World of Light and Darkness

by recctangle

A japanese teenager living in the United States enters Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's World of Light through his Nintendo Switch. Although he pretty much already knows how this will go, can he manage to survive the enemies awaiting him and defeat Galeem? (yes this summary is very cheesy but it does the work)

9. Was it a Dream?

Sorry I took so long to publish this chapter, but I wasn't really motivated to write Real Life stuff, and due to how long this was gonna be and take I decided to split this into two chapters (and fun fact, this chapter might as well be the chapter I was the least motivated to write in this entire story, maybe even of everything I've written).

Funny how it took me an entire year to realize I could just write this fic on a notebook and then copy all I wrote there here in Google Docs when I could.

Also, I had kind of explained this last chapter (really abridgedly), but for the ones who read it before I deleted it all; Akira acted wangsty because I have such a low self esteem that I whine about every mistake I make, no matter how unimportant it is, I hate myself for it (but only when it's important enough or when I remember that 'I'm a terrible person' according to myself… yeah, even pettier). So, in conclusion, my explanation for the wangst is that I myself am a wangsty ass mf (e.g; I'm so stressed over not having explained the reason for last chapter's wangst right now), and since Akira's personality is based on mine, he also had to be wangsty. You don't like that? Then… Fair enough, It's already gone… but if you don't want to read any more wangst… then don't read this chapter, it probably has more, but I honestly don't really know if it really does count as wangst.

And another warning (or whatever this is supposed to be called), this Chapter is a slice of life chapter, somewhat filler, along with the next one (filler, not slice of life), so if you're reading this after Chapter 11 got released, you could skip both this and Chapter 10 if you wanted.

---

Reviews:

From MegaSalamence64 (Chapter 1): Hey Recctangle, How are you?

I'm MegaSalamence64 ... And since you need some detailed Feedback on your Fics... , I figured I'll share my opinion on them at least...

I have to admit, It's interesting at least... (Especially coming form a Fellow World of Light Writer as well...)

(XXXX)

First off, The premise...

While your fic is not the first WoL fic with an OC (Stuff like Saving the World of Light being a Major Example)... I say this is one of the First where Kirby keeps his Sole Survivor Status at least (Many of the OC WoL fics I had Read have Kirby also get Captured by Galeem to justify the OC inclusion but I prefer having Kirby stay Alive as well)

Still, It's a more common premise to WoL Fics with Extra characters (Like Krosshair and Mine which we both Added Extra Characters in ours like Issac and Matthew form Golden Sun for Krosshair and Guzma, Agumon, Bandana Dee and Nemona for Mine (The Latter being saved for a Seperate set of Fighters then the former three) as well)

But stil, Having an OC is a very double edge sword, Akira may not have lost his memories but he can be an major turn off for some readers if you're not careful since OC can risk being turned to Mary Sues if handled wrongly (I say OCs are best used in fanfiction as minor characters or Ataganoists at least)

But for Akria's Character so far... Not sure if I'll be as attached to him as the Canon Characters but so far... No infuriating moment form him yet so far... But again, you have to be careful with this at least...

He's form but try to not overdo the Wangst at least... Angst is good for Drama but don't over do it at least...

Plus, The angst can be forgiven if Akira develops form it (AKA actually learns to become a better person) but for now, be careful when you do it since it can turn off readers as well.

You can have Akira interact with say Marth when we rescue him to relate about loosing Family at least... Or any of the Non Roy FE Characters since they too lost a Family (Save for Robin who's Dad is evil so no need to worry about that for him)

Just some advice at least...

Kirby is done fairly well at least.. So Points for you there at least...

Still, Nothing else to comment much other then having some slow character moment is good at least.

The Start of the Mario Fight is being used as a Cliffhanger, Ya I did those two in my Fics as well...

So I can relate to it at least.

(XXXX)

Now for the Questions:

1: Besides Joker, How would the DLC characters be handled?

I suggest having Sora and Sephiroth be saved for Final Battle at least... (Like have them and Palutena/Bayonetta be the Final characters to be saved as an idea)

Likewise, For who goes where: Banjo/Kazooie, Terry, Pyra/Mythra and Min-Min can be your Light Realm Guys while The Dragon Quest Heroes, Steve, Piranha Plant, Byleth and Kazuya be rescued in the Dark Realm...

Sounds good?

2: Do you plan to include Original Spirits for this Fic?

I can offer you some if you want at least...

Like these two for an example:

-Skelidrege (Pokémon Scarlet and Violet)

PF:Red!King K Rool (Skelidrege)

Conditions: The Foe has Increased Attack every time it uses its Neural Special, Hostile Assist (Squid Sisters) would activate in Battle.

Stage: Pokémon Stadium

-Hisuian Samurott (Pokémon Legends:Arceus)

PF: Default!Byleth (Male) with Killing Edge

Conditions: Oshawott would appear form Pokeballs, The Foe Byleth has increased Attack Power and Increased Chance to Launch foes

Stage: Spear Pillar

You can explain these Spirits as a result of Akira entering the Game and causing some glitch that caused these Spirits to appear...

3: Do you plan to rotate any fighters between series?

Krosshair and I did that for our WoL stories and plus, It'll be an Easy way to get characters you're more comfortable writing earlier as well... Just don't overdo at least (Maybe Three form the Light Realm get swapped for Three in the Dark Realm... Just an idea for you)

(XXXX)

Also for some characters, I'll give some advice for them at least: (You can decide their Genders if you want but I suggest having Squirtle and Charizard be Male while Ivysaur be Female at least)

For the Kanto Starters, I'll say here's some base ideas for them:

Squirtle: the Little Kid of the Trio whom is full of Energy

Ivysaur: The Middle Child who's having to keep their Siblings in check.

Charizard: The Blood Knight Big Brother whom's itching for a fight but cares for their Trainer and Teammates at least.

What do you think?

(XXXX)

Overall, It's an Interesting fic... Keep up the Good Work at least! ;)

Take care, Stay Safe, Watch your health and See Ya! ;)

-MegaSalamence64

From me: Minor spelling mistake, I WIN!

Jokes aside, this is one hell of a review, I'm glad you took your time to read and review per request though!

Alright, so:

I've read Saving The World of Light a bit, but I stopped at Chapter 4 if I remember correctly, but I'm gonna continue reading soon.

Oh, really? Well, since I only read one fic (Subspace Emissary's Worlds Conquest, of course) before I published this one, I didn't think of having Kirby be captured as well, and I don't think I would have added that even if I read more WoL fics.

I'll only be adding Assist Trophies and Pokéball Pokémon as extras, by the way.

Don't worry about that, I'll be keeping Gary Stu Akira in my mind, Secured, Contained and Protected (haha funny SCP reference)

I already assumed that not a lot of people would grow attached to him, since he's just another OC of the bunch (Akira will remember that).

Fun fact: I'm not really proud of it, to be honest, I really screwed it up on the time management on the in-battle angst. So, I can officially state that I'm terrible at writing angst!

I mean, I don't think I'll ever get over my low self esteem, but if it's for the fic, then sure, Akira will learn that he's not a bad person after 4 entire years of self loathing!

About that, I think I should probably research more about the fighters' backstories, since I didn't know that before… Actually, you know what, I don't even have enough time to do so.

Only Kirby… Huh? (insert Basil from OMORI's crying portrait here)

1: I have absolutely no idea (yeah, I didn't plan a lot of this fic out).

1.1: Honestly, that's a good idea, but I'm really just taking their locations from whatever other people online say.

1.2: Yeah, all those (except for Pyra and Mythra) were gonna be the ones in the Light Realm, and vice versa.

2: I think I'll definitely add Spirits for the next (made up) area, but I don't feel like an error like that would occur, since Akira was supposed to enter the game after all, and I can't add Skeliedrege since Scarlet/Violet hasn't released yet in the fic, but hey, I then suddenly thought about one.

Vs. Robin (Cuz the hair color, magic and that Izanagi's main element is electricity)

Spirit: Yu Narukami

Conditions:

- Left and right controls will suddenly reverse after a little while (Pulinpa, Panic Effect)

- The stage is covered in a poisonous cloud (Poison Mist, Poison Effect)

- You have reduced defense after a little while (Bewilder, Distressed Effect, Rakunda)

Stage: Mementos (Omega Version because it's the most similar to P4's battle arena)

Song: Reach Out to the Truth (So Mementos is P4 instead of P5, and because it's literally the battle theme)

I feel like reduced defense and poison is kinda broken, but whatever.

3: Eh, no, don't feel like it.

I felt like making Ivysaur a male, but sure, why not, (I ended up deciding on Male Ivysaur) and thanks for the base ideas as well!

---

Changelog:

- Decided to change Akira's hometown to be Raleigh, for... multiple reasons.

So, in this chapter you'll be figuring out more about Akira's daily life, and other stuff too, I guess (This chapter might turn out bad, since I'm not really interested in doing stuff in the real world, anyways)

Oh, and by the way, there will only be three more "important" OCs (A.K.A. that they're just more important than any other character here) introduced in this chapter. The others… I'll probably just only have their names (Plus, it's gonna be a long time before we see them again after the next chapter).

And… I don't really care if this chapter is considered bad (I think it's gonna mostly be the pacing that's gonna bug some people, to be honest), I'm just happy to have gotten over this one.

...I really want to know if I'm using the word 'frown' correctly…

Let's just get into it, if you guys are ready, that is.

---

Chapter 9: Was it a Dream?

Oh, what a nice middle-sized house with nothing special about it inside a residential area! I wonder who lives in it...

Inside one of the house's bedrooms, a teen is about to wake up.

"Ngh…" He grunts.

It's a beautiful day outside,

Birds are singing,

Flowers are blooming,

On days like these,

'Kids' like you…

Should be-

"GOING TO SCHOOL!" The teen yelled as he sat up really fast… It's Akira.

September 16th, 2022

-Real World-

Raleigh, United States of America

Akira's Bedroom

"Wow, I've never… Woken up like this…" He mutters, somewhat confused.

He looks down at his crotch. "Oh yeah, I'm attracted to Sans…. Why am I attracted to a skeleton?" He asks himself, not even knowing the answer.

"Wait a minute…" He then looks at the digital clock on the drawer besides his bed and his eyes widen. "6:50?! I'm super late, holy shit!" He says as he almost jumps off the bed and gets his pants off.

Right then, a middle-aged Japanese woman around her 40s with a black curved-out bob hairstyle, wearing a blue blouse and black shorts, enters the room. "You're late, Akira!" She scolds the teen, who rushes to get his school uniform on.

"What about you, aunt Mayuri? You're late as well, I already woke up." He scolds back, offending her a lot.

"I still hate that attitude of yours!" The woman, revealed to be Akira's aunt, Mayuri, replies.

"You get that we're not in Japan, right? Plus, you're the one who moved here."

"That's still not an excuse to disrespect your elders!"

"I know." Akira narrows his eyes. "But… Let me ask you something first." He stops getting his school uniform's pants on to look at his aunt. "Were you scrolling through Facebook on your phone again?" He asks with a deadpan expression on his face.

The expression on Mayuri's face turns into a sad one. "Yes… I'm sorry, I'll pay more attention." She apologizes.

Akira realizes what he just said, and stops looking angry at her. "No… There's no need to apologize, I was the one who woke up late, after all."

The aunt smiles at her niece. "Yes, but I'll stop, for the sake of you getting to school on time. And about that… Please continue preparing yourself for school."

"Yes ma'am!" Akira replies cheerfully and gets back to what he was doing as she leaves the bedroom. "Alright… So now I'm extra late…" He says, getting his jeans on.

Akira then gets his black shoes on, but he has a hard time tying them up in a way he likes. "Would you look at that? I'm fifteen years old, yet I still don't know how to do this?" He sighs in disappointment as he fails to tie them again. "Really…?" He asks himself.

After a short while he finally gets it right and goes to get his black sweater on, but as he's about to do so he looks down… at his body in general. "Honestly, after all I eat, I kind of expected to be less skinny, but oh well, at least I'm not underweight."

"...And I forgot to brush my teeth." He grunts right after finishing getting all his clothes on and goes to his bathroom.

Akira's Bathroom

Akira grabs his toothbrush, turning on the sink, and turning it off after soaking it with the tap water before putting his toothpaste on the brush. He then puts the toothbrush inside his mouth and starts moving it in circular motions on his teeth.

("...") The teen remains with a completely blank mind as he brushes his teeth, until he thinks about a character that caught his interest lately. (don't ask why I made this dude so hOrneh)

("Klaus von Reinherz…") He blushes a bit, looking to the side as he thinks about the mentioned muscular character. ("He's… um... hot...") He continues to brush his teeth, but with a slower pace.

("His physique… his looks…") It continues to get slower and slower with the more aroused he gets. ("His voice...") Akira has finally stopped brushing his teeth.

("That… menacing gaze of his.. more like seductive...") He says as he slowly starts to hug himself.

And now… He's just completely lost in his aroused thoughts. "A-Ah!" But he gets drawn away from them as his digital clock beeps, indicating that it's now 7:00.

("R-Right, fuck! I got… distracted.") He says inside his mind, frowning a bit as he proceeds to finish brushing his teeth.

Akira soaks his hands with the tap water and starts to wet his hair, though still leaving it messy, since nobody really minds that.

Akira then decides to smell himself. "Of course I smell like I haven't taken a shower in a week, come on!" He says before he just cleans the smell off.

Now, last but not least, he grabs the other soap bar he has, that being the facial soap he just got some days ago and washing his face with it and then water, before turning off the sink and exiting the bathroom.

Akira's Bedroom

He looks at his navy blue backpack laying on the floor besides his closet and grabs it, deciding to get out of his room and go downstairs.

Kitchen

The teen grabs his lunchbox on the table in the middle of the room and then two loaves of bread, before quickly preparing himself a peanut butter sandwich and grabbing a freezing water bottle from the fridge's freezer.

"I gotta go now, aunt Mayuri!" Akira says as he goes to the door to the outside.

"Goodbye, and take care!" She replies, smiling at him.

"Yeah, I will!" He then unlocks the door and goes to the front yard's exit.

Front Yard

"And remember to close that door!"

"Okay!" Akira opens the yard's door and closes it back after going through it, and hurries off to school.

"I hope he comes back earlier today, just like yesterday, I can't stand being alone…" Her smile disappears as she goes back inside the house.

Streets

The teen keeps on smiling as he runs off to school, munching on his recently made sandwich. ("I'm just gonna ignore what other people say about me being late!") He thinks, but then, his smile slowly fades away too. ("...Right?")

The teen slows down his speed to a complete stop. ("I'm… a joke.") He stands there as the other bystanders ignore him completely, unless they have to go around him, and he lowers his head, frowning. ("Why… am I like this?") He asks himself.

("My parents are lucky… At least they don't have to deal with my bull-") His thoughts get interrupted by an arm going over his shoulders, forcing him to walk forwards.

He looks beside him, and finds himself looking at a boy around his age with wavy dark brown hair and a bronze skin color, wearing a white shirt, black pants and black boots.

"Hey Akira, why are you so down?" The other teen asks. "You can tell me, I'm your best friend after all!" He says to Akira with a big smile. "Also, nice sandwich."

"Oh, hi Alex…" Akira replies with a small smile as he keeps on eating his food.

"No, enserio, what's wrong?" Akira's best friend, Alex (bro is literally just Kel from OMORI by the way), replies back as his smile turns into a frown and a raised eyebrow.

"Ya sabes… With my low-self esteem and all that…" The teen frowns.

"That again? Come on dude, I've said this at least a hundred times, you're not a bad person at all!" Alex says.

Akira sighs. "It's easy for you to say that…" He munches on the sandwich again.

"Oh, really?" Alex asks.

"You already know I don't exactly know how to explain stuff." He scratches the back of his head.

"Fair enough then. But… don't think about hurting yourself, alright?" Alex says, looking pretty worried for his friend's mental health.

"...Yeah." He then finishes eating the sandwich.

"Please… don't..." Alex frowns even more.

"..." Akira remains silent as they both keep on walking, frowning at each other.

"Like… I get your situation, but-" He gets interrupted (for the first time).

"Do you?" Akira replies.

"Yeah, we all have done bad things at least once in our lives." He smiles again. "You're not the only one, alright?"

"No, I meant that you don't have a self-esteem as low as mine."

"Oh, yeah, well, in that case… I'll just keep on supporting you through everything then." Alex goes back to smiling

"Thanks…" Akira smiles back at him.

"No problem!" The other teen's smile grows bigger. "So, besides that, how have you been lately?"

"Not much, actually. Except for the fact that my Nintendo Switch's screen decided to start glowing all of a sudden at night, and despite the fact that it was at 2 AM, I then had a really long dream, for whatever reason."

"Are you gonna go get your Switch fixed?"

"Why are you even asking? Of course I will."

"I just wanted to make sure, alright?"

"Oh, okay."

"So… Do you even remember what that dream was about?"

"I can't remember much about it, but I can only say that it… didn't feel anything like a dream. I felt pain, and I'm pretty sure I was thinking and acting freely as well… but it wasn't a lucid dream either."

"That's… weird. Has anyone had a dream like that before?"

"No idea…" Akira shrugs.

"Oh well, at least you had some kind of fun in that dream, right?"

"As I said, I forgot a lot about it."

"Okay."

"But something I do remember clearly was that… in the last part of the dream it all switched to Undertale, I was Frisk while Sans was doing his entire monologue, and I woke up right before the fight was supposed to start."

"Did you get…" Alex smiled mischievously. "A ぼっき (bokki)?" He asks teasingly.

"Points for the JoJo reference…" He sighs. "But I still don't know why I even told you that in the first place…"

"Hey, that means that you trust me enough, y'know?"

"You know what? Sure, but it's still kinda uncomfortable."

"Understandable, but it's still your fault, after all."

"...Yeah."

"Anyways, it looks like we're gonna get to school soon." Alex points out.

"Well, I just hope nobody says a lot about me being late for the third day in a row." Akira then sighs. "But hey, let a man dream."

"Just like how you dream of an Incineroar- '' He gets interrupted.

"H-Hey!" He says in a mix of a shout and a whisper, blushing as he thinks about what his friend would have said. "W-We're in a public place, you idiot!"

"But you didn't deny it…" Alex says, his mischievous smile returning.

"U-Ugh!" Akira looks away in embarrassment.

Alex chuckles. "You really like big guys, don't you?" He asks.

Akira looks back at his best friend. "It… depends… not like you didn't know that…"

"Yeah, for example-" The other teen gets an annoyed look from Akira. "Okay, I'll stop with the jokes."

"But it wasn't funny…"

"Well, yeah…"

"But um… the fact that I'm mostly attracted to anthropomorphic animals… Does that make me… uh… a zoophile…?" Akira asks, pretty nervous about the answer.

"Oh… Well…" Alex ponders about it, but Akira replies back before he can say anything else.

"Actually… you don't have to answer… it's obviously a yes…" Akira frowns even more.

"Hey, at least you're the overly submissive one." Alex replies.

"...Is that an insult or a compliment…?" The teen asks, but he only receives a shrug as his response.

"So… including the fact that they're kind of supposed to have brains similar to a human one… and excluding the fact that you're a pretty big pervert… there's gotta be some consent somewhere… right?" He smiles awkwardly, trying to reassure Akira.

"Yeah… but that still doesn't change the fact that I'm attracted to animals…"

"Well… there's… actually nothing else I can say to back you up…" Alex scratches the back of his head.

"No, you don't need to worry about that…"

"I think I do… because you're my best friend after all…" He smiles again.

"Thanks… but…"

"...What?" Alex raises an eyebrow.

"Well… I just can't get over the fact that… literally everyone expects me to have kids… but I'm… Homosexual…" Akira scratches the back of his head.

"That doesn't mean you can't have freedom to expre-" Alex gets interrupted yet again.

"No, I'm not talking about that, because I, myself, want to have kids, but I can't really force myself to be Bisexual or establish a romantic relationship based on lies, either." Akira explains.

"In that case… guess we'll just have to leave this conversation for another time, since we're already at school." He says, pointing at their High School's entrance.

The teen nods slowly. "Yeah, sure…"

"Let's go then." Alex says as they both enter the building.

Seventeen Sisters Highschool

1F Hallways

"Well, until break (recess) then!" Alex waves Akira goodbye as he heads to his classroom.

"Until break…" The teen waves back, heading to his own classroom.

He walks through the hallways, still with a frown on his face.

"..." He remains silent as he narrows his eyes and looks to the floor while navigating through the area. ("Sometimes… I wish I wasn't so…") He drifts off inside his thoughts as he spots his classroom and opens its door.

English Classroom

Akira closes the door, and he clearly notices that the classroom is filled with the students talking so much that he nearly can't even hear his own thoughts… as usual. Amidst the audible chaos in the entire room, only a couple of people notice Akira entering the room, including the teacher, Mr. Harrison.

"Alright class, please tone it down." The teacher asks all of the students that are making noise, but as he sees that no one's paying any attention, he grunts, before slamming both of his hands on his desk, which successfully catches everyone's attention, before shouting; "I said, tone it down!"

Now, the entire class is finally quiet as Harrison sighs, before he looks at Akira with an unamused expression on his face. "Akira, could you please explain why you've been late for three days in a row?" He asks with an unamused tone, causing the rest of the class to look at the teen, something that makes him pretty nervous, as he really doesn't like being the center of attention, especially if it's a big crowd.

"I… uh… overslept… while my aunt just… kept on scrolling through Facebook on her phone." Akira hangs his backpack on one of the hooks for them and grabs his English notebook before walking to his desk as he finishes explaining.

The teacher sighs again. "I swear to god, if you get here late one more time, I will-"

"I don't care…" Akira mutters under his breath, but Harrison manages to notice that his mouth moved.

"...What did you just say?"

"...I said… that I don't care…" Akira repeats.

Mr. Harrison walks right next to the teen's desk. "Say that again." He demands.

Akira gets up from his desk. "...I don't give a shit." He replies as the entire class "ooh"s.

Harrison gets angry at Akira's reply, and his face shows it. "Oh, yeah? Well, I think you shoul-" He gets interrupted again.

"I don't care because I see no point in me studying."

"Oh god, don't tell me you're one of those who think school is usele-"

"I see the point of studying in general, but not when it's me…" Akira scratches the back of his head

"Oh, and why is that so?" The teacher asks.

"Because… what's the point if, in the end, I'm just gonna lock myself inside my house and keep on playing videogames until I'm blind?"

Silence ensues. "..."

"..."

The teacher looks at the roof and sighs again, before looking right at the teen. "No wonder your parents are dead, they were just too tired of having to deal with your bullshit." The class audibly gasps at what the teacher just said.

"...Teacher, don't you think that's going too far?" A student says, but he gets completely ignored.

"Plus, they were probably too poor and braindead to do so." He says, making Akira angry, which in turn gives the adult an incredibly punchable smirk.

"Oh, and don't get me started on that aunt of yours. Not only is she goddamn stupid, but also really goddamn irresponsible! Having your niece get late to school for the third time in a row just for the sake of using Facebook? Man, those Minion images mustbe funny as hell to manage to rot an entire human brain. Not like people like you should be allowed to enter a school."

Akira rolls his eyes in response to what his teacher just said, making him chuckle. ("God I just wish I knew at least one comeback line…") The teen thinks.

"Your uncle's the only successful person of your entire family, since he's pretty rich, but he's incredibly arrogant. And it looks like his niece is just like him, he's an entitled piece of shit that thinks he's the center of the world just because he's good at school."

Right after, another student raises his hand.

"No, not no-" Harrison gets interrupted yet again.

"Professor, could you please get on with the lesson instead of insulting Akira's entire family, including his dead parents? I think that's going a bit too far."

"You know what? Fine, I get paid for teaching, anyways." The teacher replies as most of the class groans.

"That's what I said, and he completely ignored me!" The first student shouts.

"...Teacher, how can you just say that after all you just said?" A girl says.

"Oh, please. All I did was talk, just be glad it didn't get any worse, not like they'd let me touch any of you." Mr. Harrison says as he goes to his desk and starts reading out the attendance list.

"Ugh… I hate this guy… why is he even a teacher in the first place?" She mutters. luckily, not getting his attention.

7:11 AM

"Alright, so now that we're done with the attendance…" Mr. Harrison gets up starts writing on the blackboard as Akira sits back on his the chair behind him.

"Psst, hey, Akira." The student behind the teen catches his attention.

Akira turns around. "...Yeah?"

"You already got marked as absent in the list." He whispers.

"I'm sorry… but does that even matter at all?" The teen replies with an unamused expression on his face.

"If I remember correctly… yeah, it is."

"Alright." Akira turns back around, looking at the blackboard.

"Wow, uh…" The student scratches the back of his head after Akira's response.

The teen sighs. "I'm just not in the mood because of this guy, alright?"

"...Yeah… sure."

"Alright class, you guys should probably start paying attention now, unless you want to get an F." The teacher says as he keeps on writing, but as usual, a lot of the students don't even bother to even look at the board.

Akira starts copying whatever Mr. Harrison is writing on the blackboard. He then semi-drifts off in his thoughts while still managing to pay attention to the lesson.

("This guy really is just… annoying…") The teen sighs. ("But… I kinda deserved everything he said to me… but including my family… that was just unnecessary…") He narrows his eyes as he frowns even more.

7:59 AM

Akira is looking at the clock above the blackboard, as he has just finished studying, while Mr. Harrison is just sitting on his chair. The class is still noisy as ever, as most of the other students are still talking to each other, even though they haven't even finished studying yet.

("Please hurry up…") The teen says inside his mind, waiting for it to be 8:00, A.K.A. recess. ("I'm so impatient right now…")

Tick… Tock…

The student behind Akira taps his back.

"...What is it now?" He asks as he turns around.

"Well, I just noticed that you're… very impatient… judging by how you're acting."

"Wait, did I make it that obvious…?"

"Yeah, you really did."

"Uh…" Akira scratches his head.

"Well hey, it's not like it was bothering any of us. Plus, I was pretty impatient too, anyway." The student replies.

"Was…?" He asks, a bit confused.

"Look at the clock." The student says as he points at it.

"Okay then…" The teen turns around, his eyes landing on the clock, which is two seconds away from 8 AM, and the bell instantly rings right after that. "...Oh."

"Alright, we should be going now." He says as he gets up as Akira nods and gets up too.

"You guys can go now." The teacher says, waiting for the students to get out of the room, and the two start heading outside the classroom, both storing their Math notebooks on their backpacks and taking them.

F Hallways

Akira just stands there, right in front of the classroom's door, taking a deep breath before looking at the floor. ("Maybe I am just as selfish as how Mr. Harrison said I was…") He frowns, yet again.

The student turns around to see Akira looking at the floor. "Uh… is something wrong?" He asks.

The teen slowly looks up at the student. "Nah, I'm… okay."

"Alright then…" He starts walking away.

("Ugh…")

"Hey, Akira!" Alex shouts from around the corridor, getting the teen's attention.

"Oh, hey…"

"How are you doing?" Alex asks as he approaches the teen.

"Eh, not so good, actually…" Akira scratches the back of his head.

"What is it now?" He asks, looking pretty worried.

"Let's just say that the English teacher… decided to insult me and my family… including my parents…"

"I'm sorry, but what?" Alex asks again.

"You heard me…"

"How can a teacher just say that out of nowhere like it's nothing? I mean, sure, it's coming from him, but still!"

"Well, I did kind of offend him when I said that I didn't care at all about school…"

"Ugh, you know what? I'm gonna go have a talk with him myself." Alex says, ready to enter the classroom behind the two.

"W-Wait, you don't need to do that!" Akira tries to convince Alex, since he doesn't want to get into any more problems.

"But he insulted you and your family! He deserves to get insulted back for that!"

"But we can just tell it to the principal…" Akira replies.

Alex sighs and calms down. "Well, if you don't want to do it that bad… then sure, I guess i'll have to respect your opinion…" He frowns a bit.

"Phew…" The teen sighs in relief. "I really thought that you were going to ignore everything I said and have a… 'very friendly discussion' with him…" He then looks to the side. "But… I kind of think the teacher was right when he was talking about me being selfish." He frowns more as well.

"You're not selfish." Alex refutes his friend's statement.

"Tell that to the many times I've done bad things all because of my ego…"

"And there are also many times you've done good things because of your selflessness as well." He replies.

"That's like comparing the Vatican City to Russia in terms of size…"

Alex frowns even more. "Please… stop self-loathing already…"

"Though… even if I wasn't selfish, I still wouldn't deserve a friend like you, a friend that actually cares."

"Thanks for the compliment, but… you really need to tone your self-loathing a bit…"

"And how am I supposed to do that exactly?" Akira asks.

"Akira, look it hurts me too, you know? Knowing the fact that my best friend hates himself this much hurts me…"

"But-" He gets interrupted almost right after he opens his mouth.

"You're not the only one who's suffering." Alex says bluntly.

"I…" Akira doesn't even have the words to say anything anymore.

Alex sighs again. "Let's just go to the principal's office, alright?"

Akira nods slowly as a response and they both start heading to said place.

Stairs

"Alex, now that I think about it… I don't particularly think anyone would be sexually or romantically attracted to me…" He says as they both start walking up the stairs to the second floor.

"..." Alex stays silent.

Akira then looks at the floor. ("Wow… I guess he really is tired of my self-loathing…")

"..."

("Yup, I got that right, he isn't even bothering to say anything anymore…") Akira frowns even more. ("Am I really that annoying…?")

("I just can't get how Akira can just… think he's an absolute waste of time like it's nothing…") Alex says inside his mind as he sighs, but Akira doesn't notice it.

("All my attempts at convincing him just… won't work… he just keeps on self-loathing over and over again…")

("But… I also can't just leave him like that… what if he tries to hurt himself… or even worse?")

3F Hallways

The two teens walk out of the stairway, but they haven't changed their expressions a bit.

("All of this is just so… complicated… what am I supposed to do…?") Alex keeps on thinking as Akira looks up at him, and notices that he's looking at the floor as well.

"Um…" Akira trails off. ("Now i've done it…") His face just turns back to a neutral one. ("...I guess… I really am a bad friend, huh?")

The two stay silent both externally and internally as they walk to the middle of the hallway, where the Principal's Office is located.

Principal's Office

Both students enter the room, Alex after Akira, with the latter closing the door.

"What do you need?" The principal asks as once the teen closes the door, not even bothering to look away from her desk.

"Well, Mr. Harri-"

"If it's only about Harrison, then don't even bother, please."

"But he literally-" Alex gets interrupted again.

"Look," Ms. Hancock finally looks up at the students. "He may be a very unlikable person, but he does his job well." She looks back down to her desk after finishing her sentence.

"..." Alex remains silent.

"If you're done, please exit this room." She says very bluntly.

("It doesn't look like she'll be caring about what Harrison said any time soon…") Akira thinks as he turns around. "Let's go…" He says as he opens the door.

"Alright then…" Alex says in defeat, and the two leave the principal's office.

3F Hallways

"Wow, that was pretty rude." Alex scratches the back of his head.

"I can't really blame her, though."

He shrugs. "Yeah, sure, whatever."

"Also…" Akira pauses.

"...What?" Alex asks, raising an eyebrow.

"...Nevermind." He mutters, high enough for his friend to hear.

"...Okay." Alex replies, being left curious about what his friend wanted to say.

"We should probably just stay on the second floor for now…"

"Sure, we're gonna have our next classes on that floor, after all." Alex says as Akira starts walking back to the stairs.

"Alex, do you mind if I elaborate more on… what I said back there?"

"What are you talking about?" He asks, not getting what Akira was referring to with 'back then'.

"When I said I didn't think anyone would ever fall in love with me…"

Alex's facial expression turns into an unamused one. "...Why do you think so?"

The teen frowns and stops walking as he notices his friend's facial expression changing. "...I'm gonna take that as a no…"

Alex realized what he accidentally did. "Wait, no, I didn't mean that!"

"I'll be going now." Akira resumes walking away.

Alex extends his arm towards Akira, but he then lowers it as he sees that he keeps on getting farther and farther. ("It's no use…") He thinks. ("Why is he so stubborn…?")

Stairs

Akira walks down the stairway. "Annoying… that's what I am." He mutters under his breath, before chuckling. "Maybe I should just shut up for once."

Everyone else ignores him, as the conversations of other students overshadow his muttering, and they're just too busy with whatever they're doing to even baby an eye.

He sighs as he continues walking the way down.

2F Hallways

Now that he's on the second floor, he decides to get near the math classroom to save time when the bell rings.

"...I don't think Alex even needed to ask why… he probably just didn't want to say no…") Akira smiles a bit. ("I really do appreciate it, but…") He trails off again.

Akira is now in front of the Math classroom's entrance, and he just stares at the door. ("...Why am I even here?") He asks himself.

He then turns around, looking at the people passing by, without a frown or a smile, as to not draw more attention, not like he thinks he would, anyways.

Happy friends talking to each other, happy couples doing their own stuff, and happy… just people being happy in general. Those are the type of students that pass by Akira, but he… just can't be bothered to be happy right now.

The teen remains with a neutral face as they pass by. ("Will I… ever be ina romantic relationship someday?) He asks himself as he looks at the couple passing by.

("Will I ever have a friendly conversation with someone without having to ring up my self-loathing…?") He says inside his mind, looking at the friends passing by.

("Will I ever be… how I want to be…?") He looks at the floor, finally giving up to his urge to frown.

("Will I-") Akira's thoughts get interrupted by the sound of someone slamming a locker, followed by a yelp.

"Huh…?" Akira looks at the direction of where the sound came from, to his right, to see a stall student, with two other students behind him, with his right hand on a locker, presumably being the locker of the smaller student he's facing.

"Oh, sorry, did that scare you?" The one at the front asks as the three laugh, including him.

("Oh, great, it's them.") Akira rolls his eyes as he realizes who the trio are, pretty much the only bullies of the school, because no one else bothers to do anything similar unless they hold a grudge.

"You left your locker open, someone had to do it." The bully says with a smirk, which annoys Akira even though it isn't even directed to him.

("I think I've had enough of punchable smirks today…") He thinks as he narrows his eyes.

"B-But did you need to shut it that hard?" The bullied student asks, still being a bit scared from the sound.

The taller student chuckles. "It's our job, we're supposed to be bullies, after all."

Akira sighs. He can't decide on whether he should intervene or not. ("Ugh… these three are just… so annoying…")

"C-Could you please leave me alone already?" He asks, praying for his bully to say yes, even though he knows it's virtually impossible.

"How about no?" The entire trio says in unison, with their smirks growing even wider.

"..." The teen stays silent as he decides to not do anything about the situation and just starts walking away.

("I would like myself to not get drawn into any more problems, thanks.") He takes a left turn, successfully managing to get away unnoticed.

Akira glances behind him. ("I feel bad for that guy, but I can't really do anything about it…") He thinks as he turns his head around. ("Really, what am I supposed to do there…?") He asks himself. ("When was the last time I tried punching someone again…?") He scratches the back of his head as he frowns more.

Back at the stairs from where Akira came from, Alex comes out of them.

"I just hope he doesn't…" He trails off, before he looks to his right, noticing Akira taking another left turn. ("There he is…") He gets ready to start following him to have another conversation, but…

"Hey, loser!" One of the bullies calls him out, making the other two look at him, including the leader.

"Oh, look who it is." Said member says, his smirk growing even bigger.

"Ugh, I don't have time to deal with you three." Alex scoffs and continues walking towards Akira.

"Where are you going?" The same bully asks as the trio starts following him, leaving the student who they just bullied to just frown more.

"I wonder what's more important than being an absolute dumbass." One of the bullies at the back says mockingly as the three take a left turn to Alex.

"None of your business." Alex replies bluntly as his face turns into more of an annoyed one after hearing the bullies' steps.

"Oh, really?" The main bully asks.

"Yes, really." Alex says the last word with a really mocking tone. "Now leave me alone." His tone quickly becomes more blunt as he takes a left turn.

"Why's everyone asking us to leave them alone today?" He asks as he tries to get closer to Alex.

Alex turns around and stops walking. "Because you're annoying as hell!" He yells at the three students, already at his limit, he doesn't want to deal with them at all today.

"Ooh, how scary." The bully says mockingly. "Maybe you should be a comedian." He says again, making Alex get angrier.

"Dude, just shut up already." Alex replies, ready to do whatever it takes to get them to leave him alone.

"But last time you said you weren't gonna 'give a shit' if we kept on bullying you." The other bully (the one that said the 'absolute dumbass' line) at the back points out. "I'm guessing that was a lie then."

"..." Alex sighs as he stays silent. ("That's… right.") He turns around and continues walking.

"What, cat got your tongue?" The bully at the front asks.

("I should just… calm down, and…") Alex thinks.

The same student chuckles. "Don't tell me you're scared of us now."

"Yeah, where's all that courage now?" The other bully (same AD line bully) asks.

("And… not involve Akira in this." Alex continues as he takes a left turn. ("He… really wouldn't like knowing that I got in trouble just because I wanted to talk to him…")

"Come on, say something!" If you just stay silent like that it's not gonna be fun anymore and then we'll be forced to leave you alone!" The last bully says, receiving glares from the other two.

"Please… just stay quiet, alright?" The main bully whispers, trying to avoid insults, receiving a nod from the student that just spoke.

"Oh yeah, I forgot that you're just a bunch of idiots." Alex says, a small grin growing on his face after insulting the trio.

"Hey!" The two bullies behind the leader yell out, both offended by the insult.

Alex's grin turns into a smile after chuckling. ("I'll just have to ignore these idiots until they get bored then.") He says as he keeps on walking, with the bullies behind him.

Meanwhile, in another part of the floor, Akira just stands there, in the middle of the hallway. "Ugh…" He sighs in disappointment (of himself, of course), since he managed to hear everything.

("He should honestly just… ignore me.") He says inside his mind as he decides to finally move towards the wall so he wouldn't be 'bothering' other students by making them go around him, but he's still looking at the floor.

("I'm just… not a good friend in general…") He frowns more as he thinks that. ("And I'm pretty selfish as well…")

("Though…") He looks up at the window as he pauses. ("It's not like… I'm ever gonna have the guts to do… that.") He thinks as he just keeps on staring at the tree that's right outside the school.

("Or… will I?") He ponders about the question. ("No… I'm pretty sure I won't")

But then, he hears the bell ring, indicating that break is already over. ("...I guess I'll just have to go back to where I was…") He turns around and continues walking, but back to the Math classroom.

("Sometimes I wonder why break only lasts 10 minutes…") Akira sighs as he takes a right turn after having to go straight for a small while, and he notices that the student is still there, near the entrance to the classroom.

Akira approaches the bullied student to talk to him. "Those guys are absolute dicks." He says bluntly.

The student gets startled again and quickly turns around to see who just spoke to him. "O-Oh… Y-Yeah…" He says, really nervous.

"...I didn't mean to scare you." Akira scratches the back of his head.

"W-Well…" He drifts off.

"...But seriously though… people like them are really annoying." He says as other students of his class pass by to enter the Math classroom. "I mean, sure, the stronger people always gang up on the ones that are weaker than them, but really?"

"Uh…" The student trails off again, still very nervous.

"..." Akira stays silent as he looks at the door to the classroom. ("This is… very awkward.") He then looks back at who he's talking to. "Well, bye… I guess." He waves goodbye a bit as he heads to the Math classroom.

He waves back slowly before lowering his hand as he sees that Akira enters the room. "...I'm… really awkward." He mutters.

Math Classroom

Akira goes to sit down on his desk's chair after hanging his backpack as the rest of the students do the same.

The teacher, Ms. Mauve clears her throat. "So, today we're gonna do stuff about…" She pauses as she starts searching for something in her desk's cabinets.

("I just hope it isn't anything complicated…" Akira thinks as he sighs. ("But oh well, there's nothing I can do about it, anyways…") He says inside his mind as he pulls out his Math notebook.

"Herre it is…" She pulls out a certain (not really) mathematics book, and the class groans, making her groan as well.

"Don't tell me you wanted me to teach you a P.E. lesson or something… why are you guys always like this?" The teacher mutters the last part as she starts listing out the names of the students with the attendance list.

8:16 AM

Ms. Mauve opens the mathematics book after finishing the attendance and starts writing on the blackboard.

"Alright, so does anyone want to solve this?" She asks, looking around, but when she sees that no one is raising their hands, she sighs. "I'm just gonna have to choose randomly then…" She looks around again for a bit and points at someone…

"Akira, come here."

The teen grunts in annoyance. ("Oh. God. No.") He says inside his mind as he gets up from his desk.

("Why me…") He starts walking toward the blackboard hunched forwards, clearly expressing his disappointment.

"Oh come on, don't be such a letdown." The teacher says, offering the chalk to the teen.

Akira reluctantly grabs the chalk and looks at the board, sighing. ("I swear to god…")

He puts his hand on his chin, thinking about what the answer will be. ("If I remember correctly… and that is supposed to be that… then the answer should probably be…") He pauses as he extends his arm towards the blackboard and starts writing what he thinks the answer is after pondering about it.

The teacher examines what Akira just wrote and looks at him. "...I'm sorry, but what you wrote is wrong."

The teen groans and gives back the chalk as the teacher starts writing the correct answer with it.

"If you people actually paid attention to yesterday's class you would have known that the answer was this, not what Akira just wrote here." She says as she points to the answer she wrote.

Akira walks back to his desk, pretty disappointed ("Of course I get it wrong…") He sighs again as he sits on his chair.

"Though… I'm pretty surprised he got it wrong, actually." Ms. Mauve states, catching Akira's attention. "You guys already know this, but he normally gets A+ in this class…" She then looks at the teen. "You don't need to answer, of course, but… what happened?" She asks as she tilts her head to the side a bit.

"I'm sorry… but what are you talking about…?" Akira asks, completely dumbfounded.

"Come on, don't act like you don't know." Ms. Mauve replies.

"No, seriously, I get B, not A+..." He tries to clarify.

"Okay then, it looks like he just doesn't want to talk about it, so in that case, we'll just have to leave him alone." She turns around to the blackboard and starts writing another Math problem on it before turning back and choosing another random student. "William, please come over here."

"Yes, ma'am…" The student says as he reluctantly gets up from his desk and heads towards the board.

("I have no idea why she said that I get A+ in Math, but I guess I'll just have to play along for now…") Akira says inside his mind as the student named William gets the answer wrong, and the teacher writes the actual answer and another problem again, but before she can even raise her hand to choose a student, one of them raises hers.

"Yes, Julia?" The teacher asks the student that raised her hand.

"Julia lowers her hand. "I'll do it." She says as she gets up from her chair and walks to the blackboard.

"Alright then." The teacher gives her the chalk so she can write the board, and she does so.

She finishes writing her answer and gives back the chalk as she goes back to her desk.

The teacher examines the answer and looks back at the class. "So, to no one's surprise, Julia got the answer right!" She starts clapping, and a small group of students start clapping as well, including Akira.

"You know, you guys should probably start clapping, or else." She says, looking at the rest of the students with a menacing stare, forcing them to clap reluctantly.

As everyone finishes clapping Akira just drifts off inside his thoughts.

("I don't remember ever getting an A+ in math, so why was Ms. Mauve saying that…?") He thinks, still confused by what the teacher said.

("And plus, no one even said anything, they even seemed to look weird at me when I said I get B notes… but hey, it's not like I'm gonna be able to convince them, so…") Akira just resumes on spectating other students having a try at answering the Math problems…

9:10 AM

The bell rings, and the students get up from their desks.

"Well, I guess we'll have to leave this for next week then." The teacher says as she just watches the students exit the classroom.

("Time to go…") Akira sighs as he gets up, grabs his backpack and walks outside the room.

2F Hallways

Akira, again in the hallways, starts heading down to the First Floor for History class along his classmates.

The group is still as loud as ever, which stresses him more due to the fact that he's gonna have to deliver the homework he had to do in the middle of the night thanks to him being a dumbass and completely forgetting about it this class, and he'll most likely fail (hooray) even though he's an absolute history nerd.

("God, I just wish I didn't forget about this class' homework…") Akira scratches the back of his head as he continues walking.

Akira looks to his right, managing to see Alex's class, but he immediately looks away after noticing him appearing around the corner before going down the stairs.

1F Hallways

He frowns a bit after exiting the stairs. ("Maybe I should just… try not being a complete idiot…?") He thinks as he looks up to the History classroom door. ("Yeah, that… sounds like a good idea.")

History Classroom

Akira, along with his other classmates, enters the classroom, hangs his backpack and sits on his desk, still a bit stressed.

"So, to start off, did anyone do the homework from last week?" The teacher, Mr. Bowen asks, and more than half of the students in the room raise their hands, including Akira, but a lot of the rest just got forced to do it by their parents, by the looks of it.

"From what I can see, at least half of the students here did it then… must be a new record." The teacher mutters the last part as he opens up the attendance list on his desk.

"Bring me the homework once you hear your name." Mr. Bowen says as he then starts listing out the student's names and calling them over to his desk in case they've done the homework assigned to them a week ago.

"Mr. Bowen…?" A student asks.

"Yes?"

"Could you please give us another opportunity, like, just one more day?" He asks.

"No, I already gave you an entire week, and you didn't do it, which proves that you're also not going to do it even if I give you another chance." The teacher replies.

Akira sighs again. ("I really hope I pass…") He says inside his mind , waiting (im)patiently for his name to be mentioned…

9:15 AM

"Alright… so the next one is…" Mr. Bowen pauses as he looks at the list again. "...Akira Mikabe." The teacher looks at the mentioned student. "I assume you've done the homework, right?" He asks.

"Yeah…" Akira gets up from his chair with his History notebook, slowly walking toward the teacher's desk.

"Let's just say that I completely forgot about it until last night, and I finished it at 2 AM." He explains pretty abridgedly.

"I'll be taking that as yes." He grabs Akira's notebook before continuing. "But… can I ask you another question?"

"Uh, yeah…" Akira replies, a bit nervous of what the teacher's question might be.

"...Why exactly do you not look tired at all if you only slept four hours?" Mr. Bowen asks, pretty intrigued by that.

Akira mentally sighs in relief. "I'm still pretty hyperactive, even if it might not look like it, you know?" He answers.

"Oh, alright." Mr. Bowen looks back at the notebook. "Let's see what you have here…" He then proceeds to inspect the homework¿s answers for about half a minute.

"Hm…" He looks up at the teen. "Most of these look good from what I've read, but…" He pauses, making Akira more nervous. "I'll be reading the rest later." He puts the notebook on the pile of other notebooks from the other students that he has on his desk as Akira sighs out of relief.

"Yeah, I completely forgot about that, so you really had me nervous there…" Akira chuckles a bit after ending his sentence.

"You can go to your desk now." The teacher then looks at the list. "Next is… Jesse Storen."

Akira walks back to his desk as the other student goes to the teacher's desk. ("I'll just have to wait for now…") He thinks as he sits down on his chair and starts waiting for all the students to deliver the homework.

9:19 AM

Now, with said event done, Mr. Bowen grabs a book and opens it. "Today we'll be having a lecture." He says as most of the class grains once they hear the last word.

Mr. Bowen sighs. "I am not going to repeat anything. It's not my fault that almost everyone in this classroom." The teacher says, receiving even more groans from the students, annoying him.

The teacher then starts reading the book. "21st of October of the year 1600." He begins. "The day where one of the most important battles in all of the continent of Asia's history will occur, the battle of which as a result the country of Japan would have finally been united under one single rule… the Battle of Sekigahara."

Another student raises his hand. "Um, Mr. Bowen?"

"Yes, what is it?" He asks.

"Why did you say 'Japan would have finally been united'? For how long was Japan divided?" The student asks back.

"Well, it was, for like, 110 years, if I remember correctly." Akira replies. "But yeah, it was already united by Hideyoshi Toyotomi until two years prior, when he died in 1598, causing Japan to be split all over again, except that there were only two sides fighting against each other." He continues. "One being led by Mitsunari Ishida, a faithful retainer of the Toyotomi alongside Hideyoshi's son, Hideyori, while the other side was led by Ieyasu Tokugawa, who won in the end thanks to Hideaki Kobayakawa's betrayal, but the thing is that…" He pauses. "Hideyori was still alive up until the Siege of Osaka in 1615, so yeah." Akira finishes explaining, pretty proud of his knowledge of the Sengoku era, even though most of the class didn't pay attention (Yes I wrote this all from memory, except for the date of the Battle of Sekigahara and Hideyori's name, I confused it with Ieyasu's son's name, Hidetada, also this line compared to the others is like comparing a wood stick to an entire wooden plank lmao).

Mr. Bowen smiles a bit. "I'm glad you're this invested in history, Akira. It makes my job a bit easier while I have to deal with this class." He says, the last sentence offending the troublemakers of the class.

"Oh, really?" Akira asks, before continuing. "Well, thanks for the compliment, I guess." He smiles back.

"Anyways, let's continue." The teacher says as he looks back to the book he was reading…

10:10 AM

The bell rings, and some of the students start exiting the room, while the rest are still writing the homework given.

Akira gets up from his chair, waving at the History teacher. "Bye, Mr. Bowen!"

"Goodbye, Akira." He replies as he waves back.

2F Hallways

Akira exits the classroom and starts heading for the Science class along with his classmates who have already finished copying the homework.

("Honestly, now that I think about it… I'm just your average only talk person…") He thinks as he scratches the back of his head.

("I keep talking about how much of a bad person I am, but I never do anything about it…") He frowns as he goes up the stairs.

("But… where do I even start?") He asks himself.

1F Hallways

("Maybe I should start by… being a better friend… and stop self-loathing in conversations…") He thinks as he enters the first floor before taking a right turn.

("Though… I don't think I'm ever gonna stop hating myself anytime soon.") Akira sighs as he heads to the Science classroom.

Science Classroom

Akira sits on one of the chairs in the room, with his backpack already hanging on a hook.

"Alright class, today you're gonna learn about…" The teacher, Mr. Starrow, pauses for a bit…

(Sorry, but I don't think I'm even gonna try doing anything here, I have absolutely no idea about what are the things people do in Science class)

11:09 AM

Akira and literally everyone else in the room are currently waiting for the bell to ring so the students can go to the Cafeteria and have lunch.

("Come on… I hate being this impatient…") He thinks as his stomach growls a bit, causing him to look down at it. ("Oh, great.")

("So not only am I super impatient I'm also hungry!") He grunts as he looks up at the roof.

"...Uh, is something wrong?" The student besides the teen asks him.

"I'm just super impatient and hungry." Akira says with an unamused expression on his face, looking at who just spoke to him.

"...One question though." He raises a finger.

"Yes?"

"Why are you so impatient if there's only a minute left?" He asks, pretty confused.

"For your information, I get more impatient every second that passes by." Akira explains.

"Oh, well, it's literally the opposite for me, at least." The student shrugs.

Akira turns around to look at the clock, which is only ten seconds away from 11:10.

("Three… two… one..") He counts.

The bell finally rings, and the students start heading outside of the classroom.

"I'm guessing you're not so impatient anymore, right?" The student asks as he gets up.

"...Yeah." Akira replies, scratching the back of his head again.

"We should get going now." He says as he starts going outside.

"...Alright." Akira gets up with a grunt and follows his classmate after grabbing his backpack.

2F Hallways

Akira starts heading to the Cafeteria, which is at the First Floor, making him have to use the stairs yet again.

("I'm finally going to eat something now…") He sighs again and smiles a bit.

("And hey, next class is P.E, so I'm definitely gonna look forward to that!") Akira thinks pretty excitedly as he goes down the stairs.

1F Hallway

("I just… hope I don't embarrass myself…") His facial expression turns into an unsure one, still keeping a smile, as he walks out of the stairs.

("I'm… probably going to.") He says inside his mind, pretty worried he'll fail… miserably.

Cafeteria

Akira enters the Cafeteria, and finds out that it's actually fairly empty, having only one class of students apart from them.

Akira walks around to find a table he can sit on, and he sits down on one of the chairs, taking out the lunchbox from his backpack. It's spaghetti with meatballs, as usual.

("It's the day of the week where I can eat spaghetti for lunch, hooray!") He smiles a bit as he starts eating the food, making slurping sounds along the way, but then remembering that he's in the US, not Japan.

He looks to his right to see Alex's class entering the Cafeteria as well, and he smiles more. ("And here comes Alex!")

Akira waits for a bit, and Alex enters the room with his lunchbox. ("He'll… probably try talking with me, so I guess I'll just wait for that.") He thinks as he keeps on eating his lunch.

Alex looks around, looking for Akira. "...Where is he…?" He mutters to himself.

("God I love meatballs…") Akira starts eating his lunch with more pleasure.

Alex keeps on looking around for his friend, until his eyes land on him, alone at his own table. ("Alright… here goes nothing…") He then walks towards Akira, but he gets interrupted.

"Hey there!" A voice behind Alex says, making him turn around, and of course… it's the bunch of idiots (A.K.A. the bullies).

"Oh come on, just leave me alone, will you?!" Alex shouts at the trio, getting other people's attention as he resumes walking to Akira's table.

"What, you really think we will?" The leader says.

Alex just sits down besides Akira and begins ignoring the three.

"Hey, we're over here, you know?" One of the bullies at the back (AD line one, I refuse to give them names, fakiu) says.

"Alex… did you really have to bring these guys here?" Akira asks.

"...Yes." Alex replies pretty bluntly as he takes out his lunch, which is also spaghetti, except with ketchup.

"Oh, and would you look at that, we're eating the same food for lunch today." Akira says, smiling a bit.

"Are you just going to ignore us now?" The taller bully says.

Alex smiles back. "Yeah, pretty interesting, don't you think?"

"Yeah." Akira responds with a one-liner.

"Hey! Stop chatting with your stupid friend, will you?!" The last bully yells, making some people giggle a bit as they keep getting ignored, but Alex actually gets pretty offended from the insult towards Akira.

"It's no use, he's not gonna care if we just use words." The leader says. "Instead…" He smirks and reaches out for Akira's lunchbox, but…

Alex grabs the bully by his wrist before he can touch the box, and he looks at him with a pretty menacing stare, and post of the other people in the cafeteria 'Ooh'.

"Finally, you paid attention!" The bully says.

Alex narrows his eyes as he gets angrier. "...You piece of-"

Akira acts right in time before the curse word is said. "Alright, I think that's enough… you should calm down before you do anything bad…" He says.

Alex sighs. "Yeah… you're right." He frowns a bit.

"...Ugh!" The taller bully grunts. "I'm done!" He says as he just walks off to another table, and the other two follow him a bit reluctantly.

"Looks like they finally gave up then… I'm glad." Akira says as he goes back to smiling.

"I'm extra glad you calmed me down, you know?" Alex replies.

"I wasn't just gonna stand there and let you get into trouble."

"Thanks for that one, I guess." Alex says, smiling more.

"Yeah." Akira resumes eating. "Honestly, I feel like self-loathing in the middle of a conversation is pretty annoying to the person I'm talking to, so I'll stop." He says right after slurping up his food.

"It's okay, it isn't even that annoying…" He replies again.

"The facial expression you had then doesn't really compliment what you just said…"

"Well… uh…" Alex drifts off, tries to come up with a rebuttal as Akira keeps on eating.

"...Are you gonna say something?" Akira asks.

"...No. I'm just gonna keep eating."

"Okay." He says as the two of them resume eating.

"God, I love spaghetti so much…" Alex says.

"And I…" Akira pauses. "Love my balls." He finishes his sentence with a grin on his face.

"...What?" Alex asks, pretty confused.

"I was talking about meatballs…" Akira frowns. "...Yeah… I'm bad at making jokes." He says, smiling a bit.

"...That was definitely one of them." Alex says, frowning.

"Well, at least you're being honest." He continues eating.

Alex looks a bit worried as his friend, but he then decides to also resume eating his lunch.

11:16 AM

Now that they've both finished eating, they store their lunchboxes inside their backpacks before getting up and starting to go outside of the cafeteria.

1F Hallways

"...Akira." Alex says as they take a right turn.

"What is it?"

"You mind elaborating on… why you think that you're never gonna be in a romantic relationship with… anyone?" He asks. "I know that we've had this conversation a ton of times before, but I just wanna hear your reason again."

"Oh, alright." Akira nods. "So… to start off, I don't feel like I'm very… attractive to say the least…" He begins. "I'm also not very good in the personality sense either…" He says as he frowns more. "And… it's not like I'm gonna be able to protect them from… virtually anything, anyways…"

"Hm…" Alex ponders about how to respond for a small while.

"...What?" Akira asks.

"...Well, there's no need for me to say anything at all, right?" Alex asks back.

"...Yup." He answers. "I'm just… not fit for any type of romantic relationships."

"...You do you then." Alex says as he shrugs. "I'm not gonna tell you what to do, because it's your decision, after all."

"Oh, well thanks, I guess." Akira replies, smiling.

"By the way, now that I think about it… I don't feel like I'm prepared to have a girlfriend, either." Alex points out.

"So that makes us even then."

Alex chuckles. "Yeah, it does."

"Oh, and I forgot to tell you about something weird that happened during Math class." Akira says as they take a right turn.

"What is it?" Alex asks.

"Well, it isn't that weird, but… for some reason Ms. Mauve said that I get A+es in her class, but… if I remember correctly… I only get Bs or Cs in Math… maybe even an A- if I actually try hard enough, but me getting an A+ there? Nuh-uh (FYM NUH-UH?)." Akira explains as he shakes his head.

"That's actually pretty weird…" He says as he raises an eyebrow. "...Wouldn't she be mentioning your real notes instead of making them up?"

"That's what I'm saying." Akira says. "But the thing is that none of my classmates said anything about it. They even looked weird at me when I said I get Bs…" He continues as he scratches the back of his head.

"And according to you, 'it isn't that weird'?" Alex asks with a somewhat of an unamused expression on his face.

"...Yeah, I kinda lied on that one." He smiles nervously a bit as they take another right turn.

"Anyways, how'd History class go?"

"Pretty good, not gonna lie." Akira smiles more. "I'm pretty lucky Mr. Bowen decided to do a lesson about something related to the Sengoku era."

"That's nice, excluding the fact that you really like looking at maps of your native country being split up by at least a million clans…" He smiles back.

"That's my obsession with the Sengoku era in a nutshell!" The teen says cheerfully, making Alex chuckle.

"Well, since P.E. is coming up for your class, I'm assuming you're excited about it, right?" Alex asks.

"You got that right!" He answers excitedly.

"Okay, then. I'm glad." Alex replies.

"But, uh…" Akira's trails off, the expression on his face turning into an unsure one. "I just hope I don't screw it up and embarrass myself…"

"I'm sure you won't." Alex reassures the teen.

"Thanks, I think I'll just have to actually try so that doesn't happen." He smiles a bit.

"And it better not."

Akira smiles more as he looks to the left where the doors leading to the pathway towards the Gym is located. "While we're on the subject… should we go there?" He asks, pointing at the double doors.

"To the Gym?" Alex asks back as he and, consequently, Akira, stop walking.

"No, to the pathway, I've already told you a ton of times that I get a strong sense of nostalgia every time I'm over there, so I was expecting you to know what I was talking about by now."

"Well sorry I didn't meet your expectations." Alex replies, a slightly slight bit offended by Akira's comment. "But sure, if you want to, then we'll go.

"Let's go then." Akira starts heading towards the door, with Alex following behind.

Gym Pathway

As soon as Akira opens the door, Alex gets hit by a breeze of air right on the face, making his eyes squint a bit.

"Completely fresh air…" Akira says as he takes a deep breath right after entering the area.

"...That's hitting me straight on the face." Alex finishes his friend's sentence as he then starts getting used to it, making him widen his eyes back to normal

"Oh, yeah, I forgot you're bothered by that." Akira says as he walks to the middle of the path.

"Yeah, It's definitely bothering me, alright." Alex replies, walking right behind Akira.

Akira stands there, with his hand on his chin, before he realizes something. ("Wait a minute…")

"Uh…" Alex trails off as he awkwardly looks at his thinking friend.

"Oh… now I know what this place reminds me of…" He says, removing his hand from his chin.

"What does it remind you of…?" Alex asks.

Akira then turns around to Alex. "Have you ever played Persona 3?" He asks.

"...No?" He answers

"Well, I just realized that this place looks strangely similar to the Gym pathway from that same game… the stone brick walls and floor… the ton of bushes surrounding the area… even the tree over there, even though it's an apple tree." He says, pointing at the small clearing with a tree in the middle to the left side of the pathway.

"Oh… that's both weird and cool at the same time…" Alex says, pretty curious.

"That's why I feel so much nostalgia here…"

"...How old is the game again?" He asks.

"It was launched back in 2006."

"Oh… in that case… that's pretty understandable."

"Have a great day." Akira finishes Alex's sentence (you know, the 'Understandable, have a great day' meme?) and the bell rings right after.

"...Okay I gotta admit that timing was impeccable." Alex says.

"That's what I was gonna say!"

"Anyways, I'll be going to Geography class now." Alex then starts heading back inside the main building of the school, waving at Akira.

"Oh, bye then I guess." He replies, waving back, before lowering his arm as he watches Alex exit the place.

Now that Alex is no longer with Akira, the latter just slowly turns around and starts walking to the Gym.

("Alright… I better not get lingering pain that's gonna last for three days straight after all of this…") Akira as he enters the Gym.

Gym

Akira goes to sit down on the steps at the left side of the area, taking off his backpack, and taking a sip of the water bottle he brought. ("Gotta get prepared…") He mutters under his breath.

Akira then starts looking around the Gym for a bit, noticing that there's not a lot of other students currently in the area, before deciding to just lay his back on his backpack, which is being supported by the steps, making a grunt as he does so.

("Guess I'll just have to wait for now…") He thinks as he closes his eyes, waiting for the P.E. teacher to begin once all of the students are of the class arrive at the Gym.

11:28 AM

"That should be the last one." The teacher, Mr. Dunhall, says after having finished reading out loud the attendance list. "If everyone's ready, then let's get started." He says again, making the girls of the class get up.

"So now, all of you girls will have to jog softly along the border of the basketball court, if you get exhausted enough then please start walking around the inner part of the court for a bit before going back to the steps, and please, don't run. Do you understand?" He says, and the girls nod and line up on the border.

"Okay… three, two, one…" He blows his whistle and starts the timer on his phone, making the girls start jogging

("And I hope they don't just give up and start complaining after a single minute.") Akira sighs as he watches the girls jog around the court…

11:37 AM

Almost ten minutes later, only three of the eleven girls are remaining, to the surprise of absolutely nobody, since they're mostly terrible at physical stuff.

"Five, four, three, two, one…" The teacher blows his whistle again, indicating that the ten minutes are over. "That's enough, now go take a seat, you three." The three girls then go back to the steps and sit down as the teacher lists out their names.

"The three girls that managed to jog all the ten minutes are… Anne Frederic, Sarah Steel and Katelyn Rivers." Mr. Dunhall says as the winners receive a round of applause.

"Now that we're done with that, it's the boys' turn." He says, and all the male students in the gym get up as soon as he finishes his sentence, including Akira, of course.

("Okay… here we go then…") The teen takes a deep breath as he and the other students line up on the border.

"Three, two, one…" He blows his whistle and starts the timer again, making all of them start jogging.

("Just… concentrate… and don't overdo it…") Akira says to himself inside his mind, jogging softly…

11:46 AM

Six of the thirteen male students are still jogging on the basketball court, including Akira.

"Hah… Hah…" The teen keeps on jogging, but panting at the same time, tryíng really hard to hide his exhaustion.

("Only two more… minutes…") He thinks, a bit too determined to jog through the entire ten minutes of the exercise.

"...Akira, are you alright? You seem… pretty worn out." The teacher says.

"N-No… I'm fine…" Akira answers, obviously tired.

Mr. Dunhall sighs, clearly having caught onto Akira's exhaustion. "...He really shouldn't be overdoing it this much." He mutters, looking at the teen jogging at the other side of the gym.

"That's enough, you're clearly exhausted. Please stop jogging and continue walking around the inner part of the court." He says, high enough for Akira to hear.

("Oh, come on!") The teen complains inside his mind as he begins doing as the teacher said, grunting a bit.

Right after that, one of the students that are still participating starts running along with another student who follows behind him, getting the attention of the teacher.

"You haven't been given the permission to start showing off, so stop running!" Mr. Dunhall shouts, making the students quickly stop running.

("I can't get why they even start running in the first place… if you're being told not to run then just don't run at all, what's so hard about that…?") Akira shouts in his mind again, shaking his head. ("I mean, sure, it's them, but…") He drifts off for a bit as he keeps on walking.

"Nine minutes left." The teacher points out, looking at the timer on his phone, before looking up at Akira. "Akira, you can stop now." He says.

"What a bummer…" He mutters, understandably disappointed as he walks over to the steps.

Akira sits back down on the row closest to the ground, and sighs. ("...That was… pretty disappointing.") He frowns. ("I could have lasted up until the end if I just didn't start messing around with my breathing!")

Akira groans as he looks at the ground. ("...Why did I have to screw it all up…?") He asks himself as he then closes his eyes…

11:48 AM

The teacher blows his whistle yet again, indicating that the second exercise is finally over, and all of the students that were still participating stop jogging and go back to the steps.

"The five students that jogged all throughout the ten minutes are… Johann Kelinger, Ken Brett, William Seir, Michael Weiss and Raphael Moore." Mr. Dunhall says, and the winners receive a small round of applause.

"Now, let's take a small break, shall we?" He says again, and as usual, the chatter between the students gets louder as he finishes his sentence…

11:52

It has now been a couple of minutes since the break started, but the noise in the Gym is still as loud as ever.

"...Looks like everyone else is having a conversation with another person... but here I am… all alone…" Akira mutters, looking down at the floor again as he sighs and frowns.

"You're not alone, you dummy!"A female voice says cheerfully behind Akira, startling him.

"O-Oh god!" Akira says as he jumps a bit, before turning around to see a dark purple haired girl wearing a navy unbuttoned jacket over a white shirt and short jeans, who just spoke to him. "Y-You scared me!" He shouts at her.

"Exactly! That was the point, to make you scream like a little girl!" The girl says with an almost unrecognizable japanese accent, giggling right after.

"H-Hey! That's not very nice!" He shouts again. "Though… I am glad no one noticed my yelp…" He says, this time with a lower tone as he scratches the back of his head.

"Yeah, I know, because I lied." She says. "I didn't even mean to scare you like that, but I decided to play along, anyways." She shrugs right after she finishes explaining. "I don't like seeing people mopping around like how you were doing just now."

"Uh… sure…" Akira replies. "But… answer me this…"

"What is it?"

"...Who are you?" He asks.

The girl's facial expression turns into an unamused one. "...You're kidding, right?" She asks back.

"No, I'm serious, I've never seen you before… What year are you?"

"Same class as you." She responds.

"...Your name?"

"...Herena Marumoto."

"Nope, I do not know you." Akira says bluntly.

"Okay, now you're just being annoying."

"I'm not joking…"

"You clearly are, because I've been studying with you since we both entered this school." She says.

"But I don't remember any of that…"

"...When are you going to stop acting oblivious?"

"...Now… I guess…?" He says, absolutely confused out of his mind.

"God, that was irritating."

"So, uh…" Akira pauses as he looks to his right.

"So what?" Herena asks.

Akira then notices Alex's class on their way to the Gym through a terribly placed window. "...That."

"Oh, okay then." She replies as the other third year class enters the Gym.

"I wonder what happened though… Weren't they supposed to be in Geography Class?" He asks.

"I heard that Ms. Silverman wasn't gonna be able to come today, or any other day until she gets rid of her sickness." Herena points out.

"Oh… well, hey at least we've got some company." Akira says.

"For you, at least, since your best friend Alex is in that class." She replies

"...Yup." Akira one-lines as Alex enters the building in dead last looking around the area for his friend.

"And there he is, looking for me." He says.

"Why wouldn't he?"

As soon as Alex finally lands his eyes on the teen, he starts walking towards him. "And there he comes."

"Hey!" Herena unnecessarily shouts at Alex while waving at him.

"...Hey?" Alex replies, a bit confused.

"...Yeah." Akira says.

"...Who is she?" Alex asks.

"Oh, come on, again with the 'Who are you' joke?" She asks back again, pretty annoyed. "You guys already know I'm Herena, so stop with it already! It's getting really annoying now, you know?" She continues. "Like, come on, I was the one of the four girls that won the exercise just now…"

("I'll ignore what she just said about winning that…") Akira thinks, sighing right after.

"I'm sorry, 'Herena', but I don't recognize you at all." Alex responds, receiving a groan from the girl.

"Alex…" Akira then gets up and walks closer to Alex. "I recommend that you say that you do… she kind of gives me 'I'm going to absolutely fuck you up if you don't stop' vibes…" Akira whispers in his ear.

"Now that you mention it… she does give off that feeling… kind of." Alex says.

"And from what she told me, she's the only other japanese person in the entire school not including myself, of course." He explains. "And she says that she's studying in my class, but I've never seen her before…

"Me neither…"

"Hey!" Herena shouts at the two "What are you all even whispering about?" She asks.

"Do you really need to know?" Alex asks back.

"Yes, I need to, just in case you're talking about me!" Herena replies.

"Do you have any problem with me telling Alex that you're a Japanese girl that studies in my class?" The teen asks.

"Yes, because he should already know that, so you have absolutely no need to do that!"

"Oh well, too bad, that was what I was telling him, anyways."

"Please stop with this, because I swear to god if you don't stop I will-" She gets interrupted before she can say anything else.

"Okay, okay, we'll stop." Alex says.

"Akira looks back at Alex "See? I told you she gave off 'Anger Issues' vibes." He whispers.

"...You were definitely right on that one." He replies.

The P.E. teacher blows his whistle yet again, before shouting; "Alright, so then class 3-B and 3-C will compete against each other in a 20-minute match of football." He says.

"Oh, football?" Akira asks, pretty interested, since he's a fan of the mentioned sport.

"This half an hour long match will be of six players on both sides, so raise your hand if you want to participate."

A lot of the male students raise their hands as a response, including Alex and some of the girls along with Herena.

"Hey, hey, I meant six from each class, not the entire class!" Mr. Dunhall says. "...I guess I'll just have to choose randomly then." He continues.

The teacher then starts to choose students at random, at least for the ones that actually raised their hands.

"So, to the twelve students that got chosen, get on your respective class' side." He says, and the mentioned students start heading to their sides as he sets up the goals.

Alex looks back at Akira. "Well, I gotta go now." He says.

"Alright." The teen replies as Alex also heads to his class' side.

"So you're basically the type of sports fan that would really just rather watch a match than play, right?" Herena asks.

"Yes, and because I'm… honestly pretty bad at whatever sport comes to mind." He replies, shrugging.

"I guessed so." She replies as Mr. Dunhall blows his whistle and the match starts.

12:17 PM

The match is almost over with 9 total goals, five from 3-B and four from 3-C.

"Looks like our class is gonna win." Herena points out.

"Yeah, it seems so…" Akira says.

"Don't you feel a bit excited about that, Akira?"

"Well… uh…" Akira trails off, kind of wanting Alex's team to win.

"...What?"

"Actually, Herena-" He gets interrupted.

"Call me Helena." Herena says "It's easier and sounds better to begin with…" She pauses. "...And a bit less awkward."

"Oh, okay." Akira replies. "So… Helena… I actually want 3-C to win, you know?"

"You really went out of your way to make it a lot more dramatic and seem that you were going to say something much worse with the pauses, huh?" She says. "You had me thinking something else… it's totally fine if you want the other team to win, there's no need to be nervous about it.

"Oh… alright then…" He says, a bit embarrassed about the fact that he thought Herena would have had a wildly different reaction.

"Oh, look!" Herena says, pointing at the court.

"What?" Akira asks, turning around to see one of 3-C's students rushing straight for the goal through an unusually big opening with the ball.

"Looks like 3-B set themselves up! Will 3-C beale to make a comeback at the last three minutes of the match?" A student yells out while some 3-C students start cheering for their team.

"...That guy's commentary is completely unnecessary…" Akira says, looking at the student in question.

"Yeah, but hey, it's kind of hyping the students from his class up in my opinion, so it's cool, I guess." Herena replies.

"You could say that…" Akira looks back to the playing field, just before the student kicks the ball, and…

"GOAL!" This word echoes all over the Gym right after the student manages to score by feinting a kick with his right leg before actually shooting with the other leg after the goalkeeper jumped in attempt to catch the ball.

"Holy shit that was disrespectful, that wasn't even his main leg!" THe 'DIY commentator' says.

"Hey, watch your mouth!" Mr. Dunhall shouts back as the students participating go back to their starting positions.

"Okay, I agree with the guy." Herena says.

"Yeah, me too." Akira replies.

The teacher then blows his whistle and the game starts again.

"I don't think any other goals will happen now, since there's only two minutes left for the bell to ring." The girl says.

"Well, you never know."

"...Maybe." She replies.

Akira sighs and then closes his eyes as the seconds that pass by feel like minutes. (I originally had this for 7:58 but I decided to move it over here, buuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuut it probably still sucks ahhs)

Tick, tock, tick, tock. The sound of a clock fills the teen's mind, overshadowing all other sounds.

He wants to distract himself from the clock sounds, as it's making him a lot more impatient, but he can't, and now he's stuck with ticking sounds in his mind, until he starts repeating the sound inside it.

("Tick… tock… tick… tock…")

("Tick… tock… tick… tock…") He keeps on repeating.

("Tick… tock… tick… tock…")

("Tick… tock… tick… tock…") Akira becomes even more impatient.

("Tick… tock… tick… tock…")

("Tick… tock… tick… tock…")

("Tick… tock…") The sound of static also starts filling his mind.

("Tick… tock…")

("Tick… tock…")

("T-Tick… tock…") He starts… quivering, and his heart starts pounding harder than ever before.

("T-Tick… t-tock…")

("T-Tick… t-tock…")

("…T-Tick…")

A song faintly plays inside his mind as he visualizes a rocky wasteland.

("T-Tock…")

"H-Hah…" His breath starts shaking as he takes even shorter and shallower breaths.

"U-Uh…"

("I-I…")

"Ngh…"

("W-What…")

"U-Ugh…"

("Is…")

"Ah…"

("T-This…?")

"Nnng…"

("W-Where…")

"..." He finally tries to calm down, breathing deeply in and out.

("Is…")

"..."

("This…?")

"..."

Tick…

The teacher blows his whistle yet yet again, and Akira snaps back to reality due to that and the noises of happiness coming from the other students that fill the entire Gym.

"A-Ah!" Akira gets startled by the noise, and he sighs as he calms down, still with a hint of shakiness in said breath. "...F-Finally…" Akira says.

"Hey, Akira, are you alright…?" Herena asks, pretty worried.

The teen looks to his left, where the girl is. "O-Oh… uh…" He stays silent, not knowing what to say.

"Is something wrong, Akira?" Alex asks while walking towards his friend.

"I have… no idea about what just happened…" Akira replies.

"You were shaking really hard just now…" Herena says.

"Yeah… and it was… so confusing…" Akira trails off. "I saw… a wasteland of sorts… with some eerie music playing in the background…" He explains.

"..." Both Herena and Alex stay silent for a bit, reasonably confused.

"U-Ugh… It's just messing up my mind when I think about it now…"

"But… aside from that… you're fine, right?" Alex asks.

"Yeah… I'm fine…"

"Well, in that case, we should get home now…" Herena says as she gets up.

Akira nods and the three get their backpacks on and exit the Gym.

School Entrance

The three all stay silent as they go to the path leading outside the school, until Akira finally decides to speak near the entrance.

"...Do you guys wanna play Smash Ultimate?" He asks, looking at both students.

"You know what? Sure, I haven't played a Smash game at all before." The girl says.

"I think I will… after taking a small nap, of course." Alex answers.

"So, what about… 1:30? Akira asks again.

"Seems fine to me."

"Same here, I'll be asking my parents for permission to go to your house in the meantime." Herena replies.

"Oh, and to finish…" He pauses and looks at Alex. "Remember when we got aunt Mayuri to play?"

"Yeah, now that we have Herena-" Alex gets interrupted.

"Call me Helena." She says."

"Okay…" He looks back to Akira and clears his throat. "So now that we have Helena, we can finally have up to four players, right?"

"That's exactly what I was thinking." The teen responds.

"That seems pretty fun, I'm definitely looking forward to that." Herena says as they go through the school's exit.

"So… what way do you take to get home?" Akira asks the girl.

"I go this way." She replies, pointing to her left.

"Well, we go to the right, so…" He trails off.

"Guess it's goodbye for now then."

"Yeah." Alex says.

"So… 1:30?" Akira asks.

"1:30." Herena repeats.

"Alrighty then!"

Bye then." Herena says as she starts heading to her home.

"Bye!" Both Akira and Alex reply in unison as they do the same, but to their respective home.

"...Herena seems pretty nice, excluding her sudden appearance." Alex says.

"Yeah…" Akira says. "She literally appeared out of nowhere and nobody but us said anything about it."

"That's literally the only strange aspect of her, though."

"Wonder why that happened in the first place…"

"But… don't you think she'll be able to do… something like that…?"

"Guess we'll just have to keep an eye on her."

"...Yup." Akira says as they both notice the ground starting to get darker.

"Wait…" Alex trails off as he then looks up to the sky. "Knew it…" He says, looking at where the sun should be, which is covered by some pretty dark clouds before looking back at Akira. "If you didn't guess already, the sun got covered by some dark clouds."

"I hope it just doesn't start raining on us…"

"It probably will." Alex replies.

"We'll just walk… we're not that far away, anyways."

"...Okay."

"Oh, and funny how I get in a good mood with a cloudy sky more times than a clear sky…"

"Unless it rains." Alex continues the sentence.

(warning: they sing I Kissed A Girl after this line (not in a musical way because I'm not going to do that until I'm held at gunpoint) because they have nothing else to do other than just walking)

"Unless it rains." He repeats, and they go back to staying silent yet again until Akira starts humming 'I Kissed A Girl'.

Alex smiles and starts bopping his head to the rhythm his mind is making up to the chorus, where he starts singing the lyrics. "I kissed a girl and I liked it!" He says, pointing with both of his hands at his friend, expecting him to continue the song.

The teen stays awkwardly silent for a bit before realizing what Alex wants him to do, and clears his throat. "The taste of her cherry chapstick…"

"I kissed a girl just to try it!" Alex continues.

"I hope my boyfriend don't mind it…" Akira breathes in and sings the next lyric before Alex can say it. "It felt so wrong,"

Alex seems a bit taken off guard by the sudden change of turns, but he then realizes that it actually fits both of them more that way. "It felt so right!"

"Don't mean I'm in love tonight…"

"I kissed a girl and I liked it!"

"I liked it!" Both teens say at the same time.

"...I'd like to make myself belie-" Akira gets interrupted.

"No, we're not getting to that." Alex says.

Akira giggles a bit. "That was pretty fun!"

"Maybe we should sing together more."

"We should! We don't sound pretty bad either."

"Anyways... do you remember something else about that… 'vision' you had?" Alex asks.

"Oh, well…" The teen ponders about it. "The song that was playing sounded… pretty familiar, actually."

"Do you remember the name?"

"It's on the tip of my tongue, but I just can't remember where it was from…"

".. Anything else then?"

"Well… I think I also saw a humanoid figure…" He trails off again.

"...A humanoid figure…?"

"Yeah… and it kind of looked like…" He pauses yet again, but before he could even open his mouth again to utter another word, two raindrops fall on his head. "Huh…?" He looks up at the sky, right before a ton of other raindrops start falling on his face.

"Alright, nevermind." Alex says as he grabs Akira by the wrist and runs onto the nearest coverage which is a tree.

"Oh, come on, really?!" Akira yells out, reasonably frustrated, since he and rain… don't really have the best relationship in the world, since he gets sick pretty easily.

"...Well, now we're stuck here, great." Alex says.

Akira sighs. "Ugh… why now…?" He asks, a raindrop falling on the tip of his nose, making him 'Hmph' in annoyance as he wipes it off.

"I wonder how long this rain will last…" Alex sighs.

"Well I'm definitely not just gonna sit around here and wait for it to end!" Akira shouts as he takes off his backpack before putting it over his head to block the rain as he then rushes outside the tree's coverage.

"Hey, don't just run away like that!" Alex shouts back as he does the same with his backpack and starts chasing after the teen. "You might get a cold if you keep this up, you know that?"

"I know, but I'm not gonna wait for this rain to end under that tree!" He says as he starts running faster.

"Okay, fine, but at least be careful!"

"You think I'm not going to?" He asks. "I'm literally running as fast as I can right now!"

"Whatever, just keep on going." Alex replies.

The two students continue on running all the way to their homes through the rain.

"I don't think I can really stand any more raindrops here!" Akira shouts. "At least we're getting closer to my home now!"

"Yeah, you're pretty unlucky on that front, huh?" Alex says.

"...Yup." He one-lines as a response.

"I do wonder who Herena will be using as a main, though…"

"I'm gonna have her use Lucina for a small while, just like how I did with you and aunt Mayuri when you and her played Smash for the first time." He says. "She is the most beginner friendly character, after all."

"Yeah, okay." Alex nods.

They keep on running for another bit, avoiding puddles along the way, until they arrive at Akira's house.

"See you in around an hour and a half!" Alex shouts as he takes a right turn to his own home.

"Bye!" Akira shouts back as he pushes right through the frontyard's door and stops in front of the actual house's door.

"Alright…" He mutters as he pulls out the door's keys and unlocks it before entering the building.

Akira's Home

"Aunt Mayuri, I'm home!" The teen shouts as he lowers his soaked backpack.

"God, I finally got rid of that problem!" Akira sighs, before remembering something.

"Oh, yeah… I completely forgot that she should be asleep by now… right."

He then looks down at himself. "...Great, I just realized I'm all wet now…" He grunts a bit after finishing his sentence and just heads to his room to change clothes.

Akira's Bedroom

Akira enters the room, taking off his sweater first before throwing it and his backpack on where it originally was. "Ugh…" He grunts again as he falls face down on his bed. "I'm finally home…" He says. "I'm really tired from all that running…" He sighs.

He gets up from the bed after a small while, untying his shoes before taking them off to take off his pants.

"And I need to go to the bathroom…" Akira says, heading to the bathroom to do his necessities.

Akira's Bathroom

The teen then looks over to the mirror in the room as he does so. "..." He stays silent for a bit, looking at himself in his underwear, wondering about... whatever he wants to wonder about right now.

"...You know what?" Nevermind, now's not the time to be asking myself that…" Akira goes outside the bathroom and heads to his closet to change into other clothes.

Akira's Bedroom

He ends up choosing a black T-shirt, along with dark purple pants and a pair of black sneakers.

"Alright, now I'm ready to…" He pauses as he remembers what happened at night. "Check out my Nintendo Switch…" He unplugs his Switch's charger and exits the room with the game console.

Second Floor Hallway

"Man, even Alex forgot what happened to my Switch…" Akira mutters under his breath before sighing as he goes downstairs.

First Floor Hallway

"...Might as well check it out again…" Akira says as he notices the puddles on the floor he made as he enters the house. "...After I clean that." He continues, leaving his Switch on top of one of the cabinets.

Kitchen

Akira heads to the Janitor's Closet's door at the left of the room, opens it and starts looking inside the small room for a mop.

"There it is…" Akira says as he grabs said cleaning instrument and goes back to the entrance's hallway.

First Floor Hallway

The teen brings the mop near the door and starts cleaning the puddle on the floor.

"...Why did it have to rain right then…?" He asks himself, and then looking at one of the windows besides the door, noticing that the sky is clear now.

"...You are fucking telling me that all that was just a three minute thing?" Akira says… incredibly triggered. "...Holy shit, what even was the point of that?" He asks, but before he can get even more angry he takes a deep breath and shakes his head, continuing to mop the floor. "...Nevermind."

Living Room

He finishes cleaning the floor and stores the mop again inside the closet, before grabbing his Switch, turning it on and placing it in the Dock, and to his surprise… it actually boots up normally.

"Huh…?" He says, absolutely dumbfounded as the startup screen pops up. "Then… was all that just a problem with the battery or something…?" He asks.

The menu then loads in, and the first game on the list is, obviously, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.

He presses A, and the game then loads, skipping the opening.

Menu - Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

"...God I still love this song after all this time…" Akira sighs as he goes to the Smash section of the menu, looking at the image at the upper right corner of the screen. "...And just looking at Bowser's model turns me on…" He pauses as he closes his eyes. "...I regret saying that, I swear to god."

Akira then goes to the character selection screen, the announcer shouting; "Choose your fighter!"

"Who should I play as…?" He puts his hand on his chin as he thinks about it for a while, before hovering the cursor over Joker. "I'm not very good with Joker, but whatever…" He shrugs as he chooses the character, and the announcer shouts his name.

"Man does Xander Mobus have some vocal range, dude." Akira says as he chooses the second alternate costume. "And I boy do I wish the Persona 1 remake was better than it turned out to be… but oh well, purple's my favorite color anyway." He says again, setting the CPUs as Random before making the match a 3-stock battle.

"I'm gonna go for hazardless Battlefield Mementos as the stage…" The teen does as he said and starts the match…

---

"This is Alex."

"And this is Herena."

"Man, all of this is a bit weird, not gonna lie…" He scratches the back of his head.

"Well, I can definitely agree on that." She replies.

"So, I'm guessing you already noticed Akira's sexuality, right?" Alex asks.

"Yeah… though… I don't know what to think about the type of guys Akira's into…" Herena replies.

"Same here, to be honest."

"At least they're all… fictional… so there's no way he'd be able to actually talk with them, right…?" Herena says, laughing nervously.

"Well…" Alex pauses.

"...Nevermind." Herena replies bluntly.

"...Anyways, the next chapter's gonna be named… "I'm Just Playing Games…", inspired by a line from Mariya Takeuchi's Plastic Love's chorus, "I'm just playing games, I know that's Plastic Love".

"So the author's into City Pop music, right?" She asks.

"Yeah, and he also once told me that he heard Mario Sunshine's Welcome to Isle Delfino on piano and noticed that it kinda sounded like a City Pop song..." He pauses "...Yeah, a bit too much information, I know."

"Oh, nice to know then."

---

16/09/22

Dear Diary,

Today I woke up late for the third time in a row, and I'm glad I didn't get much criticism from that… Aside from my asshole English teacher insulting my entire family, including my… parents.

I still miss them after all these years… I just wish I had spent more time with them…

But what is done is done, so besides that… The usual pretty much happened, those three pricks started bothering Alex yet again, Math Class was a bit boring, excluding the fact that the teacher got my grades wrong for whatever reason. We had the Battle of Sekigahara as the theme for this History Class' lesson, which was obviously a pretty good thing for me. We didn't really do much in Science Class, I got to eat spaghetti with meatballs for lunch before jogging around the Gym and watching a football match between my class and Alex's class, which he participated in, but…

Before that, a random Japanese girl named Herena Marumori, claiming to be from my class, suddenly appeared behind me at the steps, no one but me and Alex said anything about it…

I also kind of had a semi-panic attack semi-vision thing right before the match ended, which… really confused the hell out of me, since everything was really blurry…

But I just decided to ignore those two things for now, since I don't really know what I should do about them.

I then went home, but not before getting soaked by the rain and decided to check my Nintendo Switch out, since it suddenly started glowing at night, but it actually just ran normally, nothing off, just… normal Smash gameplay, I guess.

Aside from all that, I'm still curious about the dream I had today… it just felt… unsettlingly real… but I can't even remember what it was about…

Anyways, let me write this thing out for the funzies...

Would you like to save?

Yes

There is already an existent save file, do you want to overwrite this file?

Yes

16th of September, 2022

-United States of America-

Raleigh

Akira, Mayuri, Alex, Herena(?)

Jobs: fucking none my dude (never have and never will.).

Social Links: Empress I (Mayuri, Rank 4), Magician I (Alex, Rank 7), Lovers I (Herena, Rank... depends on whether I actually talked to her or not "back then"... but it's probably just Rank 1)

Anyways, I should keep playing Smash for now…

---

References:

The "It's a beautiful day outside" monologue from Sans from Undertale, duh.

Klaus von Reinherz is a character from Blood Blockade Battlefront (A.K.A. Kekkai Sensen) and god do I love him :D

The high school's name is a reference to Persona 2's high school (Seven Sisters Highschool).

Also, Alex's full name is a reference to my niece's name (Alex Sandro, Alessandro).

The Principal's surname is a reference to Boa Hancock from One Piece, except that I only know Boa because she was added in the Roblox game A Universal Time as a boss, I'm not a One Piece fan.

The History teacher's surname is a reference to Calum Bowen (A.K.A. Bo en guy I mentioned last chapter), and god do I love Pale Machine (and the Pikuniku OST too).

And the Jesse guy that was called in History class's full name is based on Minecraft Story Mode's Jesse (and Soren up to a point), but the surname ended up being another reference, this time to the youtuber Michael Storen.

The Geography teacher's surname is a reference to Lisa Silverman from the Persona 2 duology.

Akira's "...I'd like to make myself belie-" line is a reference to Weird Al Yankovic's Polka Face, where the Fireflies part goes right after the I Kissed A Girl one, and it is still stuck in my mind.

Extra Notes:

Yes, my excuse for all the inaccuracies in this chapter is that… I'm not gonna say it yet. :D

And yes, I can confirm that the other two bullies are called 'AD line bully' and 'call out bully' respectively (I do not feel like giving them names) lmao

I don't really have anything really interesting to type in here, so…

Welcome to 'What Inconsistencies Exist Between Me And Akira?'

In this game show, you'll be-as the title says,-trying to guess what I added in as part of Akira's character/backstory that I don't have!

Don't expect me to be giviing you any hints at all, so go on and guess!

...

...

...

...

...

"Is it Akira's favourite color?" A voice asks out of nowhere.

...Wait, what? *looks to his side* …Roy?

"...Yes?" The swordfighter asks.

…What are you doing here?

"...You tell me." He replies. "Anyways, did I get the answer right?"

Uh... yeah, you did. My favorite color is blue while Akira's is purple.

"Alrighty then, so do I get some reward for guessing it right?" Roy asks.

Nope, and… you should be going now. *pushes Roy away*

"Oh, great." Roy mutters as he gets dragged off offscreen

*sighs and looks back to the 'camera'* So… that's it for the first installment of 'What Inconsistencies Exist Between Me And Akira', folks! *waves at the nonexistent crowd*

...Now that I think about it maybe i should shorten it to WIEBMAA or something, but that sounds a bit goofy...

...Oh well. *shrugs*

Anyways, thanks for reading, and have a great day.