Chapter 41: Quantum Blade
After the exams were over, Haruto went back to his regular school routine like nothing had happened. The usual boring classes, the same old textbook droning, and teachers who looked like they’d rather be anywhere else. He was just spacing out during lunch break when some random kid from another class came up to him.
"Hey, you’re Haruto, right?" the guy said, looking nervous as hell. "Kazuma wants to see you."
Haruto raised an eyebrow. Kazuma? He barely knew the guy, just some acquaintance who hung around with the wrong crowd. What could he possibly want?
"Where?" Haruto asked, not really caring but curious enough to find out.
"Rooftop," the messenger said before quickly walking away, like he didn’t want to stick around for whatever was about to go down.
Great. The rooftop. That’s where all the dramatic anime confrontations happened, wasn’t it? Haruto sighed and made his way up the stairs, each step echoing in the empty stairwell. The afternoon sun was beating down pretty hard when he pushed open the heavy metal door to the roof.
But it wasn’t just Kazuma waiting for him.
Ryouta was there too, leaning casually against the chain-link fence with that same cocky smirk he always wore. The guy looked like he’d stepped straight out of some delinquent manga - messy hair, uniform worn just loose enough to look rebellious, and an attitude that screamed trouble.
"Well, well," Ryouta said, pushing himself off the fence. "Look who finally decided to show up."
Kazuma looked uncomfortable, shifting from foot to foot like he wanted to be anywhere else. "Ryouta, maybe we should—"