Tomodachi no Imouto ga Ore ni Dake Uzai

After trotting through the mountain of trash and nonessentials filling the hallway, we were greeted with paradise. The hallway was sparkling from the sunlight coming in from the opened window, and the chairs and tables were neatly lined up in the corners of said hallway, no dirt or dust in sight. Just your normal, clean hallway.

The rumors you heard about the 4th floor of the special classroom building seemed like a lie, and the place looked even more neat and tidy than most of the normal classrooms. And while trotting through that hallway after Sumire, as if we’d entered a new world, I could hear a faint voice, presumably belonging to a girl.

“……Won’t you! ……In this place……..gallantly…!”

Listening to that voice, I muttered.

“You’re really practicing in a place like this?”

“The gym hall and outdoor grounds belong to the sports clubs, and the courtyard is preoccupied by the brass band club. For a weak and unimportant club like ours, this is the only place we got. Even the principal was hesitant to let us use it, but he gave in after Midori-chan’s request.”

“So, even your little sister is responsible for securing a place to practice. You’re really don’t do much, eh?”

“I do! Like stamping my seal on documents!”

“Don’t you feel miserable just saying that?”

Having our pointless conversation, we arrived at the room located in the furthest back of the hallway. Since we could hear the voices inside, there was no doubt that this was the theatre club’s practice ground.

“………”

Without any words, Sumire just barely cracked open the door, not making any noise. When I tilted my head at Sumire, wondering why she didn’t knock first, she just held one finger to her mouth, telling me to keep quiet.

So she wants me to check out how are things going? Aren’t we basically peeping toms now? Though it might be useful to watch the theatre club’s rehearsal from an outsider’s perspective.

Since I found a reason to be satisfied with that, I just acted as she instructed me to.

Inside the empty classroom was a small assortment of theatre stuff. The desks and chairs were neatly put into the corners, with said theatre stuff and tools on top of them. Estimating with my gaze, there should be around six members. Though there were definitely less people than the other larger clubs, this classroom was still way too narrow for them.

“Alright! Let’s move on!”

Having not realised our presence, the club members enthusiastically continued their practicing. Following after the girl that gave the command, the other members each all started speaking rapidly. Probably to warm up, if I had to guess. Once that was done, all the members lied down on the floor, starting to take deep breaths. This was probably a training for abdominal breathing. At first I was a bit perplexed at why they were all suddenly sprawling on the floor, but it made sense now.

Amazing. Not just the hallway, but even in the classroom, there’s not a single speck of dust to be found. No wonder they’re not hesitating to lie down on the floor like that.

“Okay, next! Time is limited! Let’s move promptly!”

“““Okay, President!”””

After their abdominal breathing training, the leading girl jumped up from the floor, bringing forth the next order, and the other members followed suit like they were a military corps in training. The girl that the others called ‘President’ seemed to have quite the energy and influence.

A serious gaze. A clear and straight way of expressing herself. Her hair, with a soothing color, tied up with a hairband. Not a wrinkle in her uniform, even the highest button of her shirt properly buttoned up, her skirt perfectly arranged according to school regulations in terms of length. Height-wise, she should’ve been around average, but because of her straightened back, she looked a bit taller. Every single thing I could see about her led me to one conclusion.

Diligent.

Very diligent.

Ridiculously diligent.

Everybody would believe her if she said that she hadn’t disregarded a single rule ever since she was born. The Queen of Honor Students, is what you could call her.

“That’s my little sister, Midori-chan.” Sumire said while pointing at the diligent girl, called Kageishi Midori.

“Ah.”

The moment I saw her face, I let out a quiet mutter.

I finally remembered. She’s the head student of the school year. Our high school has a pretty high standard for test scores in the first place, but there are still those that achieve top marks, representing our years as the head students. ‘Amazing, they live in a totally different world than me’, is most people see them.

Meaning, she’s a second year like me. Ever since entering this school, she’s continued to get perfect marks in every subject, never once handing over the top spot, a genius among geniuses.

I see, I’d never had any interest in her full name, and I mostly call Sumire with ‘Murasaki Shikibu-sensei’, but she’s got the same family name, Kageishi.

“Interesting. Maybe her outstanding grades are the reason that you’re allowed to use this classroom on the 4th floor to your heart’s content.”

“Yes. All the teachers hold a great evaluation of her.”

“So she has outstanding grades, and the talent to act as the leader of the theatre club—”

“Indeed. Perfect in both studies and club, that’s her belief.”

“Don’t tell me, the one cleaning up, and everything else is also—”

“Of course, Midori-chan.”

“That’s crazy. You should probably take a DNA test or something.”

“Can you not doubt our blood relation like that?!”

Well of course I would. Unlike a certain someone who’s pulled me up here without telling me anything, she’s not wasting any time, and has a high ability to lead other people, so of course I’d doubt her. Not to mention that her face is also pretty cute. It’s like the heavens above decided to be gracious on the day she was born. Though she gave a first impression of a straight-laced person because of her diligent expression, she might even handle herself against an idol or an actress.

The more I think about it, the more I start doubting that she’s actually related to Sumire.

“That reminds me, I haven’t really seen her since the entrance ceremony, even though she’s supposed to be a star.”

“Midori-chan is attending the gifted classes, after all. Their classrooms are pretty far from the normal ones, so it’s no wonder you didn’t.”

“Ahh, so that’s why…”

That explains why we didn’t get in contact that much until now. But, once I take a closer look, I can see certain facial features resembling those of Sumire.

…Still, that was a bit anticlimactic.

From Sumire’s despairing behaviour, I expected a lower level, time-wasting club, that only had flowers in their heads, but I don’t see any irregularities right now. I’m not really familiar with typical club activities inside a theatre club, but this looks pretty good to me, not gonna lie. Rather, it looks like everything’s going in order because of Midori’s guidance.

“Alright, basic training is over! Let’s start practicing for the real thing now!”

Inside the narrow room, the preparations for the play were moving forward at a steady pace. Their duties were perfectly split up, everyone was preparing one part of the stage, the audio, and so on. After that was done, they all moved to a certain position inside the room. In the middle of that, Midori seemed to have taken the main role. Standing in the middle of the darkened classroom after the blackout curtains were pulled up, she was now on stand-by. Even her expression, holding the reins to start the play, looked like one of an actress.

“Alright, we’ll start after 10 seconds.”

Starting the countdown, the start of the play approached. Once the countdown reached ‘3’, Midori took a deep breath, and—

“OhOh Romeo, you can’t just die like that.”

………?

That voice just now sounded like an electronic voice resembling SIRI or ALEXA. It’s one of those talk softwares you’d hear on live-reporting videos on video websites, completely deprived of any energy. Quickly checking over my own phone to see if it somehow activated on its own, I realized that that wasn’t it either. The voice I just heard definitely came from inside the classroom.

No, enough of these excuses. There’s no mistaking it. That voice came from Midori’s mouth. And the moment I judged that, Midori’s eyes opened wide. She must’ve realized that she was pretty much reading in monotone.

I see, so maybe she didn’t manage to get into the groove of the role? I heard from Iroha that for example, the start of your singing at a karaoke bar is the most difficult part. Though it’d be problematic if she did that for the real deal, this right now is nothing more than practice.

It seemed as if she was preparing her intonation for the next bit, as her expression also changed into something you’d see at an opera, and the words that followed were—

“Slwda kuz ntdzlp rvo hici, nny nafna paagrrg.”

………Mmm?! What did she just say? What came out of her mouth was so fluid that I couldn’t tell exactly what she had said. I didn’t even know if she was speaking Japanese, English, or Chinese. Hey, is she some sort of a speech robot? This isn’t supposed to be one of those plays that are mainly done with fabricated voices…right?

Despite my confusion, once Midori’s speech ended, the person responsible for the acoustics, without any logical connection at all, just let the tambourine ring. At the same time, the stage lights hanging on the roof lit up, and were all focused on Midori. Standing in the spotlight, Midori’s expression turned into that of a maiden in love, and…

“G br yndg rjuav rkvy mrefjmfmz ldsywl aogp.”

(Probably): Bringing forth her awakening of love, with no restraints.

After that, she continued to blurt out phrases so quickly that I couldn’t pick up anything at all, along with the occasional mysterious sound effects, and the lights going all over the place.

…Why add that sound there? …Why that stage light? Why those props here?

My questions didn’t stop. Not to mention that Midori seemed to have realized her unintelligibly fast speaking, after a short break.

“The universe is expanding!”

She went back to her monotonous reading. And what do you mean by ‘universe’? Didn’t you just bring up the name Romeo before? I totally thought you’d be acting out Romeo and Juliet, so why are you suddenly bursting through the earth’s atmosphere? Maybe Midori realized that she was both reading too fast for anyone to pick up, and butchered the script?

Catching fragments from the other theatre girls’ phrases, it sounded like a mix between the truth of the universe, parallel worlds, Schrodinger’s cat, and the Philosopher’s Stone. The whole play was just screaming for me to retort ‘You’re just adding words you recently learned, aren’t you?’…What is with this ridiculously bad story. Where did Romeo wander off to.

“…Sensei, this is…”

“Seems like you understand.”

Sumire showed me a smile like that of a wise man who had gained his knowledge from pain and despair.

“This is really bad.”

“Right?”

And it didn’t stop there. What happened next was comparable to taking a wrapping cloth, opening it up and putting it over a fire, only to try and put it out afterward.

The reading switched between monotonous and fabricated, with contents that didn’t get into my head no matter how much I tried, and the later part of the play seem to revolve around some Indian ninjas that worked to seal off a god in the sky (dark attribute) that was governing an urban city with science.

Like, seriously, don’t complain to me, I have no idea either.

“A blessing for this universe!”

And with that final line from the horrendous, monotonous-reading Midori, the play came to an end. Of course, all the members gave a slight bow.

Putting away the props behind the curtains, light returned to the classroom, and Midori slowly lifted up her head. Like a tradesman that’s hard to please, she put one hand on her lips, and said with a vexed expression:

“Around 80 points.”

“Did your brain melt or something?”

Shoot, that assessment was so unrealistic that I couldn’t hold back my retort. In response, Midori looked over towards us, and her gaze met mine.

“Hmpf, who are you!? Don’t you think that you’re being very rude?”

With a glare, Midori squared her shoulders as she closed in on us.

“Rude or not, after being shown such a horrific play, saying that it’s worth 80 points is basically asking me for me to reply, you know. The plays that grade schoolers nowadays perform are on a higher level than this.”

“W-Wha—?! It wasn’t that bad! It’s true that we’ve reached the peak, so there’s no more room for us to grow, but still!”

“No, grow some more, please.”

“Mumumumu… Who is this man… Ah, Sumire-onee—Cough, Kageishi-sensei, so you’ve come!”

“Yes. I wanted to check in on you and the other members of the theatre club.”

After glaring at me like I was her arch nemesis, her expression brightened up as soon as she spotted Sumire standing next to me. Since she barely stopped herself from calling Sumire Sumire-oneechan, she probably wants to keep a certain level of distance at school. That’s also what makes her a diligent girl. In response, Sumire is also acting as the usual cool beauty, while the other members of the club came running, going ‘Kageishi-sensei, Kageishi-sensei!’. Apparently, the invisible advisor was quite popular.

“Ehehe, recently, Onee—Sensei has been visiting the club more and more, I’m so happy! That increases motivation a lot for everyone, right?”

As Midori sought for agreement, the other members replied with a “Right!”.

That tense atmosphere from before was completely gone, and now they were brimming with youthful enthusiasm. A good balance between work and play, you could call it. Not to mention that Midori herself was extremely delighted to see Sumire. Her ponytail almost seemed to be swaying back and forth, like the tail of a dog that just reunited with its owner.

“Though I prefer giving you guys enough freedom, the competition is drawing close, so I’m getting fired up myself. Making sure that you all win is my duty as an advisor, after all.”

“Kageishi-sensei…!”

“That’s Sensei for you!”

“So cool!”

The club members’ eyes went all sparkly at Sumire’s words.

Seeing that, I realized one thing. Sumire is definitely worshipped by the club members, and none of them know about her pitiful real personality. And it seems like that isn’t an exception for Midori either. If they knew, they wouldn’t be acting like that towards her.

“And, Kageishi-sensei, who is this rude person?” Midori changed the topic, while constantly throwing me hostile glances.

I’d really prefer it if she stopped calling me rude. Truth be told, I might’ve been a bit too honest, but I wish that I was allowed at least some sort of rebuttal after being forced to sit through that horrifying play. Before judging me, how about you start looking at yourselves first?

“He’s the second-year Ooboshi Akiteru-kun. He came here to inspect the theatre club.”

“Inspect…? Is he the reinforcement you were talking about before? I think I have told you before, but the six of us here are the pinnacle of the theatre club. Any new person would—”

“You’re wrong. He isn’t going to join the theatre club.” Sumire shook her head.

With that serious gaze, I finally understood the flow of the conversation.

I see what she’s planning. So this is why she hurried herself to finish the illustration before the deadline.

“He’ll be the super producer, bringing success to this club.”

“Super…producer…?!”

Hey you, don’t add any weird adjectives to my name. Adding super or hyper will only make me look more suspicious.

“W-What exactly does this person understand about acting? This… totally-normal-looking, nontalented person!”

“…Seems like you’re also rocking quite the personality there.”

At first, I thought she was a super diligent girl, but she’s got the guts to say something like that on our first official meeting.

“Calm down, Midori. It’s true that he looks like the most normal person ever, and he might be nothing more than a fiendish bastard that’s totally into hardcore sadistic stuff, but—”

“You’re really enjoying badmouthing me like this, aren’t you?”

“—But he has the necessary talent as a producer. I’m sure that he can bring your acting onto an even higher level than ever before.”

Maybe Midori understood Sumire’s seriousness, but she shrank back after that. She glanced over at me, her expression wavering between trust and distrust.

“If Onee—Kageishi-sensei says so, then we might be able to trust him. But, he’s a student of our school, right? Does he have any achievements as a producer?”

“Good question——”

An expected question. In response, Sumire lifted her index finger, and froze up. Only the sound of the ticking wall clock could be heard.

Well, that’s to be expected. Leading the [5th Floor Alliance], we’ve created [The Night the black goat screamed], but we can’t talk about it to an outsider like that. Only a handful of people really know about our very existence in the first place. With that in mind, I’d rather not reveal these circumstances to the members of the theatre club. And that should be the same for Sumire. If she were to reveal her real face—the face of the illustrator Murasaki Shikibu-sensei to Midori, she’d have to explain her other job as well. Not to mention that I was probably the only one who could see her panic through her iron masquerade.

Now, show me. How will you break through this predicament?

“Haaa…”

“Haaa…?”

“This Ooboshi-kun is a man who has produced countless Hollywood masterpieces!”

““Haaaaaaaaaaaaaa?!””

Midori’s and my voices overlapped.

Can you blame us? Of all the things, Hollywood? Even if you’re a successful Japanese creator, it’s a world you would probably never ever get in contact with. Only some idiot would believe such a blatant lie.

“Hollywood…So that Hollywood?! Ooboshi-kun, you’re a genius?!”

Well color me surprised, there’s one right here.

“…Uh, yeah. It’s not that big of a deal though. I should be able to help you improve, I think.”

Unable to deny it, I could only nod. As I did, every girl of the club other than Midori raised their voice in admiration.

“I don’t really get it, but it sounds amazing!”

“It’s the person that Kageishi-sensei brought with her, so of course he’s gotta be some big shot!”

“Now that I think of it, the fact that his face looks like nothing special makes him feel even more like the real deal!”

“Right! If a famous producer like him had an ikemen look, it’d make him seem like a fake!”

Surrounding me, the girls all kept blurting out whatever they felt like. Really, I’ve been wondering for a while, but the average IQ of this school’s students seems to be a bit low. Then again, that would explain why nobody’s figured out Murasaki Shikibu-sensei’s real personality.

“Hey, president Midori! If it’s with him, going to the nationals might not be a dream!”

“Grrrrr…”

While all the club members got more and more excited, Midori didn’t even try to hide her displeasure.

“It’s true that he might have some noteworthy achievements. But, I won’t lower my head towards someone that made fun of our club. And also, Onee—Kageishi-sensei, what kind of relationship do you have with him!?”

“Relationship?”

What’s this girl on about now.

But I didn’t have much time to think, as Midori pushed her finger towards my nose.

“I-I-It’s not some perverted relationship, right?!”

“You, how did you even come up with that nonsense.”

“I mean, you’re a super rich and famous Hollywood producer, right?! I-I know about that, okay! T-Those people always use their job for something indecent! I-I won’t allow it if you lay a hand on Sumire-oneechan!!”

What a crazy jump in thinking. You’d better apologize to the entirety of Hollywood.

Her face bright red, her body shaking furiously, Midori was pointing at me. In response, I let out a deep sigh.

“There’s nothing like that, okay. Also, there’s no reason why I should lust for a living being like her.”

“Of course there is! Onee-chan is super sexy, after all! Her breasts are going boing boing all the time, and she’s got long, beautiful legs!”

…She does have good style, alright. If I close my eyes to the real Sumire, she’s without a doubt, a perfect beauty. Though she’s the number one on my ‘Women that I don’t want to hug’ ranking. 𝗳𝒓𝙚e𝓌e𝚋𝙣𝚘𝐯𝙚𝙡.𝑐૦ｍ

Also, Midori, you’re suddenly calling her ‘Onee-chan’ instead of Sensei, you know? You really are siblings, losing yourselves this much once you’re fired up.

“Anyway, I’m not in the mood for this child’s play. And I’ve never once thought about using Kageishi-sensei like that. I’m going back now.”

“Eh?!”

As I turned my back to Midori, about to step out of the classroom, Sumire hurriedly stopped me with one hand on my shoulder. Coming closer to my ear, she whispered so that others wouldn’t be able to hear us.

“Why are you going back?! Aren’t you going to help me?!”

“I did say that there might be things I could help them to improve on, but I never agreed to become their producer. Also, if the club president doesn’t even wish to cooperate, then that’s the end of the story.”

“Wait! I’ll definitely convince her!”

“Also, things won’t change much even if I give them a bit of advice.”

This club has too many problems that need to be worked on.

1: The actors’ acting ability is too awful.

2: The script is horrible.

3: They have no sense of staging.

4: Everything sound-related doesn’t make any sense.

Conclusion: This is a lost cause.

I can point that out, but I don’t have the confidence that I can fix anything.

“If we were to use the know-how of the [5th Floor Alliance], we might be able to do something, right? We work on the scenario, staging , and the sound design.”

“I can’t teach them the essential know-hows of being an actor, though.”

“That’s true, but…”

To be fair, we do have the necessary know-how on being an actor at our disposal. Really, the first thing that came to my mind here was Iroha’s face. But Sumire doesn’t know about Iroha being responsible for the voices in our game. And seeing as I can’t reveal that fact to her, I can’t help Sumire.

“Anyway, this conversation never happened. I have a mountain-load of problems concerning the [5th Floor Alliance] already. I can’t deal with any more trouble.”

“No way! What about my circumstances?! Are you saying that it’s fine if I can’t draw my illustrations anymore because I’m too busy with the girls’ tennis club?!”

“Of course not. You just have to work harder. If you work 24/7, it’s very much doable.”

“Isn’t that a bit too illegal?!”

“Since you’re the advisor, think about this problem for yourself first. I’m going.”

“No waaaaaaay!”

Ignoring the teary-eyed Sumire’s cry, I left the theatre clubroom. As I did, I could hear Midori say “It’s fine, Onee-chan. We can win the grand prize with just the people here!”, trying to cheer Sumire up, but she could only mutter a weak “Ah, uh, yeah.”

“Really, what kind of theatre club is that?”

I don’t have the time for that. My relationship with Iroha and Mashiro, and Makigai Namako’s scenario. These problems are way more important than some theatre club I just saw today for the first time.

……

Theatre, huh……

The whole time I was watching Midori’s horrendous acting, Iroha’s face kept popping up in my mind. I once again realized the talent that Iroha is holding. Not only does she have a good feel for voice acting, but she’s got good general acting skills as well.

But, this won’t work. Showing her face, exposing herself, acting beneath the shining light, this isn’t something that the current Iroha is allowed to do. Really, it’s frustrating as hell.

“Really, what a waste of talent.”

Not expecting anyone to hear my complaint, I walked down the hallway from before, listening to the tennis club members’ voices, who were still spending their youth in their own way.

*

「So you ended up with meeting another girl, huh.」

「You’re talking about Sumire-sensei’s little sister? It’s really not what you think it was.」

「But, from the sounds of it, you seem to have a good affinity with her. She’s diligent, methodical, and she seems to have a high value on her schedule.」

「Yeah, but she clearly hates me. And there’s a certain flaw in there.」

「Flaw?」

「She thinks that men are some hungry beasts. She’s the type that thinks men + girl standing next to each other = sex.」

「Maybe that just shows how close you and Sumire-sensei looked like together?」

「Stop with the bad jokes…Well, anyway, this Midori girl—」

「This Midori girl?」

「She’s so diligent that it’s annoying.」