School break was over.
You could tell by the groans echoing across campus: students dragging their feet, half-asleep conversations blending into background noise. New faces from middle school wandered around nervously, while older students complained about schedules like it was a competitive sport.
The morning air was pleasant. A cool breeze mixed with warm sunlight, one of those rare days that almost made school bearable.
Almost.
"SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT, SHE SAID IT WAS AN EASY ONE, WHY DID SHE LIEEEEE?!"
Behind the main school building, inside a supposedly empty courtyard, a boy sprinted for his life.
His uniform, dark brown trousers, a blue shirt over a white T-shirt, and a dark blue tie, marked him clearly as a high school student.
The katana in his hands did not.
Behind him, the ground cracked as a massive, demonic tree-like spirit tore itself free, branches writhing like living claws.
"COME BACK AND LET ME DEVOUUUR YOUUUU!"
"NO! WHO ASKS THEIR VICTIM TO COME TOWARDS THEM?! WHAT KIND OF LOGIC IS THAT?!"
"IT'S A FIGURE OF SPEECH, DUMBASS!"
"HOW AM I GETTING CALLED DUMBASS BY A TREE?!"
The situation was, objectively, ridiculous.
The boy reached the courtyard wall and didn't slow down. He planted a foot against it, kicked upward, and vaulted onto the higher ledge surrounding the yard.
"This job is absolute bullshit," he muttered while running. "They're totally doing this on purpose."
"LET ME KILL YOU SO YOU WON'T SUFFER ANYMORE!"
"NO! I WANT TO LIVE!"
He stole half a second to glance at his wristwatch.
His face drained of color.
"...One minute until the bell rings?! If I don't end this now, I'm finished!"
"You would be finished anyway," the tree rumbled.
"You've got a lot of attitude for being firewood."
"Resorting to racism means I win."
"HOW IS THAT RACISM, YOU'RE LITERALLY A, YOU KNOW WHAT, NEVER MIND!"
No more time.
The boy jumped down.
Branches lashed toward him as the tree spirit screeched in delight. He barely managed to parry, deflecting blow after blow, heart pounding, fully aware that this was a terrible decision.
Then.
An opening.
He swung.
The blade cut cleanly through the trunk.
Silence.
Victory.
"...Yes!"
The katana didn't move.
"...Huh."
It was stuck.
"...Okay, I'm not wasting time pulling this out. Bleed to death, I guess."
"Bro," the tree muttered weakly. "I'm a tree."
"...Sap to death?"
"...."
"Oh. It's already dead."
The boy froze.
Then-
"AAAAAND I'M LAAAAATE!"
He bolted away, leaving behind a dead spirit tree, a katana embedded in its trunk, and a courtyard that absolutely did not exist on any school map.
The bell rang.
Inside a Classroom
The classroom was loud.
Not chaotic, just alive. Groups of students talked freely, some laughing, some already complaining about homework they hadn't even received yet. It was the first day, after all, and the teacher hadn't bothered stopping them.
Said teacher stood at the front of the room.
A middle-aged man with tired eyes and neatly combed hair, he leaned against his desk while reading a paperback novel, occasionally turning a page as if this noise was nothing new. And for him, it probably wasn't.
Then the bell rang.
The effect was immediate.
Conversations died down, chairs scraped softly against the floor, and students straightened their posture. The teacher closed his book and allowed himself a small, satisfied smile.
"Good," he said. "Let's begin."
He picked up the attendance sheet.
One by one, names were called.
"Hirose Takumi."
"Here."
"Ayano Misaki."
"Present."
The rhythm continued-name, response, checkmark.
Then.
"...Kageyama Kyuusei."
No answer.
The teacher glanced up briefly, then back at the paper.
"Kageyama Kyuusei."
Still nothing.
A few students exchanged glances. Some sighed knowingly.
The teacher adjusted his glasses.
"Kageyama Kyuu-"
The classroom door slammed open.
"I'M SORRY TEACH FOR BEING LATE AGAIN I'M TRULY, TRULY, SORRY! THERE WERE WAY TOO MANY PEOPLE ON THE BUS!"
Every head snapped toward the entrance.
Standing there, slightly hunched and out of breath, was the same boy from the courtyard-tie loosened, hair messy, uniform still intact despite everything that definitely shouldn't have happened earlier.
Kageyama Kyuusei.
The teacher stared at him in silence.
The excuse hung in the air.
A normal student might've gotten away with it.
Unfortunately for Kyuusei, he wasn't a normal student.
This was, after all, the boy who was late around seventy percent of the time.
The teacher's eye twitched.
"...Take your seat," he said at last.
Relief washed over Kyuusei's face instantly.
"Yes sir! Thank you sir!"
He hurried inside, closing the door a little too carefully, and slipped into his seat as if nothing unusual had happened.
The teacher sighed.
"Since it's the first day," he continued, "I'll let it go. But don't make a habit of it."
Several students silently thought, It already is.
Kyuusei leaned back in his chair, finally breathing normally.
Alive. On time. No katana. No demonic tree.
Perfect.
Or at least, that's what it looked like.
A few students snickered.
Some rolled their eyes. Others looked mildly annoyed before losing interest entirely.
Kageyama Kyuusei wasn't exactly popular.
He was loud when he showed up, quiet when he stayed, and somehow managed to feel out of place even while sitting perfectly still.
Being held back a year hadn't helped either.
To most students, that alone was enough to earn labels.
Delinquent.
Dumbass.
Weirdo.
But in the end, no one really cared.
Weirdos did weird things. That was just how school worked.
The teacher continued attendance, the classroom returned to its usual hum, and Kyuusei leaned forward, resting his head on one hand as if trying to erase his own presence.
Almost worked.
Almost.
Directly behind him, a girl frowned.
Firstofall, she thought, he smells like sweat. Disgusting.
She shifted slightly in her chair, careful not to touch him.
But... that's a lot of sweat.
Her eyes narrowed.
Running? Sure, that makes sense. But this much? And not just today.
She thought back.
First year.
He had already been late back then. Already had a reputation. Already felt... off. Not in the aggressive, delinquent kind of way: no fights, no shouting, no troublemaking.
Just... inconsistent.
And you don't look like a delinquent either, she thought, studying his back. You don't slouch right. You don't glare. You don't even act tough.
Kyuusei sat still, staring at the board, unaware, or pretending to be unaware.
Remembering.
It'sneverjustthebus, she concluded. And you don't run late like someone careless.
Her gaze drifted lower.
His hands.
There were faint marks there. Not scars, more like pressure lines. Calluses that didn't belong to someone who skipped practice or slept through class.
Interesting.
She rested her chin on her palm.
Held back. Always late. Too tired. Too sweaty. Too calm after bursting through the door like that.
Her lips curled slightly.
You're hiding something, Kageyama Kyuusei.
At the front of the room, the teacher cleared his throat and began explaining the class structure for the year.
Kyuusei let out a slow breath.
Please, he thought. Just let today be normal.
Behind him.
Click.
The sound of a pen being pressed open.
The girl smiled faintly.
The teacher droned on about syllabi and semester goals. Kyuusei's heart rate finally settled into something resembling normal. The adrenaline from the fight was leaching away, leaving behind the familiar, grinding fatigue that felt like a weighted blanket. He just had to make it to lunch. Then he could sneak out and-
"Psst. Kageyama-kun."
The voice from behind was soft, melodic, and laced with a concern so perfect it sounded manufactured. Kyuusei stiffened, then forced himself to relax.
He glanced over his shoulder.
Aoi Rin smiled at him. It was a killer smile. The kind that made you forget, for a second, that she was probably cataloging your every micro-expression. Her hair, a shade of chestnut brown that caught the light just so, was tied in a neat, side-swept ponytail that somehow looked both elegant and effortless. Her uniform was pristine, not a crease out of place, the sailor collar lying flat against her shoulders. Big, hazel eyes blinked up at him with an innocence that was utterly betrayed by the sharp intelligence glinting in their depths.
If Kyuusei was "slightly above average" in a way that only someone looking for a project might notice: messy dark hair that refused to be tamed, a lean build hidden under a slightly rumpled uniform, sharp features softened by perpetual tiredness, then Aoi Rin was objectively, disarmingly cute. The kind of girl who got asked to hand out flyers at the school festival because she doubled applicant interest just by standing there.
It was, Kyuusei had long decided, her primary weapon.
"You're sweating a lot," she whispered, leaning forward just enough for her ponytail to brush her shoulder. "Did you run all the way from the station? That's, like, two kilometers."
Okay, here we go. Kyuusei turned more fully in his seat, propping his head on his hand to look at her with what he hoped was bland, weary annoyance. "The bus was full. I had to get off three stops early. Yeah."
"Three stops early is only eight hundred meters," she countered, her smile never fading. "And you're not even breathing hard anymore. Your recovery time is really good, Kageyama-kun. Do you do a lot of cardio?"
Trap. Trap. Trap.
His internal monologue was a blinking neon sign. She was boxing him in with logic, trying to force a specific answer. Athlete? Club member? Something that would explain the calluses, the stamina, the weird hours.
He gave a half-shrug, looking past her out the window. "I guess. I run sometimes when I'm late. Which is always. So, yeah. Lots of cardio." He delivered it like it was the most boring fact in the world.
Aoi Rin's eyes flickered down to his hands resting on the desk. "For someone who runs so much, you have interesting calluses. They're on your palms and fingers. Not like from a sports club... more like from, I don't know, holding something narrow really tight?"
Kyuusei felt a cold trickle down his spine that had nothing to do with sweat. Okay, she's way too observant. Why? I'm the class weirdo. The held-back kid. Why is cute, normal, sharp Aoi Rin spending her valuable social capital poking at me?
He had a policy for this. The Half-Answer & Misdirection Doctrine.
He sighed, a long, suffering sound, and looked back at her. He let a bit of guarded vulnerability show-just a flicker, before shuttering it behind a mask of sarcasm. "My part-time job's a pain. Lots of manual stuff. Carrying things, moving equipment. It's rough on the hands." All technically true. Carrying a katana. Moving demonic remains. The equipment was mystical sealing tags. Rough on the hands? You have no idea.
Her expression shifted a millimeter. Interest. Bingo. Lead acquired. She leaned back, seeming satisfied for now. "A part-time job? That explains the tiredness, I guess. And the lateness? Is it... late shifts?"
Kyuusei offered a lopsided, weary grin. "You're full of questions today, Aoi. Worried about me?" He flipped it back on her, putting a slight, teasing emphasis on 'worried.'
She didn't blush, but she did tilt her head, allowing the cute act to amplify. "Just curious. You're an interesting person, Kageyama-kun."
Interesting. Right. He turned back to face the front, his smile dropping. That's what people say before they decide you're a fascinating bug to pin to a board. Or before they get eaten by a tree spirit because they followed you.
The teacher was writing something on the board. Kyuusei copied it down mechanically.
Behind him, he heard the soft click of Aoi Rin's pen again. He could practically feel her gaze on the back of his neck, connecting dots that weren't even in the same universe.
Let her think she has a lead, he thought, sinking a little deeper into his chair. Let her think it's just a sketchy job and bad time management. A normal kind of weird. As long as she stays curious about the mundane mystery, she won't stumble into the real one.
And if she does... He glanced at his empty hands, ...then I'm probably even more screwed than I already am.
For now, the immediate crisis was over. He was in his seat. The tree was dead. Rin was temporarily pacified with a breadcrumb.
The teacher's words blurred into a meaningless hum. But none of it mattered.
There is no rest for Kageyama.
A single, pulsing thought had taken root in Kyuusei's brain, drowning out everything else.
My sword.
My very expensive, very registered, very not-supposed-to-be-left-in-public sword is still stuck in a demon tree.
A cold sweat, entirely separate from his morning sprint, broke out on the back of his neck. The Handler's voice played in his memory, flat and disapproving: "Loss of issued spiritual armaments will be deducted from your pay, Kageyama. At the replacement cost. Do you have any idea what a Grade-2 Catalytic Katana costs?"
He didn't. But he knew his pay was already pathetic. He'd be paying off a tree-logging job for the next decade.
Okay. Okay. Don't panic. Form a plan. He mentally mapped the school. The hidden courtyard was on the East side, behind the old chemistry wing. His next class, Modern Japanese, was in the West building. Of course it was. The universe loved this kind of joke.
Bell for next period is in five minutes. Five minutes to get across the entire campus, through the weird spatial fold into the courtyard, wrestle the katana out of a hardening spirit-tree trunk, and get to the West building.
Impossible.
Unless...
A terrible, beautiful, stupid plan began to form. It involved the rarely-used third-floor maintenance corridor, a specific window with a faulty latch, and a calculated willingness to risk a twisted ankle.
It was, objectively, a terrible plan.
It was also his only plan.
The bell for the end of period shattered his thoughts. Chairs scraped, bags were zipped, and the room erupted into movement.
Kyuusei was up in a flash, acting on pure, desperate instinct. He swung his bag over his shoulder and beelined not for the door that led to the West building, but for the one on the opposite side of the room-the one leading to the inner courtyard and, eventually, the East blocks.
He'd taken exactly three steps when a familiar, melodic voice cut through the noise right beside him.
"Going the wrong way, Kageyama-kun."
Aoi.
She had materialized at his elbow, her movement eerily smooth. She was looking up at him, head tilted, that infuriatingly cute smile playing on her lips. Her eyes, however, were scanning him like a detective at a crime scene. "Modern Japanese is in Watanabe-sensei's room. West building. You're going east."
"I, uh," Kyuusei's brain short-circuited. The Half-Answer Doctrine had not prepared for a direct intercept. "I left something. In my... old locker. From last year. East wing."
It was, even by his standards, a spectacularly bad lie.
Aoi Rin's eyebrows lifted a fraction. "Your old locker? They cleared and reassigned those over summer break. The janitors would have thrown anything left inside away." Her tone was helpful, informative. A death knell.
"Right! Yeah. But, you know, maybe they didn't! Maybe it's in the lost and found! Which is also... east." He was digging the hole deeper with a backhoe.
"The lost and found is by the faculty office. Central building." She blinked, all innocence. "You seem really flustered. Is it something important?"
Just the instrument of my spiritual livelihood and a massive debt waiting to happen. "Just a... notebook. Really important notes. For, uh. Life."
"Life notes," she repeated, her smile not fading but somehow becoming more intense. "Must be important to risk being late again on the first day. Watanabe-sensei is strict."
She was herding him. Politely, cheerfully, she was boxing him in with logic and social pressure. Every second he spent talking to her was a second his terrible plan evaporated.
A wild, reckless impulse took hold. The Blunt Redirect. He met her gaze directly, letting his own exhaustion and mild irritation show. "Look, Aoi, I appreciate the concern, really. But I gotta go get my thing. I'll handle Watanabe-sensei."
He turned and pushed through the small crowd towards the east door, moving with a purpose he hoped looked like determined forgetfulness rather than soul-crushing panic.
He didn't look back. But he could feel it. The weight of her gaze on his retreating back. He could almost hear the click of another piece slotting into place in her personal mystery labeled 'Kageyama Kyuusei.'
He's lying. He's nervous. He's going the wrong way for a reason he won't say. It's connected to the sweat, the calluses, the lateness.
As he broke into a hurried walk down the now-less-crowded east corridor, one thought burned clearer than the rest.
His mission was no longer just retrieving the katana.
It was retrieving it without Aoi Rin, cute human bloodhound, finding out what it was.
The stakes had just been upgraded from "financial ruin" to "financial ruin plus exposure of the hidden world to a dangerously perceptive civilian."
Perfect.
He rounded a corner, spotted the unmarked door to the maintenance corridor, and slipped inside, the gloom swallowing him.
Back in the classroom doorway, Aoi Rin stood for a moment, watching the space where he'd vanished. The cheerful concern melted from her face, replaced by pure, focused curiosity. She looked at the east door. Then she looked towards the west building, where she was expected to be.
A slow, deliberate smile spread across her face. It wasn't her cute, classroom smile. This one was all sharp edges and thrilling discovery.
She checked her watch. She had time. Not much, but some.
"Life notes," she murmured to herself, her voice barely a whisper in the bustling hallway. "Let's see what kind of life requires a detour towards the abandoned chemistry wing."
Making a decision that was equal parts rational inquiry and irresistible compulsion, she adjusted the strap of her bag and began walking, not west towards her class, but east, following the path of the most interesting puzzle she'd ever encountered.
Meanwhile, our hero is speedrunning
The maintenance corridor was a realm of dust, despair, and flickering fluorescent lights. Kyuusei moved through it not with stealth, but with the frantic grace of a burglar who knew the alarm was already blaring. His school shoes squeaked on the linoleum.
Third door on the left, up the metal staircase, ignore the "Out of Order" sign, it's just a suggestion, second floor landing, fire door with the broken lock...
His mind was a perfect, desperate map. This was his secret network, the veins and arteries of the school he'd memorized over a year of bizarre errands and emergency exits. He took the stairs two at a time, the clanging echoes making him wince. If a janitor caught him now, it was over.
Window at the end of Hall B. The latch is just for show.
He reached it, a grimy window overlooking a narrow alley between wings. With a practiced shove, he popped it open. The cool outside air hit his face. Below was a dumpster, then a strip of overgrown grass. Not ideal, but it cut a full two minutes off the trip.
"Here goes nothing," he muttered, and vaulted out.
He hit the dumpster lid with a loud CLANG, rolled off onto the grass, staining his trousers irrevocably with something green and slimy, and was sprinting again before the echo faded.
Around the corner, past the boiler room vent, squeeze through the gap in the fence the sports teams don't know about...
He was a blur of blue and white, a ghost in the system's blind spots. His heart hammered against his ribs, but this was a familiar rhythm. The rhythm of a mission going sideways.
And there.
The rear wall of the old chemistry wing. It looked normal-weathered concrete, a few high, barred windows. But the air in front of a specific, nondescript section shimmered. Like heat haze on a summer road, but colder. The spatial fold.
With a furtive glance over his shoulder, Kyuusei took a deep breath and stepped forward.
The world twisted. Sound muted. The sunlight took on a watery, diluted quality. He passed through the membrane of the hidden ward and into the empty courtyard.
It was just as he'd left it: eerily silent, the air still tasting of ozone and splintered wood. And in the center, the massive, grayish trunk of the demon-tree, now utterly inert and already beginning to flake into spiritual ash. Sticking out of it at a rude angle was the hilt of his katana, gleaming under the false sun.
"Thank the gods," he breathed, sprinting over.
The grip was cold and familiar. He braced a foot against the monstrous trunk and pulled.
It didn't budge.
"Oh, you have got to be kidding me." He pulled again, grunting with effort. The blade was wedged deep in wood that had hardened like concrete in death. "After everything! After the chase, the stupid tree-logic debate, the dumpster dive-you're going to do this to me?!"
He repositioned, gripped with both hands, and put his entire weight into it. A sharp, creaking sound echoed in the silent yard. Slowly, reluctantly, the blade began to inch free.
Meanwhile, Aoi is LARPing as Watson
Aoi Rin had lost him.
One moment he was heading east, a determined slump to his shoulders. The next, he'd vanished near the old lockers. It was frustrating, but also... confirming. Normal students don't just disappear.
She stood in the quiet east hallway, classes having started a minute ago. The silence was heavy. She ignored the prickle of guilt about skipping Watanabe-sensei's class. This was more important. A puzzle was active.
He mentioned his old locker. A misdirection. But he came east for a reason. What's east? She mentally listed: The old chemistry labs, mostly disused, the storage rooms, the boiler access, the rear courtyards.
Courtyards.
He'd been sweaty, like he'd been outside. Not just running from a bus.
Making a decision, she walked purposefully down the hall, her soft-soled shoes making no sound. She pushed open the heavy door to the outside, emerging into a side path that ran along the chemistry wing. The air was cooler here. She scanned the ground almost without thinking.
And saw it. A fresh scuff mark in the dirt near a dumpster. Then, a faint impression in the overgrown grass beside it. Someone had jumped or fallen here recently.
Her pulse quickened. She followed the trail, not footprints, but subtle disturbances: a bent weed, a displaced stone. It led along the wall, towards the most neglected part of the building. She felt a thrill that was entirely intellectual. This is it. He came this way.
Then she reached a dead end. A blank wall, overgrown with ivy. Nothing. She frowned, her sharp eyes missing nothing. The trail ended here. But that made no sense. Unless...
She looked at the wall. Really looked. The light seemed... odd. Warped. The ivy in one spot looked less substantial, like a poorly rendered image. Aoi Rin, a firm believer in Occam's Razor and empirical evidence, felt the foundations of her reality gently tilt.
Curiosity overwhelmed caution. She reached a hand out toward the shimmering section of wall.
Her fingers met not concrete, but a sensation like passing through a curtain of cold, static water.
She gasped, involuntarily stepping forward.
And entered a courtyard that shouldn't exist.
The sight that greeted her was not one she could have ever deduced. A gray, monstrous tree-thing, dissolving into black and gold flakes. And in front of it, back turned, heaving with effort...
Kageyama Kyuusei, his uniform stained, muscles straining, as he wrestled a full-length katana out of the tree's trunk with a final, grating SHINK.
He staggered back, holding the gleaming blade triumphantly aloft. "HA! Who's sap now, you stupid-!"
He turned.
And froze.
Aoi Rin stood just inside the shimmering boundary, the door to the normal world at her back. Her pristine uniform, her perfect ponytail, her wide, intelligent eyes that were now taking in the impossible scene: the magical courtyard, the disintegrating monster, the boy, the sword.
All the clues snapped together in a single, terrifying, exhilarating instant.
Kyuusei's face went through a journey: triumph, to shock, to sheer, unadulterated horror. The katana wavered in his grip.
For a long, silent moment, the only sound was the soft hiss of the tree spirit turning to ash.
Aoi Rin broke the silence. Her voice was calm, measured, and held a note of profound, satisfied revelation.
"So," she said, her gaze locked on the sword. "That's what you left in your old locker."
Kyuusei's mind produced only static, followed by one clear, screaming thought:
GAME OVER.