4 Yandere Think With Me

The traffic on the metropolitan highway was crawling. Red taillights stretched out like a bleeding vein across the asphalt, reflecting against the damp windshield of my sedan. I kept one hand on the steering wheel, my thumb tapping a slow, rhythmic beat against the leather.

My chest felt tight, but not from fear. It was the constant pressure of suppression. Holding back a body that could outrun a bullet just to match the brake-and-accelerate rhythm of rush-hour traffic was an exhausting mental chore.

My phone buzzed again on the dashboard console. The screen didn’t light up with a standard notification banner. Instead, the display flickered, the background wallpaper turning completely pitch-black before a neat, unformatted string of text appeared.

Unknown: [Left turn at the intersection. Take the service road under the bridge. The main highway cameras are about to go dark.]

"You’re getting bold, Chloe," I muttered under my breath, ignoring the instruction. I kept my car firmly in the middle lane, heading toward my usual route.

Two seconds later, the radio in my car cut out. The smooth jazz track faded into static, replaced by a soft, synthesized hum that vibrated through the speakers.

"You didn’t turn, Ren," a soft, flat voice spoke directly through my car’s audio system. It was Chloe Valentine. She wasn’t using a phone call; she had hijacked the vehicle’s internal computer system through the local Bluetooth receiver. "The traffic lights on your current path are scheduled to stay red for the next twenty minutes. I adjusted the grid. If you take the service road, every light will turn green for you."

"I don’t mind the wait, Valentine-san," I said aloud, knowing the microphone in the rearview mirror was picking up my voice. "I have a podcast to finish."

"You shouldn’t lie to me. Your posture in the driver’s seat shows elevated tension," Chloe replied, her tone completely devoid of warmth, yet dripping with a terrifying level of intimacy. "I am looking at you through the highway transit camera right now. Resolution is 4K. Your hair is slightly messy today. It looks nice."

A cold drip of sweat rolled down the back of my neck. I kept my face perfectly blank, looking straight ahead. This was the problem with freeing a genius hacker from an underground syndicate by physically breaking through a concrete wall to carry her out—she didn’t just thank you; she turned the entire city’s surveillance network into her personal telescope to find out who you were.

She hadn’t officially connected my face to the masked shadow yet. But she had isolated my car, my routine, and my digital signature. To her, Ren Kurogane was the only anomaly in the city that kept slipping through her data algorithms.

"Why are you tracking my commute?" I asked, keeping my tone mild, like a student annoyed by a persistent prankster.

"Because you were at the terminal when the firewall broke three weeks ago," Chloe said, the sound of her keyboard clicking faint in the background of the audio transmission. "And because every time I try to run a deep-scan on your background, my servers hit an artificial loop. A normal finance student doesn’t have an encrypted military-grade server routing through his apartment’s smart-fridge, Ren."

I bit the inside of my cheek. Note to self: change the encryption protocol on the kitchen appliances tonight.

"I value my privacy," I said simply.

"So do I. That’s why I cleared the road for you," Chloe murmured. "Take the next exit. Or I will turn off the headlights on every car surrounding you on the highway. It would be a shame if an accident happened before you reached home."

It wasn’t an empty threat. In my original draft, Chloe was a tragic girl who would do anything to protect her small circle of comfort, completely indifferent to the chaos she caused to the rest of the world. Now, that indifference was focused entirely on keeping me within her digital sight.

With a silent sigh, I turned the steering wheel, pulling the sedan onto the exit ramp toward the dark, isolated service road beneath the concrete underpass. The moment my tires hit the lower asphalt, the overhead streetlights flickered, turning green one after another in a perfect, eerie synchronization.

"Good boy," Chloe’s voice whispered through the speaker before the radio suddenly cut back to the jazz track, the connection severing completely.

I drove through the empty, shadowed road, the concrete pillars of the highway structure passing by like giant ribs. My hands tightened on the wheel. My monstrous physical strength could shatter her servers, crack her laptops, and break through any physical door she hid behind. But a ghost couldn’t fight data. If I used my power to run, I would leave an even bigger digital footprint for her to track.

Ten minutes later, I arrived at the gates of my apartment complex—a high-security residential tower in the wealthier district of the city.

As I pulled up to the security barrier, the guard wasn’t in his booth. Instead, a familiar, petite figure in a high school uniform was leaning against the electronic gate, holding a small plastic clipboard and wearing a bright, cheerful sash across her shoulder.

Mia Asakura.

She was supposed to be the daughter of an underworld boss, a trained assassin who handled weapons before she learned to drive.

Right now, she looked like an innocent underclassman doing a neighborhood charity drive.

I rolled down my window, keeping my expression perfectly neutral. "Asakura-san? What are you doing here?"

"Kurogane-senpai!" Mia chirped, hopping down from the curb with a wide, radiant smile that completely hid her lethal nature. She trotted over to my window, leaning her arms against the door frame. "The student council is doing a green-earth petition for the residential district! I volunteered for this sector because I knew you lived here!"

"It’s almost eight PM, Asakura-san. The student council doesn’t operate this late," I said calmly.

"Aw, you caught me," Mia giggled, tilting her head. Her blonde twin tails bounced against her shoulders. But as she laughed, her eyes stayed perfectly still, scanning the interior of my car. Her nose flared slightly, taking a deep breath of the air inside the cabin.

Instantly, her cheerful smile stiffened by a fraction of a millimeter.

She smelled the cold steel and traditional incense. The exact scent that Kaguya Hayashi had left in my backseat ten minutes ago.

"Senpai," Mia said, her voice remaining bubbly, but her eyes turning incredibly dark, the light completely leaving her pupils. "Did you have a passenger today? A girl, maybe? Someone with... dirty habits?"

"I gave a ride to a classmate who needed a lift to the subway station," I replied smoothly, my voice never wavering. My trained heart rate remained entirely flat under her intense scrutiny.

"Is that so?" Mia reached out, her small, soft hand gently touching the collar of my student blazer, smoothing out a crease near my shoulder. Her fingers moved with a terrifying precision, her thumb lightly grazing the exact spot where a hidden blade would usually strike. "You shouldn’t pick up hitchhikers, Senpai. The city is very dangerous lately. People get hurt so easily. I would be so sad if someone... accidentally broke your car. Or your hands."

"I’ll keep that in mind. Thank you for the warning," I said, reaching over to press the gate release button on my dashboard, using my family’s override code.

The metal barrier began to rise. Mia stepped back slowly, her clipboard clutched against her chest, her bright smile returning like a mask being slipped back into place. "Have a good night, Senpai! See you at the university tomorrow!"

I drove past her, watching her figure fade in my side-view mirror. She remained standing under the dim streetlights of the entrance, her phone already pulled out, her lips moving rapidly as she gave an order to someone on the other end of the line.

I parked the car in my private stall, grabbed my bag, and took the elevator up to the top floor.

When I finally opened the door to my penthouse apartment, the lights were already on. The soft scent of homemade miso soup and grilled fish drifted from the kitchen.

Standing by the counter, wearing a neat white apron over her clothes, was a quiet, soft-spoken girl with long, dark hair. Karen Kirishima. Haruto’s adopted sister. The girl whose expensive medical bills I had paid anonymously through a private foundation so her brother wouldn’t have to work himself to death.

She turned around, holding a tray of fresh food, her eyes softening into a gaze of absolute, unshakeable reverence the moment she saw my face.

"Welcome home, Ren-sama," Karen said softly, bowing her head deeply. "The dinner is ready. I made sure to prepare everything exactly the way you like it."

I stood at the threshold, my hand still on the doorknob, looking at the warm, cozy trap waiting for me inside my own home. Haruto didn’t even know his sister was here. The heroines didn’t know they were sharing the same target. And I was standing in the center of a web that was tightening by the hour.

I closed the door behind me, locking it with a heavy click.

"Thank you, Karen," I said quietly, preparing myself for another long night of survival.