Two years ago, in the winter of my second year of middle school.
Our everyday life and our happiness crumbled.
The special wing of Soubu Middle School...
That was the place for the three of us.
Spring.
I was the first one to enter that classroom.
I created a club called the Service Club, of which I was the only member, and made that classroom my base. ...Now that I think about it, how on earth did I even get approval for a one-person club? I should ask Hiratsuka-sensei about that today.
I was sitting quietly at the back of the classroom, reading a book.
As if waiting for someone, silently, secretly, enduring.
With a great goal in mind—at least from my perspective at the time—of changing the world.
Together with my selfish desire to eliminate enemies, to become a hero.
A little over a year later, a boy walked in.
His eyes were dead, his back hunched, surrounded by a gloomy air...
At Hiratsuka-sensei's request, I had to turn him into a decent person.
...I thought, This man too will throw unnecessary expectations onto me and amplify his filthy desires. Disgusting.
What's more, he had some connection to me. And, very inconveniently, it was a connection that worked against me. What should I do...? I worried about it.
It wasn't that I was at fault. Nor was it wrong to blame my family.
After worrying, I ended up saying nothing.
Let's just keep my distance from him. If I do as always, he'll run away too.
Thinking that, I kept insulting him.
...But contrary to my expectations, he kept coming back to the classroom. Did he fall for me? ...No, he was simply dutiful. An irritating man.
And he, too, secretly harbored the goal of becoming a hero.
There are bound to be such people entering this middle school. I didn't pay much attention to it.
Soon after that, another person entered the classroom. This time, it was a girl.
Just like the boy, she came because of a request.
She wanted to thank someone. For that, she asked me to teach her how to bake cookies.
...Simple and straightforward—just effort.
I reacted to her the same way as always.
Then, like the others, she would probably draw her own line and back away, thinking effort was foolish, justifying herself with "common sense" that wasn't truly correct.
And by some strange fate, she too had a connection to both the boy and me. She wasn't directly harmed, but just as I had with the boy, I tried to make her back away.
...But she didn't leave.
Her first words were ones of admiration. When she called me cool, the boy and I both let out a dumbfounded sound. She then said she'd do it properly this time, and went back into the kitchen.
...Such strange two people.
But I didn't actually feel any disgust.
Before I knew it, I had begun to take it for granted that the boy and the girl were together...
Totsuka Saika, a boy, asked me for help to get stronger at tennis.
The girl relied on me, and the boy—just as I had declared—defeated Hayama Hayato, who spouted meaningless ideals.
Zaimokuza, an eccentric patient of delusion, asked me to critique his novel.
He seemed to be an acquaintance of the boy, and the boy dealt with him with a certain sincerity. Had it been me, I might have insulted him until his spirit was crushed. ...Perhaps I actually tried and failed.
Hayama Hayato, the idealist, asked us to stop a chain mail.
The girl took on a role she hadn't wanted, and the boy made the decisive move.
A middle schooler named Kawasaki Taishi asked us to find out the cause of his sister Saki's coming home late and to stop it.
The girl grew angry for my sake, and the boy made the decisive move again.
From there, our relationship began to fracture slightly.
It seemed there was some kind of history between the boy and the girl.
Because of that, they began to drift apart, and the girl stopped coming to the classroom.
Should we just end this relationship here? ...That thought never came. I couldn't forget the comfort of the classroom we three had shared.
To repair the boy and the girl's relationship, let's celebrate the girl's birthday—a so-called birthday party. I went with the boy and his sister Komachi to search for a present. Though I soon got separated from Komachi.
On the way, the boy did many things for me. ...Could that be called a date? It was the first time I'd gone around stores with a boy alone. I suppose now I can call it my first date.
Along the way—unwillingly, very unwillingly—I also ran into my sister. ...Apparently, the boy had caught my sister's interest. Offering my condolences with clasped hands, I also felt a little irritation.
Moreover, the boy saw through Yukinoshita Haruno's expression as nothing but a fabricated mask. ...It was the first time I'd reevaluated this boy.
And finally, the boy and the girl's relationship returned to normal. They ended their entanglement and began a new relationship as Service Club members, the boy and the girl. I alone was left behind.
Once things finally settled, summer came.
We were asked to help at an elementary school's summer camp.
That was a request from our club advisor, Hiratsuka Shizuka.
I had Komachi drag the boy out and head to fulfill the request.
During that time, we met a certain elementary student, Tsurumi Rumi. She too was a victim of a world that rejected her, even more like my past self than the boy had been.
The boy again made a petty, self-deprecating move to resolve it.
...I could do nothing.
On the way back, my sister arrived together with the car that represented our shared history with the boy and the girl.
I had indeed stayed silent. I didn't know what to do. But this was too much.
I hurried my sister to leave at once, but surely the boy noticed. And the girl as well.
Even after summer ended, I couldn't bring myself to tell the truth to the two of them.
The cultural festival began.
My sister, as the festival's executive committee chair, created a splendid event.
I simply served as an ordinary committee member.
There's no doubt I had many thoughts.
Even so, for some reason I didn't take the same path as my sister this time.
And for some reason, the boy was also on the committee.
...What is he doing, when he said he hated working?
I think I was starting to panic from that point.
Sagami Minami, who became the committee chair, asked me for support and for help making the festival a success. Forgetting our club's original policy, I began working recklessly.
In the middle, I suffered sabotage from my sister, and Sagami—though unconsciously—obstructed things too...
I collapsed from the strain.
But the girl getting angry on my behalf surprised me a little.
The boy didn't say anything, but he came to visit me.
And again the boy made a move. What a fool. He knows he'll be criticized.
...And yet, I was happy.
Even if it wasn't for my sake.
Even if it was just you twisting excuses as usual.
Just recognizing that someone was standing next to me made me happy.
In the end, the festival was a success.
In exchange for one person's status in the school.
...I relied on him again.
The sports festival.
To make it a success, we were asked by upperclassman Shirogane Meguri, whom we'd also met at the cultural festival.
For that, I put the somewhat-disgraced Sagami as the chair and formed a committee.
There were issues—conflicts with sports clubs, friction between Sagami and the boy—but I think it went fairly well. ...Though in the end, our White Team lost. It was truly frustrating not to win with Shirogane-senpai.
On the school trip, we finally had a decisive falling-out.
We were asked by Tobe Shou, a member of Hayama's group, to help with his confession to Ebina Hina. To make it successful—a reckless request that the girl... no, we accepted. But Ebina-san wasn't interested. Then how to succeed?
The girl and I left the final move to the boy.
"I've liked you for a long time. Please go out with me."
...We were stunned.
Those weren't Tobe-kun's words. They were the boy's, who had cut in.
Ebina-san took that opportunity to declare she wouldn't go out with anyone, and the request failed.
There was no chance of success anyway. Even if he acted for Tobe-kun, Ebina-san, and their group's sake—this was too much.
Disappointment.
I thought that's all it was.
What have you done.
I wanted to say it in anger.
But what came from my mouth were only words of disgust.
It wasn't that I hated him—the boy who kept cutting himself, over and over...
It was his way of saving others even so that I hated.
After I spoke those words, the feeling that surfaced surprised me.
...Jealousy.
Of course I worried about his future at school.
But I also had that ugly feeling I'd been burned by many times before...
And so I looked away from it.
Telling myself I just hated his methods.
After the trip, Shirogane-senpai visited the clubroom again, this time with a first-year girl. Her name was Isshiki Iroha. She smiled with obvious artifice, but what was she after? She kept glancing at the boy, who had come despite what happened on the trip... and the boy blushed.
Isshiki-san's request was that she'd been nominated as a student council president candidate and wanted it dealt with—in other words, she didn't want to become president.
...Perhaps it was a jab.
At whom? My sister? True, my sister hadn't been student council president. Maybe she was doing as the boy had said—not chasing my sister, not needing to.
...No. That's not it.
You became a sacrifice.
Not a sacrifice—you just said some incomprehensible thing about creating a world without yourself. For your sake, this time, I wanted to be the sacrifice and help you.
I wanted to prove that even if one of us got hurt, our bond wouldn't break.
...But the girl disliked it.
And the boy probably did too. In the end, Isshiki-san was made student council president. She apparently realized she'd been maneuvered as well.
I realized again I'd done nothing.
Had the two of them rejected me? All I wanted was to prove our bond wouldn't break.
I...
Later, I heard Shirogane-senpai told the boy that her intent had been different. The student council including our Service Club (+1)? ...Perhaps that would have been another correct answer.
December, a little calmer.
Isshiki-san, now the student council president, came again. She wanted help with a joint event with another school. The boy apparently took it on alone.
...Perhaps he still had lingering feelings about it.
Indeed, nothing had been resolved.
Our relationship was still gradually heading for the worst.
During that time, I received some personal training from Hiratsuka-sensei, who is also a pro hero. I thought I'd need training outside the Yukinoshita household too. There, I learned the boy was aiming to become a pro hero as well.
During that work, the boy stepped into the clubroom again for the first time in a while. I had told him he didn't need to come, so why?
...The boy spoke his deepest weakness, his true feelings.
The boy wanted the same kind of relationship as I did.
...I didn't know what to think anymore. When I thought of running away, the girl held us both in her hands.
Finally, we returned to our old relationship—or perhaps even beyond it...
From then on, the girl and I also helped Isshiki-san.
Under the guise of an interview, we went to Tokyo Destiny Land. I spent time with the boy.
Sorting out the past, thinking about the future, and making one promise with the boy.
There, Isshiki-san took a big action.
Even so, Hayama-kun didn't choose her.
In the end, the Christmas party with Kaihin High was a success. On the way, I saw Tsurumi-san from the nature school and Kaori Orimoto, whom I'd seen briefly before. Tsurumi-san sat next to the boy, and Orimoto-san smiled at him. ...Honestly, that boy.
The year turned, and days passed with graduation closer. Naturally, our talk shifted to the future. The day before my birthday, the boy and the girl were caught by my sister and Hayama-kun. More precisely, by my sister.
There, the three of us confirmed we were aiming to become heroes.
I, to set the world right.
The girl, for me and the boy.
The boy, for his little sister.
The girl aside, the boy's words were a little vague.
Was he hiding something? Meanwhile, my sister invited the boy to be her future partner. My sister is enrolled at U.A. High, a promising future hero candidate. That much is certain. She seems to seriously like the boy. ...I could already see our future troubles...
Time passed again. While we trained to become heroes, we lived happy days. Along the way, the marathon and the Valentine's event had some unsettling moments.
We handled requests from Miura-san and Kawasaki-san, and after the Valentine's event—after my sister struck at our fissures—the girl began moving on her own.
What do we even want? Where do we want to go?
That time at Kaihin Park, when we discussed it.
As we sought answers from each other, we made a vow.
We didn't know yet. The girl had already decided, but the boy and I hadn't. But finally, I decided. ...Like the girl, I too wanted the boy. At the same time, I greedily wished to keep my bond with the girl as it was.
Told that by both me and the girl, the boy said he didn't like himself enough to answer us.
Are you trying to run away again? When I tried to press him, an astonishing answer came from the boy.
"Right now... I don't like myself yet. I can't say something as big as which of you I like more. ...But someday, when I've become someone I can be proud of. When I've become a hero who can protect someone in a way different from what I've done so far. Then, I want to give you two my answer."
With tears in our eyes, we nodded at the boy's "answer." He had changed from the person we first met. He might deny it, but he had turned toward us.
Now at last, we could begin to move forward.
It was at that moment I thought so.
And then, our peace was swallowed by a sudden dark mist.