If there existed a truly tormenting sensation in this world—a flavor of misery refined to its purest essence—it was surely the experience of being trapped alone in a confined space with someone you thoroughly, viscerally, and comprehensively disliked.
"Let's not. It's really not necessary. And besides, weren't you just with a whole entourage of people? Wouldn't I be inconveniencing them?"
Takahashi Mio's refusal came almost before Hojo Shione had finished speaking. It was immediate. Instinctive. The verbal equivalent of a door slamming shut.
The thought of sitting passively in Hojo Shione's passenger seat, watching Tokyo's rain-streaked streets slide past the window, being chauffeured to her own doorstep like some helpless, directionless underclassman—it felt viscerally wrong. It would be like standing at the base of a mountain, craning her neck upward, while Hojo Shione gazed down at her from the distant, cloud-shrouded summit. The vertical hierarchy was implicit. Unspoken but inescapable.
"Fukada-san has already departed," Hojo Shione replied, her voice smooth and unhurried as polished silk. "The car is empty. It's just the two of us now."
She fixed her dark, perceptive eyes directly on Mio's, holding her gaze with an almost hypnotic steadiness.
"And besides... even if you genuinely dislike me—even if the very sight of me makes your skin crawl—you still want to know certain things about Seiya, don't you? Things only I can tell you."
Tch. She's impressively self-aware, I'll give her that. Mio's internal voice dripped with acidic sarcasm. But if you already KNOW I can't stand you, wouldn't the polite, socially appropriate response be to simply stay far, far away? To leave me in peace? Why do you insist on this... this smothering proximity?
Yet, despite the venomous protests ricocheting through her skull, she found herself incapable of refusing outright. Because Shione had aimed her strike with surgical precision. She had invoked the one name. The one gravitational force Mio could never seem to resist.
I'm so pathetically weak-willed, aren't I? The moment anyone mentions Shiratori Seiya, all my defenses crumble like sandcastles at high tide. My curiosity ignites. My pride takes a backseat. Every single time.
More than that, there was a question—a burning, persistent, gnawing question—that had taken up permanent residence in the back of her mind for weeks now. A mystery she had never been able to solve through observation alone. Why? Why exactly did they break up? What crack in their seemingly perfect partnership had widened into an uncrossable chasm?
Gritting her teeth against the suffocating weight of being so thoroughly overshadowed, Takahashi Mio fell into step behind Hojo Shione, following her through the institute's glass doors and out into the gray, drizzling parking lot.
But when she saw Hojo Shione pause before a sleek black sedan—the kind of luxury vehicle that screamed "I have succeeded in life" without needing to raise its voice—and watched her produce a key fob with practiced, almost dismissive ease, the uncomfortable, churning sensation in Mio's stomach intensified tenfold. The rain pattered against her umbrella, but her bare arms suddenly felt cold and weak, as if the blood had been siphoned straight from her veins.
Hojo Shione was about to slide into the driver's seat when she noticed the girl still standing motionless beneath her umbrella, frozen like a statue in the rain. A flicker of genuine confusion crossed her elegant features.
Then, following the trajectory of Mio's gaze—fixed, almost hypnotized, on the car's gleaming silver emblem—understanding dawned. A small, knowing smile curved Shione's lips.
"Get in. Even with an umbrella, you'll catch a cold standing out here. And you don't want to hear Seiya scolding you for being careless with your health, do you?"
Truthfully, a small, petty corner of Hojo Shione's heart did want Takahashi Mio to catch a chill. Wanted her to suffer just a little. But then, almost immediately, her imagination supplied the inevitable follow-up image: Shiratori Seiya scolding Mio with that furrowed brow of his—and then, right afterward, softening. Comforting her. Wrapping a blanket around her shivering shoulders. Making her warm tea. His voice turning gentle.
The imagined scene left a sour taste in Shione's mouth. Unnecessary. Counterproductive. I'd be doing her a favor.
The mention of Shiratori Seiya's potential scolding snapped Mio back to reality like a rubber band to the forehead. She swallowed hard, closed her umbrella with a decisive shake, and slid into the passenger seat.
As she fumbled with the seatbelt—the mechanism stiff and uncooperative, the strap digging uncomfortably tight across her chest—Hojo Shione shifted the car into gear with fluid, practiced movements. Her voice drifted across the leather-upholstered interior, casual and almost kind.
"Actually... you don't need to envy me. Not this. Someday, you'll have one too. Once you become popular—truly popular—the speed at which money flows into your accounts will be utterly beyond your imagination. It's a completely different world."
The seatbelt finally clicked into place with a reluctant snap. Takahashi Mio adjusted it, the pressure still too tight, too constricting. She glanced sideways at her companion, a sardonic half-smile tugging at the corner of her mouth.
"You're remarkably confident that I'll actually become popular."
Hearing this, Hojo Shione turned her head slightly. For a suspended moment, she seemed poised to speak—her lips parting, something unreadable flickering behind her dark eyes. Then, she simply smiled. A faint, enigmatic, almost pitying smile. She turned back to face the road ahead, her hands settling on the steering wheel, and pressed the accelerator.
The silence that followed was louder than any words.
Takahashi Mio sat frozen, the meaning of that unspoken response crashing over her in slow, humiliating waves. Her face, already pale from the cold, darkened into a thunderous scowl. She ground her teeth together until her jaw ached.
She didn't say it. She didn't say a single word. But her meaning couldn't have been clearer if she'd shouted it from the rooftops.
'I don't believe in YOU, Takahashi Mio. I simply believe in SEIYA. In his judgment. His selection process. You're just the latest variable in his equation.'
The realization burned like acid reflux in her throat. Why did I ask that question? Why did I open my mouth and basically hand her the knife? This is no different from voluntarily walking into a humiliation conga line. I may as well have asked her to pat me on the head and say, "There, there, little rookie."
If this had been a month ago—if she had somehow found herself sitting in Hojo Shione's passenger seat back then, before everything had gotten so impossibly tangled—she would have been ecstatic. She would have been too giddy to sleep for three days straight. She would have texted Haruno Reika a hundred exclamation points in all caps. But now... now, the architecture of her heart had been completely, irrevocably restructured.
Outside, the light rain continued its melancholy descent, droplets racing each other down the passenger window. The soft, rhythmic pit-pat-pit-pat against the glass did almost nothing to soothe the gathering storm clouds in her chest.
Sensing—or perhaps simply deducing—that Takahashi Mio had fully absorbed her unspoken message, Hojo Shione pondered for a moment. Then, in a tone that was almost contemplative, she continued.
"Although... at the beginning, you'll likely find the process of making money incredibly enjoyable. Exhilarating, even. It feels like winning a game. But gradually—slowly, then all at once—you'll start to realize that certain things... certain intangibles... are far more important than just accumulating wealth."
Heh. Hah. Hahaha.
The scornful laughter erupted inside Mio's skull with the force of a volcanic eruption. Her internal monologue practically screamed with indignation.
How is this ANY different from a billionaire capitalist who leans back in their leather chair, sips champagne, and says with a straight face, "Oh, I don't really care about money. Money means nothing to me. It's just paper."
The retort balanced on the tip of her tongue, sharp and venomous: "You've clearly never had to take out a predatory payday loan just to survive, have you? You've never watched your debt multiply like a virus while interest rates devoured every yen you earned. What possible right do you have to preach to ME about the unimportance of money?!"
But the words withered before they could reach her lips. They felt, suddenly, both foolish and utterly meaningless. Pointless. Shouting into a hurricane.
Determined not to let the atmosphere inside the car curdle into pure, suffocating awkwardness, Mio pivoted. She asked the question directly. The one that had been burning a hole in her brain for weeks.
"Why exactly did you break up with Shiratori Seiya?"
The effect was immediate and physical.
Hojo Shione's eyelids twitched—an involuntary spasm, as if a deeply buried tripwire had just been triggered. Her foot, seemingly of its own accord, pressed down on the brake pedal with a sharp, jerky motion.
Both women lurched forward in their seats, seatbelts locking with sudden, jarring force. Takahashi Mio's heart leapt into her throat. Her eyes flew wide with a brief, unmistakable flicker of genuine panic as she whipped her head toward the driver.
Does this woman even possess a valid driver's license?! Is this how she normally operates a two-ton metal death machine?!
Fortunately—miraculously—Hojo Shione recovered her composure in the span of a heartbeat. The car's speed smoothed out. The steering steadied. She pursed her lips—the gesture tight, controlled—and asked in return:
"What exactly did he tell you? About the breakup."
Hearing this deflection, Takahashi Mio turned fully in her seat, her body angling toward Shione with focused intensity. She stared at the idol's profile—the elegant line of her jaw, the way her knuckles had gone slightly white on the steering wheel—and said, her voice flat and unyielding:
"If he had already explained everything with perfect clarity, would I still need to be sitting here, asking YOU?"
"Heh... heh heh..."
The laugh that escaped Hojo Shione was soft. Almost sad. Utterly devoid of humor.
"Yes. You're right. How could he possibly have explained it clearly? That man... for all his precision with words on paper... when it comes to matters of the heart, he's as articulate as a brick wall."
She paused. The traffic light ahead blazed crimson, and the car rolled to a gentle stop. In the watery red glow, she turned her head and looked at Takahashi Mio—really looked at her. When she spoke again, her voice had taken on a strange, layered complexity. Nostalgia and warning and something almost like... recognition.
"I truly feel, right now, that you're very similar to how I used to be. So similar it's almost unsettling."
"You don't actually need to prove anything to me. You don't need to demonstrate, with evidence and exhibits, whether Shiratori Seiya genuinely cares about you. Whether his feelings are real."
"Because I already know. I know, with absolute certainty, that he will be wholeheartedly, unreservedly devoted to you. He will pour himself into your development, your happiness, your success. That's simply what he does."
"You don't need to tell me any of this. You don't need to convince me. I know..."
Hojo Shione's gaze drifted somewhere beyond the windshield, her eyes growing distant. Filmy with memory.
"He'll check in every single day to make sure you're eating properly. Not just asking—verifying. He'll drag you to shopping malls in his precious free time to buy you beautiful clothes, even if you protest that you don't need them. When you're working—practicing, training, rehearsing—he'll be at his most attentive. He'll practically accompany you through every grueling hour. He'll sit there with his notebook, recording every area where your performance is lacking, every moment that needs refinement, every tiny detail that could be improved. And he'll also..."
Her voice caught. Just for an instant. So brief it could have been imagined.
"...he'll also show you a warmth and tenderness you've never experienced before. A kind of care that makes you feel cherished. Seen. He'll even indulge you in things that might be a little excessive. A little unreasonable. Things he probably shouldn't encourage."
The traffic light flickered. Green.
Hojo Shione's words cut off as abruptly as they'd begun. She pressed her lips into a tight, bloodless line. When she spoke again, her voice was barely above a whisper.
"Because everything you're experiencing right now... I've experienced it too. Every last moment."
Throb.
Takahashi Mio's hand, resting on her outer thigh, clenched into a fist with bone-creaking force. Each one of Hojo Shione's words had struck her heart like a tiny, precisely aimed dart. And each impact hurt a little more than the last.
What kind of nostalgic fairytale nonsense is this?! The protest screamed inside her skull. Shopping trips? Fine. Training accompaniment? True. Those things happened. But... breakfast, lunch, and dinner?! He has NEVER once bought me a carefully prepared bento, never once shown up at my door with warm soup! And what was that about 'indulging excessive demands'?! That has DEFINITELY never happened! I didn't even know that was on the MENU!
The bitter realization curdled in her stomach. She got all of that. Shione got everything. The full, deluxe, premium Shiratori Seiya Experience. And what did I get? A script and a promise he made to someone else.
She whirled in her seat, her eyes blazing with undiluted fury as she glared at Hojo Shione's composed, infuriatingly serene profile.
"Did you come here today just to show off?! To rub your history in my face?!"
"No."
Hojo Shione's response was immediate. Quiet. Unshaken. She shook her head slowly.
"My point—my entire purpose in saying all of this—is to warn you. Don't get too deeply involved. Don't let yourself drown completely in him. Because if you do... when it ends... the breakup will be unbearable. Crushing. A weight you can't imagine carrying."
She drew a breath.
"And also... I want you to know that even if you leave Shiratori Seiya—even if he's no longer in your life—you will absolutely, unquestionably be fine on your own. You'll survive. You'll thrive. You'll prove yourself without needing him as a crutch."
"My solo concert is next week. I'll prove it to you then. I'll show you what standing on your own two feet truly looks like—"
"STOP THE CAR!"
The words exploded from Takahashi Mio's mouth like a thunderclap in the quiet, leather-scented cabin. Hojo Shione flinched. Her head snapped toward her passenger, eyes wide with genuine startlement.
Seeing that the other woman wasn't reacting fast enough, Mio enunciated each syllable with the cold, clipped precision of someone delivering a final warning.
"I said. Pull. Over. And. STOP."
The temperature in the car plummeted. Mio's entire demeanor had transformed—the sullen, defensive girl replaced by a figure of blazing, barely contained fury. Her shoulders were rigid. Her jaw was set. Her eyes burned.
Hojo Shione sensed the raw, unstable emotion radiating from her passenger like heat from a furnace. She glanced at the roadside—no no-parking signs in sight—and, with the reluctant obedience of someone handling a volatile explosive, steered the car to a smooth stop at the curb.
The moment the vehicle was stationary, Takahashi Mio's hand flew to the seatbelt release. She wrenched it free, the strap snapping back into its housing with a violent thwack. She twisted in her seat, her entire body angled toward Hojo Shione like a drawn sword. Her eyes locked onto Shione's with an intensity that bordered on physical force. When she spoke, her voice was arctic.
"You really do love talking to yourself, don't you? It's practically a hobby."
"'Similar to you'? 'Everything I'm experiencing, you've experienced'? What arrogant, self-satisfied garbage."
"I haven't even debuted yet. I haven't set a single foot onto a real stage. So please—PLEASE—do not presume to lecture me with that condescending, all-knowing 'senior' attitude of yours. It's nauseating."
The words poured out now, a dam finally breached, a flood long contained and now unstoppable.
"What do you actually know about me? About my life? About what I've sacrificed to get here? Do you have any idea how utterly ridiculous you look right now? Like a tragic, resentful widow abandoned by her man, wandering the earth and dispensing bitter warnings to anyone who'll listen."
"You stand there and claim you've 'long since moved on.' That you've 'given up.' But the truth is painfully, embarrassingly obvious. You can't let go. You've never let go. You're still clinging to his ghost with both hands, and it's pathetic."
"Your whole demeanor—this gentle, wise, 'been-there-done-that' act—is so transparently hypocritical it makes my skin crawl. It's repulsive. Honestly, truly repulsive."
Mio's chest heaved. But she wasn't done. The reservoir wasn't empty yet.
"I will definitely attend your concert. I will be there. Watching. And you had better—you HAD BETTER—deliver a performance so breathtaking, so impossibly brilliant, that it makes me feel like I can never, ever surpass you. Not in this lifetime. Not in ten lifetimes. Because if you don't... if you fall short... everything you've said today will be exposed as the hollow, self-serving nonsense it truly is."
She paused. Drew breath. And delivered the final, killing stroke.
"No wonder that scoundrel said he was going to marry Saori and felt absolutely nothing for you anymore. You never even fought for him. Not once. You just sat here—you're still sitting here—complaining and blaming and waxing poetic about the past. Never lifting a finger. Never actually doing ANYTHING. It's honestly disgusting."
'Whew!'
The stale, suffocating air that had been trapped in her lungs for weeks—the jealousy, the anxiety, the insecurity, the desperate need to measure up—all of it expelled in one shuddering, cathartic exhale. Takahashi Mio felt suddenly, almost impossibly, lighter. As if a physical weight had been lifted from her shoulders.
And then, before Hojo Shione could formulate a response—before those elegant lips could part to offer a counter-argument or a denial or a condescending platitude—Mio grabbed the door handle, shoved it open, and flung herself out into the rain.
BANG!
The car door slammed shut with a thunderous finality that echoed through the quiet, rain-soaked street.
Hojo Shione sat motionless in the driver's seat, her hands still resting on the steering wheel. Through the rain-streaked windshield, she watched the girl's silhouette—no umbrella, no hesitation—stride to the edge of the curb and flag down a passing taxi with fierce, sharp gestures. The taxi's door opened. Swallowed her. Disappeared into the gray curtain of rain.
For a long, suspended moment, Hojo Shione simply stared at the empty space where Takahashi Mio had been. The rain drummed against the car roof.
Then, slowly, her narrow eyes narrowed further. The corners of her lips twitched. Curled. A soft, almost imperceptible laugh escaped into the quiet cabin.
"Heh... heh heh..."
Well. She's far more stubborn than I ever gave her credit for. A fighter. A real fighter.
Shione shook her head slowly, a complex cocktail of emotions—amusement, respect, and the faintest, bitterest aftertaste of regret—swirling behind her dark eyes.
Perhaps... I really did underestimate this one.
"..."