In Aki Rosenthal's Shadow: Feria's Secret Confession
A slightly strange school where Hololive talents attend. The popular Aki Rosenthal is everyone's idol, always having fun. But right next to her is always her best friend, Feria. Feria adores Aki. But that 'adoration' isn't just friendship. Deep down, she's secretly in love with her.
One day, a popular boy at school confesses his feelings to Aki. Watching that, Feria feels her heart shatter. 'I have to support her... as her best friend.' She thinks that, but inside she's a mess. Jealousy, sadnes
In Aki Rosenthal's Shadow: Feria's Secret Confession - Broken Mask and the Night Shrine's Secret Pact
The classroom after school was filled with an unusual energy.
Two weeks until the school festival. All across Hoshizaki Academy, preparations for the mock shops were kicking into high gear. Even in Class 2-C's room, groups painting signs on pushed-together desks mingled with others doing rough fittings for costumes.
But Feria's eyes were fixed on just one spot.
The corner by the window. Aki and Mizuki.
The two were on the production team for the class's mock shop — a maze-style haunted house — and today, as always, they were assembling cardboard. Aki held the packing tape in place while Mizuki cut it with a box cutter. Their movements were perfectly in sync, and every time their shoulders brushed, Aki would laugh, embarrassed.
" Mizuki-kun, that part's bent! A little more to the left!"
" Like this? You're so particular."
" Because it'd be a disaster if it collapsed during the real thing! We have to make it properly."
Aki's smile was like the sun itself.
But watching that light directed at Mizuki, something inside Feria's chest made a faint, unpleasant crackle. Mizuki picked a scrap of paper out of Aki's hair. Casually, naturally. Aki froze for a moment, then her face flushed red.
(*Don't touch her.*)
Feria dropped her gaze to her own hands. The scissors she was holding clamped down on the cardboard and wouldn't move. Her fingertips had gone white.
(*Stop it. You don't have the right to touch Aki.*)
The voice in her heart swirled, dark and ugly. But her face still wore the mask of a best friend.
" Aki, I'm heading to club soon."
She managed to keep her voice bright. The finest lie from someone who was good at seeing through them.
" Oh, is it that time already? You have plans with Yuu-senpai today, right?"
" Yeah. It's a literature club activity day."
That wasn't true. It wasn't an activity day. But staying in the classroom had become unbearable.
Aki gave a small wave and immediately returned to her work with Mizuki. Feria left the room. Walking down the hallway, she let out a deep breath.
(*They're always working together. Just like lovers.*)
Only the sound of her own footsteps echoed coldly.
★
The literature club room in the "Kazenone" club building was as quiet as ever.
The old sofa, the towers of stacked books, the afternoon light slanting through the window. Feria opened the door and stepped into the empty room. Yuu-senpai hadn't arrived yet.
She set down her bag and sank into the sofa.
She pulled out her phone. On the screen was a certain contact. A number she'd gotten from a first-year on the soccer team yesterday.
— *Senpai, please tell me about the match in middle school.*
A whole day had passed since she'd sent that short message. It showed as read, but there was no reply.
(*I guess it's no use after all.*)
The moment she thought that, her phone vibrated.
*'I want to meet and talk. Come behind the club building tomorrow.'*
Feria caught her breath. Her fingers went cold.
(*With this, I might learn something.*)
★
Behind the club building, it was deserted.
A gap between school buildings, a place the sunlight never reached. The ground was damp and smelled of moss. Feria arrived ten minutes before the promised time and waited, leaning against the wall.
Five minutes later, a man appeared.
A tall third-year wearing a soccer team jersey. His name, if she remembered right, was Takashi-senpai. He should have been the vice-captain at last year's national tournament.
" You're the first-year looking into Mizuki."
Takashi glanced around, then began speaking in a low voice.
" I've had my doubts about him for a long time too. So I'll talk. But don't tell anyone."
Feria gave a small nod.
" The national tournament in our last year of middle school. The semifinal, before the final. The opposing team's ace had an old injury in his left knee. Before the match, Mizuki told us: 'Target his left.' It was a match we could have won playing clean, but he chose to crush him for sure."
— *Target him.*
Those words alone made Feria's entire body go cold.
" The opponent was injured and had to leave in the first half. We cruised into the final. After the match, Mizuki answered interviews with a clean face. 'It's the result of giving it our all,' or something like that. No one thought it was under his orders."
" Is there proof?"
Takashi pulled an old phone from his pocket.
" The team's group chat from back then. Mizuki's orders are still there."
On the screen, a message from three years ago was displayed. *'Target the opposing ace's left knee. Just making him fall is enough.'*
Sender — Mizuki Shion.
As Feria took a photo of the screen, she felt her hands trembling.
(*This is his true nature.*)
★
When she returned to the literature club room, Yuu-senpai was sitting on the sofa.
A short bob of bluish-black hair. Long bangs tucked behind an ear, reading a book through round glasses. On the ring finger of her left hand, an old silver ring. Her usual quiet figure.
" What's wrong, Feria? You don't look well."
Yuu's deep green eyes gazed steadily at Feria. This person was always like that. Even without words, her eyes seemed to see straight through to the deepest depths of someone's heart.
Feria held out her phone screen.
Yuu took it without a word and scrolled through the screen. Her expression didn't change. But she definitely understood what she was reading.
" I see. A not-so-pretty part of Mizuki-kun's past."
" Should I... tell Aki about this?"
Her voice was so weak it surprised even herself.
Yuu closed her book and leaned back against the sofa. The old springs creaked.
" Let me ask you one thing."
Yuu's voice was as flat as ever. But her eyes were endlessly kind.
" Is it because you want to protect Aki as her best friend? Or — to justify your own jealousy?"
— *Thrust.*
The words stabbed into Feria's chest like a blade.
" ...That's..."
Her voice trembled.
" Can you say for sure that it's not?"
Feria couldn't answer.
She tried to open her mouth, then closed it. Tried again, closed it again. Her throat was bone-dry, and she couldn't breathe properly.
(*It's not.*)
(*It is.*)
(*I want to protect Aki — but that's only half of it.*)
(*The other half is just that I don't want anyone to take Aki from me.*)
" I'm... the worst."
Her own voice sounded distant, like someone else's.
Yuu stood up quietly. She walked to the window and looked down at the schoolyard dyed in the sunset.
" Feria's feelings might not be pretty. But — they're properly your own. If you deny them, you'll only suffer more."
" But I'm about to hand over information that could hurt Aki, driven by my own jealousy. I'm a failure as a best friend."
" A best friend isn't someone who always does the right thing. They do the wrong thing, regret it, and still stay by the other's side. That's what I think it is."
Yuu turned around and smiled, just a little.
" Whether to give that information to Aki is something Feria has to decide. But before you decide, think carefully. What do you really want to do? What should you do so you won't have regrets?"
Feria hugged her knees on the sofa.
She still didn't have an answer.
★
Before she knew it, the dormitory lights-out time had long since passed.
Aki was already asleep. From the top bunk, the sound of her regular breathing drifted down. Feria lay in her own bed, staring fixedly at the wood grain of the ceiling.
(*What should I do?*)
Yuu-senpai's question repeated over and over in her head.
(*For my best friend?*)
(*For my own jealousy?*)
It was neither. It was both. She couldn't even understand her own feelings anymore — they were a tangled mess.
She sat up quietly.
She put her feet on the floor. The cold linoleum against her skin seemed, if anything, to cool her head with sharp clarity. She threw on a jacket and took out a sheet of stationery from her desk drawer, along with the fountain pen she used — the one she'd untied from the pink ribbon she shared with Aki.
(*I'll write.*)
The nib raced across the paper.
*'To Aki,*
*I love you.*
*Not as a best friend, but in a different way. I love you.*
*I could never say it. I thought if I did, my relationship with you would break.*
*But I want to say it after all. Even if you never read this letter.*
*It hurts to see you laughing with someone else.*
*When I'm close to you, my heart pounds. When we're apart, my chest aches.*
*I've known for a long time that this is love.*
*I'm sorry. Even though I'm your best friend.*
*I'm sorry. Even though I love you.*
*I want to think that as long as you're happy, that's enough,*
*but right now, I don't think I can manage that at all.*
*Feria'*
The last few letters blurred slightly from tears.
She folded the stationery into quarters and slipped it into her pocket. The dormitory hallway was pitch black, with only the green of the emergency lights glowing faintly.
(*The Seven Wonders of the Academy.*)
(*If you place a letter at the underground shrine, your feelings will be delivered.*)
There was a rumor like that. Half joke, half serious among the students.
Right now, Feria couldn't help but cling to that superstition.
★
The basement of the main building was dim and chilly even during the day.
At night, the air was cold and damp. The pale light of the emergency lamps illuminated the stairs. Step by step, she descended carefully.
In the basement storage room, old teaching tools and broken desks were piled up, and in the far corner, there was a shrine, tucked away quietly.
A small stone shrine, said to have been here even before Hoshizaki Academy was built. No one knew anymore who had made it or why. Only the rumor had been passed down for so long — that if you placed a letter there, it would be gone by the next day.
Feria knelt before the shrine.
(*Please.*)
(*It doesn't have to reach anyone.*)
(*I just want to leave these feelings somewhere.*)
With trembling hands, she took out the letter and placed it on the small shelf of the shrine.
Then, just as she tried to stand — at that moment.
" What are you doing, at this time of night?"
— A voice that felt like an icy hand crawling up her spine.
She turned around to see Mizuki standing at the entrance to the storage room. Even in the darkness, his black eyes were clearly fixed on Feria. The green of the emergency lights cast eerie shadows across Mizuki's face.
" Mizuki-kun... why are you..."
" The soccer team meeting ran late. When I went to return the balls to the gym storage, I saw someone going into the main building. I didn't think it would be you, though."
Mizuki slowly walked closer. The sound of his leather shoes echoed heavily on the concrete floor.
" This is... it's not what you think."
" Not what I think? What isn't?"
Mizuki stood before the shrine and glanced at the letter on the shelf.
She wanted to run. But her legs wouldn't move. As if she'd been bound by a spell, she was pinned to the spot.
" This place, right — it's the shrine from the Seven Wonders. You put a letter here and your feelings get delivered — that rumor. Do you have something you want to tell Aki?"
" Stop. I have to go."
Finally forcing out her voice, Feria tried to slip past Mizuki. But his hand shot out quickly and grabbed the letter.
" Too bad. Even if you leave it in a place like this, it won't reach anyone."
Feria broke into a run.
She raced up the stairs. Her heart was pounding at an impossible speed. She was out of breath, her legs threatening to tangle.
(*He saw it.*)
(*He's going to read the letter.*)
(*My most precious feelings —*)
★
The next day.
A morning greeted after a completely sleepless night.
Aki was as cheerful as always, not noticing Feria's distress at all. That, today, was her only salvation.
Even during class, her mind was blank.
Had Mizuki read the letter? If he had —
Only the worst imaginings swirled around and around.
At lunch break, as Feria tried to leave the classroom, Mizuki, who had been wai
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