In Search of Love

“It’s a love potion . ”

A purple-haired girl was holding a gla.s.s flask with a smile .

Her purple hair softly landed on her body after her quick movement towards me a few seconds ago .

“A love potion? Is this real?” I asked . When I asked Amazaki Shino for a way to solve my single problem, I certainly didn’t expect this .

Yesterday, I went to the student council room to tell her of my problem . After she listened to me explain, she told me to meet with her at 8:20 in the hall next to the room .

“Of course! You didn’t think I, the student council prez, would lie, would you?”

She leaned towards me, grinning and twirling the bottle . The red liquid inside clearly swished around .

A few bubbles formed and popped .

Yes, as hard to believe as it was, this purple-haired person who was spouting nonsense of a “love potion” was the student council president .

I’m just your average male, black-haired loner with gla.s.ses who could be confused for an author insert . I normally sit in the back of the cla.s.s, on the left side next to the windows . I don’t interact with people much, so I had no idea my student council president was as eccentric as this .

Though, maybe it was better this way . She’s certainly easy to get along with .

“…Magic and the like don’t exist, though?”

Nothing of the sort could exist . This was modern twenty-first century j.a.pan .

She pouted, “Akirkun, you don’t believe me, don’t you . Fine, if you’re going to be like that, go try it out and see if it works . ”

“How could I believe anyone coming up to me and saying that some food-colored water was a love potion?! This isn’t a fantasy world!” I gave the obvious reply .

“Aww, come on, just try it! It won’t hurt just to try, you know?”

Umm… No, I don’t even know what this is! It isn’t a love potion, so what is it!

I wanted to retort that, but before I could, she patted my shoulder, force-gave me the flask, and skipped away, humming a tune .

“…Wait!”

Stretching my arms out, I tried to call her back, but I was too late . She had already rounded the corner .

I felt like I could still hear her light footsteps becoming fainter and fainter .

Looking down at my hands, I sighed . A clean gla.s.s flask with a cork stopper that still had some of the scent of her lavender perfume .

There was a red liquid sploshing inside of it .

I guess this is the love potion?

Though, it looks more like water with red food coloring…

Hopefully this could solve my problem . Though, I couldn’t even imagine

how it would .

I moved my head closer to the liquid . How is a love potion even possible? Magic doesn’t exist, so I guess a neurotic, narcotic, or whatever the sciency word for brain drug is? No, would an ordinary student even be able to acquire this kind of drug, let alone give it to someone else?

Impossible .

So, this is probably a hoax, and the president is playing with me .

Why would she do that, though?

I’ve never even talked to her before .

There was no reason for her to do that . Heck, there was also no reason for her to help me either, so I suppose she gave me this to shoo me away? A gag gift type of thing?

That seems probable .

As I reached a conclusion, the morning bell sounded .

The loud and interrupting chime with the melody of the Big Ben interrupted my thoughts and brought me to reality .

I glanced at my watch .

It was… 8:30 . The time when cla.s.ses start .

“Sh*t! Ten minutes already pa.s.sed!”

I stuffed the potion into my bag and hurried off to cla.s.s, running along with some other late people .

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“Asakura! Late again?” my teacher, a middle-aged woman, asked in a strict tone .

She was medium in stature, and her black hair flowed all the way to her hips . Her bespectacled face showed no signs of wrinkles .

With her hand resting on her podium, she was calmly staring at me .

I grumbled in a small voice, “Can’t you look at the time yourself?”

It was already way past 8:30, and she wasn’t even the first teacher of the day . How could I not be late?

“Hmm?” Takedsensei rapped her hand on the hardwood podium .

“Yes! I am very sorry for my tardiness! I will never be late again!”

Scary . That sound she makes as she hits the wood is scary .

Rapping her hand on the podium once again, she said sternly, “Good . Asakura, sit down . Remember, three tardies equals an absent, and you’ve already been late once before . ”

“Yes, ma’am!”

I hurriedly rushed towards my seat in the back, pa.s.sing a sea of unfamiliar faces . No, unfamiliar is the wrong word . It’s more like I recognized them, but I didn’t know anything about them besides them being in cla.s.s 1-B

The cla.s.sroom wasn’t a huge one, so I reached my place in a few seconds .

I plopped my bottom into the orange plastic chair and dropped my bag onto the

the tiled floor . Putting my arms upon the desk, I rested my head on them .

Now properly settled, I looked around .

Most of my cla.s.smates weren’t paying me any attention; they were looking at the front, where the teacher was . A few were whispering quietly to their friends .

Only one person, the person in front of me, was still looking at myself .

The source of my current problems .

Her name was Yohsane Sakurako .

Slightly cute, I guess, and she did seem to be popular with the other boys .

She had the cla.s.sic long, straight, and black hair of a Yamato Nadeshiko .

With her glistening black eyes, she was staring at me .

At that point, I knew my problems were about to get worse .

Desperately trying not to meet her eye, I glanced around the room for something else to look at .

Yes, the teacher . I was supposed to look at her anyways .

I continued to stare at the teacher, not daring to meet Yohsane-san’s eyes .

Takedsensei, like normal, was teaching something boring .

At least, to me .

Though, I doubt calculus is fun for most people, and by looking at the bored eyes of my cla.s.smates it seemed my guess was correct .

Anyways, it was a boring cla.s.s, and I was itching to take my phone out and read a webnovel .

In fact, I would be doing that right now, but the teacher was Takedsensei .

If this wasn’t real life, she’d be called the “demon math teacher of h.e.l.l . ”

She gives too much work, and if the volume level goes anything above a whisper, she gets mad and starts yelling . I heard she had even pet.i.tioned to reinstate corporal punishment .

I feel like she became a teacher only to terrorize us poor children .

I tried to use my phone in her cla.s.s before, but she caught me almost as I look the device out .

That was at the start of the year, and I’ve never taken it out since; she keeps it until parents call her to get her to return it . It ended up being quite hard to take it back .

She really was quick to catch me . Only a few seconds elapsed between me pushing the on b.u.t.ton and her demanding my electronic .

Maybe she’s also bored of her own lesson?

How else could she spot me so fast? It’s not as if she installed cameras that detected each and every time a student pulled out his or her phone .

Now that’s food for thought .

A teacher bored of her own lesson . Actually, that might be more common than I’d think . After all, it’s a rare person to like everything related to one’s job . Added

Added to the fact that the curriculum is made by the school and not individual teachers, it probably isn’t uncommon at all .

Still finding the cla.s.s uninteresting, I surveyed the cla.s.sroom once more .

Yep, everyone else was the same . Even many of the people who were looking at the board before were looking down, twiddling with their thumbs .

Only a select few were paying attention to the teacher .

Teacher’s pets? Cla.s.s geniuses? Who was I to know, but I’d a.s.sume they were like that .

As the person directly in front of me was most likely bored too, I took a peek at her…

She’s still staring at me .

…I have a bad feeling about this .

Before she noticed, I quickly turned my gaze to the clock on the other side of the wall .

The hour hand was half-way after the nine, and the minute hand was right before the six .

It was 9:29 .

About time for next period?

I was right .

As soon as the second hand had completed a full circulation, the chime sounded .

Ding dong ding dong . Ding dong ding dong .

With the chime ringing, the h.e.l.lishly boring math cla.s.s ended and real h.e.l.l began .

Well, that was an exaggeration . To be more accurate, the whisperings of h.e.l.l began .

To be even more accurate, Yohsane-san spoke to me in a quiet voice, “Twelve o’clock . Usual place . ” before smiling to me and turning around to talk to her friends .

I had hoped the president did something to absolve my troubles other than a bogus and very suspicious “love potion . ” Yet, it would seem that my hopes were for nothing . My problem was still as large as ever .

For the rest of the break, I did not stray from my desk .

Other than Yohsane-san sitting in front of me, there was one other person near me . His name was Villager A .

No, I did not know Villager A’s true name . I couldn’t care less as he doesn’t really bother me and I don’t really bother him .

Villager A was actually quite popular . Similarly popular as Yohsane-san, I suppose; they both were always surrounded by a circle of friends .

As always, they were surrounded by their circles of friends . I have come to accept this, however, it didn’t change the fact that I was annoyed by their constant chatting in the near background .

Could you talk somewhere else? Like, maybe not near this loner who wants some quietness around here?

Luckily, the break ended quickly and normal cla.s.s time was resumed .

j.a.panese was next .

Our j.a.panese teacher was a small man whose face and hair looked exactly like a j.a.panese monkey: a pink face and whitish grayand whitish gray hair .

I had a feeling he liked hot springs too .

Well, he taught the language fairly well, so I guess it could be forgiven .

Though, I still don’t see the need to know cla.s.sical j.a.panese in our future daily lives .

Thinking that, I pulled out my phone and typed in a URL .

It was the URL of “Let’s Become a Writer!” a popular novel uploading site .

Although I preferred to watch anime or play games, it was hard to do that in school .

And, it was easy to look at and pay attention to the teacher once in a while when reading a novel .

I didn’t want to entirely waste my parent’s money after all .

Logging in, I checked the new updates for novels to read .

Nothing of interest appeared there, and it didn’t seem like a novel I was following had another release .

Bored, I tapped on a random t.i.tle .

“Invijible Panda”

The synopsis looked like it was done by a two-year-old .

I tapped on the link to the first chapter out of curiosity .

And, after one second of reading, I knew .

This was actually done by a two-year-old .

It was hardly readable, and there was no plot .

Well, it was quite amazing a two-year-old could even write .

I must give the author that .

Sighing at how there was nothing good these days, I hit the back b.u.t.ton on my phone and turned it off .

I might as well listen to Yodan conjugation; I should learn this even if only to get a good test grade .

I’m the type who doesn’t need notes and doesn’t study . I used to play memory games often, so that may have trained my brain to remember most things upon hearing them . Of course, it also could’ve been good natural gifts, but I had no way to know .

Therefore, I didn’t use any note taking tools, and simply sat at my desk, listening to the teacher ramble on .

Time pa.s.ses excruciatingly slowly when bored .

That was an evident fact .

It felt like hours when I was listening to Yamadsensei’s expiation of the differences between cla.s.sical j.a.panese conjugation and modern j.a.panese conjugation .

I mean, I guess it was important, but enough to warrant a whole lesson? I don’t think so .

All through the period, I repeatedly checked my phone for anything good .

And, I always saw nothing interesting .

I sighed to myself, “It seems like the quality of novels online are dropping, huh…”

The rest of the period progressed in such a boring manner .

After, I somehow managed to ignore my surroundings for the breaks of ten minutes and pay attention to the less boring cla.s.ses .

It was like this until twelve o’clock . Lunch break .