Yamashita Umi was the captain of the swimming club. But, obviously, it was her first year in this particular swimming club. After all, up until this year, it hadn’t even existed. The school had been closed for two full years before it was purchased by the Nekoyama Group to serve as the stage for this peculiar production, after all. As for why Umi was given a position of leadership, however minor, among the roughly two hundred and fifty students and staff that made up the cast, she honestly had no idea. She had a small measure of acting experience, and she was a fairly proficient swimmer, but certainly not enough to stand out. Given how late in the scouting process she had been approached, she honestly suspected they simply hadn’t managed to find anyone better for the role. Or at least, nobody who would actually accept it. Not that she was in any position to turn it down. Her family was going through a rough patch ever since her father left them to marry his mistress, and the very generous wage offered to her for this role was something she couldn’t turn down, no matter what. But the fact of the matter was that she felt entirely out of her depth. She rather envied the first year students. After all, with the exception of those assigned to act out the part of childhood friends or the like, the first years had every excuse not to know anyone else at the school. But Umi had a whole class worth of people who had supposedly been her classmates the previous year, about half of whom were now her actual classmates. She had seniors who had, according to the setting, formed bonds with her when she was a first year in the swimming club. And of course, there was the other two second year students in the swim club, who were supposed to be her closest friends in school. One of these two supposed ‘close friends’ seemed to be floundering just as much as Umi herself, so she felt a certain degree of kinship with the girl, but the other was utterly inscrutable. Trying to get to know the three first years who had dutifully taken their place in the swimming club, one of whom Umi had seen on TV on multiple occasions because she was a rather famous youth athlete with an honest to goodness sponsorship deal with a swimsuit brand, was difficult enough on its own. Doing so while also juggling her false history with the seniors and her year-mates and the faculty was frankly overwhelming. If it wasn’t for the advice and encouragement of Miss Nakajima, the school custodian who also served as faculty advisor of the Swimming Club, she felt like she might have drowned under the pressure to perform. And all this was for the benefit of a single girl. Nekoyama Michiru. Umi had never so much as seen the young heiress up close, let alone spoken to her. She was spending every day putting on this strange performance all for the benefit of someone who would probably never pay her any attention whatsoever. But perhaps that was for the best. After all, playing her part was difficult enough with that kind of pressu… “Hey all! We’re here to try out the swimming club!” Umi spun around to face the door, confusion writ clear on her features. There wasn’t anyone else scripted to join the club, so she hadn’t expected any tryouts until next year’s cast joined the roster. She vaguely recognized one of the two girls as Mikawa Atsuko. The short but obviously extremely fit girl was supposed to be the future ace of the track team, making her presence here all the more confusing. As for the other girl… Umi’s breath hitched as she beheld perfection. Up close, Nekoyama Michiru radiated an almost regal aura of elegance and authority. Her tall stature, her perfect posture, her shining, silky hair. Dressed in a school swimsuit, the sleek musculature that spoke of a strict dedication to daily exercise formed a bewitching contrast to her curvaceous, womanly figure. The only thing marring the image of perfect nobility was the rather extravagant way she had decorated her unusually short fingernails, but that peculiar contrast was somehow charming in itself. When the young heiress introduced herself, Umi found herself hanging onto every word, burning the voice into her memory… Umi got through the next hour on some sort of autopilot, her body somehow acting out the role she’d been given with little to no input from her brain. Because her brain was filled with nothing but Nekoyama Michiru. The way she moved. The way she talked. The way she smiled. And perhaps more than anything, the way she swam. It wasn’t the perfectly efficient movements of a professional athlete, and she would certainly never make it on a competitive level with form like that, but Umi could never bring herself to critique it. Because the way Nekoyama Michiru moved through the water was beautiful… By the time club activities ended, Umi had come to a decision. No matter what happened, she wanted to become a part of Nekoyama Michiru’s life. Of course, it would be ideal if she actually joined the swimming club, but Umi rather doubted she would. She had seemed more like she was indulging a passing fancy than like she had any serious intention of joining. But Umi didn’t care. Swim club or not, she would find some way to get closer to her. Aoki Sumomo was exactly where she wanted to be. In a tiny, isolated world, created by nerds, for nerds. Throughout middle school, she had been bullied and excluded for her unusual interests. So when the people from the Nekoyama group had offered her a place to belong, a place were her indulgences would not only be tolerated but encouraged, she had been beside herself with joy. Oh, the money she would receive was nice and all. It would certainly help pay for her rather expensive hobby of collecting figurines of pretty fictional men. But quite frankly, she would have done this for free without a word of complaint. She had joined the manga club knowing from the cast list that both one of the second year girls and the third year club president were cut from the same cloth as she. And they certainly hadn’t disappointed. Mikoto-senpai was every bit as rotten a girl as herself, ever ready to dive into the murkiest depths of the boy’s love genre. And Haruki-senpai, the club president, was a far rarer treasure still. In the unrelenting hell of middle school, she had never even dared hope that she would ever befriend the rarest of all creatures, an honest to goodness rotten boy. The rest of the manga club weren’t bad, either. Sure, the four girl’s love enthusiasts and the two garden variety perverts were all a bit too enamoured with the female form for her tastes, but they had treated her own proclivities with a measure of respect and understanding, and she would do the same for them. And as for the two boys who were deeply fascinated with giant robots and the girl whose enthusiasm for magical girls rivalled that of a six year old girl, well… She might not understand them terribly well, but she certainly respected their passion. The thought of spending the next three years in this oasis of disparate passions, far removed from the outside world and its scornful eyes, filled Sumomo with a degree of hope and delight she hadn’t felt for many years. In this walled garden, this isolated little paradise, she would escape the dreaded normies and their hurtful words. Because not only had she been granted an entire club full of friends and comrades, she was also attending the only high school in the world where the ban on overt bullying was enforced by a strict financial incentive. The only fly in the proverbial ointment was the star of the show herself. Outside of club activities and the requirements of her role, Sumomo wanted more than anything to pass through her high school life as unnoticed as possible. But not only was she placed in the same class as the young lady, she was seated directly in front of her in the classroom. With everyone’s attention focused on the young lady, it was all but impossible to fade into the background. Despite her wish to have as little as possible to do with the young lady, she found herself constantly caught within her periphery. And of course, the damnable Mitsuba Ayako only made things worse. The ridiculously flashy Gal was everything Sumomo wasn’t. Extroverted, sociable, bold, fashionable… Her whole existence was so bright and radiant it made Sumomo feel like a vampire caught in the sun whenever the two interacted. And for whatever reason, she kept roping Sumomo into her loud normie conversations with the young lady. If it had just been Ayako alone, Sumomo would just have ignored her. But when the Gal was having a discussion with the young lady only to suddenly throw a question Sumomo’s way, she felt obligated to reply. It was getting to the point where Sumomo seriously considered running off to hide in the bathroom during every single recess. Since she was in the clubroom at lunch and after school, the short recesses between classes were the only time when she risked falling into the orbit of the young lady. And frankly, she’d gladly take a reputation for having a weak bladder over the kind of scrutiny that would naturally come with any sort of close association with… “Hey all! We’re here to try out the manga club!” Sumomo looked up from the manuscript she was working on with a start. Mikawa Atsuko was supposed to join the track club, so why on earth was she… “My apologies for the interruption. My name is Nekoyama Michiru, and my friend and I were hoping to experience the activities of the manga club.” Sumomo’s heart fell. As the young lady chatted to the rest of the club members about their interests and activities, she practically shrank into her seat. The polite speech, the perfect little smile, the absolute social poise, it seemed to flow across her secret oasis like a desert storm, scouring her hidden paradise with the harsh sands of reality. When the young lady finally made her way to Sumomo, she almost wanted to get out of her seat and bolt through the door. “Oh, I see you’re drawing something. May I see it?” ‘Absolutely not!’ Sumomo thought, but of course there was no way she could actually refuse a request from the young lady. Wordlessly, she pushed her manuscript toward the heiress. “Thank you very much.” As the young lady flipped through the manuscript, Sumomo had no idea what to expect. Disappointment? Silent scorn? Sarcastic mockery? Whatever came next, it couldn’t possibly be good. “How very interesting. I take it these two young men are supposed to be modern day reincarnations of Masamune and Muramasa, the historical sword smiths?” She looked up in surprise. “You can tell?” “Of course. I must say, it is really quite artful how you’re working hints and nods to the historical characters into the dialogue and artwork without making any explicit references. And the re-imagining of these two non-contemporary historical characters as rivals in a modern high school setting is rather refreshing. Alluding to the better reputation of Masamune by making him the honour student while the more dubious Muramasa takes the role of a foul-mouthed delinquent certainly makes for an interesting dynamic. And the shifting power dynamics of Masamune’s authority and good social standing against Muramasa’s physical prowess and willingness to take extreme measures makes for a riveting character drama.” Sumomo was shocked at just how perfectly the young lady seemed to understand her work. So shocked, in fact, that she almost forgot just what kind of work it was. Which was why she didn’t think to warn the young lady about the contents of page thirty-five and thirty-six… “Oh my goodness. That was rather an unexpected dramatic turn. When Muramasa boasted about the might of his sword, this wasn’t quite what I expected.” All the colour drained from Sumomo’s face. Inadvertently or not, she had just showed the heiress of the Nekoyama Group her smutty drawings! They weren’t even censored! She had sullied the eyes of Nekoyama Michiru with the image of Muramasa taking Masamune from behind! “And the detail! It must have taken you so much work to produce each panel of this sequence…” If possible, Sumomo’s heart fell even further. Not only had she introduced the Nekoyama heiress to the most explicit side of the boy’s love genre, the young lady seemed to be interested! If this manuscript ended up being the spark that ignited these rotten passions inside Nekoyama Michiru’s heart, her father would surely have Sumomo killed! Or worse! The remaining minutes of club activities ground on at a snail’s pace, and Sumomo’s heart didn’t stop beating like a drum in her chest until the heiress finally took her leave. Thankfully, the young lady had mentioned that she was interested in trying out several other clubs, so the chances that she would end up actually joining the manga club seemed rather remote. And so Sumomo went home, praying with her entire heart that the heiress would never invade the walled garden of the manga club ever again. Miura Hikaru was a man of singular passions. He was entirely possessed by the concept of cuteness in all its forms. In his early childhood, he had been rather famous as a stage actor. Or, well, as famous as any child stage actor can really be. He had mostly played female roles, but gender is hardly much of a barrier when casting children. When the rather peculiar project of putting together a facsimile of a high school life for the benefit of Nekoyama Michiru had first come into being, Hikaru was one of the first people to be scouted. Originally, he had been offered a role as a member of the drama club, but he had suggested instead the creation of a handicrafts club. And thankfully, the director had loved the idea of a very pretty boy as the sole male member of the handicrafts club. Frankly, Hikaru thought the man’s artistic vision was rather lacking in subtlety, but if it meant a practically unlimited budget for his crafting projects, he was more than willing to act out whatever stereotype the director wanted. He had put his foot down when the director suggested he should have a fake relationship with one of the other second year boys, however. No matter how you looked at it, that was simply unacceptable. After all, none of the other second year boys were cute enough to meet his standards. But to be fair, neither were any of the second year girls. “You’re thinking something rude again, aren’t you?” He looked over at the president of the handicrafts club with a frown. The girl was covered in so many piercings and bits of jewellery she looked like she’d stepped out of an advertisement catalogue for some sort of alternative fashion brand, and the contrast between her metal-covered body and her school uniform was nearly farcical. As if to underscore the sheer wrongness of the picture, she was working on making a black leather jacket from scratch, and her workspace was covered in leather scraps, thick leatherworking needles and metal studs. Compared to the delicate beadwork, the adorable soft toys and the cutesy accessories that dotted his own workspace, it was like the contrast between a nightmare and a daydream. Privately, Hikaru wondered if the director had appointed this insult to femininity as the club president just to spite him. “I was just pondering how painfully uncute you are.” “Well, that’s true enough. I’m the second most uncute thing in the room, right after your personality.” “What did you just say, you metal-faced bi…” “Miura and the president are flirting again.” “Right? I wish they’d keep the PDA to a minimum during club activities.” Hikaru made a theatrical retching noise as a means of underscoring just how distasteful he found the very idea that he might ever flirt with someone like the club president. And he was rather offended when he realized that the president was doing exactly the same thing. Unheeded by both of them, the door to the clubroom quietly closed. Then again, nobody had even noticed it opening in the first place. “Hey, Michiru… Maybe we should just skip the handicrafts club…” “I must admit, I was thinking the same thing.” Morita Hinako watched in awe as the young lady presented a box full of some of the most beautiful traditional confectionery she had ever laid eyes on. The delicate confections shimmered in the overhead light, their artistically beautiful designs seemingly perfect in every regard. “And you’re saying you made these yourself, Miss Nekoyama?” “That is correct. My grandmother is a certified master confectioner, and she takes the time to teach me her art whenever we visit her home. I felt that if I was to try out the cooking club, it would be proper to bring something I had cooked myself as a gift.” “And I made these!” Atsuko held out a large basket full of slightly misshapen chocolate muffins. They smelled nice, but there was clearly a lot of work that could be done to improve the presentation. Frankly, that was the level Hinako would expect a first year high school student aiming to join the cooking club would be at. And the fact that all the first years in the club were far better than that had left her somewhat at a loss as club president. Quite frankly, she would have gladly welcomed Atsuko to the club. It would have been nice to have a member who she genuinely felt that she could properly teach and help to improve. But she knew for a fact that Atsuko was scripted to join the track club. And as for the young lady and the veritable treasure box she had just presented… “If I may ask, Miss Nekoyama, what exactly are you hoping to learn here in the cooking club?” “I was hoping that you could teach me how to bake cookies. I have been eager to try my hand at it for some time now, but I have simply never found the opportunity.” Hinako shared a glance with the other members of the club. The actual plan for the day’s club activities was to make beef stew, but… “Then why don’t we give it a try today? We should have all the ingredients we need for two-colour cookies.” “Really? How very kind of you. Then for today the two of us will be students in your care.” On the one hand, Hinako was happy to actually get to teach someone something new. But on the other hand, she almost hoped that teaching the heiress what she wanted to learn during her trial visit would make her less likely to actually join the club. Because the sheer perfection of those traditional sweets was frankly intimidating… Ikeda Yuuki was reading through his lines for the drama club’s next production, but every now and then he threw glances at the door. By now, everyone in school knew that the young lady was going around trying out various clubs. Given the breadth of different clubs she had been visiting, she would surely come to the drama club sooner or later. And when she did, he would finally have a chance to properly showcase his appeal to her. He had done his best in class and after school, putting on his most charming princely mannerisms. And yet the heiress had barely spared him a second glance. He had also kept an eye out for any situation where the young lady might be troubled or inconvenienced by something, that he might swoop in and offer her his assistance in a suitably dashing manner. But the young lady carried herself with such perfect poise and grace that she never seemed troubled by anything. The club visit might be his last chance to draw the young lady’s eye for quite some time. After all, it would be several months before the drama club would put on its first production, and as a first year his role for that play was not the most eye-catching. But if he could somehow convince the young lady to join the drama club, he would have every chance he could possibly need to win her heart. He was pulled out of his musings when Tamura Kyoka, the only other first year in the Drama Club, burst into the clubroom. “Hey, Yuuki, big news!” “You’re late, Miss Tamura.” “Yeah, whatever. That’s hardly important right now.” “And what news is so important it makes you skip half an hour of club activities?” “Little miss protagonist just joined a club!” The entire club room fell completely silent, save for the sound of Ikeda Yuuki quite accidentally tearing his script in half. “And so I will be joining you all in the manga club as an official member. I look forward to the time we will be spending together from now on.” The silent room quickly filled with greetings and even a faint smattering of applause, but none of it was as loud as the sound of Sumomo’s head thumping into the desk in front of her.