As I moved Nb3 and brought out both knights, Nagisa, without a hint of hesitation, countered by bringing her bishop to d6.
“What’s with that school uniform? Since last year, after you got the SRT uniform, you’ve been wearing it sometimes, and now it’s Abydos? Pretty soon you’ll be showing up in Gehenna or Millennium uniforms!”
Hold on, talking like that makes me sound like a uniform collector. Sure, taking pictures of this is a hobby of mine, but it still feels kind of weird.
“But it’s cute, isn’t it? Right?”
“Blabbering again… Yeah, you’re pretty. You are pretty, that’s true. But for the love of God, why can’t you just understand the part where I don’t want you getting hurt?”
“…”
It seems like, no matter what I say today, I need to brace myself for a counterattack. Since I’m running out of things to say, I divert my gaze back to the chessboard.
“Check.”
I move my queen to e2 and declare check. Hmm… Now that I think about it, wasn’t there an option to attack with my queen without raising the bishop earlier against Nagisa?
Regardless, if it were the usual Nagisa, she would’ve positioned her queen against mine for an exchange and drawn the game out long and meticulously, but today’s Nagisa seems a bit different. She moves her bishop to e6 to block the check.
I’m not sure if it’s just her playing plainly or if it feels like I’m facing someone entirely different today.
Looking at the board, I see Nagisa’s knights and bishops all clustered in the center. I’ll move my knight from f3 to d4 and attack both her knight and bishop simultaneously.
With my bishop standing in the line that threatens her king, she can’t capture my knight. And since my queen is also attacking, she has limited options.
I thought she’d lower her queen to d7 to protect her pieces, but instead, Nagisa goes for a castling move, taking her king to a safer spot.
This was clearly her way of declaring a straightforward fight, and my dilemma deepens. When was the last time I played against such a combative opponent? I wish I had some idea of how to navigate this…
After much thought, I removed the bishop with Nxe6, also attacking her rook and queen. This time, Nagisa, for the first time, delayed her move, looking at me instead.
“Just roll up your sleeves. I won’t ask you to show me your side, okay?”
“Well, showing you my side would definitely be too bold.”
“Shh. Just be quiet and roll up your sleeves.”
Whoa, the fact that she tells me to be quiet means she’s more heated than I thought.
But seeing her worry about me like this makes my heart race.
…Honestly, this might even be part of Nagisa’s plan.
While showing her anger, she cleverly leads me to feel guilty by fretting about me… that’s exactly the kind of charming yet cunning woman I’m up against.
But I have faith that Nagisa wouldn’t do that to me. Even if she did, my feelings for her wouldn’t change.
“…Tsk. You’re all better now? Just being strong for no reason.”
“Huh? It doesn’t make sense for the person benefiting from strength to say that.”
“…Ugh.”
When I rolled up both sleeves to show her, Nagisa clicked her tongue and moved her queen to a5. I threw in a soft joke, and she jumped, blushing.
Now I have a choice to make. I could capture the rook next to the king with my knight, eat the pawn in front of it, or pull back and take my knight away.
…But what matters right now is not losing the file in front of the king to Nagisa—just moving my queen recklessly isn’t an option. Capturing the rook with my knight would force an exchange of my queen and rook, placing me in a bad position.
On the other hand, if I eat the pawn in front of the black king on g7, I’ll block the e8 spot while still using my knight effectively. So that seems like the best move for me.
“Anyway… it’s not good to just throw your weight around like that because you’re strong. If you’d broken a wing or something, how would you think I’d feel witnessing that?”
“…Saying it’s fine because it didn’t break would get me in trouble, right?”
“Trouble won’t even begin to describe it.”
As Nagisa moved her king to eliminate my knight, I responded by taking out a knight with Bxc6.
And here comes Nagisa’s critical mistake… or rather, a judgment error. It wouldn’t exactly be deemed a huge blunder; she still had opportunities to take control or secure a draw.
If she had chosen to move her rook and seize the attack instead of getting rid of her bishop, I would’ve ended up losing my queen in exchange for her two rooks.
Then, she would have had only one knight, one bishop, and a queen with loosened legs on her side.
Meanwhile, my side would have one knight, one bishop, and two rooks, but with both pieces still tied behind pawns, it wouldn’t look very favorable for me either.
“…Hmm.”
But Nagisa opted to exchange the pawn for a bishop, which allowed me to castle and clear the e-file.
Nagisa moved her rook to attack my queen, but since my king wasn’t on e1 anymore, I could just move my queen to f3 and safely retreat.
Without hesitation, Nagisa, who had been playing rapidly, finally fell into a deep think for the first time. Once she started to hesitate after playing so swiftly, it became clear the game had slightly shifted in my favor.
“Mika, to be honest… I’m worried. I can’t help but fret that while you’re throwing your body around, you might end up getting into an irreversible accident.”
“That’s… ahaha, my track record makes it hard to deny.”
“…Shouldn’t you take better care of yourself then? Always talking about love and whatnot while causing me so much anxiety seems a bit hypocritical.”
“Hmm.”
Just when I thought I might have gained a slight advantage in the game, all I get is verbal defeat. What a deceitful tactic.
But what can I even do about it?
Seriously, what can I do other than suffer internally?
“It’s harsh. I hate you for making me love you so much.”
“Ugh… That’s a bit painful. It’s not like I can ask you to hate me instead. Yeah, that’s a ‘no-go’ for sure.”
“I hate you too.”
After moving her knight to h5, Nagisa casually threw that out, and my body went stiff for a moment. Even though I knew she didn’t mean it, I still asked.
“…Really?”
“If I really meant it, what would you do?”
“…”
Well, what would I do? Retaliating is definitely impossible for my personality. So should I cling to her for now? Or should I start shedding tears in accordance with history and tradition…
Ugh, what on earth am I saying?
“I won’t let go until you say it’s a lie! Like this.”
I reached out and held onto Nagisa’s hand tightly. She exhaled deeply and put down her teacup.
“Ugh… How did I end up falling for someone like you… I’ve lost.”
“Oh? This sudden surrender?”
“…Not in chess. This is a game I can still win.”
“Right, right. It’s my fault for being so lacking at this level when Nagisa-chan made such impulsive moves.”
“I wasn’t being impulsive! That’s nonsense. Up until just before the recent exchange, the game was following my predictions exactly.”
“…?”
“The game went awry from there entirely because your ability to read the chessboard has improved a lot since before. I haven’t made a single useless move since the beginning until that exchange.”
Oh, I see. It wasn’t just that she was playing aggressively without thinking; she had mapped out responses that matched my playstyle ahead of time…
“Shall we finish the game first and then continue talking? I think I need to focus a bit from now on.”
“…Okay.”
From there, the exchanges moved quickly. Since both of us knew each other to some extent, Nagisa’s moves, now enriched with thoughtfulness on top of her usual aggressive tempo, became even easier for me to read.
As a result…
“…I lost the game.”
In the middle of it all, Nagisa made one last mistake, and the game ended up in my victory. Now that the record stood at roughly 17 wins and 532 losses, I finally had the right to declare “You suck!”
“Good job, Nagisa-chan. This was fun in its own way!”
“You too, Mika. I’m glad you liked what I prepared. You mentioned you didn’t feel the need to play chess with anyone else, so I studied a different play style from what I prefer.”
“True, it was definitely different from the usual Nagisa-chan. But still, it was pretty impressive seeing you move without hesitation☆”
“…Thank you for the compliment. I’ll prepare a new strategy for next time.”
“Anytime is always welcome for me.”
I think I might have successfully cheered Nagisa up with a game of chess! She didn’t nag me as much as I expected, so now—
“Now then… it’s time to open your mouth.”
“…Huh?”
“What’s with the surprise? You can’t be unaware of what these are for…”
“Wait a sec… Nagisa-chan, I mean, I can deal with a few things, but I absolutely can’t handle more than two! You already know well I’m not a big eater!”
“I apologize. I’ve decided to act like I don’t know from today.”
“Really, it’s no good past two. I absolutely refuse! You wouldn’t want to see me throw up, either, right?”
“Seeing that pretty wing bandaged up might make me think it wouldn’t be so bad.”
“I don’t want to show you—Ugh!!!”
‘No way she thinks she can stuff all of that in me!’ is what I thought, and how naive that thought was became something I learned unwillingly that day.
Most importantly, whether I’m a small eater or not, I learned that when my life feels threatened, Shinpi will somehow come to my rescue…
