Chapter 113: Chapter 112 - Yui Versus The Entire Cast

Kuro sensed trouble.

Not that that was unexpected.

Kuro’s bad feelings commonly turn into reality.

Regrettably.

But this time, the feeling became a reality sooner than anticipated.

This was the lunch break.

Kuro was just trying to eat his food in relative peace.

This was a rare and precious event deserving of great care.

Then, Yui Kanzaki showed up, and sat down at his side without asking.

Again.

"You look like you’re going to a funeral."

"I’m eating."

"Same difference."

"No."

"Yup."

"No."

"Whatever."

Yui stole a French fry from him.

Kuro had all but given up being surprised anymore.

That was probably a bad sign.

Then Akari walked in.

And froze.

Her eyes darted between:

Kuro

Yui

Kuro

Yui

Threat.

Immediate threat.

"Who is this?"

Yui was all giggles.

"Oh?"

Akari’s instincts screamed at her.

This woman was trouble.

Big Trouble.

And she was the type of trouble that had lots of accidents while grinning.

Yui stood up.

Walked over and started stroking Akari’s head.

Silence.

Absolute silence.

Akari froze. 𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆𝙬𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝒎

Her soul left her body.

Then it came back with a vengeance.

"STOP TREATING ME LIKE A LITTLE KID!"

Yui continued to stroke her head.

Akari was severely injured.

"STOP IT!"

Stroke.

"STOP IT!"

Stroke.

"Kuro HELP!"

Kuro turned away.

Coward.

Traitor.

Stroke.

Stroke.

Stroke.

After five minutes of having her head stroked by Yui, Akari was in complete and utter defeat.

Yui had completely defeated Akari without any effort at all.

After the fact:

Yui was defeated.

Right then Yui was victorious!

All this occurred without any effort whatsoever.

On top of that...

Aoi Tachibana happened to show up.

All the sudden things got worse.

Aoi, unlike Akari, didn’t show any response whatsoever.

She simply stared at Yui.

Calmly

Quietly.

Analytically.

Yui immediately recognized.

Then Yui turned to look back.

Silence.

One second.

Two seconds.

Five seconds.

Ten seconds.

No one spoke.

No one moved.

The atmosphere turned from comfortable to just strange.

Kuro was uneasy.

Akari was uneasy.

Many other students nearby were uneasy.

No one knew why.

The pair simply stared at each other.

As if they were rivals or wild animals searching for food.

As if they were chess players.

As if they were searching for ways to determine which of them would survive.

Then both Yui and Aoi smiled.

Both of their smiles were unsettling.

Interesting, Yui stated.

Aoi replied, "Likewise."

Back to silence...

Kuro wished he could leave this situation.

Right this minute.

However, this situation continued to become even more dramatic.

The source of the drama was the appearance of Mina Fujikawa.

Upon her arrival, Yui seemed to captivate her attention without trying.

No one understood how that happened not even Mina.

Ten minutes after arriving, Yui and Mina were the best of friends.

Kuro couldn’t determine how that happened.

No one else did either.

They were just strangers less than one moment ago.

Then, the next moment.

"Do you want ice cream?" Yui asked.

"Yes!" Mina responded.

Next, Yui asked,

"Do you want to go shopping?"

"Yes!"

Lastly, Yui asked,

"Do you want to take random selfies?"

"Yes!"

Twenty minutes later, the two returned carrying shopping bags, eating ice cream and laughing as though they had known one another for their entire lives.

Kuro looked at Yui’s notebook again to make sure all the pages

were blank. The outline drawn out had to be done with a lot of speed and accuracy, scribbling over and over until it achieved some sort of coherence. There was not a word in that notebook that Kuro could understand.

Rika had arrived within seconds after Yui. Just as quickly did Rika fall immediately under Yui’s spell.

Kuro began to shake as he realized that his life was now an endless cycle of love, writing and breaking free.

The cycle would be over. He wanted to stop it before it got too far.

Then it happened again: Kuro’s hands began moving uncontrollably.

Yui was already finished with the interview. So were the other four girls.

They had all turned back to look at Yui with admiration.

The interview had ended.

Rika arrived a minute later.

Then, before Rika even said a word, Yui attacked Rika with love, writing and breaking free.

There was no warning.

There was no way to prepare.

There was no way to experience the impact before the event happened.

Yui’s voice was an emotional weapon.

Rika’s was a manga artist and student council president.

Kuro just shook his head again and wished for it to be over.

Several girls began returning to class the moment the lunch break was over.

Not only were the girls still in class, but the chaos followed every girl home.

Somehow, all five girls ended up in Rika’s apartment.

Akari stood there doing her best imitation of an extremely well-done cookie.

Aoi stood nearby.

Mina stood near Akari, who was also near Aoi.

Rika stood quietly taking notes, but not able to hide her disappointment at the scene unfolding before her.

Yui stood in the middle of all of them, and everyone else was talking, but she always managed to control the conversation despite only being in the room a short time.

Then came Kuro after school.

Kuro came into the room and immediately stopped.

Before Kuro was a disaster zone about to explode due to the constant fighting of all these monsters.

Kuro immediately realized that Yui was most at fault, because she led all of them to the same conclusion - greater than their combined effort would be.

Then Yui saw Kuro first.

"Señor Kuro!"

All heads turned to Kuro at the same time, and all heads felt silence.

That alone gave Kuro a headache...not just any headache - a horrible headache; not just horrible or a headache - a horrible painful headache.

Now, Kuro could feel an ancient curse lift from the very beginning of time - specifically, an ancient curse placed on Kuro’s family from long ago.

Now, Kuro understood that this would not be something that was just going to disappear.

He understood that this incident was not just going to happen once.

He understood that this incident would not get less intense.

He understood that he had been captured by Yui Kanzaki in the past two days.

That information greatly frightened Kuro, but Kuro also realized how dangerous it would be to allow Yui to capture him, because she was controlling clouds of chaos and caused massive problems wherever she went.

Akari laughed and told Kuro, "Your weird friend is out of control! You need to control her !"

Kuro responded with, "She is not my friend."

Then Yui responded, "Too late."

"We are close."

"I disagree."

"Closer still."

"No."

"You could say that. "

Kuro shut his eyes.

The pain in his head was twofold.

Somewhere far away.

Minami Asakura will have to sneeze.

Presumably, her natural enemy has found some friends.

The group assembled outside along the benches in the courtyard, waiting for Kuro, who had gone to grab some drinks. He should have never left in the first place; the moment he stepped out, Akari and Yui started scrapping again.

Akari shot a glare at Yui. "Stop patting my head," she said.

Yui grinned at her. Then she patted Akari on the head.

"You’re cute," Yui said.

"I’m not cute," Akari said.

"You’re very cute."

"I’m mature," Akari replied.

"And adorable," Yui commented. Akari abruptly stood up.

"Why doesn’t anyone take me seriously?!" she screamed. Yui let out genuine laughter, which irritated Akari even more, because it sounded as though Yui was enjoying talking to her.

"Well," Yui began. "I’ve only known you a couple of hours now."

"That’s great," Akari interrupted.

"You’re actually kinda entertaining for having just met."

"That doesn’t count as a compliment."

"To me it does," Yui replied.

Akari crossed her arms.

"You’re odd," she said.

"Correct," Yui replied.

"You’re annoying," Akari remarked.

"Correct," Yui agreed.

"You’re suspicious," Akari continued.

"Also correct," Yui said.

Yui then leaned in closer to Akari.

"And you’re fun," she declared.

Akari instantly turned away from her.

Akari’s ears turned a little red when she turned away. Yui noticed.

"Aww," Yui cooed.

"Don’t ’aww’ at me," Akari scolded.

"Aww," Yui replied.

"Stop it," Akari said.

Meanwhile, at the opposite end of the courtyard, Aoi sat and quietly watched.

Unlike Akari, however, Aoi wasn’t annoyed by what she saw. She was looking to analyze, observe, and think. This is generally a lot more dangerous than being annoyed.

Aoi had put in the past few years trying to figure out people.

To figure out their intentions.

To figure out their motives.

And yet Yui Kanzaki was not an easy person to figure out.

In fact, Yui Kanzaki was a very difficult person to figure out.

People tended to have patterns when you looked at how they acted towards something.

They tended to have predictable responses to different situations.

They also tended to have predictable goals.

Yui Kanzaki did not have any of those traits.

She appeared to glide effortlessly from one conversation to the next.

She adapted to surroundings instantly.

She appeared to make friends frighteningly fast.

She also appeared to get close to everyone very quickly.

Especially Kuro.

That was the thing that made Aoi feel uneasy.

And she did not feel uneasy because Yui Kanzaki was being confrontational.

In actuality,

She was quite the opposite.

She appeared to be very friendly.

She appeared to be very comfortable.

She looked like she had been friends with Kuro for a long time.

Aoi narrowed her eyes slightly at Yui.

Interesting.

Dangerous.

And yet not dangerous in the physical sense.

She was dangerous in the social sense.

She was dangerous emotionally.

She was the type of person who could easily walk into someone’s life and change that person’s entire life in a matter of seconds.

At that moment in time, Yui abruptly turned and looked at Aoi.

Their eyes locked for a moment.

Yui’s face broke out in a smile and it appeared to Aoi that Yui was not being playful or teasing.

Rather, it appeared to Aoi that Yui knew exactly what Aoi was thinking.

For the briefest instant, neither of them broke that stare and neither of them looked away from one another.

Yui waved to Aoi and Aoi waved back to Yui.

They both smiled at one another.

Akari was looking back and forth between Aoi and Yui and felt a very strong sense of fear.

Akari had no idea why,

But the way the two of them were connecting with one another felt far more intimidating to Akari than having an argument with Yui had ever felt to Akari.