The Song of Windchimes

Lotus Flower

┏━°⌜防風鈴 ⌟°━┓

Chapter 21

┗━°⌜防風鈴 ⌟°━┛

Both the general and the second in command look at Umemiya like he's crazy. Ryuu stands behind him, comically shimmying forwards to get close and look at Tomiyama's face.
"So, our fight today was nothing," Umemiya says with a smirk, hand holding his chin, "just friendly fun, ya feel me?"

He then turns towards the audience before calling out. "SO, HEY! THANKS EVERYONE FOR COMING!" He waves "DID Y'ALL HAVE FUN?!"
"Wh–What is he saying?" Someone asks himself.
"What's happening?"
"Pfft..." Tomiyama laughs "Ume-chan, you never disappoint... You're always a laugh!"
Umemiya turns towards Tomiyama with a proud smirk on his face. Umemiya hums before turning back to the crowd.
"OKIE-DOKIE" He claps "That's a wrap everybody! Now GET OUTTA HERE!" He claps again.
Ryuu walks forwards towards Tomiyama and starts cleaning off the blood on his face, not asking anything as he squishes the boy's cheeks to clean up his bloody nose.

"Oh yeah," Umemiya looks towards Togame. "You got any decent restaurants around here that do take out?" He asks.
"Ye-yeah," Togame stutters, "why though?" He sweat drops before turning towards Ryuu and Tomiyama, the shorter of the two's face being gently cleaned with cotton wipes filled with hydrogen peroxide.
"'Why?'" Umemiya asks back "We're gonna have an after-party! Yeah!"

┌──❀*̥˚───❀*̥˚─┐
On the roof of the Ori
└───❀*̥˚───❀*̥˚┘

Sitting in the circle beside Sakura and Togame, Ryuu focused on organizing his bag that now had three large first aid kits instead of the two medium sized ones that he had before. He's intently making them fit as he ignores the murmur of everyone around him.
"ALL THE FOOD HERE LOOKS SCRUMPTIOUS!! All right, let's dig in!" Umemiya calls out before picking a piece of meat and placing it in his mouth. That move makes him go into overdrive, picking from one thing and shoving it into his mouth to quickly go to another dish and doing the same thing.

"Yeah, it's real good," Hiragi agrees, Sugishita nodding along like always as he eats a chicken skewer. Ryuu gets distracted when, from the corner of his eyes, Togame grabs a plate and fills it with a little bit of everything. The black haired male moves the plate towards Ryuu, who looks at him with wide eyes, but the taller one ignores his stares. Ryuu pouts and lightly glares at Togame before grabbing his chopsticks and grabbing a dumpling. Taking notice of the empty plate the teen beside him had, he tries to put the dumpling on it.

"What's the matter, Togame?" Umemiya asks "You're not eating anything."
His words make Togame put his plate down in front of him. Ryuu takes this opportunity to place some of the food Togame put on his plate onto his.
Togame bows, "Please accept my deepest apologies."
"This whole incident all started because of me. I'm solely responsible for everything."
"The reason Shishitoren started getting rotten... the mess from yesterday's raid and today's fights..." He pauses, "It was all my responsibility."
"I'm sincerely..." He breathes "sorry for the trouble I've caused."
"Kame-chan! It's not all just you! I also..." Tomiyama stops speaking before he bows. The interaction between them makes Umemiya smile.

"So you hear him," Umemiya states before leaning back and looking towards the bi-colored haired boy. "What do you wanna do, Sakura?"
"You should decide!"

"M-Me?!" Sakura stutters in confusion, but what Umemiya said makes sense and makes Togame turn his head towards the flustered boy. Ryuu pouts and leans back to let Togame look at Sakura directly, and after he catches the younger's attention he looks down.
"I'll take any punishment. It's what I deserve..." Togame drifts off, and his words make Sakura grit his teeth and angrily furrow his eyebrows.
"You have to..." Sakura stands up and points at Togame, hitting Ryuu's head in the process "CHANGE AND BECOME COOLER THAN YOUR LAMEASS SELF!!"
"AND DON'T DO THOSE STUPID THINGS... AGAIN!! YA HEAR ME?!"

Togame bows, not looking at Sakura. "I promise," He says. Everyone looks at Sakura, an aura of what could be described as them being proud of the secluded boy surrounding them. Minus Sugishita, who 'tsks' in jealousy because he took Umemiya's attention.
"Great! SO, that's over with!" Umemiya claps as Sakura sits back down. "Now let's dig in! C'mon, eat up!"
"Oh?" Umemiya asks himself "What's this?" Tomiyama admires Umemiya as he goes and grabs some fried burdock roots. His eyes are shining and wide in curiosity and respect.
"Ume-chan," He grabs Umemiya's attention "How can you be so happy... while still being at the top of Furin?" Tomiyama asks, genuinely wanting to know.

Umemiya looks at him before turning back to the food and reaching out for something. "For me..." He stops and takes a bite of the fried burdock root he tried out. "I love to eat."
"Every meal is like a party to me," His voice was low as he chewed and chuckled in enjoyment. Everyone looks at him with either shocked or weirded out stares due to the reason for him not really answering the question.
"No way! I love eating too!" Tomiyama slides in with a cat-like smile. "I really like curry! What about you?" He asks.
"I love omelet rice!"
"You know," He looks up "Food's only part of it."
"Meals are a way for everyone to meet up and enjoy something together."
"We can talk about anything... and laugh like idiots... and live in the moment like we've got no problems."
"I look forward to those times more than anything else."
"That might help explain why I'm so smiley right now. Truth is, all that..." Umemiya wipes his lips with his wrapped up hands. "Has nothing to do with my role here. Being at the top has nothing to do with... hanging out with friends."

Tomiyama sits up, feeling inspired at what Umemiya was saying. "Yeah... you're right," He says, "I... remember now. I had a lot of fun before I became the top. I really liked it when everyone was laughing together." Tomiyama reminisces on the past, where he was having fun with everyone before he ran off to become the top for his own greed and want for power. "But... I never realized that was what I liked. I just thought
that being at the top meant that I could have more fun."

"Why... Didn't I realize it?" Tomiyama asks himself, feeling disappointed at his lack of notice when he was younger.
The interaction seemed a bit boring to Ryuu, who was stretching his wrists and fingers while yawning. They learned their lesson and are willing to fix it, and the amount of talking Umemiya is doing is making him sleepy. He didn't think he needed to listen to the words of their leader, his morals already having been shown through their fighting and the start of their talk, so he mostly made their conversation background noise as he held his soda in his hand.

Ryuu looks at the long glass bottle with a curious gaze. He's seen them before when he'd go to the convenience store for a snack run, but he's never, ever, bought one.

'That says Ramune... right?' He reads with his head tilted to the right, 'how the hell am I supposed to open this?'