Sports… weren’t the thing I particularly excelled in. Actually, if I had to say, it was one of my weakest points.

I avoided team games as much as possible, but unfortunately, sometimes I was simply forced to participate in them. I usually ended up standing in the corner and doing nothing relevant other than walking in circles and waving my hand every now and then, so it didn’t seem like I was lazing around. When the ball happened to come up to me, I rarely could do anything with it. Even if I wanted, catching it was too much for the lazy and weak me. So, at some point, I simply stopped trying and agreed with my fate of being a third wheel to the team.

Now, there were also some less interaction-engaging sports—for example running. I would be lying if I said that I wasn’t terrible at it too. Hell, even a quick dash that took a few seconds made me lose my breath for several minutes. Could I do a push-up? Yes, of course! But no more than ten.

How had I become like that? I wasn’t fat at all, even though my lifestyle never belonged to the healthiest. I never cared about sports outside school. Naturally, I never had friends I could play with. In general, I was lazy, and it was the result of all my ignorance.

Could I change it? Probably. But I couldn’t be bothered, obviously.

Today was the sports festival—an event that took place every year and I hated it wholeheartedly. Every single person in school was forced to participate, but most people didn’t mind. Technically, you could avoid it by pretending that you happened to be sick, but I wasn’t the kind of person to use such underhanded techniques. I managed to turn down most events I was able to, but I still had to participate in some.

In general, there were numerous contests, you earned a number of points from winning them and before the day came to an end, the class with the largest amount of points won. You didn’t fight as a person, but representing the entire class. To me, it was somewhat of a pressure, even though nobody cared about me, and I cared about nobody in my class.

That’s why, for example at the relay, I couldn’t walk at my own, leisurely pace without the slightest care in the world. I had to do my best, even though this “best” was pretty much worthless. Now, there actually were some events I wouldn’t mind doing my best at. For example, the eating contest. Yes, there was something like that in my school. Apparently, it was made for all those people that weren’t good at sports but still wanted to take a chance at get more points for their class. Huh? Wasn’t that my chance?

Well, this year, there was something I was somewhat looking forward to during the festival. Unsurprisingly, it concerned that girl. Our classes would go against each other today—it wasn’t impossible that I would get a chance to face off with her directly. She didn’t seem to be good at sports as well, but… maybe she would surprise me. Also, there was the eating contest.

Honestly, I was somewhat excited—not as much as others seemed to be, but certainly more than last year.

•

Changed into gym clothes, I stood there separated from the rest of my class as I stared at some competition taking place. Usually, I wouldn’t be interested in it at all and watch it just as a way of killing time, but this time, there was actually something interesting going on there.

That blonde girl was a student in this school just like me. She acted weird and all, but at the end of the day, she was treated like everyone else by the teachers. Unfortunately, you were simply forced to take part in some competitions. While I could laze around for the most part of today’s events, she wasn’t as lucky as me.

In fact, she was quite unlucky, because the competition that was chosen for her was the relay race—arguably the most demanding one. Loud cheers surrounded me from all sides, but I didn’t bother to join them.

I couldn’t see her face because of the way she stood, but to my surprise, she didn’t particularly stand out from the other participants lined up next to her, maybe aside from her bright, blonde hair.

She wore a thin, white top and her hair was tied in twintails. Taking a look behind her every now and then with her hand extended, she seemed to be impatiently waiting for the baton.

“Why have you chosen her? She runs like shit.”

“Well, the teacher insisted, and we couldn’t do anything about it.”

“But it’s the worst… There is no doubt we’ll lose now.”

“Yeah, as if they couldn’t make her do something else. Like math speedrunning.”

I heard a rather disrespectful conversation behind me. Who were those people, and who were they talking about? I had no idea, but it seemed that they didn’t like the person that was going to run now for their class.

“Also, can’t she take off this thingy on her eye for the run? What if she trips because of that? Well, I guess it doesn’t really matter because we’ve already lost because of her.”

“But isn’t it simply because there’s something wrong with her eye?”

“No way. Don’t you remember that?”

“Well… it doesn’t have to be related, does it?”

“But it is related.”

“Maybe… but it doesn’t change that she’s the worst choice possible for this run.”

“As if they couldn’t just let those useless people sit on the bench. They wouldn’t mind either way.”

“Yeah…”

I realized at some point that the person they were talking about with contempt was none other than the peculiar girl I knew, Lumiya. Maybe they weren’t wrong about her being so terrible at running, but the way they were overly criticizing her made me want to tell them off.

But would I be able to do it? Of course not. Thanks to my cowardice, I had no choice but to listen as they spoke hatefully about my friend without her knowing.

Well, they were the kind of people she called “filthy humans”. And I totally understood that.

“It’s so boring. Let’s go.”

“Sure.”

As I looked at the running track, her turn was approaching. All contestants were running at a very similar pace and already preparing to hand the batons over to the waiting participants, including Lumiya.

Cheers surrounded the entire field.

Lumiya looked restlessly behind as her classmate ran up to her. I could see her nervousness even from this distance—her hand was trembling, and there was a lot of sweat on her body, even though she hadn’t begun running yet.

And then, she received the baton—she wasn’t first, but she wasn’t last either. Her feet started moving her forward quickly as she held onto the baton that had been successfully passed to her.

But… part of the cheers seemed to become quieter, but the effect was so barely noticeable that it could just be my imagination.

Also, Lumiya started falling behind. It was evident that she was doing her best, but she became last in no time. As I stared at her running with curiosity, I noticed that her pace became unsteady soon.

As her speed decreased, the distance between her and other participants increased.

“…”

Apparently, the participant from my class was leading, but I couldn’t care less about it at the moment.

Honestly, I felt bad for her. What was she feeling now? Not only would she be totally exhausted, but she would also receive looks full of scorn from her classmates as a reward. She had her peculiar pretense and a habit of disregarding everyone else as mere worthless humans, but I knew that it would actually impact her.

Her speed was so slow that by the moment all other batons had been already handed on further, she had still a long way to go. She still kept running, though—she took it seriously, but unfortunately, failed.

She sped up a little at the last straight, and having handed the baton over, started walking away from the track, gradually disappearing from everyone’s vision.

“…”

The race hadn’t ended, but I wasn’t watching it anymore. Instead, I was looking at her as she disappeared from the field where everyone was gathered. I wanted to approach her and cheer her up, but as usual, I hesitated.

I still had a lot of time before my turn, so I could possibly talk to her for quite a while. Nobody was watching me, so nobody would notice wherever I went. Then, why not?

And thus, I broke away from the crowd and ran after her.

•

“Lumiya…”

Soon, I found her. The place she ran away to was the forest behind the club building—our usual meeting place. It happened to be nearby.

She was sitting under a tree, as the shade cast by it protected her from the heat and made the ground cool. Instead of school uniform, she had only the gym clothes on—just like pretty much everyone in the school currently, including me.

As soon as I called out to her, she raised her cast down head and took a glance at me, our eyes accidentally meeting. This time, it was even more awkward than usual.

Her left eye was concealed under the black eyepatch, but the other one that helplessly stared back at me was watery. She displayed an expression of disappointment and misery. Soon, her cheeks flushed and she quickly turned her gaze away from me.

“W-what are you doing here?”

Her voice was faltering and dispassionate. It was also less clear than usual, most likely because she was tired from running and didn’t have enough energy left to make it louder.

“Y-you saw it?”

“Yes…”

“…”

“I won’t laugh. Actually, I’m terrible at sports too”, I scratched the back of my head.

A light and pleasant breeze cooled my body down as I stood next to her, who was avoiding looking at me.

“…”

She neither spoke nor moved. I understood that it had to be a huge humiliation for her that pretended to be so mighty and tough, and she most likely didn’t want me to see her like that.

But more importantly, I didn’t want to see her sad like that—after all, nothing really serious had happened. Actually, I knew that she was quite bad at sports, so I didn’t expect much from her run. What’s more, I actually had no expectations of her at all. Why would I? I was a failure myself, so I didn’t even have the right to judge her.

“L-Lumiya…, it’s okay.”

I tried to cheer her up, but those words were all I could do. Was her inaccessible position a suggestion for me to leave her alone? I couldn’t read any signs that girl gave me… because she was truly peculiar.

“Why did I even try? I knew that I was going to fail, so there was no point. I only humiliated myself again…”

“…”

“I’m useless. They knew about it, but still forced me to run. Yes, they only wanted to hurt me.”

With her head hidden between her knees, she spoke quietly as if talking to herself, but she was conscious of my presence.

“It’s all those humans’ fault. I hate them. I don’t want to live in one world with them…”

“Lumiya…”

But she was human too…

“I hate humans. I hate them! As if they couldn’t just all die at once. They are so dumb, so worthless and ugly, yet… the worst one is me”, her voice grew smaller as she hid behind her knees completely.

She spoke self-deprecatingly, but I couldn’t do anything with it. I tried calling out to her a few times, but she wouldn’t stop. Why was that? It was only an irrelevant and short race, but it drove her to such despair? Or was there a deeper point in that?

“L-like I said, it’s not like that…” I sat down next to her, but she wouldn’t raise her head.

“…”

“You’re not the worst… I don’t think I would’ve run better than you… but even so, you shouldn’t worry about it. It’s not like it ever mattered.”

“…”

“There are lots of things going for you… for example, you have perfect grad—”

“No. It doesn’t mean anything at all!”

“But… there are a lot of people that would like to be like you. Especially that you put almost no effort, and yet, still succeed… remember when you did my summer homework for me? You spent only half an hour on it, and then you had free time for yourself. The same thing takes most people a few days, maybe half a day if they rush it…”

Silence followed, and she didn’t move. In fact, that was the only thing in mind I could come up with at the moment that wasn’t embarrassing. There were lots of other qualities of hers that I liked and appreciated, but bringing myself to say them aloud was a difficult task.

“…”

Almost a minute had passed, but there was no response coming from her. Over the pleasant rustle of trees, I heard silent sobs from her cowered figure. Needless to say, I couldn’t leave it like that. But…

“A-also. I don’t know how to say it, but… you’re… c-cute.”

At that moment, I heard a loud rustle right next to me. Instantly I noticed that she suddenly, just like that, jumped up from the ground. As she looked down on me, her cheeks were immensely red and her eye full of tears.

“W-what do you want to achieve with this excessive flattering, you human…!” she sounded embarrassed, angry and glad.

“N-no. I was telling the truth… yes, I do think so. That you’re… c… c…” I stared at the ground as I tried to repeat my words, but in the end, I failed. We were both embarrassed. “E-either way. You’re not the worst. For me… you’re even the… among the best. So don’t worry about all those “filthy” humans.”

“…”

Well, she was my only friend, so naturally, she was the best person I knew. I couldn’t say it directly, though, but I was sure that she got the message properly. She was surprisingly smart if it came to things like that.

Suddenly, she grinned as she held her hand to her face, standing over me.

“D-did you really think that I was so weak? Of course I couldn’t show the true extent of my power to all those foolish humans. I-I humiliated myself on purpose! So they won’t expect it when I come to kill them all soon. K-kakaka.”

“Haha, you’re back already?”

“I was here all along.”

It seemed that I managed to cheer her up… at least for now. The somewhat troubling first half of sports festival was over, but there still were quite a lot of events awaiting us. I would also have to take part in some of them… and maybe I would even get to compete against her directly.