shall do the same…”

Like we’d planned, we left our bags with the attendants and asked for drinks, then left for the toilet. Once we were both in the bathroom, we changed into the clothes we’d secretly brought inside.

We were aiming to enter the toilet at this time. This bathroom was quite large. Families and children were loitering, so we came at a time when many kids the same size as us would come. We quickly changed, mixed in with those kids, and exited the bathroom.

Momiji and one of the attendants Satsuki-chan had brought along were waiting at our seats. That attendant was male and kept watch at our seats. Her other attendant was near the bathroom. But, as expected, no one had accompanied us inside. That was a mistake.

The two of us, mixed in with the other kids, made it out without being noticed by the attendant near the bathroom. I restrained the feeling of running right now to get away from this place, and we carefully walked away from the shops.

“Whew… we have done it, Sakuya-chan!”

“That we have. It has gone unexpectedly well.”

Satsuki-chan, somewhat excited, said that to me. She had been wearing famous branded made-to-order clothes earlier, but was now wearing a cheap T-shirt with a print on it.

I had similarly changed into pants and even wore a hat to hide my hair; maybe I looked like a guy. The attendants wouldn’t think that we would wander around looking like this.

We secretly brought in the clothes we had bought into the toilet and changed into them. They were one in the tens of clothes that we’d bought, so I didn’t think the attendants noticed. They probably wouldn’t think that we’d buy or wear those types of clothes either.

“Then, Sakuya-chan… what shall we do now?”

“Oh, we must walk a little. I have already decided on our destination.”

Satsuki-chan nodded and said nothing. Coming to these shops to buy our clothes in the first place was a good decision. I was thinking about bringing Satsuki-chan to a normal shopping mall after this.

I was familiar with shopping malls from my past life. Normal people often went to those places. But the current me and Satsuki-chan had never entered a shopping mall. The stores we went to were famous branded ones and ones that created made-to-order goods.

If I wanted Satsuki-chan to open up, then we had to get closer. But going to a shop where we had to put on airs to keep up appearances wouldn’t help us get closer at all. That was why I wanted to do things that the me in the past life knew about, things that ordinary people would do.

We might get scolded for doing those things. I also wasn’t certain that doing those things would get Satsuki-chan to open up. But I thought that she would never open up if we just kept up appearances at school or bought things at those high-end stores.

Something more foundational… I had to get her to show her true self. That was why I thought it was a good idea to try living the life of an ordinary person, like in my past life, where I didn’t need to keep up appearances.

“Oh, I see it.”

“Wow… I feel like I have seen this place before.”

Once we walked a little, we saw a pretty big shopping mall. Of course, I’d never been there. Satsuki-chan had probably never been too. It was something similar to the buildings I’d entered in my past life, but I had never been to this specific mall.

It was a large complex that might appear on TV, so I had watched it there. Looking nearby, it was a building that stood out, so I had also seen it there. In my case, I had done some preliminary investigation, so I knew something about it.

“What shall we do there?”

“Umm… it is nearly lunchtime, so how about we eat? We had not rested earlier.”

“Ahaha. That is true.”

Satsuki-chan finally… laughed. It was a little too early for lunch, but it was crowded since it was almost lunch. We had been walking and looking at shops since the morning and we were thirsty, so let’s eat lunch first.