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Pre-chapter Eccentricities:

This is a kenzan, it is used for flower arranging:

I tutted as a lust for blood wafted past me on the breeze. Four high schoolers, taller than I, had encircled me and were closing in bit by bit. Inexcusable as turning the first day of high school into a fight was, I was paying for my own mistakes so it couldn’t be helped.

Though it was not yet ten days into April, the air chilled, and the breeze hastened its way through my kenzan-esque hair. The sun had just awoken, and his rays struck down at us obliquely in the otherwise uninhabited park, causing the slide to glow a dull silver.

“Bein’ hit in shoulder’s a good reason to get angry, ain’t it?”

I briefly glanced over the four high schoolers, instantly recognising the navy blue blazers that were identical to my own, and spat provocatively. The ringleader, and best built, of my four upperclassmen licked his lips and raised a fist.

“You fucking with me? You might’ve broken a bone with that knock. I’m sayin’ that you get to choose if you’re goin’ to pay with a hundred, or if we’re goin’ to give you a beatin'”

“Hmmm…”

I had already hardened my resolve, in fact having bumped into the tough looking group specifically because I was already in a bad mood. I hadn’t expected them to demand reparations, but for the moment I was glad for the fight.

Yes, I thought, that morning my parents had argued loudly over parental custody and child support right in front of my elder brother and me. Fed up and ashamed, I had wished to break out with all my might. That day would have been fine, the day of my entrance ceremony for Shibuyamadai High School, had it not been for that fruitless talk of divorce.

Those emotions were what led me to inciting the four in that park. I checked my watch. I wanted to kick something whether I won or lost, right until the school gates opened at half past eight. Tossing my bag to the ground, I squeezed both fists and hunched over. The boys burst out in laughter.

“You want to be hit that badly? As you wish…”

It was a critical situation. I tensed my body comfortably to harden it, and thought I’d put all my weight into a blow for the student before me, but just as I bent my knees…

“Stop right there!” a voice called strongly out from the entrance to the park, drawing the boys’ attention.

I wasn’t the only one whose breath was stolen. Standing there, roughly wearing the uniform of our same Shibuyamadai High School was a boy with a girlish, pretty face. No, he was not pretty, but beautiful in face and in figure. He had the beauty of the magnum opus of a master craftsman. His skin was fair and, like a painting of a medieval European noble, his black hair looked frighteningly good as it hid his ears. I had not, nor likely had any of us there that day, seen a boy so beautiful before, but the surprising part was yet to come. That boy suddenly dropped face down to the ground, and, like an inchworm, raised and lowered his hips as he began to advance along the ground. He slowly drew near to us in that pathetic state at a murderously agonising pace. Neither I, nor the four, could say anything at the impropriety of it. Completely ignoring our gazes, while pumping his hips at his own pace, he managed to come to us over the course of a minute. Slowly standing, he dusted the dirt off of his uniform.

“I have shown you something unsightly.”

Indeed he had.

The previously dumbfounded boys threatened him in the same way that had me, “The fuck’re you?”

That bizarre pretty boy, by the way he had wriggled towards them like an inchworm -clearly he was eccentric- had proven that he unmistakably had guts. It was then that I too regained myself.

“Don’t try and but in. This is between me and my sempai here. I’d like it if you stayed unrelated.”

“I cannot allow that. If you wish to fight with them, you’ll have to go through me first.”

“What?”

In the next instant, the pretty boy was upon me. Caught by the arm, I was thrown before I could respond. The world rotated 180 degrees before I hit the ground. I had gone over his shoulder, and struck my hip against the ground, but he had been going easy on me, and it didn’t hurt. I was unquestionably dumbfounded.

Grabbing me by the shirt, he smiled and looked to the four, “How was that, my upperclassmen!? Should I hurt him more?”

They were so lost for what to do that I could feel the confusion hit me like a wave. Seeing they had not responded, the pretty boy took my arm crosswise, and pressured my elbow with a judo lock; painfully, that time.

“How is it!? His arm shall break!”

The four were plainly apathetic. My opponent who was causing my arm to make popping noises, who was attacking me from the side, was an unparalleled beauty. I could not err in my judgement that such a surreal sight had never before graced my eyes.

Finally, the ringleader spoke, “I don’t get it. How long are you going to do that, you idiots?”

They rather venomously urged each other to go, and left the park together, their figures quickly hidden behind the buildings.

“It seems to have gone well.”

The pretty boy separated from my arm. Having been highly considerate with his arm-lock that time, when he released my arm, it didn’t particularly hurt any more than usual.

“Just what went so well?”

I stood and wiped the dust from my back and legs.

“You went too damn far… are you picking a fight with me, punk?”

“I wouldn’t dream of it. I simply took action to end what I perceived to be a bad situation. Have I not rescued you from your dilemma without a single injury? Does that bother you?”

“It does.”

I picked up my bag, and faced him once more. He really was beautiful enough to wake a bear from hibernation. I would likely have quickly accepted it if he had told me he was female.

“Are you a first-year like me? Shibuyamadai High School?”

“That is correct. Your name?”

I spat to the ground.

“Shouldn’t you introduce yourself first?”

The pretty boy gave a bitter smile in the first graceful action that was befitting of his appearance.

“I am Kiriki Junka. You may call me Matsujun.”

Where did that matsu come from?

“I’m Suzaku Rouji. Bye bye, lady-killer.”

Walking past him, I exited the park that he had ruined the mood of. It had been one hell of a morning.

Shibuyamadai was a five minute walk from the nearest station. Located in an elegant residential area, the most defining aspect of the small campus were its old and new buildings. The standard scores from the school were unusually high, and I had used all of my life’s good fortune on passing the entrance exam. To this day I admire my ability to have made it.

People had gathered around the bulletin board beside the entrance to confirm which classes they had been assigned to. I too searched for my name.

There it was: class 1-3. I took my bag and turned to take the stairs to the third floor.

School in the morning was filled with energetic conversations between the students, but the first years on their first day were quietly fumbling about to try and close the distance they felt between themselves and the other people. If there were girls who seemed to instantly become best friends with each other, there were also those like me who emitted an aura to keep the others at bay. Well, I had figured that everyone would become used to it after a few days.

I slid open the door, and stepped into class 1-3 just in time for attendance.

That was when I heard a voice, “Hey, Rouji-kun.”

It was a voice I had heard before, or I should say, it was a voice that I had just heard, and so I raised my face. Who was sitting on a chair just before my eyes but the eccentric pretty boy, Kiriki Junka, legs together, composed.

“You’re late aren’t you? It is just splendid we’re in the same class, splendid. Come, sit.”

I was shocked.

“You, just when did you get here? I took the quickest route here, but I don’t remember seeing you passing me.”

He innocently shrugged his shoulders, “I followed right behind you after the incident in the park, and when you were taking way too long to find your name on the bulletin board, I came straight here.”

While that explanation did make sense, there was something I could not accept about it.

“You followed? Me?”

He smiled like an innocent little girl.

“That’s right. Shadowing people is a hobby of mine. I just wanted to follow along behind you while making sure you didn’t get into any more fights.”

I hadn’t noticed at all, and the thought of it sent shivers down my spine.

“You’re a creepy one. It’s like you were hired to find out if I’m cheating.”

An innocent nod.

“Yes, I’m a detective, you see. An amateur, though… I just find people interesting. You for example, Rouji-kun, you are troubled over your parents’ talks of divorce, right?”

I thought my heart was going to leap out of my chest, and my throat clasped shut.

“H-how did you know that?”

A pure smile floated across his face.

“I’ll tell you all about it if you walk back with me after school.”

“What is this?”

That was when the teacher entered the classroom, and I had to hide my shock as I made my way to my seat.

Translator’s Note:

Oh boy, the difference between the style of the first person narration and the dialogue of the POV character is a little jarring.

Hopefully, pretty boy does not resemble the painting of a noble that was painted in the medieval era, I’d hate to see what a gothic style painting looks like in real life.

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