Chapter Three: Kita Kita

Nijika still couldn't hold back: "You have absolutely no teamwork--!"

There'll be another update this afternoon~

Chapter Three: Kita Kita

"Where are we going to find a vocalist...?" Hitori kept sighing during lunch.

"Is this about the band?"

"Yeah. I want to do something for Kessoku Band. We're still missing a vocalist and guitarist, but I can't interact with people at all..." Hitori's voice grew quieter and quieter.

"Have you met anyone?" Shiko put a French fry into her mouth.

"...No. To be honest, apart from you and the teacher, I don't know anyone else at this school..."

Shiko's hand paused.

"Not a single person?"

"Ah, yes..." Hitori mistook her words for a reproach. She picked up her guitar and lowered her head even further. "Please listen to my original song: 'Me, as Useless as a Water Flea'--"

"Wait, wait, wait!" Shiko hurriedly waved her hands, dispelling the gloomy atmosphere. "I mean, I know where to find someone like that!"

In front of Class 5, Ikuyo Kita said goodbye to three friends: "...Then it's settled. See you after school~"

She entered the classroom alone.

Behind her, Hitori and Shiko crouched by the door.

Hitori sent Shiko a message with her eyes: Why is she such a super extrovert?! She had never met Kita before, but that was Hitori's first impression of her!

Shiko held up her phone. On it was Kita's social media account. "She even posts makeup photos online every day, and she has tons of followers!" She communicated with her eyes as well.

"Then why did you pick her?! Couldn't you choose someone easier to talk to?!" Hitori nearly fainted just looking at the fashionable photos on the screen.

Actually, Shiko was pretty flustered herself. (Why did I have to act so cool?! Is talking to a pure extrovert like Kita way beyond my level?! Well, there's no turning back now!)

In Bocchi the Rock!, Kita would become Kessoku Band's future vocalist and guitarist. She was the only one in the classroom. If not for that, Hitori and Shiko wouldn't have dared follow her here. At that moment, she was lying on her desk, seemingly busy with something, but she appeared a little nervous. Suddenly, she turned toward the door and looked at the two people behind the gap.

"Are you Wu-san and Gotou-san from Class 2?" she asked as gently as possible, looking at the two pairs of eyes in the doorway.

Hitori's pupils shrank.

What do we do? What do we do? She's already noticed us! She frantically blinked at Shiko. She even knows who we are! How does she know us?!

You're asking me? Who am I supposed to ask?! Shiko blinked rapidly back at Hitori. We can only go for it!

The area boss--the perfect extrovert, Kita--revealed her health bar to the two of them.

Round 1!

Player1: Hitori launched the first attack!

"(This is my responsibility. I absolutely can't let Shiko do any more for me!)" A resolution born from bonds and honor!

"(I just have to say, 'Our band is missing a vocalist and guitarist. Are you interested?')"

"(I'll win!)" Hitori believed in herself!

"Ah... ah... ha..."

Passive effect activated: Absolute Introvert.

Player1 took 99999 critical damage from her own attack!

Player1 died without a fight!

"Hi--to--ri--" After mourning Hitori for only a moment, the next person to enter the battlefield was--Player2, Wu Shiko!

"(I really do have to rely on myself!)"

Round 2!

Player2 activated a skill: "Watch this. I'm a Stage Girl, too!"

"(At this moment, I am an extrovert!)" Shiko proudly raised her head in her heart!

"Sorry to bother you, Kita. Our band is missing a vocalist and guitarist. I heard you sing well and can play guitar, so I wanted to ask if you'd be interested." Good, she had said it! This was her extrovert power!

However...

"Sorry, you spoke too quietly. Could you say that again?" The BOSS took 0 damage.

"(I'm so sorry. I'm useless, too!)"

Fortunately, Shiko said it again at a normal volume.

"Sorry, but I can't join your band..." Kita's expression grew hesitant.

"Actually, all the other members are very bright and cheerful!" Hitori had somehow already recovered.

Kita had never seen anyone so self-deprecating. "Um, it's not that I dislike you..."

"Our slogan is 'Popipapipopapopipapapipopa!'" Shiko began chiming in as well!

"Huh? Is that a spell?"

"Our goal is to fill the world with smiles!"

"A children's band?"

"Anyway, anyway..."

"Sorry, I can't join your band." In the end, Kita still gave that answer. "Because I actually can't play guitar. Before, I only pretended I could play and joined because there was a senior in the band whom I admired. But I really couldn't learn... So I ran away before our performance."

Kita looked regretful. Hitori looked as if she was about to cry. Shiko, however, remained confident.

"(That's right!)" Shiko thought. According to the original plot, Kita would ask Hitori to teach her guitar next. The two of them would go to Starry after school, and on the way, Kita would discover that Kessoku Band was the band she had run away from before. She would try to escape, only to be caught by Nijika and Ryo. As an apology, she would help out at Starry for a day. During that time, Hitori would discover how hard Kita had been practicing guitar, then summon her courage and successfully convince Kita to join the band with a speech.

Perfect!

"Kita--" someone called from outside the classroom.

"Sorry, I have something urgent to take care of. I have to go." Kita waved at the two of them and left the classroom.

To the very end, she never made any request.

Hitori wanted to die. She wanted to disappear.

She had been politely rejected!

On the Introvert Association's ranking of "Things We Least Want to Encounter," "Being Politely Rejected" had remained in the top ten for a long time!

Being rejected was something nobody wanted to experience. For introverts with little social experience, being rejected--especially being politely rejected--was an especially devastating psychological blow!

"(I won't be able to live normally at school anymore... From now on, whenever they see me, they'll say, 'That's the girl who delusionally wanted to form a band with Kita~' If I drop out now, maybe the news hasn't spread yet...)"

Hitori had already figured out how to write her withdrawal application.

"(Let's leave first. It's uncomfortable hanging around in someone else's classroom.)" Hitori wanted to leave, but found that Shiko hadn't moved at all.

"Shiko?" Hitori assumed the blow had been too much for her.

She poked her.

Shiko fell stiffly onto the floor.

"Eek--Shiko, what's wrong? Someone call an ambulance! Help--"

"Hitori." Shiko propped herself up like a zombie from a horror movie!

"Yes--"

"I'm only going to say this once." Shiko wore the most serious expression Hitori had ever seen!

"First, wipe away your nosebleed..."

"Kita is the guitarist who ran away from Kessoku Band."

"Huh?" Hitori was confused. "What she said does line up, but there are plenty of other possibilities, right? It can't really be such a coincidence, can it?"

"I can't tell you the exact reason, but trust me." Shiko gripped Hitori's hand tightly. She squeezed so hard that Hitori's face twisted.

Hitori keenly sensed that something seemed off about Shiko.

"Fine, fine, fine, but please loosen your grip a little. You're so strong..."

"Next, message Ryo and Nijika. Tell them you found a vocalist and guitarist, and ask them to come to the gate of Shuka High after school." Shiko made another strange request. She looked serious.

"No, no, no, no, no..." Making such a troublesome request for no reason would definitely get her ordered to commit seppuku!

Shiko suddenly hugged Hitori's thigh and began whining like a child: "Please! This is my lifelong request. If you agree, I'll do anything!"

"AAAAAAAAAAAH--" Hitori had another episode!

She! Was! Being! Hugged! Around! The! Thigh!

The world lost its color. Lines dissolved into pixels, and everything drifted away...

Goodbye, Mom and Dad. I'm going to a wonderful place now...

Victim's name: Hitori Goto

Cause of death: The victim's social anxiety was triggered by having her thigh hugged, causing her to self-destruct on the spot

Perpetrator: Wu Shiko

"I regret it. In short, I regret it very much," the criminal said from prison.

And so, Shiko spent a life filled with guilt and remorse in prison.

Just kidding.

Shiko had plenty of experience rescuing Hitori. She brought her back.

Outside the wall, someone gradually walked away.

In the classroom, Hitori nervously sent the message and quickly received a reply: "Received." She glanced at Shiko, who looked as if she were listening attentively to class on her left, though Hitori had no idea what she was really doing.

Although Shiko had been utterly confident, Hitori still couldn't feel at ease.

"(Shiko was like that, so I couldn't refuse her at all, aaaaaah! Hitori, you idiot--)" Her thoughts were churning as usual.

And somehow, she managed to endure until the end of the school day.

Time, stop. Hitori stared despairingly at Nijika's message: "Almost there."

Shiko had vanished somewhere by then, too.

One step at a time, she shuffled closer to the school gate. She had prepared three apology letters in advance, just in case, but hopefully she wouldn't need them...

"Ah! Little Bocchi!" It was Nijika's voice! The death knell had sounded. Hitori saw her future:

"How dare you make us come all this way over some baseless speculation?" It was Nijika? The smoking, drinking, tattooed version!

"Taking me for your band's guitarist? How cute, Gotou-san~" It was Kita? The masked, scheming version!

"Sink into Tokyo Bay." Ryo? The underworld boss had passed judgment.

As soon as Nijika and Ryo arrived, they saw Hitori crying as she handed over two sheets of paper. Ryo took them. "An apology letter..."

Before she could make any comments, Nijika spotted a familiar figure. "Ah! The runaway guitarist!"

Hitori froze. When she turned around, she saw Kita chatting and laughing with her friends as they came out of the school building.

Huh? The runaway guitarist? Who were they talking about? Was it one of Kita's friends?

Hitori watched as Kita suddenly stopped, then repeatedly apologized to Ryo-san and admitted her wrongdoing.

Could something really be this coincidental?

Hitori silently tore up the apology letters she hadn't handed over yet, although Ryo-san seemed to be reading hers with great interest already.

Behind a tree, Shiko let out a huge sigh of relief and lowered the stick in her hand. It was wonderful that Kita had appeared at the school gate on time. She wouldn't have to burn through two lifetimes' worth of social energy to forcibly drag her over.

"You've been following her for quite a while, haven't you, classmate~" a strangely familiar voice said beside her.

Shiko's heart gave a violent thump.

She turned around. A gentle face was looking at her.

Impossible. Why was she here? Why now?

Banana-shaped yellow hair, the uniform of Seisho Music Academy, and a highly distinctive appearance--there was no way Shiko could mistake her for anyone else--

From Revue Starlight, Nana Ohba.