Takayama Kenji.
My classmate, the student council president. Good at everything—studies, sports—friendly, a natural leader, trusted by teachers.
Hana-chan’s the same honor-student type, so they’ve worked together on school events and seem to know each other.
On Christmas, while I was out with Hana-chan, we coincidentally ran into him on the train.
“Madarame-kun—and… Amane-san?”
After boarding, Kenji spotted us and spoke up.
Hearing her name, Hana-chan quickly pulled away from me, fiddling with her bangs as she awkwardly greeted him.
“H-hi, President.”
“Out together on Christmas?”
When Kenji asked, Hana-chan nodded shyly. He gave her a warm smile, then turned to me—still with that gentle tone—and said:
“Madarame-kun, you’re really trash, huh?”
Both Hana-chan and I, caught off guard by his soft demeanor, nodded along at first. “Mhm, mhm—” Then we froze. “Wait, what?”
Ignoring our shock, Kenji kept smiling.
“You skip school all the time but still manage to hang out with girls.”
“No, that’s—”
Before I could defend myself, he continued.
“Why do you even skip? Wanting ‘freedom’? Isn’t that just a spoiled kid running away?”
“It’s not like that—”
“You know everyone has to follow someone’s rules, right? But you only listen to pretty girls? That’s just showing off.”
“How do you know—”
I’ve never told anyone that. Not even Kenji.
Leaning in close, his flawless face inches from mine, he whispered:
“You got scared, didn’t you? Seeing your dad bowing his head after getting chewed out by a client.”
“You’ve never fit in with groups,” Kenji said.
“If even the dad you admire ended up like that, you figured you’d be even worse, right? Imagined a future of just apologizing, over and over.”
“So you ran away,” he murmured.
Then he listed every failure I’d ever had in school:
—In elementary, fighting so much I got labeled a troublemaker.
—In middle school, nearly failing to advance because of tardiness.
—In high school, spilling paint on the class’s carefully made festival sign, ruining the mood.
“You’re scared of people. Of society. Of reality. So you hid in a movie theater. That’s the truth, isn’t it? All your grand excuses are just cover-ups.”
“H-hey, President!”
Hana-chan stepped forward angrily. But Kenji turned to her next.
“Amane-san, you’re an honors student, right?”
“Huh? W-well, I guess so—”
“You tutor the elementary boy next door, too.”
“H-how do you know that!? I’ve never—”
“But you’re a bad girl, aren’t you?”
Just like with me, Kenji whispered in her ear.
“What were you doing alone last night?”
“Eh?”
“In bed, before sleeping. Pressing your face into the pillow—”
“W-wait, ah, n-no—”
“Doing that, then showing up at school all prim and proper, playing tutor? You’re awful.”
“N-no, I—”
Hana-chan trembled, on the verge of tears.
Kenji leaned closer, studying her face.
“Ah. You were imagining some guy, right? Hmm, his name is—”
“S-stop it—!”
The train arrived just then, and I grabbed Hana-chan’s hand to pull her off.
“Hana-chan, wait for me at the café, okay? I wanna talk to Kenji about class stuff.”
“B-but—”
She was crying hard.
“Senpai, it’s not like that… I didn’t—I mean, maybe I did, but not on purpose! I don’t usually think about that stuff! I just—when I thought about someone I like… wahh—”
“I get it! I know you’re not that kind of girl!”
“Waaah~”
Still sobbing, Hana-chan obediently headed up the station stairs to the café like I asked.
“You bastard—!”
I turned back to Kenji, who was leisurely stepping off the train.
“So you’re a demon, huh~?”
Kenji smirked.
His eyes were pitch black.
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Kenji and I faced off on the platform.
His demand was simple:
“Hand over the Holy Grail.”
But—
“Don’t have it. Also, Kenji, you’re a demon!?”
“You didn’t notice? I’ve been one since elementary school.”
Turns out, Kenji had been blending in as a human for a long time.
“It’s tough,”
he said.
“Draw too much attention, and exorcists come. My real body’s burning in hell—hurts like hell.”
So he usually lay low. But the Holy Grail changed things.
“If I use the Grail to pull my real body here, I won’t have to fear anything.”
“I seriously don’t have it, man~”
“Don’t play dumb. I’m taking it by force.”
“Bring it on~”
I take a fighting stance against Kenji. But the next moment—A middle-aged woman, dressed like a housewife, grabs me from behind.
“Huh?! What?!”
As I reel in shock, the woman smirks and says, “Sorry about this~”
“What the hell?!”
Before I can process it, a little boy in a youth baseball uniform swings his bat at me. It lands squarely on my arm.
“OWW!!”
I shake off the woman and back away from the kid, but then— A salaryman swings his briefcase at me.A sporty-looking woman attacks with a golf club.One after another, the people on the platform start assaulting me.
And all of them smirk and say, “Sorry about this~”
“What is this?!”
“I’m a traditional, old-school demon. I can control people.”
“Just like in the movies you love,” Kenji says.
“First, I read their hearts. Then, I pinpoint their fears. Once someone fears me, they’re mine to command. The only difference from those movies? I’m way more dynamic. Watch this.”
The station we’re in is a major terminal with multiple lines.
Kenji claps his hands toward the next platform—
and instantly, the crowd waiting for the train all smile in unison and start jumping onto the tracks.
“Wha—”
By the time I process it, the train barrels into the platform.
It’s a horrific sight. Like the worst amusement ride—a splatter-fest.
“You’re insane…”
“Demon, remember?”
Kenji says flatly.
“Hurry up and hand it over. Or I’ll do the same to this platform.”
But I don’t have the Holy Grail! Still, if I don’t give it up, things’ll get worse. What the hell do I do?! Just then—
“Hm?”
Kenji tilts his head.
I look—and a katana is jutting out of his chest.
Wait, what? Squinting, I see a dignified, bearded man behind Kenji, having stabbed him.
“Young man, you’re safe now.”
The imposing man speaks.
“My name is Jin. In the Kaiwai underworld, I’m known as Jin the First Strike. A government-contracted immortal hunter. I once trained under the Church, felled countless demons, and in my youth, I even dated a reader-model girl—”
His words cut off abruptly.
Kenji snaps the man’s neck. Despite the katana through his chest, Kenji is perfectly fine—his wound regenerating before my eyes.
“The express train won’t wait forever.”
“Kenji, you’re pure evil!!”
But—
“Thanks to Mr. Monologue, I figured something out.”
I snatch the metal bat from the kid’s hands.
There’s only one way to save everyone on the platform—
“I just have to beat the crap outta you, right?!”
I swing the bat at Kenji—
But—
Right before it connects, my body freezes.
“Huh?!”
Kenji smirks at my confusion.
“Told you. I control those who fear me. On the train, you were terrified when I exposed your past.”
“And besides,”
he continues, “you’ve always feared me. You can’t read the room. You fail at things everyone else can do.”
Kenji never fails—not just as a model student, but in conversations, friendships, everything. I bet he’s never even been embarrassed.
Meanwhile, I’ve screwed up way more than most.
Like Kenji said: In elementary school, I got into lame fights. In middle school, I was always late. In high school, I was ostracized for “ruining” the cultural festival banner.
“You’re a pathetic halfwit who can’t do anything right. That’s why you ran from school. To someone like you, someone like me—who can do things right—was terrifying from the start.”
“You psycho murderer! Don’t talk about ‘normal’ like—”
I lunge again, but my body goes limp. No strength at all.
“Those who fear me can’t harm me.”
Kenji picks up the dignified man’s katana. Slowly, he presses the blade into my stomach.
“Guh—AAAGHHH!!”
The pain buckles my knees, and I collapse.But as my vision lowers, I spot her—
Kuromari-chan, sitting quietly on a platform bench.
Kenji follows my gaze and notices her too.
“…Huh. So you really didn’t have it.”
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