“Fu…”
Pressing the enter key of the keyboard, Kirisu Mafuyu let out a faint sigh.
“Completed…It has gotten pretty late, hasn’t it?”
Gazing at the nearby clock, the needles were indicating that the time of day was already late at night. Shown on the PC screen in front of her was a small test for world history, a subject that she herself was responsible for. Having taken care of other small paperwork whilst working on that, things ended up at the current time before she even realized it.
“Next I would have to finish the written reports, and I need to reference the documents I forgot…So I have to go to school tomorrow and pick them up…Umm…”
Although she tried her hardest to figure out the remaining work left for her, her head wouldn’t work properly at that.
“…Impossible. My lack of sleep has been going on for a while now, I can’t keep going like this.”
Having arrived at her limit, she gave up on thinking.
“Tomorrow is a day off, so I can get those documents in the afternoon as well…For now, I have to sleep and freshen up…” While muttering that to herself, she headed towards her bed on wobbly feet.
However, on the way there, she felt the urge to refresh her dried-up throat.
“Some fluid intake is necessary…Do I still have something..?”
Finding it tiresome to even make her way to the refrigerator now, Mafuyu checked her surroundings. A lot of objects were entering her view. Most of that was trash or used books. It made her wonder when was the last time her pupil Yuiga Nariyuki came over to clean up for her. It should have been fairly recently, but it turned into this mess before she even realized it. However, this still could be considered neat, compared to the usual situation. Most likely. Probably. Thinking about it relatively, at least.
“Hm…?”
As she ran her eyes over the disastrous scene called her room, Mafuyu spotted something sparkling in the corner of her view. A bottle, filled with a clear and transparent fluid. Apparently, it was reflected through the room’s dim light. It was rolled over as if to hide it behind the trash bags scattered around it.
“What was this again…?”
Though she gave it some thought for a brief moment, her consciousness started to fade even further.
“Well, this is the perfect timing for it…”
It was in a still unopened state, so it shouldn’t ruin her stomach. Making a conclusion like that, Mafuyu opened up the bottle, and gulped the contents down.
“Li…mit…”
Thus, she collapsed onto the bed. Mere seconds had passed before her consciousness already drifted into the far land of her dreams.
***
The following morning.
“Mmm…”
Her awakening was a pleasant and comfortable one. The sense of fatigue that had plagued her all too much as of recently had completely vanished. Her body was now brimming with energy, as light as ever. Her eyestrains, muscle stiffness in shoulders and waist, all gone. Almost as if she had become younger again. Weirdly enough, the bed felt bigger than usual as well.
“Fu…Laughable, what am I thinking?” Pushing out a bitter smile, Mafuyu pushed up her body.
At the same time, her sleepwear fell off her shoulder.
“…?” Since they shouldn’t be oversized by all means, she narrowed her eyes.
And then, she finally realized.
“Doubt…I feel…a bit smaller…?”
The further she gazed down at herself, the bigger the wrinkles on her forehead. The size of her hands had shrunk, and her shortened fingers looked more adorable than mature. Almost as if she was a child.
“These are my…hands, right…?”
Even as she slowly closed and opened her eyes again, the fact that she was looking at her own hands didn’t change. On top of that, her mumbling had sounded oddly high-pitched for a while now.
“N-No way, right…?”
Forcing out an uncomfortable smile, she pushed herself off the bed and headed towards the mirror. Her facial features were still the same as before, the same way she remembered them.
However.
These facial features and her entire body overlapped with the ones of her memories from around twenty years ago.
“………”
She was entranced by the sight in the mirror.
“………”
Shortly averting her gaze, she rubbed her eyes, and once again turned towards the mirror.
“………”
Closing her eyes for a bit, and reopening them again, the result was the same. No matter what she tried, the image reflected in the mirror did not change. She forcefully lifted up her mouth for a smile, and her reflection in the mirror followed suit. She then relaxed her mouth again. The young expression in the mirror turned serious as well. After repeating a similar action for a bit, Mafuyu nodded to herself.
“Conclusion…It seems like I’m still dreaming.” Muttering those words with a vacant expression, she turned her face away from the mirror. “It seems as if I’ve been more tired than previously anticipated. I guess I should sleep some more…No wait, I’m still in the middle of dreaming, aren’t I..? Would I wake up if I went to sleep in my dream…?”
Muttering questions to herself that nobody would answer for her, she once again headed for the bed. However, on the way there, her lower garment slipped off her.
“Eh?!”
She stumbled, falling down on the floor, as she rammed her face into a nearby trash bag.
“O-Ouch…”
She slowly pushed her body up from the ground, and started rubbing the slightly reddened tip of her nose, as she suddenly froze, realizing what words she had just spoken.
“Pain…? This isn’t…a dream…?”
That exact moment, Mafuyu finally realized something crucial. That is, the sensations in this dream were far too real. Coming this far, she had no other choice but to accept it.
“My body went back to my younger days…?”
To be completely frank, it was nothing more than a fantasy setting you’d see in movies or novels, but her current body was the most accurate proof she could find.
“W-Why did this happen…?”
Of course, whilst the doubts might have disappeared, it was still hard to just accept this situation.
“Hm…?”
Right then, something sparkling entered Mafuyu’s field of vision. Reflected by the entering sunlight from the window, it was an empty bottle. Right before collapsing into her bed, Mafuyu had gulped down the contents of that bottle. Out of curiosity, she took a closer look at the bottle—or rather, the label on it. What she found written there, was—
“Anti-aging medicine…?”
That was the exact wording. Anti-aging…in other words, turning young again. The most perfect expression to describe this chaotic situation. Though, in the truest sense of the word, it should only slow down the signs of age showing on one’s body, and not literally bringing the user’s body back in time, as what happened with Mafuyu.
“Because of this medicine, my body shrunk…?”
That was the one and only hint Mafuyu had to explain her current state.
“But before that…why did I have something like this lying around in my room in the first place…?”
Truthfully speaking, Mafuyu’s room was reigned by chaos and objects lying around everywhere. However, that doesn’t explain how a random object like this would just appear out of nowhere.
“……Ah.”
Mafuyu had been glaring at the bottle for a while to remember where it could have appeared from until a certain scene popped up in the back of her head. It was a work-related drinking party.
—Mafuyu-sensei is still young, so you might not have an actual feeling for it! But, the signs of aging come before you even realize it! Out of the blue! That’s why we have to start preparing against that while we’re still young! Look, this anti-aging thing? You never had any of this before, right?! Ah, I know, I’ll give you this, so drink some of it! Just take the entire box! I bought this online when I was tired, so I just bought a full box of it by accident! I haven’t tried it yet, but they said on TV that it had some fantastic effects! Depending on the person, it could even turn you back into a child. They said stuff like that! Well, not like that would actually happen though! But, that just shows that they have confidence in it, so try it out when you have the time, and let me hear about it!
While being on the receiving end of this machine gun-like talk, raining down from an older fellow teacher, Mafuyu was forced to accept the box that had a similar design as the one on the bottle. Since she missed the timing to decline it, she had no other choice but to take it home…
“It actually turned me back into a child…?!” Finding this too hard to believe, Mafuyu held her head in her hands.
She was still a bit uncertain if this anti-aging medicine really was the cause of this chaos, but she couldn’t deny the fact that her body truly had shrunk. Either way, she had to find a way to deal with this situation. That being said, what could she do in such an irregular situation?
“…Luckily, today is my day off. For now, I’ll stay inside for the entire day, and see if I can find a way to revert this. Maybe I will be back to normal tomorrow anyway…”
In the end, her only option was to stay positive about this and hope for the best.
“Maybe I won’t be able to return back to normal again…”
Muttering rather depressed assumptions to herself, Mafuyu pulled up the lower sleeping garment that had just slipped down, and headed towards the bed again,
“…?!”
On the way there, the mountain of documents on her desk fell into her eye, forcefully reminding her about a certain fact.
“Careless…! I had to get the documents from school to write the written reports…! The deadline for that is tomorrow…!”
Two choices flickered up inside Mafuyu’s head.
First—Ignoring the deadline of the reports.
Second—Picking up the documents at school with her current body.
It only took her a fragment of a second to decide on which.
***
A bit less of an hour later.
“This should work out, right?”
Mafuyu had wrapped her small body in children’s clothing. After trying her luck and going through the western clothes she had with her, she luckily found some clothes she had worn when she was younger, for a reason she didn’t know herself. She guessed that she must have taken them with her when she moved, and they had been sleeping in the back of the drawer ever since. Just this once, her sloppy personality was a saving grace.
“Determination…Now then, time to go.”
Dodging the trash bags scattered on the ground with her small feet, she headed towards the entrance.
In the end, Kirisu Mafuyu wasn’t enough of an irresponsible person to willingly ignore the deadline of the written reports, just staying at home the entire day. Even if something irregular as this happened with her own body. If she could still move, she should be moving out to gather those documents…that is the conclusion that Mafuyu arrived at.
“Ugh…the door…so heavy…”
Putting her hand on the doorknob, and turning it, she used her entire body strength to push the door open and somehow managed to do so. After safely stepping outside, she yet again used the weight of her body to pull the door closed.
“Just opening and closing a door can be this hard…” Mafuyu let out a sigh.
She already felt a small level of exhaustion just by stepping outside. However, the real deal would only start now.
“With this body, the scenery around me looks completely different as well…”
The height of her field of view was cut in half from before. It should have been a normal way she was used to, but it felt like she was walking through the streets of an unfamiliar town. Looking all around her surroundings, she headed towards Ichinose Academy.
“Ah, what’s wrong with you, looking around all restlessly like that?”
“?!”
Suddenly, she was being called out by a voice close to her, as her small body twitched in shock. She slowly, and carefully turned towards the source of that voice—
Takemoto-san, Furuhashi-san, and Ogata-san…
Standing there were three pupils of hers. They were a good bit taller than Mafuyu, and they all gazed down at her, their eyes glittering with interest.
The end…to think I would meet an acquaintance while looking like this…and my students of all the people…
As her body was frozen with fear, Mafuyu felt her own dignity as their teacher crumble away. However, to her surprise—
“H-Huh…? Did I scare you by suddenly calling out to you? It’s fine, we aren’t any suspicious people~”
The girl that called out to Mafuyu before, Uruka, showed a rather panicky reaction, as she waved her hands at her.
“Uruka-chan, that totally makes you sound like a suspicious person.”
“That’s a cliche phrase someone suspicious would use.”
Towards Uruka’s attempt to calm Mafuyu down, Furuhashi Fumino just let out a giggle, with Ogata Rizu having a straight expression, as they both commented on it.
“Ehhh?! Don’t be so cruel, you two! That makes me sound like some pervert!”
“Ahaha, I was just joking.”
“I was giving a common opinion.”
The three of them directed their attention away from Mafuyu.
Huh…?
Watching them converse, Mafuyu showed a surprised, and confused reaction inside her heart.
They haven’t caught on that it’s me…?
Weirdly enough, that easily satisfied her.
I guess…normally you wouldn’t expect someone’s body to shrink from one day to the other.
Thinking that far, she managed to gain a bit of confidence.
“Takemoto-san, I…”
“Huh? Why do you know my name?”
However, that confidence vanished immediately.
Failure…! My bad habit just…!
In order to find a solution to cover her blunder up, Mafuyu frantically observed her surroundings. And then, she saw her last hope, the bag that Uruka was holding.
“I-I saw this…! So…!” She pointed at the test paper peeking out from Uruka’s bag.
On it, one could read the name ‘Takemoto Uruka’.
“Ah, really? Wow, you can already read kanji, huh?” Uruka showed consent, while her eyes opened a bit out of surprise.
“I am…learning after all…”
Suppressing the guilt of lying to her students, she barely managed to give a normal response.
“Ohhh? What a good girl you are~”
“………”
As Uruka started rubbing Mafuyu’s head, she lowered it in a sulking manner, but still calmly accepted it. She judged that it would be safer to just go with the flow, instead of showing any sort of rebellish reaction.
An answer sheet…An English test?
With full intention of wanting to run away from reality like this, Mafuyu yet again directed her gaze at the paper handing out from Uruka’s bag.
Seems like her grades have been going up, huh…
Mafuyu wasn’t responsible for tutoring Uruka. However, she still knew about her current situation. Her previous English grades were closing in on the abysmal level, but the points shown on the answer sheet in front of her were nothing of that sort. If she kept working on her grades like this, she would surely arrive at the goal she was aiming for.
The ally of those that ‘can’t’, huh…
The face of the tutor, currently responsible for those girls, flashed up inside her head.
“By the way, are you alone right now? Where are your mom and dad?” Fumino went into a stooping position, as she asked with her gaze down. “…Huh?”
Following that, she took a good glance at Mafuyu’s expression, and tilted her head, as if she was confused about something.
“N-No I…I’m alone.” Feeling a certain danger creep up on her, Mafuyu answered quickly as she averted her face.
“Are you on an errand of some sort?” Rizu joined in to ask Mafuyu.
“Something…like that.”
Naturally, she couldn’t say she was on her way to pick up documents from the school. However, this wasn’t a lie either.
“How admirable~ And, where are you going?” Uruka asked, still softly patting Mafuyu on her head.
“That’s…”
Thus, she found trouble answering. For one, she pondered about what would happen if she just honestly told them she was on her way to the school. Knowing these girls, they might decide to take her with them to school. In all honesty, she wanted to avoid being in contact with them for too long of a time. She could never know when one of them might catch on to her true identity, and lastly, continuing this situation of lying to them was painful.
But, before Mafuyu could come up with an answer—
“Hey, is this what I’m thinking it is…?”
“A lost child?”
“Most likely.”
The three of them looked at each other, arriving at the same conclusion.
“No, that’s not…”
“Don’t worry!”
Mafuyu was about to clear up their misunderstanding, but Uruka got the jump on her, embracing her.
“We’ll properly find your mom and dad for you, okay!”
“Aren’t you hungry? Do you want to eat some udon?”
“I know, how about we tell you a funny story in the meantime? Though, it’ll mostly be improvised for now…”
All of three of them showed considerate smiles, with their own ideas.
…So actions out of pure good-will still exist, huh…
Thinking like that, Mafuyu felt bad pushing them away like this.
That being said, I can’t let this continue for forever…
However, before she could start thinking of how to get out of this, she was interrupted yet again.
“What’s your name?”
“Uuu…”
Uruka’s question yet again made her falter.
“Ma…Manatsu1…”
Too flustered, and with not enough time to think, she came up with this cheap name.
“Manatsu-chan, alright. I’m Uruka! …Well, you already know my name, I guess. But, ‘Takemoto-san’ is a bit too stiff, so you can just call me ‘Uruka-oneechan’, okay?” said Uruka with a carefree and gentle smile.
“I…understand…Uruka…oneechan.”
In order to not make it more suspicious, she just decided to follow Uruka’s instructions. Though it sounded more childish than she was hoping for.
“I’m Rizu. Rizu-oneechan.”
“Okay, Rizu-oneechan…”
Since Rizu threw her an expectant gaze, Mafuyu responded with that. By doing so, Rizu showed a satisfied expression.
“I’ll be Fumino-oneechan.”
“Okay, Fumino-oneechan…”
Although Fumino’s expression was rather flat compared to Rizu’s, she still followed suit.
Disgrace…! To think that I would have to act like a little child…!
Though her expression on the outside was as calm as she was allowed to be, Mafuyu internally grit her teeth out of embarrassment.
“…?”
In the midst of that, she realized that Fumino was yet again closely inspecting Mafuyu’s face. For a short while, her gaze was fixated on her.
“…Ah!”
““?!””
Seeing that she suddenly let out a rather volume-heavy voice, not just Mafuyu, but Rizu and Uruka both twitched in shock and surprise.
“Ah, sorry for suddenly screaming like that. But, I finally got it.”
After putting her hands together to apologize, Fumino turned her rather relieved expression towards Mafuyu again.
“I was thinking this entire time…that Manatsu-chan looked like someone I knew…and it’s Kirisu-sensei!”
“?!”
Mafuyu’s heart almost leapt out of her chest as she heard Fumino’s conclusion.
“I see, now that you say it.”
“Like a small Kirisu-sensei?”
Following Rizu’s and Uruka’s agreement, her heart started racing even faster.
“Ahh, you see, Kirisu-sensei is actually a teacher at our school.”
She assumed that they would have found out about her identity by now, but judging from Fumino’s reaction, as she started explaining, didn’t show any signs of that. Realizing that, Mafuyu let out a relieved sigh.
“She was the person tutoring me and Ricchan before. In the end, someone else took over for that, but…she was really strict…”
Following those words, Mafuyu could feel her head cool down decisively, almost a bit too much after hearing that last comment.
“A cold hearted person.”
No agitation whatsoever. She knew that people thought of her this way. She didn’t care if they did so since she was used to it. However, that’s exactly why—
“…That’s what I thought before.”
The words that followed weren’t of those that she expected, which caused Mafuyu to slightly narrow her eyes. Seeing that she used past tense there might indicate that her opinion has changed now. Fumino gazed over at Rizu and Uruka, to which they all let out a giggle.
“But…before, when I was really pushed against a wall, a call from her really saved me. Well, I don’t know how she even knew of my situation to begin with, but I didn’t expect that…and I was honestly moved.”
“I was also told by Nari…someone to rethink some things again. She might have sounded harsh all the time, but that was just because she earnestly was thinking about our future. And, although this might sound a bit rude…but finding out that she also has things she’s bad at, I realized that she was just like any other human, and that was very relieving to know.”
“I never really had that much contact with her. But, I somehow always felt that she was someone difficult to approach…But after giving me sensitive advice before the competition, or how she was wearing the Full Pure costume, and danced together at the culture festival, I was surprised to see that the selfish image I had of her was completely different.”
The three of them each gave their personal impressions. Then, they all exchanged glances again, to show bashful smiles. Watching this, Mafuyu carefully put one hand on her chest, as she thought.
…Unexpected. To think they were seeing me in such a light now.
She thought she was hated beyond belief. Naturally, it wasn’t as if they had started liking her immediately. However…Mafuyu still felt something warm fill up her chest.
“…But, the more I look at her, the more she looks like Kirisu-sensei.”
But then, Rizu’s words yet again filled her chest with tension. Her mysterious gaze that came from beyond her glasses dug deep into Mafuyu, as cold sweat ran down her cheek.
“What if it’s actually her, and she just shrunk to that size~?”
“O-Outrageous! Something like that is impossible!” She reflexively reacted to Uruka’s joke.
“…That really sounded like Kirisu-sensei, didn’t it?” Fumino gave an awkward laugh.
C-Careless…!
More and more cold sweat started to build up on her cheeks. Being stared at by the three girls, Mafuyu’s choice was—
“Um…Excuse…me!”
Tactical retreat. To immediately run away from that place.
“Fugyuh?!”
But immediately after, she ran into someone who was about to pass by them.
“I-I’m sorry…”
Rubbing the pain away from her nose, she looked up at the person she ran into.
“Yeah, be careful, okay?”
It was a familiar face to her.
Kominami-san…?!
Kominami Asumi, a graduate of Ichinose Academy, and a former pupil of Mafuyu.
“You’re not hurt, are you? ………Oh?”
As she gazed down on Mafuyu, her expression started to fill with doubt.
“…You really resemble Mafuyu-sensei, I have to say.” Asumi muttered, with a convinced tone of voice.
“Right, right!” Uruka joined them, as tension-filled as ever.
“Um…Well…”
Having failed her immediate retreat, panic broke out in Mafuyu’s head.
“A-A relative!”
Before she realized it, that was the word that flew out of her mouth.
“I am a relative of Kirisu Mafuyu!”
Everyone blinked in puzzlement at the desperate Mafuyu.
““““…Ahhhh~”””””
These were the voices following that.
“I see, a relative, huh.” Fumino clapped her hands together.
“That was the obvious solution to the problem, and we didn’t arrive at that.” Though her expression didn’t change all too much, Rizu still showed consent.
“Ahahaha, you’re right~” Uruka gave a carefree laugh.
Blunder…I should have chosen this path from the beginning…
Mafuyu internally groaned at the realization that her efforts until now were all for naught.
“By the way, what are you all doing here anyway?” Then, Asumi tilted her head in confusion.
“Manatsu-chan…this girl here is a lost child, so we’re taking care of her.”
“Ohooo?”
Raising one eyebrow after hearing Rizu’s response, Asumi yet again looked down at Mafuyu.
“Can I call you Manatsu-chan?”
As Asumi asked her with a soft tone of voice, Mafuyu quickly nodded along.
“Manatsu-chan, are you lost?”
This time, she shook her head from left to right. She deduced that, in order not to dig her own grave again, she would use gesturing like this, rather than words.
“She doesn’t seem to be lost though?” Asumi averted her gaze from Mafuyu, turning it to the other three girls.
“Really? So it was just us jumping to conclusions?”
Yet again, she wordlessly nodded along to Fumino’s words.
“Is that so…I’m sorry about that.”
“Sorry…did we bother you during your errand?”
Rizu lowered her head, as Uruka showed a bitter smile.
“…No.”
Shake Shake.
“Thank you very much for worrying about me.”
She looked at the three girls, and showed a soft smile as she gave her thanks. Those were her honest feelings. She didn’t want to deny the girls’ kind consideration towards her either.
“I’ll be going now.”
Swiftly lowering her head towards them, she turned around on her heel. This time, neither of them tried to stop her.
“See you again, Manatsu-chan!”
“Be careful.”
“If you ever feel hungry, come visit us at Ogata Udon.”
“Have a safe trip, Ojou-sama…heh.”
Only turning her head around in the very end, Uruka was waving her hand, Fumino was moderately moving her hand, Rizu’s gaze was filled with expectation, whilst Asumi softly lifted up the hem of her skirt, showing courtesy.
“…Hm.”
That sight tickled Mafuyu’s humor, and she left out a faint giggle as she turned forwards again. She found herself surprised that these kids would be acting in such a way towards a small child like her.
***
A bit after she separated from the girls.
“Fuu…”
In the near vicinity of the familiar Ichinose Academy, Mafuyu sat on a bench in a park, taking a quick break. Normally, it wasn’t that big of a distance to clear, but she was currently in the body of a young child. If she truly was a child, she would have paid no heed to her sense of exhaustion, and kept going until the bitter end, but she had kept the thought process of an adult.
“…Still, just doing a break like this is a bit boring.”
In this long silence, Mafuyu observed her surroundings, as she flapped her legs up and down. As she did, a single woman walking there entered her field of view. At that moment, she happened to look in Mafuyu’s direction, seemingly just on a pure whim.
“?!”
Right before their gaze would meet, Mafuyu jumped off the bench, and hid in the thicket behind that. After all, the girl was yet another acquaintance to Mafuyu. No, acquaintance was a fair understatement.
Miharu…?!
As it turns out, the girl walking there was actually her own little sister, Kirisu Miharu.
Danger…! It’ll be heavily dangerous if Miharu were to see me right now…!
After all, she couldn’t bring up the excuse of being a relative. First and foremost, she knew how Mafuyu looked like as a child. The chance of having her identity figured out was several times higher than with the girls she encountered previously.
“Oh…? Misinterpretation…? It felt like Nee-sama was near, just now…?”
Peeking through the opening in the thicket, Mafuyu saw that Miharu was suspiciously gazing at her surroundings.
“Wasn’t it coming from over here…?”
Looking around nervously, she approached the thicket Mafuyu was hiding in.
This is bad, this is bad, this is bad, this is bad…!
If she moved carelessly, she could reveal her location with an unwanted sound, and Miharu would check in there. Hence, all Mafuyu could do now was hope that she would give up, and turn around.
“Nee-sama~? Are you there~?”
However, to her great displeasure, Miharu still continued to head towards the thicket she was hiding in.
God is dead…
Mafuyu had already given up on the situation. What would her little sister think if she saw her older sister in such a situation. Not to mention that this happened after drinking some suspicious medicine. What kind of excuses could she come up with in such a situation? Mafuyu’s thoughts were running wild inside her head, as the saving grace arrived.
“Oh? Miharu-san, what are you doing here?”
A young boy appeared, calling out to Miharu.
…Yuiga-kun?
Yet again, another pupil of Mafuyu appeared, Yuiga Nariyuki.
Misfortune…! Why do I keep running into them one after another…!
After such bad luck the entire day, Mafuyu felt like resigning.
“Unexpected encounter…I was about to head to university, what about you?”
“I tried to get a change of pace and wanted to study outside.”
“High evaluation, I’m impressed.”
The two of them were exchanging words, completely unaware to Mafuyu’s grief and agony.
“By the way, Yuiga Nariyuki-san, have you seen Nee-sama around here?” Miharu asked, as she yet again took a wide glance around her.
“Kirisu-sensei? I have been here the entire morning, but I didn’t see her.” Nariyuki tilted his head, as he gave a rather curious response.
“Is that so…Understood. I thought for a second that I felt Nee-sama’s presence in the area, but that might have just been my imagination.”
“Presence…” Nariyuki showed a bitter smile at the rather strange vocabulary Miharu used.
“Then, I’ll be going now. Blessed fortune, please make sure to properly study for the entrance exams.”
“Ah, thank you very much.”
After giving a short goodbye, Miharu left the park behind her.
“…Fu.” Mafuyu let out a relieved sigh.
However, that only lasted for a brief moment.
“Um…”
“?!”
Mafuyu’s heart skipped a beat as Nariyuki suddenly called out to the thicket she was hiding in.
“I saw you quickly rush in there as Miharu-san approached you, but…are you okay?” Nariyuki spoke up, showing a somewhat troubled expression.
Most likely, he was wondering if his actions weren’t actually a bother to her.
“Hm…?”
As he took a closer look at Mafuyu’s face, his own expression distorted in doubt.
“Kirisu-sensei…?”
“Relative! I am a relative of Kirisu Mafuyu!”
This time she didn’t hesitate to use that excuse.
“Ah, yeah, I thought so.”
Apparently, Nariyuki had guessed as much without herself having to clarify it. Rather, she worried that she might have just made things worse with that desperate exclamation.
“Huh…? So that means you’re Miharu-san’s relative as well, right…?”
He showed no doubting that it might actually be Mafuyu he was talking to.
“Then, maybe I shouldn’t have stopped her…?”
“N-No!”
Nariyuki seemed like he was about to call out to Miharu to bring her back, so Mafuyu quickly called out to stop him.
“Um…Well…Mission! Right now, I’m on an errand that Mafuyu…oneechan gave me, so I can’t have any other relatives help me!”
In the end, that was the best excuse that Mafuyu could come up with.
“Ahh, I see. That’s what it was.”
Luckily, Nariyuki immediately showed belief towards that excuse. As he showed a kind expression, he crouched down to her level.
“Could you tell me your name?”
“…Manatsu.”
Being on the same height where their eyes met, she had to yet again rely on this fake name. All because she couldn’t think of anything else on the spot.
“Thank you for telling me, Manatsu-chan. I’m Nariyuki. Nariyuki Yuiga.” His words sounded a bit more soft and slowly spoken than usual.
It feels like he’s used to being around younger kids…That reminds me, he has a younger sister and younger brother, doesn’t he…
Remembering the details she had read about in Nariyuki’s family register, Mafuyu showed understanding.
“Nariyuki…o…onii…oniicha…”
Following that, she wanted to call him equally like how she did to Fumino and the others, a more childish way, but…
B-Bashful…For some reason, it feels much more embarrassing than before…!
She found herself in agony by trying this, but was unable to pull it off in the end.
“…Yuiga-kun.”
In the end, she ended up using her usual way of addressing him.
“Yeah, exactly.” Nariyuki showed no signs of that bothering him, and nodded along with a smile. “By the way, Manatsu-chan. Where do you have to go for your errand?” With the same smile, Nariyuki continued.
“…Ichinose Academy.”
Though she hesitated for a second, she decided to earnestly answer him. One of the reasons for that was because she couldn’t think of any other place right on the spot, but also…
It should be fine if I told him…
For some reason, that was what she felt.
“To Ichinose Academy?” Nariyuki tilted his head, a bit puzzled apparently. “What exactly do you have to do for this errand?”
“I have to bring her some documents she needs from her desk.”
“Bring her documents…Kirisu-sensei…” Nariyuki kept his smile, although it was a bit more stiff than before. “I do think that the other teachers will stop you before you can do that though?”
“……Ah.”
Mafuyu had completely forgotten about that single fact. Even if she called herself a relative, it was still questionable if they would just give over the documents. Their first action would most likely be to call the person in question. However, since it was Mafuyu herself standing there, she could not answer that. Thus, Mafuyu’s mission came to a quick and abrupt halt.
***
Time had passed a tad bit after her encounter with Nariyuki.
“You really saved me there, thank you very much.”
Standing in front of the school gate of Ichinose Academy, Mafuyu bowed down towards Nariyuki.
“Haha, it wasn’t that big of a deal, so don’t worry.”
In the end, it was him, who went to pick up the documents under the pretense of ‘Kirisu-sensei asked me to get them’ for her. Since he was a student of this school, there was no reason to doubt him in that regard. Not to mention that Nariyuki was regarded as a very diligent student by the teachers in the first place.
“Do you know the way home?”
“Yes, I’m fine now.”
“Is that so, then take care on your way.” Softly lifting up his hand, Nariyuki turned on his heel, and started going his own way.
“…Fu.”
Separating her gaze from his back, Mafuyu lowered her head as she exhaled ever so slightly. A part of that was relief that she safely managed to pick up the documents she would need, but even a bigger part of that was her exhaustion, slowly catching up to her. Getting all the way here with her child legs took a lot from her. On top of that, running into an acquaintance after acquaintance was mentally exhausting for her.
I will have to take a break, or it’ll be tough on me on the way home…
Thinking that, she started moving her legs, albeit growing wobbly, but—
“Manatsu-chan.”
Someone called out to her, so she lifted her head.
“…Yuiga-kun?”
It was Nariyuki, having crouched down, with his back to her.
“Hop on?”
Those were his only words, and urged Mafuyu as if this was the normal course of events.
“But, having you do all this is…”
“Haha, kids don’t have to hold back at all. You must be tired, right?”
Apparently, Nariyuki had completely seen through everything. Mafuyu hesitated for a second.
“…Then, I’ll take you up on that.”
But, eventually, Mafuyu gave in, and had him carry her. She really doubted herself if she could make it home safely in her current condition.
“Alright.”
As Mafuyu put her hands on his shoulders, he embraced her legs with his arms, so naturally as if he was used to this, and easily lifted her up, as he stretched out his legs.
He might not look very reliable, but at times like these, he really is a boy…
Since her entire body had shrunken down, his back looked taller, and made him seem equally more reliable.
“Manatsu-chan, can you give me a rough explanation of where your house is?”
“I can stay over at Mafuyu-oneechan’s house today.”
This time, she finally managed to come up with a gullible cover-up.
“Ahh, is that so. Then it’s fine, I know the way to her house after all.”
Nodding along to Mafuyu’s words, Nariyuki started walking.
For a while, she was shaking on Nariyuki’s back.
“Gratitude…I really am in your debt for everything you did today.”
Once her tension blew away, Mafuyu muttered these words.
“Again, you’re just a child, so you can ask for help like this.” Nariyuki responded with his normal, kind voice. “Still…Talking to you like this when I can’t see your face, I really feel like it’s Kirisu-sensei I’m talking to…”
However, because of Nariyuki getting a bit suspicious again, Mafuyu’s face tensed up.
Inattention…I went back to my usual way of talking before I realized it…
After having had Nariyuki find out about her mess of a room, Mafuyu started to relax relatively in front of him (at least compared to other students of hers). And this happened to show now as well.
“Manatsu-chan, you seem to really like Kirisu-sensei, don’t you? You’re even starting to talk like her.”
Fortunately, Nariyuki had gotten the wrong idea like this.
“Y-Yes…that’s the case…” Mafuyu decided to roll with that.
“………”
“………”
Then, a short silence ensued between the two of them.
“About…Mafuyu…oneechan.” Before she realized it, Mafuyu had opened her mouth to start a question. “What do you…think about her?”
But when these words followed, she quickly regained her sharp senses.
Foolish question…! W-What am I asking…?!
Even she herself was unsure why that question escaped her lips.
“Ah, wait, that just now was…” She panicked, trying to take back the question, but her mouth couldn’t keep up, and she fumbled.
Since she was rather quiet as she asked that, she could only pray that the wind had carried away that foolish question.
“About Kirisu-sensei…huh.”
To her misfortune, her words had perfectly arrived at Nariyuki’s ears.
“I do think that she’s a strict person.”
Normally, those words would at least hurt a teacher. But, Mafuyu was already used to being seen in such a light, and he certainly wasn’t the first one to openly say that.
“But…Ah, right. Since you’re staying over, you probably know, don’t you? She can be a bit careless at times, and a bit sloppy, but…Ouch?! Hey, Manatsu-chan?! Your nails are biting in my shoulders?!”
That being said, the words after that she couldn’t just ignore that easily.
“Ahaha, sorry, sorry. You’d get angry if someone talked badly about the Onee-san you like that much, huh.”
Yet again, Mafuyu heard a bitter laugh coming from Nariyuki.
“…But, even with all that, I still like her, Kirisu-sensei.”
“………Huh?” Having not expected these words, Mafuyu’s brain froze.
“She’s not as perfect as she might look like, but that makes her easier to approach. Even more than that…they all have the wrong idea about her being cold or anything like that. She’s teaching everyone thoroughly, really treasuring her students. That’s why I’m thankful to Kirisu-sensei, and I deeply respect her.”
However, his following words allowed her to think a bit more clearly.
“A-Ah…I understand. That’s how you mean it…”
“Hm? That’s how I mean what?”
“…Verbal slip. Just ignore that.”
Or so she tried to cover it up, but Nariyuki still seemed a bit suspicious.
“Really…? Ah, we’re here.”
Let’s call it a blessing in disguise for Mafuyu that they arrived at her home at that very moment.
“Many thanks. You really helped me a lot, Yuiga-kun.” Getting down from Nariyuki’s back, Mafuyu gave a slight bow.
“No problem. Ah, let me open the door.” He accepted the key from Mafuyu, and opened the door to her apartment.
“Now then, Yuiga-kun, I will see you at—I will see you next time I’ll go visit Mafuyu-oneechan, hopefully.”
—At school, she barely managed to correct herself.
“Yeah, I’m looking forward to it.”
Breaking up with the waving Nariyuki, Mafuyu set foot inside her apartment.
“Fuu…Fatigue. I need a break.”
As she let out an exhausted sigh, the door behind her closed. At the same time—
Rumble rumble.
“Mguh?!”
With a flashy sound, the mountain of objects stacked near the entrance all beautifully collapsed, burrowing Mafuyu beneath that.
“Mmm! Mmmm!!”
In the end, she was unable to free herself from this avalanche. From the point of view of an onlooker, this might be a familiar sight.
“Mmm!”
Clack.
Right as she fought her hardest to escape, Mafuyu head the sound of the door opening again.
“…I’ll go home after cleaning up the room,” Nariyuki’s voice resounded.
“…Mm.” Mafuyu could only nod along to those words.
***
“Alright, this should do it.”
Looking around the perfectly cleaned up room, Nariyuki nodded along in a satisfying manner.
“Apology…I bothered you with that, didn’t I.”
“Haha, it wasn’t your fault at all, Manatsu-chan.”
He turned towards Mafuyu, as his usual kind smile had a faint glimmer of bitterness in it.
“And also, I’m pretty much used to this.”
“………” Mafuyu was unable to do anything besides quickly avert her eyes.
“Here, Manatsu-chan, have a sip of this.” Nariyuki pushed a cup towards her. “It’s a milkshake. It’s supposed to work wonders against fatigue, since it has milk and eggs in it.” He smiled, only for his eyes to open wide. “Ah, I just took and used the ingredients from her kitchen…It should be fine since you’re Kurisu-sensei’s relative, right…?”
Of course, Mafuyu wouldn’t have rebuked him for that anyway, but in her current appearance, she was given no choice for that either.
“Thank you, I’ll gladly take it.”
Instead, she just responded with those words, accepted the cup, and put it onto her mouth. Maybe it was specifically made for her in mind, but it had a rather sweet taste to it. Just as he had said, she slowly started to feel her exhaustion wash away.
“Alright, this time I’ll be going home for real.”
“Yes, take care.”
“Yeah, will do.”
Putting his right hand on the doorknob, Nariyuki turned around to wave at her with his left.
“See you, Manatsu-chan.”
“………Yes.”
With the milkshake in one hand, Mafuyu watched the boy off, as he stepped out of the door, closing it behind him.
“…Now then.”
After she put down the cup on the table in front of her, Mafuyu once again gazed down at her own body.
“Predicament…What should I do if I really can’t turn back to normal again…?”
She put both hands and knees on the ground, wrapped in a feeling of impending despair. But, then—
“…Hm?”
Because her gaze was lower than normal, she spotted a certain box, resting on the floor.
I feel like I’ve seen that before…
After giving it a good look with narrowed eyebrows, a certain memory flashed up in the back of Mafuyu’s head. It was the drinking party yet again. The machine gun-like one-sided conversation with the fellow teacher, about the anti-aging medicine. Thinking thus far, it finally clicked.
“That’s right…that’s the box I got back then…!”
Basically, in this box was the (assumed to be) reason for this entire ordeal. She hadn’t seen it for a while, so it must have been buried between all the other things, and now resurfaced after Nariyuki’s cleaning.
“Maybe I could find a hint on how I can turn back to normal…”
Any slight connection was better than none, so she quickly opened up the lid of the box. Nariyuki had even worked his cleaning magic here, as two kinds of differently colored bottles were neatly lined up next to each other, only showing an opening for the bottle that Mafuyu had gulped down yesterday.
“Hm…? Two kinds…?” Mafuyu narrowed her eyebrows, as she took a closer look at the label of one bottle.
Written there was the same thing she had read this morning, ‘Anti-aging medicine’. On the other one, it said ‘Anti-anti-aging medicine’.
“Anti-anti…?”
The wrinkles on her forehead increased even further, as she read further on the label, which had the following sentence written with an almost too small of a font.
‘In the case that the anti-aging medicine worked too much, please drink this.’
“Guess. So if I drink this, I can get back to normal…?”
Naturally, she had no concrete proof for that besides that small text. It might as well worsen the situation. However, she had no other choice but to put trust in that, and try it out.
“Gamble. However, if there’s a chance, I have to take that.”
She hesitated for a second, but still prepared herself as she opened up the lid and took a sip of it, swallowing it all at once.
“Changes…None?”
As of right now, she could feel no apparent change occurring with her body…besides one.
“Fuwah…” A yawn leaked out of her mouth. “Drowsiness…Because I drank the medicine…?”
Maybe it was the exhaustion of the entire day catching up to her…Either way, Mafuyu was assaulted by a heavy sleepiness.
“Can’t…anymore…”
She barely managed to change into her sleeping garments, but she had to be content with her normal ones, since she couldn’t find any child-sized clothing right now.
“Li…mit…”
And thus, she collapsed on the bed, in the exact same way as the day before. Again, it only took her mere seconds until her consciousness drifted off into the dark abyss.
***
The following morning.
“Mmm…”
Being stimulated by the shining rays of the sun, Mafuyu slowly opened her eyes. Yet again, it was a pleasant awakening.
“…I feel like I’ve seen a weird dream.”
About her own body turning into that of a child, a dream like that. It was still as clear as day, the memories as vivid as it happened yesterday. Like it had actually happened in reality.
“Hmpf, outrageous. Something like that is impossible.” She laughed at her own dream.
Impossible, or so it should have been…But, when she looked around her room, it was neatly cleaned like Nariyuki was there yesterday, children’s clothes scattered on the floor, and a cup on the desk, with a little bit of milkshake left in it. Putting on the TV, the date shown there was the one after her day off.
“Proof…you say? Reality…it can’t be…” Mafuyu muttered, putting one hand on her head to support it.
However, she couldn’t stay like this for much longer, as a quick glance over at the clock on the wall showed that time was closing in for first period at school.
“…Thinking about it too much won’t help me…”
She decided to give up on thinking too much, and instead prepared to head out.
***
In her usual suit appearance, she arrived at the school gate.
“Manatsu-chan sure was cute, right~?”
“Yeah, I know right~”
Walking a bit in front of her, Mafuyu could hear the conversation between Uruka and Fumino. Next to them was Rizu, silently nodding along.
So yesterday…actually happened…
Coming this far, Mafuyu could only accept the reality. With so many evidence piling up, it was getting difficult to argue against it.
“But, she had this really sharp gaze, and I could feel some crazy pressure coming from her, like it was the real Kirisu-sensei.”
“Ahahaha…” Fumino forced out a bitter smile at Uruka’s words.
Rizu equally nodded along.
“…Classes are about to start, should you really be taking your time by talking here?”
““Hyaa?!””
Being called out by Mafuyu, a shriek escaped from Uruka and Fumino. Even Rizu had her eyes wide open.
“Y-Yes, that’s right! Excuse us!” With an awkward smile, Uruka quickly accelerated to get away from that place.
“Um…Excuse us.”
“Excuse us.”
Fumino had her usual bitter smile, as Rizu had…a rather difficult to read expression, but she must have felt awkward as well. They each gave a slight bow, and chased after Uruka.
“For crying out loud…”
Watching the girls off, Mafuyu crossed her arms. Her gaze was as sharp as Uruka said, but there was absolutely no ill-intent behind there, especially not after the interaction she had with them the day before.
“Oh…? Did something good happen, Kirisu-sensei? You seem happy.” Nariyuki called out to her.
“Misapprehension. It’s just your imagination.” Mafuyu responded, as she pulled a stern face.
“Is that so…?”
“Rather than that…Yesterday, Manatsu has been in your care, right? Let me thank you for that.”
Nariyuki tilted his head in confusion for a second, but stopped as Mafuyu thanked him.
“No, I didn’t do anything great…Ah, but.” Nariyuki’s expression turned into a comfortable smile. “Please tell me when Manatsu-chan is over to play again.”
That day would never arrive because Mafuyu had no intention of drinking that medicine ever again.
“She promised me that we’d meet again after all.”
However—
“…Yes.”
The previous day was a lot of stress for her, and her feelings didn’t change in the slightest. However, it wasn’t exactly a bad day for her either.
“If that time comes, I will invite you over, Nariyuki-oniichan.” She called him out in a teasing manner.
Yesterday, she was too embarrassed to say it, but now it just naturally escaped from her lips.
“Eh…?”
“You should hurry, or you will be late as well.”
Nobody saw her expression that moment, but it was undoubtedly a faint smile.
1 Mafuyu’s fuyu is written as the kanji for winter, so now she used natsu = summer
“Fu…”
Pressing the enter key of the keyboard, Kirisu Mafuyu let out a faint sigh.
“Completed…It has gotten pretty late, hasn’t it?”
Gazing at the nearby clock, the needles were indicating that the time of day was already late at night. Shown on the PC screen in front of her was a small test for world history, a subject that she herself was responsible for. Having taken care of other small paperwork whilst working on that, things ended up at the current time before she even realized it.
“Next I would have to finish the written reports, and I need to reference the documents I forgot…So I have to go to school tomorrow and pick them up…Umm…”
Although she tried her hardest to figure out the remaining work left for her, her head wouldn’t work properly at that.
“…Impossible. My lack of sleep has been going on for a while now, I can’t keep going like this.”
Having arrived at her limit, she gave up on thinking.
“Tomorrow is a day off, so I can get those documents in the afternoon as well…For now, I have to sleep and freshen up…” While muttering that to herself, she headed towards her bed on wobbly feet.
However, on the way there, she felt the urge to refresh her dried-up throat.
“Some fluid intake is necessary…Do I still have something..?”
Finding it tiresome to even make her way to the refrigerator now, Mafuyu checked her surroundings. A lot of objects were entering her view. Most of that was trash or used books. It made her wonder when was the last time her pupil Yuiga Nariyuki came over to clean up for her. It should have been fairly recently, but it turned into this mess before she even realized it. However, this still could be considered neat, compared to the usual situation. Most likely. Probably. Thinking about it relatively, at least.
“Hm…?”
As she ran her eyes over the disastrous scene called her room, Mafuyu spotted something sparkling in the corner of her view. A bottle, filled with a clear and transparent fluid. Apparently, it was reflected through the room’s dim light. It was rolled over as if to hide it behind the trash bags scattered around it.
“What was this again…?”
Though she gave it some thought for a brief moment, her consciousness started to fade even further.
“Well, this is the perfect timing for it…”
It was in a still unopened state, so it shouldn’t ruin her stomach. Making a conclusion like that, Mafuyu opened up the bottle, and gulped the contents down.
“Li…mit…”
Thus, she collapsed onto the bed. Mere seconds had passed before her consciousness already drifted into the far land of her dreams.
***
The following morning.
“Mmm…”
Her awakening was a pleasant and comfortable one. The sense of fatigue that had plagued her all too much as of recently had completely vanished. Her body was now brimming with energy, as light as ever. Her eyestrains, muscle stiffness in shoulders and waist, all gone. Almost as if she had become younger again. Weirdly enough, the bed felt bigger than usual as well.
“Fu…Laughable, what am I thinking?” Pushing out a bitter smile, Mafuyu pushed up her body.
At the same time, her sleepwear fell off her shoulder.
“…?” Since they shouldn’t be oversized by all means, she narrowed her eyes.
And then, she finally realized.
“Doubt…I feel…a bit smaller…?”
The further she gazed down at herself, the bigger the wrinkles on her forehead. The size of her hands had shrunk, and her shortened fingers looked more adorable than mature. Almost as if she was a child.
“These are my…hands, right…?”
Even as she slowly closed and opened her eyes again, the fact that she was looking at her own hands didn’t change. On top of that, her mumbling had sounded oddly high-pitched for a while now.
“N-No way, right…?”
Forcing out an uncomfortable smile, she pushed herself off the bed and headed towards the mirror. Her facial features were still the same as before, the same way she remembered them.
However.
These facial features and her entire body overlapped with the ones of her memories from around twenty years ago.
“………”
She was entranced by the sight in the mirror.
“………”
Shortly averting her gaze, she rubbed her eyes, and once again turned towards the mirror.
“………”
Closing her eyes for a bit, and reopening them again, the result was the same. No matter what she tried, the image reflected in the mirror did not change. She forcefully lifted up her mouth for a smile, and her reflection in the mirror followed suit. She then relaxed her mouth again. The young expression in the mirror turned serious as well. After repeating a similar action for a bit, Mafuyu nodded to herself.
“Conclusion…It seems like I’m still dreaming.” Muttering those words with a vacant expression, she turned her face away from the mirror. “It seems as if I’ve been more tired than previously anticipated. I guess I should sleep some more…No wait, I’m still in the middle of dreaming, aren’t I..? Would I wake up if I went to sleep in my dream…?”
Muttering questions to herself that nobody would answer for her, she once again headed for the bed. However, on the way there, her lower garment slipped off her.
“Eh?!”
She stumbled, falling down on the floor, as she rammed her face into a nearby trash bag.
“O-Ouch…”
She slowly pushed her body up from the ground, and started rubbing the slightly reddened tip of her nose, as she suddenly froze, realizing what words she had just spoken.
“Pain…? This isn’t…a dream…?”
That exact moment, Mafuyu finally realized something crucial. That is, the sensations in this dream were far too real. Coming this far, she had no other choice but to accept it.
“My body went back to my younger days…?”
To be completely frank, it was nothing more than a fantasy setting you’d see in movies or novels, but her current body was the most accurate proof she could find.
“W-Why did this happen…?”
Of course, whilst the doubts might have disappeared, it was still hard to just accept this situation.
“Hm…?”
Right then, something sparkling entered Mafuyu’s field of vision. Reflected by the entering sunlight from the window, it was an empty bottle. Right before collapsing into her bed, Mafuyu had gulped down the contents of that bottle. Out of curiosity, she took a closer look at the bottle—or rather, the label on it. What she found written there, was—
“Anti-aging medicine…?”
That was the exact wording. Anti-aging…in other words, turning young again. The most perfect expression to describe this chaotic situation. Though, in the truest sense of the word, it should only slow down the signs of age showing on one’s body, and not literally bringing the user’s body back in time, as what happened with Mafuyu.
“Because of this medicine, my body shrunk…?”
That was the one and only hint Mafuyu had to explain her current state.
“But before that…why did I have something like this lying around in my room in the first place…?”
Truthfully speaking, Mafuyu’s room was reigned by chaos and objects lying around everywhere. However, that doesn’t explain how a random object like this would just appear out of nowhere.
“……Ah.”
Mafuyu had been glaring at the bottle for a while to remember where it could have appeared from until a certain scene popped up in the back of her head. It was a work-related drinking party.
—Mafuyu-sensei is still young, so you might not have an actual feeling for it! But, the signs of aging come before you even realize it! Out of the blue! That’s why we have to start preparing against that while we’re still young! Look, this anti-aging thing? You never had any of this before, right?! Ah, I know, I’ll give you this, so drink some of it! Just take the entire box! I bought this online when I was tired, so I just bought a full box of it by accident! I haven’t tried it yet, but they said on TV that it had some fantastic effects! Depending on the person, it could even turn you back into a child. They said stuff like that! Well, not like that would actually happen though! But, that just shows that they have confidence in it, so try it out when you have the time, and let me hear about it!
While being on the receiving end of this machine gun-like talk, raining down from an older fellow teacher, Mafuyu was forced to accept the box that had a similar design as the one on the bottle. Since she missed the timing to decline it, she had no other choice but to take it home…
“It actually turned me back into a child…?!” Finding this too hard to believe, Mafuyu held her head in her hands.
She was still a bit uncertain if this anti-aging medicine really was the cause of this chaos, but she couldn’t deny the fact that her body truly had shrunk. Either way, she had to find a way to deal with this situation. That being said, what could she do in such an irregular situation?
“…Luckily, today is my day off. For now, I’ll stay inside for the entire day, and see if I can find a way to revert this. Maybe I will be back to normal tomorrow anyway…”
In the end, her only option was to stay positive about this and hope for the best.
“Maybe I won’t be able to return back to normal again…”
Muttering rather depressed assumptions to herself, Mafuyu pulled up the lower sleeping garment that had just slipped down, and headed towards the bed again,
“…?!”
On the way there, the mountain of documents on her desk fell into her eye, forcefully reminding her about a certain fact.
“Careless…! I had to get the documents from school to write the written reports…! The deadline for that is tomorrow…!”
Two choices flickered up inside Mafuyu’s head.
First—Ignoring the deadline of the reports.
Second—Picking up the documents at school with her current body.
It only took her a fragment of a second to decide on which.
***
A bit less of an hour later.
“This should work out, right?”
Mafuyu had wrapped her small body in children’s clothing. After trying her luck and going through the western clothes she had with her, she luckily found some clothes she had worn when she was younger, for a reason she didn’t know herself. She guessed that she must have taken them with her when she moved, and they had been sleeping in the back of the drawer ever since. Just this once, her sloppy personality was a saving grace.
“Determination…Now then, time to go.”
Dodging the trash bags scattered on the ground with her small feet, she headed towards the entrance.
In the end, Kirisu Mafuyu wasn’t enough of an irresponsible person to willingly ignore the deadline of the written reports, just staying at home the entire day. Even if something irregular as this happened with her own body. If she could still move, she should be moving out to gather those documents…that is the conclusion that Mafuyu arrived at.
“Ugh…the door…so heavy…”
Putting her hand on the doorknob, and turning it, she used her entire body strength to push the door open and somehow managed to do so. After safely stepping outside, she yet again used the weight of her body to pull the door closed.
“Just opening and closing a door can be this hard…” Mafuyu let out a sigh.
She already felt a small level of exhaustion just by stepping outside. However, the real deal would only start now.
“With this body, the scenery around me looks completely different as well…”
The height of her field of view was cut in half from before. It should have been a normal way she was used to, but it felt like she was walking through the streets of an unfamiliar town. Looking all around her surroundings, she headed towards Ichinose Academy.
“Ah, what’s wrong with you, looking around all restlessly like that?”
“?!”
Suddenly, she was being called out by a voice close to her, as her small body twitched in shock. She slowly, and carefully turned towards the source of that voice—
Takemoto-san, Furuhashi-san, and Ogata-san…
Standing there were three pupils of hers. They were a good bit taller than Mafuyu, and they all gazed down at her, their eyes glittering with interest.
The end…to think I would meet an acquaintance while looking like this…and my students of all the people…
As her body was frozen with fear, Mafuyu felt her own dignity as their teacher crumble away. However, to her surprise—
“H-Huh…? Did I scare you by suddenly calling out to you? It’s fine, we aren’t any suspicious people~”
The girl that called out to Mafuyu before, Uruka, showed a rather panicky reaction, as she waved her hands at her.
“Uruka-chan, that totally makes you sound like a suspicious person.”
“That’s a cliche phrase someone suspicious would use.”
Towards Uruka’s attempt to calm Mafuyu down, Furuhashi Fumino just let out a giggle, with Ogata Rizu having a straight expression, as they both commented on it.
“Ehhh?! Don’t be so cruel, you two! That makes me sound like some pervert!”
“Ahaha, I was just joking.”
“I was giving a common opinion.”
The three of them directed their attention away from Mafuyu.
Huh…?
Watching them converse, Mafuyu showed a surprised, and confused reaction inside her heart.
They haven’t caught on that it’s me…?
Weirdly enough, that easily satisfied her.
I guess…normally you wouldn’t expect someone’s body to shrink from one day to the other.
Thinking that far, she managed to gain a bit of confidence.
“Takemoto-san, I…”
“Huh? Why do you know my name?”
However, that confidence vanished immediately.
Failure…! My bad habit just…!
In order to find a solution to cover her blunder up, Mafuyu frantically observed her surroundings. And then, she saw her last hope, the bag that Uruka was holding.
“I-I saw this…! So…!” She pointed at the test paper peeking out from Uruka’s bag.
On it, one could read the name ‘Takemoto Uruka’.
“Ah, really? Wow, you can already read kanji, huh?” Uruka showed consent, while her eyes opened a bit out of surprise.
“I am…learning after all…”
Suppressing the guilt of lying to her students, she barely managed to give a normal response.
“Ohhh? What a good girl you are~”
“………”
As Uruka started rubbing Mafuyu’s head, she lowered it in a sulking manner, but still calmly accepted it. She judged that it would be safer to just go with the flow, instead of showing any sort of rebellish reaction.
An answer sheet…An English test?
With full intention of wanting to run away from reality like this, Mafuyu yet again directed her gaze at the paper handing out from Uruka’s bag.
Seems like her grades have been going up, huh…
Mafuyu wasn’t responsible for tutoring Uruka. However, she still knew about her current situation. Her previous English grades were closing in on the abysmal level, but the points shown on the answer sheet in front of her were nothing of that sort. If she kept working on her grades like this, she would surely arrive at the goal she was aiming for.
The ally of those that ‘can’t’, huh…
The face of the tutor, currently responsible for those girls, flashed up inside her head.
“By the way, are you alone right now? Where are your mom and dad?” Fumino went into a stooping position, as she asked with her gaze down. “…Huh?”
Following that, she took a good glance at Mafuyu’s expression, and tilted her head, as if she was confused about something.
“N-No I…I’m alone.” Feeling a certain danger creep up on her, Mafuyu answered quickly as she averted her face.
“Are you on an errand of some sort?” Rizu joined in to ask Mafuyu.
“Something…like that.”
Naturally, she couldn’t say she was on her way to pick up documents from the school. However, this wasn’t a lie either.
“How admirable~ And, where are you going?” Uruka asked, still softly patting Mafuyu on her head.
“That’s…”
Thus, she found trouble answering. For one, she pondered about what would happen if she just honestly told them she was on her way to the school. Knowing these girls, they might decide to take her with them to school. In all honesty, she wanted to avoid being in contact with them for too long of a time. She could never know when one of them might catch on to her true identity, and lastly, continuing this situation of lying to them was painful.
But, before Mafuyu could come up with an answer—
“Hey, is this what I’m thinking it is…?”
“A lost child?”
“Most likely.”
The three of them looked at each other, arriving at the same conclusion.
“No, that’s not…”
“Don’t worry!”
Mafuyu was about to clear up their misunderstanding, but Uruka got the jump on her, embracing her.
“We’ll properly find your mom and dad for you, okay!”
“Aren’t you hungry? Do you want to eat some udon?”
“I know, how about we tell you a funny story in the meantime? Though, it’ll mostly be improvised for now…”
All of three of them showed considerate smiles, with their own ideas.
…So actions out of pure good-will still exist, huh…
Thinking like that, Mafuyu felt bad pushing them away like this.
That being said, I can’t let this continue for forever…
However, before she could start thinking of how to get out of this, she was interrupted yet again.
“What’s your name?”
“Uuu…”
Uruka’s question yet again made her falter.
“Ma…Manatsu1…”
Too flustered, and with not enough time to think, she came up with this cheap name.
“Manatsu-chan, alright. I’m Uruka! …Well, you already know my name, I guess. But, ‘Takemoto-san’ is a bit too stiff, so you can just call me ‘Uruka-oneechan’, okay?” said Uruka with a carefree and gentle smile.
“I…understand…Uruka…oneechan.”
In order to not make it more suspicious, she just decided to follow Uruka’s instructions. Though it sounded more childish than she was hoping for.
“I’m Rizu. Rizu-oneechan.”
“Okay, Rizu-oneechan…”
Since Rizu threw her an expectant gaze, Mafuyu responded with that. By doing so, Rizu showed a satisfied expression.
“I’ll be Fumino-oneechan.”
“Okay, Fumino-oneechan…”
Although Fumino’s expression was rather flat compared to Rizu’s, she still followed suit.
Disgrace…! To think that I would have to act like a little child…!
Though her expression on the outside was as calm as she was allowed to be, Mafuyu internally grit her teeth out of embarrassment.
“…?”
In the midst of that, she realized that Fumino was yet again closely inspecting Mafuyu’s face. For a short while, her gaze was fixated on her.
“…Ah!”
““?!””
Seeing that she suddenly let out a rather volume-heavy voice, not just Mafuyu, but Rizu and Uruka both twitched in shock and surprise.
“Ah, sorry for suddenly screaming like that. But, I finally got it.”
After putting her hands together to apologize, Fumino turned her rather relieved expression towards Mafuyu again.
“I was thinking this entire time…that Manatsu-chan looked like someone I knew…and it’s Kirisu-sensei!”
“?!”
Mafuyu’s heart almost leapt out of her chest as she heard Fumino’s conclusion.
“I see, now that you say it.”
“Like a small Kirisu-sensei?”
Following Rizu’s and Uruka’s agreement, her heart started racing even faster.
“Ahh, you see, Kirisu-sensei is actually a teacher at our school.”
She assumed that they would have found out about her identity by now, but judging from Fumino’s reaction, as she started explaining, didn’t show any signs of that. Realizing that, Mafuyu let out a relieved sigh.
“She was the person tutoring me and Ricchan before. In the end, someone else took over for that, but…she was really strict…”
Following those words, Mafuyu could feel her head cool down decisively, almost a bit too much after hearing that last comment.
“A cold hearted person.”
No agitation whatsoever. She knew that people thought of her this way. She didn’t care if they did so since she was used to it. However, that’s exactly why—
“…That’s what I thought before.”
The words that followed weren’t of those that she expected, which caused Mafuyu to slightly narrow her eyes. Seeing that she used past tense there might indicate that her opinion has changed now. Fumino gazed over at Rizu and Uruka, to which they all let out a giggle.
“But…before, when I was really pushed against a wall, a call from her really saved me. Well, I don’t know how she even knew of my situation to begin with, but I didn’t expect that…and I was honestly moved.”
“I was also told by Nari…someone to rethink some things again. She might have sounded harsh all the time, but that was just because she earnestly was thinking about our future. And, although this might sound a bit rude…but finding out that she also has things she’s bad at, I realized that she was just like any other human, and that was very relieving to know.”
“I never really had that much contact with her. But, I somehow always felt that she was someone difficult to approach…But after giving me sensitive advice before the competition, or how she was wearing the Full Pure costume, and danced together at the culture festival, I was surprised to see that the selfish image I had of her was completely different.”
The three of them each gave their personal impressions. Then, they all exchanged glances again, to show bashful smiles. Watching this, Mafuyu carefully put one hand on her chest, as she thought.
…Unexpected. To think they were seeing me in such a light now.
She thought she was hated beyond belief. Naturally, it wasn’t as if they had started liking her immediately. However…Mafuyu still felt something warm fill up her chest.
“…But, the more I look at her, the more she looks like Kirisu-sensei.”
But then, Rizu’s words yet again filled her chest with tension. Her mysterious gaze that came from beyond her glasses dug deep into Mafuyu, as cold sweat ran down her cheek.
“What if it’s actually her, and she just shrunk to that size~?”
“O-Outrageous! Something like that is impossible!” She reflexively reacted to Uruka’s joke.
“…That really sounded like Kirisu-sensei, didn’t it?” Fumino gave an awkward laugh.
C-Careless…!
More and more cold sweat started to build up on her cheeks. Being stared at by the three girls, Mafuyu’s choice was—
“Um…Excuse…me!”
Tactical retreat. To immediately run away from that place.
“Fugyuh?!”
But immediately after, she ran into someone who was about to pass by them.
“I-I’m sorry…”
Rubbing the pain away from her nose, she looked up at the person she ran into.
“Yeah, be careful, okay?”
It was a familiar face to her.
Kominami-san…?!
Kominami Asumi, a graduate of Ichinose Academy, and a former pupil of Mafuyu.
“You’re not hurt, are you? ………Oh?”
As she gazed down on Mafuyu, her expression started to fill with doubt.
“…You really resemble Mafuyu-sensei, I have to say.” Asumi muttered, with a convinced tone of voice.
“Right, right!” Uruka joined them, as tension-filled as ever.
“Um…Well…”
Having failed her immediate retreat, panic broke out in Mafuyu’s head.
“A-A relative!”
Before she realized it, that was the word that flew out of her mouth.
“I am a relative of Kirisu Mafuyu!”
Everyone blinked in puzzlement at the desperate Mafuyu.
““““…Ahhhh~”””””
These were the voices following that.
“I see, a relative, huh.” Fumino clapped her hands together.
“That was the obvious solution to the problem, and we didn’t arrive at that.” Though her expression didn’t change all too much, Rizu still showed consent.
“Ahahaha, you’re right~” Uruka gave a carefree laugh.
Blunder…I should have chosen this path from the beginning…
Mafuyu internally groaned at the realization that her efforts until now were all for naught.
“By the way, what are you all doing here anyway?” Then, Asumi tilted her head in confusion.
“Manatsu-chan…this girl here is a lost child, so we’re taking care of her.”
“Ohooo?”
Raising one eyebrow after hearing Rizu’s response, Asumi yet again looked down at Mafuyu.
“Can I call you Manatsu-chan?”
As Asumi asked her with a soft tone of voice, Mafuyu quickly nodded along.
“Manatsu-chan, are you lost?”
This time, she shook her head from left to right. She deduced that, in order not to dig her own grave again, she would use gesturing like this, rather than words.
“She doesn’t seem to be lost though?” Asumi averted her gaze from Mafuyu, turning it to the other three girls.
“Really? So it was just us jumping to conclusions?”
Yet again, she wordlessly nodded along to Fumino’s words.
“Is that so…I’m sorry about that.”
“Sorry…did we bother you during your errand?”
Rizu lowered her head, as Uruka showed a bitter smile.
“…No.”
Shake Shake.
“Thank you very much for worrying about me.”
She looked at the three girls, and showed a soft smile as she gave her thanks. Those were her honest feelings. She didn’t want to deny the girls’ kind consideration towards her either.
“I’ll be going now.”
Swiftly lowering her head towards them, she turned around on her heel. This time, neither of them tried to stop her.
“See you again, Manatsu-chan!”
“Be careful.”
“If you ever feel hungry, come visit us at Ogata Udon.”
“Have a safe trip, Ojou-sama…heh.”
Only turning her head around in the very end, Uruka was waving her hand, Fumino was moderately moving her hand, Rizu’s gaze was filled with expectation, whilst Asumi softly lifted up the hem of her skirt, showing courtesy.
“…Hm.”
That sight tickled Mafuyu’s humor, and she left out a faint giggle as she turned forwards again. She found herself surprised that these kids would be acting in such a way towards a small child like her.
***
A bit after she separated from the girls.
“Fuu…”
In the near vicinity of the familiar Ichinose Academy, Mafuyu sat on a bench in a park, taking a quick break. Normally, it wasn’t that big of a distance to clear, but she was currently in the body of a young child. If she truly was a child, she would have paid no heed to her sense of exhaustion, and kept going until the bitter end, but she had kept the thought process of an adult.
“…Still, just doing a break like this is a bit boring.”
In this long silence, Mafuyu observed her surroundings, as she flapped her legs up and down. As she did, a single woman walking there entered her field of view. At that moment, she happened to look in Mafuyu’s direction, seemingly just on a pure whim.
“?!”
Right before their gaze would meet, Mafuyu jumped off the bench, and hid in the thicket behind that. After all, the girl was yet another acquaintance to Mafuyu. No, acquaintance was a fair understatement.
Miharu…?!
As it turns out, the girl walking there was actually her own little sister, Kirisu Miharu.
Danger…! It’ll be heavily dangerous if Miharu were to see me right now…!
After all, she couldn’t bring up the excuse of being a relative. First and foremost, she knew how Mafuyu looked like as a child. The chance of having her identity figured out was several times higher than with the girls she encountered previously.
“Oh…? Misinterpretation…? It felt like Nee-sama was near, just now…?”
Peeking through the opening in the thicket, Mafuyu saw that Miharu was suspiciously gazing at her surroundings.
“Wasn’t it coming from over here…?”
Looking around nervously, she approached the thicket Mafuyu was hiding in.
This is bad, this is bad, this is bad, this is bad…!
If she moved carelessly, she could reveal her location with an unwanted sound, and Miharu would check in there. Hence, all Mafuyu could do now was hope that she would give up, and turn around.
“Nee-sama~? Are you there~?”
However, to her great displeasure, Miharu still continued to head towards the thicket she was hiding in.
God is dead…
Mafuyu had already given up on the situation. What would her little sister think if she saw her older sister in such a situation. Not to mention that this happened after drinking some suspicious medicine. What kind of excuses could she come up with in such a situation? Mafuyu’s thoughts were running wild inside her head, as the saving grace arrived.
“Oh? Miharu-san, what are you doing here?”
A young boy appeared, calling out to Miharu.
…Yuiga-kun?
Yet again, another pupil of Mafuyu appeared, Yuiga Nariyuki.
Misfortune…! Why do I keep running into them one after another…!
After such bad luck the entire day, Mafuyu felt like resigning.
“Unexpected encounter…I was about to head to university, what about you?”
“I tried to get a change of pace and wanted to study outside.”
“High evaluation, I’m impressed.”
The two of them were exchanging words, completely unaware to Mafuyu’s grief and agony.
“By the way, Yuiga Nariyuki-san, have you seen Nee-sama around here?” Miharu asked, as she yet again took a wide glance around her.
“Kirisu-sensei? I have been here the entire morning, but I didn’t see her.” Nariyuki tilted his head, as he gave a rather curious response.
“Is that so…Understood. I thought for a second that I felt Nee-sama’s presence in the area, but that might have just been my imagination.”
“Presence…” Nariyuki showed a bitter smile at the rather strange vocabulary Miharu used.
“Then, I’ll be going now. Blessed fortune, please make sure to properly study for the entrance exams.”
“Ah, thank you very much.”
After giving a short goodbye, Miharu left the park behind her.
“…Fu.” Mafuyu let out a relieved sigh.
However, that only lasted for a brief moment.
“Um…”
“?!”
Mafuyu’s heart skipped a beat as Nariyuki suddenly called out to the thicket she was hiding in.
“I saw you quickly rush in there as Miharu-san approached you, but…are you okay?” Nariyuki spoke up, showing a somewhat troubled expression.
Most likely, he was wondering if his actions weren’t actually a bother to her.
“Hm…?”
As he took a closer look at Mafuyu’s face, his own expression distorted in doubt.
“Kirisu-sensei…?”
“Relative! I am a relative of Kirisu Mafuyu!”
This time she didn’t hesitate to use that excuse.
“Ah, yeah, I thought so.”
Apparently, Nariyuki had guessed as much without herself having to clarify it. Rather, she worried that she might have just made things worse with that desperate exclamation.
“Huh…? So that means you’re Miharu-san’s relative as well, right…?”
He showed no doubting that it might actually be Mafuyu he was talking to.
“Then, maybe I shouldn’t have stopped her…?”
“N-No!”
Nariyuki seemed like he was about to call out to Miharu to bring her back, so Mafuyu quickly called out to stop him.
“Um…Well…Mission! Right now, I’m on an errand that Mafuyu…oneechan gave me, so I can’t have any other relatives help me!”
In the end, that was the best excuse that Mafuyu could come up with.
“Ahh, I see. That’s what it was.”
Luckily, Nariyuki immediately showed belief towards that excuse. As he showed a kind expression, he crouched down to her level.
“Could you tell me your name?”
“…Manatsu.”
Being on the same height where their eyes met, she had to yet again rely on this fake name. All because she couldn’t think of anything else on the spot.
“Thank you for telling me, Manatsu-chan. I’m Nariyuki. Nariyuki Yuiga.” His words sounded a bit more soft and slowly spoken than usual.
It feels like he’s used to being around younger kids…That reminds me, he has a younger sister and younger brother, doesn’t he…
Remembering the details she had read about in Nariyuki’s family register, Mafuyu showed understanding.
“Nariyuki…o…onii…oniicha…”
Following that, she wanted to call him equally like how she did to Fumino and the others, a more childish way, but…
B-Bashful…For some reason, it feels much more embarrassing than before…!
She found herself in agony by trying this, but was unable to pull it off in the end.
“…Yuiga-kun.”
In the end, she ended up using her usual way of addressing him.
“Yeah, exactly.” Nariyuki showed no signs of that bothering him, and nodded along with a smile. “By the way, Manatsu-chan. Where do you have to go for your errand?” With the same smile, Nariyuki continued.
“…Ichinose Academy.”
Though she hesitated for a second, she decided to earnestly answer him. One of the reasons for that was because she couldn’t think of any other place right on the spot, but also…
It should be fine if I told him…
For some reason, that was what she felt.
“To Ichinose Academy?” Nariyuki tilted his head, a bit puzzled apparently. “What exactly do you have to do for this errand?”
“I have to bring her some documents she needs from her desk.”
“Bring her documents…Kirisu-sensei…” Nariyuki kept his smile, although it was a bit more stiff than before. “I do think that the other teachers will stop you before you can do that though?”
“……Ah.”
Mafuyu had completely forgotten about that single fact. Even if she called herself a relative, it was still questionable if they would just give over the documents. Their first action would most likely be to call the person in question. However, since it was Mafuyu herself standing there, she could not answer that. Thus, Mafuyu’s mission came to a quick and abrupt halt.
***
Time had passed a tad bit after her encounter with Nariyuki.
“You really saved me there, thank you very much.”
Standing in front of the school gate of Ichinose Academy, Mafuyu bowed down towards Nariyuki.
“Haha, it wasn’t that big of a deal, so don’t worry.”
In the end, it was him, who went to pick up the documents under the pretense of ‘Kirisu-sensei asked me to get them’ for her. Since he was a student of this school, there was no reason to doubt him in that regard. Not to mention that Nariyuki was regarded as a very diligent student by the teachers in the first place.
“Do you know the way home?”
“Yes, I’m fine now.”
“Is that so, then take care on your way.” Softly lifting up his hand, Nariyuki turned on his heel, and started going his own way.
“…Fu.”
Separating her gaze from his back, Mafuyu lowered her head as she exhaled ever so slightly. A part of that was relief that she safely managed to pick up the documents she would need, but even a bigger part of that was her exhaustion, slowly catching up to her. Getting all the way here with her child legs took a lot from her. On top of that, running into an acquaintance after acquaintance was mentally exhausting for her.
I will have to take a break, or it’ll be tough on me on the way home…
Thinking that, she started moving her legs, albeit growing wobbly, but—
“Manatsu-chan.”
Someone called out to her, so she lifted her head.
“…Yuiga-kun?”
It was Nariyuki, having crouched down, with his back to her.
“Hop on?”
Those were his only words, and urged Mafuyu as if this was the normal course of events.
“But, having you do all this is…”
“Haha, kids don’t have to hold back at all. You must be tired, right?”
Apparently, Nariyuki had completely seen through everything. Mafuyu hesitated for a second.
“…Then, I’ll take you up on that.”
But, eventually, Mafuyu gave in, and had him carry her. She really doubted herself if she could make it home safely in her current condition.
“Alright.”
As Mafuyu put her hands on his shoulders, he embraced her legs with his arms, so naturally as if he was used to this, and easily lifted her up, as he stretched out his legs.
He might not look very reliable, but at times like these, he really is a boy…
Since her entire body had shrunken down, his back looked taller, and made him seem equally more reliable.
“Manatsu-chan, can you give me a rough explanation of where your house is?”
“I can stay over at Mafuyu-oneechan’s house today.”
This time, she finally managed to come up with a gullible cover-up.
“Ahh, is that so. Then it’s fine, I know the way to her house after all.”
Nodding along to Mafuyu’s words, Nariyuki started walking.
For a while, she was shaking on Nariyuki’s back.
“Gratitude…I really am in your debt for everything you did today.”
Once her tension blew away, Mafuyu muttered these words.
“Again, you’re just a child, so you can ask for help like this.” Nariyuki responded with his normal, kind voice. “Still…Talking to you like this when I can’t see your face, I really feel like it’s Kirisu-sensei I’m talking to…”
However, because of Nariyuki getting a bit suspicious again, Mafuyu’s face tensed up.
Inattention…I went back to my usual way of talking before I realized it…
After having had Nariyuki find out about her mess of a room, Mafuyu started to relax relatively in front of him (at least compared to other students of hers). And this happened to show now as well.
“Manatsu-chan, you seem to really like Kirisu-sensei, don’t you? You’re even starting to talk like her.”
Fortunately, Nariyuki had gotten the wrong idea like this.
“Y-Yes…that’s the case…” Mafuyu decided to roll with that.
“………”
“………”
Then, a short silence ensued between the two of them.
“About…Mafuyu…oneechan.” Before she realized it, Mafuyu had opened her mouth to start a question. “What do you…think about her?”
But when these words followed, she quickly regained her sharp senses.
Foolish question…! W-What am I asking…?!
Even she herself was unsure why that question escaped her lips.
“Ah, wait, that just now was…” She panicked, trying to take back the question, but her mouth couldn’t keep up, and she fumbled.
Since she was rather quiet as she asked that, she could only pray that the wind had carried away that foolish question.
“About Kirisu-sensei…huh.”
To her misfortune, her words had perfectly arrived at Nariyuki’s ears.
“I do think that she’s a strict person.”
Normally, those words would at least hurt a teacher. But, Mafuyu was already used to being seen in such a light, and he certainly wasn’t the first one to openly say that.
“But…Ah, right. Since you’re staying over, you probably know, don’t you? She can be a bit careless at times, and a bit sloppy, but…Ouch?! Hey, Manatsu-chan?! Your nails are biting in my shoulders?!”
That being said, the words after that she couldn’t just ignore that easily.
“Ahaha, sorry, sorry. You’d get angry if someone talked badly about the Onee-san you like that much, huh.”
Yet again, Mafuyu heard a bitter laugh coming from Nariyuki.
“…But, even with all that, I still like her, Kirisu-sensei.”
“………Huh?” Having not expected these words, Mafuyu’s brain froze.
“She’s not as perfect as she might look like, but that makes her easier to approach. Even more than that…they all have the wrong idea about her being cold or anything like that. She’s teaching everyone thoroughly, really treasuring her students. That’s why I’m thankful to Kirisu-sensei, and I deeply respect her.”
However, his following words allowed her to think a bit more clearly.
“A-Ah…I understand. That’s how you mean it…”
“Hm? That’s how I mean what?”
“…Verbal slip. Just ignore that.”
Or so she tried to cover it up, but Nariyuki still seemed a bit suspicious.
“Really…? Ah, we’re here.”
Let’s call it a blessing in disguise for Mafuyu that they arrived at her home at that very moment.
“Many thanks. You really helped me a lot, Yuiga-kun.” Getting down from Nariyuki’s back, Mafuyu gave a slight bow.
“No problem. Ah, let me open the door.” He accepted the key from Mafuyu, and opened the door to her apartment.
“Now then, Yuiga-kun, I will see you at—I will see you next time I’ll go visit Mafuyu-oneechan, hopefully.”
—At school, she barely managed to correct herself.
“Yeah, I’m looking forward to it.”
Breaking up with the waving Nariyuki, Mafuyu set foot inside her apartment.
“Fuu…Fatigue. I need a break.”
As she let out an exhausted sigh, the door behind her closed. At the same time—
Rumble rumble.
“Mguh?!”
With a flashy sound, the mountain of objects stacked near the entrance all beautifully collapsed, burrowing Mafuyu beneath that.
“Mmm! Mmmm!!”
In the end, she was unable to free herself from this avalanche. From the point of view of an onlooker, this might be a familiar sight.
“Mmm!”
Clack.
Right as she fought her hardest to escape, Mafuyu head the sound of the door opening again.
“…I’ll go home after cleaning up the room,” Nariyuki’s voice resounded.
“…Mm.” Mafuyu could only nod along to those words.
***
“Alright, this should do it.”
Looking around the perfectly cleaned up room, Nariyuki nodded along in a satisfying manner.
“Apology…I bothered you with that, didn’t I.”
“Haha, it wasn’t your fault at all, Manatsu-chan.”
He turned towards Mafuyu, as his usual kind smile had a faint glimmer of bitterness in it.
“And also, I’m pretty much used to this.”
“………” Mafuyu was unable to do anything besides quickly avert her eyes.
“Here, Manatsu-chan, have a sip of this.” Nariyuki pushed a cup towards her. “It’s a milkshake. It’s supposed to work wonders against fatigue, since it has milk and eggs in it.” He smiled, only for his eyes to open wide. “Ah, I just took and used the ingredients from her kitchen…It should be fine since you’re Kurisu-sensei’s relative, right…?”
Of course, Mafuyu wouldn’t have rebuked him for that anyway, but in her current appearance, she was given no choice for that either.
“Thank you, I’ll gladly take it.”
Instead, she just responded with those words, accepted the cup, and put it onto her mouth. Maybe it was specifically made for her in mind, but it had a rather sweet taste to it. Just as he had said, she slowly started to feel her exhaustion wash away.
“Alright, this time I’ll be going home for real.”
“Yes, take care.”
“Yeah, will do.”
Putting his right hand on the doorknob, Nariyuki turned around to wave at her with his left.
“See you, Manatsu-chan.”
“………Yes.”
With the milkshake in one hand, Mafuyu watched the boy off, as he stepped out of the door, closing it behind him.
“…Now then.”
After she put down the cup on the table in front of her, Mafuyu once again gazed down at her own body.
“Predicament…What should I do if I really can’t turn back to normal again…?”
She put both hands and knees on the ground, wrapped in a feeling of impending despair. But, then—
“…Hm?”
Because her gaze was lower than normal, she spotted a certain box, resting on the floor.
I feel like I’ve seen that before…
After giving it a good look with narrowed eyebrows, a certain memory flashed up in the back of Mafuyu’s head. It was the drinking party yet again. The machine gun-like one-sided conversation with the fellow teacher, about the anti-aging medicine. Thinking thus far, it finally clicked.
“That’s right…that’s the box I got back then…!”
Basically, in this box was the (assumed to be) reason for this entire ordeal. She hadn’t seen it for a while, so it must have been buried between all the other things, and now resurfaced after Nariyuki’s cleaning.
“Maybe I could find a hint on how I can turn back to normal…”
Any slight connection was better than none, so she quickly opened up the lid of the box. Nariyuki had even worked his cleaning magic here, as two kinds of differently colored bottles were neatly lined up next to each other, only showing an opening for the bottle that Mafuyu had gulped down yesterday.
“Hm…? Two kinds…?” Mafuyu narrowed her eyebrows, as she took a closer look at the label of one bottle.
Written there was the same thing she had read this morning, ‘Anti-aging medicine’. On the other one, it said ‘Anti-anti-aging medicine’.
“Anti-anti…?”
The wrinkles on her forehead increased even further, as she read further on the label, which had the following sentence written with an almost too small of a font.
‘In the case that the anti-aging medicine worked too much, please drink this.’
“Guess. So if I drink this, I can get back to normal…?”
Naturally, she had no concrete proof for that besides that small text. It might as well worsen the situation. However, she had no other choice but to put trust in that, and try it out.
“Gamble. However, if there’s a chance, I have to take that.”
She hesitated for a second, but still prepared herself as she opened up the lid and took a sip of it, swallowing it all at once.
“Changes…None?”
As of right now, she could feel no apparent change occurring with her body…besides one.
“Fuwah…” A yawn leaked out of her mouth. “Drowsiness…Because I drank the medicine…?”
Maybe it was the exhaustion of the entire day catching up to her…Either way, Mafuyu was assaulted by a heavy sleepiness.
“Can’t…anymore…”
She barely managed to change into her sleeping garments, but she had to be content with her normal ones, since she couldn’t find any child-sized clothing right now.
“Li…mit…”
And thus, she collapsed on the bed, in the exact same way as the day before. Again, it only took her mere seconds until her consciousness drifted off into the dark abyss.
***
The following morning.
“Mmm…”
Being stimulated by the shining rays of the sun, Mafuyu slowly opened her eyes. Yet again, it was a pleasant awakening.
“…I feel like I’ve seen a weird dream.”
About her own body turning into that of a child, a dream like that. It was still as clear as day, the memories as vivid as it happened yesterday. Like it had actually happened in reality.
“Hmpf, outrageous. Something like that is impossible.” She laughed at her own dream.
Impossible, or so it should have been…But, when she looked around her room, it was neatly cleaned like Nariyuki was there yesterday, children’s clothes scattered on the floor, and a cup on the desk, with a little bit of milkshake left in it. Putting on the TV, the date shown there was the one after her day off.
“Proof…you say? Reality…it can’t be…” Mafuyu muttered, putting one hand on her head to support it.
However, she couldn’t stay like this for much longer, as a quick glance over at the clock on the wall showed that time was closing in for first period at school.
“…Thinking about it too much won’t help me…”
She decided to give up on thinking too much, and instead prepared to head out.
***
In her usual suit appearance, she arrived at the school gate.
“Manatsu-chan sure was cute, right~?”
“Yeah, I know right~”
Walking a bit in front of her, Mafuyu could hear the conversation between Uruka and Fumino. Next to them was Rizu, silently nodding along.
So yesterday…actually happened…
Coming this far, Mafuyu could only accept the reality. With so many evidence piling up, it was getting difficult to argue against it.
“But, she had this really sharp gaze, and I could feel some crazy pressure coming from her, like it was the real Kirisu-sensei.”
“Ahahaha…” Fumino forced out a bitter smile at Uruka’s words.
Rizu equally nodded along.
“…Classes are about to start, should you really be taking your time by talking here?”
““Hyaa?!””
Being called out by Mafuyu, a shriek escaped from Uruka and Fumino. Even Rizu had her eyes wide open.
“Y-Yes, that’s right! Excuse us!” With an awkward smile, Uruka quickly accelerated to get away from that place.
“Um…Excuse us.”
“Excuse us.”
Fumino had her usual bitter smile, as Rizu had…a rather difficult to read expression, but she must have felt awkward as well. They each gave a slight bow, and chased after Uruka.
“For crying out loud…”
Watching the girls off, Mafuyu crossed her arms. Her gaze was as sharp as Uruka said, but there was absolutely no ill-intent behind there, especially not after the interaction she had with them the day before.
“Oh…? Did something good happen, Kirisu-sensei? You seem happy.” Nariyuki called out to her.
“Misapprehension. It’s just your imagination.” Mafuyu responded, as she pulled a stern face.
“Is that so…?”
“Rather than that…Yesterday, Manatsu has been in your care, right? Let me thank you for that.”
Nariyuki tilted his head in confusion for a second, but stopped as Mafuyu thanked him.
“No, I didn’t do anything great…Ah, but.” Nariyuki’s expression turned into a comfortable smile. “Please tell me when Manatsu-chan is over to play again.”
That day would never arrive because Mafuyu had no intention of drinking that medicine ever again.
“She promised me that we’d meet again after all.”
However—
“…Yes.”
The previous day was a lot of stress for her, and her feelings didn’t change in the slightest. However, it wasn’t exactly a bad day for her either.
“If that time comes, I will invite you over, Nariyuki-oniichan.” She called him out in a teasing manner.
Yesterday, she was too embarrassed to say it, but now it just naturally escaped from her lips.
“Eh…?”
“You should hurry, or you will be late as well.”
Nobody saw her expression that moment, but it was undoubtedly a faint smile.
1 Mafuyu’s fuyu is written as the kanji for winter, so now she used natsu = summer
