Chapter 135 – The Past Returns

"...Erika Tachibana."

"What did you say..."

As if a cloud of darkness had covered his face, Takei began to take on a more serious expression in response to the name that Araki uttered.

Even though he had already confronted his past fears, the lingering memories still made his heart shiver at the thought of going through something like that once again.

Drilling his stare into the boy, Takei was not amused with the way this conversation was going.

"Erika Tachibana is my sister, and you were the one that hurt her," Araki stated, without a doubt inside his head. "For that, I truly hate your guts."

Takei didn't remember a single time where he had hurt Erika, intentionally or unintentionally, so he believed that Erika told Araki a lie to get him on her side.

When he looked over at Akari, she seemed to have the same idea since there was a very evident frown on her face.

"Takei would never do something like that," Akari said. "He wouldn't hurt a fly, nevertheless a girl."

There was an almost visible aura of displeasure that was radiating from Akari, as a result of the annoyance that was Erika Tachibana.

For as long as Akari had known about Erika, she had hated the evil witch for causing Takei so much pain.

Even though she hated Erika with every fiber of her being, Akari was still somewhat grateful for her.

If Erika hadn't hurt Takei and abandoned him, then Akari would've never been able to meet and fall in love with him.

It was an odd way of thinking, but Akari was sure that it was a blessing in disguise for her.

Putting that aside, she still hated Erika for what was done to her beloved, so there would be no mercy for Erika or anyone related to her.

Seeing the scowl on Akari's face made Araki take a step back and look at the situation with a different perspective.

"You're ruining your good looks by scowling," Araki lecherously grinned. "How about dumping that loser over there and hooking up with me?

"Ew, gross," Akari immediately replied, with an extremely disgusted expression on her face.

"..."

When a beautiful girl said that he was disgusting directly to his face, Araki was speechless with what to do as a result of his ego breaking.

"Pfft, you got him good!" Takei laughed. "Although he wasn't wrong with the first part of what he said, you do look best with a smile."

With a clearly shaken face, Akari leaned in even closer to Takei and looked up into his eyes.

"Thanks, but..." Akari paused. "Sometimes what you say is really bad for my heart."

As a result of having his cute girlfriend acting extremely shy in front of him, a natural lazy smile appeared on Takei's face as he petted the meek Akari's head.

Glancing over the couple that was cheerfully ignoring him, Araki clicked his teeth and stared holes into them.

"I'll make you two regret what you've done to me. Mark my words, you're in for a world of hurt."

As evident by the mix of seriousness and anger on his face, Araki was not joking around when he said that he wanted to hurt them.

Takei didn't particularly care about what Araki said, since he believed it to only be the ramblings of an idiot.

Therefore, he merely brushed it off and proceeded to walk away with Akari in hand.

However, something caught his ears when Takei began to walk in a different direction.

"I wonder what your face will look like when I defile her body in front of you... Hehehe..." Araki creepily muttered.

Turning around to face the red-headed boy, something snapped inside of Takei at that very moment.

"Takei, no sto-" Akari tried to say.

Before she could even finish her sentence, Takei was already no longer by her side.

The reason why he wasn't at her side?

"!"

It was because he was sprinting towards Araki with a pissed off expression on his face.

Araki could sense his impending doom as a result of his comment, so he tried to run away to no avail.

Because as soon as he turned to run away in a different direction, Araki was instantly knocked down to the ground.

The moment he hit the ground, Araki turned around to collect his bearings, but he wished he hadn't done so.

It was most likely due to the rage-filled monster that was standing in front of him.

Looming over him with an aura of death was none other than the person that he had pissed off and berated, Takei Tanaka.

"WHAT DID YOU SAY ABOUT HER?!" Takei roared.

With an expression on his face that was never seen before, Takei grabbed the collar of Araki's shirt and held him up to eye level.

"Now tell me, what did you say?"

"..."

A distorted angry expression was plastered on Takei's face as he glared at Araki with several years of anger backed up behind the glare.

Why? Why is the whole Tachibana bloodline so fucked? Fuck, fuck, fuck. This guy is really pissing me off.

There was a red haze that covered the entirety of Takei's vision which made it hard to think rationally for him.

Even after Takei had yelled at him so much, Araki hadn't said a single thing which made Takei even more angry.

However, it wasn't Araki's fault.

He was just too terrified to say anything, as evident by his frozen jaw and shivering hands.

Seeing that Araki was refusing to comply, Takei raised his fist above Araki and prepared to make him pay for what he had said.

"Eek!"

Araki let out a terrified scream as he saw the fist that was up in the air and aimed at him.

This will be your atonement.

Prepared to give Araki what he deserved, Takei thrusted his fist downwards towards the fool that had planned on hurting his beloved.

"Takei!"

However, his fist had suddenly stopped mid-air right before colliding with Araki's face.

Akari's voice rang loudly in his head as she dived forward and hugged him from the back.

"Stop! You don't have to do more than this!" Akari pleaded. "I know you're mad on my behalf, but please don't be an even worse person than he is. I know you're a good person at heart, so please don't let go of that."

Hearing that enchantingly beautiful and soft voice through his ears slowly brought his consciousness back to normal.

The red haze was slowly disappearing as Takei realized the reality of what was happening.

"What have I done..."

—

New Idiot Couple Meter: 36 -> 40%

Serious Meter: 0 -> 50%

Serious-san: Is he some kind of a shonen character now?

Sugar-chan: I think this series is turning into an action series now...