The Literary Beauty’s Embrace

“Ye Sakaki, your note-taking technique and the legibility of your handwriting both have significant room for improvement.”

“Oh?” I responded, preparing to continue my studies.

‘My handwriting? Legibility? Isn’t that just a polite way of saying my writing is ugly?’

‘What does that have to do with studying?’

‘I wanted genuinely constructive advice, but is this person just trying to act profound and play games with me?’

“Yes, fine, I understand, Liu Zhuang.”

My tone was utterly perfunctory, yet I continued as I pleased, ignoring her sturdy gaze.

‘Hmph… I don’t have time for this nonsense.’

‘Skipping a grade has already made me incredibly nervous.’

“I say…” Liu Zhuang continued.

“Ye Sakaki.”

“…Ignoring someone’s advice is hardly polite, you know…”

No sooner had my gaze returned to the textbook than a sudden, heavy pressure descended upon my shoulder.

Gasp… gasp!!!

Completely unprepared, the air in my lungs was instantly expelled by an irresistible, immense force.

“Wh—!”

My martial arts training allowed me to regain my senses in an instant.

A soft, yielding sensation, yet one with hard, grainy particles—like uncooked glutinous rice—pressed against my back.

At the same time, a pungent, yet invigorating, aroma assailed my nostrils.

It wasn’t unpleasant, but the scent was overwhelmingly intense, capable of inducing dizziness with just a whiff.

It was the ‘explosive’ type of women’s perfume specifically designed to combat body odor.

A perfume so potent it could only be described as ‘heroic’!

A rich, somewhat greasy voice rumbled in my ear.

By then, I couldn’t even lift my head.

Fat! It had already enveloped my entire lower body, making even the slightest movement impossible!

“Cough, cough! Urgh! You!”

The culprit was none other than Liu Zhuang, who had seemed so polite moments before.

My lungs were so compressed that air exchange was impossible. Then, my right hand, still clutching a pen, was suddenly engulfed by a massive, bear-like paw!

“Ye Sakaki… don’t rush to continue studying. If your method is wrong, your efficiency won’t improve, you know.”

“Come now~”

A voice, like the grunt of a pig, reached my one ear still free in the air.

“Let me… teach you… little by little… how to make… good… notes…”

“Pfft…! Urgh!!!” (I couldn’t refuse! There was no longer enough air in my lungs to even cry for help!)

This ‘bear paw’ gently covered my ‘delicate’ hand, enveloping my palm, then guided my fingers to write lines of elegant, fine script across the pristine textbook pages.

“Oh ho ho, Ye Sakaki, don’t mind how I look. Even so, I’m still a genius, only one rank behind that… ‘City’s Third,’ who has no femininity whatsoever! Hmph… I’m merely a super literary ‘beautiful girl,’ only ‘a mere’ half a point below the ‘City’s Third’ in essays on average, you know.”

“Gurgle gurgle… Urgh urgh urgh!!!” (I couldn’t breathe at all! Coupled with the crushing pressure! And that heroic perfume scent!)

‘And?! A beautiful girl?! She’s not a guy?! Liu Zhuang is actually a ‘literary beautiful girl’?!’

‘A beautiful girl more feminine than the City’s Third?!!!’

‘Nonsense! I won’t believe your tall tales!’

Yet, at this moment, the entire classroom was eerily silent, save for Liu Zhuang’s hot, dragon-like breath.

‘So those classmates weren’t trying to make things difficult for me; they were my saviors!’

‘But how could I, who had rejected my saviors’ kindness, now beg for their charity again?!’

Liu Zhuang’s muffled voice, along with a breath filled with a mixture of rotten meat and expensive toothpaste—an aroma infinitely more ‘magnificent’ than the previous ‘heroic’ scent, now only describable as ‘tragic’—swept through my scalp and into my nasal cavity once more!

Fortunately, by this point, I couldn’t breathe at all, so this particular scent didn’t penetrate my nasal cavity, merely lingering around it.

‘Ah! This is hell! Mother Mary, please save me!’

“…Ye Sakaki, you see, in this excerpt from ‘David Copperfield,’ we must first address… its main idea…”

“…Modest, who deceived and married David’s mother, coveted her property; Emily’s elopement was due to the temptation of money; the suffering of the Wickfield family, Ham’s despair…”

“Hiss, hiss, hiss…” (Stop talking about the protagonist’s despair! I’m the one who should be despairing right now! If this goes on for five more minutes, I really won’t make it out alive!)

“Subsequently, the author used…”

“…(My consciousness was slowly fading, and even more terrifying, as the temperature rose, streaks of greasy oil were constantly seeping through my five-millimeter-thick school uniform and the shirt beneath, making my entire back feel damp.)”

“…”

“…Dickens… approached it from a humanitarian… perspective, exposing… the evil of money… and lifting the beautiful… veil of the ‘Victorian era’… to reveal the hidden… social… reality behind it.”

By then, I could no longer hear what Liu Zhuang was saying. Everything seemed so distant, and vaguely, I thought I saw a golden-glowing Mother Mary waving at me incessantly…

Even with a physique more agile than an Olympic champion’s, I found myself utterly powerless against this boundless, immense force.

Clang!

Just then, a dizzying, earth-shattering sound suddenly pierced my ears, and it was as if I had found an opportunity to breathe again.

“Ahhh!! I really can’t stand it anymore! Liu Zhuang, have some self-respect!”

A crisp, clear girl’s voice, tinged with boundless, strange vexation, pierced through the immense bulk of fat and reached my ear.

Through my oxygen-deprived, dream-like vision, the girl’s blurry figure seemed to faintly shimmer with the divine radiance of Amaterasu Ōmikami.

‘Ah, she must be my Mother Mary, then?!’