COTE: Koenji What if

Vol. 1 Chapter 12.4 - Albert vs Ryuuen

After the date with Satou, I waved her off. The date didn't go too bad surprisingly.

I thought back to my social life. The only person I seemed to have become true friends with is Albert, and I guess my friendship with Sudou has been growing.

Despite everything, I still haven't managed to find a realistic way to even start a simple friendship with Kanzaki that doesn't feel forced or unnatural, much less a true friendship. If only he was in my class. I sighed to myself.

What to do, what to do? Do I just call him and say I want to hang out? Keep it simple? How did I even make friends with the friends that I have made so far? I still have no clue.

I really don't know much of anything about Kanzaki. I wonder if he is only interested in class related things, such as Yukimura.

I do have his contact information at the very least. Speaking of which, I was looking through my phone. I had quite a lot of contacts now, and even made a new contact today, being Hashimoto.

I could ask Koenji for help, but if I do Kanzaki might interpret it as class related deals instead of me trying to make friends with him. After all, Koenji has so far used Kanzaki for background deals with class B such as with the cheats, and negotiations to tutor class B.

I could ask Ichinose or Hirata, but that would also be the same case, he might see it as just negotiations about improving the relations between class D and class B.

Honestly, that might be the best way at this rate unless if I get lucky and have a chance encounter with him.

Bump. 

Ow. I bumped my head onto a lamp post. I really should keep in touch with reality instead of going on long monologues, while looking through my phone at the same time.

I looked around to see if anyone was watching, if maybe Koenji was watching. That would be the worst case scenario. Fortunately, after a thorough scan of my surroundings, no one saw what just happened.

Hang on, is that Albert? And is that Ryuuen? It looks like Albert is following behind Ryuuen.

An area like this is barely visited by anyone, now that I think about it, which explains why no one saw what just happened despite the time of day. There also doesn't seem to be cameras here either. Because of this, I decided to quickly hide behind a wall. It could be that Ryuuen lead Albert to this location for a nefarious reason.

I couldn't really hear what they were talking about. I attempted to move in closer in secret. 

I then saw Ryuuen grab Albert's shirt.

Ryuuen threw a sucker punch at Albert. Albert effortlessly caught this punch despite Ryuuen's speed and then gut punched Ryuuen with his right fist. 

Ouch. 

Ryuuen looked like he was about to fall to his knees, but then I saw a smile on his face. A sinister smile. A look of determination was on his face.

He then grabbed Albert's fist which was still in his stomach. Tenacity is a way to describe Ryuuen in this situation. But then Albert quickly pulled his fist back, to the point where Ryuuen almost lost his grip and Albert threw another gut punch, using his left arm now. 

Brutal. 

Albert used the angular momentum from pulling back his right fist using his waist, using the clockwise motion his body made to throw punch with his left arm. As Ryuuen was trying to hold onto Albert's right fist, when Albert pulled his right fist, this caused Ryuuen to get pulled towards Albert, leading to the left gut punch being extra powerful.