Volume 2 - Top-Tier Character Ayanokōji-kun [DISCONTINUED] [READ THE REVISION]

Chapter 5 - Independence Illuminates A Future Faith

Human relationships are complicated.

With some people, they can be hard as diamond, tall as a mountain and strong as a bull.

With other people, they can be soft as a feather, short as a dwarf and weak as a newborn calf.

They break easily and lay on the ground in pieces, just like shattered glass.

Of course, they also change, adapt and transition to different states.

In those cases, they remain but are unrecognizable when compared to their original, untarnished forms.

It can be considered a sad occurrence, but also cause for celebration.

Either way, there is one thing to be certain of:

Human relationships are not stagnant.

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"Sit down," I said.

It was the next day, the second day of our new semester. For the first time in a long while, I was once again in Sewing Room #2. Usually, I'd only be here to get lectured by Hinami, but ever since a certain event, our relationship had taken a radical turn. Now, she couldn't mess with me anymore like she used to; nor was I her personal lab experiment. In a while, the student would even outshine their master.

Hinami still considered me her equal when it came to academics and physical activities, and I didn't mind letting her keep that fragile fantasy—she'd come to realize the truth eventually.

"D-Do you have to command me like that?" Hinami anxiously asked me.

Her heart was entangled in threads of fear, like a rabbit cowering in front of a wolf's empty stomach. She frequently stuttered and trembled when we were alone. Of course, she'd do her best to put up a façade in the presence of those she supposedly considered her friends, but even then, I was able to glimpse moments of uncertainty.

It was actually quite cumbersome getting to a point where I could talk to her in private after "that" incident. Her willingness to contact me during our summer vacation was nonexistent, forcing me to wait for her fear to subside. Was I that scary? Or did her trauma affect her psyche just that much? Definitely something to remember for the future.

"I want to make this quick. Look," I said and pointed to a chair at the other end of the abandoned room. "You can sit all the way back there."

Hinami stood stock-still in front of the entrance, giving off the impression of a lifelike doll. She definitely looked the part. 

Jokes aside, I realized she was paralyzed with fear. But when she noticed I wouldn't budge, she reluctantly moved along the walls and eventually sat down on the chair, leaning back to get as far away as possible. She tightly gripped her own arms, showing a natural defense mechanism of humans once they felt an imminent threat to their life.

"...You could have been nicer to me, y-you know?" I saw her lips tremble from my position.

"Hinami, I'll say this now so you'll stop complaining about my 'rude behavior':

I don't like you; nor do I like being around you."

"But then—"

I ignored her useless opinion.

"There are several things I absolutely hate in this world, and you committed two actions which I utterly despise. 

Firstly, you incessantly pried into my past, even though I told you to let the matter go multiple times."