CH 22

Recently, my school life was going nicely. Too nicely; I couldn’t stop smiling. I was able to slowly close the distance between Satsuki-chan and I. She was slightly guarded in the beginning, but maybe now I could really call us normal friends. I could say the same with Azami-chan.

She actually replied when I addressed her now. Compared to the beginning, when she was definitely ignoring me, we had become remarkably closer.

At this rate, maybe the future in my imaginations, no, my delusions, when I played ‘Love Flowers’ would really be waiting for me: the future where I laughed and flirted with everyone.

“Ufufufu!”

“…”

“…*cough*”

In the car going to school, I let out a laugh and my brother and Momiji looked over at me. They were looking at me weirdly, so I tried to cover it up with a cough for now, but I couldn’t really cover it up after all…

Momiji usually sat in the front passenger seat, but when she helped me dress, she was in the back seat with me. The mornings were busy and there was no time, so that had become routine.

“Tyhl y tsse eyu.”

“R’x sqq.”

Yu casvbla yde R lmkvle vbl nya yv vbl aswdeycswv yde ldvlale Mswjy Gnyelxu okvb Ysxkfk pllkdt wp sqq. R bye clld yvvldekdt vbkp pnbssz qsa y xsdvb dso. Mblal olal y zsv sq vbkdtp R tsv wple vs kd vbyv sdl xsdvb yde dsvbkdt qlzv swv-sq-rzynl yv yzz yduxsal; R oyp fwpv y dsaxyz qkapv-tayela tskdt vs pnbssz.

“Qallvkdtp.”

“Twb?! Q-Qallvkdtp.”

R tallvle lhlausdl, yde vblu yzz zssjle pwarakple yp vblu alvwadle xu tallvkdt yde kxxlekyvlzu cynjle yoyu. Mbkp oyp yzps yd lhlaueyu vbkdt R’e tsvvld wple vs…

Ebu olal vblu yhskekdt xl zkjl vbkp? R eked’v byhl y nzwl. R oypd’v yniwykdvydnlp okvb ydu sq vblx, dsa eke R alxlxcla eskdt yduvbkdt vs xyjl vblx alxlxcla xl…

Sktbv dso, R sdzu dsaxyzzu vyzjle okvb Fyvpwjk-nbyd, Ggyxk-nbyd yde vbl Wkhl Lsavbp Gppsnkyvksd xlxclap. Mbl svbla pvweldvp, altyaezlpp sq nzypp sa pnbssz ulya, ynvle zkjl vbl rlsrzl lyazkla yde bwaaklezu cynjle yoyu qasx xl.

I had no idea why. I didn’t do anything, nor forced anyone to do anything. Of course, my only friends were Satsuki-chan and Azami-chan, so I wasn’t really close with the other girls. Wasn’t that how you started out with everyone, though? You gradually become closer from your original relationship as strangers. But if people avoided you like you were someone suspicious while you were still strangers, there was no way you could get closer.

I was just trying to be friendly, say hello, and talk to people, so why was everyone avoiding me?

I wasn’t really being bullied. I wasn’t being completely ignored either; once I greeted people, they responded to me. However, they ran away immediately after that.

By ‘run away’, I didn’t mean that no one was around me. I just felt everyone looking at me from far away. They weren’t bullying or ignoring me; they were just looking from a distance. 

Why’d it become like this… I was seriously beginning to think that maybe it was because of the Lady Sakuya curse that happened because everyone hated her for being so arrogant towards everyone. Unlike me, the in-game Lady Sakuya had many followers but also many enemies.

She met a disastrous end because of those enemies… The ending felt light and funny, but it was supposed to feel final and disastrous… so, I acted as friendly as possible and didn’t make any enemies to avoid that kind of ending… Well, I tried to do that, but it hadn’t gone well at all.

“Hmm…”

“Sakuya-chan, greetings.”

“Satsuki-chan! Greetings!”

As I entered Class 3, Satsuki-chan greeted me. It was early in the morning, so there weren’t many people inside. That didn’t mean that no one was inside, however. But, even after seeing my interaction with Satsuki-chan, no one tried to greet us. They’d give a sort of response if I greeted them, but then they’d look bothered afterwards.

Azami-chan told me that I should get involved with the other person even if I had to force myself to. I could apply that principle to someone who was my friend, like Satsuki-chan, but applying it to even my classmates might make me seem like too much of an annoyance, so I didn’t do that.

“Good morning, everyone!”

“Azami-chan, good morning!”

“Greetings, Azami-sama.”

After a while, when the number of people increased, Azami-chan came in as well. She stood at the entrance, greeting everyone, and got replies coming from here and there. Everyone really did love Azami-chan… completely different from me.

“Azami-chan, greetings.”

“…morning.”

I greeted Azami-chan as she walked near my seat, and she returned my greeting quietly as she passed. It was definitely a huge development compared to how she’d ignore me before with a “Hmph!”. The Azami-chan who spoke quietly as she turned away from me and didn’t even take a look at my direction was cute too.

People were gradually coming into the classroom, but it didn’t get as noisy as a normal elementary. There were a few students having conversations, so it wasn’t completely silent. However, there weren’t any kids playing excitedly like in a normal elementary school.

Some people might’ve thought that was lonely, while others may have thought that it was the result of a very good upbringing. But, I thought it felt a little lonely.

When I was a kid, both I and my surroundings were way noisier. Children were like that, for better or for worse. But at this Touka Academy, the students didn’t play like kids, and were instead polite. They grew up like that, and they were attending that kind of school, so it was normal, but… the indescribable gap between this life and my previous one made me feel lonely…

～～～～～～～

While I was sorta ignoring class and doing homework for Raihoukai, solving their texts, and doing lesson preparation and review, it had become after school. Today I had to go to the Five Norths Association salon, even though I didn’t want to.

When my brother would graduate, I’d be the only one in Touka Academy’s elementary division, so maybe mom wouldn’t notice if I skipped. But, since my brother was here this year, I had to go even though I didn’t want to.

…more precisely, I’d noticed something super unpleasant…

My brother would graduate next year, so even if I didn’t attend the Five Norths Association, there’d be no way for him to verify that. The chances of my mom hearing that information from my brother were very low.

However, the parents of the Five Norths Association members might talk about how I didn’t show up at the salon, and what if people from other families secretly told my mom? I wouldn’t know when or where my mom would hear that information from, so I couldn’t control that at all.

…uh-oh. Did that mean I couldn’t skip going to the Five Norths Association from here on out?

My brother had said something. Something like ‘If you don’t have a good relationship with Ibuki and the rest, it’ll be hard for you when I graduate next year’… was that basically pointing towards this reality? My brother graduating didn’t mean that I could skip going to the Five Norths Association, instead meaning I couldn’t receive his support any longer.

My situation might get worse after my brother graduates, but it couldn’t get better. So my brother was trying to get me to establish my own position somehow while he was still in elementary…

Woah! What was I talking about? Was I stupid? Did I really even think like a first-grader now?

My sixth-grade brother Yoshizane-kun could understand that and advised me on it, but me, who’d even graduated university and was a functional member of society in my past life, didn’t notice that and was just super nonchalant…

What should I do… this was a big problem… I couldn’t ask to enter some faction this late…

The factions in class and in the Five Norths Association were already set. In class, the biggest faction was Azami-chan’s group, and then there was Satsuki-chan’s group, quiet but definitely united. Apart from that, there was the group that kept their distance from everyone, which included the people who in my past life would be called non-normies, unpopular, downers, and otakus.

Of course, I was someone who didn’t belong to any one of those groups, a lone wolf. Right, a lone wolf.

The factions at the Five Norths Association were a tad more complex, not like in class where Azami-chan and Satsuki-chan were leaders of their respective factions. Of course, the Saionji family and Tokudaiji family, both of high family rank within the Seven Shining family, held large influence and were the leaders, but there was no way the sixth-graders would entrust the position to first-graders who’d just entered the school.

It was complicated, so I’d have to think carefully every time I needed the full details, but for the prestigious families entering Touka Academy, not just those in the Five Norths Association, something called ‘vassals’ existed. You could say that ‘vassals’ were retinue, or, simply put, a master-servant relationship. You might’ve been thinking that there’s no way a master-servant relationship could exist in this day and age, but in this neighbourhood, it did.

Also, even if it was called ‘master-servant’, that didn’t mean it was a relationship like with the past samurai, who always obeyed their master’s orders and would commit seppuku1 if they disobeyed. It was a looser group; using modern terms, something like a faction. It had become something like what house would enter which faction, and who’d become the head of said faction, the ones at the very top being the Five Norths families.

The Konoe family held the largest number of vassals, and it was number one both in it’s conglomerate power and faction power. Next was the Kujou family… I’d like to say, but that was unfortunately wrong. The Kujou family was second-place in terms of family status and family business, but the Ichijou family held more vassals. Their family status was almost the same, with the Kujou family being nominally superior, but there was no real difference.

The Ichijou family was lacking in family business and conglomerate power compared to the Kujou family, but it could be said to surpass the Kujou family because of its vassals, or basically, because it had so many people in it’s faction. At the very least, were a decision to be made using the ‘democratic’ majority vote, the Ichijou family would have more voters than the Kujou family.

The Kujou family was the third-ranked after the Ichijou family, considerably inferior to both the first- and second-ranked families in the amount of vassals they had. The size and power of a conglomerate being otherwise, family status wasn’t absolute in this day and age. Now, when something had to be decided, the Kujou family was definitely in the dust with the amount of vassals they held; basically, the amount of people in their faction.

Well, that was fine. Yoshizane-kun could do something about the Kujou family’s troubles; he said so himself. The problem was that I couldn’t casually ask to join some faction now. 

Basically, I was a lone wolf who didn’t belong anywhere. Yes, a lone wolf.

How’d it become like this?

The situation at the Five Norths Association was still okay. In a way, I brought it on myself. But I had tried to have conversations and get along with everyone in class, but it wasn’t going well at all. Everyone just looked at me from afar, like they were staring at a particularly rare animal.

What should I do? It’d be hard to start my own faction now. I also couldn’t enter a faction. Huh? I was trapped, right? Trapped right before a destruction flag in the elementary division…

“Oi!”

“…”

Maybe I could recover somehow… I hated destruction flags, but I hated being alone even more. I wanted to live my youth laughing cheerfully with other cute girls!

“Oi!”

“…”

Right now, it was going well with Satsuki-chan and Azami-chan… wait, hold on a second? One month had already passed, you know? Wouldn’t elementary schoolers who were classmates for a month already be friends? They’d talk at school and even go on play dates, right?

But I was still only kinda greeting and having small talk with Azami-chan and Satsuki-chan, right!? Wasn’t that pretty bad?

Normally, if you were friends with someone, you would’ve gotten much closer to them after a month. But what had I been doing for that month? Had I zoned out a little too much?

This was bad… if I didn’t do anything…

“I said ‘Oi’, right!?”

“*sigh*… I have told you multiple times that my name is not ‘Oi’; can you comprehend that? Or is that too much to remember for you, who has extraordinarily bad memory and a worryingly low intellect?”

Good grief… I was seriously worrying over stuff, but this annoying kid came over to my seat and kept being noisy. There weren’t generally any rewards when I got involved with this guy. I’d stand out too, so I didn’t want him to ever talk to me. My plan at the Five Norths Association was just to quietly be a shadow.

“—agh! You!”

“Ibuki… restrain yourself. Didn’t you come here for that thing?”

“Tch!”

Ibuki, who Enju was restraining, clicked his tongue loudly. What in the world was he planning to…

“Oi! Sakuya! I’m having a party, so come!”

“…yes?”

What? What did he say just now? The Konoe family was having a party, so come? He said ‘come’ like it was an order and not an invitation, though? Who’d go when he said it that way? And what’s up with him casually addressing me without honorifics? Who said you could call me by name, huh?

“After hearing the date and time, I will check my schedule and reply to…”

“It was a ‘yes’. That’s great, Ibuki. Kujou-san’s coming too. Everyone heard, right?”

Enju!!!! You idiot! Whose side were you on!? Wait, you’re on Ibuki’s side! That was fine. But I didn’t say ‘yes’!

“Hmm, well…”

“She definitely said ‘yes’…”

Even so… the other members nodded their heads in agreement towards Enju when he brought it up.

Scary… I was set up. Maybe I shouldn’t have carelessly answered, but I definitely didn’t say yes. All I did was ask ‘What?’ back.

But it was too late to say that now. Everyone else already thought that I’d accepted the invitation.