Yamamura Miki

Suzuki Tsubame's expression was quite a sight.

"Your nerve is this weak, and you still dared to play at tailing someone?"

His tone carried a hint of teasing.

At the same time, he put the Presence Regulator in his hand back into the System Space.

The talent you were so proud of... was utterly insignificant before my hard work.

Yamamura Miki slowly raised her head and looked helplessly at the man before her, who had startled her so badly.

The girl nervously swallowed, her voice halting as she said:

"Um... I... I was just a little bored."

"I wasn't following you. I just wanted to come up here... um..."

Toward the end, her eyes darted away, and she no longer dared meet Suzuki Tsubame's gaze.

Wasn't that practically a confession?

Suzuki Tsubame grinned and chuckled. "Did I say you were following me?"

The words Yamamura was about to say caught in her throat.

"You're Class A's Yamamura, right? Did Sakayanagi send you?"

"No, I wasn't... No, that's not right, my name is Yamamura."

"But... but Sakayanagi didn't send me. I really just... wanted to come up here to see the view."

Yamamura looked utterly flustered, and her words became increasingly incoherent and disorganized.

"Is that so?"

His tone held obvious uncertainty.

Suzuki Tsubame bent down and locked eyes with the crouching Yamamura from an absurdly close distance.

"Yamamura, don't lie to me, okay~"

The boy's half-smiling gaze, coupled with the warm and comforting aura that radiated from him like the sun, washed over her. (Having a Pure Yang Body after reaching the peak of physical constitution was perfectly reasonable, right? Trollface.jpg)

It completely melted Yamamura Miki's thoughts into a puddle of mush.

"I... I..."

Yamamura's face turned bright red, and her pupils instantly became two spinning spirals.

His warm breath enveloped her in an instant. Her thoughts became incomparably chaotic, her mind a tangled mess.

"Hehe... since you came up here to see the view."

Suzuki Tsubame straightened up and extended a hand in invitation.

"...then there's no problem with coming with me, right?"

"..."

Although Yamamura's heart was in complete disarray.

Her right hand nevertheless seemed possessed as it tightly grasped the hand he had extended.

By the time Yamamura came back to her senses, she was already standing with Suzuki Tsubame in front of the rooftop railing.

"How does it feel? This should be your first time up here, right?"

Compared to the surrounding buildings, the School Building's rooftop stood head and shoulders above the rest.

From here, they could vaguely see Tokyo's bustling city center in the distance.

Compared with the enormous skyscrapers far away, Advanced Nurturing was no more than a drop in the ocean.

"Uh... yeah, it's pretty nice."

Yamamura nodded. Her thoughts were churning right now, and she could not focus on the distant scenery at all.

"By the way... Yamamura, were you really not sent by Sakayanagi to keep an eye on me?"

Suzuki Tsubame's gaze settled on the girl's flushed face.

"No... I wasn't. I didn't receive instructions from anyone."

The girl shook her head, firmly denying it.

Classmate Sakayanagi... I'm sorry, but I think I'm going to mess this up. That was what the girl thought, not believing she could deceive the man beside her.

"I see."

"So... these past few days, you've just been acting according to your own preferences?"

Suzuki Tsubame put on a look of sudden realization.

"Mm..." The girl nodded. Classmate Sakayanagi, it looks like I haven't messed things up yet.

"Yamamura, I'm sorry."

"Hmm?"

Yamamura looked at Suzuki Tsubame in confusion, not understanding why he had suddenly apologized.

Clearly, she was the one who should have been apologizing, wasn't she?

"I kept overlooking your feelings. I hope you can forgive me, Yamamura..."

With a sincere tone, Suzuki Tsubame looked at the girl with a trace of apology in his eyes.

"Huh?"

The girl's pupils widened violently, as though struck by an earthquake.

"Suzuki, that's not..."

Yamamura looked flustered, desperate to deny that notion.

"Can I call you Miki?"

Suzuki Tsubame directly interrupted the denial she had wanted to voice.

"Of course... and in exchange, you can call me by my name too."

The girl stared blankly, then nodded as though possessed.

"Mm..."

A sound resembling an affirmative hum suddenly squeezed out of her throat.

"Miki, please take care of me from now on."

Yamamura seemed not to hear him, her expression utterly unchanged.

Looking at the girl's vacant, lifeless face, it seemed she would not be coming back to her senses anytime soon.

"If you have anything troubling you in the future, you can come talk to me..."

"No, Miki... even if nothing's wrong, you can still come find me."

Suzuki Tsubame reached out and gently stroked the girl's head.

Yamamura's expression remained unchanged, completely ignoring both Suzuki Tsubame's words and actions.

Suzuki Tsubame scratched his head. It seemed she had completely crashed.

After Suzuki Tsubame left.

The girl finally snapped back to her senses. She hurriedly raised a hand and tightly covered her chest.

Her heart... could not stop pounding wildly.

Everything that had just happened was an entirely new experience for her.

It was not that she had truly fallen into a daze.

It was only because... she did not know how to face him.

Ever since she could remember, the gazes of her peers had rarely lingered on her.

Whether in elementary school, vocational school, or even high school, it had always been the same.

She had never had a proper friend by her side and was always alone.

She had once forced herself to believe that this was one of her strengths, and that even after growing up... living such a quiet life.

...didn't seem like such a big deal.

Although she truly had thought that way.

But... when Suzuki's gaze seeped into her life, what exactly was this strange emotion?

She didn't know.

She didn't know.

It was only... that the her of the past did not know.

Until today, that was.