Book 4: Chapter 5: Patch 1.0: Settling In

Ryouta wakes up to the scent of food being cooked and the sound of busywork around the house.

“Shit, I totally slept longer than I was supposed to. Wait, did I – didn’t I… Cassandra’s stuff was everywhere. She’s going to be so mad at me. Maybe I just shouldn’t open my eyes and pretend to be asleep. I won’t get yelled at if they think I’m asleep, but… if I’m pretending to be asleep then I won’t be able to eat anything,” Ryouta thinks, unaware of the conflicted expression he’s showing on his face.

“Mom, dad, I might be joining you wherever you are once I get up. Wait, there’s no proof that I’m not already dead and in the afterlife right now. That could be my mom making me food instead of my girlfriends… she made really good cookies. Now I want cookies. Damn, if I didn’t fall asleep then I could have texted them and told them to bring home stuff to bake cookies,” he thinks some more. He really doesn’t want to get up.

But, he knows that he eventually has to. There is no hiding nor escape. No matter what he tries, it will only be delaying the inevitable.

Ryouta opens his eyes.

“Good morning,” Cassandra says, “Ryouta.”

Yep. He is going to die.

“M-morning, Cass Cass. I love you. Have I mentioned how great of a girlfriend you are and how perfect you ar—” Ryouta tries to say but gets cut off when Cassandra boldly leans down and presses her lips against his own.

“How is she not mad at me? I mean, I’m not going to complain, but seriously. This doesn’t make sense. Cassandra of all people should be the most pissed off at me over something like this,” Ryouta thinks. “Wait, maybe I really am dead? That would explain this. I’ve either gone crazy or am dead already.”

“I hope you’re enjoying your bed for the night,” Cassandra whispers into his ear before pulling away.

“What – what do you mean by that?” Ryouta asks her.

When he looks up at her face, he sees what looks like her suppressing her anger to the best of her ability. But then she sighs and relaxes her tense posture.

“You’re lucky I love you and am trying to be nice. Don’t do something weird like that again,” she says with a pout. “Pr-promise not to play with my clothes and you won’t have to sleep on the couch.”

Ryouta sighs himself and then answers with, “I promise, Cass Cass. And I’m sorry for screwing around with your clothes.”

“You better be. Now get back to work while we finish dinner.”

“Aye aye.”

Ryouta waits until Cassandra leaves before truly believing that it is over – that he is free from her anger.

She still seemed embarrassed and annoyed, but she’s not blowing up on him nor threatening to kill him nor anything else like that. She actually seems to have forgiven him.

Ryouta breathes another sigh of relief, pulls out his phone to check it, and – wait, he saw a quick reflection of his face in the phone’s screen. Something didn’t look right.

He gets up and goes into the bathroom to look in the mirror.

“PERVERTED DOG BASTARD,” is written on his forehead in thick, black ink. His mouth is circled with an arrow pointing to it and text that says, “Serra’s Holster.” The final girl to have left a mark on his face wrote, “Alice was here,” with a cute smiley face and a heart on his right cheek.

Honestly, the sight of it just makes him laugh more than anything else. He’s happy that his girlfriends are the types to pull a little prank on him like this instead of going around and smashing his belongings like in some crazy stories that he has heard of online. Plus, it’s funny. It wouldn’t be funny if he actually had to go out into public and do anything, but since all he has to do is put things away and eat food, this is fine.

“I deserve it this time,” Ryouta says, not even trying to wipe away the ink. It would only be fair to wear it for the rest of the evening given what he was doing. “Alright! I’m in a good mood now. Let’s get the rest of the unpacking done.”

Of course, five minutes into continuing his task and he starts feeling sore all over. His legs, arms, back – it’s all hitting him now. While he may be in better shape now than he was just a month ago, and certainly more than before he started dating them at all, he’s still not used to working this much.

But, a deal is a deal, and he will push himself until he’s breaking down to accomplish his end of it.

Fortunately for Ryouta, he manages to get everything done before dinner is ready and before his body totally breaks down. The only boxes left unpacked are the ones that the girls brought full of their personal items and clothes. Serra is the only one who told him that he could unpack her things as well since she has the least shame of them all. When Ryouta was putting away her bras, he was tempted to try and wear one like he did with Cassandra’s, but the cups are just way too tiny for his head. They’d probably struggle to even serve as an infant’s hat.

“I’m done!” Ryouta exclaims, plopping onto the couch and kicking his feet up onto the table.

“My hero! It is rude to place your feet on furniture,” Alice scolds him from the kitchen with a mixing spoon held in her hand and an apron over her front.

Naturally, being the deviant that Ryouta is, the first thing he thinks of when he sees one of his girlfriends wearing an apron is them wearing an apron and nothing else underneath it. The thought is strangely extra erotic when it comes to Alice since she’s in a wheelchair. He wouldn’t get to see her sides and back as easily, but he’d know that they are bare regardless.

He really wants to see that now.

“I’ll take my feet off the table if I get to see you naked in an apron,” Ryouta says.

“Ah! That does sound like it would be fun. I have seen pictures of that before and have always been fond of it!” Alice replies. “But take your feet off of the table first!” she says with a pout and crossed arms.

Ryouta takes his feet off the table to instead lie down on the couch in a position where his feet are hanging off of its side rather than lying on top of it.

The position already isn’t the most comfortable, and it only gets worse—or better depending on one’s perspective—when Serra comes over and plops herself down on top of him.

She might be light and soft, but she still knocks some air out of him when she lands on top of his stomach when he’s not expecting it.

Then she swivels around and positions herself to lie down on him, her legs going between his own and hanging off the couch, while her head rests on his chest.

Ryouta hears Alice awwing from the kitchen.

“If only we had a child already! Then the child could lie on top of Serra, and then you would have a pyramid of bodies!” Alice exclaims.

“I’m sure there’ll be kids eventually. Just not now. Now is the time for food instead of babies,” Ryouta replies.

“Why not both? We’re not going to get any younger. You don’t want to be grey and old by the time our kids are adults, right?” Cassandra asks.

Ryouta is starting to realize just how bold Cassandra can be when it comes to having kids.

She must really want a kid.

“You know… despite how much you three want to have kids, we still haven’t had actual sex in real life yet,” Ryouta calls them out.

Cassandra and Alice return to what they were doing before instead of acknowledging the issue he’s brought up.

However, Serra, being the mischievous munchkin that she is, scoots farther down his body until her rear is pressing down against his crotch. She doesn’t even know what they’re talking about and she’s trying to get a rise out of him.

This is when Ryouta joins Cassandra and Alice in being flustered and unsure if he’s capable of actually having real sex. They’ve just been satisfying each other with non-penetrative fun so far unless the penetrating of mouths counts, but it’s been a few months already and not one of them has had proper sex with the others in real life. It’s just been so much easier in-game.

“I think we might have to have a talk about that,” Ryouta thinks just in time for the timer to ring and dinner to be ready.

First, dinner. Then, talk about sex.