Seven Wonders Overtime part1

Seven wonders overtime – Part 1 Today, a tense atmosphere was floating in the Literary Club Room, which was a rare occurrence.

The only sounds seeping through the closed window from the outside world were the shouts of the baseball team, whose bark was worse than their bite; the noise of the wind ensemble's trombone practice, which betrayed the players' sore lack of skill; as well as the slight warbling of birds and the susurration of tree leaves in the spring wind. On the other hand, the occupants of the room maintained the complete silence within.

Koizumi and I were standing on opposite sides of the long table, with our upper bodies bent down and our eyes wandering back and forth on the table top. Nagato was, as usual, sitting in her corner on a folding chair, reading a book as thick as an encyclopedia without looking up even once. And then there was Asahinsan.

While seated, she slowly extended her willowy right hand, drew a card from the pile of cards placed in front of her, then carefully flipped the card face up and gently moved her tongue, which was pink like a Nitidotellina Nitidula1, to read the words written on the card.

"Being so lonely~"

Koizumi and I were gradually leaning further forward, with our eyes wide open.

"I would rather~"

At that moment, Asahinsan rested for a beat and looked at both me and Koizumi. She was in her usual maid outfit, but even as I noticed something new about how beautiful and cute she looked yet again, I had no time to convey that thought.

Observing our lack of reaction, the limited-edition maid-lady of the Literary Club Room continued in a mumble.

"Like to die~"

While pricking up our ears to hear the moderately slow, funny voice2, Koizumi and I shifted our eyes hurriedly along the table. Our target was one card among the dozens spread messily on the table. I softly chanted "Like, like, like" but Asahinsan spoke before I could find the target.

"Unless I cannot see you~"

Having read the text all the way to the end, Asahinsan gently placed the card back on the table, relieved.

"Phew."

She sighed, taking a sip of sencha3 from her personal teacup.

But the two of us were still busy searching for the second half of the phrase. Just as I heard Nagato turn the page,

"Here."

Koizumi touched a card near his area and picked it up.

"This one matches, right?"4

I wonder how many times he's been guilty of showing me that faint, ironic smile.

"I suppose."

Answering in the affirmative, I turned my head to ease the stiffness in my neck, and continued.

"Alright, shall we go on to the next one?"

The silence visited us again, as if the previous scene was being replayed.

Koizumi and I were staring at the table, Nagato was speechlessly working diligently on the her reading material. Asahinsan slowly extended her hand, selected a card and took a breath.

"In the autumn rice field~"

The two males in the room had no response.

"In the temporary……"

Asahinsan's voice was laced with bewilderment.

"Umm, shed?"

"Barn."

Nagato murmured a reply in a flash.

"In the temporary barn~ ……Since the um, hay?"

"Straw mat," Nagato corrected.

"Since the straw mat feels so rough~"

Koizumi and I looked on in exasperation.

"My…… hands?"

"Sleeves," Nagato muttered.

Asahinsan repeated the phrase.

"My sleeves are getting wet from the dew~"

But I had already started searching for the matching card since she uttered the first syllable. However, my effort was not to be rewarded.

"Here."

Once again, Koizumi picked up a card that was easily within his reach.

Asahinsan was about to take on the challenge of reading the next card, but I stopped her with my hand and spoke to Koizumi.

"Let's stop. It's counter-productive for us to continue. Or rather, it's troublesome."

"I see."

Koizumi readily agreed.

"I was thinking that it would get more exciting, but I suppose it would be difficult."

He tapped his lower jaw as a genuine ironic smile appeared on his face.

I sat down on my own folding chair with a flop and spoke.

"It's impudent of us to try and have a match of Karuta with our level of education and cultural appreciation. Let's only do it after we've honed our memory a little more."

I've played all sorts of board games and card games with Koizumi already, but probably having run out of ideas, he brought a musty, old set of Hyakunin Isshu5 this time. We thought that having a match would be a good way of killing time, but as I mentioned earlier, both of us hadn't memorized the poems, so we unobjectionably fell into the predicament of acting like amateurish amateurs, only able to start searching for the card after the latter half of the phrase had been spoken.

To be precise, the only phrase I somehow remembered was "In this calm and peaceful spring sun, the flowers are falling without calm mind", and for some reason it was the same for Koizumi. I'd set my eyes on that target because it was the only one I could secure, but I frankly lost a lot of motivation when it was snatched up by that guy. Moreover, while it warmed my heart to listen to Asahinsan's cute mistakes, they did nothing to help the progress of the game go unhindered. In other words, since the reader and the players were not well-prepared, continuing any further would be an insult to Fujiwara no Teika6.

If we are playing again in the future, perhaps we should try it with Tsutsui Yasutaka's UrOgura