Ayanokoji POV
"I thought I would get to see big breasts~!"
Contemplating suicide, Ike shouted in agony in earshot of Hasebe.
Murmurs spread among the girls. Like I said, I expected the girls to hate him for being so blatant...
"Ike, this isn't time to be sad. There are a lot of other girls!"
"Y-yeah. Anyone's fine. This isn't a time to feel down!"
"Yeah!"
Yamauchi and Ike affirmed their friendship and clasped each other's hands.
"You two, what are you doing? Looks fun."
"Ku-ku-kushida-chan?"
Kushida interrupted the two boys.
Wearing the school swimsuit, Kushida's curvy body line was on display.
In less than a second, all the boys stared at Kushida. Her breasts are about D or E cup. I don't know exactly but it's around that size. It's also a lot bigger than I thought. Her butt was also much bigger than expected. However, I immediately averted my eyes.
For one it was because of the shame and for the other because of the ominous pressure that stared at me from behind my back.
(AN: Don't mind the quality of this picture. I was lazy, so it looks very rough and undetailed.)
Sia, looked at me with a gaze that says 'you disgust me.'.
I was already used to seeing her lively expressions, so the cold gaze she directed at me surprised me.
So that was the reason the boys in class call her the 'ice princess'.
I can remember Ike asking me if being expressionless was a requirement for hanging out with Horikita and Sia as they both were known to have cold eyes, so that side of her wasn't unknown to me.
The reason why she's only called 'princess' and not 'queen' is because, compared to Horikita, she seems more approachable due to her generally kind nature and goofy personality. Even so, these eyes justified that name more than enough.
...Receiving that look from her is a little troubling...
"Why do you have that weird expression?"
Horikita looked at my face, feeling suspicious.
"I'm currently getting targetted by part of the royal family of the ice kingdom."
Looking at both of them now, their eyes truly look similar. They might be lost sisters, who have never met each other.
"What is that even supposed to mean?"
Horikita looked at me with a confused expression. However, she didn't inquire further, not having any interest in the joke I made.
"..."
For some reason, Horikita looked up and down my body.
"Ayanokoji, do you exercise?"
"Eh? No, not particularly. I'm not proud of it, but I was part of the 'go-home' club."
"It's quite obvious that you exercise."
"Maybe I inherited good genes?"
"I don't think that's the case."
Horikita refused to believe me as she looked at my body critically. Fortunately, she was stopped before she could say anything else.
"Why do you want to know, Horikita? Do you have a muscle fetish? Or are you just into Ayanokoji?"
The girl, who had been glaring at me before, now came into the scene to save me from Horikita's sexual harassment.
"Don't say stupid things, Hirano. I know you're smarter than that."
"Yes, and that very smart Hirano has judged that you bother Ayanokoji too much."
"If you get so bothered by having another girl talk to your boyfriend, you should get your jealousy problems checked out."
Sia took bewilderedly a step back. With furrowed brows, she looked to the side. Her ears turned red a little before she faced Horikita again.
"H..he's not my boyfriend! We're just friends."
Ouch. Even though I knew about the status of our relationship, it still hurt to see her refuse it so harshly.
"If you don't want to make your relationship public, you should try to not be so blatantly obvious."
Horikita rolled her eyes and then went away, leaving only me and Sia behind.
"Tch. Why do you like her anyways? She's so stuck up."
"She's not that bad if you get to know her."
"Why would I even want to get to know her?"
Lucky me. She seems to be so upset about Horikita's behaviour that she seemed to forget being angry at me.
"And don't you think that just because I saved you, I'm not angry at you anymore."
Nevermind. It was too naive of me to assume that.
"Why are you mad at me anyway?"
"What do you mean why am I mad at you?"
Like a grumpy cat, she glared at me again. Sadly, she failed this time and only ended up looking cute. Looks like she's a bad liar.
"Y..you did bets on the chest size of girls! Isn't that disgusting?"
Turning red, she covered her face, before slightly creating an opening between her index and middle finger, revealing her left eye.
"Creep. Weirdo. Pervert. Half-witted, dim-witted, nit-witted nincompoop."
"That last one really hurt."
"As it should!"
With a quiet 'hmph' she turned her head away from me, crossing her arms while pouting.
"At least nobody voted for you."
"Huh? What's that supposed to mean?"
Strangely irritated about my comment, she turned to me with a dumbfounded look on her face, feeling insulted for some reason.
"You just don't seem very..."
With my eyes, I looked down at her body, scanning her like a computer.
It seems like I was mistaken.
Although she was very thin and certainly didn't come close to someone like Kushida, she wasn't flat or curveless by any means.
Though she was very thin. I wonder if I should pay more attention to her diet. She has a habit of not taking care of her own well-being, as she seems to 'forget she has to eat'.
At least that's what she said.
In a way, she resembled a statue made of glass. Like a fragile tool, which must be handled carefully. If handled with carelessness and irresponsibility, that tool will break and can't be used again.
For that reason, I must treat her with care. She seems so fragile, after all.
"You two seem to get along very well."
Kushida approached us both from the side, interrupting our little banter.
"No, we do not. He's annoying and I hate him. He's also a big pervert."
"I'm not a pervert. I'm just a healthy boy in my teens."
Seemingly ignoring what Sia had said about me, she just giggled.
"Come on, Hirano. It's not worth breaking up with your boyfriend over little things as this."
"H-huh? Why does everybody assume we are a couple?"
"You're not?"
Before Sia could say anything, I answered for her, not wanting to hear that energetic refusal of hers again.
"No, we are not."
"Oh," Kushida said, looking apologetic. "I just assumed that you were a couple. You always hang out after all and there are rumours of Ayanokoji coming to your room at night."
"Well..." Sia stroked her chin thoughtfully, her voice turning serious again. "It's not like the rumours are false...there is just no romance between us yet."
Yet? It was something, which Sia herself didn't realize she said, but Kushida seemed to visibly react to that by responding with a wide smile.
"Good luck then, Hirano! I'll be cheering for you!"
"Huh?"
And with these words and a big smile, Kushida walked away while waving at us.
"What's wrong with that girl?"
Immediately after she was gone, Sia turned to me with a confused look on her face. I knew what the reason behind Kushida's behaviour was, but refrained from answering. To be honest, I didn't have anything against that impression of Kushida. Sia is undeniably pretty. In fact, she's so popular among the boys that she tied with a certain 'Honami Ichinose' on the girl's popularity rankings.
Although the reason behind their fanbase was different. While Honami was well-liked because of her looks and her cuteness, Sia's fanbase was a little...special.
"I don't know. Just don't think about it too hard."
"I guess..."
Silently we proceeded to watch as our teacher came in. The lesson would begin in only a few minutes.
"Hey, Sia. How good are you in swimming?"
"Huh? Me? I basically suck at anything physical."
It was not surprising. Looking at her, her body fat percentage must be at least lower than average.
"What about you, Ayanokoji? You must be great at sports, right?"
"No, I would say that I'm just about average."
"Really?"
Sia seemed dissatisfied with my answer. She must have quite a discerning eye.
"Even though I wouldn't like to admit it, Horikita is right. You're obviously trained and..." She grabbed my arm with her hand, softly brushing over my skin. "...judging from your body heat, your muscle density must be also pretty high. Way above average I would say."
"You must be mistaken. Other external factors like environment, activity level, and health status also play a role. Additionally, different individuals may have different baseline levels of body heat due to differences in their metabolic rates, body composition, and other physiological factors."
"I know and I have already included every factor in my judgement. Still, your muscle density must be really high. I can't believe that you're supposed to be just average. What exactly are you hiding, Ayanokoji?"
Seeing that she has some suspicions, it confirmed my theory that she didn't remember the past. Though I wasn't sure if she was just acting or not, deciding to test her by baiting her.
"I just used to play chess very much."
"Chess..? I don't think that chess..."
It doesn't seem like she understood the bait. Not only by her words but also by her actions. I have previously already found out that she's a bad liar, so unless she is a master in deception, she wouldn't be able to fool me with her acting. It seems like she really did forget.
"If you're that uncomfortable with it, then I won't pry any further. Just take your time."
Realizing that I won't give her any clear answers, she decided to drop the topic.
"Alright, everyone gatherー"
Then, the teacher came in and started with the usual introduction.
We soon started to warm up with 50m swimming, before the teacher suddenly announced something.
"Anyway, it looks like mostly everyone can swim."
While his statement was true, there were people included in that list, who swam slower than a child. And with 'people' I meant a certain girl with short, black hair.
"Sorry, Sensei. Back in middle school I was called the Flying Fish after all."
"I see. Then you guys can immediately start competing against each other then. 50m freestyle, separate yourselves by gender."
"C-compete!? Are you serious?"
"I'll give the first place winner a bonus: 5,000 points. On the other hand, last place will get supplementary lessons so prepare yourselves."
Those who were good at swimming were cheering, while the worse swimmers weren't thrilled at all.
"Because there aren't too many girls, I'll split you guys into two groups and give the fastest time the overall victory. For the boys, I'll take the top 5 times and then hold a final round."
I didn't expect the school to give points as prizes. Perhaps it's to punish the students who skipped class. What a well-thought-out plan.
There were 16 boys and 11 girls, excluding those who didn't know how to swim. When the girls started their race, the boys sat on the sidelines and started to cheer for... no, evaluate the girls.
"Kushida-chan Kushida-chan Kushida-chan Kushida-chan Kushida-chan. Hahahaha."
"Hirano-san Hirano-san Hirano-san Hirano-san Hirano-san. Hehehehe."
While Kushida has completely captured Ike's mind, Sia seemed to have done the same to Sotomura. Sotomura even used 'san' to refer to Hirano, even though it is commonly used to speak to someone of a higher hirarchial status.
"You guys are scary, Ike, Sotomura—quiet down."
"B-but Kushida-chan is fucking cute. Her breasts are really big too."
"And don't forget about Hirano-san! Her gap-moe is just too strong! I want her to dominate me and spit on me and then take care of me after with her usual gentle smile~"
Without realizing, I grit my teeth as I heard Sotomura talking about his fantasy's with Sia. For some reason, it bothered me.
Kushida and Sia garnered popularity from the boys in a whirlwind. Is there anyone as popular as them right now?
"Tsk. Kushida-chan is way better than that medium sized girl!"
"You don't know what you're talking about! Hirano-san is the complete package of everything!"
Ike and Sotomura argued about who the better girl was. However, they were so loud that even the girls could hear it, resulting in Sia glaring at them in irritation.
"Oh, she looked at me!"
"Tsk. I might understand what you mean, Sotomura..."
In only a few seconds, they both had gone from fighting with each other to agreeing with each other. And for some reason, the feeling of irritation inside me just kept building up.
Next up was Horikita.
If you only talked about faces, Horikita was second, but her bad personality dropped her popularity down. However, she has a fair bit of popularity, so when she stood at the start line, there were a few cheers.
"Everyone, make sure to remember this sight! Today's fap material has been secu—"
Ike was in the middle of his sentence, but stopped mid sentence for some reason, shuddering as he did so.
The whistle blew, and the 5 girls jumped in. Horikita is in lane 2. Taking the lead in the beginning, she maintained her lead at a distance. She confidently came in first place.
"Oh! Horikita did it!"
Her time was about 28 seconds. That's pretty quick. Without even breathing heavily, Horikita slowly got out of the pool.
The boys were staring at her bouncing ass as she got out of the pool. I also unintentionally looked at Horikita. She really wasn't my type. Yea.
Then came the second race. Kushida and Sia were in lane 4. The boys were waving and cheering with smiles on their faces.
"Woooooooo!"
They're some aggressive boys. Some of them even tried to look in between the girls' legs, but were stopped by a weird feeling they felt.
During the self-introductions, Kushida declared to the whole class that she wanted get along with everybody. It seems like her wish came true. And about Sia...that girl really didn't care. It seems like she is not used to all that attention and chose to ignore it rather than embrace it.
The second race started. It was pretty one-sided. The girl known as Onodera won the race in a landslide. Her time of 26 seconds was clearly the best time. Kushida got a time of 31 seconds, which was pretty good but only got her 4th place. The last place was occupied by Sia with a time of a little over two minutes. How can a person be so bad at physical activieties?
I went to go talk to Sia who had gotten out of the pool.
"That's too bad. Last place. Seems like you have to take suplementary lessons."
"Ugh. At least I managed to make it through the whole race..."
"That's not something to be proud of."
"Talk about yourself. Are you confidence in yourself, mr. average?"
"Obviously. I just don't have to be last. As long as I'm not you, it should be fine."
"..."
I already gave up on trying to get 1st place. My only goal is to avoid the supplementary lessons.
I was put in lane 2, while Sudou was in the first lane. Matching Sudou's pace was impossible, so I didn't even try to. I aimed to stay in the middle so I wasn't last place. Keeping that in mind, I dived into the pool.
Finishing the 50m stretch with great speed, Sudou looked up from the water. The boys and girls let out a voice of admiration.
"Is that even possible, Sudou? You finished in 25 seconds."
I only got 36 seconds. About 10th place. Great, I don't have to take supplementary lessons then.
"Sudou, won't you join the swimming club? If you practiced, you'd compete pretty well."
"I plan on just playing basketball. Swimming's just for fun."
Not even breaking a sweat from that small amount of swimming, Sudou calmly got out of the pool.
"10th place. Should I call you Averagekoji then?"
After I finished my race, Sia approached me with a small grin on her face, making fun of me.
"Please don't give me weird nicknames."
"Yeah yeah, whatever, Averagekoji. More importantly, is there any reason why we're having swimming classes in april?"
"That's because we have a great indoor pool."
"Really? I don't think that's it. Do you still remember what he had said? Something about teaching us until summer? Not only had he given us a time limit, but the way he specifically mentioned 'summer' kind of bothers me. Wouldn't he usually say something like 'at the end of our classes' instead of summer?"
"You're just overthinking things."
"Maybe or maybe not. We'll see."
At the end, the first three places were occupied by Koenji, Sudou and Hirata in that exact order. And so we proceeded leisurely with our student life's until the end of the month.
And thus, the first of may approached.