Shimazu Yoshino was in her own room, in her own house, troubled.

On her kotatsu was a paper handle-bag you would find at a cake store, one that could fit three or five little cakes into.

It was a Valentine"s present from Hasekura Rei, her sœur at school and her blood-related cousin at home.

"&h.e.l.lip; Strange."

Last year the box was large enough to fit a hat. So she prepared herself for an even larger gift this year. But&h.e.l.lip;

"It"s half the size of a s...o...b..x. What"s going on?"

As she"d said to Yumi-san, the chocolate cake grew every year, and while it was a burden, she was also pleased by it. How long would the cake continue to grow? When would it reach its pinnacle, and how would it look then?

"But I didn"t think it"d be this year-"

Yoshino looked at the box again, and thought.

Lots of things happened last autumn-. And love wasn"t really something to be measured by the size of a present, but she was feeling especially anxious this year.

"&h.e.l.lip; Gosh."

She thought back to when she received it. She could have been able to ask, "Wow it"s quite small this year," as a joking remark at the time. But they were in the midst of a little spat, so she didn"t pay the size any heed.

Well, she called it a spat, but it was mostly Yoshino just pouting.

Rei-chan wasn"t (especially) in the wrong, but she was still angry, so there was no helping it. Rei-chan hid the treasure in such a weird spot, so the half-day dating ticket went to some random first-year. And Rei-chan had the gall to show up smiling!

She became irritated again remembering all that, but she had to think about what to do with the box, so Yoshino left her anger aside for the moment.

Right, the problem was the content.

"It"s not chocolate cake."

She opened the box, then sighed. What was this about?

Ignoring the size of its contents, they were quite different from what she"d expected.

Was this some sort of message? But Rei-chan wasn"t the type to use such means.

"I don"t get it-"

Even the famed detective Yoshino could only throw her hands in the air. Plus, her biorhythm was all over the place or something, because her deducing skills were failing her today. After all, she was the one who was supposed to understand Rei-chan the most, yet she couldn"t figure out where Rei-chan hid her treasure.

If things were to come to this, she shouldn"t have been so harsh a few moments ago. But that was just retrospective thinking. After kicking up such a hissy fit, she couldn"t just ring her up and ask about the contents of the present.

Plus, considering what she gave, she really had no confidence in bringing up such a topic. If you were to weigh them on a scale, Rei-chan"s present would end up significantly heavier. Both in appearance, weight, and probably taste.

"I don"t get it, should I just eat it?"

Truth be told, father hadn"t returned home yet, so they were still waiting on dinner. So she was actually quite hungry at the moment. She knew you weren"t supposed to eat sweets before dinner, but maybe it was alright to just eat a bite?

"Huh?"

The moment she decided to eat, she remembered.

"Rei-chan said she"d just stopped by Rosa Foetida"s house."

That was shy she"d been late. Usually they exchanged presents as soon as they got home, so she"d been wondering where Rei-chan had gone. They"d gone to school separately because of the treasure hunt, and then Rei-chan"d gone home earlier, so that"d been nagging at her spirits, too.

"Maybe she switched Rosa Foetida and I"s presents&h.e.l.lip;!?"

No, there"s no way she"d make that sort of mistake-.

"No, it"s totally possible, because it"s Rei-chan."

After all she was careless enough to stick her card in the Edo pricing book in the library. Of course, Yoshino understood that was supposed to be for her, but that sort of thought process was twisted. It was alright because Rei-chan"s fans found it, but if no one found it, or worse, if Yoshino had found it, how was she going to explain that?

Rei-chan seemed meticulous, but she tended to be careless.

"She messes up so much sometimes."

She might not have thought about the size of the boxes. Ah, that must be it. It had to be. Last year she gave Rosa Foetida bitter truffles. So the size of the box must have been around that of a bento box. If that box were to become bigger a year later, it"d be around this size.

Such smooth reasoning.

"Then I shouldn"t just eat it."

She closed the box and folded her arms. Rei-chan might call her at some point. Maybe Rosa Foetida was calling Rei-chan now. -That a large cake had been delivered to her.

She had to make sure she"d be able to return the present immediately when that happened. If she were to eat the present right now, it"d look like she was being super possessive, and she didn"t want to have that appearance.

She"ll sit tight for a bit. Yoshino rolled to her side in her kotatsu.

"I wonder if Rei-chan"s eaten yet."

Even though they were neighbours, they couldn"t see the lights in each other"s room. Where was her hatefully beloved cousin right now, and what was she doing?