Epiones POV
The air inside the abandoned music room was thick with a medicinal scent that absolutely didn't belong in a school. It was sharp, sterile, and piercingly cold, cutting through the familiar smell of old structural wood and accumulated dust. Chizuru sat rigidly on the worn piano bench, her movements jerky and stiff, like a digital film skipping frames. The fluid, polished grace she usually possessed had completely evaporated, leaving behind a girl who looked like she was struggling to hold her own skin together. She fumbled with the silver briefcase her father had sent, her fingers entirely lacking their usual mathematical precision.
"Epione... the case," she whispered. Her voice sounded strange, heavily layered with a faint, electronic static that made the hair on my arms stand up instantly. Oh no.
I rushed forward, my own hands trembling as I clicked the heavy latches open. The pressurized hiss of freezing vapor hit my face, smelling strongly of cold iron and burnt ozone. It was a terrifying scent that instantly reminded me of a hospital during a complete power outage. I reached inside and handed her one of the glowing, incandescent blue vials.
With a steadying breath, Chizuru pressed the sleek injector cartridge directly to her thigh. A soft, high-tech whir-click followed, a sound like a high-end camera shutter snapping in a quiet room. I watched, breathless and paralyzed, as the sickly, translucent grey tint of her skin vanished, replaced almost instantly by a healthy, sun-kissed glow.
"Are you... sick? Are you going to be okay?" I asked, my voice barely a whisper in the hollow space of the room. "Miss Pillarion seemed so worried, and your hands are always so cold."
Chizuru closed the silver case with a sharp snap, her mechanical stiffness vanishing as her bubbly, gummy smile snapped right back into place. "It is very rare, Epi-chan. A highly confidential hereditary condition. If the public ever knew, my family's corporate enemies would see it as a structural weakness in the Katsura bloodline. It is why I need my medicine to keep my circulation entirely stable. You won't tell a soul, right?"
I shook my head vigorously, my heart aching with a sudden wave of empathy for her. To carry such a massive medical burden and still remain so bright seemed impossible. "N-No! Of course not! I was just... really surprised and concerned. I honestly thought you were having a terrible fever."
"I know," she chirped, standing up from the bench with effortless grace. "But don't be. I am as sturdy as they come, Epione. This happens all the time, so I've gotten completely used to it. Think of it like a vitamin that needs to be taken at a regular schedule. If it's not taken properly, my body grows frail and not so very useful. But look! I can function properly now."
Chizuru explained smoothly as she positioned herself back in front of the keys. Placing both of her pale hands on the white tiles like an absolute professional, she began to play a melody that felt intensely familiar to my ears; Shostakovich's Waltz No. 2. It was a beautiful, haunting tune I knew I had heard before, but my brain couldn't quite remember where. She played it with zero mistakes, her features relaxing as she simply enjoyed the fluid grace of the ability to control the music.
As she played, the afternoon sunlight hit a perfect, sharp angle directly through the high window, casting a natural spotlight over her uniform. I leaned forward, my breath catching in my throat. Was it just a trick of the glare, or did I catch a brief glimpse of total translucency in her skin? It was as if her hand had briefly turned into clear glass under the sun.
How odd...
Hmm,but thinking about it, when she fought those students it doesn't even showed a hint that she's suffering from this condition
Once she was satisfied with the final chord, the notes faded cleanly into the quiet room, and she called out to me.
"See? Now, let's head out, Epione. We have a lot of items to check on as ordered by Miss Pillarion, don't we?"
"Ah... yeah! You're very skillful at this, aren't you?" I agreed, forcing my eyes away as I tried to brush the lingering images of her grey, pulsing skin from my mind.
The shift from the quiet sanctuary of the music room back into the main hallway felt like stepping directly from a strange dream into a cold, hard reality.
The afternoon air in the corridor felt strangely thin. For me, the sudden absence of the usual tripping feet, low whispers, and hissed insults from the surrounding rows was almost more unsettling than the bullying itself. It was a vacuum, a hollow space where my daily survival fear used to live, now filled only by the rhythmic, perfect clicking of Chizuru's loafers beside me. We walked past the trophy cases where the glass was polished to a mirror finish, reflecting two girls who looked like they belonged together, even if I felt like a common imposter walking in her shadow.
As we rounded the corner toward the lockers, my heart performed a jagged, violent somersault. Standing by the trophy case was the quad: the four girls whose systematic cruelty had been a constant North Star in my map of pain. Mina, Sarah, Len, and Jade. They were leaning heavily against the lockers, their expensive designer bags slung over their shoulders, looking like they owned every inch of the tile floor.
"Oh no," I whispered, my hand instinctively flying to my forearm, covering a deep, phantom scar that wasn't even visible through the thick fabric of my uniform sleeve. I grabbed Chizuru's wrist, my fingers trembling. "Chizuru, this way. Let's go through the library hall. Quickly."
Chizuru let herself be dragged a few inches, her head tilted at that curious, bird-like angle. Internally, her eyes seemed to be moving faster than humanly possible, as if she were actively observing the microscopic tremors in my grip.
"Is there a spider, Epione?" Chizuru asked, her voice a perfect melody of feigned innocence. "You're running like you saw a monster."
"Just... just please, hurry," I urged, desperately trying to melt into the shadows of a nearby janitor's closet.
But the hallway was too narrow, and the girls were already turning their heads. The collision was completely inevitable. I was looking over my shoulder to check for an exit when I slammed right into Mina's shoulder.
"Watch it, klutz!" Mina snapped, steadying herself with a glare.
I froze instantly, my breath hitching in my throat. "I... I am sorry. I didn't see..."
"Whatever," Mina said, rolling her eyes as her gaze flickered toward Chizuru with a volatile mix of suspicion and annoyance. "Look, just because the counselor made that stupid Peer Support agreement doesn't mean we are actually friends. Seriously, stop following us around! We don't have the time to babysit you. And don't even think that just because we signed that paper it means some kind of closure. We don't need you. Shoo off... before trying to help us, help yourself first. You absolute eyesore."
The quad pushed past us, their shoulders hitting mine with enough deliberate force to make me stumble back against the lockers. I stood there for a long moment, feeling the familiar, burning sting of their words, while Chizuru watched them walk away with a look of intense, quiet focus. For a second, she looked high-level offended.
"They seemed... remarkably energetic," Chizuru remarked, her voice bouncing right back to its bubbly pitch as she helped me straighten my school vest. Well I guess that's her polite way of saying they are annoyingly loud. Chizuru looked at me with curiosity
"Who are they? They mentioned a legal agreement?"
I took a shaky, uneven breath, the adrenaline slowly receding from my chest. "It is... it is a strict condition from the Counselor, Miss Pillarion. Instead of facing formal suspension and expulsion for what they did to me on campus last month, they were placed under a Restorative Justice plan. I am supposed to be their official guide. I watch over them, report their behavioral milestones for action planning, and give them advice when they are supposed to be reflecting on their actions. In return, they are legally and academically bound to leave me alone. It is like a personal detention where I am the jailer, but... they clearly hate me for it."
Chizuru's eyes blinked, a slow, deliberate, mechanical blink. "So, you are their little shepherd? And if they behave badly, you tell the administration, and they get in severe trouble?"
"Basically," I sighed, looking down at my scuffed shoes. "But it just makes them resent me more. Honestly, I would rather they just forgot I existed entirely."
"I think it is a wonderful responsibility," Chizuru chirped, looping her arm right back through mine with an unyielding grip. "You are helping them become better people, Epione! Though, some people need a great deal of... structural shaping... to get there."
"...I guess you're not wrong there."
"Of course I am not,my sourcs of data do not like!" Chizuru smiled. "People won't act accordingly unless you knock the senses right out of them. Now, let's go straight to the canteen to have our early lunch! Since we have a one-hour free period on our schedule."
I was about to agree, but my phone vibrated in my pocket. I paused, pulling it out as a calendar notification blinked at me like a mocking eye. A cold shiver that had absolutely nothing to do with the music room's air conditioning ran straight down my spine.
"W-wait."
"Hmm? What's the matter, Epi-chan?"
I stared at the screen, checking the exact date. "Ahh, it starts today," I mumbled quietly.
"What must be starting today?"
"The peer support agreement... the first tracking session starts today."
"Ahh... eh?"
That was exactly how we ended up in the isolated courtyard behind the old gym. The afternoon air was completely still, and the shadows of the high brick walls felt long, dark, and suffocating. The quad was already there, huddled tightly by a stone bench, looking over their shoulders repeatedly as if they expected the federal police to walk through the gates at any moment.
As Chizuru and I approached, Mina looked up and immediately scoffed, her face twisting into that familiar mask of social superiority. Behind her, Sarah, Len, and Jade shifted into a tight semi-circle, their collective gaze heavy with a casual cruelty I knew all too well.
"Oh, look, the "savior"is here and summoned us," Mina sneered with sarcasm she didn't even bother to stand up, just leaned back against the stone with a fake, fragile confidence that made my stomach churn. "By the way, did you see the local news, chaperone? Maybe you should be careful walking home. Whoever delivered that package to those guys might decide they don't like pathetic losers, either."
I felt myself shrink instantly, my shoulders hunching up toward my ears as the old terror flared. But before I could even open my mouth to apologize for existing, Chizuru stepped forward. She didn't just walk; she placed her entire frame directly between me and the four of them like a physical wall of freezing air.
"Actually," Chizuru interrupted, her voice sweet but carrying a strange, immense weight that seemed to drop the ambient temperature. "I think whoever did that very much dislikes people who systematically hurt others. Don't you agree?"
Mina opened her mouth to snap back with an insult, but her voice caught sharply in her throat. I watched from behind Chizuru's tall shadow, completely mesmerized and terrified. Chizuru wasn't blinking. She was watching them with a coldness that didn't even feel like human anger. It felt like... absolutely nothing. A total, void-like absence of human warmth that made the air around us feel thick and hard to breathe.
"Let's start the tracking session, Epione," Chizuru said, her eyes never leaving Mina's face. "I am very interested to hear what they have to say for themselves."
"Seriously, is this a joke?" Mina snapped, trying desperately to regain her typical bravado. Sarah and Len nodded along behind her, though Jade looked a bit pale under the sun. "Are you lecturing us right now because we decided to skip the morning orientation block? Even my parents aren't as strict as you! What if I smack you against the walls right now to wake some senses into you, huh!"
Mina lunged forward from the bench, her right hand raised to deliver a strike. My heart completely stopped. I braced myself for the wet sound of a slap, for the schoolyard chaos that always followed when they lost their tempers. But she never reached us.
With a high-speed movement so fluid and instantaneous I could barely track it with my eyes, Chizuru's hand shot out like a camera flash.
Her fingers clamped around Mina's incoming wrist like a pressurized steel vice. The sound of the physical impact wasn't the soft smack of skin on skin; it was a dull, heavy, terrifying thud, like bone meeting reinforced structural metal.
"I don't remember rude behaviors being allowed in a counseling session," Chizuru said. Her voice had dropped into a flat, terrifying monotone that didn't sound like a high school exchange student at all. "Continue reading the script, Epione. Or... do you want me to proceed directly to physical action?"
My eyes widened to the size of saucers, my heart hammering violently against my ribs. "P-please, I also don't want to do this, b-but Miss Pillarion asked me to... we have to cover the designated points."
"Fuck off!" Len hissed from the back of the semi-circle, her voice trembling slightly as she took a step away from Chizuru.
Chizuru didn't let go of the wrist. Instead, she mathematically increased the crushing pressure. I watched in a daze as the skin on Mina's wrist turned completely white, then a deep, angry purple. A faint, high-pitched electronic whine started to ring in my ears, so thin and sharp I thought my brain was imagining it. It seemed to be emanating from deep within Chizuru's arm cavity.
"Epione is talking," Chizuru whispered, the air itself vibrating around her white blazer. "And when someone is actively helping you avoid a permanent academic record, you should be exceptionally grateful. In fact, you should be completely silent."
Mina's face went from an angry red to a ghostly, translucent white. She looked genuinely, deeply terrified for her life. "Let... let go! You are hurting me! You are breaking my wrist!"
"Am I?" Chizuru tilted her head at that sharp, bird-like angle, her pupils moving in tiny, rhythmic jolts as she scanned the structural thresholds of Mina's face. She looked exactly like a machine reading a digital book I couldn't see. "I am simply stabilizing the situation. Epione, please continue to the accountability section."
I swallowed hard, my hands shaking so much the paper rustled loudly in the quiet courtyard. I forced myself to finish the script Miss Pillarion had provided. "The... the second point is about personal accountability. Miss Pillarion says skipping class is a flight response. She suggests that next time, you should come directly to the library instead. I can sign you in there. It counts as an official study hall. It is a clean way to keep your discipline records clear."
Chizuru's grip tightened just a fraction of a millimeter more, making Mina gasp out loud for air. Sarah and Jade stepped backward, their eyes wide with absolute shock.
"Did you hear that?" Chizuru mused, her sweet lilt returning but her eyes remaining dead and dark. "Epione is offering you a clean way out of your mess. She is being so incredibly generous to you. Most people don't get a map when they sin. They just get... lost. In soundproofed warehouses."
The sudden, specific mention of the warehouse news made a violent shiver run straight down my spine.
"We get it!" Sarah squeaked out, her terrified eyes darting to Chizuru's locking fingers. "Library! Study hall! Just... tell her to let go of her!"
"Epione? Are you completely satisfied with their verbal acknowledgement?"
"Yes," I said quickly, my voice nearly failing me entirely under the stress. "Please, Chizuru, let's just go to the canteen."
Chizuru released Mina instantly. The girl fell backward, hitting the stone bench with a dull thud, cradling her purple-streaked wrist against her chest as if it had been crushed in an industrial hydraulic press.
"Perfect!" Chizuru chirped, the flat, mechanical monotone vanishing instantly as she smoothed out the front of her white blazer. Her bubbly, gummy smile was right back on her face, bright and cheerful as if we were just leaving a local cafe. "I will see you four tomorrow morning for the pre-class check-in at the lockers. Don't be late. I would absolutely hate for Epione to have to write a negative behavioral report to the counselor."
As the quad scrambled away toward the gym exit, literally tripping over their own feet to put physical distance between us, Chizuru turned back to face me. She looked completely refreshed, her dark eyes sparkling under the noon sun. "You are such a wonderful mentor, Epione! You really have a unique way with words."
I could only manage a shaky, breathless laugh, my chest heaving. I knew she was strong from what happened with Marcus, but I didn't know her physical strength was this terrifying. My mind kept replaying the precise sound of her hand catching Mina's wrist. It hadn't sounded like a human being defending a friend.
It had sounded like a heavy, motorized deadbolt sliding into place inside a steel frame.
"Are you okay?" Chizuru asked softly, tucking a stray strand of dark hair behind my ear. Her touch was light and remarkably soft, but her fingers were perfectly steady, showing zero tremors from the physical altercation.
"I am fine!" I said, my voice still a bit high and thin. "Thank you, Chizuru. Really... thank you."
"That is exactly what friends are for," Chizuru replied, her gait becoming light and bouncy again as she led the way.
While I forced a small smile in response, the midday sun was a relentless, blinding glare overhead as we left the rear courtyard. But the structural heat outside was absolutely nothing compared to the freezing cold shiver still racing down my spine. The vivid image of Mina's purple, crushed wrist was permanently burned into my mind.
"Wow, Epione! Look at the time," Chizuru chirped happily, checking her sleek wrist watch with a quick turn of her arm. "It is exactly 12:00. No wonder my internal clock was humming so loudly. It is officially time for biological refueling!"
I looked at her, still a bit dazed and detached from reality. "Lunch? Right. I almost forgot that people have to eat."
"Of course they do! Especially after such a highly productive counseling session," she said, looping her arm tightly through mine and steering me toward the main building doors. "A good shepherd always needs her energy to watch over the flock."
The walk toward the campus canteen felt miles longer than usual. The immense weight of Chizuru's words about shaping people hung heavily in the air between us, mixing with the distant, frantic energy of the student body echoing through the corridors. As we pushed through the double glass doors of the cafeteria, the usual chaotic lunch hour chatter was completely gone, replaced instead by a heavy, unified hum of absolute fear and low whispering excitement.