The sound of a brutally slapped cheek echoes in the whole classroom… and nobody dares to comment on the fact that just occurred.

What did the heck happen? Why I suddenly feel dizzy and I have my head turned towards my seat?

I was walking towards the class exit and I know it is just a few steps away from me.

Once I step out of this toxic and bullying atmosphere that I forged with my own hands I will be finally doomed and able to concentrate only on my revenge and regrets.

That’s the outcome I desire and I crave for.

Becoming a “berserk warrior” it’s what I wish since years ago.

So… why I stopped walking? Why I’m not reaching out to that door of damnation?

At the end of this thought, the pain from my face has substituted the questions that were popping in my head.

The point that was damaged and aching… was my left cheek.

“Huh?”

I emitted a confused and dumbfounded sound from my mouth while I realized, after having touched my now bruised face, that I was slapped from...from…

*bzzzzztt#@???!!!*°#ç£$*.

An incomprehensible screech alarmed me in my head and put myself on my knees as soon I turned my head to see clearly who is the offender of the act.

In front of me is standing a girl of my age that arrives at my shoulders in height with light and shiny brown hairs kept in a short ponytail with a braid.

She has a fit and athletic body but she also surely is feminine and developed in the areas that make a girl…well, a girl.

Another peculiar thing that I notice is that instead of our jet black university uniform… she wears what it seems a private university uniform dyed in red with a couple of white stripes on the sleeves, shoulders, uniform pocket, and on the zone where the uniform buttons are located.

Also, the skirt that she wears is a plaid one and obviously a red one with white stripes.

But these are not at all her features that I’m concentrating on now… but I’m focusing instead on her magnetic and red like rubies eyes.

Yeah…they are staring and piercing through my empty ones like two spears that are thrown into the void.

And now that I started staring in those red like cherries irises… like if she is seeing a demon inside that pitch-black darkness, she changed in a matter of seconds from an angry and furious expression to… a feared one?

No… I’m wrong.

That contrast between her now saddened eyes and softened face emits a completely different feeling from fear.

It looks more like… the face of the disappointment of a mother, sister, or dear friend after you committed the worst of crimes.

But…it’s funny

*bzz-bzz@#|()/&&%%&/OO//&I*

I don’t have anything like that anymore…I chose damnation after the “Genesis Nova”.

The path to my fall it’s already written since twelve years ago.

If I had something like that I would have known since that day.

Something to care about.

Something to call home.

Something that could take me out of the darkness in me.

… I don’t have anything like that…

*bzz-°°ççç*é°ç:___:;;()((//&/%%&*

…or do… I?

But before I could continue to question myself…the girl started to talk:

“Ren…stop this suffering you forged with your own hands.

I…I…I don’t want to see that broken expression on you!

You don’t deserve this, and you have no reason to do it!”

…What the heck is going on?

Who the freak is this red-eyed female?

I never met her in my years here in Deneb...

I’m pretty sure I told my name before…but damn, we are still in what it once was Japan!

No one calls a person from the other sex by name without a fond relationship on this side of the world!

“What are you doing with your life now!?

Do you think that becoming a joker and be bullied could change anything?

Damn, I can’t leave you for-”

“…Who the hell are you?”

“…Uh?”

The girl that was scolding me like an old lady till a second ago is now quiet and the only words that could be heard are the ones that sound from the mouths of the nearby students that are gossiping and fantasizing about the relationship between me and my offender… but seems now that all the girls in the class are cursing and badmouthing me.

Why I’m so sure about it?

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Simple, because the red-eyed woman it’s on the verge of crying.

I could tell it from miles away that she is containing herself from making her now lucid and wet eyes burst out in tears.

But a problem now surges.

And that problem is…that this girl it’s freaking stupid!

She declared that she is connected in some-way to me after her nonsense attempt to scold me!

She saw a moment ago that even if I made this pain, I’m already in the black-list of everyone here!

What the heck she thought in her brain to affiliates herself with some trash like me!

Now she will be the target of all the lions in this den for YEARS if she cries!

I am resolute to take this path… but I could NEVER forgive myself to take someone down with me!

I need to do something and quickly.

Damn Ren, she is even a beauty, you can’t ruin this girl's life like this!

I’m in a panic and don’t know what to do with this sudden situation that came with this accident…and so I’m now looking, with probably puzzled and guilty eyes, straight into the face of miss Kamiya.

At that moment…a change of glances between me and Kamiya started and what can I say about that is… it was exhausting and asking her to help me… cost me a lot.

Don’t get me wrong, she understood immediately what I was looking for…but she even took the time to write down a list of things to do in the change of helping me resolve the mess that myself and the girl I never saw did.

Do not sleep in my classes anymore.

Do not go fooling around the campus in my classes anymore.

Correct all of my share of entrance tests instead of me for the next two weeks.

Do the groceries and buy me lunch for one week.

These are the four sacrifices written in that hellish list…and she even took the time to draw a doodle of her winking to me to mock myself even more!

But even after that… I will not give up on helping the girl near me.

And so... here I am, nodding in resignation and sighing in anticipation for the hellish weeks am I walking into.

Miss Kamiya smiles slightly before to start acting towards the class:

“Good grief Ashikaga, who could have ever imagined you were not only a joke but even a Don Giovanni?

Not only do you try to put your hands on your teacher… but even of the students of the exchange program between metropolis-states?”

“Wait, wait, WAIT! She is from another metropolis?” I ask her dumbfounded and continuing wth my joker act, helping miss Kamiya to create a chance for changing the atmosphere in the class… but also sincerely so I can get some clue about the red-eyed girl identity.

“ Ahh…Now you see what kind of crazy mess is this guy, dear Tsurugi from Altair? He is a brainless zombie.”

And once she was questioned with this joke, the girl decided to stop her emotional break and answer cheerfully:

“Yeah, I probably confused him for another person. The Ashikaga I know it’s not a spineless shrimp that cause messes like this. Please forgive my embarrassing behavior”

Ouch, that hurts!

But I gave a slight input for saving this girl, so I’m happy like this.

But still…

“So, like I was saying before the brainless lad decided to interrupt, the young Tsrugi is going to join this biology course and so, I hope you are going to treat her well for the year she is going to stay with us.

If I receive some bad news regarding your behavior, I’m going to double your homework, clear?

Miss Kamiya's declaration made every student in the class sigh and complain…except me.

Tsurugi.

These words make a chill run down my spine and the annoying screech scream in my head.

Brain, what are you trying to tell me?

Taking advantage of all the chaos created by my professor I sneaked out of the room through the door of damnation…while spelling a name that jolted In my mind while looking back at Tsurugi’s figure.

“Hana…mi?”

After spitting out that word the screams in my head stopped but nothing came along after that if not that

Tsurugi Hanami sounds familiar…and a lot.

“Oh well, sooner or later I’ll remember something, now...what time is it?”

I shrugged the thought out of my mind and walked along the corridors of my university, founding a clock on a white wall of the southeast zone of the campus.

It says 9:30 A.M

“Well, maybe it’s early…but let’s see if that duo is already at the usual place.”

And so, I started to walk towards the usual place I spend my afternoon naps…the rooftop of the northern building.