"I'm here."
In a milk tea shop not far from Academy, Kurashiki Reina sat in a booth by the window on the second floor, resting her head on one hand and looking out through the floor-to-ceiling windows.
Under the golden glow of the setting sun, the scene included students arm in arm, carrying backpacks and milk teas, chatting joyfully as they strolled along, with birds chirping and hopping on the high wires above.
The setting sun, like an old fisherman by the river, spread its wide net every day on time, casting everything in a soft golden hue.
Hearing the voice, Reina turned her gaze from the window to the girl who took the seat opposite her.
The girl was dressed in a uniform similar to her own school's, with only slight differences in colour.
The school badges on their chests were also similar, both featuring a circle with a large triangle and a smaller inverted triangle within it, which in turn enclosed a smaller dark circle.
As Eiko Private Academy was a branch of Seijin Private Academy, it was normal for their uniforms and badges to be very similar.
Thus, Reina gave the girl only a cursory glance before moving her attention to her pretty face, which carried a teasing expression.
The girl's face was beautifully delicate with refined makeup.
By looks alone, she was an attractive young lady.
However, her frequently raised eyebrows and narrow eyes gave off a sense of disdain for others.
Combined with her often teasing remarks, she seemed like a mean person to those who didn't know her well.
Well, that was more or less the case.
Dropping her backpack onto the seat, Tsushima Rina, who had hurried over, took a sip of the strawberry-flavoured sparkling water placed before them and teased:
"Is today's Reina the melancholic young lady? Sitting so lonely by the window is quite rare for you~"
"Rina, I didn't ask you here to tease me."
After taking a sip of her cool sparkling water, Reina, biting her straw, asked:
"Do you have any high-quality resources? Can you introduce someone to me?"
Both she and Tsushima Rina were visually oriented.
Just as boys like to look at lightly dressed beauties, they openly admitted their preference for handsome, lightly dressed men.
And like most boys, Reina's mobile phone was filled with many handsome men she followed online.
As for street-side flirtations... given her mother's status as a major shareholder in a large corporation and her own status as a genuine rich girl, she wasn't about to demean herself to that level.
Rina, however, was a bit different.
She dared to approach strangers and ask for their contact information.
However, as far as Reina knew, her friend had no intention of giving herself away just yet.
In Rina's own words, 'They are all pretty-faced trash. It's fine to look more and chat a bit, but it's nauseating to be with them.'
So, Rina preferred to look for attractive guys among her peers at school.
Being with someone of the same age didn't come with dark motives, and it allowed for more time to get to know each other.
If they got along well, they could even get married right after graduation.
Although she was a tough girl, Rina still harboured typical female dreams of transitioning from a school classroom to a wedding chapel.
As her best friend, Reina knew of her keen interest in finding handsome guys.
So, realizing her mother was serious about setting her up this time, Kurashiki Reina, who had no real-life options other than online videos, immediately signalled for help.
Hearing her words, Tsushima Rina, twirling a fry on a stick placed in the middle of the table, looked curiously at her.
"Eh? Reina, weren't you always about letting things happen naturally? Why the sudden urgency?"
"Tch~"
The girl grimaced, her frown as tangled as knotted string, and said discontentedly:
"It's my mother, of course. I don't know what got into her. She usually ignores my affairs, but now she's suddenly introduced me to a fiancé, which is really annoying."
Munching on a fry dipped in ketchup, Rina sipped through her straw, looked at the girl, and nodded lightly in agreement, "That does sound annoying~"
"Forget her for a moment, Rina, do you have anyone available right now? I'm really in a hurry."
"I know you're in a hurry, but just slow down…"
Before Tsushima Rina could leisurely finish her sentence, Kurashiki Reina, noticing that her friend was being evasive today, looked at her suspiciously,
"You haven't found a target in school, have you?"
Rina, suddenly caught off guard, laughed it off as usual:
"If I had found someone, I would have bragged to you already, how could I..."
However, she was interrupted mid-sentence by Reina picking up her phone to text, which alarmed her a bit:
"Reina, people are talking here, pay attention."
"It's fine, you keep talking. I'm just going to ask your followers what you've been up to these days."
Well...she just remembered that her younger followers had met Sasaki a couple of times.
Quickly reaching for her friend's phone and missing, she laughed awkwardly as she withdrew her hand, saying:
"I'll talk, I'll talk, I'll do it myself."
"Alright, keep talking."
Still holding her phone ready to type, Reina smirked and lifted her head signaling the girl to hurry up.
Although reluctantly, Rina knew the jig was up.
If she didn't spill the beans, Reina would find out anyway.
Considering her current relationship with Sasaki, which wasn't even friendly, she thought it wouldn't hurt to share the situation.
With that in mind, Rina started explaining from the Monday after she lost a bet the previous week.
She briefly described her first encounter with the boy and mentioned this morning's events.
After laying everything out, Rina took a sip of her drink,
"That's about it."
Normally, she would have teased her friend about being snubbed by a guy for having small breasts, which would have given her ammunition to tease Rina for a long time.
But now, in need of help, Reina didn't dare to make jokes that might upset her friend.
She even cleared her throat to suppress her laughter, then asked for a photo of the guy.
"Do you have a photo of that guy? Let me see who dares to reject our beauty, Rina."
"What a great figure he must be, just a fool who doesn't appreciate what he's missing."
Still resentful about Sasaki's disinterest in her appearance, Rina unlocked her phone, opened her gallery, found the photo she had taken of him this morning, and handed her phone to Reina.
"Here."
.
.
.
Kurashiki Reina placed her phone on the table and took her phone, examining the photo of the boy.
The photo only showed his upper body.
Although she couldn't see his whole figure.
With her brief stint as a magazine model, Reina could estimate the boy's height based on the width of his shoulders and the angle of Rina's photo.
The result… well… he was quite tall.
He was much taller than the average male student at her school.
Judging from the contours of his arms and chest, his physique seemed to be quite good, likely the type with a well-built body that looked good even without a shirt.
His physique and height were impressive, and his face...
Most boys don't have the habit of grooming their hair, so his light brown, slightly messy hair didn't look unkempt.
Thanks to his good hair quality and bright, expressive eyes, he didn't come off as scruffy but rather fresh and natural, effortlessly charming.
'He's the one!'
Although she hadn't scrutinized him closely, just from his eyes, she knew he was the one she was looking for.
Whether or not she would fall in love with him, he would be more than sufficient as a shield for her purposes.
Since her friend wasn't involved with him yet, and she wasn't genuinely trying to date him, Reina started searching through Rina's contacts nonchalantly,
"Rina-chan, I'll borrow this guy for a bit, you don't mind, right? I promise I'll return him once I'm done!"
Knowing this would be the outcome, Rina leaned back, sipped her drink, and said, "Even if I did mind, it wouldn't make a difference, would it?"
Hearing her words, Reina, not usually thick-skinned enough to steal the man her friend was interested in, still felt quite embarrassed.
"It's an emergency, life and death! Don't worry, I'll get back at him for mocking your bust size."
With so many contacts and not knowing which one was her target, Reina handed the phone back to her friend, slapping her significantly larger chest playfully, "Send me his contact info, let me avenge you fiercely!"
"Your confidence is really annoying."
Seeing her 'nuclear warhead' nearly bursting through her shirt buttons, Tsushima Rina clicked her tongue in annoyance and handed Sasaki's LINE ID to her.
"I mean, how do you plan to get back at him, my enthusiastic Reina?"
After sending a friend request to Sasaki, Kurashiki Reina put down her phone and asked:
"What does Rina want to do?"
"My idea is to make him fall for me, then when he confesses, I'll mock him for being too small, saying I like bigger guys or something."
"Treat him the way he treated us. How about that? Pretty cool, right?"
Not knowing what Reina meant by 'make him fall for her,' Tsushima Rina blinked and confirmed with some confusion:
"That sounds satisfying, but are you planning to sleep with him?"
"No way, if I were that easy, my mom would break my legs."
Shaking her head, the girl continued:
"I just mean to mock him, and then use that as an excuse to break up."
"Don't worry, I won't compete with Rina-chan for a guy."
"You can compete if you want, your mom wouldn't approve anyway."
Knowing what kind of family her best friend came from, the girl wasn't worried.
After all, as a rich young lady, even if Reina really fell for Sasaki, her mom wouldn't approve.
Based on her inquiries this afternoon, she knew Sasaki's parents died in a car accident.
Given their mismatched backgrounds, her mom would never agree.
Unless Sasaki became a live-in son-in-law.
But with Reina's mom's personality... any man with a bit of temper wouldn't want to be a live-in son-in-law at her place.
And Sasaki... judging by his mockery of her small chest this morning, he certainly had a temper.
So Tsushima Rina wasn't worried that her best friend would compete with her.
Not confident in resisting her own mom either, Reina's main reason for doing this was to irritate her and make her feel disgusted.
To show her she wasn't a doll to be manipulated.
At the same time, using this excuse, she could buy time to persuade the two sisters from Kyouka's family.
They certainly wouldn't want their marriages to be arranged by adults.
Definitely not.
As long as the three sisters worked together, dismantling the adults' arrangements would only take a moment.
Thinking this, Kurashiki Reina didn't continue the heavy topic.
......
18:55
Eikou Private Academy, Baseball Club.
Phew— Phew—
"Today's training is over, dismissed!"
After the whistle symbolizing the end of the exhausting training blew.
The baseball club members one by one collapsed to the ground.
"More training and more load, when will this end?"
"It should continue until the competition starts, I guess."
"Ah~ it's so tough."
Hearing the members' complaints, as the head of the club, Katase Shouya was supposed to step up and boost their morale.
Because maintaining this motivated state was the only way to achieve good results in the big competition.
If it were before, he would definitely have done that.
But the message from Nanao Akane this afternoon, asking him to go home together, made him think urging them to go home and rest quickly was also a good choice today.
Sitting on the ground with them, the boy panted and said:
"If you're tired, then go home and rest, take a nice bath and relax."
"Eh? I thought Shouya would say something like 'perseverance is victory' again."
"Yeah, yeah, I thought so too."
"Suddenly changed today, it's really unusual."
Hearing his companions' jokes, Katase Shouya slowly stood up, took off his baseball cap, and fanned himself:
"I'm not a machine, I get tired too."
"No more talking, I'm going home to enjoy a bath."
Saying that he turned and walked towards the distant locker room.
His initiative made the other members, who originally wanted to rest a bit longer, unable to sit still.
They supported each other, stood up, and walked to the locker room together.
Although Katase Shouya was the first to enter the locker room, he was the last to change clothes.
After all the members had changed and left, he took out his phone from his backpack with a pendant, and sent a message to someone saved as "Akane."
[Akane, they've all left.]19:08「Read」
It seemed the person on the other side had been looking at their phone, as the message was read immediately after being sent.
And within three seconds, a reply arrived.
[Got it, Shou-kun, just come to the east gate of the school. I'll be under the tree nearby. (Excited.jpg)]19:08 「Read」
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