"Talking like that in front of girls is too lewd. ↖" With a smile, Konoka directly wrapped Little Nine in her clothes. After hesitating for a moment, she finally asked, "Say, Asuna, could the elevator be overloaded because of this book?"
"No way? It's only a book—how could it cause an overload?" she said skeptically, now stripped down to nothing but her underwear. Yet even after throwing out so many clothes and lightening the load considerably, it still seemed useless. Worse, the delay had allowed the stone-armored man to draw closer.
With no solution in sight, Negi directly ran out. He had only just righteously said two sentences when Asuna grabbed him by the collar and dragged him back!
She hadn't really believed Konoka at first, but after Negi ran out and the elevator still remained overloaded, she began to doubt. Even if it really was overloaded, losing Negi's several dozen pounds should have lifted it long ago, shouldn't it?
Yet his leaving had still meant nothing. The elevator remained overloaded.
"Damn it!! If you want this book so badly, then have it!!!" To the stone-armored man's stunned amazement, Asuna seized the book and viciously hurled it out. The book seemed to have landed a critical hit—after striking the stone-armored man, it directly smashed him flying.
Negi watched the book tumble down the spiral staircase together with the stone-armored man, so miserable he nearly cried. All that work for nothing.
At that moment, the elevator finally lived up to expectations with a ding. The overload condition had been lifted.
"...What a boring prank!!" Seeing this, Asuna narrowed her eyes. It really had been related to that book!!
Freed of its overload state, the elevator immediately started up and swiftly carried them away from the underground library.
"Phew—ha! We finally got