"Since you're being so sincere about it, I suppose I'll give you a chance."
Kawakami Tomie gave a light, leisurely clap, the look of gleeful amusement on her face growing more pronounced by the second.
This was genuinely delightful.
A man so desperate to invite her out that he'd swallow every humiliation — even going out of his way to flatter a rival — now that was a rare species of clown, truly one of a kind.
Such an entertaining clown. How could she possibly throw him aside so quickly?
She turned to look at Amamiya Rin, drawing out her voice in a sticky, languid purr.
"Rin~ Someone's offering to treat us — it would be a shame to say no. Think of it as making a new friend."
Amamiya Rin looked at that expression of hers — the one that would happily set the world on fire just to watch it burn — then slid his gaze to Hiratsuka Makoto's face, that mixture of desperation and yearning written plainly across it. He felt a profound, wordless exhaustion.
"Right, right — let's all be friends!" Hiratsuka Makoto lit up like he'd just received a divine blessing, practically tumbling over himself to agree.
"There's no need to be friends, and no need for you to treat us — but…" Amamiya Rin said evenly. "The Grand Babilus Circus. Name a date. Tomie and I will be there."
In Amamiya Rin's mind, Hiratsuka Makoto had already become a time bomb with an unknown countdown — liable to go off at any moment.
If he was going to explode, better to let it happen on Rin's terms.
When the time came, he'd set the right conditions, apply a little pressure, and quietly hand the man over to the police.
The moment Rin's blunt refusal landed, Hiratsuka Makoto's face clouded over instantly — the whites of his eyes swallowing most of his pupils, his whole presence flickering with something unstable and unpredictable.
Then Rin's words turned, and that stormy expression shattered into something bordering on manic elation. His eyes lit with a strange, unsettling brightness.
"Great! Wonderful! We can work on the friendship slowly — for now, shall we exchange contact information?"
Hiratsuka Makoto's hand shot into the inner pocket of his suit jacket. He produced a card holder, drew out two business cards, and extended them toward Rin and Tomie with both hands.
Amamiya Rin accepted the card and gave it a brief glance.
Hiratsuka Makoto. Section chief of sales at some trading company. Not a trivial title.
Kawakami Tomie pinched the card between two fingers, gave it a careless once-over, then tucked it into Amamiya Rin's coat pocket.
Hiratsuka Makoto then produced his phone, his gaze fixed intently on Kawakami Tomie.
"Rin, you do it," Tomie said, tossing him a coy glance. "Otherwise you'll only get jealous."
The look she shot Rin made Hiratsuka Makoto's expression sink.
Amamiya Rin and Kawakami Tomie exchanged a glance. He pulled out his phone and dialed Hiratsuka Makoto's number.
Only once the contact exchange was settled did Hiratsuka Makoto finally relent, walking back toward his car with three backward glances for every two steps forward.
He was the only one walking, though. Amano Sei hadn't moved.
Hiratsuka Makoto had already pulled open the driver's door and dropped into his seat before he noticed she hadn't followed.
He frowned in obvious displeasure and called out: "What are you standing there gaping at? Let's go!"
Amano Sei turned to look at him. Her voice came out quiet, distant, almost hollow.
"Hiratsuka-kun… what am I to you, exactly?"
Soft as her voice was, it grated on Hiratsuka Makoto like nails on a chalkboard. He snapped at her, impatient:
"What is this nonsense? Are you getting in the car or not?"
"This is nonsense?"
Amano Sei let out a bleak, bitter laugh. She had never, not once in her life, felt as pathetic as she did right now.
In Tomie-san's eyes, Makoto was nothing more than a clown. But in Makoto's eyes — wasn't she exactly the same?
Hiratsuka Makoto's gaze slid toward Kawakami Tomie, who hadn't gone far. His expression hardened, and he said coldly:
"Let's break up."
The words hit Amano Sei like a physical blow. Her whole body trembled — and yet, strangely, no tears came. Not even grief, not exactly. What was left at the bottom of everything was just a hollow, drifting sense of loss, like something she'd been carrying for so long she'd forgotten its weight.
"I've been meaning to say this for a while," he continued, with the ease of someone delivering a prepared speech. "You've always gone out of your way to match my preferences — hairstyle, lipstick, clothes, perfume. Of course, any man would appreciate that. But when you're so focused on it, the pressure on my end gets heavy. That's not your fault. It's just that your type is better suited for a more serious kind of man. I'm too easygoing, I suppose. Someone like me needs someone just as easygoing."
He delivered this breakup monologue with a faint air of self-satisfaction, the condescension of someone speaking down from a height.
In his mind, Kawakami Tomie was simply a far better fit for him.
Amano Sei said nothing.
"Goodbye."
He tossed that hollow farewell into the air and drove off without another glance.
Amano Sei stood staring in the direction the car had gone, both hands in her pockets, her face carrying neither joy nor grief.
Amamiya Rin had already stopped walking. A contemplative expression crossed his face.
He had initially felt a pang of guilt — this girl had been dumped because of Kawakami Tomie, and he'd thought to offer a word of comfort — but then…
The scene in front of him was triggering a very distinct sense of déjà vu.
Amamiya Rin slipped his arm free from Tomie's, reached into his inner coat pocket, and produced a small notebook. He flipped through several pages and quickly found the entry he was looking for.
[The Long-Haired Girl in the Attic — Key plot points: A fickle man breaks up with his overly accommodating girlfriend. After the breakup, she decides to cut the long hair she'd grown for him. The hair, having already developed a will of its own, winds around a rat — and then severs her neck.]
Worrying he might forget manga plotlines over time, Amamiya Rin had written down the broad strokes well in advance. The long-haired girl and the fickle man standing before him now matched this entry almost perfectly.
Whether it was truly the same story, he couldn't say for certain — he hadn't remembered the characters' names before he'd written the notes, since it was a short story, nowhere near as well-known as Tomie or the Spiral.
Still. Better safe than sorry.
"Amano-san."
Amamiya Rin spoke up.
Amano Sei turned around and met his gaze.
"I'm sorry. But for what it's worth — in my view, your boyfriend wasn't a good person. Just like he said himself: he's fickle. Even if today hadn't happened, you two would have ended up here eventually. This breakup is a good thing for you. It frees you from something that was weighing you down."
Amamiya Rin said it with complete sincerity.
Amano Sei heard the words, blinked — and felt a sudden flare of indignation rising in her chest.
What did he mean, the breakup was a good thing? What did he mean, it freed her? What kind of apology was this? Wasn't this just pouring salt directly into an open wound?
But when she looked up and met Amamiya Rin's eyes, that flare of anger inexplicably died before it could catch.
His gaze was focused and earnest. No pity in it. No hollow, performative sympathy. He was simply looking at her, steadily and seriously, stating something he genuinely believed to be true.
"…Maybe you're right."
Amano Sei tugged the corner of her mouth into something between tired and relieved — a rueful smile.
"Honestly, I knew. I've always known. I just kept thinking — if I tried a little harder, maybe we could…"
She didn't finish the sentence. She just shook her head slowly, her long hair swaying with the movement.
Amamiya Rin's gaze lingered on her hair.
Beautiful hair — black and glossy, smooth as silk, reaching all the way down to her waist.
Beside him, Kawakami Tomie stifled a yawn.
"Are you quite done? I'm starving." She looked at Rin, her tone sliding into theatrical indignation. "And would you stop staring at other women? She was just that man's girlfriend, you know. Don't tell me — because he hit on me, you got annoyed and now you're thinking of stealing his girlfriend away?"
She twirled a strand of her hair around one finger, smile curving with wicked amusement.
"Hehehe — if you're going to do something like that, could you at least do it somewhere I can't see?"
Before her words had even finished landing, Amano Sei went rigid — startled, or perhaps trying to avoid any appearance of impropriety — and quickly stepped back several paces.
"If you have nothing useful to say, you can stay quiet. Understood?"
Amamiya Rin narrowed his eyes and shot Tomie a brief sideways look.
Then he turned back to Amano Sei.
"You're not taking any of what she just said seriously, are you?"
"Of course not — of course I'm not." Amano Sei gave an awkward little laugh, but her answer carried genuine sincerity. "I don't think you're that kind of person at all."
They had only just met, and under rather unpleasant circumstances at that.
But even so, Amano Sei felt that Amamiya Rin carried a certain quality about him — something upright and uncompromising, a presence that made you feel, instinctively, that here was someone principled.
Which was why it puzzled her so much. Why was someone like him with someone like Kawakami Tomie?
She didn't want to speak ill of anyone behind their back — but Kawakami Tomie and Amamiya Rin were polar opposites in every way. They were attractive together, yes, but as a pair they made no sense whatsoever.
Amamiya Rin's gaze passed over Amano Sei's hair and he asked:
"What are you planning to do now?"
"Planning…?"
She repeated the word blankly.
"I… I'll go home, I think. Class… I don't really feel like going today. Not in the right headspace."
As she said it, a bitter smile drifted across her face.
"Let me buy you breakfast."
Amamiya Rin said it out of nowhere.
Both Amano Sei and Tomie turned to look at him at the same time.
"Hey—"
Tomie dragged the syllable out in a long, displeased note, puffing out her cheeks.
"Think of it as an apology for what happened today. I've always believed verbal apologies are the most useless things in the world," Amamiya Rin said, matter-of-factly.
"That's not necessary. Didn't you just say yourself — this breakup was good for me?"
Amano Sei moved to refuse at once.
"Even if I believe it's a good thing, it still caused you pain. If you won't let me make it up to you, I'll feel guilty about it."
Amamiya Rin said this in a perfectly calm voice, his face showing not the faintest trace of guilt.
Amano Sei was left completely speechless, blinking in mild bewilderment.
She got the sense that Amamiya Rin wasn't the type to cling or push. Which was exactly why this insistence felt strange. Was he really just trying to apologize?
Still — Amano Sei's nature was too accommodating. Even when something felt off, she didn't have the spine to refuse him outright.
And so, a few minutes later, the three of them were seated by a window in a café at the side of the street.
The morning crowd was thin. The air was threaded through with the rich scent of freshly ground coffee and the warm sweetness of baked pastries.
Tomie had chosen the window seat. The moment she sat down she picked up the menu, one fingertip sliding idly across the photographs on the pages, a faint furrow between her brows.
"Everything looks so ordinary…" she murmured under her breath.
They had tens of millions of yen from the distillery — more than enough to eat at an upscale restaurant.
(Don't treat money like it means nothing. Just because you have funds now doesn't mean you can throw them around. There are plenty of things that money will need to go toward — and besides… don't forget, they're all watching that sum you're sitting on.)
Amamiya Rin replied in his mind, and a ripple of laughter echoed through the Tomie Network.
Because of Amamiya Rin's restrictions, all the Tomie instances had been keeping their spending in check — and now that a substantial sum had come in, not a single one of them was willing to let any other Tomie have it to herself.
"Tch."
Tomie clicked her tongue, looking displeased, and launched into a squabble with the other Tomies inside the Tomie Network.
Amamiya Rin ordered plainly — bread and coffee. Amano Sei ordered the most modest set on the menu, a simple sandwich combo. Tomie dragged her feet and eventually, grudgingly, settled on a fruit salad and a croissant.
While they waited for the food, the table fell into a somewhat awkward silence.
Tomie propped her chin on one hand and stared out the window, visibly uninterested in the proceedings.
Amano Sei kept her eyes down on the tablecloth pattern, studying it as though some profound secret were woven into the fabric.
It was unavoidable, really. Enough uncomfortable things had happened between them to fill a small anthology.
"Are you and Tomie in the same year?" Amamiya Rin asked, opening a topic.
"Mm, yes." Amano Sei looked up, and seemed to exhale a small breath of relief — something to talk about was infinitely better than sitting in silence. "Same department, different classes. Tomie-san is… very well-known."
"Well-known?" Rin followed up.
"Because she's so beautiful — everyone talks about her."
Amano Sei smiled, though it took a little effort.
"Though Tomie-san doesn't seem to come to class very often. I rarely see her in the lecture halls."
"Because it's a waste of time," Tomie said, without looking up from the window.
Amano Sei did not agree, but she didn't contradict her either.
The food arrived before long. Amano Sei ate her sandwich in small, careful bites. Tomie speared a strawberry from her fruit salad with a fork, scrutinized it with visible skepticism, and only then, reluctantly, put it in her mouth.
"By the way," Amamiya Rin said, taking a sip of coffee as though something had just occurred to him. His gaze drifted again to Amano Sei's hair. "You've been growing your hair for a long time, haven't you? And you take good care of it — it's beautiful."
Amano Sei blinked, her fingers instinctively curling around the ends of her hair.
"Ah… yes, I haven't cut it in a long time. Hiratsuka-kun… he liked long hair."
Her voice dipped when she said his name.
"Must be a lot of work to maintain?"
"Not too bad — I'm used to it." Amano Sei gave a small smile. "The washing and blow-drying does take a while… but thinking about it now, I really was being foolish."
"Are you thinking of cutting it?"
Amamiya Rin asked.
Amano Sei was quiet for a moment, then slowly nodded, her expression caught somewhere between forced cheer and resignation.
"It really is too much trouble. And now that we've broken up, there's no point keeping it. Better to cut it short — more practical."
"It's not without meaning, you know," Rin said, unhurried. "The words for 'hair' and 'god' are homophones in Japanese. Did you know that? As far back as the Nara period, hair was considered a sacred symbol of life — people believed it was not merely a representation of vitality, but an embodiment of it. There's even that old saying: 'a woman's hair is her life.'"
"There's actually a shrine dedicated to this in Kyoto — the Okagami Shrine in Sagano, the only shrine in all of Japan enshrined to the deity of hair. The connection between hair and the divine runs quite deep, apparently."
He said it casually, as though simply sharing a curious piece of trivia — but his eyes remained, quietly and deliberately, on Amano Sei's hair.
____
👻🔥+40 ch: Walnut-chan🔥👻
🔥 New history: Danmachi: Summoning Ruri Gokou, And other Chuunibyou Brats
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