(Ake's Viewpoint)

  [Start of the Semester, Three Weeks In: September 17th]

  A brown-haired girl and a dark-haired boy stood in large room with desks positioned to form a large square. The boy stood by the window, sipping on a cola as he stared out the window.

  I, the girl, simply stood by the desks with weary eyes.

  “I suppose a congratulations is an order. Only your first year and you’re already the vice president of the student council.” The boy told me.

  Il let out a small sigh and gave the boy a half-smile.

  ~Honestly. I didn’t really want to be here. What were my friends thinking?

  “I was rather surprised that this junior high school held elections for council so early into the year. It’s barely been two weeks since the semester started.”

  “Ah yes, well the school considers the council an equivalent to the clubs around here. They used to hold elections after midterms but last year we didn’t get any new members so I guess that freaked them out. As a result, they held a sort of popularity contest across the chosen class representatives.” The boy said, a subtle smirk painted across his face.

  “What happened last year?” I asked him, slightly tilting my head.

  “Well, all the top scorers in the exams outright refused to join the council. Instead they all created a book club, my little brother included. You’ll probably run into them soon enough.”

  The boy pushed himself off the wall and walked up to me. He held out his hand for a handshake and gave me an innocent grin.

  “Anyways, my name is Ashura Kuroshin. Welcome to the student council, Ake Mori.”

  I stared at his hand.

  I glanced up at his face.

  ~Can I trust this boy? He’s a third year and the student council president, so maybe I can trust him.

  “Don’t worry. I won’t hit on you. I have a girlfriend, after all.”

  “Uhuh… Right…”

  I took his hand, shaking it slightly.

  Suddenly the door flew open. A girl with a blonde side-pony with white ends stood at the doorway triumphantly with her fists to her hips. She puffed out her chest and shouted out.

  “Huehuehue! I, the great and magnificent Mashiro, have come to grace you with my presence!”

  Ashura simply smiled and raised his hand at the blonde. “Oh hey, Mashiro.”

  “Haiiii, Ash-kun! I got a request for the Tea Time Book Club!!!” Mashiro said cheerfully as she waved around a piece of paper.

  “Cool. Hand it over.” Ashura walked over to meet the girl halfway, taking the paper from her hand. He took a look at it and pulled out a pen from his pocket. “You didn’t forge your members’ names again, did you? My precious little brother will get mad at you again if you did.”

  “A-ah! Wellll…!” Mashiro laughed and scratched the back of her head.

  “Uhm…” I spoke up, holding my hands together against my chest as I looked at the two of them.

  “Ah right. This is one of the top scorers I mentioned earlier, Ake. Meet Mashiro Kiwusawa. The school’s local gremlin and the founder of the Tea Time Book Club.”

  “Hey! I’m not a gremlin! I’m a wizard! Get it right, Ash-kun!”

  “Right, right. Bring this back to me when you have legitimate signatures, alright? I can’t keep letting this slide every time, you know. I don’t want little Ran to hate me, you know.” Ashura said, his smile still beaming as he shoved the paper back into Mashiro’s chest.

  Mashiro puffed her cheeks, clutching the paper dramatically to her chest.

  “Hmph!! Fine! I’ll get those signatures for real this time! But only because I need my familiar to like me too!”

  “Still calling my little brother Ran your familiar, huh? Have he accepted the role yet?” Ashura chuckled.

  Mashiro’s cheeks turned red and she turned away, crossing her arms. “N-no…”

  “That figures. He can be a stubborn little kitty at times, that brother of mine. Haha.” Ashura grinned, pressing his fingers to his chin.

  Mashiro stuck her tongue out at him before turning to me. Her eyes sparkled with this intense curiosity that made my stomach tighten.

  “Oh! You must be the new vice president that won the popularity contest! That must mean you have a radiant aura! Radiant! Yes, that’s it! You’ll be THE radiant student council member… Ake-chan was it?”

  “Ah— yes.” I replied, bowing my head slightly. ”But… drop the -chan, maybe?”

  Mashiro leaned in far too close, her face inches from mine. Our noses were almost touching.

  “You’re cute! You’ll fit right in!”

  “Fit… right in?” I echoed, unsure whether to be flattered or terrified.

  Ashura placed a hand on Mashiro’s head and gently pushed back. “Don’t scare her on her first day on the job.”

  “I wasn’t scaring her! I was welcoming her!” Mashiro protested, flailing her arms.

  I blinked.

  This was… a lot.

  Ashura sighed, but his smile didn’t fade. “Mashiro, go get those signatures. And tell Ran I said hi.”

  “Will do! Huehuehue!” Mashiro spun on her heel and bolted out of the room, nearly tripping over the doorframe on her way out.

  Silence settled for a moment.

  I exhaled slowly.

  “…Is she always like that?” I asked.

  Ashura laughed. “That was her on a calm day.”

  I stared at him.

  He shrugged. “You’ll get used to her. Eventually.”

  I wasn’t convinced.

  Ashura walked back to the window, taking another sip of his cola. “Anyway, you’ll be working with me for the next year. If you ever need help, just ask. I’m not as scary as I look.”

  “You don’t look scary,” I said.

  “Good. Then we’re off to a great start.”

  He flashed me a grin — warm, harmless, and just a little too knowing.

  I wasn’t sure if I trusted him yet.

  But I trusted him more than the gremlin wizard who had just burst through the door.

  And that was enough for now.

  …

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  [Start of the Semester, 1 Month, 1 Weeks In: October 2nd]

  Less than a week after I started the student council and met Ashura, I met the rest of the Tea Time Book Club.

  Mashiro Kiwusawa was even more chaotic than the day we initially met.

  Eliba Cerubi seemed to have this vibe that she didn’t want to be bothered, but I respected that.

  Raneko Kuroshin seemed to be alot more calm and straightforward than his older brother. Though of the group, he was said to score the highest in almost every exam both this year and last so it seemed he knew more than he let on. So he was similar to his brother in that sense, at the very least.

  The most notable of the group, however, was a small doll-like girl named Rea Dola. She was quiet, reserved. She reminded me a bit of myself, but she never spoke to me. She seemed rather attached to Raneko, however. Ashura mentioned that Rea was the only one to score higher than Raneko in the English exam. She had scored a perfect score, no less.

  About three more weeks have passed by since then and I once again found myself standing in the student council room early into the day, just before the homeroom bell was set to ring.

  “Early again, I see.” Ashura smirked as he let out a small chuckle.

  “That’s only because you kept insisting I get here early.”

  “Well, we council members are supposed to be model students. However, you’re the only one who listened to my insistence. How noble of you, miss Mori.” He smiled. “As a reward, I’ll let you on a little secret.”

  “A secret…?”

  Ashura leaned in slightly, lowering his voice like he was going to spill something highly confidential.

  I blinked.

  “What kind of secret?”

  ~I can’t trust this boy. Not yet. He’ll get me into tons of trouble if I let him!

  “There’s going to be a transfer student coming in soon.”

  I looked at him, blinking some more.

  It wasn’t the kind of secret I was expecting. Rather, thankfully, it was rather normal.

  “In October?” I questioned further.

  “Mm-hmm.” He nodded, taking another sip of a cola. “It’s unusual. But the school approved it. I hear it’s because the legendary Mia Yuruichi is involved.”

  ~Mia Yuruichi. The awards display in the hall showed many awards won by her. She was said to be a prodigy athlete and a genius. She was the first to ever graduate from this junior high a year early and rumors say she graduated from her chosen high school a year early as well. Plenty of gossip have spread across the classes about her, even amongst the first years.

  “Yes. That Mia.” Ashura said, smiling at me as if he read my thoughts.

  “That’s rather mean, you know.” I retorted, sending him a Eliba-styled glare.

  “Oh, my apologies. It was rather obvious what you were thinking, especially looking at that cute face of yours.” Ashura simply laughed it off while throwing me the usual flattery. Whether he meant it or not was still unclear.

  “Anyways. I hear he’s going to be transferring into your class as a first-year.” Ashura continued, taking a long sip of his cola.

  I frowned. “Why tell me this?”

  Ashura shrugged. “Because you’re the vice president. And because you’re the only one who actually shows up early enough for me to gossip with.”

  “That’s not—” I stopped. “…That’s not a good reason.”

  “It’s a great reason,” he said, completely unbothered. “Besides, I think you’ll get along with him.”

  I blinked again. “You don’t even know him.”

  “True,” Ashura admitted, tapping his chin thoughtfully. “But I have a feeling.”

  A feeling.

  Coming from him, that could mean anything.

  Ding dong.

  And then the bell rang.

  …

  [Start of the Semester, 1 Month, 2 Weeks In: October 8th]

  I sat down at my seat, slouching over the desk as I heaved a sigh.

  “Woah, Ake. You seem rather tired first thing in the morning.”

  “Student council duties.” I muttered. “Plus, the teacher wanted to talk to me about something.”

  “Oh, about what?” The girl behind me asked.

  I opened my mouth to speak a reply but—

  The classroom door slung open, crashing against its limits. Everyone’s eyes immediately turned towards the front of the classroom, where a white-haired boy with golden eyes stood nervously in front of the blackboard.

  “You can take the empty seat in the back by the window.” I heard the teacher Yoshito say.

  The boy nervously started to step forward, but Yoshito grabbed him by the shoulder. “Ah right. Please introduce yourself to your fellow classmates, mister Yuruichi.”

  ~Yuruichi? So he shares a name with the legendary Mia?

  I could hear an audible swallow from the boy as he let out a small cough.

  His voice came out softly, almost ethereal.

  “Uhh… My name is Yoiyami Yuruichi. I transferred here today. I hope we can get along.”

  Everyone remained silent.

  But then I could hear the students around me whispering to each other.

  “That’s him…”

  “He’s even paler up close, like a vampire.”

  “His eyes— look at his eyes.”

  “Is he the one who…”

  “Shh. He’ll hear you.”

  The teacher clapped his hands once, trying to regain control of the class.

  “Alright, alright. Settle down, everyone. Yuruichi, you may take your seat now.”

  The boy began to make his way to his desk again.

  Then, in that moment, the friend sitting behind me leaned over her desk and spoke into my ear.

  “He looks like he walked right out of a fantasy novel.”

  My breath caught for a moment.

  I looked over to the boy as he nearly tripped over but quickly regained his balance by stomping his foot on the floor.

  He gave a small smile — one of someone who felt like breaking inside. Then he took his seat in the blink of an eye.

  ~So this is the transfer student.

  The whispers continued around me.

  “He looks paler now.”

  “Is he okay?”

  “Maybe we should ask?”

  “No way. You do it.”

  “He’s too scary. I don’t want to.”

  Ding.

  A notification appeared on my phone. I turned it on to check it.

  Somebody had sent me a video.

  I perked my head up, looking around to see if I could see who sent it.

  Ding.

  Another message popped up.

  It simply read “Watch this”.

  Hesitantly, I took out an earbud and pushed it into my ear. Then, I tapped on the video to play it.

  The video was of the school hallway. A familiar white-haired boy stood cornered by the windows by a larger male student.

  “So you’re the new guy everyone seems so excited about, huh?” The sound quietly played in my ear. It did not sound like the transfer student, so it must had been the larger boy.

  “And?” Yuruichi’s voice came out as soft as it did in class just now, but his tone was fairly monotonous and the single phrase was extremely blunt.

  The larger boy slightly shifted his weight. It was subtle, but I could tell that he was trying to size Yuruichi up.

  “It seems I might need to knock you down a peg, transfer student.” He said.

  The larger boy arm went up. He had thrown a punch. But in an instant, the transfer had caught it in his hand.

  “Oh?” Yuruichi replied.

  I paused the video for a moment. There was something off.

  I stared closely at it.

  ~That’s it…

  Yuruichi’s eyes… appeared to be faintly glowing.

  Not only that— there was a shadow in the window.

  ~A shadow…? In the window?

  I tapped on the screen to continue the video playthrough.

  “Mind telling me what your issue is? Perhaps we could solve it together.” Yuruichi said.

  A few seconds passed. Yuruichi’s eyes stopped glowing and the shadow faded. He quickly let go of the boy’s hand.

  “Sorry.” He said, then he quickly walked away.

  The video ended.

  I looked over at the transfer student— at Yuruichi sitting in the corner.

  In the video he was scary but here, right now— he just looked scared. Even more scared than anyone in the class.

  He was alone.

  ~I can’t let this happen… I-I’m the class representative! And the vice president of the student council! I have a duty to protect all the students!

  I nodded to myself, as if agreeing with my own thoughts.

  Then, I stood to my feet.

  I approached the boy quickly. If I didn’t, I was afraid he’d run away from me.

  “U-uhh… Hello. May I be of assistance to you?” The boy asked as he looked up at me.

  I closed my eyes, and heaved a small sigh. Opening them once more, I gave the boy a bright smile and extended my hand towards him.

  “Hello. My name is Ake Mori. Nice to meet you, Yuruichi.” I said.