Warau

Chapter E: Final Cultural Festival for the Seniors

We are close to the summer break now, meaning- time to finally create a new anthology for this year's Kanya Festival. But, I plan to keep my contributions low this time as my main priority is on winning 'the' challenge. The Kanya Festival will be a three day annual cultural festival like usual. This time, at the end of the festival, the third years will be called onto the stage class wise and they all will be blessed by their juniors for their final examinations. I definitely will need their blessings.

I am in the club currently.
"So, what are your ideas for this year's anthology?" - Satoshi
"This is our last cultural fest, I am already feeling nostalgic tbh" - Mayaka
"How bout we pick Oreki-san's sister Tomoe-san's wisdom as our main theme?" - Chitanda
"Sounds good" - Satoshi
"I have heard quite a number of her feats in school." - Mayaka
"K, it's decided, she is fairly known around the school so it would be easy to make this one" - Chitanda.
"This will be a good way to pay our tributes to her too." - Satoshi
"We should also include her love interest in it." - Radao
Everyone looks at Radao in surprise with his line.
"LOVE INTEREST?!!" - Mayaka
"SHE FOUND SOMEONE?!!" - Satoshi
"Wait guys, allow me to explain." - Chitanda

Chitanda takes control of the scene and explains the entire anecdote of Tomoe-nee-san and Saoto-san to the two. "Oh, so that is the story," Mayaka says after understanding. "K then, we will also include her love interest in the anthology," Satoshi agrees. Talking about including romance in my sis's book right in front of me; I really don't exist ig.

"K, writing for this year will be done by Hotaro again." Satoshi announces. "No way, I am way too busy with my studies." I completely disagree. "I will do it." Radao raises his hand. "Hm, kk then, Radao will do the writing for this year...What about you Hotaro?" Satoshi asks what I would do this year in the fest. "Studies." I reply simply. "C'mon Hotaro, this is your last year here, enjoy the last year at least, it's literally an universal law to do so." Satoshi tries to convince me. "Well, we should rather be more of a guest this year, true that this is our last year here at this school but, I don't want to increase my years either." Mayaka explains Satoshi. Chitanda also nods to Mayaka's statement. "You can celebrate the Kanya Festival next year too if you wish," I say with a smug. "Not fair." Satoshi gets annoyed.

"Well, What are your plans for the following final examinations?" Chitanda asked Satoshi. "I will go full study mode after the Cultural Fest." Satoshi answers her. "What about the time before the cultural festival? You will study normally right?" Mayaka asks with a stare. "Um, ye sure, I will daily ope-" "You must study well from this day on else you will probably not make it to graduation!" Mayaka scolds Satoshi. Radao, who was sitting beside me, leans to me and whispers, "It's sure fun watching daily drama here."

"K, I am deciding and announcing that Satoshi Fukube will not be taking part in the making of this year's anthology and that he will focus on his studies till the final examinations." Then she looks at Chitanda who was listening to her, "Do you agree with this, club president?" "Yes, I fully agree with you Mayaka." The decision was made instant and Satoshi just watched it in despair. But then, Mayaka looked at me, and said, "Also, the responsibility for looking after Satoshi in his studies will be handled by Hotaro Oreki." "Wooo" Radao applauded. "Hey! Give me a break, will ya?" I oppose the idea. Though both mine and Satoshi's marks have been similar since the past two years, this year is a completely different scenario and I really don't want any disturbance.

"If you're not writing the anthology this year then you must look after Satoshi, it's related to studies anyways." Mayaka tells me. " Sigh, Fine.." I finally agreed with her. Satoshi looks at me and giggles. "I guess I won't mind if Hotaro will be the one looking after me."

And hence, it was declared that Chitanda would be the editor, Mayaka the designer and Radao would do the writings during the production of the anthology. I and Satoshi would come into the play during the Kanya Festival for the promotion of sales. Losing a few days won't hurt much I suppose. And yes, I would like to have a nice annual festival for the last time in my high school life.

Today's session was mostly related to the cultural fest. After it ended, I and Radao were the last as usual except, Satoshi waited for me outside the door. I caught a glance of his glimpse of me while I was packing my bag. "You have a conference with Fukube-senpai? I can't stay too late so would you lock the club room?" Radao asked me. "Sure, you can head home. I will lock the door once I am done with my talk." I told Radao. "Alright then, later Senpai" "Adieu". Radao byed Satoshi too who was outside and went home. After his departure, Satoshi came inside and began his talk.

"Um Hotaro, about my studies... I don't really have much confidence in even passing tbh. This is weird but, as I told you a year back, I didn't want to get obsessed with Mayaka like how I always would get obsessed with something I like a lot. Yet, I somewhat got obsessed with her and now well...I can't describe it but I ain't getting the focus to even get some concept into my head."
"I see"
Well, I have an easy solution for this. The level of distraction Satoshi is facing can be felt by me. I am glad that he is ultimately taking concerns for his studies.

"Come to stay over my home during the summer break, I will give you the potion of wisdom by which you will easily score good." I tell him with a smirk. "Huh...what? Really?!" Satoshi is astonished and amazed. "Yes." I confirm. "That's awesome! Kk them, I'll be coming to stay at your place on the first day of vacation." "Hmk, sure."

Days passed by and the summer vacation rolled in. It was a warm afternoon in the town. "Hey sis, did you hear the telephone ringing?" I asked sis to confirm if my ears were all right. "Nah, no ringing." Sis answers. Sigh, Hopefully Satoshi didn't forget about his stayover. It's a pain that I don't know his new number, else I wouldn't have been waiting idly until now. A few minutes later, Satoshi finally arrives, with some special refreshments. "There were some foreign food stuff being exclusively sold in the city mart. The line was huge and I barely managed to get these Italian lasagna." Satoshi hands over the carry bag to me. "O thanks, but you didn't have to bring it for me either." I say to Satoshi while being grateful for his gift. "Share this with your sister, also give her slightly more than what you will eat." Satoshi applies the restrictions. I glare at him. "Fine, I didn't hope for any food anyways." I say while going to the kitchen. "Then give the entire part to your older sister." "Like I would."

I come back from the kitchen with the one last piece of lasagna in my hand. I enter the television room where Satoshi is sitting with his book. "Ok then, are you ready to take the potion of wisdom?" I ask Satoshi. "Yes." Satoshi seems excited but also nervous. "Ok then, lend your consciousness to me." I ask him to listen carefully as I explain. "Ok, I am paying full attention in inheriting the wisdom." Satoshi responds.
"In order to score excellent , get obsessed with it too." - Me
"Um how? I don't even like studying.." - Satoshi
"But do you dislike scoring too?" - Me
"No." - Satoshi
"Just abuse the obsession with Mayaka and picture that scoring good is a part of your obsession for Mayaka. I know it's a little confusing but, try to do it yourself and see the results after a week." - Me
"Hm, abuse my obsession?" Satoshi says to himself. He smiles and expresses that he's ready.
I insert the educational disc into the player and start the television. Once turned on, it starts playing the lessons for the final examinations. I tell Satoshi to carefully focus and try grasping the concept. The player played till 9:02 pm and Satoshi watched it with full attentiveness. After ending, Satoshi stretched his arms and said, "That was a big progress, now I will definitely pass the exams with ease." "Not yet, this is not enough for you to pass." I exclaim. "What do you mean Oreki?" Satoshi is puzzled. I explain to him what I meant and he gets overwhelmed.

The summer break ended and it was now the moment of the Kanya Festival. Satoshi looked playful once again, but I can't stop him now as he spent a lot of time in productivity during the summer break. I too became slightly more rosy as I also wanted to cherish my last moments as a student.

"Ok then, let's rock during this year's Kanya Fest!" Mayaka encourages everyone. "Yes!" Everyone yells back. "Yes," I say like a sloth again."

During the first day of the grand event, I walked around the school advertising the year's exclusive anthology of Kamiyama High School. Our aim was to sell 150 copies this year. The shop keeping was given to Radao as he refused to publicize the anthology. He certainly was more of an introvert than me; he admitted that he had no friends other than the club. We sold 43 copies on the first day.During the second day, the plan was usual except we went around different activity clubs and advertised our anthology there too. We succeeded in selling 59 copies on the second day. For the last day, we planned to do something special in order to sell the remaining copies of the anthology. The plan was to call Tomoe Oreki herself to increase publicity. It worked well and we easily sold the remaining copies. All the members along with sis were celebrating their success early afternoon. I walked out the room to look around the festival for one last time. Chitanda saw my exit and followed me. "You're exploring around the school?" "Yeh"

We walked around together, played and took part in various activities and settled at the beverage club to rest. "Btw, what is your fortune number Oreki-san?" "The heart shaped thing which we got from the fortune telling club on the first day?" I didn't care much about it but I still took out the piece of paper and read out, "25 ". That surprisingly made Chitanda shocked and blushed. "Um, what is your number?" I ask Chitanda cautiously. "Not different" Chitanda reveals. "Well, one paper doesn't decide the future for someone." I comfort Chitanda. "Um yes, I guess it doesn't" Chitanda says nervously. It was an awkward position but got back to normal shortly after.

The thanks giving ceremony started anon and the third years waited at the backstage class-wise to receive their blessings from the juniors. Our class went first and we were all applauded cheerfully. One of the juniors then began giving a speech for us. I continually looked towards Radao as the speech continued, he too stared at me as I did. Once the ceremony ended, it was now time to go through the one way end; Graduation.