It took us thirty minutes of hard work—handing out flyers to visitors, eliminating the guys who flocked to Yuzu to hit on her, handing out flyers, and eliminating them again.

“It’s finally over. Good work, Yamato-kun.”

“Yep.”

When we finally finished handing out all the flyers, we felt a sense of freedom and gave each other a small high five.

Since Yuzu and I were also helping out with the basketball team, we were given a rather vacant schedule on the festival day. With this, we could enjoy the festival by ourselves.

“Now that we’re free, what do you want to do? Do you have somewhere to go?” When I asked her that, Yuzu started to think about it.

“What should we do? I’ve been so busy with preparations that I haven’t been able to do any research. If only we can ask someone… Oh, here we have it..”

When I looked at the place where she was looking, I saw the pumpkin head.

“Hey, Keigo,” Yuzu called out to him, the pumpkin head turned around and came over to us at a fast pace.

Then he wrote something in the sketchbook he was holding and showed it to us.

Don’t call me by my name. You can call me Jack or Mr. Pumpkin now.

“Okay, but why are you writing?” I asked, and the self-proclaimed Jack wrote something in his sketchbook with a pen again and showed it to me.

I’m the mascot of this festival, so I can’t talk to protect the worldview.

“That’s like a mouse from some land of dreams… Aren’t you in charge of patrols, how can you not talk?”

I can only talk when there’s trouble. But other than that, I never talk.

Mr Pumpkin showed a strange sense of professionalism.

While I was looking at the mascot with an equal blend of admiration and astonishment, Yuzu couldn’t wait to directly ask what she wanted.

“Hey, Kei… Ooops, Mr. Pumpkin, you know what this festival has to offer, right? Do you have any recommendations for places for couples to go?”

When asked, Jack moved his pen quickly again.

Then why don’t you go to the Fortune Telling Manor? I’m sure it’s in Class 2A.

“Fortune telling… That’s a good one! Right, Yamato-kun?”

Yuzu’s love for fortune-telling–like other normal girls–seemed to have come out, and she was excited. I particularly didn’t have any objections either, but I couldn’t help but compare our outfits.

“Well, okay, but asking for compatibility readings between a witch and a priest sounds weird.”

“So, should I go back to being a vampire?”

“There’s no change in chemistry at all, is there?”

While we were talking about this, Jack showed me his sketchbook again.

I’m glad to hear that you are happy with my suggestion. Then I’ll get back to work.

“Hmm, good work.”

“See you later, Mr Pumpkin.”

After watching Jack leave with his hand raised, we headed to the second-year classroom where we were going to do fortune-telling.

Fortunately or unfortunately, the school was not overflowing with couples; we were able to easily enter the fortune-telling room.

“Welcome… Ah, it’s you guys?” The fortune-teller inside was a senior member of the basketball team, Nishimiya-Senpai.

“So this is your class. Thank you for the last time.” I gave her a bow, and she gave me a cracked smile.

“Izumi, and Nanamine, right? I’m indebted to you guys. As a thank you, I’ll tell your fortune for free.”

“Oh, you’re sure? Then please do.” With a smiling face, Yuzu accepted the generous offer.

The fact that her behaviour didn’t annoy people might be due to her personal charms or perhaps, natural virtue..

“Okay, write your dates of birth and star signs here.”

Nishimiya-Senpai held out a piece of paper to us, and we each wrote our profiles on it. The senior looked at it and then began to read our fortunes using tarot cards.

“Ooh, this gives me the jitters…”  Yuzu murmured to herself in the meantime.

“What a surprise, I thought you would be confident as usual.”

I thought she was going to say something like, “When you’re someone like me, even compatibility reading involving me will be perfect.”

“Well, you see, I’m just too good for Yamato-kun by any stretch of the imagination, right? That’s why I’m afraid that gap would give minus points to our compatibility.”

“…Rather than that, I think minus points would come from how much stress I had from enduring your raw personality..”

While we quibbled, Nishimiya finished reading our fortunes.

“Okay, I got it. You two are… 60% compatible.”

“The score got deducted!”

“The score got deducted…”

The result was neither good nor bad—we were unsure how to feel about it—and we had the same but also opposite reactions. Perhaps feeling strange by our reactions, Nishimiya-senpai coughed and cleared her throat before beginning her explanation.

“First of all, your basic compatibility is good. However, there seems to be too much ambiguity and deception on both sides, and some parts where you run away from the issues.. Shouldn’t you two drop your pretenses and meet each other head-on for once?”

“…”

“…”

Um… I wouldn’t say exactly which part was it but her words gave a critical hit for us—the fake couple—in so many ways that we went silent.

How scary, this fortune telling was the real deal. How should I say it, like the way how it thoroughly pointed the part where both of us had been keeping things ambiguous—it was fricking true.

“Well, you see, this is only fortune telling.”

Nishimiya-senpai, perhaps taking the silence as a sign that we were feeling down by what she had said, put up a smile to smooth things over.

Then, she added, “What was revealed in this fortune telling is your current compatibility. In other words, there is room for growth of another 40%. Just see how lovey-dovey you two already are, from now on you will top up another 40% isn’t that great?”

“Y-yes. I look forward to the future.” Yuzu also smiled a twitched smile.

“Th-then, to gain that 40% top-up, we’ll go to see other things in this festival…” Feeling fearful of fortune-telling, I stood up to make a quick retreat.

""

“I think it’s good for you two to do that. Oh, wait! You two won’t be working on the basketball team anymore, but you should come to see the play.”

Yuzu and I nodded at her words. It was a good chance and I also wanted to see the stage play that I was involved in.

“Yes, of course. Now, if you’ll excuse us, we have to go.”

“Thank you very much, Senpai.”

We bowed lightly and left the fortune-telling room.