Hero Complex

Chapter 008: cruel innocence, kind guilt

❝ I ONLY EVER WANTED TO BE LOVED. ❞

☞ this entire chapter is a flashback episode set four years ago.

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[Four Years Ago]

The shuffling sound of a stiff, silky kimono was heard as well as heavy panting as a girl ran down the dark alleyway, the neon lights of the shoppes flickering after the midnight hour.

Her feet were bare and bleeding slightly, though she was otherwise unharmed physically, and had a traumatised and fearful expression painted on her face, head turning back every now and then to make sure no one was following.

Long, black hair flowed loosely behind her as she hiked up her pink kimono so that she could run even faster, though her floor-length sleeves still dragged on the wet ground and feet pounded against the street.

Suddenly she rounded a corner and smacked right into a figure who stumbled back and fell on the ground with the girl on top of him with a loud 'uff─' sound.

"What the hell! That hurt!" The figure groaned, rubbing the back of his head, which had been hit in his fall against the asphalt, though he still turned his head down to look at his assailant before his eyes widened at the sight.

A similarily-aged girl looked up at him, around fourteen, who was dressed in an expensive light pink kimono and white obi sash and although she was astoundingly pretty, had a haunted and terrified look in her wide eyes.

Looking up at him, who was now slightly blushing at how pretty she was, though worried as well, the girl started to tear. "Please...help me...─"

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"Fūjioka-kun?" A cheerfully innocent voice interrupted the thoughts of the withdrawn male student, who had his facemask up and was staring out the window on his lunch break, not caring enough to talk to anyone.

"Hm?" The mentioned boy turned his head to face the same girl he had bumped into that night, except for the fact that she was now dressed in a sailor junior-high uniform and her eyes were teasing but bright.

"Kikyō-san." He nodded his head, wondering what she needed.

"It's Himikō." The girl puffed up her cheeks cutely with a pout before giggling and tucking a strand of her waist-length hair behind her ear. "I was wondering if you were going on the school trip? Everyone signed up except you."

She tilting her head in question, waiting for an answer before the boy sighed annoyedly and mumbled that he didn't have much of a choice.

At that Himikō positively beamed in delight, her cheeks dusted with a faint pink as her eyes crinkled happily before running back to her friends, who were calling.

As she ran...or rather skipped off, Daisuke Fūjioka watched her with a raised eyebrow. She sure did seem different from the petrified girl he had met that night, whom he was surprised to learn was a transfer student introduced a few days later on in their final year of junior high.

Though she was a strangely timed transfer student, she became the most popular girl in the school on her very first day, with her pretty looks, cutely ditzy bubbly personality and sociability.

Other third-year male students passed by the classroom, looking in with matching blushes as they caught the eye of the transfer student who waved cheerfully at them.

━━━━

The girl sat there, on the floor of his dorm room, the edges of her luxurious pink kimono soiled with dirt and mud and she had her arms wrapped around her head as the boy came back into the room quietly, holding two mugs of a steaming drink.