Agrippa
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All Right! Fine! I Will Take You! – Chapter 42
🕑 Added 2022-06-17 11:36:53 +0000 UTCIconic lines.
This is a subject we’ve already touched upon in our ongoing lecture series, “Learn Anime With Hachiman-sensei,” coming soon to an educational channel near you. Still, while the matter at hand was treated with all the exhaustive seriousness this well-loved series is known for, there was a facet left unexplored in the original lecture.
That is, what is the effect of an iconic line?
Of course, upon the audience, that effect need not be elaborated upon. We all intimately know about the effusive need to cheer with barely restrained glee at the utterance of such family classics as ‘You’re already dead,’ ‘Lelouch vi Britannia commands you!’ or ‘Can’t beat the cock, man.’
Yup. Fun for the whole family.
Anyway, what this lecture will center on is precisely the other side of the coin: what is the effect of such lines on the characters themselves?
Imagine being a smug Aztec quasi-god who likes to drink vampire smoothies. You’re at the top of your game, killing Nazis left and right like villains tend to do, and then you’re confronted by some uppity kid who’s obviously not up to facing your thousands of years of experience. He’s basically creatively committing suicide just by being in your general vicinity, never mind challenging you.
And then he says, ‘Your next line is gonna be—’ and everything goes to Hell.
What is the mental process that such events cause in the victim? What thoughts would rush through the head of someone hearing, ‘I’ll destroy that fucked up delusion of yours!’ right before their jaw is smashed by someone who doesn’t even have the decency to have enough money to make suing them worth the time, effort, and powerless spite?
Can you imagine the cold sweat? The feeling of your muscles locking up as if in front of a predator out of the dawn of man? The draining sensation of your paling face?
Well, I’m glad to report that I, in the interest of the advancement of the sciences, am now in a privileged position to answer any questions regarding the subject.
‘Glad’ may not be the right word, though.
Mostly, because Iroha is standing behind me, leaning over my left shoulder while I try to nonchalantly sit in this little, out-of-the-way Italian restaurant she’s taken me to after deciding my dating prowess needs some shaping up before I’m allowed to choose any locations for future events.
“Senpai… I took them off,” she whispers.
And I really, really wish she’d said, ‘This isn’t even my final form!’ because the meaning is about the same, but the latter sounds so, so much less intimidating.
So I hide the trembling of my hand induced by nerves that have been stretched like piano wire since I foolishly issued a challenge I knew I would lose, and Iroha took it upon herself to make my defeat not only inevitable, but something that would serve as a warning for future generations of kitsune’s boyfriends everywhere.
(Everywhere, in this case, meaning Japan, mostly. I think. I’m unclear on the kitsune population emigration policies.)
I think I was going to do something with my hand. Something other than grabbing Iroha and making her sit on my lap so she’ll at least provide coverage for the rising issue she’s causing…
Ah, yes, of course.
I, after having forced my hand to remain steady by the not at all unhealthy method of digging a fingernail in the back of my thumb (pain), take my coffee cup, inhale it like I know anything about coffee in any shape other than its heavenly canned incarnation, and take a slight sip of the chocolate sprinkled cappuccino.
Then, I deposit it in front of me with a delicate clinking of porcelain and turn slightly aside toward Iroha, who’s patiently waiting for me to properly set the scene for her dramatic reveal that will surprise absolutely no one, thus paying homage to the great classics of manga everywhere that managed that very same feat through grueling effort and arcs upon arcs of characters pondering the mysteries of the universe in a way that made it perfectly clear it was a very good thing that breathing didn’t require higher cognitive functions.
Reveals as shocking as Itachi not being actually bad, Naruto being the son of the Fourth, Orochimaru being still alive, and Anko needing to eat something other than Takoyaki.
What’s that, you say? Every single example about shocking reveals that weren’t anything but is from the same series? Let’s just say one should appreciate a master at work.
“Senpai…” Iroha impatiently prods me, still leaning over me in a way that has her breasts push against my back.
So I sigh with all the resignation of a saintly being about to be martyred, look at the pushiest of my three girlfriends (heh), and ask her:
“What did you take off, Iroha?”
She smiles that smile that tells me she not only appreciates my playing along, but my pretending not to do so for a moment just to let her further savor my inevitable downfall.
“My panties, Senpai…” she whispers before licking inside my ear.
And I make her sit on me.
“Ah! Senpai, are you so—”
“None of that. None of your little speeches. I’ve got an erection that could easily be classified as a medical issue, and it’s all your fault, so you’re going to sit there and provide cover for me until it settles down,” I tell her, glaring into her eyes in a way that I hope will chastise her, but that it actually makes her blush prettily and squirm on top of me, said erection clearly aware of how her thighs are rubbing against one another with me in the middle.
…
I think I may have miscalculated.
‘You don’t say?’
Shut up. It’s not like I heard you making any suggestions.
‘Maybe because I didn’t think you would be so idiotic as to pull Iroha on top of your cock to help settle you down.’
Everybody’s a critic.
‘Well, I am you, so, in this case…’
I hate karma. With a passion.
‘Settle down, Homura.’
“I don’t think you’ve thought this through, Senpai…” Iroha mutters, the bashful, downward tilt of her head and the flush on her cheeks something that makes me want to lie her down on the round, marble table, spread her legs open, and—
“Dear customers, maybe you should try not to make a scene?” a waitress wearing an orange checkered uniform modest enough not to attract the kind of people who wear mirrors on the tip of their shoes (or so I’m told) tells us, the words something that should be grumbled in barely contained annoyance, yet sound like she’s struggling to hold back unmitigated delight that, for some reason, has the blushing Iroha perk up and throw me a grin that isn’t helping at all—
“Oh, hi! I was here yesterday,” she tells the waitress, who nods far too readily at that, so I guess Iroha decided to be particularly Irohaish—wait a second, yesterday?
“I do remember, dear customer,” the woman who wouldn’t have starred in Pia Carrot but may have been a fan-favorite side character says with yet another nod that makes her short, brown hair bounce.
Oh, good. I’m adding details to her description. I’m sure this won’t turn her into a recurring character. I’m sorry, lady, but the harem slots for older women are already filled with both a chain-smoking Christmas Cake and an Ara Ara type Oneesama; better luck next time.
“Maybe I should introduce myself if we’re to become regulars? Hi, my name’s Iroha, and he’s Hachiman,” she says, something glinting in her cunning eyes that tells me something is flying over my head right now.
Seeing the waitress’ hazel eyes (damn it!) widen, it’s obvious that, whatever it was, hasn’t flown over her head.
“I… I see. My name’s Natsumi; pleased to meet you,” she says, pointing to the nametag over her moderately-sized bust—fuck! She’s named cast now! “I look forward to your next visit,” she squeaks out with a mouse-like voice that is definitely a charm point, because of course it is—
And she scurries away to enthusiastically prattle at a long-suffering bartender.
…
“What was that about?” I ask Iroha, for once not even trying to pretend not to be befuddled.
“That was me charitably paying back something the poor woman had to endure for too long,” Iroha magnanimously explains, lifting her chin and crossing her arms below her breasts.
…
“You and Haruno had lunch in here, and you were an utter brat to the poor waitress, but you noticed how much she was into gossip and decided to give her something juicy to chew on,” I tell her after not applying Haruno’s teachings, because of course I’m not following in her footsteps to become a Sherlock to her Mycroft.
Mostly because chubby Haruno (or is that ‘thicc,’ in the proper parlance?) is not something I think I’m prepared to face.
Not while still having my erection trapped between Iroha’s ridiculously tender thighs.
While she pouts.
“You’re no fun, Senpai,” she tells me, looking at me from the side of her eye, cheeks puffed, back hunched over.
…
Damn it.
So I slowly drag a bent finger up her spine as her eyes widen and lean forward to whisper in her ear:
“I think I can change your mind on that.”
And, if that whisper is slightly, you know, deep?
All’s fair in love and war.
At least, everything that benefits me, because Iroha can definitely be really unfair when looking at me with wondering, warm eyes, a tender, genuine smile, and a hand lying over my chest that has my heart thundering against her.
And she’s still clutching my cock between her thighs.
***
“This is not what I had in mind,” she tells me, cutely grumpy.
“Wait for it,” I answer, not for the first time.
Nor second, third, fourth, or… you get the idea.
“Senpai, surprises work better when they are unexpected, rather than a mess that keeps on dragging on…”
“Yeah, that’s what I said, but the Fourth Ninja World War still took seventeen volumes. And people complain about five minutes on Namek…”
“I don’t know what you just said, but I’m pretty sure it should make my libido dry up and die.”
“Really? Did it work?” I ask with a hopeful tone that’s met with a put-upon glare.
“Not. At all,” she answers, her tone dry as, I’m pretty sure, she never is.
“Iroha, I think you’re the first girlfriend in the history of the world to angrily proclaim she’s still horny for her boyfriend—”
“I’m pretty sure I am not. Not everybody’s as… thorough as you, Senpai.”
Aaaaaand now I’m blushing.
And hunched over.
With my hands stuck down my pants, because, apparently, Standard Adolescent Male Gait Number Two has become an integral part of my survival skills.
To no one’s surprise.
‘That’s a lie. I’m still surprised you won’t die a virgin.’
Like Zaimokuza?
‘… We need to have a talk about that at some point.’
Nope. We really, really don’t.
“Let’s just not every boyfriend has the good luck to be with a girlfriend so… encouraging,” I finally answer, desperately trying to come up with an answer that doesn’t end up with me pinning Iroha against a wall and—
Right. Now she’s blushing.
“Oh? Are you saying you—” she starts to… you know. The thing. The damn thing.
So I ping her against the nearest stretch of bare wall, my hand over her mouth, my eyes on her wide, luminous, honey—
Fuck. Fuck.
“Iroha… I know you’re trying to make me lose our little challenge and have me kiss you, but if you keep pushing, I’ll end up using that mouth of yours for something far less chaste, because there’s only so much I can take before I lose all control and just take you to—”
A warm, slight hand delicately pulls down on mine, so gently I don’t even think to resist her.
And Iroha, with a wide smile that couldn’t be happier if I told her that her clan had approved her vassalage to my own, leans forward, touches her forehead to my lips, and whispers:
“Senpai… everyone’s staring at you.”
…
With the sense of impending dread that’s my near-constant companion and will soon be introduced as a recurring character with their own name and description (and possibly a charm point or two), I look around.
Because, in the middle of the crowded street, there’s a space cleared around us delineated by a semicircle of people looking and muttering at the hypothetical perpetrator of domestic abuse.
…
Nigerundayou!
“Senpai! Wait for me!” Iroha yells as she hurries to chase me, making people question which one of us was the actual perpetrator. Something that, if I’m ever asked about, I’ll say was totally intentional.
“Nope! You’re only going to make this worse!” I answer, looking back over my shoulder to see her running in a way I can only describe as ‘futuristic robot intent on infanticide.’
Really, Iroha, what would your ancestors say? If there ever was a time for you to pull off a Naruto run, it was now!
“How?! How could I make it any worse?!” she says as a mildly amused salary man jumps out of the way, likely reminded of that time he was reincarnated as a generic harem protagonist.
“I don’t know! But my faith in you is unwavering!” I answer as a mildly familiar man in a security uniform gapes at me.
“That’s really sweet!”
Fuck, it is.
And, as I rush past the cosplay shop I was unwisely bringing Iroha to, I’m yet again reminded that my expectations and the Strongest Junior don’t mix that well.
Really, at this point?
Just as I expected.
***
“While I thought I may end up our date sweaty and with my clothes in disarray, I certainly didn’t think it would be because you’d make me chase you down a whole neighborhood, Senpai,” Iroha grumbles.
In front of her house.
Because I’m a gentleman and decided to escort her there, not because it was in running distance.
At least my training’s made it so I’m sweating and panting rather than, you know, dying.
I don’t know why Iroha seems equally capable of withstanding the fatigue, but I’m also too afraid to ask.
‘Self-Preservation-kun?! Is that—’
“Nobody made you chase me,” I protest in a dignified tone that is not, no matter what any potential witnesses may claim, grumpy.
‘Why do you keep teasing me like this?!’
Because you deserve nothing but the very best, Brain-chan.
‘That’s not—’
Also, because I want to distract you from that whole ‘bisexual thing.’
‘Look, you’re already busy enough. Even if you were really bisexual rather than a heterosexual that has a very notable one exception, it’s not like you can do anything about it.’
How pragmatic of you, Brain-chan. I’m thankful for—
‘Oh, don’t be; I was just distracting you.’
Wait, wha—
Oh. Iroha’s grabbing the front of my shirt and glaring at me.
“Nobody made me chase you, huh? Nobody acted in a way that, if I hadn’t grabbed with all I had and refused to let go, would’ve ended with you never so much as looking at me while—”
I grab her shoulders, pin her against the tan bricks of the fence surrounding her home, and kiss her with all I got.
Roughly, not holding anything back, pressing my body against hers until she moans, her legs spreading open so I can step between them and push my thigh against the warm, wet heat that I keep yearning for even after being sated again and again. Not because of my lust for her, that need to sate myself on her and in her that I keep discovering new depths to, but because she’s Iroha, my Iroha, and I…
I don’t ever want that to change.
So I let my hands wander, one protectively holding her waist and another slowly dragging up her thigh until I cup her pert ass, discovering that she, to no one’s surprise, wasn’t lying. That she really took her panties off.
And I’m very tempted to fuck her in the middle of the street, in broad daylight, at the entrance to her home.
So tempted that, when she lets out a cute, short, almost yelping moan inside my mouth that I readily swallow, I almost snap.
Instead, I squeeze her, my fingers feeling the heat rising up from below my hand, and pull away.
Not much, mind you. Just enough that we are brushing rather than almost melding.
“Hachi…” she says, her eyes hazy before she blinks them clear, and a broad grin splits her face. “I win, don’t I?”
And I caress the side of her face, feeling the peach fuzz, the heat of her mild blush, the movement of her smile rippling across soft flesh and muscle.
“I won’t ever think about kissing you as losing, Iroha,” I tell her, my eyes on hers, my other hand still on her waist.
She raises one of her own, cupping my face on the opposite side of hers, and briefly biting her lip.
“Stop making me want you so badly…” she whispers.
I close my eyes, lean my forehead against hers.
“Never. I’ll never allow you to drift away from me.”
The lust remains.
The yearning, the desire for her touch, her warm body, her sweet moans.
It’s overpowering, a hunger so intense I never thought I could feel something like it.
It still pales in front of the other yearning.
The one that makes me hug Iroha, shut up, and hold her until it’s time for her to go.
***
Going back to my own home after the eventful weekend is the kind of thing most mangas skip. Yes, there may be a brief scene with the harem protagonist crossing the threshold only to be tackled to the ground by the overly affectionate haremette that never manages to win in the end, because we all know the tsundere candidate has a racial trait that makes her all but assured in her victory unless it’s the first route of the visual novel and we need to delve into the trauma of our Heroic Spirit before we get to the really juicy parts.
With that In mind, I’m rightfully horrified at Komachi greeting me as soon as I open the door, her eyes telling me she’d been waiting for me, and I pray to whatever gods smile favorably upon technical virgins—
‘Not a technical virgin.’
Shut up! It’s a force of habit! And I’m panicking!
“Brother… Mom and Dad want to talk with you,” the greatest little sister in the world who’s thankfully not jumped on top of me and tackled me to the ground says.
Also, my mind screeches to a halt, which can’t be healthy for Brain-chan, so, sorry about that.
‘Now he apologizes…’
Also, Komachi’s warning has definitely come too late.
Because, in front of me, in the middle of the hallway that leads to the living room, stands a middle-aged woman with narrow, squinty eyes, her arms crossed over her mauve sweater, her legs spread in an almost manly way that stretches the black skirt, and her fingers tapping her elbow impatiently.
“And where have you been all weekend, young man?” my mother asks.
And I suddenly feel the bizarre need to shout ‘nigerundayou’ for the second time in a single day.
Comments
Agrippa
I stopped reading shortly after the time skip, but I kept tabs on the story by asking my still addicted friends if things were going as I thought they would go. After guessing right one time too many, I stopped bothering. Really, I loved everything up till they came back from Wave, but the chuunin exams already had hints of something that I wouldn't enjoy. What killed it for me was Sasuke's falling into Orochimaru's clutches after his whole arc up to that point had precisely been about opening up and learning to once more care for others. I have about the same problem with Harry treating Snape as if the first novel hadn't ever happened. ... Ah, yes, my chapter! Glad you're enjoying the differences between the two tricksters in the group. They turned up this way organically rather than due to my plans, which is, as always, both baffling and a true pleasure, so I'm really happy they are appreciated for their own merits. About Hachi's parents, the next chapter will feature a long conversation with them, so... let's see how I pull that off.
Agrippa
Ah, I actually messed up and duplicated the "40" when copypasting last chapter's title, so this is 42 and the preevious one 41. Thanks for pointing that out!
y
This should be chapter 41, not 42, I think
Pope Yoda I
...alright, I'm going to say it - Naruto turned to absolute garbage at the time skip arc and fell HARD when the incredibly, unbelievably terrible Itachi arc kicked off. That's about when I dropped it completely and coined the term 'Kishimotoed' for a creator utterly destroying their own work in such a way as to irredeemably damage it and leave only bitter memories in it's wake. For example: Bleach was Kishimotoed. Dragon Ball Super was Kishimotoed. See? Works well, eh? *cough* Sorry for the derail. I enjoyed the chapter. You keep hitting Iroha's character perfectly, and in such a way that despite the rough outline being similar to Haruno's, they both remain pretty distinct entities instead of just a trope divided between two names. That's a pretty solid achievement, as it can be very tricky to navigate two similar characters without overlapping them. I'm curious to see how you write the parents. They have basically no presence in the fandom, so I'm kind of curious to see if you'll write them or instead choose to write about them instead.
