What if beneath Karen's pure face was hidden a devious soul?
The "pink on the outside, black on the inside" trope was quite common, after all...
Keita could almost imagine the scene.
On some afternoon after school.
Karen would affectionately take Anna's hand and, in a troubled yet sweet tone, ask her "best friend" for advice.
"Um... Anna, I have a worry I want to discuss with you..."
"What is it, Karen?"
"It's just... Sousuke, when we're sleeping at night, he always likes to do... well, very excessive things... it makes me so tired. Anna, you've known Sousuke for so long, do you know why he's like that? What should I do?"
What kind of expression would be on Anna's face then?
Shock?
Humiliation?
Or a total breakdown as her final illusions were shredded after a moment of blankness?
The corners of Keita's mouth couldn't help but curl upward...
Ah, really.
His own personality was truly twisted enough.
But it was just a thought...
He was afraid of his abilities leading to crimes or something; surely one couldn't be framed and convicted just for thinking...
Wait... better stop thinking like that... can't let things slide toward a worse place...
He calmly judged himself even as he enjoyed the pleasure of these wandering thoughts.
Still, just thinking about it wouldn't cause actual harm to others, so why not indulge in this cheap entertainment?
No one stepped forward to bail Anna out.
In their social circle, Sousuke and Karen had naturally become the focus of everyone's attention because they were dating, and most people had offered their blessings.
Therefore, Anna's current situation as the childhood sweetheart suddenly became very awkward and delicate.
Her friends might feel sympathy for her pathetic state, but Anna hadn't shown just how miserable she was...
Rashly comforting her out of self-importance might end up offending both sides...
And so.
Anna was left isolated in this cage of friendships built upon her rival's kindness and her childhood sweetheart's denseness.
"So, Anna, shall we go to the cafeteria for lunch together during the break?"
Karen shook Yanami's arm, extending the invitation with a matter-of-fact intimacy.
The invitation itself might have been pure goodwill, but it was no different from a cruel declaration to the defeated.
Come eat with us.
See how happy we are.
Thank you, my friend, our... witness.
The unintentional actions of the winner are often the deepest wounds to the loser.
Keita shook his head self-mockingly in his heart; Yanami really was in a wretched state...
Anna's body stiffened further.
She found it hard to refuse.
Because if she refused, it would be like admitting to everyone that she was jealous, resentful, and unable to give her sincere blessings.
She could only use all her strength to force a flawless smile and then cast a pleading look toward the man she had known for over a decade.
"I'll pass. Sousuke, you should also pay a bit more attention to Karen."
These words were filled with her humble plea and struggle toward Hakamata Kusagari.
Her subtext was: Please, Sousuke, look at me. You should have noticed my predicament. Find an excuse to take Karen away and let me be alone.
However, Sousuke didn't receive the signal at all.
Or rather, immersed in happiness, he no longer had the mental capacity to decipher his former childhood sweetheart's complex emotions.
He just replied naturally, "Don't worry, Anna. I'll take care of everything regarding Karen. Right, Karen?"
"Mm-hmm!"
Karen nodded vigorously and leaned her head happily on Sousuke's shoulder.
A perfect combo.
The last flicker of light in Anna's eyes went out.
She gave up struggling.
She let the sweet aura of the two drown her, beginning to mechanically chime in on their discussion about lunch.
Keita withdrew his gaze, feeling that the play had reached garbage time.
When one side's will to resist is completely destroyed, what remains is nothing but a one-sided display of affection, which had lost its observational value for him.
Just then, the warning bell for class rang, but the teacher was nowhere to be seen.
In the corner of the blackboard, a line of small characters was written in chalk: "This class will start ten minutes late."
This meant Anna's suffering would be extended for another ten minutes.
She was forced to stand in the center of the vortex of happiness, listening to those two discuss future date plans and where to go for the weekend.
Those topics were all things she had once fantasized about for her and Sousuke's future.
Time passed minute by minute; those ten minutes felt as long as a century.
When the teacher still hadn't appeared, Sousuke finally noticed something was wrong: "Anna? What's wrong? You've seemed a bit out of it for a while."
But this late concern meant nothing to Anna now.
She seemed to be woken up by his words, looking up and remembering a lifeline—class duty.
She was responsible for the pre-class preparations today.
"Ah! I remember now! It's my turn for duty today!"
Anna shouted in an exaggerated tone, her voice carrying a sense of joy like a release.
"Maybe the teacher ran into some trouble, I have to go look for them!"
With that, she immediately turned and walked quickly toward the back door of the classroom.
Yanami's exit route inevitably took her past Keita's seat.
The moment she passed him, Anna's heart tightened uncontrollably.
Two days ago, all her disguises had been stripped away in front of this man.
His cold gaze, like he was looking at someone making a scene for no reason, was still branded in her mind.
She must look even more wretched and ridiculous now.
She bit her lower lip and buried her head lower, wanting to pretend she hadn't seen anything and just rush past.
However, a bizarre curiosity drove her to cast a quick glance at him out of the corner of her eye.
The expected mockery didn't happen.
Keita wasn't looking at her at all; he was just sitting there quietly with a history textbook in hand, seriously doing pre-class preparation.
His profile looked calm and focused against the sunlight from the window, as if all the noise from the outside world had nothing to do with him.
Anna froze, an indescribable emotion welling up in her heart.
Was she relieved that her unsightly state hadn't been seen by him?
Or... was she disappointed that this annoying man couldn't even be bothered to look at her anymore?
She didn't have time to think before she had already rushed out of the classroom.
And the moment Anna's figure disappeared from the doorway, Keita, who had been looking down at his book, slowly and imperceptibly raised his head.
He rubbed his temples.
Just now, that faint, persistent stinging sensation had... once again, lessened.
Although not as complete as it was outside the restaurant two days ago, that sense of comfortable relief was real.
The timing was perfect, right when Yanami passed by him and stole a glance at him.
Keita put down the textbook in his hand.
Two days ago, he had provoked Yanami with his words.
Conversely, some kind of emotion must have been generated just now when Yanami peeked at him.
Both of these emotions were directed at him.
This discovery made Keita's plan to "conquer" Anna to help himself become clearer and more urgent.
What he needed to do was to make it so that Sousuke's shadow could no longer fit in Anna's world, making her joys and sorrows stem more from him.
If his personality were more wicked, this matter would be even simpler...
The cold air in the hallway poured into her lungs, cooling down Yanami's feverish head a little.
She leaned against the wall and took a deep breath. Finally... she had escaped.
After a brief moment of distraction, she remembered her task and immediately ran toward the faculty office.
However, the office was empty.
She ran back downstairs to the Second-year floor to start looking, eventually finding Teacher Amanatsu on the staircase landing, carrying a stack of lesson plans.
"Teacher!"
"Oh, it's Yanami. Strange, I remember the first period today was for your class. Why hasn't a single Second-year student shown up?"
Anna looked at the Byzantine lesson plans in the teacher's hand, which were clearly prepared for the Second-years, and suddenly understood.
She could only smile bitterly as she dragged the teacher, who had misremembered the schedule, all the way back to the Third Floor classroom, while simultaneously stopping Teacher Amanatsu's idea of taking the opportunity to explain Byzantine history.
When Anna stepped back into the classroom, the expression on her face had returned to its usual calm.
Keita looked up from his book and fixed his gaze on the figure returning to her seat.
Looking at Yanami's nonchalant facade, pity slowly surfaced in his mind.
Would an "Outgoing Person" like Anna—a creature who was always at the center of the crowd and enjoyed the spotlight—ever, for a single moment, wish she could become a little invisible person whom no one noticed?
In the past... probably not.
For someone accustomed to applause and attention, the spotlight was her nourishment.
But what about now?
Every time she was forced to stand beside those two, receiving the meaningful gazes of the entire class...
When she was forced to put on a facade of "I'm fine, I'm happy for you"...
Perhaps her desire to be invisible would only grow stronger.