Chapter 5 - Echoes of the past

The second week began as a choreographed repetition of the first. Waking up before dawn, clothes chosen with precision so as not to stand out or appear negligent, breakfast in the student commons without exchanging a word. One face among dozens. Neither memorable nor forgettable. That was Tokura Yoshi. That's how he should be.

Room 2-B. Always the same seat. At the back, by the window. The morning light streamed in, slanting through the dusty glass with a warmth that didn't touch his skin. The lectures followed each other like gentle waves: magical theory, imperial history, elements of transmutation. His attention never wavered, but his participation was nil. He observed without intervening. He learned without demonstrating.

In front of him, several seats away, the voice of the protagonist floated with a naturalness that sometimes hurt to hear.

-Hey, wait! If we combine that with the third seal, then I could amplify the area spell, right?!

-Only if you don't explode first, you idiot,' Haruka replied, somewhere between annoyance and ill-concealed tenderness.

Laughter. Comments. Small gestures of camaraderie that felt like a world away. One to which Tokura Yoshi no longer belonged.

Sometimes, as he pretended to write in his notebook, he watched him. The protagonist. His hair always a bit tousled, as if he didn't have time to comb it but somehow it looked good on him. The way he talked to everyone as if he had known them all his life. No fear. No guilt.

'He has everything... without asking for it.'

And next to him, Haruka. With that serene air, slightly distant, but always firm. No one knew what was behind those eyes. No one but him.

She hadn't looked directly at him since the first day. But his presence was like a constant shadow. Her every gesture was as measured as Yoshi's. Every smile, as studied.

'She still strives to look untouched...'

At lunch, Tokura Yoshi usually left before everyone else. He would walk through the quieter corridors, looking for empty benches or corners where he could eat without being seen. That day the sky was overcast, and the breeze carried with it the smell of damp earth.

He sat under a tree with fallen leaves. In front of him, the training field was empty. A couple of teachers were crossing the far concourse.

He took out his lunch box. Rice, some fish, two onigiri balls prepared at the inn. Each mouthful was silent. He chewed without haste. Tastelessly.

Behind him, a group ran past. Familiar voices.

-Come on, dueling class is almost starting!

-Liz-senpai is going to practice with haruto-san again!

-They say she effortlessly defeated him yesterday!

'Them again...always them.'

He finished eating. He got up and walked back into the building. In the corridors, his footsteps left no trace. Students were talking, laughing, arguing... but not with him.

Yoshi slipped between them like an unremembered thought. He had no friends. He sought no allies. He just survived, day after day.

At night, in his room in his high school dorm, he wrote little notes in a journal hidden under the floorboards. It was his way of not going crazy.

Day 8. No one said anything. No one has looked at me with suspicion. Haruka fakes her facade as usual. The protagonist remains the same. It's annoying. It's painful. I'm relieved.

She closed the notebook. He turned off the light.

Sleep did not come quickly.

In his mind, the image of the protagonist mingled with Haruka's, with Charlotte's, with the voices of distant laughter, with a name that was no longer his own.

Tokura Yoshi slept. But Tokugawa Hideyoshi would not let him rest.

And tomorrow would be the same. Another day. Another torture.

Another tightrope walk over the abyss of a past that no one must remember.