- I can't do it. Fuck. It's like - oh just damn it all, I can't bring a single fucking thing out of it! It's just plain worthless! – I exclaimed to particularly no one, tearing yet another sketch to pieces and throwing it out in rage. I regretted it immediately, though, the moment it landed in the garbage can. I felt like crying – that one wasn't as hopeless, at least. Poor me.

This was one of those 'my muse has gone off somewhere' cases. No big deal, happened all the time – to me, at least. Feels awful.

- Agrh, I shouldn't have gone to this goddamn uni at first – what was wrong with working at a tattoo salon or something like that? Less ambition, more nerves surviving? Nooooooo, I wanted to become a fucking artist. And what do I get? Right, just this stinking paper I CAN'T GET ANY DAMN THING OUT OF!

And… this is how it goes. Eventually, I stopped my pointless yelling and tried to calm down myself a bit. Drank a can of cold beer, turned my eyes away from that concentration of evil – my workcorner – and took a deeeeeeep breath. It still pisses me off a lot – the times when my inspiration just isn't working, I mean. You know how it goes, right? Just about everything that comes out of your pencil is official CRAP. Period. And to recover from this hell there has to be something really special hitting your eye. Like Kawasaki being caught off while teaching another girl how to kiss. Oh yeah, that sight was priceless… cough. Anyway. This far I've been lucky enough to return to my normal state pretty quickly, but…

…But what I'm talking about isn't my creativity crisis, but one of the 'healing factors' that had turned my life into something entirely different. Hell, I've changed myself, too, changed a LOT.

He was merely a new student in our group, nothing special. True, I did think he was beautiful, but then again, I thought that about a lot of guys, starting with my beloved self. What? If you don't love yourself, no one will. That was the rule of my ever so positive life – but, as I said already, things change.

There was a bit of a commotion. Girls kept gossiping in whispers about the newcomer as if he was a new popular idol. They told me not to get close to him ('if you bother him, he'll make those really weird faces'), but that didn't do any good. I was curious, I have to admit, the more 'cause he didn't talk to anyone… So, I wanted to stir him up a bit. He was in our group now, so we're all in this together and stuff like that… Or to cool him off, in case he was just looking down on us. I was wrong about that, but you know – anyone would've considered that because he had the 'I don't care' feeling all around him.

But all this was forgotten once I saw his pictures. They became an ultimate cure for my crisis, which I never had ever since. He drew butterflies. Wings all around, spreading along the uneasy feeling like cold fall breeze and frail melancholy. Strange, that's for sure, but stunning beautiful. I had almost forgot to open my mouth and start to speak, so great was my astonishment. And even in the casual talk (actually, I was almost the only one who was talking, he still wasn't really eager to lead a conversation) I kept changing the subject to his pictures. Wanted to kill myself for that later – it just sounded so stupid. But they really struck me…

- Ohayo there! I totally loove your butterfly pattern. My name is Kaidou Kio. I really do like your artwork, – I dumped the first thing that was on my mind. As expected, that guy had no reaction to this.

- Geese. You're totally blocking me out! – I continued cheerfully. – Was this a waste of time? It's sort of sad that you don't have any friends! – That was true. People without friends are usually sad people, and sad people ruin my environment!

He just took out a cigarette and lit it. Is he smoking?.. Hey – a new theme to talk about!

- Ohhh! A cigarette! That's kinda gross, ya know? People here are much against smoking, - I don't like it either. Smoking. But I kept that one to myself.

There was a silence, and just as I was about to open my mouth again, he uttered:

- I'm only here to paint. Making friends wasn't a goal.

Finally, I thought. So he does know how to speak after all! I was victorious. An answer came out immediately:

- You must be so lonely to have such a philosophy! You're way too serious for your own good. Come on, you're young! Live life to the fullest!

There it was. The 'weird face' they'd warned me about. Not scary one bit. This is going to be fun, I thought.

The guy himself had long blonde hair, round glasses and an emotionless face. Oh yeah – a hot body too. No wonder girls had him on top of their chat… though no one had actually talked to him – he was freezing cold. Even I had felt a little uncomfortable around him at first, and I'm famous for my friendliness… even bluntness... I tried not to take notice of it, though. After all, my intuition had already told me he's a weirdo, but a really good one – and that chick is always right! My intuition, I mean. Gold stuff.

His name came to be Agatsuma Soubi.