680 is My Target Score!?! -ORCA Series

❲1.0❳ |Prologue|

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【Pov: Kato Kazuki】
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"I hereby declare, Kato Kazuki will withdraw from the candidate of the head of Kato Family."

My faithful companion, Shibasaki-san, tried to keep up both his straight emotion and his tough body posture, standing on the large and sickening meeting room. He who had protected me for years, he who had served me for the last decade, his sharp eyes, gazing at the utterly shocked sight of the main family members of Kato.

Some of them were confused, few had a spark of joy I could felt faintly. This was the best decision I could make, or so I thought.

｢...or so I thought.｣

I thought that I could protect him by withdrawing from the candidate. I thought my beloved brother would gain more honor, care, privileges and so on.

In fact, this was the biggest mistake I had carved in my life.

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"Kato."

My hands stopped writing data observed from strange meteorite rocks I found on the Yaogarazu Museum.

"Enjiro-sensei? Is there anything I could help?"

I took a glance on his weakened old body, resting his backbone on the new wheelchair his daughter bought for the fifth time.

"I had your request paper of internship piling up on the garbage bin, you see. I know you hate paper works and social life, but how would you graduate from Bachelor? Think you shouldn't waste your youth on your ego."

My eyes retracted and my hand continued their job.

"Why bother working under someone when you can do more interesting things on your own? Couldn't my last innovation surpass that internship and paper stuffs?"
"Haha... You're joking. That's far better that those."

I could tell he was being honest. He acknowledged me and he would like to pass me that easily, but he just couldn't. Deep in his heart, he was concerned about myself.

"I've just thought a new solution you can take- what about being a private 'tutor' for three months? Internship sounds hard for you because you will meet a bunch of unfamiliar moving corpses, but being a tutor - you will need to interact to 1 person in a fixed time, and you can spend the rest of the day for your research. Would it work for you?"

Suddenly, Mirai jumped from her little chair and looked at me as if she found something fit in the puzzle.

〈It could work!〉

She told herself in her mind. I rolled my eyes on her and Enjiro-Sensei pulled a smile on his face. He giggled.

"Keep in mind, I won't accept the usual Kato lecture for it, Mirai-chan."

Mirai blinked slowly as she was struggling to disagree on Sensei's guess.

"Kato, sleep on it and let me know if you are interested on it."

He raised from his chair and left me with the 10 years old child I secretly adopted & hid in his research room.

"Kazu-san."
"Hmm?"
"I know this is a selfish request, and this is seems like out of nowhere."

Her little hand passed me a ripped paper from her notebook.

There's a name on it- The moment I read this, I knew it was her foresight, it should be! Though I understood this, I maintained my usual facial expression to hide the fact I could read her mind.

"This person- I -I wanted you to meet ’him‘ personally! ‘He’ is 5 years younger than Kazu-san, if it is possible, would you be a tutor for ’him‘?"

I guessed her right, but this time I couldn't read her motive yet.

"Why?"
"Uh- ‘He’ is a kind person! I can tell that much! I-"

    〈wanted him to be ’his‘ friend! My foresight told me ’he‘ brings a good omen! If it is, I should also tell Kazu-san to tame ’him‘! It should work, no, it must work! ...

Kazu-san should have more friends and people to trust with, and that's how I should repay his kindness for me! That's why, please make it work-〉

"I see ...," saying it while doubting everything would work.

I mean, I respected Mirai-chan's intention, and as far as I had her, I'd always used her foresight for my own sake. The fact that she had no malice in it knocked my heart and I found it hard to refuse her.

I took a short silence, and finally answered her forcefully, unable to not retract my sight from her.

"I'll try."

She immediately busted with joy and blinked her eyes with a gigantic smile on her face, as if she holed a hole-in-one in  golf for the first time.

That night, I couldn't slept- my face was pale. I began to be confused all over the night of what should I do for it. I mean- It's hard for me to meet someone new, when ‘he’ didn't even know me! The worst part was, would ‘he’ accepted me as an albino? Or what if ’he‘ found out that I could read ‘his‘ mind? What if ‘he’ marked me as a weird person? I didn't have any social skills- I-

The door creaks.

"Aniue, are you still awake?"
"Uh-"

Suddenly I felt it a bit relaxing seeing my brother visit me.

"It's your usual honey milk tea."
"Akito?"

"It's nothing. Of course you wouldn't be nervous to apply for a private tutor tomorrow-

〈It just Aniue doesn't look well, perhaps he feel sick?〉

Hope it would work well, Aniue. I'll take my leave then,"

The door shuts.
I knew Akito was trying to encourage me. That's right, if I wasn't trying to keep my poker face and my image in front of my brother, I'd run for miles, work out through the night just to shut my thoughts up.