I traced my finger along the other leg of the bench, and an identical seam split it in two, pushing the tilted edge downward, levelling my seat straight.
"Kamukura, you're my lifelong enemy from now on!" Rin grumbled, rising to her feet and patting dust from her skirt and black stockings, her eyes narrowed.
I didn't leave it level for long. Reclining back, I tipped the bench diagonal again, balancing it at a steep bend. A centimeter behind and it would fall backward, an inch ahead and it would flip forward.
Looking at my actions with a raised eyebrow, Rin crossed her arms beneath her breasts, tapping her heel against soil at irregular intervals.
"Won't you take a seat now?" I asked while tilting my head toward her, long hair following my movement.
She glanced at the bench first, then its legs held at a precise angle, then at my face.
"Hmph. You're as insufferable as always." Her words were immediately followed by her shin swinging toward a bench leg closest to her.
I shifted my weight toward my own edge, and the bench's far leg lifted off ground, clearing her swipe by a fraction as her kick cut through empty air where it had been.
Before losing balance, I brought it back down with another shift.
"Trying to fight me while sitting on a bench, are you serious?" Rin's mouth fell open, and she stared in my direction with wide eyes.
Ignoring her words, I curled my hand inward, gesturing her over while fully setting the bench straight.
She closed her mouth and strutted over, flicking loose soil out of her way with short, irritated jabs.
After lowering herself beside me, she abruptly went silent, her hair falling forward to cover her eyes, lips going flat.
Quiet stretched between us for a minute straight.
When she broke it, her voice had lost its light tone, turning heavy and low.
"You won the Grail War."
Her words did not carry any resentment, yet I could sense something underneath them.
"... My teacher died after whatever you did with the Grail." I could see her fingers curl around this bench's edge, knuckles turning white, accompanied by the sound of wood creaking inward.
"I had my servants do some research on him. The overseer Kirei Kotomine, right?"
She nodded her head fractionally, face still fixed forward toward the sunrise.
"Do you hate me for it?" I asked, elbows dropping to my knees, gloved fingers intertwining.
A dewdrop fell from a leaf ahead, and on the surface of that drop, my own face was reflected, still that same blank expression, crimson eyes like a dull, polished surface.
"Do you know what he told me before dying in my arms?" Without replying, she asked a question of her own.
Before I could gesture, she continued. "He told me that he was the one who killed my father in the last war by stabbing him in the back when he least expected it."
More than three hundred of my parallel thoughts halted simultaneously, all of them redirecting their focus toward her.
"And he was laughing in between, saying he could still feel the taste of betrayal on his tongue, exquisite even now."
Silence settled between us for a moment.
Then the sound of teeth grinding against teeth echoed from her, and the bench's edge in her grip gave way, splinters erupting into her palm.
A deep exhale and her shoulders went slack, hair pulling back to reveal her eyes, soft and relaxed, unlike the narrowed ones from before.
"So... no, I don't really hate you for killing him." Rin swung her legs slightly, but then her face scrunched up at my lack of reaction. "Maybe I do hate you, just a teeny-tiny bit."
I reclined the bench back fractionally. Her balance went with it, back swinging with her legs, arms scrambling for something to catch.
"No! I really really hate you, Kamukura!"
She screamed as I held her at the peak for one second, nothing to balance her, body falling backward, about to flip headfirst into the soil, and then I brought her back down, bench legs slamming on ground.
Her fists were already sailing for my arm, too light for a punch, too strong for a push, something in between.
There was a ninety-six percent chance that they couldn't even ruffle my coat, and any movement to dodge them would use up more energy than remaining still, so I did exactly that, letting them connect.
Her knuckles grazed my arm four times, and she seemed to have reached a conclusion. Her next punch tore through air in full force, screaming for my face.
"... You don't learn, do you?"
Those words had barely left my mouth when I leaned my body into her strike, the back of my head adjusting fractionally to touch her fist's edge, shoving it sideways into the bench's frame.
Her fist met wood, and she screamed, wrenching her arm back, blowing on her red knuckles.
Blinking hard to keep tears from falling, Rin glared in my direction mid-blow.
I looked at her expression, and my lips twitched upward on their own for one second, two, before I forced them down, an exhale slipping through.
"Did you just laugh at me!?" She launched herself crown-first at me, red knuckles forgotten momentarily.
But I was already rising to my feet, clear of her dive's trajectory entirely by the time she reached it, leaving her head to careen toward the bench's side rail.
Rin's eyes constricted, that metal rail enlarging in her vision, lips trembling as she braced for impact.
My finger pressed against her forehead first, slowing her dive and bleeding off her momentum before she came to a halt centimeters from the railing.
She took some time to process what had happened while I pulled my finger back, slipping my other hand into my pocket.
Withdrawing a pair of envelopes, I deposited them onto her frozen hands hovering mid-air.
"Huh?" Rin snapped out of it. "... What is this?"
Glancing around, I noticed the dewdrops across those leaves around us had started to evaporate now.
It's time, then.
I turned on my heels and took a step away, voice reaching her anyway.
"They're admission letters, signed by the vice director of Clock Tower, Barthomeloi Lorelei. You and your sister can study there under her oversight after you finish your schooling here, if you'd like."
Her breath hitched at those words, shoulders going rigid.
"Why would you give something so precious—"
"This is goodbye, Tohsaka."
Rin went silent, eyes tracing my back as I continued to move further and further away, the horizon painting my black coat in shades of orange-gold.
Her fingers crushed into the admission letters.
She screamed after me.
"Will I ever see you again!?"
I paused.
"I... don't know."
Then resumed walking again.
"Maybe."
That was the last time I met Rin Tohsaka.
...
..
.
***
[200 Power Stones = 1 Bonus Chapter]
[10 chapters ahead on P@tr3on = [email protected]/Not_Aaryan]
...
[Author's Thoughts]
And, that closes our chapter on Rin. This is a goodbye... I'll miss you too, Rin.
Now some people might want me to literally specify what Izuru feels for Tohsaka, is there anything worthwhile there? So I'll answer it here.
What Izuru feels for Rin is... fondness without attachment, and that too because he's messed with Tohsaka too many times for no reason at all.
Anyway... have a rocking day, everyone!