"You mean Mai doesn't want to protect me?"
Lin Ye looked puzzled, then startled — his shock so convincing it was hard to tell whether it was real or feigned.
But Mai Sakurajima's feminine sixth sense told her Lin Ye was putting on an act, deliberately faking it just to make her feel bad, to hurt her.
"I really can't protect you,"
"How sad. Mai won't even protect her devoted boyfriend. That must mean Mai doesn't love me anymore. She's fallen out of love, out of love,"
Every word of it struck home in Mai Sakurajima's heart.
She knew perfectly well Lin Ye was lying, needling her with a joke meant to stir up trouble — but it got to her all the same.
"I really can't protect you. If the fans get angry, wouldn't I be the one caught in the crossfire first? Shouldn't I be the one who needs Lin-kun's protection instead?"
Mai Sakurajima shot back,
giving Lin Ye a helpless retort of her own.
That should settle it!
"Then I'll take good care of protecting you, Mai, and keep you safe and sound."
The simple promise left Mai Sakurajima utterly convinced,
because last time, Lin Ye had protected her exactly this way — shielding her, keeping her behind him.
And at the very beginning, it was Lin Ye who had restored her sense of existence, back when it had vanished entirely — he was the one who had stayed by her side through all of it.
Mai Sakurajima was deeply grateful. It was Lin Ye who had carried her through that hardest stretch of her life.
If Lin Ye hadn't appeared and stayed with her, she might well have sunk into utter despair and chosen to end her life, to leave a world that had forgotten her.
Mai Sakurajima had always believed herself the kind of girl who could get used to loneliness — who could live and survive alone, who could keep her social ties to a minimum.
But when she had actually been ignored, forced to exist alone in the world, she'd finally understood the truth: surviving on her own was harder than she'd thought.
Deep down she needed companionship. She craved connection with other people.
Mai Sakurajima had badly wanted someone who would stay by her side forever,
and naturally that someone would be a lifelong partner — a husband who could stay with her for the rest of her days.
Then Lin Ye had appeared, standing right in front of her, pulling her out of her crisis, saving her from the Strange's grasp. Because of that she'd fallen for him, been drawn to him — and in the end, she was the one who took that step forward, the one who confessed and chose to be with him.
For that,
she had even tolerated Lin Ye's close, ambiguous ties to other women, accepting the lovers-and-fiancés bond between him and Yukino Yukinoshita, deciding not to fixate — not yet, at least — on whether his feelings belonged to her alone.
Mai Sakurajima also knew that, strictly speaking, she herself counted among the latecomers. Before she had ever met or grown close to Lin Ye, there had already been Ai Hoshino and Yukino Yukinoshita.
Even though she was Lin Ye's first girlfriend, the one who had settled into a relationship with him faster than either of the other two.
But morally, emotionally, it always felt like something was missing — just a little.
So Mai Sakurajima wouldn't press too hard, wouldn't force Lin Ye to sever ties with the other girls. She even suspected that pushing him too hard would backfire, driving him further away instead.
So,
keeping things as they were, while watching for a chance to gradually pry Lin Ye loose from the other girls, was her plan for now.
As for whether she'd actually manage it in the end,
Mai Sakurajima had no real confidence.
Worst comes to worst...
she'd really just share him with Yukino Yukinoshita!
That was the absolute last resort Mai Sakurajima could bring herself to accept.
If she'd had any choice, she truly wouldn't want to.
Then again, even if she were willing, that cold beauty Yukino Yukinoshita almost certainly wouldn't be — what woman wanted to share her boyfriend, her future husband, with another woman?
Mai Sakurajima thought to herself, silently.
"For a lifetime,"
After a brief silence, Mai Sakurajima suddenly blurted out those words.
At first Lin Ye was taken aback, not quite sure what she meant — but he understood quickly enough.
It meant staying together for life.
This girl had truly entrusted her whole life to him.
This wasn't some joke, some idle remark — it was sincere, straight from the heart. She had already made up her mind.
Even though she didn't fully understand him, even though in their time together she was mostly the one accommodating, adjusting, adapting her own habits to fit him —
if it were any other man, Mai Sakurajima would never have needed to sacrifice herself like this just to keep up. Any other man would have cradled her in his palm and cared for her without a second thought.
But with him, it was an entirely different picture.
If word ever got out about how the two of them actually interacted, there was no telling how many people it would shock, how many would find it hard to believe.
Lin Ye stood and moved to sit beside her. He took her hand, and with a serious look said, "All right. For a lifetime — this life, I'll protect you."
He looked at the girl beside him, his calm words carrying an unmistakable conviction.
He would protect Mai Sakurajima for the rest of her life.
Mai Sakurajima could feel the sincerity and resolve in the man beside her.
"Can I ask you for one small thing?"
"You can. I just can't promise I'll say yes."
That drew a helpless smile from Mai Sakurajima — clearly he already knew what she was about to ask, which was exactly why he wouldn't commit.
"Just protect me, and only me... but I already know you won't agree,"
Mai Sakurajima finally shook her head and sighed.
If he could have granted that request, he'd have already cut ties with the other girls and drawn a clean line — instead of going on the way he was now.
Sometimes, thinking about it, she found the whole thing rather hopeless.
As a major star, one who had grown from child star to celebrity,
she knew exactly how popular she was,
knew exactly how many men adored her.
If she wanted, countless men would gladly be her boyfriend, would cherish her, dote on her — and something as basic as devoting himself to her alone would be the bare minimum she could ask.
But Lin Ye — Lin Ye made it plain —
that facing her, he was good in every other way, but emotionally he would never love only her, would never cut ties with the other girls or keep his distance for her sake.
On this one point, and this one point alone, Lin Ye wouldn't budge.
And in matters of the heart between a man and a woman, emotional exclusivity mattered enormously.
She truly wished the man she loved could be devoted to her and her alone, with no other woman on his mind.
But Mai Sakurajima knew that was hard — very, very hard.
Either Lin Ye had been faithful and exclusive from the start, or else...
Mai Sakurajima sighed again, unable to help it, then shook her head and decided not to dwell on it any longer.
Let it be, then!
She'd just go on like this with Lin Ye. She shouldn't ask for more than that.
Of course, she could still hope — she just wouldn't pour any more time or energy into it.
"I'll protect all of you,"
The moment Mai Sakurajima heard that, she shot Lin Ye a sidelong glare. "So how many more sisters exactly are you planning to saddle me with?"
That much was certain —
and probably not a small number, either. Surely it wasn't just the three of them.
Mai Sakurajima had already counted Ai Hoshino in that number.
"It won't be many. Honestly... I've been turning other girls down the whole time,"
"Such as!"
"My junior, Iroha Isshiki,"
Lin Ye even pulled up a photo of Iroha Isshiki.
"She's this cute and you still turned her down?"
"I did. If she gets her hooks into me, if we get any more tangled up together, my whole life will never know a moment's peace,"
so Lin Ye judged.
After all, compared to Haruno Yukinoshita, Iroha Isshiki fell a bit short — but her knack for stirring up trouble was nothing to laugh at.
Of course, more than her talent for making trouble, it was her sheer tenacity for clinging on that Lin Ye had come to appreciate even more.
He'd turned her down flat, one-sidedly, again and again — but Iroha Isshiki simply wouldn't let go.
If at first most of it had been sheer contrariness, now part of it was surely curiosity, a fascination with the mysterious and the Strange.
Curiosity killed the cat.
Ever since he'd shown Iroha Isshiki his superpower, Hypnosis, in front of her, it had become nearly impossible for her to go back to living an ordinary life.
It could be said Lin Ye had already reshaped the way Iroha Isshiki saw the world, ratcheting up her craving for excitement by several notches.
Ordinary people could no longer satisfy that restless, curious, trouble-hunting heart of hers at all.
Now, only he could.
Add in the contrarian streak left over from before, and Iroha Isshiki's determination to have him had only grown stronger, fiercer.
Getting Iroha Isshiki to let go was, at this point, an extremely tall order.
Lin Ye found it a real headache, too.
He couldn't exactly use force, could he!
Against a girl who liked him, he couldn't very well drive her off with violence — and as for Hypnosis, his current skill level wasn't nearly as reliable as his superpower version.
As for anything else, he genuinely had no better solution.
Unless, one day, Iroha Isshiki came to her senses on her own, realized this feeling would lead nowhere, and truly decided to cut her losses in time,
otherwise, Lin Ye figured there was really no way to make her back off.
Unless...
he got Yukino to help?
If Iroha Isshiki found out he had a girlfriend, and Yukino spoke up to warn her off, maybe Iroha Isshiki would finally back down.
"Lin-kun thinks very highly of her,"
Mai Sakurajima remarked.
"I just think her willpower is astonishing,"
Lin Ye gave Mai Sakurajima a brief rundown of Iroha Isshiki's recent behavior, and even Mai Sakurajima was quietly startled by how relentlessly persistent the girl was.
"That just proves Lin-kun really is popular with girls. Otherwise why would such a cute junior be so fixated on you!"
Mai Sakurajima understood that a girl chasing a boy was already something embarrassing, something that cost her face — and yet Iroha Isshiki had done it anyway, and even after being turned down by Lin Ye again and again, she showed no sign of stopping. If anything, she kept going.
It could be said,
Iroha Isshiki had already lost most of her pride, chasing Lin Ye only to be rejected over and over.
Maybe, on some lonely night, when Iroha Isshiki sat alone thinking it all over, she quietly cried, felt the sting of it.
That was absolutely possible.
Even a cheerful girl, an outgoing girl, had her own lonely, sorrowful side.
"So, I turned her down — the cute junior, I turned her down too. Mai shouldn't go thinking I say yes to just any pretty girl who comes after me,"
"That's only because you don't like her. If you did, you definitely wouldn't have turned her down,"
Put that way, there didn't seem to be much wrong with it.
Lin Ye genuinely didn't have much romantic feeling for Iroha Isshiki.
Part of that was because, knowing her personality, he'd deliberately kept his distance.
Lin Ye didn't want yet another mischievous, trouble-stirring, high-spirited girl around him.
"Mai likes me, and I like Mai too — but I turned you down at first, remember,"
Mai Sakurajima: ???
It was true, her own case exactly — but hearing Lin Ye say it out loud always irritated her.
"So I guess I threw myself at you to land Lin-kun. How wonderful, how wonderful, ha ha ha,"
Mai Sakurajima's tone abruptly flipped, turning it into self-mockery.
Lin Ye smiled.
"There's one more — Haruno Yukinoshita, Yukino's older sister. She came after me hard, no holding back at all. That time your presence vanished, she helped out too."
"How hard did she come after you?"
"We were at a hotel together. She hinted at it — she was already wrapped in nothing but a bathrobe."
That...
Wasn't that basically telling Lin Ye he could do whatever he wanted?
Mai Sakurajima thought.
You could say Haruno Yukinoshita had already mentally prepared herself to give herself to him.
"Let me see the photo,"
She wanted to see it for herself.
Soon enough she saw Haruno's photo — about seventy percent similar to Yukino Yukinoshita, but where the younger sister was all Cold Frost, the older sister Haruno was clearly far more outgoing, far more lively.
This was a woman with a completely different personality from Yukino Yukinoshita.
That much, Mai Sakurajima could say for certain.
"And still nothing happened?"
"Mai's my girlfriend, and I still haven't brought myself to touch you yet!"
Lin Ye's remark made Mai Sakurajima's eyelid twitch.
The words should have pleased her, but hearing them left her strangely, faintly annoyed.
It's not that I'm unwilling, not that I'm saving myself for our wedding night — you're the one who's unwilling, you're the one with the reservations. "I'm starting to wonder if there's something wrong with your body."
"Someday Mai will find out whether there's anything wrong with my body,"
"I wouldn't mind finding out tonight,"
A hint?
No — that was an outright declaration.
Mai Sakurajima had said it plainly, letting him know she'd already braced herself for tonight — provided he meant it sincerely, and this wasn't just some testing joke.
"I would mind letting Mai find out tonight,"
"Heh. No guts,"
Mai Sakurajima huffed.
Honestly, she'd steeled herself for tonight — but if Lin Ye actually tried something, she still wasn't sure she had the nerve. She'd be a bundle of nerves.
And now, with Lin Ye saying nothing would happen tonight, she felt a wave of relief — and yet, oddly, she also felt put out.
She, Mai Sakurajima, a major Japanese star, such a beauty, had already dropped a hint like that,
and this jerk Lin Ye had actually turned her down — without a single stray thought?
Something wasn't right here!
Mai Sakurajima fumed, sulking.
____
Gift for Everyone: Once we hit 50 Powerstones, I'll release +1 bonus chapter
________________________________________
If you want more chapters, please consider supporting my page on (P). with 50 advanced chapters available on (P)
👻 Join the crew by searching Leanzin on (P). You know the spot! 😉