To love a sword

Chapter 9: Meeting Part 2

Beta read by Paragon of Awesomeness and Shigiya

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-Sainan Middle School-

(One Year Earlier)

For Momioka Risa, the past few days were quite uneventful. Exam season was in full effect, leading to her usual free time after school that she spent hanging out with her friends at karaoke to disappear. 

Now she instead had to spend hours on her studies to memorize the subject material from classes she either skipped or never paid that much attention to in the first place. Risa's friend and partner in crime, Sawada Mio, was safe given her rather surprising discipline to study everyday after school — even after they spent the entire day hanging out and returned to her house dead tired. Risa didn't want to flunk her exams and risk getting held up for an entire year and missing the opportunity to be surrounded by more mature and developed girls at Sainan High School. 

"Mn… my head is going to explode." She said while slouching at the cafeteria lunch table. Her eyes were sunken with dark bags under them, bloodshot irises, and a generally messy state from the enormous amount of stress, lack of sleep, and missing out on meals she got from studying all night. Looking in front of her, she was met with the unappealing sight of a lunch tray filled with a single apple, a carton of juice with the main dish being some yakisoba bread. 

"I think I'm going to vomit." Nothing looked appetizing anymore. The cafeteria food tasted stale and bland, the juice was far too artificial and everything made her feel even more nauseous. 

"You can bring your own meal, Risa." By her side sat Mio, looking normal and the complete opposite of her whilst munching on a tuna onigiri. 

"You know that I can't cook anything other than an omelet dressed with some ketchup and mayo." Just the thought of eating another one of those made the girl sigh at her misfortune. "Dad and Mom have barely spent any time at home recently due to their jobs, so at night we mostly just eat takeout. The next morning there's barely anything left and the day-old food just doesn't look as appealing to me." She grabbed the bread and took a single bite, and just as she guessed — it was quite bland.

"Are you sure you're not sick or anything? Even your skin is pale. I don't think I've ever seen you in such a state before, Risa. Maybe you should go see the doctor or have a nap at the infirmary." Mio said, worried about her friend's health. 

"I can't," Risa moaned. "Next we have math class, I can't miss it or else I'll have more to revise later on. I'm already super late on my other assignments and I think the teachers are plotting to fail me intentionally with how they keep introducing new chapters when they've barely gone through the last one!" This was injustice! A secret plot put together by the corrupt staff of the school who wanted to keep a beautiful and sexy girl like her, just so they can torture her further! She could already feel the stares coming from every corner of the halls, the evil cackles and mustache-twirling happening in the background as they plotted her downfall!

"I think the lack of sleep is getting to you." Mio deadpanned, finding the sight of her friend losing her mind to be almost funny were it not for the very possible consequences weighing everything down. "And again, if you don't rest now then I guarantee you'll learn nothing in class with that fried brain of yours." 

Risa shook her head, "I don't need rest, I need another bottle of energy drink and a nice pair of racks to charge me back up." It was a bit embarrassing to admit, but Risa missed groping other girls' breasts — so much so that she began touching her own without any effect. That feeling of catching someone by surprise and hearing their cute cries soothed her soul. All of this coupled with the fact that everyone was unique, so she always felt something new everyday. "Haa… if only I had a time-dilation machine like the ones in those shows where a single year inside is a single day in the real world. I'd have enough time to learn everything and get some sleep while I'm at it."