The reason Yuki suddenly ended up meeting with all three of them in this nice coffee shop this early in this beautiful morning instead of Mashiro on her own is that while he was talking to Mashiro on the phone about her weird request and the misunderstanding it might have caused between her and that jerk Sorata.
An angry Chihiro suddenly barged into her room using a spare key to open the door and interrupted their conversation by demanding that she comes with her to meet Yuki. Otherwise, she wouldn't allow it.
And when Yuki saw her he couldn't help but think 'This woman really has a lot of free time…'
As for Sorata, his jealous heart kept creating plenty of excuses for him until he settled with saying "I'm taking care of her, I need to know what's going on" and ended up coming too. However, because of how each of them was drowning in their own thoughts, they didn't talk at all the whole way here so he was still unclear about who this guy Yuki's, or maybe he didn't want to know …
'Is this the guy she wants to 'touch'?' Thought Sorata with a disgusted look on his face as he stared at Yuki's skeletal appearance and thought that he was way better than him, and when Yuki noticed this was completely unaffected by the clear disgust and he immediately started laughing in his head 'Hahahaha, as expected, right now people aren't as afraid of me as they used to be, so I was really upgraded… not bad, maybe there's a chance for a comeback and I won't end up single like Chihiro'
It has to be mentioned that Sorata has a very confusing personality, he has both an inferiority and superiority complex at the same time and it shows clearly in his behavior and he keeps hurting the people around him because of it.
For example, he keeps pestering Mashiro and the other tenants of Sakurasou about how lucky they are for being talented and assume that their success only comes because of this and he could have done the same if he had their talents and this makes him hard to live with...
Mashiro however was a different case, because she didn't have a normal upbringing and couldn't take care of her mundane matters which's supposed to be something anyone could do. So, Sorata's mind convinced him that despite her superior talent, he was still better than her in many ways, and this feeling only increased the more time he spends and takes care of her...
This is why for the first time in his life he didn't try to distance himself away from someone better than him and would even end up falling in love with her in the future when she becomes more and more reliant on him, but they will break because his inferiority complex was never cured and became a poison to their relation... and let's not talk about the girl that was chasing after him for years and kept being ignored by him, poor Nanami...
Meanwhile, while Sorata was looking at the sick-looking boy in front of him. Chihiro on the other hand immediately started talking "Yuki you bastard, why didn't you answer my calls and messages, and how come you don't look like a ghost anymore all of a sudden?"
Chihiro and Mashiro were surprised because Yuki looked way healthier and muscular than he did before but he can't explain to them that he has a shitty system that could give quests with miraculous rewards so he simply responded while glaring at her "If you didn't keep interrupting my sleep, maybe I would be looking even better right now"
Chihiro's cheeks reddened a little for getting directly exposed for her doings causing Mashiro to shoot her a weird stare. So, she decided to divert the subject to her cousin to avoid any more humiliation "So what are you trying to do to my pure cousin?"
At this point, Sorata too blurted out in anger while slamming the table surprising not only them but also everyone in the coffee shop "Indeed how dare you try to take advantage of Mashiro?"
"What are you doing Sorata?" Chihiro didn't expect such an outburst to come from the usually gentle and harmless Sorata so she shot him an angry look for causing this disturbance and drawing all eyes on them... not like they weren't drawn to them in the first place by Yuki's creepy appearance and Mashiro's beauty creating a huge contrast… this is how yin and yang were born, it all started from the beauty and the skeleton...
Finally realizing that he was acting crazy, Sorata nervously looked at Chihiro and apologized "Sorry…" While Mashiro for the first time felt disgusted while looking at him and seeing how crazy he was acting for no reason...
I calmly looked at this guy before I turned to look at Chihiro and said "Stop enlarging the misunderstanding and please explain to me who's this idiot you brought with you that's yelling at me this early in the morning for no reason?"
Sorata's face twisted in anger, hearing Yuki call him an idiot so nonchalantly but Chihiro replied before he could say anything "This is Sorata Kanda, he's a tenant at Sakurasou and he's h-h-helping me take care of Mashiro when I'm busy" Sorata was sad that Chihiro didn't seem willing to defend him at all…
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
Meanwhile, Yuki simply stared at Chihiro with a strange face as he said "Help you huh? why do I feel like you completely dumped Mashiro on him?"
Chihiro became flustered all of a sudden as her face turned a deeper shade of red than earlier as she said "What are you talking about? That's not true right, Kanda-kun?"
Sorata who was jealous of how casual they were talking started feeling out of place until he was suddenly awakened by Chihiro's question and simply nodded at her absentmindedly before he suddenly snapped and said "How can you be so casual when he's trying to take advantage of Mashiro?"
This kid was getting on Yuki's nerves, but before he and Chihiro could respond and reprimand him, Mashiro suddenly stood up and angrily said "Stop talking to Yuki like that, he did nothing wrong!"
Sorata got even angrier seeing Mashiro defending this stranger and said "Are you an idiot? Do you even understand what you are doing? Well, I guess a talented person like you doesn't need to care about her actions becau-"
Seeing that he was hurting Mashiro's feelings because of his misunderstanding and selfishness, Yuki finally snapped at this kid "Hey kid, shut up! Who do you think you are talking to?"
Sorata looked at him in anger and said "I take care of this girl every day, and now I can't even talk?"
"First of all, stop talking like you are doing this for her, this has nothing to do with Mashiro and everything to do with you" Yuki said with a weird smile as he approached Sorata who started to feel nervous for some reason
"What are you talking about? I'm doing this for her sake!" said Sorata, but Yuki's smile simply grew wider when he saw this as he said "Really? Why didn't you ask them about who I was? Why didn't you ask me what I thought of Mashiro's words? Why don't you ask Chihiro, her cousin, why she was acting so laid back and casual to this 'stranger' and didn't seem to mind what's going on?" At this point, Yuki was face to face with Sorata as he looked at his eyes coldly making him gulp nervously and said "It's because we both understand Mashiro while you don't and the reason for all of this is simply"
Sorata's face was filled with a shocked look before Yuki completely dropped the bomb on him " The answer is easy, because you are jealous, and you can't get over the fact that those words were actually directed towards someone else, someone you feel superior to, right mister inferiority complex?"
Sorata's face turned pale and tried to deny " No, I'm only doing this fo-", But Yuki raised his skinny hand and quickly interrupted him as he didn't want to hear any more of his bullshit "Lie to yourself all you want, I don't care, just don't bother me with your insecurities and idiocy"
Then, he turned to Chihiro who was sporting a guilty look for bringing Sorata with them and the sad-looking Mashiro and he gently patted her head as if nothing had happened and he simply said "Did you bring your manga with you as I asked you?"
Mashiro nodded absentmindedly before she took out a pack of paper from her bag filled with simple sketches for her manga and gave it to Yuki... and seeing this, Sorata finally understood, that Mashiro only wanted help with her manga so he couldn't help but stand there dumbly and stare at Yuki as he read through the sketched Mashiro gave him…
It was a simple romance story, which Yuki found surprising as these kinds of stories required a lot of emotions and this girl could express none of them, and it showed because as he started reading through the sketches, he found that the story was lacking even though the quality of the drawing was amazing, but that's only a part of the manga, it still requires a good storyline and character development …
Something he also noticed was how he found himself understanding these pictures in a way he never did before, and just by staring at them once, he felt like he can see their flaws and redraw them again if he ever wanted to which he attributed to his new drawing talent…
Meanwhile, while he was engrossed in reading the manga, Sorata simply ended up lowering his head and leaving the coffee shop unwilling to embarrass himself any further as Yuki's words kept repeating in his head all the way until he arrived back at Sakurasou and he understood very clearly that he hit the nail on the head…
Chihiro and Mashiro didn't try to stop him because he was clearly the one in the wrong, insulting someone without trying to understand what's going on properly...
"Mashiro, do you want my honest opinion?" Yuki was already over Sorata and said while looking at Mashiro who still seemed to be affected by Sorata's incident… However, she still nodded at him and said "Yes, please tell me what you think"
Receiving a positive response, Yuki started speaking with a smile "Okay, let's start with what I think is good, your drawing skills are amazing, you told me you are a famous painter back when you were in England and it really shows in the quality of these sketches that aren't even the finished product… but" at this point, the smile faded from his face as it turned into a frown…
"But…" murmured Mashiro with her expressionless face and after a hesitant pause, Yuki continued saying "However, the storyline is subpar at best, and the emotions the characters are showing are also lacking, this is the biggest problem with this manga"
"Yuki don't be too harsh on her. After all, this is her first manga and she still has plenty of time to improve in this regard" said Chihiro when she noticed Mashiro lowering her head after hearing what he said and thought that he might have hurt her feelings…
But to her surprise, Mashiro had an enthusiastic look in her eyes as she said "Yuki, help me!" the reason she asked him this was because how he easily understood her intentions earlier and she felt like he would be of great help to her in expressing the emotions of the characters and solve her biggest flaw...
'Sigh, unfortunately, right now I don't have the time to help myself not to mention you' Yuki thought and was about to reject her offer but suddenly, the table and chairs on which they were sitting started shaking! and not just theirs, but everyone in the coffee shop felt the same thing as drinks started spilling all over the place including theirs and the people started to panic...
"This is…" Yuki couldn't help but grow fearful when he thought about the cause of this earthquake and the incident that was going to follow it shortly after in the future...
----------------------------------------
An: I have a very good guess that Yuki's going to be literally shaken by this earthquake in the inside and the outside...