Enrollment Arc, Part II

by Tsutomu Sato

  Nevertheless, instigating any direct fights would mark them as targets to be purged. He was backed by the disciplinary committee chairwoman. Everyone, even those without intimate details of the situation, could easily imagine the student council and the club committee coming to his aid.

  Then what should they do? The standard move would be to pretend like it was an accident. And that’s what they did. They would wait for Tatsuya to approach on his patrol, then create an intentional quarrel. When he stepped in to mediate, he would be hit with magical attacks made to look like misfires. That seemed to be the pattern.

  From Tatsuya’s point of view, incidents were suddenly breaking out wherever he went, one after another. It was unbearable. But as long as he was a disciplinary committee member, he couldn’t ignore them and pass by—he needed to make an effort to bring the situations under control.

  On top of that, people were just flinging magic at him at random, too. He was able to nullify most of them before their effects manifested and escape danger, but there were some he couldn’t completely quell, too.

  He’d known on the first day that people seemed to be after him, but he couldn’t do anything until he discovered proof that it was all secretly connected—and by the time he did, recruitment week would be over.

  In other words, he couldn’t help running right into every trap.

  He had only discovered a culprit during that one incident on the fourth day, but he had fled as well. The person was, after all, a student studying at the elite First High. In general, everyone here was extremely skilled in their methods. Tatsuya got the feeling, though, that the time, place, and objective for their superb abilities couldn’t have been more thoroughly mistaken.

  “…When I think about it, it’s amazing I didn’t get hurt…”

  “They’re putting the restriction back on carrying devices around today, so you don’t have any more to worry about, right?” said Mizuki, trying to console him.

  “I sure hope so,” said Tatsuya, taking the opportunity to nod.

  The student council may have had off-seasons, but it had no days off. It didn’t work on a shift system, after all. Miyuki had to work at the student council again today. And for the siblings, leaving one at school and going home alone wasn’t an option. From an objective spectator’s point of view, it was their own fault they were teased as having a brother/sister complex.

  Nevertheless—“I’m sorry, Tatsuya. I will need to make you wait for me…”—as long as they still had the good sense to feel guilty over making the other wait, they could still be saved.

  “Don’t worry about it… Well, you probably can’t do that, can you…” Tatsuya said, smiling, patting his sister’s head a couple times.

  It would be more apt to call it a pet than a pat. His hands were gentle, and Miyuki bashfully—but comfortably—narrowed her eyes.—While walking through a hallway with students going home.

  Their display of intimacy was prone to being misunderstood (?). The glances cast toward the two heading for the student council room were a mix of goodwill and malice. However, there was a marked difference in them from the all-too-common stares given to couples that were too friendly with each other, and Tatsuya pulled his hand away when he felt the malicious ones.

  When he walked with Miyuki like this…

  Until last week, the greater portion of those mean looks would have been ridiculing. Now, there was a hateful antipathy…and, peeking out from behind it, fear. Not the awe given to the strong…but the fear given to the unknown. The Course 2 students who should have been relieved at his actions were doing the same.

  All that said, this was the first time this week he was spoken to by someone he didn’t know.

  “Shiba?”

  Tatsuya and Miyuki turned around in sync. His physical abilities were clearly superior. The reason they reacted at the same time regardless was because Miyuki’s act was done out of reflex, whereas Tatsuya hadn’t been completely sure the person had been talking to him.

  “Hello. And pleased to meet you, I suppose?”

  It was a fairly pretty girl with medium-length hair pulled back in a ponytail. A strange hairstyle, but Tatsuya remembered seeing her face. “You’re right, nice to meet you. Your name is Mibu, right?”

  She was the sophomore in the kendo club who was essentially the beginning of his week of violence—and one of the parties involved in the kendo club intrusion incident.

  Tatsuya stopped, and she approached with unhesitating movements. Either she was fearless by nature, or free of worry because he was younger. Or maybe she held him in disdain for the same reason. Whichever the case was, it was certainly better than awkward reservation.

  Miyuki aligned her movements with the upperclassman as she stopped before her brother and took a half-step back. She was in a spot just out of Tatsuya’s focus, but naturally inside it if he turned the slightest bit away.

  “I’m Sayaka Mibu. I’m in Class E, same as you.” Tatsuya’s eyes were naturally drawn to Sayaka’s left breast. Sewn onto her green blazer was a plain green pocket. He realized immediately that’s what she meant by same.

  “Thanks for before. You saved me, and I didn’t thank you—I’m sorry.” She gave him a friendly smile, steeped in the charm boys her age would be hard-pressed to resist. Though it was a term not to be used easily around those who could manipulate magic, in a literary sense, one could say her appeal had magic hidden in it that would steal your heart away. —Well, in popular literary terms, anyway.

  “In addition to thanking you, there’s something I’d like to talk to you about… Do you have time to come with me for a little bit?”

  Whether or not she was conscious of the effect her smile had on male high school students was up for debate, but she probably understood it quite well. Although, for Tatsuya, with his too-beautiful sister at his side, it might have been somewhat uncomfortable.

  “I can’t right now.” Sayaka seemed more shocked than annoyed at his brief rejection, to which he followed up with, “Are you free in fifteen minutes?”

  At Tatsuya’s words, spoken quite definitively, she looked at him with a desolate, even blank expression, then hurriedly blinked a few times, and finally seemed to understand what she’d just been asked.

  “Oh, yes, that works. I’ll wait for you in the cafeteria.” Though quite flustered at the unexpected response, she succeeded in obtaining Tatsuya’s promise.

  Tatsuya could only accompany his sister as far as the door of the student council room. Were he to enter, he’d probably see Hattori. Neither of them would be very comfortable if that happened, so Tatsuya, with nothing to do there anyway, had been naturally avoiding the student council room after school.

  “All right, I’ll be waiting for you in the library.”

  Until yesterday, Miyuki had always been waiting for Tatsuya. This was the first instance of him waiting for her, but it was the pattern he’d simulated in his head before school had started. He knew that she would surely come into some sort of official position. Therefore, he would not mistake how to spend his time. All the more because one of the reasons he’d come to this school in the first place was for the private literature and records he couldn’t access except from organizations related to the National Magic University.

  “The library?”

  But Miyuki, who would have known all that, tilted her head and repeated what he’d said. Even he couldn’t help but let doubt creep into his voice. “…That’s my plan. Why?”

  “No, it’s just that you were going to go see Mibu in the cafeteria after this, so…” Miyuki’s eyes were directed toward his collar.

  “Miyuki?” Despite him saying her name, she didn’t bring her face back up.

  She didn’t try to meet his gaze. In fact, she averted hers to the side.

  Tatsuya didn’t understand why his sister was acting this way. In anyone else’s case she would have been sulking, but that was the one thing his sister would never do. Although he tried to get an answer out of her, t
he student council room was before their eyes and both were making people wait. “I don’t think it’s going to take very long. She probably just wants to recruit me for her club.” He knew as well as anyone that was mistaken…but it gave him a chance to resolve the situation.

  “…Is that really all it will be?”

  “What?”

  “Is it just a club recruitment offer? I think it might not be. I don’t have a reason, but…I feel rather anxious. I’m very happy that you have won a reputation…but if they knew even a fraction of your real power, there would be many flocking to use you for their own ends. I think that those who wouldn’t are in the minority. Please, take extra care.”

  It would have been easy to laugh it off as imaginary fears…if it hadn’t been Miyuki Shiba saying it. “…Don’t worry. I’ll be fine no matter what happens.”

  “That’s why I’m so worried!”

  At last, Tatsuya got a dim idea of what his sister was afraid of. “…I’m all right. I would never get that desperate.”

  “…That’s a promise, Tatsuya.”

  “All right… By the way, Miyuki, I don’t think some committee activities in high school are enough to be called winning a reputation.”

  “…Geez! What does it matter, really? To me, your very name is famous, Tatsuya!”

  Miyuki twirled herself around and headed for the card reader. Her cheek, hidden behind her black hair fluttering in an arc, was tinged with crimson.

  He immediately found who he’d come here to meet—Sayaka was standing right near the entrance. “I wouldn’t have minded if you’d sat down to wait.”

  “But then you might not have noticed, Shiba. I’m the one who invited you, so I didn’t want to make you need to look.”

  It was a very feminine concern for him, or maybe it was just because she was older. But Tatsuya got the impression she didn’t understand much about herself. She was sticking out like a sore thumb. He’d have to prepare himself for more annoying rumors after this. He sighed as the thought of the faces of two certain upperclassmen who would laugh mightily at his expense crossed his mind.

  Of course, he wasn’t careless enough to let his sigh show on the surface—on his face. He was meeting this girl for the first time, so it would be rude to sigh at her as soon as he met her. “In any case, let’s sit down. Then we can talk.”

  “It’s not very crowded, so we should buy drinks first.” That was neither a question nor an invitation, but an assertion. He was a little surprised by it, but he wasn’t about to suggest otherwise.

  He bought coffee, and she juice; then they sat down at two empty seats, facing each other. He took a sip of his coffee, then, with the cup still in his hands, looked toward the opposite seat.

  Sayaka focused on slurping up the brilliant scarlet liquid through a straw. She downed two-thirds of it in one go and finally looked back up.

  Their eyes met.

  She looked taken aback, and immediately reddened. It seemed very much like the hue of the juice had made its way into her face.

  “…Do you like that kind of juice?” It was a plain question for Tatsuya, but…

  “Mmgh… Who cares? I like sweet things! I’m basically just a child, after all!” …She suddenly grew angry—no, sulky, even.

  If it’s so embarrassing, then why did you bother getting it? thought Tatsuya. He also felt that her degree of shyness and her level of defenselessness weren’t in balance. But what he actually said was on a completely different vector. “I like sweet foods, too. I’ve never had that before, but I drink juice often at home.”

  “You do?”

  “Yes.”

  “Oh…”

  He didn’t actually do anything of the sort, but Sayaka put a hand to her chest and sighed in relief. The action didn’t make her look older than him—she seemed quite different from last week.

  “Umm, well. Leaving all that aside… Again, thank you very much for last week. It was thanks to you the situation didn’t get out of hand.” She touched her knees together and placed her hands on them, straightened her posture, and gave a bow.

  She was certainly the kendo belle—she seemed much more like that now than the “cute girl” she’d been until last week. He let his half-automatic observations flow toward the back of his mind and gave a noncommittal answer. “You don’t need to thank me. I was doing my job.”

  Sayaka didn’t seem satisfied with his formal reply, however. “I don’t mean for just stopping Kirihara. That was a stupid duel we were having. Kirihara and I were one thing, but I wouldn’t have been surprised if both the kendo club and the kenjutsu club were punished. It was resolved peacefully because you insisted there was no harm done, didn’t you?”

  “It really wasn’t anything to make a big fuss about anyway. Aside from you and Kirihara, nobody was injured. After that it was just the kenjutsu club going nuts, so at the very least, the kendo club wouldn’t be blamed for anything.”

  “But that’s because you were fighting them—that’s sort of why it wasn’t a big problem. If it was anyone else, people would have gotten hurt for sure. Maybe other people could have stopped them without hurting them, but you dealt with so many of them without even letting yourself get hurt. I’m still in disbelief! I think the kenjutsu club should thank you for going easy on them.

  “And about that, I did let Kirihara get hurt…so this might sound like an excuse or kind of unfeminine, but… If you do martial arts for a while, this kind of thing happens. The time comes, no matter what, when you can’t hold back your desire to display your own strength in the process of achieving mastery. Shiba, you know what I mean?”

  “I see—yes, I know.”

  —That was a lie. At least half of it, anyway. He didn’t see his training as being martial arts. They were nothing more than combat techniques he was studying. He could understand the appeal of wanting to show off your ability to carry out your duty, but simply put, he had never had anything to do with impulses to simply flaunt his strength.

  “Right?” However, Sayaka wouldn’t have known much about what was deep inside him—obviously, since they’d only first talked to each other today. “No one needs to make a huge deal out of everything. Well, if people had been injured during that brawl, it would’ve probably been a big problem, but Kirihara was actually the only one who really got hurt. He and I were both fighting well aware we could get hurt, so it’s nobody’s business to make a fuss out of it.”

  That’s wrong, thought Tatsuya. The problem was that Kirihara had broken the rules and used a highly dangerous spell. In principle, recruitment week troubles were handled within the club committee. If things would have ended with just Sayaka and Kirihara swinging their shinai around, Tatsuya would never have intervened, and Mari probably would have kept out of it, too.

  Of course, he said none of this aloud.

  “But there’s still a lot of people who want to make such a small thing into a problem. A lot of students have been exposed for the same kind of thing—just so the disciplinary members could get better grades.”

  “…I am a member of the disciplinary committee at the moment, so…sorry.”

  “I-I’m sorry! I didn’t mean it like that, really!” Feigning an ashamed expression, she looked at Tatsuya, who was bowing his head. Sayaka, suddenly flustered, began to explain herself in a mad haste. “What I wanted to say was that you’re different from them, and that’s why you helped me, and um, I didn’t want to bad-mouth the disciplinary committee—well, I don’t like them, but, umm…?”

  Tatsuya expressionlessly observed Sayaka as her gestalt collapsed…though his own eyes were smiling. The random list of words she was saying had already lost all meaning, and they quickly faded out. Soon, he only saw her mouth opening and closing, with no sound coming out—and then she noticed the smirk in his gaze and looked down, embarrassed.

  “…Hey, Shiba, you’re kind of a bully…”

  He felt like he’d heard that before. “I am not possessed of such a unique inclination,�
� he said nonchalantly, pretending he didn’t know what she meant. Then, forestalling any argument to the contrary, he continued. “So what did you want to talk about?”

  “…I’ll come right out and say it.” Her lips were saying otherwise, but maybe she gave up or her sense of objective won out, because then she said, “Shiba, will you join the kendo club?”

  Finally, she began to talk about the original reason he was here.

  It was so predictable he couldn’t deny feeling slightly deflated, but he already had an answer. If she’d said that from the start, this would have gone more quickly, he thought, a little irritated. He gave her his prepared reply. “I’m grateful for the offer, but I have to decline.”

  “…May I ask your reason?” Sayaka couldn’t keep the shock out of her face at Tatsuya’s immediate response, to which he didn’t seem to have given even the slightest bit of thought.

  “Actually, I’d like to ask why you invited me. My skills are empty-handed ones—they’re completely different from kendo. With your level of skill, you know that, right?”

  His tone was a calm one, not particularly rough or provocative, but there was an unmistakable sharp edge to what he’d actually said.

  Sayaka’s gaze wandered through empty space. She looked like she was desperately seeking an escape route. In a way, she probably was. After breathing a single sigh, she began to speak in an abstract way. “One’s grades in magic are treated as the most important thing at Magic High School… I knew that much from the start, and still enrolled here. But don’t you think it’s wrong to decide everything just based on that?”

  “Please, continue.”

  “There’s no helping the fact that classes are separate. We just don’t have any practical ability, that’s all. But that’s not all being at high school is supposed to be. Even clubs are prioritized based on magical talent, and that’s wrong.”