Chapter 5
AD 2096, April 6, the first day of the new school year. Tatsuya and Miyuki went to school, Minami stayed home. The cliché phrase “it’s been a while”, didn’t fit, because they had occasionally gone to school for Student Council meetings during spring break.
After today and tomorrow, the two siblings would no longer be alone on the path to and from school. Perhaps because she was conscious of that, Miyuki glued herself to Tatsuya during the short commute from the station even more than usual. From afar or even from close by, their point-blank nearness gave off the illusion that they were walking arm and arm.
From the start, these siblings had become pretty well known among the magic high school students, whose numbers could not be called small. At this time, almost no student did not know of the relationship of the elder brother and his younger sister. The ‘conventional people’ who raised their eyebrows at the impropriety of relatives who acted more like lovers were not just one or two. It was not a surprise that there were no brave souls (or possibly boorish people) calling out to them to take them to task, but the number of people who directed shocked eyes at them was not small.
Naturally, such a thing — being surrounded by those stares — did not make Miyuki anxious at all. For her, people who could not face her and speak up were only riffraff. Even under normal circumstances, it could be said that she accumulated a lot of looks, so the times she wasn’t being looked at were fewer. For Miyuki, other people’s stares were too numerous to be bothered about.
On the other hand, there was no way Tatsuya could “not let the gazes of others bother him” like his sister.
He served as his sister’s guard. He defended his sister from all malicious intent. This was his assigned duty and, simultaneously, a privilege he would not let others take from him. Tatsuya could not ignore any ill will directed against Miyuki.
This was not particularly difficult. Because the trifling ill will was directed at Tatsuya himself, no one was able to direct it against Miyuki.
It was hard to aim a negative eye at Miyuki. For example, even those who felt jealous of Miyuki had difficulty aiming their jealousy. Her looks and talent were too luminous; jealously sent against her became a sort of graciousness. Due to the difficulty of directing malicious intent against Miyuki, a strong will was needed to do it.
Thus, if Tatsuya was aware of it, it was never a mere fluke.
Paired with a strong will, the stare was neither distinctly hostile nor friendly. The look being aimed at Miyuki was of an unusual type. Especially, from the opposite sex, it was even less understandable.
Tatsuya was familiar with the boy’s face. He had not met him face to face, but he had seen the 3D image that had come with the profile. The boy was one year younger than him, the freshman representative—
(—That is certainly the eldest son of the Shippou Clan.)
Unconsciously, his brow furrowed, but Tatsuya deliberately kept his expression from changing. Tatsuya vigilantly kept himself from displaying oversensitivity, but perhaps because he was aware of the intermittent glances Tatsuya sent his way, Takuma averted his face and disappeared into an alley entrance.
“Onii-sama?”
Immediately afterward, Miyuki spoke to him in a doubtful voice. She keenly perceived that a fraction of her brother’s mind had slipped away from her. Even though she could ignore the gazes of the riffraff, she couldn’t ignore Tatsuya’s gaze.
Tatsuya shook his head to tell Miyuki “it’s nothing”, turned around in response to a greeting of “morning” and raised his hand.
Erika, followed by Leo, Honoka, Shizuku, Mizuki, and Mikihiko were in a mass. It wasn’t unusual for all of them to be together after school, but it had been a while since they had all been together on the way to school. Especially Shizuku, who hadn’t come to school with them since before the end of last year, because she had been studying abroad.
Seeing as at last their final member had returned, the faces were all the same, but some of them were wearing a design on their uniforms different than what they had until last month, when they were first years.
On Tatsuya’s breast, there was now an emblem of an eight petal flower surrounded by a gear.
The same embroidered design was on Mizuki’s blazer.
And on the left side of Mikihiko’s chest, there was the eight petal icon of First High School.
“Mikihiko, how does it feel to wear the uniform of the first course?”
“Don’t mock me, Tatsuya.”
Mikihiko answered Tatsuya’s broadly grinning teasing congratulations with a pained but smug smile. They had known that Mikihiko would be transferring to the first course since last month; however, this was the first time they each got to look at each other in their new uniforms.
“How about you, Tatsuya, how does the new blazer feel?”
“Even though you called it new, it only looks that way.”
Mikihiko’s remark had also referred to the fact that the magic engineering course was a new course. Only the name denoted what it was and instruction for the brand new course hadn’t even started yet. Well, not just instruction but everything about the new course would start from today. At any rate, until the day it actually started not even the class lineup was clear; indeed, the feeling of not enough preparations having been made was incontrovertible. The remark about only the appearance being changed was also a joke but it was not without foundation.
“Ooh, cynical.”
However, Tatsuya had a serene, or rather a “it doesn’t really matter”, attitude about it, contrary to his friends' expectations it seemed. With Tatsuya's personality, they hadn’t expected him to show great joy about the class separation, but they had imagined he would be a little buoyant.
“Re-al-ly, Mizuki was fairly slack-jawed.”
After Leo, Erika rang out her discontent. She made a sidelong glare of disappointment, but as her opponent was Tatsuya, the dart of her glare passed on right through to the other side.
“I… I was not slack-jawed!”
Mizuki protested without thinking. She hadn’t intended to pay heed to her second course friends (in short, Erika and Leo). But she couldn’t conceal the embarrassed happiness on her face that Erika had pointed out.
“It’s all right not to over do it.”
And as Erika’s mischievous smile showed there was undoubtedly no need for Mizuki to be worried about their feelings.
The Magical Engineering Course classroom in the main school building was in the middle of the classrooms on the side on the third floor. Class E. In short, the room right above the one Tatsuya and Mizuki had been going to until last month.
By the way, Erika and Leo were both in class F. When they found out their assigned homeroom from the school’s wireless, the pair had blatantly displayed their distaste. Perhaps their attitude was genuine, or maybe they were concealing their real feelings out of embarrassment… only the people themselves knew and, in any case, it didn’t really matter either way to Tatsuya. Though, Mizuki and Honoka were deeply interested.
When Tatsuya entered the classroom, the seats were about half occupied. The five rows of five were the same as last year; the Japanese phonetic order of the seating was also the same as when they were first years. However, did the A I U E O lined up on the sides without regard to gender have a special meaning or was it merely a whim?
After wasting less than a second on solving the meaningless puzzle, Tatsuya went to his own seat. The first row from the hallway, second seat from the front. Like the previous year, Mizuki was in the seat next to him. Well, this had no special meaning since in Japanese phonetics, they were Shi-ba and Shi-ba-ta.
“Mizuki is next to Tatsuya this year too, huh. Maybe I should've attempted to change classes as well?”
The one who grumbled the unnecessary joke without caring whether anyone heard it was Erika, who had both her arms on the rail of a wide open window.
“Surely, that’s not needed. You’re in the class next door.”
Leo, who was peering at the face of Erika, who was thrusting her body out the window, followed up with a remark that, contrary to its contents, was spoken in a regretful tone.
“That’s right. Even though we're in different classes, it’s not particularly inconvenient.”
One year before, this scene would have become an exchange of abusive language, but Erika didn’t follow up with an inflammatory remark or tit for tat. That change was a little amusing to Tatsuya, as that behavior (on the surface at least) indicated agreement with Leo’s words without looking at him even a little.
“Since intruding on another class isn’t forbidden.”
“Only taking instruction in another class is.”
Mizuki promptly showed her agreement with Tatsuya’s statement; she probably thought she could divert Erika. Of course, although she looked wild, Erika had almost never escaped from instruction. Tatsuya was the clear winner in number of times leaving the classroom during instruction.
“That’s also true.”
Perhaps, Erika no longer remembered placing any objections. She readily nodded her assent to Mizuki’s words.
“Nevertheless… there are a lot of unfamiliar faces.”
Erika murmured that as she looked around the room, changing her train of thought. The ostensibly sociable Erika remembered the faces and names of almost all one hundred of the second course students in their year. In short, ‘the unfamiliar faces’ were former first course students.
“Ah, now that you’ve mentioned it… it does seem a little unexpected.”
The number of students inside the classroom had considerably increased as it got closer to the start of instruction, and two thirds of the seats were now filled. That was confirmed by examining the group, and the genuinely sociable Leo, in a voice soaked in surprise as his words suggested, exhibited his agreement.
The pair — no, although she hadn’t piped up to agree with Erika’s statement, Mizuki should be included — the trio had believed that most of the people who would want to transfer into the new Magic Engineering course would probably be second course students. They hadn’t thought that the extremely proud first course students would choose to share a classroom with second course students.
For Tatsuya, although the first course transfers were surprising, it was a trifling matter, so even though he could certainly understand why Erika and the rest had thought that way, he hadn’t broken in with any special comment.
“By the way.”
Erika wasn’t fixated on this topic either. Besides, there was something she was more interested in.
“Tatsuya, you’re being glared at a lot.”
Erika’s remark was affirmed by Tatsuya displaying a slight shrug of his shoulders. Even before she pointed it out, he had been aware that he was on the receiving end of a fixed glare of hatred. And he had already grasped whose glare it was. As for why he was being glared at, since he couldn’t really understand, it might weigh on his mind. Nevertheless, he confirmed that he had more reasons to hate her than she had to hate him. Since merely being looked at didn’t cause actual harm, Tatsuya planned to leave it alone, but it seemed like for Erika, it wasn’t something she could ignore. Her disagreeable voice showed what was going on in the back of her mind.
“She caused all that trouble in so many ways; I wonder if she still hasn’t acknowledged that it was all her own temper tantrum.”
“Even if she knows it was a temper tantrum, she probably can’t just replace all those emotions quickly.”
“Quickly… it’s already been half a year.”
“Only half a year.”
As Erika answered him thus, Tatsuya directed his eyes fleetingly to the origin of the stare, which was off to the side behind him. Flustered, Hirakawa Chiaki, who had been glowering at him in hatred, averted her eyes. Immediately afterward — perhaps she was mad at herself for showing cowardice — she scowled at him with a grim look in her eye.
That attitude of Chiaki’s grated against Erika’s nerves even more. Naturally Erika, who had seen the brave display of introspection by Sayaka, who had been deceived into becoming part of a terrorist group after the incident, had trouble making up her mind about Chiaki’s behavior, since with the excuse of avenging a misplaced grudge, Chiaki had knowingly become a cat’s paw of foreign spies and even now hadn’t apologized to Tatsuya once. On the other hand, Erika, who didn’t have any problem picking fights, did want to go after Chiaki herself, but there was a chance that doing so would cause Tatsuya trouble instead. Besides, Erika felt that Chiaki’s impudent actions just now meant she was ‘trying to pick a fight.‘
A sharp light resided in both of Erika’s eyes. Her eyes did not narrow; to the contrary, both of her eyes were open with the corners of her eyes raised. Although Erika’s beautiful face had a catlike air about it, it was tinged with a ferocity that brought a tiger or leopard to mind. Her appearance even aroused some slight desire to appreciate her aesthetically in Tatsuya; however, if he let this situation go on, he was guaranteed to be embroiled in a whirlpool of trouble. Tatsuya considered the cost of being an onlooker a little too expensive.
“Erika, it’s useless to speak to her.”
Erika turned her sullen face to Tatsuya. A weak willed man would’ve immediately prostrated himself and apologized energetically, but unfortunately Tatsuya didn’t have any such laudableness (?).
“I’ll put out the sparks I let fall myself. That is, if the other side has the nerve to fan the spark into a flame.”
Tatsuya smiled cruelly. Seeing nothing friendly in that look, Erika calmed down. Perhaps it was an indication that she was showing her regret by trying to conceal her embarrassed smile.
At that point, a voice intervened with good timing and changed the mood.
“Can I bother you for a bit?”
Tatsuya turned around to the voice that called out to him from right behind him. A male student, who had just entered the classroom with an amiable smile, was standing there.
“Is this the first time we’ve properly greeted each other? I am Tomitsuka Hagane. Nice to meet you, Shiba-kun.”
“That’s right, I know your name, but essentially this might be ‘the first meeting’. Shiba Tatsuya. Nice to meet you, Tomitsuka.”
While grasping the offered hand in return, Tatsuya answered in his usual tone. To be truthful, wasn’t shaking hands a little over the top for a self-introduction between fellow classmates, Tatsuya thought, but he didn’t reveal his feelings. Tatsuya’s surprise over Tomitsuka being here also didn’t show on his face.
Nonetheless, Tatsuya’s friends didn’t have a poker face like Tatsuya’s. For example, Mizuki fixedly stared at Tomitsuka, who had sat down right behind Tatsuya, and when she came back to herself, her face turned red. She was probably embarrassed over her own bad manners. Mizuki spoke to Tomitsuka with an embarrassed grin.
“Tomitsuka-kun, nice to meet you. I am Shibata Mizuki. Pleased to meet you.”
“I am pleased to meet you too.”
Tomitsuka’s friendly smile rid Mizuki of her embarrassed grin. Watching what was somewhat a normal high school exchange at last released the other two from their petrified state.
“How unexpected… for the fifth-ranked Tomitsuka to join the Magic Engineering course.”
As her words implied, the awkward words Erika directed to someone were full of surprise.
That was understandable. As Erika said, Tomitsuka was a top class honor student who was ranked fifth in the combined scores of the final exams at the end of their last school year (the top of the overall scores were 1st place Miyuki, 2nd place Honoka, 3rd place a male student by the name of Igara Sousuke, 4th place Akechi Eimi; Shizuku didn’t make the list because she was studying abroad). With such a satisfactory record as a first course student, there didn’t seem to be any need to switch to the magic engineering course. —As far as those with objective eyes could see.
“Are you Chiba-san? As someone who is also from the Hundred Families, I think you might be aware Chiba-san, but my family specializes more in combat than in emergency aid, and I… have a problem with my practical skills.”
A question hadn’t been exactly addressed to him, but Tomitsuka answered Erika while directing a slightly pained face at her. Thus, Erika (and Leo as well) recalled the gossip about the other name associated with Tomitsuka.
Range Zero, a distance range of zero, was his nickname; while it was a title of honor implying the manifestation of matchless strength at zero distance, simultaneously it was an insult that said he could not do distance magic. Actually, it wasn’t that he couldn’t use it at all; however, there was no quibbling over the fact that Tomitsuka had a problem with long distance aiming which he himself recognized.
From the side, Tatsuya sent a lifeline to Erika, who was lost at sea and unable to find words to answer him with.
“Everyone has strengths and weaknesses.”
Was he comforting him or needling him, to this questionable lifeline,
“It sounds persuasive when Tatsuya said it.”
With an earnest voice, Leo broke into the pause.
Tomitsuka’s ‘bitter smile’ changed into a ‘sarcastic smile’.
“I found you, Tomitsuka-kun!”
Immediately afterward, his complex tangle of emotions was blown away by the cheerful voice that thrust into the classroom of second year class E.
“Akechi-san!?”
In front of the sight of Tomitsuka, who hurriedly turned around, ‘Amy’ — that is, Akechi Eimi — was noisily trotting to him from the classroom’s rear entrance. Due to the fact that she was an athlete in last summer’s Nine Schools competition, she was also an acquaintance of Tatsuya.
There was a large number of high-pitched clicking sounds as the framework of Tomitsuka’s desk brought her to a halt; her hand was raised like she was trying to throw a ball through a hoop in some fashion and her whole face was smiling.
“Morning, Tomitsuka-kun.”
It was as if a ‘!’ and a ‘?’ dancing were at the end of her words, so energetic was her greeting. Although they both had carefree personalities, Eimi was different from Erika whose joyfulness was concealing the wounds in her heart — Eimi was joyful to the core. She was the valuable type that made those watching her feel that the worries they were moping over were foolish. Despite the scene just now, due to Eimi’s arrival, all awkward feelings had been wiped from the atmosphere.
“Ah, yes. Morning, Akechi-san.”
Tomitsuka was drawn by the charm of that energy. No, the feeling given off by the look on his face was not ‘Eimi is charming Tomitsuka’; ‘Eimi is overwhelming Tomitsuka’ seemed closer to being correct.
“Shiba-kun, morning.”
“Morning, Amy. Come to think of it, Amy and Tomitsuka were in the same class last year.”
“That’s right. You’re well informed?”
“It’s a minor thing.”
Tatsuya sent a smile drained of energy at the wide-eyed Eimi.
“Amy, this girl is Shibata Mizuki. This is Chiba Erika. The one over there is Saijou Leonhart. The three of them were my classmates last year.”
Mizuki and the others shouldn’t have had any interaction with Eimi. And Tatsuya’s hypothesis was not off the mark.
“Nice to meet you. I am Akechi Eimi. Call me Amy.”
Tatsuya had introduced the three simply (carelessly?) and Eimi had readily introduced herself in return.
“O.K., Amy. It’s all right if you call me Erika.”
The one who immediately responded was, naturally, Erika.
“Please call me Leo.”
“Nice to meet you, Akechi-san.”
Leo followed with a (supplementary) self introduction and Mizuki bobbed her head. As she did so, for some reason Eimi puffed out her red cheeks in dissatisfaction.
“Amy.”
“Eh?”
“Didn’t I tell you to call me Amy?”
Mizuki could not understand what she’d done to make Eimi angry and her eyes showed guilt and innocence. If you looked at it objectively, Eimi’s insistence was nearly irrational, but cases where force triumphed over reason had been observed repeatedly in the world. Anyway, Erika and Leo were dumbfounded since they didn’t know what kind of girl Eimi was, and Tatsuya, who somewhat knew her, was not showing any intention of intervening for some reason. And the other person who knew her, Tomitsuka, appeared to be merely impatient and reluctant to intervene.
“Umm… nice to meet you, Amy. It would be fine if you addressed me as Mizuki.”
In the end, although she was puzzled, Mizuki gave in.
“Yes. Nice to meet you, Mizuki.”
At once, Eimi smiled openly. The smile was more foolishly naïve than pleasant; it had the effect of making people slightly doubt that the selfish manner of speaking she used had really taken place.
Satisfied, Eimi nodded and pivoted her body to turn towards Tomitsuka.
“Now, it’s Tomitsuka’s turn.”
“Uhh?”
Why had the conversation turned to himself? What the heck did she mean by his turn? Tomitsuka was completely dumbfounded by this too rapid turn of events.
“Amy.”
Eimi once again voiced her nickname.
Tomitsuka still didn’t understand what Eimi was demanding from him. The puzzled Tomitsuka looked right and left and became aware that Tatsuya was enduring the scene with a smile.
Tomitsuka asked for help from Tatsuya by eye contact. Tatsuya constructed a sober expression to answer Tomitsuka’s 911 call.
“You don’t like being called Akechi-san, right?”
Tatsuya’s hypothesis was on the mark it seemed, as Eimi nodded yes-yes.
“Don’t you want Tomitsuka to also call you by your nickname?”
Eimi’s sullen display with Mizuki had foreshadowed this. Well, Tatsuya had already expected this development so he hadn’t said anything during the previous episode.
On the other hand, Tomitsuka’s face started to flow with cold sweat.
“Eh, umm, Akechi-san, you called me ‘Tomitsuka-kun’ and…”
“Oh? So it would be all right if I called you ‘Hagane-kun’?”
So that’s it ~ you should have said so earlier ~ Eimi said with her eyes while she leaned toward Tomitsuka, peering up at his face with both arms behind her back, holding her hands together. Tomitsuka was clearly flustered to anyone’s eyes. The lukewarm eyes of Tatsuya and the others went to Tomitsuka, who was leaning backwards with an even stiffer face.
“No, um, that isn’t exactly what I wanted to say… Ah!”
Tomitsuka was desperately trying to avoid meeting the eyes of Eimi, who was blissfully staring at him, and he deliberately stood up and raised his voice when he caught a stare flowing at him from two seats away.
“Akechi-san, let’s have this talk next time.”
Evading Eimi, who had blocked off half his field of vision by leaning forward, Tomitsuka walked toward the seat of the girl that had been looking at him.
“Is that you, Hirakawa-san? You’re in this class as well?”
Tatsuya and the others were just barely able to catch Tomitsuka’s voice from where they were. They weren’t able to catch Chiaki’s diffidently whispered words of reply at all.
“Amy, is it all right not to follow him?”
Erika spoke to Eimi, who looked sullen about being abruptly left behind, in a purposely low tone.
“Do you think there’s nothing you can do now but retreat…?”
Was this the whisper of a devil tempting a human heart into sin, or was it the voice of an angel to someone facing a hard road. —Of course, it wasn’t such a grandiose thing; it was simply nothing more than the utterance of an imp egging on her fellow schoolmate, but the effect was instantaneous. Eimi nodded with a determined look and rapidly went after Tomitsuka.
“…You are one scary female.”
To Leo, who was not quipping but whispering it in a somber tone,
“This way is more constructive, right?”
Erika answered with a broad grin.
“Certainly, this is an extremely interesting development.”
A bit of surprise mixed into the shocked look Mizuki gave to Tatsuya, who was looking at the gazes of undisguised curiosity that onlookers directed at the three of them, Tomitsuka, Eimi, and Chiaki, which he just pointed out.
The youthful drama of which Tomitsuka was the lead actor (or perhaps the prey) was taken care of by the ringing of the bell. After Eimi left the Class E classroom at a lively trot, Erika and Leo went to the Class F classroom.
Afterwards, there was no ceremony for the first time all the students were assembled for instruction. The stance of the school was that getting the information needed was an individual responsibility. From now on, this class would have a teacher in charge of their practical skills (just like classes A-D in the first course). Over half the class considered not even displaying the name of the teacher until the actual day it started to be pretty over the top, but Tatsuya was part of the minority who didn’t think so.
It probably hadn’t been decided til the last minute — if Tatsuya’s supposition was completely accurate.
After all, if the number of magicians qualified to be teachers hadn’t been inadequate, then half the students that they had the capacity for at First, Second, and Third high schools wouldn’t be placed in a lower caste.
Taking the dearth of personnel into consideration, the teacher in charge of Class E’s practical skills instruction would be a fairly eccentric individual for a magician educator and might not be much of a teacher, Tatsuya predicted. For example, very elderly or perhaps the opposite, fairly young. If all the instructor was going to do was teach practical engineering skills, then the teacher would not need to have a great deal of skill as a magician, so the possibility that they might dispatch a researcher without any qualifications as a teacher was also within Tatsuya’s expectations.
However, thirty seconds after instruction was to have started, a practical skills teacher stood in front of the entire second year class E who did not meet Tatsuya’s expectations. It also seemed like the teacher was not what the other students imagined either, as a small commotion ran through the classroom.
The one who appeared was a woman in her forties.
Of course, that alone wouldn’t strike anyone as unusual. There were clearly more male instructors in magic high schools, but female ones weren’t all that unusual. The surprise came from the woman’s looks.
Her hair was blonde. The color of her eyes were blue. Her skin color white. Her body was tall and her legs were long from this and her other physical traits; it was clear from looking at her that the woman was a Caucasian of Nordic descent.
“I am Jennifer Smith (sumisu).”
She gave her name in the style of English speaking countries and her full name was an English one.
“I am originally from Boston, but I became a naturalized citizen eighteen years ago.”
However, these words melted the majority of their doubts. If that much time had passed since she had been naturalized, then there must be no worries on the security front. Normally, the patriotism of naturalized citizens (toward the nation that naturalized them) was required to be firmer than that of the citizens born in a nation. If they did not display more loyalty to their new country than to their former country, then their naturalization wouldn’t be recognized. In the case of a magic researcher with many chances to connect with national secrets, this is especially true. There was still the question of why she would throw away her nationality to become a naturalized Japanese citizen when the USNA was not only the wealthiest nation in modern era, but also had the most cutting edge magic techniques, but to Tatsuya that was comparatively unimportant.
“Until the end of the last school year, I was a professor at the National Magic University, but from this school year on, the main school has placed the instruction in magic engineering for this class in my hands. I look forward to working with you.”
She is in the same situation as Tsuzura-sensei, Tatsuya thought. Tsuzura’s back-story was that his too independent mind had caused his downfall. What could be the circumstances in Smith-sensei’s case? —Tatsuya considered that hypothesizing she was a troublemaker was both rude and arbitrary.
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