My Horny Stepmom Turns Me into Her Vampire Slave

Chapter 138: B - Eliss’s final hours on Earth

"So today’s the big day, huh, Aoshi?" Ayane asks.

She and Aoshi are leaning against the wall of an arcade, eating ice cream while Eliss and Takuma spend the afternoon playing a co-op shooter.

"Yeah. Tonight, at exactly midnight, she’ll return to where she came from..." Aoshi sighs.

"The way you say that makes it sound like you’re talking about an alien returning to her home planet," Ayane jokes.

And yet, that joke is far closer to the truth than she could possibly imagine.

"Yeah, maybe that was a bit dramatic..." Aoshi replies, forcing a smile that barely manages to conceal his sadness.

"You know, I won’t deny that I’m really going to miss her too..." Ayane says, her eyes fixed on Eliss, who is completely absorbed in the game. "...she’s such an amazing girl. Funny, smart, always cheerful, and somehow able to lift everyone’s spirits. When I think back to our afternoons before she came along, they feel so boring now. I don’t really know how to explain it... she’s the kind of person you don’t realize you needed in your life until you actually meet her. But I’m sure you know exactly what I mean..."

"Y-Yeah... I think I do."

"How the hell are you this bad?!" Eliss snaps at Takuma. "I thought teaming up with someone who spends all day playing video games would let us beat the high score, and instead we didn’t even come close! I’ve practically never touched a video game before today, and I’m already infinitely better than you!"

"If the zombies were lolis instead, he’d be breaking records from now until the end of time," Ayane chimes in.

She then rolls up the sleeves of her hoodie to her elbows.

"Takuma, move over and make room for a real gamer."

"Hmph... I told you from the start that I’m not good at arcade shooters..." Takuma grumbles. "Besides, I’m an intellectual. I much prefer games that reward intelligence and strategy, not running around shooting everything like a maniac."

"Sure. I can only imagine how much genius it takes to platinum a game about making your little sister do perverted things," Ayane fires back.

She takes Takuma’s place beside Eliss and firmly grips the gun-shaped controller.

"You’re only saying that because you’ve never played one! I bet if I gave you the easiest eroge in the world, you wouldn’t even make it past the title screen!"

"You’re right... because I’d smash the computer with a hammer before the game even started!"

Takuma ignores her and walks over to join Aoshi against the wall of the arcade.

"Aaah... seriously, Ayane is so weird. How can anyone hate the greatest invention in human history that much?"

"W-Well... it’s hard to deny that some titles push the boundaries of decency pretty far. Honestly, they probably push the boundaries of legality too," Aoshi remarks.

"Ugh... since when did you become such a prude too? There are tons of paintings with naked women in them, and nobody gets upset about those. People even put them on display with pride and pay money to see them! Aren’t eroge basically the same thing? If nudity can be art, and eroge contain lots of nudity, then mathematically speaking, eroge contain a whole lot of art! But of course, someone with a birdbrain like Ayane can’t appreciate art and would rather spend her time blowing zombies’ heads off with a rifle!" Takuma concludes, shaking his head in dramatic disappointment.

"Oh, so according to you, Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus and My Two Hot-Tempered Twin Sisters Are Always Fighting Over Who Gets My Thing are basically the same thing, huh?!" Ayane shouts.

Nothing escapes her ears, not even while she’s completely absorbed in the game.

"Of course not! Eroge are interactive. Paintings aren’t!" Takuma fires back.

Ayane simply sighs and shakes her head in exhausted resignation.

"Anyway, Aoshi..."

Takuma’s voice suddenly becomes deathly serious, as though he’s about to reveal the ultimate truth of existence itself.

"...never forget why we enrolled in Computer Engineering. Never forget our dream, Aoshi — the dream of creating the greatest visual novel ever conceived by the human mind! A masterpiece of programming, storytelling, and writing that future generations will admire and study as the Holy Grail of ero-VNs! The absolute pinnacle of eroge! A work so magnificent that it will immortalize us as true heroes of the modern age, revered for millennia to come!"

Aoshi is completely overwhelmed by that wave of enthusiasm and grand expectations.

"And just like a prophet struck by divine revelation, I too received a vision last night! I dreamed that I was living through the greatest visual novel of all time! It was so vivid, so real... it genuinely felt like I was inside an eroge, experiencing everything through the eyes of the protagonist! And it wasn’t any game I’d ever played before — it was something completely new. Something so perfect that only a genius mind like mine could ever have conceived it!"

Aoshi shakes his head in disapproval, lets out a deep sigh, and places a hand on his friend’s shoulder.

"Takuma, I think we need to have a serious conversation about your eroge obsession — I think things may have gotten a little out of hand..."

Instead, Takuma grabs Aoshi by both shoulders and begins shaking him violently.

"Who are you?! WHO ARE YOU?! What have you done to my dear friend Aoshi Toya?! Where are you hiding him?! WHERE?! Aoshi, I’ll save you!"

At that exact moment, a deafening scream from Eliss catches Aoshi’s attention.

He relaxes a moment later, however, and lets out a sigh of relief when he realizes it’s a scream of joy.

"Finally! I DID IT! I BEAT THE HIGH SCORE! And it’s all thanks to you, Ayane! You’re amazing, incredible — the best! I love you! I love you, I love you!" Eliss cheers, bouncing up and down like a madwoman before throwing herself into Ayane’s arms and hugging her so tightly she nearly suffocates her.

"T-Told you it took a real gamer to get the job done!" Ayane gasps, her face squashed against Eliss’s enormous chest.

And without even realizing it, a faint, wistful smile forms on Aoshi’s lips — his heart instantly filling with that familiar emptiness and sadness at the sight of Eliss embracing Ayane so warmly.

A scene he knows he will never see again.