Part-1 Ch-05 Ep-01

 The sound that reaches my ears is the chirping of birds. When I look around, there is nothing but trees stretching as far as the eye can see.

Faintly, I can also hear the murmur of a river flowing nearby.

This is not a picnic.

I, Nagase Mari, am currently lost in the forest.

“W-w-w-why does it have to be meeeeee!!!!”

Truly, why does it have to be me.

Let’s go back thirty minutes.

A little while after summer vacation ended, we came to the school’s camping trip in the woods. After being jostled around on a chartered bus for about two and a half hours, we arrived at a lodging facility tucked deep within the mountains.

Immediately afterward, we gathered with only the bare minimum of luggage and set off toward the summit of a nearby mountain.

The plan was to eat the lunch we had brought once we reached the top.

“Maki, isn’t your luggage a bit much?”

As we walked together, I was taken aback by the sheer size of Maki’s backpack. When I asked her about the amount of gear that made it look as though she had come for a serious mountain expedition, she said, “Better safe than sorry, you know.”

“So that just in case someone gets injured or lost, I can at least deal with it,” she added. Well, let’s set aside who that “someone” might be.

Watching her climb the mountain with that heavy pack strapped securely to her back, I found myself thinking:—Unfortunately, the one who’s going to get lost is you.

This school camping trip is an event that appears in the otome game world—『Cherry Blossom Oath ―The Story of Us That You and I Weave―』.

The protagonist, Ichinose Maki, gets lost during this camping trip together with a capture target who makes his first appearance here.

While walking along a narrow path that had become slightly muddy from the previous day’s rain, she slips and falls down the mountain slope.

The one who instinctively moves to help her and ends up being dragged along is Asahina Yuu, the very capture target who happens to be in her assigned group.

Normally they are in different classes, but because this is a school-wide event, all classes draw lots together to form mixed groups. Those groups then cooperate to reach the summit, encouraging interaction between students from different classes.

Asahina Yuu, who ends up in the same group as her, is usually a frivolous, easygoing type, but during the getting-lost incident he reveals a dependable, manly side with lines like “I’ll take care of it somehow, so don’t worry,” a gap in his character that makes him quite popular among the capture targets.

Which is why what I needed to do was support the situation so the two of them would be together at the moment the getting-lost event occurred, shaping the flow so they would naturally grow closer.

To be honest, I really did not want Maki to get lost or injured.

Fortunately, the conversation between Asahina-kun and Maki seemed to be going well.

As we approached the summit, the slope grew steeper, and the path turned rugged, with exposed rocky surfaces scattered throughout. Because it had rained the day before, some students occasionally slipped when their feet got caught in the mud.

It might be about time.

While chatting with the others in our group, I focused intently on Maki’s movements.

Asahina-kun and Maki were laughing together, and just as Maki spun around playfully and began saying, “Hey, hey, Mari!”,

Her footing slipped with a soft slither, and her body began to tilt.

Dangerous, I thought, and before I realized it, my body had moved on its own.

I instinctively took a large step forward, trying to catch Maki as she fell.

All my efforts were in vain, though—Maki did not tumble down the mountain slope.

“Whoa—ttttt, that was close.”

Muttering softly, she braced her legs and straightened herself without help.

Even with that huge pack on her back, she could steady herself on a muddy, treacherous path after slipping.

What remarkable core strength.

It might also have something to do with the fact that, for some reason, she had started training again before the camping trip, raising her status values in stamina, strength, agility, and more.

While I was thinking this,

“Huh?”

My field of vision suddenly spun.

At the same moment, Asahina-kun leaned forward to grab my arm, and the two of us tumbled down the mountain slope together.

“Mari!?”

“Nagase-san!”

“Asahina-kun!!”

And so, for some reason, I ended up falling into the lost-in-the-woods route instead of the heroine.