Mizuri (3 years ago)

Mizuri didn’t really have to go to class, did she? Mizuri was twelve, and already three years ahead of the rest of the twelve-year-old Angels out there. She should at least be free to stay home and rest for a year, shouldn’t she?

Nope.

So she didn’t complain when they came for her in a black SUV, tied her up, and drove her all the way to the Higashi Academy. After all, Angels didn’t have much freedom. The Pacific Treaty hadn’t been kind to Angels, especially to prodigies like Mizuri.

When Angels didn’t fulfill their end of the Treaty, which included an absolute rule that said an Angel’s education must be continuous without excuse, except for a maximum of a week every two months, the ordinary humans didn’t fulfill theirs either, which was largely just a statement on treating Angels as fellow human beings and not as freaks with powers.

Mizuri had considered a lot of the possibilities, and she’d decided that being tied up and brought to school was a kindness.

She also knew that the ordinary humans wouldn’t listen to her, so she decided to hold on until she reached the Higashi Academy.

She asked the first teacher she saw, a short, balding man in his late fifties, if there was a way she wouldn’t have to go to class.

He nodded.

Then he smiled, his eyes twinkling with amusement. “If you can beat me in a duel, that is.”

Mizuri agreed. Why not? If she lost, it meant she still had too much to learn, then she’d request a vacation again when she was strong enough. If she won, that meant vacation. She let him lead her to the forest surrounding the Higashi Academy’s dome. He went through the forest, taking a weirdly looping path that seemed to build itself as they walked, and stopped at a clearing, where a lone cherry blossom tree was in full bloom.

The teacher positioned himself under the cherry blossom tree.

“When do we begin?”

As far as Mizuri could remember, there were rules for Duels, but the teacher didn’t seem too concerned, so she assumed the rules weren’t as complicated as she assumed them to be.

She shrugged.

The teacher pulled a coin from his pocket and placed it on his thumb, ready to flip it. “These are my conditions. If you win this duel, you get to decide how long you’ll stay out of class. The Higashi Academy will cover for you if the police investigate. But if I win, I get to decide. Do you accept?”

It took Mizuri a few seconds to process that the teacher had changed the point of the Duel from whether or not Mizuri would be getting a vacation to how long Mizuri’s vacation would be.

Which meant that win or lose, Mizuri would be getting a vacation. She just had a feeling that if he won, she’d get herself a vacation she didn’t really want to have.

“Right,” she said.

He flipped the coin.

Mizuri watched it as it turned end over end in the air. She watched as it reached its apex and fell back to the ground.

The coin hit the ground.

The kusarigama was out of Mizuri’s pocket, as always. It was always like this. Her reflexes weren’t reflexes so much as extremely accurate predictions of the future. Her body almost always knew how to act before her mind even kicked into gear.

She whipped the kusarigama forward as fast as she could, and she was already thinking about exactly how long of a vacation she’d have. No one ever stayed conscious after her first attack, after all.

But he wasn’t there. Mizuri looked around, bewildered. She’d been sure he’d just been...

He reappeared beside her and jabbed his elbow in her stomach. Mizuri’s slash went wild, cutting down a tree from the ring of trees around the clearing. Suddenly in a world of pain, she dropped to her knees.

She laughed inwardly. Teleportation? Of course that would be the only thing her speed couldn’t beat. What were the chances she’d be having a duel against a teleportation magic user now?

Mizuri could only wheeze and cough as the teacher held her right shoulder in place so she wouldn’t tip forward and smash her face on the ground. She saw her kusarigama just a few feet away, and she tried to inch toward it, but the teacher kicked it away, out of her reach.

Her first loss. And it was the first duel she’d ever had that had something on the line.

“My name is Owari. Call me Owari-sensei,” the teacher said. His face was no longer the smiling face from earlier, Mizuri realized with a start.

Just Owari? No surname? Mizuri had no surname either, only one given to her by “family friends” that took her in when she’d been an abandoned baby. Tanakishi, had been the name they’d given her. Said it had been her parents’ surname. But she didn’t throw it around. As far as she was concerned, her parents had abandoned her, so why did she have to take their surname and be proud of it? Besides, how could she trust that that was really their surname? They hadn’t been around to confirm it, and there weren’t any papers except her own.

But she had other problems at the moment.

“As promised, I’ll be deciding your vacation time.” He produced a book from his bag and set it down on the fallen tree trunk.

“Someone will come along when the time comes. Challenge them to a duel. Your vacation ends when you win.”

Mizuri couldn’t answer. Her head was spinning, and the pain in her abdomen still hadn’t subsided. Her body was growing heavier and heavier against Owari-sensei’s grip every second.

“Don’t hold back. You don’t like it when people hold back, right?”

He released his hold on Mizuri’s shoulder, and she tipped over, faceplanting on the ground. That knocked her out, but she saw a final glimpse of Owari-sensei before she went under. He was staring at his hands like it was the end of the world.