In near-future Japan, a sudden genetic mutation has caused the birth ratio of men to women to collapse to 1:50. Men are protected by the state as living national treasures, while women fight desperately to win a man's heart and secure a future. High school student Yuma Arimura transfers into a mixed-gender school where boys are almost nonexistent. The moment he walks into class, girls scream, faint, snap photos, and whisper about wanting to be his. Yuma just wants a normal life, but everywhere h
National Treasure High - Stop being a National Treasure and become a man.
The cold concrete room was saturated with the smell of blood.
Warehouse No. 7 in the old East Tachikawa warehouse district. In its deepest corner, Arimura Yuuma was bound to a metal drum, his arms tied behind his back. His arms bore countless injection marks. The needle for genetic extraction was closing in, mere centimeters away.
(This is bad. Really, really bad.)
His teeth wouldn't stop chattering. He might die. The moment that thought crossed his mind, the area around his bladder suddenly loosened, and something warm trickled down his thigh.
Before him stood two women in black suits. Cladnes operatives—commonly known as "Branches." The woman with her hair tied high pressed a cotton ball soaked in disinfectant against Yuuma's arm.
"Don't struggle. I'll make sure it doesn't hurt."
Yuuma forced his voice out.
"You people... are you seriously going to sell me?"
"Obviously. You're merchandise. How much do you think the genes of a National Treasure specimen are worth?"
The other woman readied a syringe. The silver needle glinted dully in the dim warehouse.
That was when it happened.
A thunderous roar.
The warehouse's iron door blew inward.
"—Found you."
A reddish-brown short bob swayed amid the scattering iron debris. Hawata Suzui. A third-year at Seirei Academy who hated men. Three piercings in her left ear, countless old scars on both hands. She had kicked the door down and was the first to charge in.
"Keep your damn hands off that man!!"
Suzui rushed the two operatives, grabbing one by the collar and slamming her against the wall. The other drew a short blade. But from behind her, a quiet voice rang out.
"Please don't move."
A dark silver ponytail. Large blue-violet eyes. Tobe Setsu. Yuuma's apprentice guard, sixteen years old. She deployed her guard ring—a telescopic stun baton issued to guards—and pressed it against the operative's neck.
CRACK!!
Blue-white sparks. The operative's body convulsed and collapsed to the ground. Setsu showed no emotion. She moved only to protect Yuuma.
"Arimura-sama. Are you injured?"
"Setsu... how did you know where—"
"I analyzed the power usage patterns of the warehouse district from the coordinates just before your identag's location signal cut off. That's all."
A matter-of-fact tone. But beneath her bangs, Setsu's eyes wavered ever so slightly.
Suzui glanced back toward the warehouse entrance.
"Hey, I'm leaving the rear to you. You're the only one who looks like she'd be dead weight."
Standing there was Hikami Sumika. Her waist-length black-purple hair was stained with dust and gunpowder smoke. Her narrow, sharp eyes stared straight at Yuuma.
"Hawata-san. I won't be dead weight. I came all this way to stand beside Yuuma-kun."
Sumika's voice was low and trembling. A voice mixed with madness, desperation, and something deeper—a prayer.
But from the back of the warehouse, three more operatives appeared.
"Eliminate the intruders. Take the man alive."
The moment the voice sounded, Suzui moved.
"Bring it on!!"
Suzui threw one of the operatives. A shoulder throw. The woman's head slammed against the concrete floor, and she went limp, eyes rolling back. Suzui's boxing-hardened fist sank into the next operative's face. The sound of bone breaking. Suzui was laughing.
Meanwhile, before Yuuma's eyes, the situation was taking the worst possible turn.
"Ah-ah, don't come any closer."
Further back in the warehouse, a woman who appeared to be an executive in a black suit had twisted the arm of a platinum-blonde young lady—Shirase Inori—behind her back. Inori had been restrained as a mole.
Inori was the daughter of the Shirase Medico family. A bewitching, intelligent woman who had been after the rights to Yuuma's genes.
That same Inori whispered into the executive's ear.
"I destroyed your organization. I leaked everything anonymously to the Human Goods Management Agency. The Shirase family, your transaction records—all of it."
The executive's face twisted with terror and rage.
"You... you whore."
Inori turned toward Yuuma and smiled. That bewitching red lipstick looked like blood in the dark warehouse.
"Yuuma-kun. I'm glad I got to meet you."
The next instant.
SHLUCK.
The short blade in the executive's hand plunged deep into Inori's abdomen.
"Guh... ah..."
Red spread across Inori's white blouse. Red far too vivid. It dripped onto the floor with a wet splatter.
(Huh?)
Yuuma's mind went completely blank.
Inori crumpled. She fell to her knees on the ground, yet she never took her eyes off Yuuma. Coughing blood, she smiled with just her lips.
"...That's why... it's okay now. You didn't use me as a tool. That alone is enough."
"Inori—!!"
Yuuma screamed. The ropes bit into his arms, and the drum clattered. The syringe fell to the floor with a metallic clang. The sound of Suzui kicking operatives. The sound of Setsu swinging her guard ring. All of it felt distant.
Before his eyes: Inori's blood. Red. Far too red.
The fear of death. The warmth of urine. The pain of the ropes. Everything crashed over him at once, and Yuuma, on the verge of vomiting, kept screaming Inori's name.
---
Sumika picked up an iron pipe that had been lying on the warehouse floor.
A meter-long, rusted lump of iron. Far too heavy for her slender arms, she gripped it with both hands and raised it overhead.
"Move. Get out of my way."
Sumika's eyes shone with an eerie light. When her emotions wavered, her pupils glowed uncannily. The operatives flinched for an instant.
THUD.
Sumika swung the iron pipe full-force into an operative's temple. A dull sound. The woman's body flew sideways. Sumika didn't stop. She raised it again, swinging down a second time, a third time.
"Don't touch my Yuuma-kun."
Blood sprayed. She couldn't tell whose. Red droplets splattered across Sumika's cheek. Still, she ran toward Yuuma. Her high heels snapped. Barefoot, she dragged the iron pipe behind her.
Sumika collapsed to her knees in front of Yuuma.
"Yuuma-kun. Yuuma-kun."
Sumika's hands reached for the ropes binding Yuuma's arms. Her nails were split, blood seeping from beneath them. With her bare hands, she tried to untie the knots of the hard rope. No matter how hard she pulled, they wouldn't budge.
"Why? Why won't it come undone? Please. I'm begging you."
Sumika struck her own thighs with her fists. Again and again. As if trying to hold onto her sanity through the pain.
"I couldn't protect you. I failed again. Yuuma-kun, all alone..."
Tears streamed down Sumika's dirt-stained cheeks. She broke down sobbing, apologizing over and over in a voice that sounded like she might vomit.
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. It's my fault. If only I'd stopped Inori-san sooner. Everything is my fault. I promised I'd protect you. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Yuuma-kun."
Yuuma looked at Sumika's hands.
Battered hands. Split nails. Bloodied fingers. And still, she fumbled at the knots with trembling hands, trying to free him.
(This girl... she's always like this.)
A dull ache spread through the center of Yuuma's heart. Sumika's possessiveness. Her madness. But beneath it all, it had always been this. I want to protect you. I want to protect you. That was all—and yet she kept blaming herself for failing, bloodying her own hands in the process.
"Sumika. That's enough."
Bound as he was, Yuuma gripped her hands back.
"I'll go. In your place, I'll protect you."
Sumika's eyes flew wide open. Tears streamed down her skin, stained with blood and dust.
"Yuuma... kun..."
---
Inori, still sprawled on the ground, pressed one hand against her stomach and reached out with the other. In her hand was a small knife. A folding knife for self-defense.
"Sumika... use this."
Sumika glanced at Inori for just a moment. The rift between them. The stairway incident. The betrayal. And yet now, Inori held out the knife.
Sumika took it without a word.
"...I'll remember this."
Sumika pressed the blade against the ropes behind Yuuma's back and cut through them in one motion.
SNAP. SNAP.
The ropes fell away.
Yuuma's body was free.
---
"You bastards! There's still two more over here!"
Suzui kicked one of the operatives away and shouted toward Yuuma. In her hand was a guard ring she'd snatched from an enemy. She hurled it at Yuuma.
"Hey, man! Catch!"
Yuuma caught the guard ring on reflex. It was heavy. A silver baton. Faint arcs of electricity escaped from its tip.
"Use that to protect yourself at least. The days of the National Treasure-sama who just gets protected are over, right?"
Suzui's lips twisted into a crooked grin. It was the moment when the lonely, clumsy girl behind those sharp eyes handed Yuuma his first role as a "man."
Yuuma gripped the guard ring tightly.
An operative lunged at him. Yuuma swung his arm without hesitation.
CRACKLE!!
The electric shock struck the operative's shoulder directly.
"GYAAH!"
The operative collapsed. Yuuma's fingers were trembling. He was scared. But he had moved. To protect, he had moved.
Sumika watched Yuuma's back, unable to stop her tears. For the first time, she understood what it felt like to be protected by him.
"Ah... so that's what it was."
Sumika's voice trembled, but she definitely smiled.
---
From outside the warehouse, shouts and sirens drew near.
"Freeze!! This is the Human Goods Management Agency!"
"This is the police! Everyone on the ground, now!!"
Bursting in were guards from the Human Goods Management Agency and a police special unit. The information Inori had sent anonymously had finally borne fruit. Instructors from the guard academy had also rushed in, searching for their student Setsu.
The operatives were subdued one after another.
Inori, still on the ground, laughed.
"...You're too late. Honestly."
The bleeding from her abdomen hadn't stopped. A red puddle soaked her platinum-blonde hair.
"Get Inori-san treated immediately! Bring the paramedics over here!"
As Inori was loaded onto a stretcher, she called Yuuma's name.
"Yuuma-kun."
Yuuma ran to her side.
"Inori... why would you... go this far..."
Inori's blue eyes caught his. Her eyes, which should have been cold, were cold no longer.
"Because you didn't use me as a tool. ...I love you. That's all it is, I'm sure."
Yuuma gripped her hand. Inori's fingers were cold as ice.
"I won't forget you. I'll never forget you."
Inori smiled. A gentle, girlish smile he had never seen before.
Sumika touched Inori's other hand.
"Do you hate me?"
Inori slowly shook her head.
"Right now... not so much."
Those words quietly crumbled the outline of Inori's hatred.
The paramedics carried Inori away.
"Yuuma-kun... let's meet again, okay?"
Inori's voice was already fading.
---
Several days later.
Seirei Academy. The classroom entrance.
When Yuuma opened the door, four women stood there.
Sumika, with her waist-length black-purple hair. She wore her usual refined smile, but there was something lighter about her now, as if she'd let go of something.
Suzui, with her reddish-brown short bob. Still wearing her usual sullen expression, she leaned against the wall, glancing at Yuuma as if trying to match her story with his.
Setsu, with her dark silver ponytail. Her blue-violet eyes turned toward him, and the corners of her mouth softened slightly.
And Inori—still not discharged from the hospital—but as the fourth "person waiting," a letter had been placed on her desk.
Yuuma stood in the center of the classroom.
The eyes of his classmates gathered on him all at once.
"I am no one's property. I'm not a National Treasure, not a resource, not a gene tank. My life is mine to choose."
The classroom fell completely silent.
"And on top of that, I'll say this. If you've entered my life, then I'll enter yours too. I'll protect all of you. As a man, I'll stand beside you. That's the answer I've reached."
Sumika's face lit up radiantly.
Suzui turned away to hide her embarrassment and muttered under her breath.
"...It's not like I want to be friends or anyth
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