The geography of my new life was split between two entirely different worlds.
By day, I attended Shuchiin Academy, an architectural marvel situated in the heart of Tokyo's affluent Minato Ward. By night, I returned to the Ichijou estate, a sprawling, heavily secured traditional compound hidden away in the quiet, upscale hills of the Akasaka district.
But right now, as the sun dipped below the Tokyo skyline and the neon lights flickered to life, I was venturing into completely different territory.
I walked down the bustling, crowded streets of Shinjuku. The weekend was officially here. Before I had to face Karla Kure's brutal training on Saturday, I had a specific goal in mind for Friday night. Through the grapevine of the syndicate's lower-level enforcers, I had caught wind of an underground fighting arena—a lawless, unsanctioned fight club where martial artists and bouncers battered each other for cash.
With my Perception and Dexterity push to level 6 and my newly acquired Advanced Boxing, I needed to test my mechanics against actual human opponents. Curses were chaotic, but fighting a trained martial artist was a completely different science. I needed the sparring experience.
I navigated through the dense sea of pedestrians when I suddenly stopped in my tracks.
Near the entrance of a brightly lit department store, tucked slightly into the corner of the building, a girl was curled up with her arms wrapped around her knees.
She was wearing the distinct, elegant uniform of a Shuchiin Academy third-year. Her long, silken black hair spilled over her shoulders, framing a face that was strikingly, almost painfully beautiful. But right now, her face was buried in her arms, her shoulders trembling slightly as she silently cried.
What baffled me wasn't her distress—it was the crowd.
Hundreds of people were walking past her. Some were passing mere inches from her feet. A businessman actually dropped a receipt right next to her shoe. Yet, not a single person looked down. Tokyo crowds were famously cold, but this was ridiculous. No one offered to help. No one even threw her a passing glance.
I stepped out of the flow of foot traffic and walked over to her. I crouched down to her eye level, keeping a respectful distance.
"Senpai?" I called out softly, keeping my voice gentle so as not to startle her.
The girl flinched. She slowly raised her head, her large, tear-filled violet eyes locking onto mine. For a second, she looked utterly terrified, her breath hitching in her throat.
"You..." her voice was incredibly frail, a stark contrast to the refined, mature aura she possessed. "You can see me?"
I blinked, genuinely confused by the question. "Of course I can see you. Are you alright? Sitting on the ground in the middle of Shinjuku isn't exactly safe."
A sudden, overwhelming wave of relief washed over her features. She quickly wiped at her eyes with the back of her sleeve, trying to compose herself and salvage her dignity.
"I'm... I'm fine," she murmured, her voice trembling as she looked away, clearly embarrassed that a junior from her school had caught her crying. "I just... I thought I disappeared. Nobody was looking at me. Nobody would answer me."
"Disappeared?" I tilted my head, looking at her like she had just spoken a different language. "What are you talking about? It's just a busy street. People are just being rude and minding their own business. You definitely haven't disappeared."
She stared at me, opening her mouth to argue, but before she could say another word, a soft, distinct rumble echoed from her stomach.
The girl completely froze. A fierce blush erupted across her cheeks, reaching all the way to the tips of her ears. She pulled her knees tighter to her chest, looking like she wanted the concrete to open up and swallow her whole.
I couldn't help but offer a small, warm smile. The underground fight club could wait.
"There's a quiet family diner just down the street," I said, standing up and dusting off my trousers. I didn't extend my hand—she was already on edge, and I didn't want to crowd her space. "I was actually just on my way to grab something to eat. Would you like to join me? My treat."
She hesitated, looking up at me with a mixture of suspicion and lingering fear. She was a Shuchiin elite, and likely accustomed to boys having ulterior motives.
"You don't have to," I added casually, putting my hands in my pockets. "But it's bright, it's warm, and they serve an excellent hamburger steak. Plus, it might be better than sitting out here in the cold. Think of it as a junior showing proper respect to a senior."
She studied my face for a long moment. Whatever she was searching for—pity, mockery, or predatory intent—she didn't find it. I was just treating her like a normal person who needed a hot meal.
Slowly, she uncurled her legs and stood up, smoothing out the wrinkles in her skirt. She kept her gaze slightly lowered, her pride still wounded but her immediate panic fading.
"Just a hamburger steak," she muttered softly, her tone regaining a tiny fraction of its usual cool edge. "If you try anything weird, I'm leaving."
"Deal," I chuckled, gesturing down the street. "Right this way, Senpai."
The family diner was a warm, quiet sanctuary compared to the chaotic chill of the Shinjuku streets.
The bell above the door chimed cheerfully as we walked in. I asked the hostess for a booth in the back, giving my senior some much-needed privacy. Once we were seated, I ordered two of the diner's signature hamburger steak sets and a pair of hot teas.
Mai sat across from me, her posture impeccably straight despite the exhaustion lingering in her eyes. For the first few minutes, neither of us said a word. I let the quiet atmosphere of the diner work its magic, giving her time to decompress.
She finally broke the silence, her violet eyes studying me carefully over the rim of her cup.
"You're a first-year," she stated, noting the subtle differences in my uniform.
"I am," I nodded, resting my arms casually on the table. "Ren Ichijou. Class 1A."
"Mai Sakurajima," she replied. She paused for a fraction of a second, her gaze hardening just slightly, as if bracing herself for a very specific, overwhelming reaction.
I just smiled and offered a polite nod. "It's nice to officially meet you, Sakurajima-senpai."
She blinked, genuinely caught off guard.
"That's it? You really don't care? Most people stare, or start whispering the moment they hear my name."
"I've seen the billboards, Senpai. It's hard to miss them," I answered honestly. "But right now, you aren't on a movie set or a magazine cover. You're just a student from my school who looked like she really needed a hot meal."
Mai stared at me for a long, quiet moment. The defensive walls she naturally kept up seemed to waver. She looked down at her tea, a very small, very genuine smile tugging at the corner of her lips.
The waitress arrived, setting two steaming iron plates of hamburger steak on the table. The rich, savory aroma filled the booth. Mai picked up her chopsticks, whispered a quiet "Itadakimasu," and took her first bite.
Watching her eat with quiet, refined desperation made me realize just how badly she had needed this.
Halfway through the meal, the color finally returned to her cheeks. She set her chopsticks down, wrapping her hands around her warm teacup. The atmosphere grew heavier, the silence stretching between us as she gathered her thoughts.
"Ichijou-kun," she began softly, her voice carrying a fragile tremor. "Do you believe in the supernatural?"
I paused, setting my own chopsticks down. Between the Kure clan and the literal curses I hunted every night, my entire life was steeped in the supernatural. But I kept my expression perfectly grounded and relaxed.
"I have a very open mind, Senpai," I replied gently. "Why?"
She looked down at her reflection in the dark tea. "Because I didn't just have a panic attack out there. Something is wrong with me. Today... it got so much worse. It's like I'm slowly being erased."
She took a shaky breath, the terrifying reality of her day spilling out.
"People stopped noticing me. Then they stopped hearing me. This afternoon, I tried to buy something to eat, but the clerk just stared right through me. I left the money on the counter, but when I tried to go back to my apartment... the concierge wouldn't acknowledge me to open the security gate. I couldn't get inside. I haven't eaten all day. I was just wandering around Shinjuku, screaming at people, and no one even blinked. I thought... I thought I was actually going to disappear completely."
A single tear slipped down her cheek, completely shattering her cool, actress persona. The profound isolation she had experienced today was a living nightmare.
"You aren't disappearing," I said, my voice firm, laced with absolute certainty to anchor her back to reality. I reached across the table, not touching her, but invading her field of vision so she had to look at me. "Look at me, Senpai. I hear you. I see you perfectly fine. You are sitting in a diner in Shinjuku, eating a hamburger steak, right across from me. You exist."
Mai looked up into my eyes. The sheer panic that had been suffocating her all day finally broke, replaced by an overwhelming, breathless wave of relief. She quickly wiped at her eyes with the back of her sleeve, letting out a watery, exhausted laugh.
"You're a strange junior," she whispered.
"I get that a lot," I smiled, leaning back in my booth. Now that the emotional crisis had passed, it was time to lighten the mood.
"Besides, I'm feeling incredibly honored right now. If the rest of the student body found out I was having a private, late-night dinner with the famously beautiful Sakurajima-senpai, I'd probably be assassinated out of sheer jealousy. Consider this the peak of my high school career."
A fierce, immediate blush erupted across Mai's cheeks. She clearly hadn't expected me to seamlessly pivot from comforting anchor to brazen flirt. She quickly cleared her throat, trying to reconstruct her usual cool, unbothered facade.
"You're awfully smooth for a junior," she countered, her voice taking on a teasing, slightly dangerous edge. "Are you always this quick to flirt with girls you find crying in alleyways?"
"Only the ones who look like they belong on a magazine cover," I replied effortlessly.
Mai's eyes narrowed playfully. Determined to regain the upper hand in the conversation and remind me of the hierarchy, she shifted in her seat. "You know, Ichijou-kun, confidence is a good trait. But little boys shouldn't play with fire unless they want to get burned."
To emphasize her senior authority, she leaned forward across the table, resting her elbows on the surface and looking up at me through her long lashes. It was a calculated, actress-level tease.
However, she had severely miscalculated the physics of her own uniform.
The Shuchiin dress code was notoriously strict, meaning her collar was buttoned high.
But as she leaned forward, pressing her arms together on the table, the dark fabric of her uniform was pulled impossibly taut. The motion violently emphasized the sheer size of her bust, outlining the incredibly heavy, perfect curves pressing against the fabric.
My newly upgraded Level 6 Perception caught every single detail. The fabric straining. The undeniable gravity of her proportions.
My brain completely stalled. The witty retort died in my throat as my eyes instinctively locked onto her chest.
Mai noticed my sudden, dead silence. She saw the exact trajectory of my gaze.
She froze.
The teasing smirk instantly vanished, replaced by a blush so violently red it reached the tips of her ears. She sat back so fast she nearly knocked over her water glass, instinctively crossing her arms over her chest to hide the outline.
"You... you absolute pervert!" she hissed, glaring daggers at me. Under the table, her foot shot out, kicking me sharply in the shin.
"Ouch," I chuckled, rubbing my leg but offering zero apologies. "You leaned forward, Senpai. I was merely appreciating the laws of physics. My eyesight is just exceptionally good."
"Don't try to justify it with logic!" she snapped, though the sheer embarrassment had successfully chased away the last lingering shadows of her supernatural dread.
I smiled, waving down the waitress to ask for the bill.
"Alright, Senpai," I said, pulling out my wallet.
"Dinner is finished, and since you can't get past your concierge... we need to figure out whose bed you're sleeping in tonight."
Mai's foot shot under the table, delivering a second, much sharper kick to my shin.
"I beg your pardon?" she demanded, her violet eyes narrowing dangerously as her blush flared up all over again. "Whose bed?"
"The guest room at my family's estate, Senpai," I clarified smoothly, paying the bill and standing up from the booth. "Unless you prefer sleeping on a park bench in Shinjuku? It's a massive compound, and I guarantee the guest beds are more comfortable than a concrete sidewalk. Plus, the security is tight enough that no one will bother you."
Mai hesitated, her pride warring with her sheer exhaustion. She looked out the diner window at the dark, unforgiving streets of Tokyo. She had spent all day wandering completely invisible, entirely cut off from the world. The thought of being alone out there again clearly terrified her.
"Just the guest room," she muttered, crossing her arms defensively. "And if you try to sneak in, I'll scream so loud your entire entire neighborhood will wake up."
"I'll make sure to lock the door from the outside, then," I teased, earning another glare as we walked out of the diner and into the cool night air.
"But wait... aren't we going to the station?"
"I told you, Senpai, I have an errand to run first," I said, gesturing down the street away from the main transit hub. "Just stick close."
As we navigated the crowded sidewalks, I noticed Mai instinctively shrinking away from the passing pedestrians. She was terrified they would bump into her and not even register her existence. Without making a show of it, I casually shifted my position, placing myself between her and the heaviest flow of foot traffic, acting as a physical buffer.
As we walked, my mind rapidly turned over the details of her situation.
An actress who had been in the spotlight her entire life. A sudden hiatus. A desperate, suffocating need to escape the public eye. And now, complete invisibility and physical intangibility to normal people.
'Adolescence Syndrome.' The urban legend where severe psychological stress or potent desires during puberty manifested as reality-bending anomalies. The atmosphere around Mai was literally "reading the room." She had subconsciously wanted to disappear, so reality was obliging.
I decided not to dump the entire supernatural thesis on her right now. She was already exhausted; telling her that her own subconscious was erasing her from existence might trigger another panic attack.
"Senpai," I asked casually, keeping my eyes forward. "When you went on hiatus... was it because you just wanted people to stop looking at you? To stop perceiving you entirely?"
Mai glanced at me, surprised by the sudden, piercing accuracy of the question. She looked down at the pavement. "Yes. I just... I couldn't breathe anymore. I wanted to escape it all."
I offered a soft, confident smile. That confirmed it.
"Don't worry," I said smoothly. "As of three hours ago, I became the President of a highly unofficial school club explicitly dedicated to solving students' personal problems.
Consider yourself the Service Club's very first official client. I know exactly how to fix this."
Mai looked at me, her violet eyes wide. The overwhelming dread that had been haunting her finally lifted, replaced by a genuine spark of hope. "You really are a strange junior."
"I try my best," I chuckled, stopping in front of an abandoned, graffiti-covered commercial building.
Mai looked at the dark entrance leading down into the subterranean levels. She stopped dead in her tracks, pulling her Shuchiin blazer tighter around her chest.
"Here?" she asked, her eyes narrowing with sudden, intense suspicion. "What kind of errand is this, exactly? Ichijou-kun... you're trying to drag a girl who currently technically 'doesn't exist' into a dark, abandoned basement. If you think you can take advantage of my situation to do something weird to me..."
I stopped, entirely amused by where her mind had immediately jumped. I turned to face her, stepping just a fraction closer. I let my Level 7 Charm bleed into my posture, locking my eyes onto hers with absolute, unwavering confidence.
"Senpai," I murmured smoothly, my voice dropping an octave. "I am incredibly flattered by your imagination. But let me assure you—if I was going to do something indecent to you, I promise I wouldn't pick a dirty, concrete stairwell. I have far higher standards for you than that."
Mai's breath hitched. A violent, instantaneous blush erupted across her face, completely shattering her defensive glare.
"Besides," I added, my lips curving into a playful smirk. "If I wanted to make a move, I'd wait until we were safely in my estate's guest room."
"You... you absolute idiot junior!" she hissed, her face burning as she swatted my arm. "Just do your stupid errand so we can leave!"
I chuckled softly, turning and leading the way down the concrete incline. Mai followed close behind, her pride wounded but her fear replaced by sheer embarrassment.
As we descended, the atmosphere rapidly shifted. The air grew thick with the smell of exhaust fumes, stale cigarette smoke, and sweat. The muffled sound of roaring voices echoed off the cold walls. Mai's embarrassment vanished, replaced by nervous apprehension. She instinctively stepped closer, grabbing the sleeve of my shirt as we emerged into a massive, multi-level parking garage.
It looked like a scene ripped straight out of an underworld movie.
High-end luxury cars were parked in a wide circle, their bright headlights illuminating the center of the concrete floor. Hundreds of people—yakuza enforcers with exposed tattoos, corporate executives waving thick wads of cash, and rough-looking street fighters—were crowded around, screaming at the top of their lungs.
"Ichijou-kun!" Mai whispered urgently, her nails practically digging into my arm. "What is this place?!"
"Underground fighting arena," I replied calmly, guiding her through the outer edge of the roaring crowd to a relatively safe spot near a thick concrete pillar.
We looked toward the center of the headlight-illuminated ring just as a sickening *CRACK* echoed over the crowd.
Two men were fighting bare-knuckle on the concrete. One was a lean, athletic martial artist. The other was a massive, heavily scarred brawler who looked like he weighed well over a hundred kilos.
The fight wasn't even close. The giant brute absorbed a kick to the ribs without even flinching, grabbed the smaller fighter by the collar, and delivered a devastating, brutal headbutt. The smaller man's eyes rolled back, and he collapsed into a bloody, unconscious heap on the ground.
The crowd erupted into a deafening roar of approval, money changing hands rapidly.
Mai let out a choked gasp, turning her face away and pressing her forehead against my shoulder, genuinely terrified by the sheer violence. "Let's go. Please, Ichijou-kun, let's just leave."
In the center of the ring, the referee—a sharp-eyed man in a cheap suit—stepped over the unconscious fighter and raised the giant's bloody hand.
"Three consecutive wins for the Iron Demon!" the referee bellowed, his voice echoing off the concrete. He looked out at the sea of crowsds land gamblers. "Who wants a piece of the purse?! We've got two million yen on the line! Who's next?!"
I looked down at Mai, gently prying her trembling fingers off my sleeve. I shrugged off my Shuchiin blazer, folded it n