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Chapter 98 – Start of Spring
Spring break was a period filled with anxiety.
It was the afterglow of a completed school year, combined with the excitement of welcoming a new one. There was also the anticipated lineup announcement and the uncertainty and hope that came with it.
In addition to that, we were going to enter our final year of high school. We had to prepare giving a proper closure for everything that we had done for the past few years. From our club activities, studies and social relationship, we had to part ways from all of them, making this particular spring break more depressing than normal.
However, exceptions always existed.
Me.
I welcomed spring break whole-heartedly. Why should I be anxious about the new school year? What club-activities should I care about? Creating new relationships? My studies? Worrying whether I could graduate or not? None of that mattered to me, only tomatoes. Yes, while my peers were thinking about those insignificant things, I was thinking about how great tomatoes were.
“Is this what a dr*g addict looks like?”
Said Ugin, but who cares about that?
“I’m not addicted to dr*gs, I’m addicted to tomatoes.”
“But…”
“I’ll tell you a trivia. Tomatoes contain toxic substances.”
“Eh, really?”
“They have something called tomatine. It makes you addicted to it to the point that you’ll eat it until your stomach bursts out. It’s some kind of pleasure substance to me.” (T/N: Tomatine does exist, but it’s poisonous for mostly animals and it’s pretty much harmless to humans. Don’t mind the rest of the sentence, he’s just memeing.)
“When I’ll cremate you, I’ll make sure to add some tomatoes in, Brother.”
“Please do. If possible, send my ash to the tomato farmers so they can use it as fertilizer— Wait, what’s with that uniform?!”
I didn’t notice it before because I was busy dealing with my tomato’s drunkenness. Ugin was wearing a strange uniform, probably her new high school’s uniform.
“Moooom! There’s a JK in the house! Give me my gun, quickly!”
“I’m going to kill you for real, Brother.”
My sister would finally become a high school girl. She could finally be basked with the power of JK, entering the period of bliss that every female in the world yearned for. A period where they could wear their cute uniforms and their fashionable clothes while having fun with their boyfriends—
Wait a second…
If she became a high school girl, flies would be all over her, wouldn’t they? I can’t let this go. I should buy her a stun gun and some VX gas. I couldn’t let her mingle with those people who lived in the dark-side of the society. The people who would treat other people’s freedom like dirt and exploit their worth until the day they die.
Those people were the reason why human being endlessly strived for more surveillance and control over everything. From AI-based CCTV that could predict when crimes would happen to ID systems that could track and control the behavior of people. The world would soon come to a point where it would be safe to live in, but the people had no privacy whatsoever. In this situation, what would humanity decide going forward? Find out more, the screening will start on July 14th.
“You need to stop drinking those tomato juices, you really look out of it.”
“Watch out for the guys out there. If something happens, before you call 110, call me first. I’ll come running for you at a speed that even the physics can’t comprehend and I’ll send those guys to Siberia– Nay, the black hole itself. I’ll make them observe the truth of the world.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll definitely call for 110.” (T/N: 110 is the police hotline in Japan.)
I knew that she was sensible enough to not voluntarily put herself in danger. I hoped that she wouldn’t betray my trust for her.
“Is there anyone from your middle school there?”
“There are some, yes.”
That should be fine then. It was better than throwing her in a den filled with strangers. Then again, she was a social butterfly. She would be able to adapt even if I were to throw her into the deep sea or Jupiter. It was useless for me to worry about her.
Recently, she started to be more and more like an old man, so the sight of her acting like a girl again made me feel relieved. There was a time when she asked me if Atsukan tasted good or not. I felt like my whole world collapsed when I heard that question. Of course, I would know jack about that thing! I was a minor! What kind of thing did she look up on the internet? (T/N: Atsukan, to put it simply, it’s hot sake.)
I just told her that it tasted like a goblin’s piss and warned her to not try to do anything funny if she didn’t want the police knocking at our house’s door. My words seemed to fall on deaf ears though, as she replied to me with ‘But, I’m curious’. It was at this moment that I decided to move in advance to exterminate everyone that would try to get their hands on her the moment she would enter the university.
In any case, Sakaki Sui wasn’t a person who would lose himself in the bliss of the spring break. That was why his schedule for the spring break was as clear as a NEET’s resume.
That was why I was really sensitive toward Ugin’s behavior at home. I watched her movements closely as dust started accumulating all over my body like a PC that was disconnected from its power supply. When I was doing that, I saw her fiddling around with her smartphone. Because I was curious about that, I asked her a question.
“I’m trying to look for fellow freshmen on social media.”
That was her answer.
Apparently, in this modern age, everything started even before school started. The modern JK used the power of the internet to start their social life in advance to avoid being left out when the school actually started. Hell, not only JK did that, the boys also did it. What kind of supernatural phenomenon was this, I wonder?
An organic being like me didn’t have much contact with that side of the world, that was why I was dumbfounded after finding out about this revelation. The world turned more complex and bizarre as time went on. Seeing this, I decided that my decision to stay as a lone wolf was the correct one.
*   *   *
[Let’s look at the lineup announcement together.]
Hiwa Arina sent me that incomprehensible line of text.
They would be announcing the lineup at the graduation ceremony. The reason why they did that was probably to force the other students to attend the ceremony. Though, the ceremony was always filled with people since they didn’t take any fee to attend it. It could also be because the ceremony was that one time when everyone would gather together to see off their seniors.
Whatever the reason behind it, I would be attending the ceremony. This was the last chance for me to see Akakusa-sensei, there was no way that I would miss it.
Also, Aki-senpai would be there, this was also a chance for me to say my final goodbye to her. I didn’t try to contact her before this because I knew that she was busy with both graduation and exams. Since everything was pretty much over, I could talk with her now and make sure that I tied up every loose end with her.
*   *   *
A few days passed and the day of the graduation ceremony arrived.
It was a holiday, yet I had to wake up early in the morning and put on my uniform.
“Where are you going?”
“The UK. The plane’s gonna take off soon.”
“With what passport?”
“The counterfeit one I made in Hong Kong.”
“There’s really something wrong with your head!”
I finished my breakfast quickly before leaving my home at a speed comparable to a bullet train.
This was my newly acquired movement technique. It would reduce my lifespan by three minutes whenever I used it, but if I didn’t do this, I wouldn’t make it in time.
Like the opening of a silly anime, I used all my strength to run. Too bad, there wasn’t a beautifully placed title with flowers falling and a cute heroine in this opening. Instead, there was a tall high school guy, running with bloodshot eyes, bulging veins and scattered sweat. It wasn’t something that I would let a child see.
Attendance wasn’t mandatory and you could come late if you wanted to, but I was a punctual person, being late wasn’t acceptable.
Thanks to that, I managed to miraculously arrive in time. I managed to make the impossible possible, creating my mark in the annals of history!
“You look like a mess.”
Said Arina who bumped into me.
“I know. They haven’t started yet, right?”
“Yes, but they will soon. Let’s go.”
There were students that looked at me as if I was an idiot. I ran as fast as I could. They didn’t know that I had to get three heart transplants because my heart kept bursting into pieces on the way.
When we got into the gym, I was looking all over the place to find empty seats. Then I found Makoto and Tsuru inside.
“What happened, Sui? Why are you on your last breath?”
“Every capillary in my body ruptured… I failed to beat the gravity in that dogfight…”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
Soon after, the ceremony began. I had been having trouble catching my breath, but I regained my composure as I turned my attention toward a certain place among the teacher’s seats. Akakusa-sensei was there with tears covering her eyes. Too soon, Sensei.
The ceremony proceeded smoothly. Bouquets of flowers were presented to the teachers as they came on stage. The female teachers started to cry, so were the female students. Like they said, women get emotional quickly, huh? I turned my gaze toward Makoto… Who was also crying. You too, huh?
After the ceremony ended, the students exited the gym and lined up in the hallway.
This would be where the teachers who would be transferred walked. This would be the last chance where they could have conversations with their students as their teachers.
“Oi Makoto, wipe your tears.”
“Sniff… Sniff…”
“If I close my eyes and listen to the sound you make, you sound like you’re being choke–”
“Shut up!”
I didn’t know why he was crying, but he looked so sad.
After a while, Akakusa-sensei came out. While holding a lot of gifts from her students in her hands, she walked while nodding her head.
Then Makoto’s tears turned into streams.
“Sensei! I’ll miss you!”
“Thank you, Makoto-kun.”
With a wry smile, she shook his hand. Suddenly, he begged for her photobook, so I quickly grabbed him by the collar and pulled him away from her.
“Good luck at your new workplace, Sensei.”
“Thank you. Good luck with your exam, Sui-kun.”
Our parting words were simple, but that should be enough. We conveyed everything we wanted to convey with our eyes anyway.
Before she left, she gave me a wink.
“There’s a souvenir for you. I left it somewhere in the school.”
“Oh, really? What is it? Where did you leave it?”
“Look for it yourself~”
Was it a photobook? No way, right? Suddenly, Makoto wiped his tears and declared war on me. Dumba*s, there was no way that she’d leave that kind of thing for me.
Besides, I won’t lose to you.
*   *   *
Short break. The students were hanging out in front of the school building.
The class lineup announcement would be posted there.
“I wonder what my new class will look like…”
“I hope mine will be peaceful. I don’t want any monkeys there and I hope that there are a lot of pretty girls!”
“I thought you’re going to stay single forever, why does that matter to you?”
“Pretty girls serve as eye candies for the exam!”
“What a thing to say in front of a girl’s face…”
I ignored Arina’s and Tsuru’s looks of disgust and waited patiently for the announcement.
Since I had some free time, I was talking with Toma and Shinji who were nearby, but I suddenly remembered about Aki-senpai. She didn’t come to the ceremony for some reason, or else she woulda talked with Arina already. It was unfortunate but it couldn’t be helped. She probably had started living on her own somewhere outside the prefecture. Well, I never thought that I would be able to say my goodbyes properly to everyone.
After a while, the teachers appeared with several cylindrical rolls of paper, each was as tall as a person. The students roared in excitement, bringing smiles to the teachers’ faces as they started their preparation.
“Finally.”
“If your name isn’t on there, Sui, I’ll laugh at you.”
“I’ll destroy the board if that were to happen.”
The teachers, working in pairs, opened one side of the rolled up papers and stuck the corners with duct tape. As they did this, the students shouted ‘Quickly!’ in excitement. There was someone who even moaned in a lewd voice while they did that. Wait, I knew this voice, it was Mugiyama Kaya. What the hell was that girl doing? Someone, please stop her!
Not long after, the teachers made a final check to make sure that everything was ready.
And then, the lineup was available for us to see.
“I’ll look forward to working with you this year too, Sui.”
Said Arina to me. That confused me since it had been three months since the New Year started, but I kept my mouth shut after seeing her calm look. She wasn’t joking when she said that. That meant there was a clear reason why she said that.
The students were excited enough to bounce around and scream, meanwhile I desperately looked for my name in the lineup.
“Oh, I’m in class 3-1. Finally I got to be the number one–”
In the same class as mine, I saw the name Hiwa Arina.
Dumbfounded, I turned my gaze at Arina.
She smiled at me before repeating what she had said to me before this.
“You… Is this the souvenir she left for me?”
“Who knows, it’s a secret.”
She turned her head away and hugged Tsuru. Guess we were in the same class again, huh?
Seriously, this was chaotic.
Then I noticed Makoto standing beside me. He gave me a salute. I looked at my class’ lineup again and noticed that his name was there.
Seriously, this was chaotic.
Kaya’s name was also there.
Seriously, this was the end of the world.
“I’ll be looking forward to working with you for the third year, Sui.”
“At this point, this is a curse.”
I bowed as I said that. This situation was like when two enemies on the battlefield met up again after the war was over. Their hatred toward each other was gone. Only those two men who strongly wished for world peace remained.
My last year would be a good one, it seemed, Sensei.