Blue Archive - Story of Joshua Sensei

Chapter 5 - Down Time II

She sighs to herself. "Is this ever going to end? All of this work piled up, and the others aren't doing anything to help." She groans as she tries to hold the boxes aloft. "And it's so heavy, too. Though that shouldn't surprise me at this point." Sitting down the boxes, she notices me approaching. "Huh?"

"Need a hand, Chinatsu?" I ask.

"S-Sensei?! What are you doing here?" She asks, a bit shocked.

"Finally got a break, so I figured I'd explore. I went to Trinity for a bit the other day, so I figured Gehenna would be next." I explain.

"I-I see. And the answer is no! I can handle carrying these documents just fine." She once again struggles to lift the boxes.

"You're clearly havin' a hard time. Let me carry half." I say, picking up some.

She sighs. "I really shouldn't be asking a teacher to do this for me..."

"You didn't ask, I offered my help."

"Fine. You're offering, so it would be rude to turn you down."

"Alright then." I say, easily picking up a few boxes with ease.

She sits still for a moment, eyes wide. "You're stronger than I thought, Sensei."

"Schale has a gym room I use every morning." I say, with a shrug. "C'mon then."

Chinatsu picks up some of the boxes as she leads me into the academy. As we walk through the halls, I ask. "So, where to?"

"Oh, It's just straight down the stairs here." She says, motioning to a staircase. "I promise it's not too far."

"Alright. Still, I can't believe you were gonna have to go down these stairs with this stuff." I point out, as she was really struggling with this stuff on flat ground.

"I don't think it would have been that dangerous. Well, maybe a little..." She trails off, suddenly a bit worried. "Now that I think about it, you're the first person to say something like that to me. Thank you."

I get a bit confused at that. "I'm the first person to worry about you?" I ask, eyebrow raised as we walk downstairs.

"Well, the students of Gehenna have unique personalities, to say the least. Many of them would never bother with this kind of menial work. They always try to avoid it. So I have a lot of practice in dealing with these sorts of things, that's all." The elf girl explains.

"What are you in charge of anyways, paperwork?"

"No, I'm the head of the Medical Committee." She says, like it's obvious.

"Then why the hell do they have someone with your position doing something so unrelated?" I ask, a bit upset. "You should be focusing on medical stuff, not menial crap like this."

She sighs yet again. "I don't get why a medical officer would have to do this either. Truthfully, I wish we had more people to take care of this kind of work. If no one does it, then it'll just keep piling up. Someone has to do it." She then smiles and says. "Though this kind of work suits someone boring like me. Haha..." She trails off with a self deprecating laugh.

"Hmph." I huff, annoyed at what she's saying about herself. "I wouldn't call you boring. I think you're a very kind-hearted girl."

Chinatsu suddenly stops walking. "...Excuse me?"

"What?" I ask.

"I must have blacked out for a second, because you couldn't possibly be talking about me." She says, blinking.

"Of course I was." I say, squashing her doubts.

Her face lights up with a blush. "M-More importantly! I should apologize for taking up your time like this. You came all the way here, and yet I..." She trails off. "W-We should hurry," She says, picking up her pace.