Volume 1 - Top-Tier Character Ayanokōji-kun [DISCONTINUED] [READ THE REVISION]

Chapter 33 - Working Wrecks Brains And Bones

A job. Being employed or being the one who employs.

In any of these scenarios, you have to work. Sometimes less, sometimes more.

Some may like it. Others don't, for obvious reasons.

While it can be a passion, most of the time, it is not.

It's just something you have to do.

Once it's done and over with, joy may or may not return to you.

Work can be quite horrible.

You have to complete a multitude of absurd tasks originally thought for one person.

Or your superior is simply unreasonable.

Maybe your colleagues belong to the lowest of the low.

The work itself can also be terrible in various ways.

But what defines "terrible" work?

Does it have to be tiring?

Mentally draining?

Annoying?

Well, it's different for everyone.

However, there's something no one can deny—

Writing these intros every chapter really is grueling work.

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Several days have passed since the overnight trip.

Finally, the day of reckoning had come. Today I would take one step into the world of adulthood.

No, not what one might usually think hearing those words. That will come later.

I'm talking about work.

Right now, I was standing in front of the karaoke place with the fake résumé Matsuo had prepared for me, in my bag. I was about to have my first job interview. I'm pretty sure I'll get accepted. I mean, this is just a part-time job. How hard could it be?

I went into the karaoke place, with the girl working there welcoming me apathetically and then yawning. Didn't expect to meet one of my people in this kind of place. Now I'm even more excited. Who wouldn't be after seeing such a deadbeat? Maybe the other employees working here are different.

Her bleached wavy shoulder-length hair was tucked behind one ear. She looked around my age.

"I have a job interview," I said, returning her previous apathetic greeting. "My name is Ayanokōji Kiyotaka."

"Oh, they're.."—the gray shades of boredom visible inside her pupils were gone—"Wait a second, you are Ayanokōji Kiyotaka?"

"Yes," I said, already fed-up with her curiosity.

"I see, I see." She leaned forward, as if to inspect me, and then nodded with wide-eyes once she seemed... satisfied? What did she see in me?

"Sorry, but is there something I need to do? Or—"

She shook her head, not needing to answer my incoming question. "No, no. Wait here a minute, 'kay?" She took off, disappearing into the back. I was able to glimpse a gleam of interest in her eyes, if you can call it one. But she shouldn't know me, and I definitely don't know her. That only leaves one option.