"And the members of the student council for the second year of the Fuyuki Junior High has been decided. The teachers have discussed and when considering the opinions of the students, we have decided that the student council President and Vice President shall be Issei Ryuudou and Rin Tohsaka respectively."
Upon the announcement, he took a look beside him. It had disappeared in a flash, and anyone else would have not noticed it. He knew what to look for however and he had seen what he expected. Her expression had twitched and changed for a single moment into mix of annoyance and rage. She had indeed immediately resumed her act and had placed on an overjoyed and humble expression the instant anyone else had turned in her direction.
It seemed that while she had achieved what she set out to do in this school and had enjoyed having 'fun', not everything had gone exactly to plan. While this was her first setback thus far, he knew that internally she was disappointed and annoyed. He sighed. He would have to deal with her whining about her loss to Issei later.
"We would like to invite the new student council leaders to give a speech for the rest of the student body."
She had gotten up along with Issei whom he had spotted right in front of the hall. It was the first day of his second year at Fuyuki high school and part of the administrative routine was to announce the first iteration of the student council. Personally, Shirou had felt that Issei would be a better pick as the student council President.
While Rin had displayed all the right attributes and had the right attitude for the job, he understood his friend far better. She was acting in a performance. It was a performance that she had adopted a role, a façade for. Everyone else was but a viewer in her show and she had engineered the situation to provide her with the most amusement possible. While Shirou felt that she would have performed admirably, Issei was the individual who had a life goal of being the leader of an establishment.
While the establishment mentioned was his family owned temple, Issei did have a great sense of responsibility and had genuinely cared and devoted his efforts into all aspects of whatever leadership role he was taking. Whether it was his new one or the one he had based his life's aim around.
The different members of the student council were currently taking turns to deliver their speeches about their commitment to their duties and to the student body. Shirou recalled Rin's speech that she had set out to write. It had not been written recently. conveniently enough, it had been written several months ago at the end of the school term.
She had showed him the speech that she had wrote and had asked for his opinion on her speech. She had gone through several drafts of the speech with his input. The main concerns that had led to the drafts each time had been how humble Rin had wanted to be perceived as. She was naturally a very proud individual, proud of her own attributes and ability. It was an ingrained part of the personality that one could spot if she talked to you. That was not the perception she had wanted to convey in school however and so had to alter the speech several times to display the appropriate humility while also not seeming boring or artificial.
Humorously enough, she had first written the speech for the preparation of the role as student council President. As the responsibility and authority of the Vice President was vastly different, she had to change her speech spontaneously while she was delivering it. She had still performed well however, not stumbling over the words that she improvised.
Were it not for her intelligence compensating for the error she had made, she would have been so obviously caught for her complacency. It would have been a huge blow to the facade that she had so wanted to keep alive. Shirou would personally cook a meal for whomever would give him a chance to know what was going through her head at this moment.
As her speech had ended and the other members of the council were going up for their speeches, Rin had walked back to her seat at the side of him. She had brought a piece of paper, her written speech before coming up to the stage. Her hands were open as she walked signifying the disappearance of that paper. Shirou would not put it pass her to discreetly use a fire spell on the written paper when she was performing the speech in order to get rid of all evidence of her folly.
After Rin had sat down, Shirou had brought up his right arm to pat her several times on her shoulder. It was an act of concern and solidarity that he supposed he should give as her friend. She had only replied by narrowing her eyes and glaring at him before shaking his hand off her shoulder. He supposed that she had not took her loss to Issei as well as she presented to the other students.
"Congratulations Issei, I'm sure you really deserve it."
"Thank you Emiya… Oh, Tohsaka's coming over here. I think she's looking for you."
"Oh?" Shirou looked backwards to see a smiling Rin walking briskly towards their conversation. There was something wrong about the smile however.
"Ryuudou, I am afraid I have to take Shirou away from your conversation at the moment. By the way, congratulations for the position of President of the student council. You were the most obvious choice for the role."
Issei had narrowed his eyes for a moment as though thinking there was something wrong about Rin's statement before shrugging off his suspicion and replying.
"Oh, its fine if you wanted to discuss something with Shirou, we weren't discussing anything important anyway. Also, I'm sure it was a hard decision to decide the position of student council President. Don't sell yourself short Tohsaka, for all we know they could have decided who gets the position by alphabetical order."
Rin smiled and bowed once to Issei before dragging Shirou by his wrist away. Rin was silent all the way and had been walking quickly a brisk pace but the force she was increasing on Shirou's arm was an indicator as to her mood at the moment. They had eventually arrived to the roof of the school building which Rin had the keys for as part of the student council.
Rin was silent as she fumbled over the keys. She had kept a tight grip on his arm. Shirou wasn't sure if he had done something wrong but she seemed really displeased with him. She eventually managed to open the door to enter the open space of the roof. Opening the door, Rin kept her grip on his arm and with a slight application of reinforcement shoved him through the door. She then walked up to him and kicked his shin out of nowhere.
"Ow! What is wrong? What have I done again?"
"What were you doing with Issei?"
"I was just congra…"
"Ow!" She had kicked his shin again. Harder this time.
"Why do you have absolutely no tact!?" She shouted at him. It was now that Shirou had recognized her emotions. She wasn't just angry at him, she was also frustrated.
"Was there something wrong with what I did?" This time Shirou had adopted a bewildered and indignant expression instead of his confused expression.
This time his sentence had been allowed to finish. There were repercussions to her grace in allowing him to finish his sentence however. She walked up to him once again before repeatedly kicking his shins several times before she stopped when he had raised up both his arms in defense. She threatened to kick him another time before she took a few steps backwards and pulled both the twin tails of her hair in frustration.
"Shirou…" She said as she sighed. "You can't just do that to a girl you know?"
"Do what?" Shirou was getting more and more confused by her behavior even with her supposed clarification of what he had just done wrong. While she wasn't looking at him with a negative expression, she was instead looking at him as if he were hopeless. He wasn't sure if this was worse.
She sighed again and looked at him with the same expression before continuing but with a slightly forlorn tone.
"While this was just meant to be a bit of fun, I really worked hard for it you know? I think only now do I realize that a part of me had genuinely really really wanted it."
"Oh, you mean about the student council position…" This time Shirou adopted a look of comprehension before continuing with his doubts "But what does that have to do with you kicking me?"
"…"
"…"
This time Rin looked at him with an astonished expression as if he were the biggest idiot in the world. Shirou had felt that he might very well be with him still not comprehending the reasons as to her frustration and anger with him.
This time Rin shook looked down slightly and shook her head before marching out of the open space of the rooftop and into the exit. She closed the door as she left, still leaving a Shirou extremely confused about the situation.
As Rin closed the door to the roof and got to take the staircase down, she was still feeling extremely annoyed about the situation of her hopeless friend. It was then that she developed a smirk and thought up of a little trick to do that would cheer her up. She climbed up from the few steps she had traversed while thinking and stuck the key into the door and locked the door. She developed a slightly hysterical giggle atypical of the public perception of her as she skipped her way through the school.
When Rin had first heard the announcement that she had not been picked as the student council president, she had felt shock and annoyance. These were emotions that she had expected to feel. What she had not expected to feel were the subsequent waves of sadness.
When she had first done her research and had set out to become the ideal student and the student council president, it had been just part of a little bit of fun and amusement for her. It had felt fun the first few months of adopting her facade and doing the different little things that would get her chosen for the role.
While she had indeed adopted a facade in school, she had still made some friends nonetheless. While they weren't Magi and thus would never know her true self, she had enjoyed their company and spending time with them. They were the only other individuals she would ever get to interact with on a regular basis other than Shirou.
She had first developed a specific plan of the different kindhearted and helpful things that she would do to gain rapport with the students and increase her chances of attaining the position she had wanted. As she had done to carry out her plan however, it had slowly deviated from what it was at its inception. Rin had started to favor some activities more than the others. She had still accomplished everything she had set out to do of course, but it was still a large deviation from her plan.
Rin had begun to favor activities that had to do with helping her schoolmates as well as her teachers. It was not a phenomenon that she had expected to happen. She didn't think she was a nice person at the core but all the same she had not looked forward to all the activities she had planned in order to win rapport and it was normal to have some preferences to what she wanted to do anyway.
She had not considered that she had genuinely enjoyed helping other individuals. She had slowly begun to accept the possibility after undeniable evidence from her own observations but she had discarded her preferences as a weird quirk of hers. She was a Magus after all, one had to harden their heart when doing things as a Magus. Besides, the people she was helping didn't matter anyway. They were irrelevant to her other goals in life.
It was only now that she had just realized that beyond the amusement she had gained, a degree of her had genuinely enjoyed the routine and different tasks she had to go through in order to become the student council president.
When considering everything she had in her life, such a setback was a pathetic thing to get hung up over. It was nothing compared to the wider universe she had known compared to the other students but she just couldn't stop the disappointment from coming. It appeared that she had really enjoyed what she had done and was genuinely looking forward to attaining the responsibilities required of such a position.
After the flood of the emotions that had gone through her was processed, she had already finished her duties as the Vice President of the student council. She had gone through the day automatically while having her mind stuck on her emotional turmoil. By the time she had finished her duties, it was a quarter way through the period of time that was recess before they gathered into their after school clubs.
She had decided to find her friend Shirou. He was the only one she would feel comfortable venting to. It was expected that he wouldn't understand her feelings but he would accept her as she was with all her petty flaws. While she had other friends of a sort in this school, they weren't like Shirou who knew so much more about her and her character. Much has changed in her relationship with Shirou ever since she had been first threatened by him into a deal.
Ever since she had started to give him lessons in magecraft, he had come over to her house almost daily. Whether it be for his research for his goal of helping his father or learning more magecraft from her, he would be there when she looked for him. As months and months passed, they had developed a friendship of a sort and they had begun to trust each other more and more. There was still a gulf between them, stopping them from fulling putting their trust in each other but that gulf had been dissolved once she came to know of his true motives of asking her for the agreement in the first place.
For the past two years. Their bond had grown even more and she would consider him a dear friend of hers. Their friendship wasn't perfect as she had her quirks and Shirou was horrifically dense sometimes. Even so, he was a friend that could be always relied on when she needed help or to vent. This was why she had felt betrayed upon seeing Shirou talking with Ryuudou as though they were laughing about her flaws.
She was fine with Issei Ryuudou of course, he was a serious individual whom she didn't have an opinion of one way or another. He was also Shirou's friend but in turn he was also her main rival for the student President position. Ryuudou had not seemed to care about the rivalry for the position that Rin had thought it to be and thus she had not mentioned or acknowledged it with him either.
While Ryuudou had seemed to not have a motive of trying to gain a leadership position like she did, and was genuinely just doing what he felt right, he had to have known he was one of the nominees for the position. Rin had now known him well and was never quite too sure if it was a supreme confidence that he would be victorious or a genuine unknowingness of the rivalry.
While a large part of Rin had always known that Shirou's act of congratulating Ryuuodou was not out of malice but rather of his innocence and inexperience in such situations, she couldn't help but think it was slightly discourteous for him to not consider her thoughts in the matter.
While she was extremely disappointed about not getting the position of student president, she was more annoyed by Shirou's behavior. She had planned to vent to him about her problems and lo and behold, he was chatting amicably with her rival.
She had planned to drag him to the rooftop and start a proper rant about the expected behavior of a friend in such situations when she was astonished about the extent that Shirou had not been aware of his failings. She had decided in that moment that she would be unable to deal with him and educate him about the proper behavior that he should adopt in her current state.
When walking down the staircase, she decided that even if she had failed to attain the top position of the student council, she would at least enjoy the fruits of what she had attained. Was it an abuse of authority? Yes. Was it a spiteful thing to do? Yes. Would she regret doing it? No. She had accepted that she was a spiteful girl after all. Besides, Shirou was a Magus. He would be able to get out of what she had left him without destroying the lock.
She had left just like that. She had left after an assault for unknown reasons. It didn't hurt him of course; she hadn't used reinforcement but it was the principal of the manner. While he may have his faults. What could he have done that warranted such an action?
To understand the enigma that was his friend, he revisited what had happened today. After assembly, she had split off from him in order to travel to the student council club room for the delegation of duties for the student council. The next time he had seen her was in class where she was preoccupied in thought while he was busy working on the mathematical equations needed for his magical formula.
After the classes of the day had gone by, she had been dismissed from the last period of class early for her duties as part of the student council. As such during recess, he had not seen her in the canteen. He had instead seen Issei whom he had decided to congratulate for his achievement. This was also what had gotten him into this problem.
She had indicated that one of her issues was with losing the position of student council president to Issei and that her problem was with him congratulating Issei. While he could see that she was problem impacted more than she expected when she had gotten the secondary position, she was aware that Issei was also his friend.
Perhaps she felt wronged that he was going to Issei first before addressing her problems? He hadn't been able to find her when he looked for her at recess but perhaps it might just have been slightly more tactful to deal with her issue first before going to Issei. Shirou felt like that was the root of the problem though he still didn't feel like he had understood the issue. Nevertheless, he made a mental note to do the right thing in the future.
It was almost time till the recess was over. Shirou had eaten before talking to Issei and so he decided to travel to his club. He had joined the literature club. There was a simple reason as to his choice of clubs. The activities in the club.
The literature club was a club for appreciating literature as its name suggested. Each member would read a book every day and write a review for it. While the members usually discussed about the contents of the books that the others were reading, the bare minimum required for him to be allowed to be dismissed was to complete the review of the book. That took the least time for a club. He could hand in his review of the book and expect to be allowed to go. He wasn't even sure he knew the names of his other club mates.
As Shirou turned on the doorknob that led out of the rooftop level, he felt a resistance and a clicking noise. He turned on the doorknob once again and felt the same resistance and noise. Turning it in the other direction achieved the same result. It was then that Shirou had realized what must have happened. Rin must have locked him in as a result of her annoyance with him. Shirou sighed and activated his magical circuits before placing his hand on the doorknob and manipulating the lock to open for him.
After the little fiasco with the lock that he was sure his friend found extremely funny, he arrived at his club room. It was an unused classroom tucked at the side of the school library. It was connected to the library by a door with a password that the members were aware of. As he walked in, he noticed that it was half full. Most of the members had arrived early.
The state of the club was not of concern to him. All he had to do was walk up to the box at the end of the room where they would place their book reviews in. As he slipped his report in the slot, a club member attempted to strike up a conversation with him.
"Emiya, you don't plan on staying today as well? are you sure? Another order of books by the library has just arrived. I'm sure that there would be some that you would enjoy. Even if there's nothing that you like, wouldn't it be nice to hang out?"
Shirou was already on his way out of the room. He had not given the suggestion an ounce of thought. His only reply was with a grunt. Any more he spoke would just be giving them encouragement to retain him.
"Have you had any success?" A female student asked of the student that had attempted to persuade Shirou to stay.
"Nope. Emiya sure is cold." The student replied.
"He is like this with everyone." The aforementioned female student sighed.
"Not everyone!" Another student piped up.
"Right. Everyone except Ryuudou and Tohsaka. The only individuals he makes contact with are those two."
"I wonder, how is he such great friends with Tohsaka? They're even closer than he is to Ryuudou. I heard they walk to school together." A fourth student commented.
"This is true. I saw them once when walking to school myself. Do you guys think that they are together?"
"No way. Why would a kind and helpful girl like Tohsaka be interested in him?"
"How would I know? People have weird tastes after all."
"Er Hrm… Now would you like to stop speculating on the relationship of other students and may we continue todays discussion of the literature that we enjoy?" The student who was the club president chimed in and ended the conversation.
A week had started since the first day of the second year of the school. Shirou had been nearing the completion of his Magical Formula for his spell. He just needed to solve several dozen more equations as well as several experiments to ensure that his spell worked before he could start on a new phase on his quest.
He had decided to make a trip to the Tohsaka Mansion earlier in the morning before traveling to school. There were some reference materials that he needed to correlate with the progress of his Magical Formula.
As he rang the bell, he was surprised to be greeted by Rin opening the door. He had not expected her to be up this early and had pressed the bell as a courtesy after the incident of him breaking into her home early in their relationship.
She had looked normal in the morning for once, her hair was done up into her signature hairstyle, she had her uniform on, even her visage was one adopted by only the living. She must have been up for a while to look so awake when answering the door so early in the morning. Shirou had assumed that she wouldn't have even woken up yet.
"Shirou? What are you doing here?"
"Why are you up so early?" Shirou ignored her question as he brushed past her on the way up to the staircase. There was only one reason he would be here. While he was still her friend, and he would acknowledge that he could be horrifically dense in such matters, Shirou had still understood propriety to an extent.
As Shirou pushed open the door to the study and got to retrieve the book on Magical Formula the he was looking for, as well as a magical encyclopaedia of sorts, he found that she had followed him into the room and was looking at him sympathetically.
"You have been looking on ways to create Magical Formulae recently haven't you? Have you found a way?"
"Not quite. I am well on my path though, if this spell I'm planning to use works. I will tell you about the details when I succeed. I just need a few more references before it will be complete."
"Are you done at the moment?"
"Yes, the calculations can be handled later. Why is there something you want to do?" He looked at her quizzically. He was wondering if whatever she wished to do was related to her being up so early.
"Nothing much. I'm feeling rather energetic this morning. Let us go for a walk around the neighborhood."
Shirou just nodded and they walked out of the house together. It appeared that she had already had breakfast. That was a surprise. He was expecting her to use his culinary talents once he showed up at the door. He had been planning for it even.
She was walking slowly around the neighborhood. She was also whipping her head around and squinting her eyes. It seemed that she was looking for something or someone. They soon came a stop as she stopped at an alley overlooking a residence. Shirou was puzzled. While he not been here before, always taking the direct and fastest road to the Tohsaka Mansion, he knew who had lived in this residence they were looking upon.
The residence was a Mansion largely similar to the Tohsaka one. The total area looked about the same, they had the same number of floors and they even had similar painting schemes. Aside from the fact that the Mansion was in the same part of the district that contained all of the western Mansions, the other similarity it had to the Tohsaka Mansion was that this residence was also a residence of a Magus family.
"Isn't this the Matou Residence?"
"Oh, you know this too?" She looked at him inquisitively.
"Of course, I know. I had to consider all the Magus families that lived in Fuyuki before I came to you for help. Although, I saw that there were also notes that indicated that Kiritsugu had also broke into here during the last Holy Grail War."
"What are we doing here anyway? Was there someone you were looking for?"
"Of… Of course not! It is just my responsibility of a Tohsaka to be aware of the activities of the other Magi within Fuyuki." She affirmed slightly too quickly before continuing.
"There are two members of the Matou currently in Fuyuki. One is definitely not a Magus while the other should be going to school today. I am just looking for any suspicious activity from them."
"One is not a Magus? Have you been in contact with a Matou before?"
She sighed and turned to him. "You may not have noticed in your lack of concern about school, but we do have a Matou in our year you know?"
"Do we? I don't recall feeling any traces of magical energy in the school aside from ours." Shirou was concerned now. Were his senses lacking somehow?
"Exactly. While he's not in our class, I have passed by him in the hallways several times. He has absolutely no magical circuits to speak of. If he does, it is probably of a pathetic quality that can't activate magecraft anyway."
"Oh, by the way. If you were wondering, he has blue hair. He should be pretty recognizable. If I recall correctly, I think his name is Shinji?" She scrunched up her nose as if she were trying to recall a half-forgotten detail.
Just as Shirou was about to ask another question, Rin put her hands to cover his mouth while shoving both of them deeper into the alleyway before peeking out at the Matou Mansion. Shirou taking her cue, peaked out at the Mansion too.
Coming out of the mansion was a girl of several inches shorter than Rin. She had violet hair with a red-pink ribbon on the left side. She possessed gentle features and had a blank expression. She was alone while coming out of the Mansion. It appeared that the other Matou, whatever his relation to her, was not accompanying her to school.
Shirou focused his senses around and found that he could not detect a trace of magical energy in her at all. Perhaps now that both members of the Matou's were not Magi, were they considered a defunct Magus family? As far as Shirou knew, the only other member of the Matou was an old man that was presumably their grandfather. By the previous Holy Grail War, he was already too old to fight and had been dismissed as a combatant. Shirou didn't even know if he was still alive.
As the Matou girl walked on the way to the Fuyuki bridge, they were still at the alleyway. Rin was still looking at her. Shirou did not know why. Rin was looking for threats, here right? If the girl did not possess Magical energy, she was not a Magus and thus would not be a threat to them. If so, why were they still here?
Just as Shirou was about to drag her on the way to school, he heard sniffling. As he turned to look at the source, she turned around in the other direction. He saw her hands raised up to rub the tears off her face. As she turned back to face him once again, her features were trying to resume her normal expression of normalcy but her eyes were still tinged red. This was alarming.
"Rin… Are you okay?"
"What? Of course, I am Shirou, I am perfectly fine. More than fine even. It might be a bit early but I think it would be an amazing opportunity to enjoy the sight of the city as we travel our ways to school."
"Oh… Okay. What is up with us visiting the Mat…" Shirou stopped his question as he saw Rin merrily skipping away from him, completely ignoring his questioning. She was trying to portray a cheerful version of herself. He could see the tremors on her legs as she skipped every step though. Whatever had led her to shed tears was something she did not wish him to be aware of.
He would respect her wishes even if she had believed that she fooled him. But even with how busy his life was, he believed it would be wise to dedicate some time away from her at school to investigate what was up with the Matou girl that had caused such a reaction.
As Shirou walked quickly to catch up to her skipping, Shirou felt that whatever it was, it was his obligation to help look out for Rin and the problems she faced. He was her friend after all.
She was silent the rest of the way to school. Shirou had brought out the book that he had just loaned to read. If she was going to be silent about her problems, he might as well get working on what he needed to do.
Even on his preoccupation with his research, as they walked their way to school, he had noticed that they were always following the same path as the Matou girl. While they were always walking two streets back, there was no denying it. She was absolutely looking at and keeping an eye on the Matou girl.
As the next few weeks passed, he had made an investigation as to what had caused Rin's behaviour on that morning. He had firstly observed the other Matou in the school. The one he had been unaware of. There was nothing perfectly noteworthy about him. He had followed him several times and it was a guarantee that he had possessed no magical energy so Shirou doubted he was related to Rin's issue.
Shirou had also observed the Matou girl as well. He had discovered that the other Matou was her brother. They didn't seem to have the best relationship. The elder brother of the other Matou was often rude to her. She was polite in return though, so that may have just been a facet and regular quirk of their sibling relationship. He did too have a slightly quirky friendship with Rin. Who was he to draw meaningless conclusions?
He had observed the Matou girl more as she was the catalyst for Rin's reaction. She was meek and eager to please from what he could see. She was helpful towards her classmates but was not particularly close to her classmates such that they could be called friends. She was a rather normal girl if not for one observation that Shirou had made.
Her eyes. They were empty. Blank. They were not empty in the way that Shirou's used to be and still was to a degree. They were empty in another way. Shirou had seen those eyes before. The eyes were like Kiritsugu's whenever he had returned on one of his overseas trips.
They were eyes of resignation. Of hopelessness. The message that such eyes sent was that the individual was under immense despair. Was this related to what had led Rin to have such a reaction?
Shirou had tried multiple times to prod an answer from Rin. He was never direct of course. He had always used the subtle approach of addressing the Matou as a family and asking about the implications of both members not being Magus. She had always avoided the question, changed the subject or given a meaningless answer unrelated to what he had wanted to find out.
Shirou had eventually reached a dead end in his investigation. While he promised himself he would return to it, he had a commitment to make. He was a few days away from the completion of his Magical Formula that would streamline the spell that was expressed with his Origin. He would solve this matter after he had undone the Curse that had plagued Kiritsugu.
Authors Notes:
Another year passes and now they are in the second year of Junior High. Rin is chosen as Vice President of the student council instead of her desired position. She is indeed not pleased but there are several other emotions that she didn't expect to feel.
We see Shirou's thoughts on the matter as well as who he thinks should get the position. We also see what Rin has been up to in order to compete for the position. We see Rin get bitten by her overconfidence but manages to get through just peachy.
Next up, shirou congratulates Issei on his victory. Rin sees this and wishes to take Shirou away. At this moment, Issei and Rin are amicable since they don't yet have enough interactions to develop into his hatred of Rin yet. Currently it is a one sided rivalry between them but it will escalate.
Rin is pissed at Shirou congratulating Issei. Shirou does not know why she is pissed. He is a bit daft with regards to social incidents like this. In his defense though, his only two friends are Rin and Issei and he dosen't have any other social interaction.
Rin is so frustrated and feels she can't deal with Shirou's emotional ignorance at the moment. She does feel cheer up after playing a small prank on Shirou though so all is well.
Now we visit Rin's thoughts and about the situation and her thought about her goal to become Student President. The problem is that Rin is a nice person at heart but she doesn't really have a chance to know that herself since she's actually pretty mean to Shirou sometimes.
While being a Magus, she still is pretty social and does enjoy having friends. We observe her journey about what she does and how she discovers more about herself in the process.
After this, we see her thoughts on Issei which aren't very many. They haven't really interacted enough. This both being part of the student council is a catalyst for more interactions. This also happens in canon incidentally.
She is betrayed by Shirou congratulating her rival but she knows Shirou's character and it is actually a source of amusement for her normally but at his moment it is a source of anger. She would normally educate him as to what to do the next time but this incident actually hits her pretty hard.
Back to Shirou and we see him still being confused about what just happened. He goes through the days events and sort or arrives to the correct conclusion but is still baffled about regular human behavior.
A bit of slice of life material in this chapter so far and the theme continues as we see Shirou going to his club and leaving quickly to go back home to work on his spells. The club members speculate about him but all that really says is that Shirou hasn't interacted with anyone else in school and so no one really knows much about him.
The chapter so far has really been to provide a slice into the lives of the character. It is needed to develop their characters in regular situations as well as to break up the long dumps of magecraft and plot. While it is part of the plot, the main use of this chapter is basically to provide a better and more digestable flow of the story and not just continuous and intense plot without breathing space. We are coming up on that anyway so this is even more essential since its going to be intense in a while.
Back to a bit of plot before we end this chapter. It had been a week since the second term of Junior High school. This means that new students are coming. One of the students is a younger sister of a certain Tohsaka. As this is the only Junior High in Fuyuki, she has to go to school here.
Rin knows this and this will be her first opportunity to observe her sister's condition since her adoption by the Matou's. Rin is often accused as a bad sister in canon even when she looks out for Sakura discreetly. She just doesn't have much of an opportunity to know more about Sakura's home conditions since sakura keeps it to herself.
This is partly to give Rin's character more depth but also partly because we can't just forget about Sakura even if she isn't going to be relevant at this point. Besides, forgetting about Sakura just makes Rin a bad sister.
Rin cries a bit when first seeing Sakura. This is partly due to this being her first glimpse of her sister in years but also partly due to this being her first time seeing her in purple hair (I think this is true in canon). And this really kicks in the thought that Sakura is no longer actually her sister since there are probably magical ways to make her actually biologically Matou through magecraft and the change in hair and eye color is an indication of that.
They can't sense Sakura's magical energy due to 'you know'.
Shirou sees Rin crying and is concerned. Such is their bond that even with Kiritsugu's condition weighing so much on him, he can still devote enough attention to Rin.
He does a mini investigation in his free time and discovers some things but nothing that indicates what happens. He does know something's up with Sakura due to her empty eyes though. The only reason he knows the conclusions to draw from her empty eyes are due to Kiritsugu also having them and him personally being empty in another way. Due to Rin being a well adjusted and regular human being, she can't recognize what that means.
Shirou has almost completed his Magical Formula for his spell of 'concepts' (I really need a better name or way to describe that) so more plot next chapter.