Chapter 1: Prologue

There are certain people whose mere presence can command the atmosphere of an entire room. Hisaka Sayaka, a first-year in the high school division of Sōshūkan Private Academy, is precisely one of those people.

“Is something wrong?”

“No, nothing really.”

It was a typical break time. I was in my seat by the classroom windows, and next to me was Hisaka. This arrangement was decided the moment we entered high school. Normally, seating charts follow alphabetical order, but Sōshūkan is anything but normal. It’s an institution attended exclusively by the children of prestigious families, some of which were once bitter rivals, feuding to the point of bloodshed. Consequently, even something as trivial as where we sit is orchestrated with some hidden intention by the school. As for why Hisaka and I were placed side-by-side, I haven’t the faintest idea.

Hisaka Sayaka has light brown, semi-long hair and features so refined they could be considered a work of art. She wears black-rimmed glasses and ties her hair into two simple, unfashionable ponytails, yet none of it diminishes her beauty in the slightest.

 

Even when she’s just sitting there, absorbed in a paperback novel, I find my gaze drifting toward her, captivated. Sometimes I stare a little too intently, and she notices—like right now.

“By the way, Hisaka, what are you reading?” I asked, trying to cover my lapse.

“A mystery novel,” she answered, her eyes still on the page. “Someone gets murdered, and the detective becomes obsessed with exposing the culprit. They relentlessly pursue suspects, trying to drag their secrets into the light… It makes you wonder, where does all that passion come from?”

“How should I know?”

What’s the point of psychoanalyzing the conventions of a mystery novel?

“Wait, did you buy a mystery novel you knew nothing about?”

“It was thirty yen at a used bookstore.”

“That explains why it looks so worn,” I remarked. The book jacket was missing, and the pages were yellowed and falling apart.

And yet, when Hisaka is the one reading it, even a shabby old book takes on the air of a rare, antiquarian volume. How strange.

“Beautiful people sure have it good…” I muttered under my breath.

“Hm?”

“No, it’s nothing. Don’t mind me.”

“I see.” Hisaka murmured, returning her gaze to her book. A moment later, she added, “Even if you’re beautiful, if you don’t leverage your looks, you’ll be too impoverished to afford a brand-new, seven-hundred-yen paperback.”

“So you did hear me,” I said, surprised. “Wait, are you actually struggling financially…?”

“I’m a scholarship student, you know. My family couldn’t afford to send me here otherwise.”

“I-I see.”

The Sōshūkan Academy we attend is what you’d call a “rich kids’ school.” Families are expected to possess a certain level of wealth, and the tuition fees reflect that. My family, the Kiyomiya, descended from Kyoto nobility, and we’re still wealthy enough that tuition is a non-issue. I’ve been in this school’s escalator system since elementary, a good nine years now, and for most of that time, I never even knew a scholarship program existed.

“Well, you transferred here a year ago and have been at the top of our grade ever since,” I offered. “With a brain like yours, you’ll be earning good money in the future.”

“It’s not very refined to immediately connect everything to money.”

“Weren’t you the one who just brought it up?”

It’s a little frustrating to be painted as the scumbag when she’s conveniently ignoring her own words.

“Ah.”

“Hm? What’s wrong?”

“Do you have any plans to read this?” she asked, holding the book out.

“No, not at all. It doesn’t seem like my kind of thing.”

As I answered, Hisaka turned the open paperback toward me. On the page, the name “Mano” was highlighted in bright pink. Next to it, an arrow had been drawn in red pen, with the word “Culprit!” written beside it, just in case there was any doubt.

“This is the worst,” she sighed. “And I’m not even halfway through.”

“It wasn’t even worth thirty yen… I’m going back to get a refund.” Hisaka stood abruptly, reaching for the school bag hanging from her desk.

“Wait, wait!” I said, startled. “I get how you feel, but you don’t need to go that far for thirty yen!”

“It’s not about the money; it’s a matter of pride. I refuse to let them get away with pawning this off on me.”

With that firm declaration, she slung her bag over her shoulder and prepared to leave.

“W-wait, Hisaka!”

“Kyah!”

“Ah!”

Oh no…!

For a fleeting instant, I saw Hisaka’s perpetually cool expression harden. As I had reached out to stop her, my hand had wrapped around her waist. Her dark navy blazer usually masked her figure, but my hand told me what my eyes couldn’t—her waist was surprisingly slender.

Just one hand is enough to tell me that much… Does this girl even have internal organs?

“Hey, is Kiyomiya sexually harassing Hisaka-san…?”

“Whoa, that’s basically groping, isn’t it? Should we tell a teacher?”

“He’s such a scumbag…”

The whispers of the girls around us snapped me back to reality, and I quickly retracted my hand. Even if my only intention was to stop her, what I’d done was, without a doubt, outrageous sexual harassment.

“It can’t be helped,” Hisaka said calmly. “I’ll forgive you.”

“Huh?”

That was… surprisingly easy.

Or so I thought──

Hisaka leaned in, her lips brushing against my ear as she whispered.

“If you want to touch me, you can do it when we’re home.”

“……!”

I nearly toppled over in my chair. It wasn’t just her breath I felt; it was the faint, soft contact of her skin against mine.

“The bell’s about to ring,” she said, pulling back.

“A-ah, right.”

As if nothing had happened, Hisaka sat down and began arranging her textbooks on her desk. My neighbor, the honorary scholarship student. Come to think of it, there was never any chance she’d actually skip class to storm a used bookstore over thirty yen.

I’m being completely played, wrapped around the little finger of Hisaka Sayaka.

Both in the classroom──and at home.

 

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