Episode 88 – Jade (gem) True Strength

This is the first time I’ve been alone with Yukihana Hisui. We had been next to each other before at the sports festival, but that was an exception. We hadn’t really talked nor had we had a heart-to-heart talk with each other. In the first place, there should have been no reason for Yukihana Hisui to come all the way over to my place.

“You really beat me at the sports festival. I don’t remember the last time I was so far behind in the sprint.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You’re still playing dumb. I’ve already established that you’re that ridiculous rabbit-faced bastard. It’s just unsightly now.”

Hisui is apparently convinced that I’m the guy from back then. I honestly don’t know how he knows who I am, but his sister may have blurted something out. Yukihana, who came up to me after the relay, seemed convinced that rabbit man was me. It seems that the cost of the relay may have been greater than I thought.

“Or shall I prove it another way?”

“Another way?”

“Solid proof that you’re the guy at that time.”

It seems that Hisui is determined to prove that he is me, no matter what. In fact, he’s right, but I’m genuinely curious as to how he’s going to prove it. So I decided to just sit back and watch.

“Oraaaaa ! !”

“!?”

But just as I decide to watch, Hisui’s shoulder shakes for a moment. No, it was an attack on me. He was about to swing his left fist at my face at ultra-high speed. If I took a serious hit, at best he will break a bone in my face. At worst, it would be a blow that would leave me blind or brain-damaged. But……

Snap…..

The swinging fist stops just short of my nose. It’s a stop that requires tremendous concentration. Moreover, the laws of physics dictate that putting force in the opposite direction in a straight line that hits the tip of the nose must be very taxing on the arm. However, the small man in front of me was able to do it with ease. That alone was enough to measure his strength.

Yukiuhana Hisui has the ability that is equal to not only Nanase and Shinkai, but also me. Depending on the situation, he may even have the ability to surpass me.

As I analyzed this, Hisui looked at me with a serious expression on his face. Apparently, Hisui had something on his mind during our exchange.

“You were reacting just now, weren’t you?”

“I was just too scared to do anything.”

“No, that’s not it. You were able to react and did not avoid it. In that split second, you judged that there was no need to avoid it.”

The swinging motion Hisui made at that moment was exactly what I was going all out for, but the killing intent and hostility disappeared quickly.

The hostility disappeared even though he was about to attack. The conclusion that can be drawn from this is that it was a shortstop or a strike against me. If that was the case, I decided there was no need to bother avoiding him. If I took some strange action at this point, I would be misled into thinking something unnecessary. However, I could say that he was one step ahead of me.

In any case, he instinctively understood that I reacted and did not avoid them.

“I don’t understand. Why is it that with your exceptional physical ability and talent, you don’t try to use them?”

“I don’t have it.”

“You’re lying. I’ve only seen a guy who was about to get hit but acted like that only twice in my life.”

“There’s a lot of them who’s like that.”

Somehow, this Yukihana Hisui seems to be going through a battlefield. His experience of fighting and using the body is frighteningly higher than me. If this guy gets serious about it, it will be easy for him to take control of this school. At Shinkai’s current level, there is no way to stop him.

“You look like you can handle it.”

“Well……”

I’m sure that from the outside, I look like I can handle it. In any case, he’s not wary of the man in front of him, and no matter how I look at it, he;s in a state of answering that he is full of gaps. But the fact is, I was relaxed and my mind could not have been more at ease.

In this one moment, I knew, I could see. I could see Yukihana Hisui’s talent and the effort he has put in. And his current comprehensive ability and the goal that will eventually reach me. And the only fact that I could predict and analyze all of them, and attribute them to my brain. For him, it’s cruel, but for me, it’s a foregone conclusion.

——There’s no need for me to go out of my way to get serious about someone like this.

I’m sure that I can win the fight with a mouthful, and even if he does make a fist, I can predictably avoid it, and although it will break my bones a little, it will be easy to hold him down. If I open my drawers a little, I can come up with any number of ways to play with him.

If you call it pride, that’s the end of it, but I can’t think of a situation where I would lose in my current state. I’m close to him in terms of ability, and I’m sure he is no match for Shinkai. But even so, there are elements that are too far away from me.

Yukihana Hisui’s talent for fighting and violence is…..

“What are you laughing at, bastard?”

Apparently, I was smiling without realizing it. But it can’t be helped. I didn’t think it was possible to reach such a level of achievement through hard work alone.

A kind of art. That’s what I thought of Yukihana Hisui.

Now, it’s okay if I take the lead in the conversation a little. I was getting tired of being asked questions.

“So what do you want from me?”

I finally pressured him to tell me the main issue. The fact that he went to the trouble of coming to a rooftop that is normally off-limits suggests that he’s trying to do something that he doesn’t want people to see or hear. To be honest, I would be lying if I said I had no idea what he was up to, but I still dared to ask him a question.

“Tsk ! What did you mean by that last time?”

Hisui throws a piece of paper at me in a pissed-off manner. It was something I had secretly handed to him when I sat next to him at the sports festival. The content is this.

–Your sister is being voyeuristically photographed in front of the school building by a man in a gray hat with a camera.

I told Hisui that voyeurism was taking place at this sports festival, albeit in a fragmentary manner. Although indirectly, the man was actually acting suspiciously, looking in all directions. But I knew that wasn’t enough to get him to take action, so I decided to impress him with me and my message by showing him an overwhelming run in the relay. Although it was also my step sister’s wish, I would say that it was a success that I made a serious effort there.

Furthermore, making him think that his sister is the victim must have made him more impatient. As a result, I was able to get a handle on the voyeurism case, even if I had to leave it to someone else.

“I wonder.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me ! I took his camera away from him and found a bunch of pictures of the girls ! And I don’t know how he took them, but there’s a picture of the changing room in there too ! Aah !?”

“The changing room?”

I had thought that it was only the school grounds that had been voyeuristically photographed. But I didn’t realize they were also breaking into the school building. No, no. Maybe there are collaborators inside the school. Either way, it would be extremely malicious.

“How the hell do you know about it?”

“I don’t know.”

“Oh, really?”

Then Hisui moved again. It was only my arm earlier, but this time I stepped so hard that my entire body seemed to blur. Then, with all the strength in his body, he released a hook at my stomach. This time, unlike the previous one, it was a genuine attack, not a stop-gap. I guess he was aiming at my stomach because he was thinking of attacking me in a place that is inconspicuous from the outside.

(This is indeed a bad idea.)

If I take it seriously, it will destroy my body. An attack that filled me with a sense of hopelessness was approaching me.

To be honest, I could have avoided it or run away from it, but that would not be possible in order to achieve my goal. So I decided to catch the fist. However, not with my stomach, but with the palm of my hand that I held out toward the fist that was being swung out to meet it.

Pow ! ! !

The dry sound of flesh colliding with flesh echoed on the rooftop.

“……Seriously.”

Hisui was stunned by the scene before him. Even the person who attacked it probably didn’t expect it to be caught. At best, I could avoid it or run away. Or I choose defense among the limited options. That in itself was not strange, but even so, it’s just too weird.

Hisui’s fist was not pushing me out of the way, but rather gripped tightly in my hand, not moving an inch.

“Let me go, you bastard !”

“……I see.”

I slowly let go of Hisui’s fist, reminding him of the difference in our abilities. I’m sure Hisui felt it keenly after that exchange. In order to fight with me, it’s necessary to make a mistake with the resolution of death. But Hisui, who was not here to fight, calmed down and asked me again.

“What is it with you? What do you want? How much do you know about us?”

I was the one who had asked the question earlier, and now he was asking it back. Then silence followed for a while. I may be wrong, but at least it’s not like I’m going to take any action against Hisui here. The only thing I’m going to carry through here is just silence. That’s enough.

“……Tsk !”

Hisui is blatantly annoyed that I’m not answering him. But there’s nothing we can do for each other, because if we take a hard line, that would be meaningless. Then Hisui turns on his heel as if giving up.

“You, don’t poke your head into unnecessary things. Also…..if you do something to my sister. I’ll kill you.”

He spat this line and left the rooftop. I guess he figured there was nothing he could get from me. He obviously knew something, but it was difficult to get it out of me. But since I didn’t seem to have any hostile intentions, leaving me alone was no problem. Hisui must have decided so. Otherwise, he would have stabbed me here and now. I guess it was a good thing that I was in a passive posture, almost unresisting.

In contrast, there’s nothing in particular that I want from Hisui. After all, he had just played a major role. The situation is now set. All that’s left is……

“……You keep your answer to what you want to do.”

With that, I took my phone, which I had left connected all this time, out of my breast pocket, said that and hung up the call.

At the moment of disconnection, I thought I heard a confused girl’s voice through the phone.