Chapter Seventy-eight: The Challenge!

The next morning, Aoki Shi trudged drowsily down the road to school, dark circles under his eyes, his steps light and unsteady. Every so often, he covered his mouth to stifle a yawn.

Last night, he’d finished off all the beer in the fridge yet still couldn’t sleep. He’d barely dozed off for an hour or two around three or four in the morning, only to get up at six to prepare breakfast and lunch. Even a machine would be flagging under such conditions.

Half-awake, Aoki Shi wandered on, when behind him came the overly dramatic voice of Takashi Mitsuhashi: “Shi-chan~”

Aoki squinted back at him, seeing the boy trot over, beaming with sunshine. He replied weakly, “Please call me Aoki. We’re not that close.”

Undeterred, Mitsuhashi slung his arm over Aoki’s shoulder, grinning. “Aw, don’t be so distant! You’re so cold.”

Aoki shook off his arm, annoyed, feeling his body turn to jelly. He needed to get to school and catch up on sleep. He couldn’t be bothered with Mitsuhashi’s antics.

As Aoki shuffled along in his daze, Mitsuhashi slyly pulled an envelope from his pocket and, seizing the moment when Aoki was too groggy to notice, slipped it quietly into Aoki’s jacket pocket.

“Oh right, Shi-chan, you said last time that when you become the boss, you’d team up with me to form the Mitsuhashi Gang. You meant it, right?” Mitsuhashi smiled, eyes narrowed.

Aoki managed a feeble chuckle. “We’ll see. Let’s wait till I’m actually the boss of Muyou High.”

At least let me get my mixed martial arts skill to level four, with extra stat boosts and better techniques, then I’ll think about it, he thought. Right now, he had no intention of starting trouble. He had medical texts to study, and he needed to get his learning skill to level four to see if there were any special effects. He was busy enough as it was—who had time to be some school kingpin?

Out of Aoki’s sight, Mitsuhashi snickered to himself, waving as Aoki walked away. “See you, then. When you’re the school boss, I’ll come find you!”

“Mm…” Aoki swayed along toward the school, his vision blurry.

Mitsuhashi waited until Aoki disappeared around a corner before he began to tremble with suppressed excitement. Clutching his stomach, he tried to stifle his laughter: “Ohoho! Eheh! Heehee!”

He seemed to have an endless supply of strange laughs. Eventually, he gave up holding back, hugged his belly, and rolled on the ground, guffawing: “Ahahaha! Aoki Shi, you really underestimate how devious I am!”

“Once you find the challenge letter I slipped in your pocket, I refuse to believe you’ll just ignore it!” Mitsuhashi cackled on the ground for a while, then sat up, his expression turning sly. “To be sure, I sent challenge letters to every influential student in the second and third years. Even if you wanted to avoid it, you probably couldn’t.”

He would, of course, keep a close eye on how things unfolded. If Aoki couldn’t handle it, he’d step in to help right away. That way, Aoki would owe him a favor and would eventually accept him as his boss—willingly, too!

Besides, he’d heard there were a lot more shaved-heads at Muyou High lately, and plenty of students had started following Aoki. That could only mean the Mitsuhashi Gang’s influence would soon skyrocket!

“Once you’re the boss, I’ll have you join my Mitsuhashi Alliance!” Mitsuhashi struck a pose, knees bent, left hand curled before his face, right arm stretched out straight—looking as ridiculous as some superhero—and laughed boisterously: “By then, those scrap heaps like Suzuran, Kaiju, Red High, and Housen won’t be able to stop me from becoming the strongest delinquent in any high school!”

“Ah-ha!”

“Ahahaha!”

“Ahahahaha!”

His wild, three-part laughter echoed down the street.

Aoki Shi kept feeling as if someone behind him was laughing loudly. He turned around, puzzled, but heard nothing and chalked it up to lack of sleep. Sighing, he trudged on toward the school.

The envelope, not fully stuffed into his pocket, slipped out as he moved, fell to the ground, and, caught by a stray breeze, fortuitously tumbled through a gap and into the storm drain, vanishing without a trace.

———

“What?” In Class Two of the third-year, Ryota Ishihara stared at the letter in his hand, his expression twisted.

Scrawled across the envelope in messy handwriting: “I, Aoki Shi of Class Three, Year One, will officially become the boss of Muyou High today. If you have a problem with that, come find me during lunch break. If you don’t show, I’ll take it as your consent! From now on, Muyou High is mine!”

The words were arrogant and domineering. Even though Ishihara had been thoroughly beaten before, he couldn’t help but feel a fresh surge of anger. He glared at his underling, face dark. “Are you sure this challenge letter came from Aoki Shi?”

His lackey looked conflicted. “I don’t know, but when I opened my shoe locker, it was there. Who else would do this if not Aoki Shi?”

Ishihara licked his lips, a gold tooth glinting as he thought for a moment, then snorted. “No, this can’t be from him.”

His followers exchanged confused looks. “Why not?”

“Aoki Shi isn’t the type to pull something like this,” Ishihara sneered. “As much as I still dislike him, I can’t deny he’s the most likely guy to become Muyou’s boss.”

“If I were him, I’d have much better, easier ways to take over than sending out such a brazen challenge. All this would do is rile everyone up—what good is that?” Ishihara tossed the envelope aside and propped his feet on the desk. “If I can see that, there’s no way he can’t.”

“I bet others got the same letter.” No sooner had he finished than someone strode purposefully through the door—a burly, thick-necked, mean-faced guy with slicked-back hair, who looked nothing like a high schooler.

“Fatty” might not usually fit with “burly,” but this guy filled out his uniform so completely it seemed on the verge of bursting, creating a contradiction that was hard to ignore.

He stood just over five foot seven, yet his frame was two sizes wider than Ishihara, who was over five foot ten. A clanking gold chain hung around his neck, and with his greasy hair and skin, he looked like some nouveau riche butcher who’d made his fortune selling pork—broad-shouldered and beefy.

“Hey, you know that kid, right?” Unfazed by the stares of Ishihara’s cronies, Fatty shoved aside a couple of troublemakers and plopped himself down in front of Ishihara’s desk with a swagger.

Ishihara glared coolly. “Watch yourself, Fatty.”

“Heh…” Fatty narrowed his eyes. “I thought getting beaten up by a dozen guys would’ve taught you some manners by now.”

“Don’t get cocky, you fat bastard!” one of Ishihara’s followers shouted.

Ishihara raised a hand to keep the peace, even laughing. “Looks like you got a challenge letter, too?”

Fatty glanced at the heckler, then replied cheerfully, “I was just thinking, graduation’s coming up, I’d keep my nose clean—and then someone goes and stuffs a challenge letter in my locker. Kids these days are way bolder than we used to be.”

“He’s pretty tough,” Ishihara said flatly.

“Oh?” Fatty gave a noncommittal chuckle. “So what are you planning to do?”

“Nothing,” Ishihara said, sipping coffee through a straw. “Just watch the show.”

Fatty heaved himself up with a shake. “You scared?”

“I need to focus on my studies if I want to pass the entrance exams. Only a few months till graduation anyway—what’s the point in fighting, win or lose?” Ishihara’s tone was serious.

Fatty snorted disdainfully and left.

After he was gone, one of Ishihara’s gang looked glum. “Boss, are you really going to just roll over?”

Ishihara only rubbed his nose, meeting the disappointed, frustrated stares of his crew, and sighed. “It’s obvious someone’s setting Aoki Shi up, using him as a pawn. Does that make you happy?”

“Those idiots might not realize it,” Ishihara said, taking another sip, “but I know one thing for sure.”

“The school board’s got their eye on Aoki Shi.”

He chuckled. “If this goes south, we might not even get our diplomas. You guys still want to fight him?”

The others hung their heads in silence.

Muyou High wasn’t like Suzuran, Housen, or Kaiju—delinquent schools where you could brawl for three years and still get your diploma without a care for college. While they liked the thrill of being delinquents, that didn’t mean they had no ambitions of further study. Tuition here cost several times more than at national schools—if their families didn’t care about college, why send them here at all?

Ishihara looked with interest at the coffee cup in his hand, murmuring, “So what will you do, Aoki Shi?”

That Fatty was no pushover—and who knew how many others had received the same letter.

It was going to be interesting.