Prologue: Shinsen High

"Oi, Chizuru! We're gonna be late, ya know!? Hurry up!" the hand gripping me tightened as I was forced to run at a faster pace. "H-hold on, Heisuke-kun! I'm tired…"

A good physical body was definitely something I didn't have, nor did I really ever wanted one.

"No way, Chizuru! You know what happens if we're late on the first day of the week!" the brown haired boy didn't let up, and we ended up running all the way to the main gate of Shinsen High, only to hear the bell ring 100m away and the gate closing right in our ways with two stoic looking students facing us behind it.

"You're late again, Toudou Heisuke and Yukimura Chizuru. How many times does this make?" the president of the Discipline Committee, Saito Hajime frowned at us. Not that I could blame him; he was a serious guy for sure, and this certainly isn't the first time we're late, which said a lot, especially how this is the first day of school after summer break. "Hey, when the hell are you gonna let go of my sister's hand, huh!?" my twin brother and also in the Discipline Committee, Nagumo Kaoru, glared at Heisuke. He shivered under the pressure and hurriedly let go of my hand. He's always overprotective, and was even worse after we were taken in by different families when our parents died.

"Nagumo-kun," Saito-senpai said in a low voice, "I don't appreciate you raising your voice so early in the morning."

"It's that guy's fault for sexually harassing my sister! Isn't that against the school rules too!?" Kaoru snapped back.

I laughed nervously as the two bickered front and back. At that moment, Heisuke whispered in my ears, "Hey, let's use this chance to sneak in!"

"E-Eh!? T-that's not a good idea, Heisuke-kun…" the moment the last word left my mouth, a textbook hit Heisuke on the head, making him whine in pain.

"Ouuchhhh! What the hell was that for!?" just as he turned around, muttering curses, a tall man smacked him for the second time. "Toudou, where are your manners towards your elders?" Heisuke immediately stiffened, suddenly losing the ability to form proper sentences. "H-H-Hijikata-sensei!?" indeed, it was our homeroom teacher, Hijikata Toshizou, a.k.a the Demon. He was infamous in the school for his strict rules and his punishments if you fail to abide them.

(P.S. Heisuke was enlisted on his Black List during the first week of school. Until now, I've never dared to ask him what exactly he did. I wasn't even sure I wanted to know.)

"Hijikata-sensei, you're late today again as well. This serves as a bad example for the students, especially when you're the Assistant Principal."

Under the student's harsh words, Hijikata groaned. "As serious as usual eh, Saito?"

"And, please do not smoke within school compounds!" Kaoru snapped angrily. Apparently, Kaoru seems to hate Hijikata for unknown reasons.

"Geez, Nagumo, shut up. I'm locked out, so it's not counted yet, right? Anyways, are you sure it's okay to lock me out? Who knows what our Principal may do..."

That seemed to do the trick, and the two reluctantly opened the gates for us, repeatedly emphasizing that "Today is special". Well, it's not like I don't get their point. After all, without Hijikata, our Principal, Kondou Isami, is a complete mess.

I felt tiny, squashed between a load of boys who smelled of sweat. We were assembled for the opening ceremony which, to be honest, I felt quite a waste of time. The boys' chatters resounded in my ears, each at least head taller than me. I felt relieved as I saw our Principal step up on stage, grabbing the microphone enthusiastically.

"Ahh, welcome back, everyone!" Principal Kondou laughed nervously into the microphone, causing horribly high pitched distortion sounds. Every student covered their ears, groaning.

"A-ah, I'm so sorry about that!" this time, he spoke too loudly, and the same after-effects occurred.

"Geez! Principal, can you just get down from the stand if you've nothing to say!? We're going deaf, here!" one by one, the seniors begun raising their voices as they were likely used to this scene occurring yearly.

"O-oh. Right! Of course. Well, just enjoy this school term, everyone! It may be important to get good grades, but enjoying's a bigger part of life!" with that, Kondou got down from the stand with a thundering applause from the students, which I pondered over which reason was it for: Kondou's speech itself, or the fact that it was over?

Before I could come to a decision, our student council president, Kazama Chikage, took over the stage. Unlike Kondou, he received a huge round of applause. Even though he's a third year in our school, he's actually the same age as Hijikata, and they even went to the same college. Rumor has it that they were never on good terms, and even now Kazama became the council president just to abuse his powers against Hijikata. I'm not sure how much of it is true, but he certainly is putting it to good use, wearing a custom made uniform. Trailing behind him was Amagiri Kyuuju and Shiranui Kyou, his... friends, I guess. I haven't dared to speak to them yet.

"This week, we have prepared an event that requires the whole school to participate... which is the Folk Dance competition!"

Within a heartbeat, you could spot many different expressions. From poker faces twitching to excitement, or a scowl, or even shock, like Amagiri and Shiranui's faces.

"W-wait! We didn't even hear about this, Kazama!" Shiranui protested.

"Kazama! Why didn't you discuss it with us first?" Amagiri said at the same time.

"That's because I just thought of it," Kazama replied with a shrug. This time, everybody, including teachers, but excluding me, groaned. It was Kazama's style of doing things. He did it so often, even a first year like me got used to it. I simply chuckled nervously, not knowing how to exactly react to this sudden news. Folk dance? With about, what, a few hundred boys and no girls?

Don't I have a say in this?

If I knew things would become like this, I probably wouldn't have come to this school, even if it meant I'd be separated from Heisuke after 15 years of being stuck together and travelling an hour by bus and another half an hour of walking.

Sigh.

Hi guys! This is a new work I got inspired from after playing the Hakuouki game, and doing alot of research on it XD I'm trying to follow the SSL storyline as much as possible! Hope you'll support it ^o^