"You came into my life as a story,
you left as a legend."
—Katekyo Hitman Reborn, Reborn.
The Empress | Chapter 2
It was a boiling hot summer day in Japan, Tokyo. The only relief was the cool wind blowing every once in a while. But of course, the heat was no excuse to slack off from practice for the Seishun Gakuen Tennis Club regulars.
"It's too hot. Way too hot!" Momoshiro Takeshi exclaimed, throwing his tennis racket gripping hand up.
"Fuuush, don't state the obvious, baka." A snake-like male—Kaido Kaoru—inputted.
"Huh?! What did you say, Viper?!"
"Maa, calm down you two." A brown-haired male with closed eyes and a never-ending smile—Fuji Shusuke—said.
Yet, the two rivals continued their bickering.
"I just finished making a new Inui-juice." The two froze in terror. "I call it the Improved Akazu." The male with the notebook in hand—Inui Sadaharu—pushed up his glasses, making the lens flash under the suns ray.
The effect of those words was immediate as they all instant backed away from the smirking male with green faces, except for the sadist, who looked like he wanted to try it and a stoic captain—Tezuka Kunimitsu, who observed his teammate with a mental sigh.
"Save me Oishiii, nya!" A cat-like male—Kikumaru Eiji—hid behind his doubles partner—Oishi Shuichiro, who looked worried.
"C-calm down everyone." Being the mother-hen among the group, he tried to stop the chaos.
The last male—Kawamura Takashi—sat on the bench shyly, watched his teammate. That is until a certain Tensai placed a racket in his hand. Instantly, a loud "Burning!" broke his silence.
Approaching from a distance, "What is with all the racket?" Keigo Atobe raised an elegant eyebrow with the rest of his team behind him.
"Hyotei?!" Momoshiro Takeshi exclaimed in surprise.
Kikumaru stepped out from behind Oishi, "Hoi, hoi, what is Hyotei doing here?"
"Ore-sama was thinking of having a practice tennis match against Seigaku. Isn't that right, Kabaji?"
"Usu." The tanned giant—Munehiro Kabaji—replied while carrying a sleeping Jiro Akutagawa on his back effortlessly.
The rest of Hyotei stood behind their self-proclaimed king and sighed. The weather was hot enough and to top it off they were going to be running. However, no one complained about their captain's decisions. But that didn't mean they couldn't complain.
"It's too hot, nya!" Kikumaru flailed his arms around, resulting in the racket to slip from his grip.
Everyone present watched as the racket flew up and landed out of sight.
"My racket! Wait, nya!" The acrobatic male immediately ran after it.
"Wait, Eiji!" Oishi followed; worried for his partner running without looking where he's going. Everyone knew it's a bad idea to let the cat-like tennis player run loose without someone supervising him.
The rest also trailed or jogged behind two since the tennis courts were in that direction.
When the two groups of males arrived at their stop, Yushi Oshitari noticed a shift in movement from a distance away.
There was a male crouching down; the sight was unclear, making the figure look like a blob of color.
Kikumaru quickly grabbed the fallen racket in his hands and smiled widely before squinting his eyes, following Oshitari's line of sight. His sharp eyes noticed another figure laying down, a smaller one. He froze dead on his track, "I-is that a corpse?" he pointed towards the figures with a shaky finger, too scared to add his usual 'nya' at the end.
"N-nani?" Oishi's snapped his head at said direction, eyes wide open. His fellow tennis members had similar reactions, yet the calmer ones managed to remain composed. Fuji was no longer smiling but opened his eyes to reveal beautiful blue haze. Atobe raised an elegant brow and walked towards the figures, wanting to be the first to see what was going on. The rest followed behind him reluctantly, except for the curious and interested ones. Fuji, Tezuka, Inui, Oshitari, and Hiyoshi followed calmly.
When their vision was clear, they stood there in shock. There was an average looking male with light brown hair crouching down towards a girl. Correction. A beautiful girl. Her impossibly long lashes lightly kissing her smooth cheeks with eyes firmly shut, and for some reason, they felt a strong desire to see those eyes open to reveal the color they hide. High cheeks bones, cute nose, sharp chin and red lips under the bland-looking male looked inviting. Her knee-length, silky locks laid around her petite figure like a shield with small locks framing her slim face. The girl was wearing a short-in-the-front-and-long-in-the-back sky blue dress which was decorated with flowers on the hips. It emphasized rather tightly around her bust with strings zigzagging, making it appear bigger—most blushed at that observation. The front of her dress reached a couple inches above her mid-thighs, showing off her toned, slim legs and her small feet. Her slim neck wrapped in a string of flower in the left side and bare shoulders, displaying more of the snow white complex.
All in all, she was definitely a sight for sore eyes. The girl was stunning. Only when the male hovering over her gently gripped the side to her cheeks and leaned closer to meet her velvet lips, did they snap out of their daze.
Kikumaru blushed deeply, along with his teammates and Hyotei—the tranquil tennis players tried not to let it get to them.
"Hang on; s-she looks like she's sleeping. Should we stop him?" Otori, being the perfect gentleman, asked with dusted pink cheeks.
"Yes, it's only proper to stop him." Fuji nodded with a glint in his eyes.
"What if he's her b-boyfriend?" Kawamura added shyly, his whole face turning bright red.
"Ore-sama will find out." The 'King of Hyotei' was all too calm yet, his eyes were narrowed at the male. He walked over and coughed loudly in annoyance, making the male jolt and stand up all too quickly. He looked panicked as he glanced around from side to side before his wide eyes landed on Atobe and the males behind him.
"I-I-I wasn't-"
The male's panicked behavior gave him away. "There is exactly 9.1% he is this girl's boyfriend." Inui answered their previous question which was all too obvious now unless he was too shy to kiss his beautiful 'girlfriend', which seems doubtful.
The male gulped under their accusing gaze and ran like his life depended on it—which it probably did.
"Hey, wait!" Hiyoshi and Momoshiro looked like they wanted to run after him, but stopped when the girl stirred. Instantly, their gaze was on her petite figure as she slowly opened her eyes.
Time seems to stop as they stared deep into two breath-taking hazel orbs that seem to sparkle under the sun. They watched as she squinted her eyes from the searing brightness of the sun and blinked slowly, trying to adjust to the brightness, before sitting up and rubbing her right eye all-too-cutely.
Oishi froze in his place, how were they going to explain the situation when a group of males was standing over a helpless beauty without being called perverts. Momoshiro cursed the run-away male, if he was here, they could have cleared up the potential misunderstanding.
After a moment of holding their breath, they heard the beauty ask in a mellow voice. "Where is this?"
Fuji's breath hitched as he hoped no one heard. Her voice was calm and collective yet, gentle and melodious as the sound of bells. Perhaps because she just woke up. Whatever the reason, the sound affected Fuji and from a quick glance around, he wasn't the only one.
How can one girl have so much effect on them? Fuji concluded that since they were always focused on tennis that they never really got to interact with the opposite gender.
But, there was also something familiar about the beauty.
Finally deciding to break the silence, Tezuka replied much to their relief; they didn't want to keep the beauty waiting. "We are in a tennis court. Are you lost?" He didn't ask what she was doing sleeping in an open field full of dangerous males. It wasn't his business and he didn't want to seem nosy.
"Um... you were almost attacked!" Hiyoshi finally explained with pink cheeks, she was exactly his type: a delicate girl.
They watched as the girl curiously tilted her head—rather cutely might they add—before a look of realization flashed her eyes. "Mhm."
'That's it?!'
They shouted mentally. Usually, a girl would be freaked out, scared, or even disgusted, but the girl just acted like it was normal, something that happens all too often.
"It's okay, you're safe now, nya!" Kikumaru approached the girl and patted her head gently. 'Her hair is so soft, nya!' He had misunderstood her response—or the lack thereof—as shock and thus, decided to comfort her, most likely unaware of how inappropriate it was.
And for the ninth time, his teammate watched in shock as the fragile beauty slowly leaned into the acrobatic player's touch. "Kitty." She whispered.
Kikumaru's heart accelerated as he unconsciously tightened his hold on some of her long locks, resulting in a pained whimper from her velvet lips.
Oishi immediately pulled his partner away from the fragile beauty gently, "Are you okay?" his eyes filled with concern making her eyes widen ever so slightly before returning to normal.
"Ojou-sama!"
Atobe watched as another male with a butler outfit rushed towards the girl. He immediately pulled her in a tight hug as though she weighed nothing, which was probably true.
This one was rather handsome with short blond hair and blue eyes. He looked older than them by at least a couple of years.
"Ojou-sama, I was so worried! You suddenly disappeared while I was talking to the CEO." The male pulled back and scanned her over for any injuries. "Is Ojou-sama alright? What happened to the bodyguards?"
The 'King' immediately took a disliking to the male when the cute little minx blinked owlishly and patted his hair to calm him down. "Yuki is fine, Haru."
He perked up at the name once again. Judging from the sound, it appears the girl—now known as 'Fuyuki' or 'Yuki'—refers to herself in the third person. "Yuki told them to leave her be."
"And they obeyed?" Haru asked in disbelieve; they were hired by Fuyuki's father, not her.
Nodding, "Ja." It was obvious how much charisma she had based on her powerful yet, frail aura.
But, little did they know she actually blackmailed them into obeying her.
Some of the tennis players were curious as to what 'Ja' meant, and it only took a few moments for the observant males to understand as she nodded her head when she said it. Of course, Tezuka understood the word perfectly since he traveled to Germany and picked up on the common German words at the very least. Kikumaru swooned inwardly at the cute 'Ja'.
"Ojou-sama!" he frowned. "You must be protected from savages who try to corrupt your innocent!"
With that said, Atobe concluded the butler was a lunatic. The self-proclaimed 'King' was highly annoyed at being ignored. "Who are you?" He practically demanded in a rather rude tone.
Finally, the butler acknowledged their presence. He stood protectively in front of the petite girl, blocking her from their view, and glared at the tennis players. "I'm Ojou-sama's personal butler, Chevalier Haru. Who are you..?" he seized up their appearances, which Fuyuki forgot to do, and right away she recognized the name 'Seigaku' label on some of their jerseys. Stepping out from the butler's frame, the beauty stood in front of the group like she was seeing them for the first time.
"Seigaku," she repeated, catching their attention. The adoration in her tone sent a proud glow through their hearts while the Hyotei captain and his fellow teammates felt both envious for some reason—which they decided was 'because the pretty foreigner is Seigaku's fan'.
Fuyuki hesitantly opened her mouth, and then closed it. As if sensing her reluctance, Oishi smiled at her encouragingly. And that's all it took for the girl to say, "Yuki wants to see Ryoma."
Kikumaru pouted in disappointment. In fact, they were all disappointed and noted how the beauty used the freshman's first name.
"Frei-chan knows O'chibi?" The redhead finally managed. Haru immediately glared at the male for calling her 'Frei-chan'. Meanwhile, Fuyuki was puzzled as she repeated the last word 'O'chibi'.
"He means Echizen Ryoma." Fuji added helpfully.
They watched in another wave of envy as the beauty smiled dazzlingly for the first time since their meeting; her whole face lit up like Christmas lights as she nodded. "Ja. Do you know where he is?" Unable to contain her excitement, she subconsciously grabbed the Tensai's shirt and looked at him—she was an inch or so taller—with the happiest look Fuji has ever seen in his presence. Usually, people cower away at the sight of his sadistic face yet, here she is clinging to his shirt as if her life depends on it. He could smell the scent of magnolia from the small distance between them.
"The brat went back to America." It was Atobe that spoke for the Tensai and Fuji wasn't sure if he wanted to thank him or poison him.
Instantly, her hands dropped to her sides discouragingly. With a small, "Oh." she found the ground to be of more interest.
Atobe felt guilty for the reaction he caused but to his defense, it was the truth. Nonetheless, the guilt refused to go as he—for the first time in a while—shifted uncomfortably on his right leg.
Inui was all too busy furiously writing everything down on his notebook, muttering "Ii data." under his breath. Clearly the male was too busy to feel any guilt.
"Are you satisfied now, Ojou-sama? Let's go home." Haru pulled her away gently and kept both hands on her shoulders as a sign of comfort.
But Fuyuki felt frosty.
Why?
Why wasn't he here?
Fuyuki had run away and made up too many excuses to count in order to come to Japan. She wanted to see him again no matter what. Her papa was mad, but still, she begged and pleaded to go to Japan. Only to realize he's not even in Japan. She wanted to laugh at herself for looking so wretched. She should have done some research before coming here instead of planning on surprising the tennis prodigy.
"W-we could leave him a message when he comes back..?" Oishi suggested awkwardly, he felt bad despite knowing it wasn't anyone's fault.
Two hazel pools meet his bland black eyes making him gulp. "Please tell Ryoma, Yuki came to Japan to see him, and" she quickly crouched down and ruffled through her small purse—which they only noticed now—to pull out a pen and paper. He watched as she wrote down ten digits before handing the paper to him, "tell him to call her; Yuki lost her previous phone and- his phone always seems to be busy." she mumbled the last part more softly.
Oishi repeated those words in his head and nodded with a smile. "I will."
"Thank you." Fuyuki pecked his left cheek gently. "Please continue to take care of Ryoma. Although he seems arrogant, Ryoma is very fragile." Her gaze was distant, stuck to the ground from the corner of her eyes as she said the last four words. With that said, she left behind 14 bewildered males. Some from the fact that she just kissed a now red-faced Oishi and others from the fact that she just put 'Ryoma' and 'fragile' in one sentence. That freshman was one of the cockiest tennis players they knew.
Lots of scenarios come to mind as to what type of relationship Seigaku's freshman shares with the beautiful girl, but regardless they all agreed that this will not be the last time they see her.
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Edited: Sept 15, 2020