"No way…"
The crestfallen High School boy stood in front of the vending machine, rummaging through every pocket he had, but couldn't even find a ten-yen coin.
Finally, he had run out of ammunition.
The piercing sound of cicadas filled his ears, the air in his vision shimmered and distorted, sweat trickled down his cheeks from his forehead, and he felt as if his soul was escaping from the top of his head.
Damn it, how can summer in the island country be so hot… Tokyo! Hot!
Even though it was already the last day of August, there was no sign of the temperature dropping.
He reluctantly bent down and felt the coin return slot, wondering if someone had bought a drink and forgotten to take their change, but he felt nothing.
In his previous life, although he wasn't wealthy, he was at least a corporate slave who could support himself, and he had never been this poor.
It was bad enough that he didn't become a winner in his new life, but to be so down and out that he couldn't even afford a cold drink was truly miserable.
Now he faced a difficult choice.
Either slink away from the vending machine like a loser, or…
One last gamble!
Well, as a man of integrity, there's no need to say what choice he should make, right?
Damn you, old heavens! I'm coming for you!
He continued to bend down, his knees slowly lowering, hands on the ground, his whole body in the fierce posture of a king of beasts hunting…
Success or failure rests on this one move!
Come on! Koi!
For true duelists, everything is inevitable!
"Kuroba-kun, no matter how short on money you are, you shouldn't lie on the ground looking under the vending machine. Your uniform will get dirty."
What appeared in his vision was not a coin that would change his destiny, but a pair of black leather shoes. Judging by the 23cm (size 36) shoe size, the owner of these shoes should be around 1.55 meters tall.
For a Japanese girl, this was already quite tall.
Looking up from the black over-the-knee socks, the girl covered the hem of her school uniform skirt with her hand, her defense watertight, preventing him from peeking into the abyss beyond the absolute territory.
Having been seen in such a disgraceful state, he… Akira, didn't feel embarrassed at all. He stood up, patted the dust off his uniform, and argued, "I wasn't looking for dropped coins; I was just checking my luck for today."
Upon hearing this, the girl's eyes widened in surprise; she even raised a hand to cover her mouth.
However, what surprised her was not the stubbornness of the person caught red-handed, but the fact that Akira spoke at all.
"Kuroba-kun, you can talk?"
"…I'm not mute; of course, I can talk."
Akira rolled his eyes, fanning his collar to let in air as he grumbled.
The girl, however, tapped her cheek and gave the reason for her surprise.
"Because it's already been a semester plus a summer vacation since we were assigned to the same class, but I've never seen Kuroba-kun talk to anyone."
"Hmph…"
Akira couldn't refute this, as he indeed hadn't spoken a single word to his classmates during the first semester of High School.
It seemed he had only spoken a few words to Kobayakawa-sensei, the language teacher, who had been moved to tears because Akira was willing to speak.
It wasn't that he didn't want to talk, nor did he want to pretend to be aloof; it was simply because… he couldn't speak Japanese!
As a pure-blooded Chinese person who grew up under the red flag in his previous life, although Akira was an old otaku who had been immersed in anime and Japanese culture for many years, he had a considerable understanding of Japanese culture and its adult entertainment industry. He could read the fifty-sound chart, recognized many internationally renowned actresses, and could even recite some lines etched into his DNA. But asking him to truly converse like a local was too difficult for him.
So, when he discovered that he had transmigrated to the island country and had no extra benefits or systems, he, who was usually gentle and easygoing, couldn't help but curse at the sky.
Damn it!!!
You crazy old heavens!
Where are my transmigrator benefits?!
It's fine if you don't give me a system! At least load the 'native language'!
How am I supposed to go to school like this?! Be a High School student, my ass!
But complaints aside, he still had to study. After all, as far as he could tell, Akira realized that he probably couldn't return to his original world, as he didn't even know how he had transmigrated in the first place.
Thus, Akira, with tears streaming down his face, began the arduous process of self-study.
He borrowed his landlady, the Old Lady's, granddaughter's old elementary school Japanese textbooks, wore headphones to practice listening during class, devoured alien-like books at the library after class, and even pestered the short-tempered landlady, the Old Lady, to practice speaking at home.
Day after day, and after a concentrated special training during the summer vacation, Akira finally raised his Japanese to an introductory Lv1 level.
Don't underestimate this introductory level; it was already at a point where locals couldn't detect anything strange. If anyone knew about Akira's transmigrator identity, they would at least praise him: Your Japanese is really good!
And the girl in front of him was the second person Akira formally conversed with after learning the local language… The first was the landlady, the Old Lady.
"So, was there a reason you suddenly started talking?"
"No particular reason, just that my puberty ended, so I'm removing my mental barriers."
Akira couldn't help but laugh himself after saying that—puberty that was fifteen years late.
The girl blinked, accepting this obviously perfunctory explanation. With her hands clasped behind her back, she revealed a charming smile, one that was enough to make genuinely innocent teenagers fall in love at first sight.
"I see, so that means I'm Kuroba-kun's first."
"…."
In that instant, even the old-souled Akira felt his heart rate pick up.
That was quite ambiguous to say…
Akira looked at her smiling expression, unable to tell if she was genuinely innocent or just pretending to be.
"However, I hope Kuroba-kun isn't talking to me because you're friendly to every stranger, but because you know me. After all, if only I know Kuroba-kun, it would feel a bit presumptuous."
She took half a step forward, leaned her upper body, and brought her face close to Akira's, asking, "So, Kuroba-kun, do you know my name?"
"…."
Akira couldn't answer immediately, but it wasn't because he had no impression or had forgotten; after all, she was a classmate.
There were only about thirty students in a class in Japan. It was understandable not to know students from other classes, but he couldn't possibly forget the faces of his own classmates, especially after nearly half a year had passed.
It was just that there was a small accident during the self-introduction session on the first day of school.
At that time, Akira was still in the dual stage of confusion: 'I don't understand Japanese at all!' and 'Who the hell am I?!' He was so preoccupied with his own problems that even if she had introduced herself, Akira couldn't remember her name.
By the way, Akira's entire self-introduction process was…
Stand up! Silence! Look straight ahead! Firm gaze! Not a word! Stand in meditation like an ascetic monk!
Ten seconds… twenty seconds… thirty seconds…
After a suffocating minute, Kobayakawa-sensei, the homeroom teacher and language teacher, who couldn't bear to watch and didn't want to waste any more time, briefly introduced Akira's name on his behalf and gently urged the other students to try and make friends with Akira.
However, how could a self-introduction (self-sabotage) that approached absolute zero be changed by a little care from the homeroom teacher?
Akira was thus branded as a gloomy weirdo 'no one wanted to associate with,' and on the very first day of school, he was unanimously relegated by his classmates to the lowest tier of the class, even lower than an otaku.
Of course, Akira had always been indifferent.
Rather, he was even a little happy, because he successfully learned his new name and its pronunciation, although the cost was an entire semester of living a lonely myth.
Perhaps the girl in front of him also remembered Akira's name at that time.
However, Akira had thought he wouldn't have any interaction with his classmates until graduation, but he didn't expect to strike up a conversation with her here, and she was the one who initiated it.
Is it because it's summer vacation now, and there are no other classmates nearby, so she dared to approach him? No, she should be more scared if no one else is around, right?