“…Umm, so they were talking to me?”
He still hadn’t realized that the students were indeed talking to him; hence, there was a kind of veiled request for confirmation behind his question.
Either way it didn’t seem like he would be going anywhere unless this conversation progressed.
Youko curtly replied with a deep sigh, “Seems like it.”
“Sigh… I am a member of the public morals committee, so I should at least let you know. Hierarchies are a big deal in this school. People will rarely let you off just because you didn’t notice them, so be sure to be careful next time.”
“That’s impossible… Ah.”
“Hah?”
That may have been an offhand remark, but it was still an instant rejection of a public moral committee member’s advice.
By the time Shinichi realized what he’d said, he’d covered his mouth with his hands.
Shinichi was the sort of person who couldn’t hear anything around him when focused on his thoughts.
What’s more is that he’s spent a long time traveling alone where he proactively rejected others.
Unless he focuses and listens for voices around him, he can’t notice anything around him even when asked unless there’s killing intent, mana, or strong hostility.
But that’s not something he could tell this girl in front of him.
“…Should I take that ‘impossible’ of yours as you not having any intention to change for the better?” She asked.
“Umm, that’s…”
Shinichi was completely baffled by her annoyed words.
If he were still calm, he could still have salvaged the situation, but he didn’t have a hint of that left.
After all, if he were asked if he felt like changing for the better, the answer would be a resounding ‘no’.
He didn’t think there was any need to change.
But he also knew how others would take that, so he couldn’t say anything.
“Is that so? Then just do whatever you want then!”
Of course, to her, his speechlessness could only be affirmation, and in the end, she left fuming.
She, who watched that entire exchange, from her master’s shoulders sighed as she watched her master scratch his face, troubled.
“What a short-tempered girl,” she asked.
“Only when it comes to stuff involving me, though. Ha ha ha…” Shinichi replied.
Shinichi couldn’t help but laugh dryly as he gave his conjecture that was most likely correct.
When all the classes in the morning were over, the boy collapsed in his chair.
Steam could almost be seen coming out of his head.
She wryly smiled. “Kyukyui?”
“…This is cruel, too cruel… I couldn’t take a single class properly.”
What responded to that worrying voice was a weak voice and an exhausted face.
In these past few days, the classes could more or less be divided into three categories.
The first category covered classes he either knew too much about or were too good at but terrible at holding back at.
The second covered classes that spoke of things so strange he couldn’t understand them at all.
And last covered classes he knew too little about, and as such couldn’t keep up with the speed of the lectures.
In other words, not a single class could be taken properly.
Given such desperate circumstances, it only stood to reason that he would turn to the five basic subjects for salvation.
“But! I endured! Alright, let’s go! The cafeteria is calling!!”
“Kyukyu!”
Perhaps the cafeteria was his only oasis here.
She nodded and jumped up to his shoulder, then Shinichi bolted out of the classroom.
The sudden change in mood caused the people around him to become flabbergasted, but Shinichi couldn’t care less.
The place he looked forward to the most in Garesto Academy was the cafeteria.
To someone like him who spent 2 years in another world, where the food he ate everyday wasn’t guaranteed, the guaranteed food provided by the cafeteria was a very welcome treat.
As soon as Shinichi entered the cafeteria, he ordered a pork fried with ginger set meal, muttering under his breath that it was revenge for the other day.
Upon getting his tray, he looked for an empty seat. This was the time period when the cafeteria was busiest.
No matter how big the school made the cafeteria, it could never be capable of accommodating the entire student body simultaneously.
The cafeteria was so packed during the lunch hour rush that the students couldn’t even afford to separate themselves into groups.
“Oh, a free seat. Let’s take it and start eating.”
“Kyui!”
For some reason, though, the table at the center was free, and Shinichi happily took it.
Suddenly, the noisy atmosphere all around froze.
Normally, a person would find it strange why there’s a seat vacant when the cafeteria was so busy.
And even if said person didn’t find anything strange about it and took it anyway, they would still realize that there’s something off in the response of the people around them.
But right now, before Shinichi, was that delicious pork fried with ginger, looking and smelling as tasty as he’d imagined.
Moreover, it was accompanied by the dazzling white rice and the aromatic miso and fresh salad.
Before such a delicious meal, Shinichi was already at his wit’s end just keeping his drool from spilling out of his mouth; hence, he was not in the state of mind to realize such a minor detail.
“Hamu, KUuu!! I’m so happy to be able to live!!!”
“KyuUuu!!”
Shinichi took the empty table without any hesitation and carefully chewed his food to taste every bit of it.
With such delicious food in hand, the confusion of the onlookers couldn’t matter less.
The servant beast with him was also taken by the inari sushi he’d given her.
But while the main characters in this incident were at the peak of their happiness, the faces of the people around them were all pale, and in a miraculous turn of events, the thoughts of all the students gathered in the place overlapped.
—What does this transfer student think he’s doing!?
But that was only a given.
After all, the table he was using was specially prepared for the special class, who possessed the greatest privileges among the student body.
No student believed that it was okay for a normal student to use it.
Unfortunately, none of them thought that he might have simply not known.
“Hey, what are you sitting there for!”
As luck would have it, the people who had the right to use that table came.
Moreover, it was the more hot-headed bunch who came.
“The sweetness of the cabbage is enough to make me cry! I want to beat the past me for hating vegetables!”
“Hah?”
To make things worse, Shinichi was completely immersed in eating and couldn’t hear them.
He filled his mouth with the side dish salad and smiled with his whole face.
“The umami of meat, the brilliance of white rice, the warmth of miso soup, and the abundant vegetables. KUUu!! With this I’ll be able to get through the afternoon classes too!!”
Compared to those fruitless lessons, this delicious meal was truly a gift from heaven.
As Shinichi looked like he couldn’t be happier, the onlookers were flabbergasted.
“…Ahh, so delicious…”
Grain by grain the rice turned Shinichi useless, the umami of the miso soup filled him, and he reached the peak of happiness.
When ‘she’ saw that, she was moved to tears.
Therefore…
“D-Don’t mess with us!”
“Kyu!”
“Uwah, you’re kidding!”
Anyone who would interfere with her master could only be her enemy.
She flashed her purple lightning at the approaching students and showed them her fangs.
When they realized her existence for the first time, they were naturally flustered.
“I-Is that an amaryllis!?”
“Why is a protected animal that people are forbidden from making contact with here!?”
The infamy of the amaryllis has reached far and wide. Strictly speaking, she wasn’t actually an amaryllis, but she looked just like the real thing and also had similar abilities.
With someone like her blocking the way, naturally, even the special class students couldn’t do a thing.
It wasn’t worth picking a fight with someone like her just because of a table.
“…Was he always that kind of gentleman?”
Meanwhile, a girl with a magnificent aura muttered to herself as she watched from the entrance of the cafeteria.