1 years later current age 13.

“HA” I strike with my bokken missing Saeko Busujima by an inch as we continue to lash out at one another dodging while also striking. Its amazing how fast she is with the blade both of us fighting all out while I’m cheating with a skill, she's just that much more skilled than me.

Saeko is the daughter of the master of the dojo. 3 years ago, I started to learn from them after her father taught a hand full of lessons at the school. They he taught us about their family history of samurai, I needed a bit of an outlet for a lot of stuff going on in my life so I dove head forward into learning everything I could from them. I picked up the skill Swordsmanship. Which improved learning rate then reaction time at lvl 25, attack speed at 50. Master Busujima is proud that I’m apprenticing alongside his daughter since it’s a bit rare for others her age to challenge her. I say challenge lightly since at best I can bring the fight to a stalemate as we both become to warn out to continue.

Saeko is a bit strange, with long purple hair that has a triangular fringe at the front which barely touches the ridge of her nose. She has deep blue eyes and is taller compared to a lot of the other girls our age. Well, she is one year older but the same year in school.

She gets this slight smile every time she lands a hit. It sparks the competitiveness in me that I didn’t realize I had, so we keep going until we are both bruised and sprawled on the floor.

“Very good uh students. Go uh take a break?” The Kendo club instructor doesn’t really teach us much since we both take lessons with Saeko’s father who has long since abandoned teaching here in favor of going back to his original dojo. He mostly just did it for a little while here in order to try to find someone to fight with his daughter once he found someone, he couldn’t stand the other students and left. The other people in the club aren't as dedicated but we use it as a nice place to spar and the championships require you to be part of an official team. It saw my level in swordsmanship take off by leaps and bounds.

Takashi, Rei and Saya tried to stick around in kendo club with me, but Takashi left after getting beaten and getting upset about it. Saya isnt exactly athletic so she left too, claiming that it was beneath her when she could be applying her genius to more important things. Rei stuck around for a bit but decided to join the spearmenship club instead. This just Left me and my newly made friend Saeko.

Saeko and I just lay there next to each other for a while on the mats before getting up in the same moment and waving off to each other for a brake. We sit there drinking our own water and every once in awhile mentioning tips on the fight. I enjoy her company the most out of everyone here so far. Quiet, direct, we don’t need to communicate to get the point across or when we do its fairly straightforward. At first, she was a little cold but after a while she started opening up making innuendos and teasing back and forth but most of the time we just sit in enjoyable silence. It’s a lot less annoying then being around a lot of the others for long periods of time. Like Takashi he asked out Rei but still doesn’t really act like they are dating. Every conversation is all about him every time we are all together. It’s obvious that she feels a bit awkward but is still in love with him which puts a bit of a strain on hanging out with them. Then Saya still tries to nitpick me about every little mistake I do in order to point out any flaw I have. I don’t really get it. If I’m so annoying, why does she keep wanting to hang out with me and Takashi or me and Rei?

I never really got “love” in my last life I understand it a bit better after mom. I didn’t really have anyone like that in my last life, so I never really understood romance either. So, I don’t understand why Rei is still with him or if its just something I’m missing.

Saeko and I sometimes practice well into the evening and after the instructor leaves. Saeko always carries around her bokken and her father has taught her the way of swordsmanship since she could walk so its not like he's scared that she walks home at night. I also walk home now and have taken to carrying an umbrella everywhere. Its not exactly the best weapon but its easier to pass off as normal. Auntie complained a bit saying I would look like a doofis to all the girls. When I tried and used Saeko as an excuse for other kids doing it. She wouldn’t hear any of my arguments though and just told me to take an umbrella instead. Now I’m just that weirdo that always has an umbrella, instead of that weirdo that has a sword. Not that much of an improvement.

One day while walking home me and Saeko part ways at an intersection. We give our silent goodbyes. I walk for a while until I hear wood striking flesh. The meaty thumps being echoing from far away. I rush back the way I came, only to see Saeko smiling over a man covered in his blood as he has multiple broken bones. I rush over to check on her.

“Saeko! Saeko are you okay are you hurt? Is any of this blood yours?” I look her over her smile looks a bit strained as she looks at me then turns into a frown after looking at the mans crumpled form.

“No, no I’m not hurt” she fidgets a bit. Awkward now that shes being observed.

“Okay let’s call the police while they are on their way tell me what happened.” The situation looks a little bad with the man looking so beat up.

I pull out my phone and get ahold of the police and tell them to send an ambulance, describing the injuries involved. Seeing the man will live just that he’ll likely have a very long recovery time.

“This man was attempting to force himself on me. So, I responded with my sword.” Saeko tells me as if stating a fact rather then saying she beat a man up to the point of unconciousness. I look up at her. Rather then any sort of remorse or worry if anything she looks slightly happy.

“Good, shitbag deserves to be beat up then.” I stand up and give him a slight kick to his less broken leg making it slightly more broken.

“Wait, you’re not upset with me for hurting him this much? I could have ended it quickly….I goaded him into it making myself seem weaker before I beat him up to this state.” She looks down at the crumpled form. Then back up at me like there was something weird about me now.

“Why would I? The guy was trying to force himself on a 14-year-old girl scum deserves to get his ass kicked.” Saeko gets a slight smile at this but still looks like she is hiding something.

“Whats wrong it looks like theres something you’re not saying?”

“It felt good…” she almost whispers.

“What was that? I didn’t quite hear you.” I lean in a bit.

“I said it felt good! beating him up… that is…” She somewhat bashfully moves as she started strong before petering out into a bit of self-consciousness. It looks a bit wrong considering how much blood is on her clothes.

“Well yeah of course it would you’re a badass and this is proof of it.” I gesture to the crumpled body of the man that outweighs her easily 2:1 and then gesture to her complete lack of injury.

“You don’t think that’s weird?” shes now looking at me a bit confused.

“Not really? I mean your dad is a dojo master I’m sure he loves fighting too.” She looks a bit relieved hearing that but still a little conflicted.

“Its not the fighting… it’s the hurting him.”

“Eh same difference. Just because you’re a bit of a sadist doesn’t mean you’re a bad person.” I mean it takes a certain kind of person to climb to the top of martial arts. Her dad is kind of intense so I can see a lot of his behavior leading up to this kind of thing.

“Sadist?” Shes probably never heard the term before. Its not exactly normal in the culture over here. Espeshally if her dad is very strict on these kinds of things.

“Yeah, someone that enjoys inflicting pain. It’s a bit extreme in this case but theres a lot of people with ahem more intimate relationships that deal with sadomasochism.”

Her eyes seem to swirl at this like a weight was taken off her shoulders from something she had been worried about.

“So, it’s not weird? Its… normal?”

“I mean I wouldn’t say normal? But theres definitely a lot of other people into that. You’re not weird by any means at least.” I start cleaning the blood off her face as we sit on the curb waiting on the police.

She hugs me getting blood on my nice school uniform.

“Thank you…you helped more then you probably realized…” she says into my side I can feel her smile twitch on my arm as I let out a long sigh.

“Don’t worry you can always rely on Umbrella guy to save the day.” It’s the cheesiest thing I can think of at the moment. I get a bit of a pity laugh before she just cringes at the joke.

“Hey its going to rain one of these times and you’re going to want under my umbrella. Then we’ll see who calls for who.” I give her another pat on the head before realizing we havnt contacted our families yet.

“Regardless lets just hope that the police believe the case against this pedophile, let’s get you cleaned up and home after that. We should probably call our family too.” I call Auntie who freaks out hearing that a pedophile tried to attack a student. Meanwhile Saeko is on the phone with her father. He just asks if she was hurt, if she killed the guy and if she did where to find the body to help dispose of it. Which really goes to show how freaking metal her father is. Saeko smiles a bit at her father’s comment about the body realizing that maybe she isnt all that weird after all.

After waiting awhile, it begins to rain. I begin laughing a little subtle at first before a full-on laugh as she begins pouting in the rain unwilling to ask for cover. I eventually move over to her instead. “Don’t worry umbrella guy is here to save the day yet again even if your going to make fun of it.” She gives me a look that just says ‘really?’ but I stick by the joke. It’s a bit awkward watching someone unconcious from the side of the road as it pours on them but at the same time, I feel little sympathy for him though, so I get over the awkwardness after a bit.

Eventually the police arrive and take our statements. The ambulance takes the guy away in a hurry, probably because he had a few broken bones and had been laying in the rain for about 15 minutes. We were kept at the station for a bit while they did an ID check on him. From the preliminary results it showed that the man is a registered sex offender already, so they let us go home since our story is likely to be true just being told not to skip town. We both got picked up, Saeko’s father seeing me just nods and I bow to him before Saeko leaves telling me that she would see me at kendo tomorrow and thanked me for the umbrella and everything else. Auntie picked me up and freaked out over the bit of blood on my shirt thinking I’d been hurt. I explained everything to her again and she relaxes a bit before a bit of a strained smile.

“That saeko girl is dangerous.” Giving a weary look towards the door. She likely saw them on the way in.

“Yep, but she just defended herself. Honestly, I hope you could do the same if it came to it.” Her strained smile goes into more of a contemplative look touching her chin and looking up.

“-sigh- I suppose your right. The creep got what he deserved. Good job being there for her and calling us. It could have been handled a lot worse.” She then spends the car ride home giving me all the details about what I shouldn’t do if that situation ever happens again. I guess one of the number one rules is don’t hug the person covered in blood. Who’d have thought that contaminating evidence might make you dismissed as a witness.

I also had to thank her for the advice on the umbrella instead of the bokken. She was a bit confused but then gave a knowing smile when I mentioned that me and Saeko shared an umbrella while waiting for the police.

A couple days pass and charges arnt pressed against Saeko. It’s been found that the man was intoxicated and with previous history of child molesting was given a jail sentence. Saeko was given a warning though about excessive force since the man had broken 19 bones with numerous bruises.

We celebrate a bit after the hearing the sentencing, and she does something I wasn’t expecting and gives me a kiss. I was shocked at first since I didn’t really see our relationship going that way. But of everyone shes the one that I get along with the best. We can just silently enjoy each other’s company and her father apparently told her he approves of me since I can wield a sword on par with her. I get a bit lost as she rambled out all the reasons, we should date. I’m stuck staring off for a bit making her nervous until I agree a bit awkwardly because I never really expected to be in this sort of situation. I thought it was supposed to be the guy that asked the girl out? But I guess that was a bit closed minded of me. Regardless at first, I wasn’t all that sure about our relationship but the longer it went on the more we just enjoyed each other’s company. Whether it just be the quite moments or the innuendos between sparring matches eventually it turned into something that helped make each day just a little bit better.