Chapter 17
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Volume 1: First Performance: A Tragic Love Story Of A Young Lady And Spring Cherry Blossoms
Chapter 17: The Cross-Dressing Boy Learns The Young Lady’s Intentions
In the blink of an eye, time passed――――and finally, lunchtime arrived.
The sound of the bell rang out, and the classmates stretched out their arms in exhaustion.
Then everyone started moving, spreading out their lunches with their friends or heading to the cafeteria.
As I was staring blankly at the scene, Honoka called out to me from the seat in front of me with an innocent smile.
“Onee-sama! Would you like to have lunch together again today?! Hina-chan and Hanako-chan said they’ll be waiting for you in the cafeteria!!”
“Ah, I’m sorry, Honoka-san. I have a prior engagement after this today…”
“Do you have a prior appointment?”
“Yes. I would really like to have lunch with you all, but…there are some unavoidable and complicated circumstances…”
“…Kaede Kisaragi.”
Suddenly, I heard my name being called in an emotionless, monotone voice.
When I turned towards the direction of the voice, I saw a girl with medium-long black hair standing at the entrance to the classroom.
The expressionless girl, wearing a white frilly head dress with a white brim, which was often worn with maid uniforms, stared intently at my face and quietly began to speak.
“…My lady is waiting. Please follow me.”
With those words, the girl walked briskly down the hallway and disappeared.
I hurriedly left the classroom and followed behind the girl.
“Wait!”
The girl, dressed like a maid, walked straight and swiftly down the hallway.
As I trailed closely behind her, trying not to be left behind… she didn’t say a single word to me.
Nervously, I decided to try and speak to her back.
“Um… You were the maid standing behind Lady Karen during lunchtime yesterday, right?”
“……..”
“M-may I ask your name…?”
“Are you hitting on me?”
“……Huh?”
“I know that deep down, you’re a beast starved for lust. So your intentions are obvious. You plan to win over a seemingly innocent and docile girl like me and then devour her body, right? Honestly, this is why creatures that survive on nothing but lust are such a troublesome thing.”
“…Umm, well, I don’t have any such intentions…”
“It’s Reina.”
“What?”
“My name is Reina Akiba. I serve Lady Karen of the Hananomiya family as a maid.”
After abruptly introducing herself, the maid who called herself Reina continued walking quietly.
…This girl and I had only exchanged glances for the first time yesterday, so we were practically strangers, right?
So why did she speak to me with such anger in her voice?
Tilting my head in confusion, I quietly followed behind the maid――――.
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“Yanagisawa-kun. You’ve arrived.”
When I reached the rooftop, there was Karen, elegantly eating a sandwich on a leisure sheet.
Upon spotting me, Karen smiled and gestured for me to sit across from her with a “Please?”
I obeyed her words and sat down in front of her in a formal kneeling position.
“Now then. The reason I summoned you is to discuss a certain matter. I intend to talk to you about it now.”
“…This is about the commotion this morning, isn’t it?”
“Huh? This morning? Ah… do you mean the incident where you subdued the molester?”
“Huh? So it’s not that? I thought for sure you were going to scold me for risking exposure as a boy…”
“I don’t think there’s any problem with that. Judging from the situation around you, not many people suspect that you’re a boy. If anything, isn’t it good that you’ve become popular through this opportunity? With this, you’ve come one step closer to becoming the ‘Flower’ of Hananomiya Girls Academy, I think.”
Saying this with a big smile, Karen put the last bit of sandwich into her mouth and began wiping her mouth with a napkin.
After letting out a short sigh, she wore a tired expression.
“What I want to discuss with you is a different matter. Remember how I mentioned yesterday that there was going to be a family dinner gathering at the Hananomiya estate?”
“Ah, yeah, you did mention that.”
“You’re probably not aware of the circumstances of the Hananomiya family, but right now, there’s a fight for succession going on within the Hananomiya family. Led by me, the daughter of the eldest son, my siblings, and cousins are all competing to succeed my grandfather.”
“Wow, that sounds… pretty intense. Wait, but shouldn’t the successor be someone like your father, Karen, since he’s the eldest son? Why is there a succession battle among the grandchildren?”
“Well… my grandfather believes that younger people can manage the group for a longer time. Because of that, he’s entrusted various companies under the Hananomiya umbrella to all the grandchildren, and he’s evaluating our management skills to determine who’s most suitable to inherit the family.”
“A…company? Wait a minute. Karen, you’re 15 or 16 years old, just like me, right? And you’re managing a company? Seriously?”
“Oh, did I not mention it before? I’m actually the president of a couple of companies. On top of that, I’m also in charge of the board of directors for this school that was entrusted to me by Grandfather —— Hananomiya Girls’ Academy. However, my name isn’t clearly on the board as the chairman, so I kind of run the school from the shadows.”
“Uh, huh… This is a story on such a grand scale that I can’t really understand it…”
“You may be talking like it’s someone else’s problem, but you’ve already taken a step forward in this matter, you know?”
“Huh? Why? Far from being the successor to the Hananomiya family, they called me an unloved child.”
“I said that Grandfather entrusted me with the running of this school, right? If this school is profitable, then my management skills will be recognized by Grandfather… so this is a successor screening, so to speak. Hehe, don’t you understand now? Why you were allowed to enroll in this school?”
“…Ah…I see. So, in order to make an impact for Lady Karen, I was dressed as a girl and thrown into this girls’ school. So, this wasn’t an order from the main Hananomiya family, but something you gave me yourself?”
“Correct, applause! clap, clap, clap, clap.”
Saying that, Karen lowered her eyes and clapped her hands a few times, then she put her hand to her mouth and smiled fearlessly.
“The only people in the Hananomiya family who know that you are enrolled in this school are me, my aunt Airi who is on my side, and this girl who has sworn loyalty to me – Reina, the maid. Therefore, most people in the Hananomiya family don’t know that the rejected Fuuma Yanagisawa is attending an all-girls high school dressed as a girl.”
“…Huh? Well, when that aunt kept talking about the main family, I thought for sure it was an order from a high-ranking official in the main family…but I guess that wasn’t the case…”
Saying that, Karen let out a big sigh, her smile vanished, and she suddenly spoke to me with a serious look on her face.
“Now onto the main point… My siblings, who are fighting over the succession with me, have been acting strangely suspicious lately. They’ve started to be strangely concerned about Hananomiya Girls’ Academy lately… and it’s making me a bit worried.”
“So, are you trying to say that your brother is planning to do something to this school… or something like that?”
“Yes, that’s right. These days, the fight for succession is no longer a test of pure management ability. It has become an ugly act of tripping each other up, with spies hiding in the companies each side runs and attacking each other from behind the scenes.”
Saying that, Karen let out a short sigh, picked up the teacup, and quietly gazed at the surface of the tea.
“Yanagisawa-kun, as I ordered you before, you should work hard to become the top actress at this school. However, you should make sure that you never let it be known that you are a man. I think that something like today is still within the realms of acceptability, but you must always be careful not to give away any major flaws. It would not be strange if there were spies sent by other successor factions at this school. If they were to find out about this…there is no doubt that I would be criticized as a manager.”
“I see. I get it, Karen. But… you did some pretty crazy things to get some results. Was there any point in going to all that trouble to get me into this school?”
“That’s… because I―――――――”
That was when it happened.
The door to the rooftop opens and a female teacher dressed as a nun appears.
The female teacher – my homeroom teacher, Maria Ashiya, put her hands on her knees, panted, and spoke to us in a flustered manner.
“”S-something terrible has happened, Karen-san! Just now, in the staff room―――――””
After hearing those words and what followed after, Karen and I suddenly found ourselves looking at each other in silence.
