8:20 AM. 1st of November.
10 minutes until school starts.
Yuuto walked by himself toward the school. His hair was neatly combed, his glasses spotless, and his posture straighter than usual. Confidence radiated from him.
'It might not be the biggest win today, but taking down that dumbass bully... yeah, that doesn't feel bad at all,' he thought, nearing the school gates. A subtle smirk tugged at his lips.
'I'll be out of this world soon enough,' he reassured himself. Yet, despite his determination, the image of this world's Yuuto's mother flashed in his mind—her tired, worn face.
'Why am I remembering her all of a sudden?' He sighed, lowering his gaze for a moment in contemplation. 'Yeah, I feel kinda sorry for her. She's exhausted, sure, but that's her deal with her real son, not mine. All I'm here for is to deal with that bully and leave. Once he's out of the picture, life will be easier for Lesser Yuuto and his mother. That's how it's supposed to be.'
His thoughts hardened as he stepped closer to the school grounds. 'Play the role of the caring son, the hero who helps everyone? That's not me. I have my own priorities.'
Yuuto glanced around, noticing an adult man in a jumpsuit staring at him from across the grounds. 'Must be the P.E. teacher... But... what's that look for?'
He braced himself, prepared to be looked at, to be judged like the original Yuuto must have been judged before.
But something about the man's stare unsettled him. A knot tightened in his stomach. The original Yuuto must have missed a lot of school due to bullying, which might explain the negativity from the staff.
Still, the teacher's gaze wasn't just disapproval—it was disgust, a raw disdain that Yuuto could feel in his bones.
"Good morning, teacher," Yuuto called out, trying to maintain his calm.
The teacher didn't respond. His face contorted, fists clenched tightly, like he was restraining himself from saying something. He turned his head away, unable to mask his emotions.
'What's your problem?' Yuuto thought, narrowing his eyes. 'The blonde bully must have been athletic. I guess you're pissed that you're losing him to someone like me. Well, tough luck. Sucks to be you, teacher.' Yuuto roughly untied the knot in his stomach, laughing it out of his system with a mocking chuckle.
With that, Yuuto pushed through the school entrance and into the building.
Yuuto prepared himself to be looked at, and stared at...
... But something about his gaze stirred an unpleasant feeling in him, despite Yuuto's best attempts to simply dismiss it. The original Yuuto must've missed out on school a lot because of his bullying, which was sure to illicit a negative reaction from the teaching staff whenever they're around him.
... But that look of disgust on that teacher's face as he looked at him, singling him out from the rest of the students... Something felt off.
"Look…" the students whispered, their gazes glued to him. "It's him…"
"He actually dared to come to school…!!" some of the more aggressive students murmured, fists clenched tightly. Yuuto didn't miss their hostility for a second.
'This... This isn't the usual excitement to beat up their favorite victim again,' he realized, narrowing his eyes as he glanced around the hallway. 'This is different. They're trying to hold themselves back... from killing me.'
'They're angry.'
Every single face he passed was twisted in disgust. Wrath barely contained behind glares that felt like they could burn him alive.
'... You must've been hated, Lesser Yuuto. I understand that. But this level of hatred…' He took a deep breath, steadying himself as he moved forward. 'Something's wrong.'
The weight of their stares pressed down on him, like bats lurking in the shadows, waiting to swoop down and devour him whole.
'No, wait... nothing's wrong,' he reminded himself, forcing his nerves to calm as he continued toward his classroom. 'Whatever they're angry about, it's none of my concern. Once the footage of that bully leaks, they'll all see the truth. They'll realize what kind of bastard he really was.'
With that thought, Yuuto stepped into his classroom. The original Yuuto was a first-year high schooler—no older than 16. His bully was a year above him, and his sister, a third-year.
As soon as Yuuto entered the room, every head turned toward him, eyes locking on him like prey.
They were silent. A teacher was already in the classroom, despite it not being time yet.
Despite all of Yuuto's reassurances to himself, a knot tightened in his stomach. He hesitated at the threshold. Something about the way they were all looking at him…
... screamed danger. Like he wasn't safe—not even from the teacher.
Yuuto lifted his gaze, locking eyes with the teacher without uttering a word.
'Something is 100% wrong. They can't be this angry just because I've missed some school…' he realized, his gut churning.
"Sakurai." The teacher's voice was low as he turned to face Yuuto, barely containing his disdain. "Go to the principal's office... Now." The words were spat through clenched teeth, his eyes narrowing with barely controlled rage.
Yuuto blinked, trying to steady his voice. "May I ask why—"
"GO TO THE PRINCIPAL'S OFFICE NOW, YOU DISGUSTING BRAT!!!" The teacher suddenly erupted, his voice cracking with fury. "I can't believe you even had the nerve to ask after what you DID!!!"
He pointed sharply at the door, spit flying from his mouth, splattering across the floor.
'What I did…!?' Yuuto's brow furrowed in confusion, his gaze shifting from the teacher to the rest of the classroom.
They were all glaring. All of them. Even the kid with the snot trickling down his nose, bowl cut and round glasses—even he looked at Yuuto with disdain.
Yuuto turned and left, his mind racing. 'Just what the hell is going on...!?'
As he stepped into the hallway, two students passed him, eyes glued to their phones, the pale glow lighting their faces.
"He should've beaten that fucker harder…" one of them muttered under his breath.
Curious, Yuuto looked past their shoulder, his eyes widening in disbelief as he realized what they were watching.
It was the footage of him getting beaten down by Yuuno. Yuuto's breath hitched as the screen showed Yuuno pinning him to the ground, delivering a brutal kick to his abdomen, the sound of flesh hitting flesh unnervingly loud even on the phone's small speaker and the original footage's poor quality. The students watching snickered, as if enjoying every second of his humiliation.
'WHAT!? Why do they have that!? The teachers wouldn't leak it...' He thought as he turned around and walked towards the principal's office.
'The only person I shared it with... Was... The sister... Did she leak it!!?' He thought, his pulse quickening.
'But wait, if she leaked it, isn't that a GOOD thing!? Why is everyone so damn angry at me!? There's no way they're all so hive-minded about it unless...' Yuuto thought as he gently opened the door to the principal's office.
The moment he stepped inside, a cold weight settled in his gut. He froze for a second at the threshold once more, his pulse quickening as his eyes darted around the room. The principal sat behind his desk, stern and unreadable. Yuuto's mother sat across from him, her face tight with disappointment and anger, so much it overshadowed her lingering exhaustion. A teacher stood beside her, arms crossed, watching everything with a disapproving gaze. And then there was Yuuno—slouched, but with an air of false humility. Yuuto's sister sat next to him, patting him on the back as if he were the victim.
'Why's she comforting him...?' Yuuto narrowed his eyes, feeling a surge of confusion and anger. 'The only way... The only way everyone would be like this... They must've got the context from somebody else...!!'
Yuuto's fists clenched as he stepped further inside, his footsteps echoing in the suffocating silence of the room. His breath was shallow, his mind racing as he looked at his sister.
'She really is a failure of a sister. You leaked it to him first, didn't you?' Yuuto thought, his pulse slowly steadying as the situation began to make sense, though the sharp sting of betrayal still pierced his chest. He stared at the tomboyish sister, who snapped her attention toward him the moment he entered. Everyone else followed suit, their gazes filled with disdain—everyone except Yuuno.
'He twisted the narrative somehow. DAMN IT. I completely underestimated how deeply he's manipulated her... and how perfectly he's maintained his public image!' Yuuto mentally berated himself.
"You... damn...!! Why!?" his sister shouted, her breath hitching, teeth gritted with frustration and anger.
'... I walked into this blind, without knowing the full context!' Yuuto's mind raced as he began to walk toward the lone empty chair in the middle of the room, next to his exhausted, frowning mother.
'This bastard…!' Yuuto's eyes locked onto Yuuno, who still sat with his head slouched, but made sure Yuuto saw the faint smirk playing at his lips, hidden beneath his hair.
'He has all the cards. I messed up!' Yuuto's thoughts tumbled as he sat down between his mother and his sister, the tension thick around him. His sister, in her subtle way, acted as a buffer between Yuuto and the smug figure of Yuuno.
But then, something else caught his attention.
An unidentified blonde girl sat on the opposite side of the bully, her head lowered, avoiding eye contact. Her face was hidden beneath a curtain of long, smooth hair as her arms rested tensely on the chair. Yuuto's eyes narrowed further in suspicion.
'Who's she...?'
"YUUTO!" the principal suddenly roared, snapping Yuuto's attention back to him. "You will NOT look in that girl's, or this fine young man's direction ever again!!" His voice thundered through the room, shaking the walls with authority. Yuuto's mother and sister turned their gazes toward him, eyes filled with contempt and bitter disappointment.
"YOU WILL ANSWER TO ME!" the principal shouted, his fury palpable.