We stood at the opposite sides of the room, staring at each other down.

“Ready?” Ryu raised a cello bow, almost mimicking how I held my shovel.

I responded with a nod.

Although this was a practice round that Ryu had simply asked, I felt my legs shake for a few minutes. Although the first time against him I had won, Ryu said he was going to try and amp up the difficulty for the training.

I had started to wonder why I trusted him to exchange tips for me. He doesn’t seem qualified at first, but it felt as if there was something I had thrown away when considering him.

“Go!” Ryu rushed forward at me, carrying a small cello bow in his hand.

“Woah…” I swung my head back, clashing the blade of my shovel with his bow, “What’s up with you today?”

“I just felt like it today Kurumi,” Ryu smirked, “Besides, when was the last time we taught each other something?”

I don’t know why, but Ryu has been quite scary lately.

During our second meeting, he decided one day he wasn’t going to ‘hold back’ just to get me up to speed in case we ever ran into another issue.

I know he’s a pragmatic guy, but I don’t think we would ever meet another survivor. And even if we did, violence wouldn’t be an answer.

“The bow won’t hurt. I was lying about the holding back part” He spun the bow around in a fashionable manner, striking the blade of my shovel.

By the look of his moves, it seemed as if one hit and I’d be on the floor knocked out cold. Yet at the same time, his actions only meant his only intent was to test me at every angle.

Ryu took a step back, locking the bow with my shovel. We stared at each other for a moment, as I glanced down to notice an opening on his leg.

He pushed forward again, only to lose his balance as I stepped away.

Now’s my chance!

I swung my shovel straight towards his shin, only for it to be slammed through the floor with Ryu’s bow. Despite all the force I had thrown, a single stroke stopped it dead in its tracks.

He’s fast…

Ryu lunged forward, only to miss as I released my grasp over the shovel and sidestepped away. He gave a glance at the shovel, before charging at me again. I swung away again, feeling the breeze each time Ryu sent the bow.

His movements weren’t exactly fluid, as if he was improvising on the spot without thought. Yet it felt almost impossible to get an opening.

“That’s quite unlucky of you”

He spun the bow around, swinging it around my head as I ducked over, lightly shoving him towards the nearby table while I snatched his bow.

“Two can play that game” I slid towards the ground, gripping onto my shovel with my other hand, “Wanna call it quits?”

It seemed I had won again. And with both weapons at hand, it seemed I’ve improved.

“This would be good for if you ever got into a pinch”

“Pinch?” I raised an eyebrow.

Ryu planted his foot onto the leg of a nearby chair, now kicking it towards me. I stepped over to the side, managing to dodge it out of luck.

I stormed over towards Ryu, sending the flat end of the shovel close to his face.

“I win– Huh?”

Ryu had both hands grasping onto the shovel with both ends, stopping it dead in its tracks.

“Nope” He smiled.

I swung the cello bow straight through its side, only for it to be cut in half through a single knee straight at it.

We kept ourselves at a standstill, as I tried to wrestle my shovel straight towards him to no avail.

“Jeez you make it hard…” I scratched my head.

“Well if it’s hard, then it’ll be easier for you when you actually get into a situation like this”

Before I could respond, he pushed the shovel away, leaving me wide open. Yet as I backed away, he grasped onto the nearby duffel bag close to the table, throwing a tennis ball straight at me.

“Oof!” I stepped over to the side, kicking the ball back to him, “That’s unfair!”

“No it isn’t” He threw another ball, this time missing.

“Jeez I thought you took– Huh?!” I felt a light tap on my back.

Somehow, the ball deflected from the wall behind me.

“Okay, that’s it”

I rushed across the room, swinging my shovel straight at him only to miss as he stepped back.

I followed suit, sending more swings straight at him only for the same result. Although most of the tennis balls Ryu was throwing at me barely hit the mark, some of the lucky ones even dealt quite the blow at my leg.

Even trying to corner him was impossible for me.

“Think fast” Ryu threw another ball, this time missing.

“Wait, why are you doing this?”

“Just to simulate you getting swarmed at all sides. If you could block or dodge most of them, then you don’t need to worry about fighting against a swarm”

Quite an odd reasoning, but I couldn’t really question.…

“One recommendation” Ryu picked up another tennis ball, “Try dodging it”

“Of course…” I rolled my eyes.

Ryu threw another barrage of balls towards the nearby tables while stepping to the right. I took a few steps back while having my shovel lowered to dodge the oncoming hits to no avail.

By now, I had realized why I started to trust Ryu in teaching me this.

“Visualize where the ball would hit, Kurumi. See which one is coming first and step away” Ryu slowed down his throwing for a moment, “Try not to panic if it isn’t going for you”

“Why can’t I just push it away, even if it misses me”

“What if there’s another threat in front of you? Your shovel is heavy so it wouldn’t be easy just swinging it constantly” Ryu threw another ball, this time heading straight for me.

“How was that so fast- Huh?” The same ball I had dodged bounced through a nearby table, giving me a light tap.

After a moment of staring at the ball, it all made sense now.

Ryu’s testing to see how smart I am in a situation like this. But the fact that he is underestimating me is quite cocky of him. I gave a smirk.

He started to circle around me, collecting a few tennis balls off the ground while I watched him.

I did a quick twirl of my shovel, parrying each ball that ricocheted towards me with little effort before rushing towards him with the shovel aimed at his torso.

“Do you yield?” I gave a smug look

“I was going to ask you that question but uh…” Ryu pointed down at the floor, “Yea I yield”

By some miracle, I hadn’t stepped on a single tennis ball that was littered all across the floor. One wrong step and I would’ve tripped.

“Jeez, was that why you didn’t go hard on me?”

“Yuuri would kill me if I do” Ryu slid his foot around the balls, consolidating them all under one table, “Hence why I was ready to catch you if you lost your balance”

“Yea…” I leaned back at the table, “Why’d you choose to play like that anyways?”

“Do you remember the last time it rained?”

“... Yeah”

“I’m not blaming you for anything of course, but I’ll digress from that” Ryu grabbed onto the duffel bag, scooping up all the balls he had consolidated into it, “Just to get you up to speed of course”

“Well, in that case, should I tell you to run a marathon while I throw tennis balls at you?”

“You’d have to clean it up”

“Right…”

Ryu seemed to have smiled more often than usual today.

I had noticed that he was talking to this imaginary friend yesterday, while Yuki was following closely behind. Yet when I asked him about it, he dismissed it as ‘just a friend’ which was code for playing along.

But from what Yuuri told me, Ryu never smiled while interacting with Yuki’s delusions. And not to a scale like yesterday. But perhaps he’s just in a good mood.

“Can I ask you something?”

“What’s up?”

“I know you take up martial arts, but how come you are so well adapted with a shovel?”

“Well… isn’t it like an extension of yourself?”

“Are we talking physically or mentally?”

“Err… both?”

“Of course…” Ryu rolled his eyes, “The fact that you keep it with you while you’re sleeping is saying something”

“Shaddup” I gave a tap behind his back.

“Anyways, would you like to go for a second round?”

“Yeah… but could you tone it down a bit?”

“Sure”

Despite what I had asked, Ryu seemed as relentless as before. Yet this time, he managed to somehow set up ways to trap me midway through a fight. A strategy that I hadn’t gotten used to.

After an hour, we sat close by the tables with a bottle of water. I poured some over my head while Ryu poked his head through the window.

“Not gonna lie Ryu, you’re quite difficult to handle”

“It’s not like the movies where the person who’s stronger or faster wins the fight…” Ryu turned over, “Ever watched a lot of action movies?”

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

“Nope, just video games”

“Which type?”

“The console ones where you go up against another player” I grabbed onto a bottle, passing it to him, “Want some?”

“I’ll pass” Ryu started to look outside at the hills, “The rain wasn’t as heavy as I thought it would”

“Perhaps the next time we spar we do it out there with the rain”

“I wouldn’t mind. It’d probably give me a second wind to be honest”

“And a lot of cheap tricks to throw at me…” I muttered.

“Heh. Maybe next time. If we ever extend our security beyond the school”

“That’ll probably take a while”

“Hence why I need you”

“Well, why can’t you also take up the fighting?” I leaned by the wall, “You’re quite capable yourself”

“Are you saying it from what you’ve seen today and last week? Because I’m not that good to be honest”

“Don’t play oblivious with me. Remember that festival two years ago?”

Ryu kept silent.

“You were throwing devastating blows to those guys all the time. And all over something trivial” I gave a snicker, “What happened anyways?”

“Well…” Ryu sat down close by the window, pushing away the shrapnel scattered across the floor, “I won… of course. But I never expected you to be a witness of it”

“The whole school was talking about you and those teenagers. Even the Judo Captain thought you would be a perfect example for his club members”

“Really?” Ryu smirked.

“It was why when you offered me to exchange some skills, I didn’t say no”

“And nowadays I thought school rumors disappear after a few months…” Ryu rolled his eyes.

Ryu seems a bit dumb when it comes to these social situations. It wasn’t like the rumors would simply leave him one day.

“Well, they kinda do” I laid the shovel close by the ground, “But that doesn’t mean people will forget”

“Right…” Ryu gave a glance at the ceiling before looking back at me, “I’ll admit I had trained a lot back in the day… I had only quit after that incident”

“Well, you didn’t instigate the fight, right?” I leaned forward, giving him a smug look.

“If I did, I'd be a normal student at best. I don’t think the school would want a School President who had started conflict”

“Huh… perhaps those seniors chose the wrong person to mess with”

“Yeah…” Ryu gave a glance at me, “It was surprising to see the entire school watch. Katsuragi… Mizuki… Takeya…”

I stopped for a moment, before nodding.

“Ah…” Ryu looked over at me, “Sorry about that”

“It’s alright. I’ve moved on”

“If you don’t mind answering, did you like him?”

With my face feeling quite red after that question, I gave a nod before looking away.

“I never personally knew Katsuragi, but I had heard rumors of you liking him from a person I knew in track and field. Before the outbreak reached our school I noticed you were talking to him at the field so that reinforced my ideal”

“What, were you some sort of spy?” I turned over.

“Of course not” Ryu shook his head, “But ever since that incident at the rooftop, for some reason it couldn’t get over my head. Even though I’ve never had a crush with anyone, I couldn’t help but… feel bad for you”

My eyes widened for a moment, almost unable to process what I had witnessed. For once, it felt as if Ryu had changed from the inside.

“And uh… Kurumi” Ryu turned over, “I’m sorry for dumping my trauma over at you last week”

“Oh no! Don’t consider trauma dumping that” I waved my hand dismissively, “I already understand why you reacted to that in the headmaster’s office”

“Well, what about what happened after that? Telling you to keep it shut from the others was quite manipulative of me”

“Ah don’t sweat it. I wouldn’t have said anything regardless”

Ryu gave a nod, smiling for a moment.

It’d be quite a stretch if I said Ryu didn’t have any empathy. Yet the fact that he had expressed this sort of sensitivity towards something that was my trauma, it felt as if he didn’t want me to think about it alone.

I had never seen Ryu as a sensitive person who would get sad over anything. As a matter of fact, everytime we had witnessed something traumatic, it felt as if he would move on the next day with accepting the reality.

But it seemed as if he had been hiding this feeling for quite some time. And now I can understand why.

“Well, that’s all in the past. Let’s move forward, right?”

“Of course…” Ryu gave this small stare at me for a moment, “But can I ask, why do we call someone who we like their girlfriend or boyfriend?”

The question was quite simple in nature, yet I couldn’t understand why we did it.

“Perhaps it's one of those things that never made sense in the first place but we just go along with it”

“That’s quite the judgment, but I like it” Ryu nodded, “Some things should remained questioned for later”

“Have you ever gotten a girlfriend before?”

“I wish I could say yes. But I never had an attractive feeling to Hano”

My stomach curled up as he mentioned Hano, yet I maintained a straight face.

“Right… Did you ever plan to get one?”

“It never made sense to me. And during the past few years I had always thought that friendships and relationships are rarely… authentic”

“Authentic?” I raised an eyebrow, “Aren’t most if not all friendships real?”

“Some people I knew used other friends as a way to receive loans or get help from others. Some wrestle and laugh at each other. Sometimes they even get into a bit of mischief. Is that truly a way for friendship?”

I shrugged in response. Ryu had always asked those questions like they were part of some philosophy of his. Yet he couldn’t easily answer it.

“Well, isn’t the point of friendship being doing something together? Have something that we can relate to?” I left my shovel on the ground, “You used to paint a lot, right?”

“Well you can’t define friendship on mutual interest, but yeah”

“Hano-chan liked to do art as well. And you two were friends. Isn’t that a part of friendship?”

“Is it really that hard to piece together a definition for it?” Ryu rested his head over the wall.

Ryu wasn’t wrong, to say the least. I couldn’t find the exact answer to friendship. But I’m sure he’ll find out. For someone like him, he was probably overthinking what it was.

As we exchanged looks at each other, the sound of rain echoed across the hallways, followed by the sound of Yuki calling out our names.

“Dinner time already?” I got up.

“Probably not. Yuuri may need help with the laundry”

“Wanna come over?”

“I already have my little operation with the clothes going. I’ll catch up with you later”

“Alright… how about you run a lap around the second and third floors. You need that stamina”

“Sure… how about we meet tomorrow and do a run?”

“Yeah” I gave a short wave while walking towards the clubroom, “I hope you’re tired by the time you get back to the clubroom”

“Heh, quite the expectation” Ryu now got up, giving a few stretches.

I do wonder why Ryu asked me about friendship though. If it was something completely foreign or he was thinking about it.

Ryu wasn’t the type you could easily become friends with due to how serious he took his role to a point where formalities were ingrained within his rulebook. Someone who would question everything you did.

But now Yuki and I started to see him as just someone who was willing to smile and open up. A step forward compared to how he isolated himself in his office during the first days. Even Yuuri had started getting used to it.

It was nice to say the least.

Three years ago, the Ryuusei festival was underway across the school.

It wasn’t exactly the most exciting, yet it was better than having to study in the classroom for another hour as classes had to end early for the festival to commence.

Rather than deciding to go out with a few friends of mine, I had wandered alone in the meantime. As I got close to one of the nearby stalls, I noticed the door to the sports warehouse was open.

At first, I didn’t mind. Yet after noticing some shouting and movement, it pretty much spelt drama.

As I leaned close by the wall, the sound of sobbing echoed across the warehouse.

I peeked over at the door, watching the commotion.

SMACK

A senior’s face was slammed straight through the wall, creating a massive bang which reverberated dangerously close to where I was watching. Despite flinching for a moment, I continued to stare into the room.

“C’mon!” A voice echoed across the hallway, “If you’ve really expended all that energy fighting each other, this wouldn’t be fun, right?”

I squinted for a moment, staring straight through the opening.

Ryu walked towards the middle, his confident expression almost echoing across my head as if what had happened during his second and third senior year was a complete downgrade.

Yet, through his expression, I noticed that his eyes could barely catch up as it looked like he was going to fall asleep anytime.

Another figure came into my view, now charging straight into Ryu only to miss. Taking this opportunity, he managed to slide a box of tennis balls over towards the figure, causing him to crash into the nearby wall.

Ryu Tanaka? Getting into a fight like this? I thought to myself, What in the world is happening…

As I had only known him as a Junior Student Council member, all I really thought was why my first impression of him was this cocky self-centered person with a loud mouth.

After a few inaudible shouts and commands, two figures now surrounded Ryu, pacing around him with their fists closed. With the significant height difference between him and the two seniors, it felt as if he was taking a suicide mission.

The figure in front of him charged forward straight at Ryu, sending a barrage of blows straight at him without any issue. His maneuvers, despite being quite rough and improvised, were almost foolproof. Especially against this senior who had started to push Ryu back through sheer strength.

“Quite disappointing for a blue belt like you”

Ryu quickly stepped forward, closing the gap between him and the figure before sending a series of responding jabs and strikes towards the figure’s neck. The figure gurgled for a moment, before collapsing.

The senior behind him reeled his right foot behind, sending a kick towards his back only to miss entirely. Ryu, by some miracle, somehow dodged it as if he was in a movie.

“I’m gonna make sure you die right here!” The figure screamed while sending multiple jabs towards his face.

Contrary to the figure’s statement, Ryu remained unphased while parrying each strike.

“You won’t get far then” Ryu gave a scornful look.

“You piece of–”

Before the figure could say anything, Ryu sent two jabs towards his face, followed by a knee towards his gut and a shove to the nearby wall.

Despite the lights around the warehouse, it was only now that I had managed to get a full look of Ryu. His face was marked by a mere smile. Not anything creepy or terrifying, rather just one as if he genuinely found it a hobby for pleasure.

With how charismatic and almost overconfident he had acted over the first school year, I couldn’t even tell if he really liked it or if it was just a facade.

“Both of you had the audacity to pick on someone who was two years younger and merely was an outlier in her year level. Yet you can’t even lay a finger over her friends” He walked over towards the first senior on the floor, sending a devastating kick towards his gut.

“Agh!” The senior cursed something out, only to be muffled by the pain.

“What about you?” Ryu pointed to someone away from my sights, possibly the girl sobbing, “Are you gonna try something?”

The figure that had crashed into the wall charged straight at him almost in complete silence, only managing to catch him off guard and bear hug him.

“Huh?”

Ryu now lurched his left elbow backwards, barraging the figure’s gut relentlessly before grabbing onto his arm and slamming him straight down onto the ground, He then turned over to the sobbing figure.

“You tremble at something that you’ve been doing for the past three years without remorse… yet Hano never cried or made a problem about it! She should’ve been crying. Not you!”

The distant female sob across the warehouse started to turn into rage.

“Hano?” The voice gave a small scoff, “This is pathetic! Why would you even be friends with a loner like her–”

“Shut up” Ryu interrupted, “I’m not listening to anyone of the likes of you–”

A sudden grunt followed, as Ryu now stepped away into my view, both hands raised as if he was about to meet an attack. The female senior stepped into my view for a moment, thrusting something from her arm straight at him only to miss.

A knife??

She thrusted her knife straight at Ryu’s gut, this time almost landing at him only to have missed due to how overextended she was. Despite Ryu being able to parry and dodge his strikes, it looked as if at any time his luck could run out.

I wanted to jump in and tell them to stop it, or by the very least call the teacher and tell them that a senior was about to kill Ryu. Yet at that moment, all I did was stare at the unfolding battle.

“Using a knife on me, hm?” Ryu stepped over to the right, “Perhaps you should be expelled”

“I won’t be getting expelled by a psychopath like you!”

The girl screamed, repeatedly swinging the knife only to miss. Yet everytime Ryu dodged it, I could tell the knife was getting dangerously close to his chest.

“You think you’re in the right here?”

“All I know is you’re wrong!” She swung her knife straight at Ryu’s neck, only missing by a few inches.

“Sometimes two wrongs make a right…” Ryu stepped away again, his face composed, “But I don’t think I should be concerned anymore after this”

As I tried to get another good angle, the commotion around me grew louder. Confused chatter turned into intrigued discussions as more students started to pile around me.

By a few seconds, hundreds of students were now gathering by the entrance watching what was unfolding. I was eventually pushed out from my spot, having to now contend with the flood of students who later got front seats in the incident.

It was only until the next day that I heard snippets of the story. Only my friends at the Track and Field club asked me what I had witnessed, yet most of their absurd questions only bent what was meant to be the truth.

I didn't know what Ryu was doing at that time. It wasn’t sure for me to know if he was a psychopath, perhaps just someone seeking revenge. Yet for now, it seemed like it was something I shouldn’t worry about.