"Does Rinji-nii really get along that poorly with Shinomiya-senpai?"
"I honestly don't know," Hina admitted. "I met him later than you did, and I'm not that familiar with his circle."
All she really knew was his father, the Sagara couple, Hayasaka, and that girlfriend of his who hadn't shown up in ages.
To the middle schoolers, both Rinji and Kaguya were stars of the high school division's student council. Their relationship wasn't clear from the outside.
Even among the high schoolers, most people who weren't close to Rinji wouldn't imagine he disliked Kaguya. To them, a perfect ojou-sama like her was simply impossible to dislike.
"Still… leaving him alone with Shinomiya-senpai, is that okay?" Hina asked nervously as they walked outside.
"They'll probably just argue at most. And my brother's there, so it'll be fine," Kei replied. "But… I don't know whose side he'll take."
"Huh?"
"Rinji's his best friend. But Shinomiya-senpai is his girlfriend now. He's really stuck between them."
Shirogane wasn't the only one in a bind—Kei felt the same.
She truly wished Rinji and Kaguya could get along.
"I… really like Rinji-nii, and I really like Shinomiya-senpai too. I hope she can really become my sister-in-law one day…"
---
"Rinji, you're acting a little strange today."
"Sorry, President, seeing Hina and Shinomiya together stirred up some memories," Rinji said.
"Rinji, the moment you show up you target me. It feels just like the first semester again," Kaguya said after sipping her tea. "Didn't you say you already considered me a friend?"
"Yes…"
Rinji didn't deny it.
"I do consider you a friend, Shinomiya. My attitude today is only because of some special reasons, don't take it personally."
"If you're talking about what my family did in the past, you should have already taken your revenge, right?"
"…Shinomiya, do you really know what your family has done?"
"You mean almost driving you bankrupt?"
"Tch, I guess it's time you knew, otherwise you'll just think I'm picking on you deliberately."
As Rinji said this, he glanced at Shirogane.
Shirogane read the look, knowing what came next involved disputes between powerful families. As a small figure, it was better not to get involved.
"I'll go handle some unfinished student council work. You two go ahead and talk."
He stood up and went back to his room. Before closing the door, he added:
"Don't fight."
"Don't worry, we won't."
The door shut with a click. Rinji turned his gaze to Kaguya.
"You should know what I once did to the Shinomiya family, right?"
"Of course. You killed the executives of a subsidiary, and many of the family's bodyguards also died by your hand. It was practically demonic. The fact that I can even interact with you like this now is a miracle."
"You don't seriously think I did all that just because your family cheated me out of a bit of money, do you?"
"Then why?"
"I once invested in a pharmaceutical company and worked with its boss for a while. Though it wasn't long, we became friends. Those days were happy, until your family reached their hands into it."
"What happened?"
"At the time, the Shinomiya family wanted to expand into the pharmaceutical market. Our company happened to have channels for key medicinal ingredients and patents for new drugs. Whether for market share in Tokyo or for long-term interests, the Shinomiya family had to crush us to secure monopoly."
"…"
"They poached core employees, threatened those unwilling to compromise, fabricated news to spark public boycotts—these were your family's methods." Rinji watched Kaguya's face shift. "You're from the Shinomiya family, you should know better than me how they operate."
"Yes."
Kaguya knew very well her family was capable of such things.
"It wasn't a big company to begin with. After those moves, it lost any chance of development. That boss was also threatened. I heard executives from your family's subsidiary even mocked him to his face. A lifetime of effort destroyed in an instant. Maybe out of guilt for wasting my investment, or maybe out of despair for the future, four years ago he jumped from the deserted factory rooftop."
"That boss was…"
"I called him Uncle Amano, the founder of the former Amano Pharmaceuticals. He was one of the entrepreneurs your family destroyed." Rinji's gaze turned cold. "And he was also the father of Amano Hina, the girl you met today."
"…"
Kaguya's pupils shrank instantly.
She never imagined her own family had forced that cute underclassman's father to death, making them her family's victims.
"Hina lived through four bitter years. To support her gravely ill mother and raise her younger brother Nagi, she falsified her age to take on full-time labor jobs. Even after her mother passed, she worked to raise her brother alone."
Seeing Kaguya trembling, Rinji continued.
"Hina's suffering was caused by your family, but I can't escape blame either. If I had stayed in Japan and fought the Shinomiya family to the end instead of fleeing, maybe her mother would have survived, and Hina and Nagi wouldn't have suffered so much."
He sighed.
"Shinomiya, as Uncle Amano's friend, I want his children to live happy lives. That's why I restarted Amano Pharmaceuticals and gave Hina shares. I don't think you, as a child at that time, were at fault, but knowing that the person Hina admires is a member of the family that killed her father… my feelings are complicated."