Tahiko was happy to have made a friend in Fukuna. Not just someone he was acquainted with, but an actual friendship. However, there was now another problem he was just learning about.

“How come Ida doesn’t come by here anymore?” It had been a nice and enjoyable week so far. Nothing bad had happened and he had fun chatting with the girls he was actually close with. “She used to want to ask me thing, but ever since I went to the arcade with Fukuna she hasn’t talked to me since.”

“You really can’t put two-and-two together, can you?” Amasa had a snide remark on how stupid he was to not have figured this out yet.

“I see that I’ve apparently made a mistake.” He responded. The people on this world were weird. Tahiko knew he did nothing directly to them, yet they were still upset at him anyway. “But, I did nothing to wrong her. No harsh words, certainly would never dream of laying a finger on her.”

“You also need to learn that direct stuff isn’t the only way to hurt someone’s feelings.” She hadn’t seen that girl much, but she could get an idea on why she felt the way she did. He had been quite warm and kind to her, yet all of a sudden the boy was now avoiding her. Not to mention he spent a nice day out with a girl like Fukuna. So at some point, anyone would take that as a signal to just leave them alone. “I actually feel bad for her, so you should go talk to her yourself.”

“That would be the wise thing to do.” He agreed and got up. “In fact, why wait?” Well, there was a good reason for waiting. That being their first break just ended so he promptly had to sit back down the moment he stood up. “Eh, lunch is a good time too.”

And so he waited for lunchtime to come by to head over to Chisa’s classroom. She was a nice girl, so he wanted to be friends with her as well. Though unfortunately he was aware she was unaware of the truth about him. So it did make thing difficult in explaining himself.

“Oh, I didn’t expect you to come by today.” She said as he walked to her desk. The girl went into a bit of a rush in making her table appear more decent now that he was here. It had turned into a tiny mess from getting her lunch out. “Um, it’s nice to see you again.”

“The same to you too.” He responded, placing down his food without permission. Amasa had suggested he just eat lunch here to have a proper conversation with the girl. “It’s been a while since I’ve seen you, so I decided to come check by.”

“Oh, that’s why…” She was surprised to hear that coming out from him. At this point, she was under the assumption he no longer liked her as much as he did when they first met. So she had been content with just returning back to her quiet and lonely life.

“So is there a specific reason for you to not show up at my classroom anymore?” He asked, not taking any time to beat around the bush.

“Um.” She didn’t want to tell him that it was because she thought he no longer wanted to hang out with her. “Just… busy, I guess.”

“Really? Oh, that’s good then.” He took her word for it without question. “Because Amasa told me she thought it was because I wronged you. So I came by to apologize for my behavior.”

“Then, apology accepted.” She replied, breathing a sigh of relief he wasn’t mad at her either. “I’m sorry it’s been hard to find a good time with you. It doesn’t make things any easier since we don’t have each other’s number or email.”

“Email?” He had never heard of that word before. It seemed to be based on the term mail, which he was aware of. So what was the point of the ‘E’ before it? “Well, I suppose I should procure a phone soon.” Amasa did tell him that her parent were planning on adding him on the plan soon. So he’d be receiving that communication device to be able to talk to anyone he wanted to at any time. “The moment I do, I’ll make sure to obtain your details.”

“Thanks.” To Chisa, he spoke in such an odd manner. It was like he wasn’t from the country, yet spoke Japanese perfectly. Or maybe that was a problem with her? She didn’t talk to people in conversations that often. Most of it was in passing where maybe a couple of sentences passed between her and the other.

None of her thoughts and concerns were quelled with by another simple fact. Why did he have to be a boy? If Tahiko was a girl, then she wouldn’t have the other issue of worrying about what his feelings for her was. He seemed to come out of nowhere and decided to try and befriend her. No one did that, but perhaps his intentions weren’t just looking for simple friendship.

“So what hobbies are you interested in?” He asked, thinking about his time with Fukuna. Apparently in order to make friends with people, he needed to focus on what he could share with them. That was what they taught him when he realized why he was causing Amasa so much annoyance. Well, he still hadn’t fixed that problem yet, but things were trending in the right direction. “You like the arcade?” As someone with only one specific hobby that was only on Earth, he was limited in finding what they would be.

“Not really…” Since she didn’t hang out with other people often, and if so it was usually something more formal. Chisa didn’t like going to the arcade, there was always so many people and if she wanted to play video games then she’d just stay home and do it on her Mintendo Flip.

“Uh…” Now he was at a loss for words. That was his only way to break the ice, so the boy was left racking his brain trying to figure out what else people did for entertainment around here. “Then what do you do?”

“I just read a lot of light novels, I guess.” Chisa was a bit of a bookworm. If it wasn’t for him, then she’d probably be finding herself in the library once again.

“Light novels?” He knew what novels were, but what made the ones she read light exactly? Well, it wasn’t hard to ascertain that they were probably shorter than an average novel. Though his idea of an average novel were mostly booklets that taught him magic, rather than ones used for entertainment.

Unless by light, she meant the term light in a literal sense. Tahiko had heard tales on Enatis of unique humans showing up out of nowhere with the ability to use the magic of light. But, there was no way she could be talking about magic, right? Amasa and Fukuna stated before that it didn’t exist on this world.

Though it was possible this girl could be aware of such a concept. She was apparently viewed as ‘smart’ and ‘intelligent’ in this school. That’s what the teachers kept telling him every time they saw him with her. Those were terms used to describe how and why such powerful wizards existed. The one known as Merlin certainly used it a lot to describe himself. “Could I, perhaps see what you read then?”

“Y-you want to know what I read?” She got nervous upon hearing his suggestion. It was fine to say that she read light novels, since it was term that didn’t describe genre at all. So one could assume she read clean stuff.

She didn’t.

That understandably caused her to stress out a bit. He was someone who barely knew her, but wanted to make a concerted effort in trying to be her friend. The girl didn’t want to do anything that would turn him off, so what was she going to do about this now? “You probably wouldn’t be interested, since you’re a boy.” Chisa attempted to come up with any excuse now to tell him. Her face growing bright red as she grew more embarrassed at the thought of him reading her stuff.

“But I am interested.” He found it odd that she was against the idea. Unlike with Fukuna, this girl appeared to be more apprehensive about doing a lot of things. “Because you read it, so I want to know more about what you like.”

“I’m sorry, but we just can’t do that.” She denied him and pointed over to the clock. “Look, lunch is about to end. So I think it’s time for you to go back to your classroom now.”

“I see…” He replied, disappointed at her walling him off. “If you don’t to share, then I can’t force you.” With that, the boy packed up his lunch and left her desk. He took a moment to look back at her right before exiting the room. As much as he wished to pry a bit more into her life, how could he feel entitled to doing so? After all, he refused to do the same with her, in order to hide his own secret of being a knight.