45. Reprimand

45. Reprimand

Fuuta, regarding Rankings. (ft I-Pin, Lambo and Reborn)

"Hey, Fuuta, what's that?" Lambo spoke up in his usual childish curiousity tone, "That's a huuuge book!"

Fuuta looked up from his book, turning towards the cow child. Smiling at the younger he replied cheerfully. "It's my ranking book!" he explained. He lifts it up slightly to show the cow child the dark red cover of the huge book he fits into his shirt pocket.

"Ooh! But why?"

Fuuta chuckles at the pestering-child tone Lambo uses. "I'm just looking through my old rankings for revision." he told Lambo, "There might be something in here that's interesting, right?"

"Then me too!" Lambo declares, "Lambo wants to look at Lambo's awesome ranks!" he giggled, leaping to the crook of the boy's arms and looking at the book from over there, "Lambo-san will join you!"

Fuuta giggles. "Sure!"

-

Lambo settled down at Fuuta's lap and they began to read the rankings, going through each and everything that seemed interesting. Occasionally, Lambo would ask weird questions, and Fuuta would patiently provide an answer for each of them.

"Then, what's the Bovino Family good at?" Lambo spoke up, interested now.

"Bovino Famiglia?" Fuuta questioned, lifting the pages over as he searched for the name. He paused at a certain page, "Hmm, the most notable one would be..." he scanned through the list quickly, "it's 12th of all mafia Families with advancements in their scientific inventions!"

"Is that something great?"

"Yes!" Fuuta's mouth was hanging agape, "That's an incredible ranking for such a minor Family, Lambo!" he awed, "Oh, doesn't that mean the ten-year bazooka is possible one of the greatest inventions of the universe? And you're just casually using it all the time?"

"But buttt, Lambo-san doesn't know aaaanythin'." he was using the slurry, bored-of-this tone, "Lambo-san's a kid, so I don't needa answer hard questions."

Fuuta was taken aback. Well, he really didn't expect Lambo's Family to be this much of a deal, but Lambo's attitude towards it is even more surprising.

"AAnyway," Lambo declared, jumping onto the book and point at one list on the other page, "What's this, Fuuta?"

Fuuta turned his attention back to the book. "Oh, that's-" he started, but stopped for a second as his eyes softened, "This is... Ninomiya Rei-san's ranking."

"Rei?" Lambo asked, "WOo, Fuuta, I wanna know Rei's ranks!"

"I-pin want know too!" the girl suddely chimed in, suddenly making her presence known beside them.

"I wanna know too," came the squeaky, faked childish tone from Reborn.

Fuuta jumped, startled at the sudden appearance of the martial artist and baby hitman, "huh? how long have you two been there?" he asked.

"About half way into Rei's name, I guess." said Reborn.

I-pin nods in agreement.

-

The four children were now checking through the ranks together, the smaller ones crowding around Fuuta as they pointed out the cool rankings.

#43 in Mafia Potential.

#31 in being a skilled Magician.

#152 in adaptability to spatial changes.

#16 of the best fighters in Namimori Junior High.

"Well, it's actually really above average. Most Mafioso don't even have these ranks." Fuuta explained, "For someone of his constitution, it's almost ridiculous."

#66 in having one-of-a-kind, incurable diseases.

#13 from last among all Namimori students in physical strength.

The last among all Namimori students in physical stamina.

"That's weird!" I-pin pointed out, "Rei-nii, potential?" she pointed at the previous rankings, questioning.

"Huh? It is?" Lambo was just confused at what was wrong, "What is?"

"Hey, Reborn, what do you think?" Fuuta turned to the baby hitman, "Isn't it weird to have such a contrast in good and bad rankings?" he asked.

The four fell silent as they pondered- this was quite strange. People could have both abnormally high and incredibly bad ranks, but all these were power and ability-based ranks.

Reborn stood on the book-- and pointed at the list of rankings that weren't related to battle.

#5 in being good at handling kids.

#127 in the adoration of small toys and trinkets.

#91 in daredevil tendencies.

#3 in list of people you shouldn't mess with.

Reborn shifted his palm, bring attention to the one at the end of the list.

"Those abnormal ranks..." he spoke up, his face solemn as he eyed the rank in scrutiny, "I believe it has something to do with this."

#3 of people (alive) possessing detailed, otherworldly wisdom.

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Rei returns to School (ft Kyoko)

When he first opened the door, the classroom instantly fell into an abrupt, forced silence. All eyes turned to him and the support on his right hand--

"Uh--" Rei scratched his cheek awkwardly, "I'm back?"

...and so, chaos began. They all charged forward shouting at him questions and indecipherable yells. Eventually, someone in the crowd shushed them all up.

"Are you really alright now, Rei?" a boy spoke up, worriedly.

"Huh, uh, yes?" Rei answered impusively it was almost on instinct.

"Ninomiya- god, I thought you frickin died! We were damn worried!" Another boy called out. "Woah, look at that arm! You look terrible, man!"

"Oh," Rei tucked his arm behind his back in attempt to hide it, "uh, it was broken, but it kinda healed mostly-" he chuckled dryly.

"You really don't need to go to the infirmary? I mean, you can always just stay in the infirmary forever y'know I mean- uh- I mean but-"

"Kuma would kill me!" Rei whined at that, "Also, I kinda skipped too many days, so I'm worried I won't get to go up the grade--"

"How bad were your injuries? Really, how many stitches did you get?"

"Hm? I guess you have to ask Kuma for that-"

"You got a scar on your temple, oh no!"

"Oh this? Hehe-" Rei put his left arm up to cover it, thinking up a reason to change the topic now.

But his saviour was a girl with auburn hair, that squirmed through the crowd to get to the center. Kyoko stood out as she separated the crowd from Rei.

"Now, everyone," she spoke up with her usual gentle smile, "I'm sure Rei needs a little rest."

At that, the crowd reluctantly scattered, but the mood was eased and calmed now. They all grinned and welcomed Rei back, then proceeded back to their daily activities.

Rei breathed out a sigh of relief as the crowd left him.

"Thanks, Kyoko." he said sincerely, "I was really-"

But Kyoko turned around with a smile almost too sweet for him. "Rei-kun." she started.

Rei felt a chill rush down his spine at the cold, cold tone the girl was using.

Kyoko turned fully to Rei, in her perfect poise and smile-- "May I speak to you up at the roof during recess?" she requested sweetly.

Rei felt his stomach drop in despair.

Silence unsued as the temperature in the room fell a few degrees.

Stares- stares of utter disbelief and shock were shot straight at Rei- they were at the verge of screaming out- because- this- this- this sounded exactly like a confession request??

Kyoko-chan? to Rei?

"Uh-" Rei's voice was stuck in his throat. Unlike the class, Rei's face was pale in utter, terrified, mortification. "Uh- sur- Sure! Sure!"

-

"I TOLD you not to push yourself!" Kyoko yelled.

Yeah, she yelled. The sweet, orange beauty, the star of this school-- is yelling at me.

I was kneeling on the ground, solemnly receiving the reprimand that was fired at me.

"Are you listening??"

I straightened up. "Yes, ma'am!"

Kyoko puffed up her cheeks in annoyance. "You're always like this, Rei-kun!" she scolded again, "You think too much about everything but yourself! Seriously, all of us are the only people worrying about you! Why can't you just take care of yourself more?"

I had to just calmly, calmly take it in.

Kyoko usually never gets angry. Her getting angry was the one and only thing no one has ever seen.

No one except Takeshi and I, at least. Because no one else is moronic enough to make the cinnamon sunshine girl angry.

I can't talk back. As per experience, if you talk back, this lecture will never end. And so, I kept quiet and waited for it to end.

"Do you understand?" she asked angrily. She was staring straight at me now, and I took it as a good sign that this reprimanding session was over soon.

"Hn." I reply.

Satisfied, she spoke up again, "Promise me to never do it again?"

"Hn." was my reply to that too.

But that striked Kyoko as weird. "...Rei," she spoke up, "are you listening to me?"

"Hn."

"Whats..." Kyoko spoke hesitantly, "One plus One?"

"Hn." I answered on autopilot.

...

FUCK, I MESSED UP!

When I looked back up, Kyoko was teary eyed.

She eyed me like I was a bully, with eyes laden and crowded with tears.

She sniffed, and a tear spilled out from each eye.

"Oh God- No wait- No don't- Kyo- Please- I'm-" I didn't know what to say as I panicked with every single cell in my body, freaking out with every nerve in my mind--

She was full on crying now, tears falling endlessly as she sniffed and rubbed her tears away.

"Kyoko! I'm really sorry! Sorry! Oh god, please I'm sorry don't cry! It was my fault please!!"

-

I ended up having to give her my lap as a pillow for the rest of break. She closed her eyes, snuggling closer in childish stubbornness as she refused to let me stand up.

My legs were terribly numb.

Rubbing her head soothingly, I sighed in relief as Kyoko stopped crying.