Chapter 51
Tomorrow is the midterms.
Still, there were things she had to do, so Vita had come to the hospital.
-The medicine is ready! Would you like to come pick it up tomorrow?
She'd received a message, after all.
Come to think of it, she'd been deeply troubled since last night. Troubled about her identity.
‘But why am I…’
In truth, Vita herself didn't know why she was worrying about this. She was still waiting to be called in for her consultation.
“Patient number 36, please come in-!”
There was still a little time left, so Vita moved right up beside her junior, Ru.
“Hey, Ru.”
“Ah, you startled me-!”
Ru jumped in surprise. His startled shout drew everyone's attention.
“No, what are you doing?”
Vita's expression turned sullen. Ru's expression wasn't much different.
“What do you mean, what am I doing, sunbae? That's what I want to ask.”
“You're so bland, brat.”
Still, he was a good kid. He was secretly kindhearted, so when she called him because it would be boring to go to the hospital alone, her junior had gladly come.
“And don't forget the figurine.”
“I said I know, seriously.”
Of course, in exchange, she had agreed to give him one of her figurines.
Not a bad deal,
and she was grateful he'd come with her. Vita smiled faintly, then suddenly threw a rather meaningless question at her junior, Ru.
“From your perspective.”
Given the nature of the question, she moved right up against him. Grabbing Ru's little ear with her fingers, Vita whispered.
“Do you think I'm a man or a woman…?”
Ru's expression quickly turned red as a tomato.
Well, of course. It wasn't as though his sunbae had never asked pointless questions like this before. But what flustered Ru was simply how close she was.
Too close. And the voice whispering right into his ear was so alluring. Ru thought he was beginning to understand what a sweet voice felt like.
‘Besides, this person right now…’
His sunbae, that was. Wasn't she completely a woman through and through, just from the way she dressed?!
No, seriously. She was completely a woman right now.
If he hadn't known that Vita had originally been a man.
‘In so many ways, incredibly…’
Ru was in a difficult position. To be honest, his tastes ran toward someone with a fuller figure, but his sunbae was pointlessly pretty right now, too.
But Ru was fairly quick on the uptake.
“Obviously, you're a man…!”
And so he gave her the answer she wanted.
She had already decided on the answer before asking him. If he'd said she was a woman, wouldn't he have gotten a knuckle on the head? Besides, she had come to the hospital to turn back into a man.
“Hmm, right?”
His sunbae grinned. And perhaps her expression was just a little solemn, too.
“Yes, I am…”
Just as Vita was thinking to herself that she was indeed a man, her turn finally came.
“Patient Bianca, number 39, please enter the examination room!”
“Ah, yes-!”
Vita soon entered the neatly organized examination room.
***
Was her name Rosa, or something? The pretty, silver-haired doctor welcomed Vita right away.
“It's been a while, hasn't it?”
She greeted Vita with a gentle gesture and a warm smile.
“Have a seat, first. Hmm, you've become… a little more feminine in the meantime…?”
“Ahh, no!”
“There's no need to be embarrassed.”
The doctor was all smiles.
Vita's face flushed, and she immediately sat in the chair. Having such a pretty person in front of her made her inexplicably nervous.
“There probably isn't any need for me to explain everything at length, is there?”
“N-no.”
The two sat facing each other.
Suddenly, a packet of medicine was held out in front of Vita.
“So, if I take this medicine…”
As Vita swallowed dryly, she heard an affirmative answer.
“You can turn back into a man.”
“R-really?!”
“Yes, definitely. As long as you truly wish to.”
“Truly… wish to…”
When Vita trailed off, the doctor suddenly asked:
“Do you remember what the medicine does?”
Magic was a power that was difficult to explain. As the field of magical studies continued to advance, things that had once been impossible were sometimes made real.
The researchers at Baumkuchen Hospital had been studying the ‘red pill’ for the past few years.
“A medicine that helps you escape a false reality and face the truth.”
“That's right. Exactly.”
People can't choose their sex at birth. But a man can be feminine, and vice versa. Yet, because of insufficient technology, quite a few patients had suffered side effects from sex-reassignment surgery.
The medicine had been developed for people like that, and Vita had happened to take it entirely by chance.
“So the effect of this medicine isn't much different. It took a little longer to give it to you because we had to keep reviewing its safety, but the period for taking it is three weeks, and it should definitely be safe.”
“I can't believe I can turn back just by taking this…”
After saying goodbye to Ru and returning home, Vita continued staring absently at the neatly packaged medicine. The small red pills.
Whether it was a trick of fate or not, exactly three weeks remained until the contest she'd promised to have with Carlisle.
[As long as your own resolve is firm, you can return during the third week of taking the medicine—on the day exactly three weeks from now. I wish you the best of luck.]
Before leaving the examination room, Vita remembered the doctor's words and clenched her fist.
‘Yes. I can do this.’
She was simply returning to the way she had been, restoring things to normal.
So, without hesitation, Vita swallowed one pill after lunch.
Gulp-
“Oh…”
The medicine tasted surprisingly good, and it gave her the feeling that everything was gradually returning to normal.
Vita smiled.
And the very next day.
At long last, the big day of the exams dawned—the midterms.
Vita had studied until almost late at night the day before, leaving dark circles under her eyes. Even so, her eyes were wide open.
‘Focus. Focus.’
The only sound echoing through the classroom was the rasp of pens.
For some reason, Vita suddenly felt flustered as she worked through the questions.
‘W-what is this…?!’
Why was everything coming back so easily?
It was bizarre—she remembered everything with perfect clarity!
Flustered, Vita let out a hiccup.
Hic-
But it simply wouldn't stop.
Hic- Hic-
Vita kept hiccupping.
She felt bad about it, and she was embarrassed for another reason as well, so her small face soon turned red as a tomato.
Why, why?!
‘Why can I remember it so well…?!’
Why was she remembering everything so well, just as Carlisle's nonsense had said she would?!
‘But hey, this is a good thing!’
Mm, mm. First, she should focus. She was solving the problems incredibly well, too.
Vita suddenly remembered something Carlisle had said.
[You've got talent.]
Though Vita herself had no idea.
Apparently she had talent in a very strange direction, so Vita's face reddened as she forced herself to focus only on solving the problems.
Strangely, she hadn't gotten a single question wrong in history. That only left her more flustered.
***
“Phew- It's over!”
“Wow, yahoo!”
The students erupted in cheers.
The five-day midterm exams were over.
Classes ended early on the day the exams finished. And it was Friday morning, too!
Once they were dismissed, the weekend was right around the corner.
“Ah, I'm excited. I wonder what our scores will be?”
“Let's go to karaoke after academy, at least.”
No matter how the results turned out, everyone's faces were bright with the relief of finishing the exams. Vita was chatting with Sasha as well.
“History was the hardest for me on this exam.”
“Huh, really?”
It was a somewhat unexpected comment, and Vita tilted her head.
“It was the easiest.”
“What are you talking about? Everyone was freaking out because it was so obscure!”
Vita had spent the past several days studying and nothing else, and had even turned off her phone, so she had no idea what was going on.
“Class president, vice president! Could you go get the report cards?”
“Yes, teacher!”
Vita got up from her seat, looking tense. The academy's grades came out on the very day the exams ended, after all.
The hallway was relatively quiet.
Walking beside her, Carlisle started trying to hit on her for no particular reason.
“Do you have plans after this?”
Of course she didn't, but Vita narrowed her eyes. She couldn't help feeling wary.
“Why, all of a sudden?”
“We said we'd have a contest.”
What kind of out-of-the-blue contest was he talking about?
But there wasn't a single hole in Carlisle's logic.
“I have to give you a chance.”
Of course, Vita knew what chance he meant.
A chance for him to seduce her. Since they'd agreed to have a contest, it was only right that he be given a chance.
“Mm… ngh…”
So while Vita pondered, Carlisle patted her on the head.
“If it really makes you uncomfortable, just watch anime at home. I have a part-time job anyway, so I won't be staying long.”
“…Well, if that's all.”
In other words, it was a date. Carlisle had more or less arranged it unilaterally, rather casually, but Vita had no particular grounds to refuse. She wasn't heartless enough to turn him down after he'd put it that way.
‘More than anything, if it's anime…’
She was definitely the senior, after all. There was still plenty she could show a beginner like him, so Vita eventually agreed.
Come to think of it, she'd ignored all his messages during exam week, so she felt a little sorry about that, too.
In any case, that was that, and what mattered to Vita right now was, of course, her grades.
The two of them brought back a stack of report cards from the teachers' office. Vita immediately checked her overall rank.
“F-first place…?!”
Vita, who had been sitting at her desk, abruptly shot to her feet.
Everyone's attention turned toward her, and her deskmate Sasha gave her an enthusiastic round of applause.
“Wow, that's amazing.”
“Bianca really got first place?!”
“There's nothing she can't do.”
It was impossible to believe. Vita looked toward Carlisle with a dazed expression.
‘Did I finally beat him…?’
That guy, of all people? She had beaten him for the first time, and it was so unbelievable she could hardly accept it.
“Just a coincidence.”
But then Carlisle slowly approached. He held his report card open right in front of Vita.
“I'm in first place too.”
Vita blinked.
“Give it here, let me see!”
Sure enough, Carlisle's report card also said first place.
“T-this can't be.”
Just as the thoroughly flustered Vita lightly bit her lip—
Clap, clap-
The teacher suddenly clapped her hands.
“All right, everyone. Just as Carlisle said, we have two first-place students in our class this time. Apparently it's a tie…?”
“Wow-”
“Amazing!”
The other students in the class congratulated them. Vita, of course, was a little disappointed.
‘…I knew it was too good to be true.’
There was no way beating that guy could be this easy. She had come in second by a hair every time. But now that she knew the full story, it was even more absurd.
In these midterms, history had been the subject that best separated the students, and there had been exactly two perfect scorers. Those two were Vita and Carlisle Schultz; they had tied in all the other subjects.
‘Oh, so that's what it was?’
Something inside Vita seemed to deflate, but she didn't feel as bad as she had expected.
‘Still, it's a tie for first…!’
In any case, it meant she had definitely improved compared to the past.
Today better than yesterday, tomorrow better than today!
Emily had said that all she had to do was keep improving, too.
Sasha and the other friends seemed amazed.
“But how did you two both get perfect scores in history?”
“I heard there were only two perfect scorers.”
“I guess smart people really do have some kind of connection.”
‘C-connection…?’
Vita suddenly froze.
Just then, she happened to meet Carlisle's gaze, and he gave a sly little smile.
“Well, definitely. We do have a connection.”
After realizing what he meant, Vita's face turned red.
‘C-crazy…!’
Was he seriously insane?!
She knew exactly what he was implying. She was so flustered that—
“Y-you…!”
Fortunately, her friends didn't seem to understand the meaning, and Carlisle only chuckled and pretended to run away.
***
That evening, Emily was lost in thought.
The midterms were over, so she should have felt relieved, but her feelings were terribly complicated.
‘Friend, unrequited love. Unrequited love, friend…’
Her feelings were simply tangled.
It hadn't been long since she and Bianca Shamal had become close, after all.
‘Still, a friend.’
They hadn't known each other long, but Emily wasn't so oblivious that she failed to notice the affection Bianca felt toward her.
At least, Bianca seemed to genuinely like her—she really did seem to see Emily as a friend.
If so, Emily wanted to return those feelings as well.
She liked Bianca, and since Bianca had approached her first out of goodwill, Emily didn't dislike her. That was why Emily's feelings were even more complicated.
If Bianca had been a bad person, or had some flaw, Emily wouldn't have felt so conflicted.
Her friend and the person she liked were intertwined. Emily was human too, so she couldn't help feeling conflicted.
‘What am I supposed to do about this…’
With her head buried in her pillow, Emily continued thinking.
Still, the two of them weren't dating yet. Maybe she could wedge herself into that gap?
Of course, in Emily's eyes—
Bianca Shamal clearly had feelings too. Emily thought she probably liked Carlisle Schultz.
But Bianca seemed unwilling to admit it.
Whether that was fortunate or unfortunate, Emily couldn't say.
But one thing was certain: she felt uncomfortable letting things continue like this.
While Bianca, still her friend, hadn't realized her own feelings, Emily felt guilty about unfairly forcing her way into that gap.
“What's the point of any of this?”
Emily let out a hollow laugh.
“Carlisle doesn't have feelings for me anyway. What am I thinking?”
This was the real problem.
First, she had to win the affection of her childhood friend, Carlisle. That prospect felt vague and insubstantial to Emily.
But Emily Swan knew that if she simply stood still, she would accomplish nothing. She had kept doing exactly that, which was how things had ended up this way.
The midterms were over. And afterward, on the schedule—
“There's the school trip, right?”
It was happening next week.
School trips were exciting in many ways.
You left familiar surroundings for a new environment, and could use the opportunity to close the distance between you.
‘Yes. There…!’
Emily Swan resolved to summon her courage.
She planned to make a move on Carlisle during the school trip, and intended to properly find out how her friend Bianca felt about her as well.
***
And so the weekend passed, and several more days went by.
“Ahh… I feel like I can live again.”
During that time, Vita had quite a hard time with the sudden arrival of her magical day. Thanks to it, she could barely move around her room, and the pain was so severe that she even missed school.
-Are you okay, Bianca? Keep yourself warm.
Emily worried about her, too.
Carlisle Schultz would sometimes come to nurse her himself, repeatedly stroking her hair or simply sitting beside her with his arms around her before leaving.
“…I told you not to come.”
Vita simply found even this bewildering.
‘This is strange, all of this…’
In some ways, it felt stranger than doing anything lewd.
“Get better, quickly.”
He made no demands, simply staying dutifully by her side. In a subdued voice, Vita asked Carlisle,
“…What are you trying to do this time?”
“…Nothing. I'm not going to do anything.”
Vita shrank back at the tenderness in his voice.
But whenever Carlisle left, Vita never failed to take exactly one red pill every night.
There was no doubt she was going to return to normal.
One distinctive feature of this academy.
Its final semester before graduation was different from the others. The gap between the midterms and finals felt shorter, and the semester itself ended a little earlier.
That was because of the university entrance system.
So it was fair to say that about two-thirds of the semester had already passed.
-They even have a hot spring and a swimming pool! And the beach is right nearby. The so-called swimsuit showtime!
-Sasha, you really are… I guess the dean pulled some strings. More importantly, Bianca, you're feeling better now, right? You looked fine when I saw you at lunch earlier.
-Yeah, of course! Thanks for worrying about me, Emily.
As Vita texted back, her anticipation gradually grew.
‘It'll be fun, I'm sure.’
Before she knew it, the schedule for the last school trip of her life was right before her.