T/N: Thank you lantern8, Voraxe and Hilmsan for the coffee!
T/N: So, for the last tens chapters or so, I translated Ouendan/応援団 as cheerleaders. It’s completely wrong. Ouendan or cheering squad, is a whole different thing than cheerleaders. This is my bad, it completely slipped my mind that the west’s definition for ‘cheerleaders’ is different than what I had in mind. There’s also the matter of the fact that there isn’t really a word for ‘cheerleaders’ in Japanese as they’re using an English loan word for it, so I just assud that they ant the sa thing. For the difference between the two, the biggest difference is that the cheering squad mbers are mostly males, though it isn’t that rare for them to add cheerleaders into the group. I’ll make revisions to the s, sorry for the inconvenience.
That was the mont I realized that Amami-san was angry. She went through a lot because of him, even more than what I had to go through. It was completely understandable that she’d explode in anger like this.
Everyone called her an angel and such, but in the end, she was just a normal girl. Whenever she found out that her friends were wronged, the tone of her voice would beco more stern than usual, just like what happened with Arae-san.
I always thought of her as the kind of person who wore her expression on her sleeve. But, the current her was…
“Ooyama-kun, let ask you sothing. What made you think that you and Maki-kun were similar? Because you thought you had a similar personality? Height? Face?”
“T-That’s…”
Quiet anger. That was the closest expression I could use to describe her current state. Sensing that there was sothing in Amami-san’s smile, Ooyama-kun stumbled on his words.
This situation felt more like an interrogation than anything.
“Y-Yuuchin, what’s wrong? Y-You’re scaring .”
“Yuu, I understand how you feel, but calm down, okay?”
Sensing her mood, Umi and Nitta-san imdiately rushed to her side. But, after saying “Don’t mind ,” to both of them, she continued on.
“You two are completely different people. The only similarity that you two have is your atmosphere and that’s it. At your core, you two are completely different. Even that similarity has changed since last autumn. Maki-kun, who had been working hard since then and you, who had only been trying to drag other people down to your level, do you think that you’ll grow the sa way as him?”
“T-That might be true, but–”
“But what? Are you still trying to say you’re similar to him? In what sense? Sprint ti? Grades? He beat you in both regards. He has a girlfriend who he cherishes while you don’t. Now, tell , why do you think that you’re similar to him? What makes you think that he’s ‘lower’ than you?”
“…”
Unable to answer, Ooyama-kun just shrunk down on the spot.
He probably knew that our positions had beco completely different since long ago, but he was blinded by his jealousy and pride.
Amami-san likely knew this as well.
This situation reminded of back when she confronted Arae-san on her own. Except that back then, she was by herself, anwhile right now, we were right behind her.
This alone gave her more authority as we could back her up the mont Ooyama-kun tried to argue against her words.
…But this shouldn’t go any further. As I said earlier, our goal was to solve the problem as soon as possible, not trying to get our revenge on Ooyama-kun and his friends.
Revenge would only bring us temporary peace of mind.
“I understand your feelings, Amami-san, but let’s just stop. He won’t dare to do anything else to us and honestly, who cares about what he and everyone thinks about .”
“But, Maki-kun…”
“Yuu, please. None of us want you to go this far, okay?”
“Yuuchin, this is enough. Rep is right, any more than this and we’ll beco the bully instead of the victim.”
“Umi… Ninacchi…”
When the three of us managed to calm Amami-san down, Ooyama-kun let out a sigh of relief.
“Ooyama-kun, just go. We don’t need you anymore.”
“B-But…”
“Just go, and forget about what Amami-san said earlier. Don’t forget about what I said earlier either… Also, good work for the backboard.”
“…Sorry, Maehara-kun.”
After confirming that Ooyama-kun left the vicinity, we brought Amami-san to a nearby chair and sat her down there.
“Here Yuu, drink so water, then take a deep breath.”
“…”
Amami-san obeyed Umi’s instructions, gulped the water she gave her and took deep breaths repeatedly.
For a minute or so, she remained silent with her face leaning on Umi’s shoulders. After a while, her breathing beca calr. She then muttered a few words,
“…Are you kidding ? What the hell was he on about?”
“Yuu?”
“He made light of you and Maki-kun… The people I hold dear, the ones that always stood by my side whenever I needed them. He thought he was the sa kind of person as Maki-kun? Seriously, don’t make laugh…”
Her impulsive actions must be a result of her guilt over the ongoing bad rumors about us. But more than that, it was the result of us being the people that she cherished.
While I was happy that she was thinking about that way, what she had done just now was a little out of line.
In any case, since there was still ti before the assembly, we decided to take a rest inside the student council room.
“Oi, I saw that Ooyama guy just now— Ah, you guys already talked to him?”
“Good morning, Nozomu. Is that your cheering outfit? It looks good on you.”
“Hm? Ah yeah, thanks. It’s old and slls a little, but it still fits .”
It seed like he imdiately rushed to us after he changed his outfit. He was wearing the school’s cheering squad outfit. From the length and the embroidered nas on the back of the outfit, it seed like they had been using this sa outfit for generations. With that in mind, it made the outfit look even cooler.
Because he just got back from his practice, he hadn’t been involved in the previous squabble. Thanks to that, he was still acting cheerful like always. That cheerfulness was pretty infectious as it relaxed the tense atmosphere in the room.
“…You know, I had been racking my brain, trying to co up with sothing to drive away this bad atmosphere and you ca here cluelessly, but sohow did what I couldn’t do. Also, what kind of couple play were you two doing? ‘It looks good on you’? ‘Ah, thank you’? Are you trying to feed us BL?”
“What? What the hell are you on about? We’re friends! Don’t make it sound weird!”
“But you were blushing when I gave you that complint.”
“Why are you encouraging her?!”
As we made that silly exchange, everyone’s expressions started to loosen up.
“…Hehe.”
Amami-san, who had been watching us, giggled. It felt like it had been a while since I last saw that expression of hers.
“Is everything okay now, Yuu?”
“Mhm. Thank you, Umi. Sorry, Maki-kun, I took Umi from you just now… It should have been you who monopolized Umi’s shoulders, not …”
“…Can you stop talking as if he has the exclusive rights for my shoulders? …I an, it’s true, but we don’t do it all the ti, you know…”
A few minutes before the assembly, Amami-san had returned to her normal mood.
Although the thing that happened just now would affect her in so way or another, she should be able to focus on the festival now that everything is over.
If we were to do our best, we should be able to drive the bad atmosphere away.
“Ah, right, since the five of us are here, let’s do a quick huddle! I know we can do it later, but this is the only ti we could do this with only the five of us.”
“Sure, let’s do it! It’s a good way to get into the mood.”
“Ngh… It’s embarrassing though… Well, whatever, no one is watching us anyway, doing it once in a while should be fine… Alright, I’ll be in your care, Rep.”
“I haven’t said anything yet… Whatever, you up for it, Nozomu?”
“Sure. I’m in a different group, but you know what? Let’s just do it for the hell of it.”
I never thought that I’d do such a normie thing in my life, but here I was.
This would be added to the list of our good mories together.
“…Uh, everyone, put your hand out.”
I moved my hand forward and everyone followed suit.
Umi, Amami-san, Nitta-san, lastly Nozomu.
I could feel the weight of their hands on the back of mine.
The warmth of the friends that I’d always cherish.
“By the way, how should we do it? Should we call out our team na? ‘Blue team, hurrah!’ sothing like that?”
“I don’t know… It isn’t like our group has a na… Even our group chat doesn’t have a proper na…”
The group started with Umi and by ourselves. Then, the number increased one by one. Since we had no plan to add anyone else to the group, I guess it was ti for us to decide a proper na for the group.
However, I couldn’t think of a good na.
“Here’s an idea! Let’s na our group ‘Umi-chan’s’ because she’s the one holding our reins!”
“Nina, I swear… Whatever, don’t use my na. Maki’s the one who made the group, so we should use his na instead.”
“So, ‘Maki-kun’s’? Hmm… That doesn’t sound right to …”
“Is that so? Then, how about we take a little bit of both and call the group ‘Maki-chan’s’?”
“…”
Sohow, I beca the leader of the group even though in reality, the three girls were the one who decided on everything that our group did. Whatever, we could just leave it as a tentative na. We could always change it later.
Though it seed like everyone settled on keeping that na. Whatever, I’ll just accept this as my fate.
“Alright, one, two–”
“““““Three!”””””
‘Maki-chan’s! Fight! Hurrah!’
…I didn't know if it was because of the mood, but it felt like everyone was pumped up. Then again, this was how our usual group was.
Now, all we had to do was enjoy the festival.
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