A Wild Last Boss Appeared

Afterstory 4 – An Out-of-Season Swimsuit Event

Notice 1: Again, apologies for the massive delay. I’ve been really busy in real life these days and haven’t had the chance to get around to it.

This is probably the weirdest side story we’ve had so far. At this point, the author’s probably drunk and just writing whatever pops into his mind (for the first half of the chapter)…

__

(Author note)

Originally, I had been planning to publish this chapter during the summer, but I procrastinated so much here and there that by the time I noticed it, the summer had already ended.

So this chapter is a bit of an out-of-season beach episode.

(Author note end)

__

On that day, the “Fish” Pisces felt extremely excited.

To clarify, he wasn’t jumping or screaming in excitement like a monkey. He simply felt very excited.

It was midsummer. Under the pretext of it being hot day in and day out, he had taken the opportunity to invite Ruphas and the others to come have a dip in the sea.

Although there was no such thing as the four seasons on the Moon, because he had received a positive reply back from them, he believed that they were probably going to come.

Putting the personalities of Ruphas and the other members of the Imperial Thirteen Heavenly Stars aside, in terms of looks alone, they were a brilliant line-up of beautiful women.

Just imagining them wearing swimsuits that exposed a lot of skin made him drool with happiness.

Needless to say, his preparations to receive them were flawless.

He had completely rented out an entire beach, along with a line-up of stores that sold refreshments.

He had even prepared finely shattered ice covered in various kinds of syrup – apparently, this was known as shaved ice in another world.[1]

Yeah! My preparations are flawless. Come whenever you want.

Just as Pisces thought that, his comrades came down from the Moon through an X-Gate.

“We’re here, Pisces!”

“Sorry to keep you waiting.”

The first person to speak up was Castor, who was already wearing board shorts.

The individual next to him was Sagittarius, who, as usual, was not wearing anything to cover his bottom half.

Looking aside, Pisces also saw… Leon, Taurus, Aigokeros, Karkinos, Orm, Mercurius and Terra.

In fact, he even saw Phoenix, Hydrus and the Three Winged Knights there.

“Yo, so we’re at the right place?”

“Grrr…”

Following them was the former hero’s party, whom Pisces had not intended to invite in the first place.

Apparently, after being invited by Pisces, Ruphas had figured that she might as well also invite them over too.

The people who had arrived as part of that group were Jean, Ricardo, Nick and Shu. There were also Gants, Friedrich, Kaineko, Sarjes and the merfolk.[2]

Behind them, the ranger squad, which had supported the hero’s party from the shadows, was posing.

“Oh, so this is the place. I guess it’s not too bad to forget about work every once in a while and take a swim.”

“Right.”

Megrez and Merak were coming by from the opposite direction.

Almost as if purely to mock Pisces, Benetnash had not come with them.

As a matter of fact, even though Aquarius had not come, Ganymedes had come here on his own.

“–”

Crack. Just like that, something inside Pisces shattered, creating a crack that ran all the way through him.

What shattered might have been his expectations. Or perhaps, it might have been his ambitions or desires.

Regardless of what it was, Pisces had a strong sense that something was about to shatter and scatter into bits and pieces.

“…… Oi…… whatabout Ruphas-sama? Wh, what about all the ladies…?”

“Ruphas-sama said seawater makes her wings sticky and it’s too much of a hassle to wash it afterwards, so she decided not to come. Dina’s busy working. Alovenus-sama spent one million on a gacha game, so she ended up getting her smartphone confiscated by Dina and is currently depressed.

I don’t think I need to mention Scorpius, but she said she was going to pass because Ruphas-sama wasn’t going. Libra never had any interest in playing around to begin with. Pollux and Parthenos also said it was too much of a hassle, so they decided not to come.

As for Virgo, she’s gone ‘over there’. Oh, and Aries was sleeping.”

After being shot with that despair-inducing explanation that was fired out of Castor’s mouth, Pisces’s face looked as if the world was about to end at any moment.

It seemed that the Moon’s forces had been annihilated for many different reasons.

No, it was not just the forces from the Moon. Looking at the other factions, Pisces felt as if the entire female gender had been annihilated.

Not even the gorilla had come.

Well, I guess she doesn’t really need to come.

And Castor had just casually mentioned Aries, but he’s a guy.

“Ga… ga… aa! Impossible… something like this… aa! Why… why…! Only the men… of all things… there are only dudes here…! Something like this can’t possibly… something like this… it’s unfair…!”

In response to the only-dudes-unexpectedly-appearing-all-at-once show (with the exception of Aries), Pisces’s face distorted as if it was ice cream that was melting, and he fell down on his knees in despair.

This is far too much.

Even though we’re at a beach, why are there only men here…? As if such a hell can be permitted in this world!

Nobody benefits at all from this! This whole situation is no different from spitting at heaven after not being able to understand the wonderful things that were promised to you.

It would be an understatement to say that Pisces’s face looked ugly at that moment. There was a limit as to what qualified as foul.

What was happening right now was a lot worse than Leon, Taurus, Gants, Sagittarius and Orm being together in one place.

But because all of them were very muscular, the atmosphere was just hot and stuffy either way.

Even the others who had ended up coming to the beach were looking around at each other and had expressions that said, “How did things turn out like this…?”

“A, anyways… shall we go for a swim now?”

As nothing would change if things were left as is, Orm made a suggestion to the others, and they all stiffly nodded.

A beach that was completely rented out and full of stuffy men… Such a bad dream would not have existed anywhere else.

However, after having gone through the trouble of coming to the beach, it did not make sense to just go home without doing anything.

As a result, everyone there ended up deciding to go into the water with a darkened expression.

Even though there were no flowers here, the act of swimming in the sea was in itself still a fun activity.

Although they had initially just been messing around with gloomy expressions, after a while, the atmosphere lightened up and everyone was able to enjoy their time.

While the way they were playing around was a little out of norm, since they were doing activities such as dividing the sea up in a way similar to a certain The Ten Commandments, running on top of the seawater or diving to the bottom of the sea, they were certainly enjoying their time.

As they were doing so, something huge appeared from the ocean.

“Hyahaha! I am the one who inhabits the sea, Tentacle Octopus! Now, where are the lovely kitty cats whose swimsuits I’ll be stripping away!?”

The thing that appeared in front of them was a giant octopus which embodied what it meant to be an erotic monster.

It was squirming its tentacles unpleasantly while at the height of its mood.

A beach meant beautiful women. Beautiful women meant lewd troubles. That was how the scripts usually flowed.

If what you were reading right now was a nocturne novel, this octopus would have played a big role.[3]

Unfortunately… yes… how merciless. Was such a thing even allowed?

Even though it had risen up from the bottom of the sea, the only thing that the octopus could see was hell.

– There were only stuffy bastards.

“………”

The perverted octopus was petrified and looked around for the second time.

Wherever it looked, it only saw men, men and more nightmare-inducing men.

Every single one of them was far too muscular and far too hot and stuffy.

As a matter of fact, when it came to Sagittarius, even before he could be forcibly stripped, he had already stripped. The entire thing was far too unsightly.

Once the perverted octopus saw this, it withered. It quite literally withered and shrunk down.

“…… Let me just say this… are you guys idiots? This is a beach, why did you guys even come here if there were only going to be guys here? You know what a beach normally entails, right? Would you get what I mean if I say that what should be here right now are cute girls wearing flimsy swimsuits that are only a string away from revealing everything and are moments away from causing trouble? You know… I showed up because I wanted to strip swimsuits from some ladies and I was fully prepared to get beaten up by the protective male protagonists of the story, but what even is this…? Why are there only guys here, huh?”

“… Umm, we’re sorry about that, I guess?”

“… I see… so you’re also a miserable man like me.”

The one individual who could relate to the soulful cry of the perverted octopus the most was Eros.

He too was shouldering the same misery that the perverted octopus was shouldering.

Even though I’m here at the beach, why am I swimming together with this all-star line up of hot and stuffy bastards? Right now, I just want to go back to heaven.

Eros and the perverted octopus crossed their arms and tentacles together and embraced each other without saying anything more.

Because the two of them shouldered the same pain and misery, they could understand each other and thus felt a sense of camaraderie.

At approximately the same time, on Earth.

On that day, Minami-Jyuji Sei and Virgo were walking down the beach.

Swimming together in the sea… unfortunately, was difficult.

Although Virgo was wearing the stealth bandage that Ruphas had once used to hide her wings, if she were to enter the water, it would become undone.

On this planet called Earth where science, rather than fantasy, dominated everything, Virgo’s wings would stand out quite a lot.

Despite that, they at least wanted to have the right atmosphere, so they were currently walking on the beach together.

Sei was solidifying his resolve as he looked at Virgo, who was walking beside him.

… It, it should be about time, right? It’s fine for me to take one more step forward, right? If she tells me that she’s actually not interested in me, or that we should just stay friends, I won’t be able to recover though. I think that there’s a thread… or at least, there should be… please let there be one… I’m going to say it. Today is the day…

Sei and Virgo could be said to be dating each other. – Sei believed that was the relationship between the two of them.

At the very least, he believed that they had passed the point of mere friendship.

Unfortunately, human beings simply did not have enough time to let such a fleeting relationship continue on indefinitely.

Even though it had already been over five years since the incident, Virgo still looked the same. In all likelihood, she would continue to look the same far into the future.

But that was not the case for Sei. In the past, his facial features had the traits of a young man, but after merely five years, he now looked like a mature man.

He had grown taller and his body now looked a lot stronger and sturdier.

By now, he had finished growing. From now on, he could only grow old and start to decline.

Which was why… while he was strong and young, he had to take a step forward and bridge the gap.

“Umm… Virgo. There’s something important that I want to talk to you about. Can you hear me out for a bit?”

In response to Sei’s words, Virgo simply smiled back without saying anything.

She was also waiting for it. For those words to come from Sei’s mouth.

Interpreting the situation as such, Sei placed his hands on Virgo’s slender shoulders.

“My… lifespan is different from yours. Sometime in the future, I’m going to leave you behind and pass on. But if you’re fine with someone like me… would you–“

In the middle of Sei making a once-in-a-lifetime confession, the sea abruptly swelled up.

When the two of them turned to look at what was happening, they saw the top half of a giant grotesque monster sticking out of the water.

It was an embodiment of insanity. A god sent away from another world.

The Mutant God, Thulhu.

That monster had appeared next to them at the worst possible timing… It looked at the two of them and sensed that it had appeared at a bad moment.

“???????…”

Oh. Don’t mind me, feel free to continue.

As if it was saying such a thing, Thulhu shook its arms, then sunk back into the ocean.

What did you even come here for?

“………”

“………”

The atmosphere that they had established had been ruined. While it might have just been their imagination, the ocean that had been sparkling under the setting sun since just a moment ago now appeared to be dark and stale.

Although Sei and Virgo were glaring at the sea, half in anger and half in exasperation, there was unfortunately no sign of Thulhu coming back up.

“… Sei-kun, shall we go home?”

“… Yeah.”

If he were to confess despite the mood having been completely ruined, it would not have been a good moment.

While it was unfortunate, Sei’s once-in-a-lifetime confession would have to be postponed until the next time.

__

(Author note)

Q: What did you even come here for…?

A: Thulhu: “??…”

Reason: Taking a stroll.

(Author note end)

TpstT: Poor Sei, even in an after-story, he can’t catch a break.

__

[1] “https://www.nippon.com/en/guide-to-japan/fnn20180727001/”.

[2] I don’t think we’ve ever been given a name for this merfolk.

[3] Nocturne novels (?????????) refers to R-18 novels. “http://noc.syosetu.com/”.