Mahou Shoujo Ikusei Keikaku - Volume 17 - Chapter 10

The Schoolyard Observer

Despite what you’d expect from the at-a-glance aristocratic surname of Kinunomiya, my family had been middle class since my grandfather’s generation. Before then, I didn’t know, but I’d heard they were farmers just barely feeding themselves, so they were probably worse than middle class. At this point, nobody knew why we’d wound up with that surname.

As was typical for a kid from a middle-class household, I’d gone to public schools for elementary and middle school. Public schools would basically accept anyone, whether you were from a rich family or a poor family.

So there had been a lot of different people there. About 30 percent of them I’d liked, while 10 percent were people I just couldn’t bring myself to like. Twenty percent were smart, while 65 percent were dumb. Forty percent were good people, and 20 percent were nasty. I was a good example of one of the nasty types. I was always looking to see who was in control in a classroom. I’d sense the power balance, and either get close to them or stay away from them as I enjoyed my time at school.

And just over 40 percent of them were lacking in class. A lot of the boys in particular were vulgar, and it seemed to me there wasn’t anyone actually sophisticated.

I was sure there were some who gave a sense of their good upbringing, and some such girl came off as ladylike, but when I started high school at an institution packed with real, blue-blooded rich girls, I realized that I’d had no classmates who were sophisticated in the true sense of the word.

Phrases like “oh, you flatter me,” “good day,” “oh my,” “gentlemen,” and “amusement” would come out of these girls’ mouths completely unironically—they were real blue bloods.

Yes, starting in high school, I began going to a school for rich girls. Why was it that someone like me, who had only ever been middle class, was able to stage an upper-class debut? It was really no big reason. My father left his desk job to strike out on his own in this day and age and miraculously made his business succeed. So I started attending a private school that would never have let me in based on academics, wasn’t in my neighborhood, and had high tuition, to boot. I just took my chance to slip into the rich girls’ school I’d always secretly yearned for. That was all it was.

I was so on edge, worried that the natives might attack another who came in after the fact, but that never actually happened. The rich girls were kind, magnanimous, and carefree. They didn’t like anything unsightly or indecent—so perhaps that meant they didn’t even like to think about backbiting or malicious bullying, which was the embodiment of unsightliness and indecency.

My prejudiced opinion that bullies existed in every social strata was quickly proven wrong. Or so I thought at first. It seemed that wasn’t true, and some students had done something like bullying in the past, but apparently, they had all—without exception—left the school. Having already gotten good at pretending to be a rich girl by the orientation at the beginning of school, I went “My, how frightful” and trembled a bit.

It wasn’t an act that I was scared. It really did seem frightening to me. It seemed possible. Because I knew of someone who seemed like she definitely would do such a thing.

Back when my father first quit his day job and began trading miscellaneous imports, there was talk of a large shopping mall coming to the neighborhood that came up and then quickly vanished. Apparently, people were whispering baseless rumors that some landowning girl had pulled strings behind the scenes to ruin the launch plan. According to that rumor, she had done it because the café that served her favorite chocolate parfait might be put into a tough spot by the shopping mall. My father had many minor contracts with businesses in that commercial area, said café included, so he’d heard about that story.

Kanoe Hitokouji. In a nutshell, she was a girl who owned land, but she was not the sort of person who could be described in a nutshell.

They said that if you threw a rock in the prefecture, you would hit Hitokouji’s land. Born in such a major landowning house, she was always at the top of her year in her studies and was fabulously athletic—even though she wasn’t in the track club, she was faster than the class track club athletes. She was beautiful in looks and eloquent in speech, and you could practically smell the class in every single one of her gestures, even a single blink. Even among other blue bloods, she stuck out as being on a level or two above the rest…except she didn’t hold it over their heads. She was a blue blood among blue bloods, just naturally pompous.

And she wasn’t simply an imposing figure. Whether they were true or not, there were no few heroic-sounding rumors of her having meted out harsh punishment to some bad people. Aside from that story about the large shopping mall, they also said that a few college students who entertained themselves in nasty ways and tried to pick up Kanoe when she was on a walk through the neighborhood stopped coming to college for a few days, and then when they did return after a long break, they had settled down so much, it was like they were different people. To the blue bloods, even such fearsome tales were apparently a part of the great Kanoe’s charm, and they would shriek and chatter about it like other girls of their age, but in a more refined way.

I’d always had a pleasant time at school by currying favor with the powerful. In this class—or rather, in this school—the absolute strongest was clearly Kanoe Hitokouji. So then you’d think that I should be getting close to her. But she was different from the children that I’d come in contact with before, the “strong of the classroom.” She was actually strong, the type that was powerful even in the world of adults. If I were to approach her via my usual simplistic methods, I was bound to meet a sorry end. All of the rumors indicated the degree of difficulty here. Even if only a tenth of the rumors were true, this would be pretty hard.

But I also thought that if I was to try to get close to someone, then Kanoe would be it. While it was dangerous, there was much to be gained, and I would really regret it if I let this pass me by. I figured if I was going to do it, then I would be careful.

I would observe Kanoe in such a way that I would not be noticed, making sure to stay far enough away that I was safe. Only after that I should approach her. Plenty of girls would shriek and chitter when they saw Kanoe. If I mingled with them to talk about how she was so wonderful and lovely and whatnot, I could get lost in the crowd. Squeeing and chittering with other girls was not at all fun for me, but right now, fun was of second- or third-place importance.

This was how I watched and observed Kanoe Hitokouji after entering school. I spent quite a while on observation—the secondary effect of which was that I noticed that her attendant, Mamori Totoyama, was a rather interesting creature.

Attendant. There was such a thing as too old-fashioned, but if you were going to describe Mamori Totoyama, then no word was more accurate than “attendant.” She followed Kanoe Hitokouji around from behind and was responsible for her various daily needs and troubles. No matter how many times seat assignments changed with the seasons, the two of them were always side by side—in other words, it was easy to tell that even our homeroom teacher was showing deference here.

Kanoe treated Mamori like a pet she was proud of. That was a vulgar simile, if I did say so myself. But it really did strike me like that.

Just as there were girls who would shriek and chitter about how Kanoe and Mamori made a good set, it looked to me like each of them enhanced the other. The “soft” Kanoe, with her fluffy curls and fine white skin, and the “hard” Mamori, with her functionally and evenly cut black hair and overbearing height, were completely mismatched, while at the same time paired as if compensating for the parts of the other. I could get why Kanoe would feel proud.

In contrast with Kanoe’s seeming pride, apparently Mamori was not all that loyal, and she would be surprisingly blunt. More than once or twice, in a quiet voice that nobody could hear—observing Kanoe as I did, I was often listening—she would make sarcastic and nasty remarks about Kanoe.

“It’s a mean thing to say? You, of all people, are saying that, miss?”

“I’m surprised you even knew the word ‘kindness,’ miss.”

“What the heck? That’s just gross. Oh no—I just said that out loud.”

It was generally something like that. She had to have done it more than ten or twenty times, if you counted the times I hadn’t heard.

The first time I heard it, I was shocked. I’d even wondered if I’d misheard. I was just a classmate, and Kanoe was a fearsome figure even for me—so having a direct relationship of master and servant, it had to be even worse for her. I got a peek at her face, wondering if she was scared. But Mamori had her usual cool look and didn’t seem ashamed, and Kanoe was also smiling pleasantly.

Mamori was average in sports and academics; she didn’t particularly excel in anything. The only thing she beat Kanoe on was height. She never smiled or looked happy. At the very least, I never saw it. She always looked bored.

Maybe Kanoe preferred a more low-key type of obsequiousness. Or maybe this role worked precisely because Mamori was the one filling it. The odds between the two possibilities were four to six. They weren’t great either way.

After observing her for some time, I came to a tentative conclusion. Mamori Totoyama was a deeply interesting angle from which to approach Kanoe.

Compared to fans of Kanoe, or fans of the Kanoe/Mamori pairing, fans of Mamori on her own were in the vast minority. But her unaffected—or put a meaner way—unsociable attitude would make them nod with enthusiasm, as if to say, “That’s just what I prefer.” But it seemed they wouldn’t go so far as to push Kanoe to the side, committing to the view that “So long as she’s happy, that’s for the best.”

It was a very one-sided way of looking at things. To Kanoe, Mamori was not just a loyal servant. She was someone important, and might well have been the key to getting close to Kanoe Hitokouji.

Observing her with the calmest eye possible might lead to new discoveries. No—maybe I should try initiating contact, instead. It would be less dangerous than with Kanoe, and it would be worth trying. It would be a preparatory step for living an even better life at school. I couldn’t scrimp on time and effort now.

Bearing in mind the fact that Kanoe Hitokouji was a dangerous person, I stayed far enough away not to be noticed and observed. Not just with Kanoe—with Mamori as well. In fact, it was best to weigh it sixty-forty toward Mamori. If she offered me an opening, then I’d attempt some form of communication.

This was a good general course of action. All right, let’s keep at it.

And so I tucked that determination in my heart, though I could speak to no one about it—of course I could speak to no one about it—and on the afternoon of that very day, in the five-minute interval between fifth and sixth period, an incident occurred.

The fine young ladies who attended this school did not all go to the bathroom together. Pretending to be a fine young lady myself, I also went alone. I strolled to the bathroom and went into one of the open stalls, and right when I was about to close the door, a shadow fell over me.

Mamori Totoyama was facing me with her usual cool expression. It should go without saying that even when girls entered the bathroom together, they didn’t enter the same stall together. I should have been able to protest, or scream, or something, but I couldn’t move, frozen in place. The only thing moving inside me was my heart, which was attempting to pump blood around my whole body twice as fast as normal. I’d been thinking that I’d try an approach if I had the chance, but I’d never expected her to come to me.

Mamori closed the stall door behind her and leaned right close to me. I reflexively tried to back up, but I was prevented by the toilet, my legs couldn’t move, and I lost my balance. I started an unsightly fall, but Mamori came even closer, wrapping an arm around my waist to catch me.

“Sorry for being so sudden, in a place like this,” she said.

Her breath was on my ear. I could feel her palm through my uniform. Her fingers were long. The information about Mamori Totoyama I had gained through my observation was now flowing into me—with physical sensations, too, this time.

“It would be dangerous to speak where others could be watching…so I had no choice.”

Her restrained voice, practically a whisper, felt more intimate than usual. That voice that was so prickly toward Kanoe Hitokouji had an intimacy in it! And it was toward me. My heart rate soared. My body was heating up at an even faster rate.

“Kinunomiya, you’ve been watching Hitokouji a lot lately, haven’t you?”

Even if I had been feeling calm, I wouldn’t have been able to say, “No, if anything, I’ve been watching you.”

“Well—plenty of other people watch her, but your looks are a little different from the others’… The way you look at her doesn’t seem very affectionate. I couldn’t help but feel curious.”

I could have sworn that I’d been the one watching her, but she had been watching me, too. I’d thought I was the observer, but I had been observed. Mamori Totoyama—this woman who acted like she was disinterested in everything in the world—had paid attention to me and had been watching me the whole time.

“I can understand the feeling painfully well. However, blatant hostility is truly dangerous. You can’t let her see you as unpleasant, and it’s even worse if she thinks of you as interesting. If there really is something you just can’t stand, then please, let me.”

Mamori supported me with her right hand as she squeezed my hand with her left. My head kept spinning; I couldn’t think straight. With 30 percent less cognitive ability than usual, I was at a loss over something as trivial as “I don’t want her noticing my sweaty hands.” Even though there was no way she wouldn’t notice.

“Well, then…pardon me, truly.”

Mamori released my hand and gave me a little bow in the cramped space. Her head came down from a level higher than my own, and as it came close, a waft of a smell—most likely the pleasant scent of her shampoo—tickled my nostrils. The hand I’d just drawn away from came forward, hovering as if it would touch the hair in front of me, and I hastily stopped it.

With her head bowed, Mamori wouldn’t see me being so weird. She opened the door behind her in the same way as she’d come in, slipped out like a ninja through the slightest gap to go outside, and shut it with a thump.

I blew out a breath like I was trying to get all the air out of my lungs. My head felt dizzy, and unable to stay on my feet, I slumped down to sit on the Western-style toilet.

I couldn’t lose my cool. No time was more important to think with composure than when you were taken unawares. I pulled out my handkerchief and wiped my forehead. Calm down, calm down, I told myself. I am an observer. Though I’d flinched a little, surprised that she had also been watching me, it wasn’t as if I had quit being an observer.

My mind still in a haze, I somehow got through the school day, went home, and slept the night, and by then I’d finally managed to regain my cool. While swaying on the bus to school, I pondered.

Was Kanoe Hitokouji behind that incident the day before? I had the feeling she wasn’t. It wasn’t like I should be believing everything Mamori said, but there were a lot of things that didn’t seem right, if Kanoe was involved. In other words, this hopeless tightness in my chest was 99 percent Mamori’s fault.

The one to mark in the future was not Kanoe. It was Mamori. Starting that day, that sixty-forty ratio would be 100 percent devoted to Mamori. I could do as Mamori had warned me that way, too, so you could call it two birds with one stone.

I pulled out my phone and adjusted my schedule. First, I changed the title from MT to M—MT was for Mamori Totoyama, but M was just for Mamori. This was my way of showing that I wanted to be close enough with her that we would be on a first-name basis. I also changed my plans, making my observation rate that had been sixty-forty with Kanoe and Mamori into 100 percent Mamori—all Mamori, all the time.

Starting that day, I wanted to observe Mamori’s activities after school, too. Rather, I had to observe her. I was an intellectual and calm observer.