“What are you talking about?” The boy replied, getting nervous about his inquiries. He also felt Rouko’s eyes staring a hole into the back of his head as he talked with Hakuta. “You two are being weird. Why are you really here?”

“He’s been a bit obsessive about this gamer friend he made a few weeks ago.” Said Rouko. “You could say he’s a bit crazy for them.”

“I’m not being obsessive.” Hakuta defended himself from such slander, even if it was obvious to anyone in the situation that it was true. “I just want to find out who that person was, what’s so weird about that?”

“The part where the rest of us don’t care about it.” She answered. “This is all on you and we all think you’re just wasting time on someone who doesn’t even like you enough to let you know who they are.”

“Whatever.” He gave up on trying to convince them he was in the right. It was evident they were not going to accept his quest no matter how hard they tried. Not to mention he was talking to Rouko, who was easily the most stubborn out of the bunch. “Anyway, don’t think you can weasel out of my question. You have to be the masked gamer.” The boy turned his attention once more towards the other guy.

“And I would say I’m definitely not.” He responded. “I don’t know about this guy you’re talking about. But I have heard rumors about this gamer who’s hiding their identity.” Though he had only read about it online with a bunch of other otaku who were talking about local mysteries. “They say he’s a real good gamer, but leaves as quickly as he shows up.”

“I wonder if they’re just doing it for clout?” Rouko thought to herself out loud. “You know they were probably always good, but being good at video games is kind of lame. So they went with this mystery gimmick to get people talking about them.” And she could tell it worked very well of the boys she was sitting with.

“Being good at video games is not lame!” The pair of guys both took offense to her off-handed insult about gaming.

“But I really did want to find out who they were.” Hakuta brought back the conversation to his own desires. “I don’t know if there’s really any other reason than being curious.”

“Are you just looking for someone you can relate to?” The boy asked. He assumed that his friendship with Rouko likely came from circumstance than simply having anything in common. His thinking came from observation and from experience. “Like you’re the only one among your friends who’s like what you are. So you want to know someone who likes the same things as you.”

“I guess you’re right.” He sighed. “It’d be nice if we could talk, hang out, do all the things I want to do instead of being dragged around by people like her.” Hakuta sent over a glare at Rouko to ensure she knew who he was talking about.

“You know, I used to have an online friend I could talk about otaku stuff about all the time.” He told him. “Sometimes, I really wanted to be able to meet them in person. Because I did feel a little lonely at school, but of course that’s my fault anyway because I wanted to avoid people back then.” Hakuta began to feel like for once, he had met someone who actually understood him. It was like they were more similar than they thought. “Though I hope you’re lucky like I was. It turned out my online friend was someone I knew in person, but we both didn’t realize it.” He laughed.

“Someone in person…” Hakuta repeated, wondering if that could be the case for him. After all, the masked gamer was someone who knew who he was. Perhaps they had recognized him at school, but was too shy to admit it. Of course, if that were the case, then this didn’t explain why they suddenly stopped interacting with him.

Curiously, it happened around the same time as when Ino stopped wanting to have anything to do with him. Perhaps she knew the person, albeit wasn’t aware of their hidden secret, and said something about him to them? And that was enough for them to also want to cut ties with him?

Meanwhile Hakuta wasn’t the only person who was having a conversation. Ino had been taken away by her cousin, the school’s vice president, who had an inkling of an idea about her poor relationship with the boy.

“That boy.” She started. “Something about him seems familiar. Have you ever mentioned him to me?” Ino’s cousin asked.

“He’s a classmate, so likely yes.” Ino answered at first, only to reside down to a sigh to admit the truth. “I have told you about him. He used to be a friend of mine.”

“I hate to wonder why he’s a used to be, instead of still is.” She replied. “Ino, I know you have a hard time making friends, but it’s not a good thing to push people away.”

“I’m not pushing anyone away.” She crossed her arms in defiance. “We just have too many differences from each other and viewpoints we can’t reconcile.”

“I hope it has nothing to do with you hating gyarus.” Her cousin chuckled. It got no response from her and they continued on without addressing the elephant in the room. “You know it’s kind of funny. Everyone’s always saying you’ll be the next student council president, but you’re a lot like me before I ended up meeting her.”

“I’m nothing like what you used to be.” She argued. “You were shy, quiet, meek, and unable to have a normal conversation with anyone. I can talk to people just fine. It’s just that I’m not really friends with anyone.” One could argue that she was surrounded by a ton of acquaintances while at school. The entire classroom knew who she was and had positive interactions with her most of the time. The problem came that none of them could be said to be close friends to her.

“But I changed after I met her.” She responded, referring to her chance encounter with the student council president. “We all do, it’s a part of growing up. And I know a certain boy who did a lot of changing for all of us because of some special circumstances.”

“I hope it wasn’t because he was blackmailed.” Ino thought on her suspicions about Hakuta’s newfound relationships. “We used to be a lot more similar, but it’s like he’s not even the same boy anymore.”

“Hmm, sounds like a certain person I know.” Her cousin smiled in thought while reminiscing the past. “I used to feel pretty apprehensive about him at first, especially when he first started acting strangely compared to how he used to be. But everything turned out perfectly great for all of us.”

“Okay, now when you put it like that. I really think that friend of yours got blackmailed.”

“Look.” She placed a hand on the girl’s shoulder. “I don’t want to force you to do things you don’t want to. This is still your youth, but as an older cousin, I don’t want you to make mistakes and waste it away. It’s good you have goals and know what you want, but just open up a little and be willing to see what someone’s got to offer.”

“Fine.” She begrudgingly accepted the idea. If only to get away from dealing with this conversation where she knew her cousin wouldn’t take no for an answer. “I’ll try, but if it doesn’t work out I’m just going to give up.” It would be pretty easy to not give a concerted effort. All she needed to do was interact with the boy, ask a few questions, and move on with her life.

“Great, because it looks like he’s hanging out with one of my friends right now.” Her cousin grabbed her hand and led her down to where the TV and game console was set up. There they saw Hakuta along with Rouko playing a game with the boy. “I guess your dad wouldn’t be happy about you playing a lot, but this is supposed to be a fun time. So he doesn’t have to find out.”

“I wasn’t planning on playing anyway.” She muttered in response before deciding to take her spot. Considering how everyone was sitting, Ino had no choice but to sit besides Hakuta. It was impossible to be next to the boy in the middle and there was no way she’d ever choose to sit next to Rouko. “Hey…” She greeted him while she sat down.

“Ino!” Hakuta was shocked to see her talking to him. So much so he lost all concentration on the game he had been playing and immediately got hit by a monstrous combo to get taken out of the stage.

“I see you’re not immune to girls getting your attention.” The boy commented laughingly as he celebrated the victory.

“Huh, I guess he isn’t.” Rouko agreed quietly as she looked on at the boy. His full attention now turned towards their class representative.