Riiiiing—
The alarm clock on the nightstand went off.
Miyahara Kaoru raised her hand and smacked it; the alarm fell silent, and she got up with a yawn.
The quilt slid off her body onto the bed.
Her beige pajamas wrapped a figure with pretty average curves.
But her skin was very fair.
Her features were delicate; she definitely looked like a beauty.
Miyahara Kaoru opened the box on the nightstand and put on her earrings one by one.
For newly pierced ears, you're not supposed to take the studs out, to avoid infection.
But for someone like her, whose ears were pierced long ago, she had to take the earrings off when sleeping to avoid accidents.
Miyahara Kaoru finished putting them on and ran to the bathroom to wash up.
The phone on the desk suddenly rang; Miyahara Kaoru hurriedly spat out the mouthwash, wiped her hands on her short skirt, and ran out of the bathroom.
She slid her index finger to answer.
A crisp voice came from the other end of the line: "Kaoru, it's graduation day today, are you up yet?"
"Yeah, I'll be at school right away."
Miyahara Kaoru replied.
The university she attended in Tokyo wasn't exactly prestigious, just average.
Ayatsuki Ayaka originally had the chance to get into a much better university.
Even though her grades were an absolute disaster, with her identity as one of the Treasure Users, places like Tokyo University and Waseda were completely at her mercy.
But she turned them down, and she didn't go to the same university as Aozawa either.
She chose Ivy University, where Takahashi Saeko, Tama Chan, and Miyahara Kaoru were enrolled.
Miyahara Kaoru got dressed, grabbed her bag, and rushed out the door.
The place she rented was only a three-minute walk from campus.
Soon, she saw Ayatsuki Ayaka waiting at the school gate.
The passing years had given her aura a touch of maturity; the only thing that hadn't changed was that sweet smile that always dispersed the gloom on people's faces and in their hearts like the sun.
"Senior Akizuki, can I have your autograph?" "Senior Akizuki, me too."
A group of little fangirls clustered around Ayatsuki Ayaka, asking her for signatures.
A lot of people enrolled in Ivy University specifically because Ayatsuki Ayaka was studying here.
"Haha."
Ayatsuki Ayaka didn't put on any airs at all; she cheerfully agreed to the underclassmen's requests and signed for them.
By now her signature no longer looked like a dog's scratchings the way it did at first; after some serious practice, the four kanji of "Ayatsuki Ayaka" had a bit of a soaring, powerful calligraphic flair—one glance and you'd think it was the work of a master calligrapher.
As for the rest of her handwriting, best not to bring it up.
Anyway, she only ever signed her name; she never wrote any extra blessing phrases.
Miyahara Kaoru hurried forward and said sternly, "All of you, make way!"
Seeing how unapproachable she looked, the underclassmen quickly scattered away from Ayatsuki Ayaka.
"Hehe, Kaoru, you're here. Saeko and Maru are so slow."
Ayatsuki Ayaka smiled, and there were tiny beads of sweat on her tanned forehead.
Miyahara Kaoru pulled out a tissue to wipe it off for her, saying gently, "If you call me, of course I'll come over right away."
"I have to give a speech on stage today, and I'm a little nervous. How do I look like this?"
Ayatsuki Ayaka spun around once. She had gone for a spring outfit: a very proper white shirt on top paired with a black suit jacket.
Below she wore a skirt that covered her knees, matched with fuzzy black tights and knee-high boots.
This proper outfit, completely different from her old Hot Girl style, was Ayatsuki Ayaka's way of taking into account that she was going to be on stage giving a speech, so of course she needed to dress formally.
She still loved that Hot Girl vibe even now, but she rarely dressed like that in public anymore.
With her current social status, it would be easy to trigger a mindless trend among the masses.
She had nothing against girls who genuinely wanted to be Hot Girls, but she felt that a bunch of naïve girls turning into Hot Girls just because of her would be a really awful thing.
In her view, being a Hot Girl was something you could pursue in high school; once you were in college, or even out in society, it was better not to dress like a Hot Girl anymore.
"You look great."
Miyahara Kaoru's face lit up with a smile.
Ayatsuki Ayaka clenched her fists excitedly, then saw Tama Chan and Takahashi Saeko coming over and waved quickly: "You two are so slow, the graduation ceremony's about to start.
Did you bring a camera to record my glorious moment?"
"Of course I did."
Takahashi Saeko took a camcorder out of her bag. She really wanted to complain: you're already a Treasure User, why do you care so much about giving a speech at graduation?
But then she thought, if Ayatsuki Ayaka didn't care about things like this, there's no way they could still be good friends despite such a huge gap in status.
The college years had changed Ayatsuki Ayaka a little, but her essence remained the same.
In front of them, she was still the same innocent sixteen-year-old girl from back then.
"Hehe, make sure you capture all of my gallant figure!"
Ayatsuki Ayaka lifted her chin and puffed out her chest.
Takahashi Saeko looked at her with a fond, pampering smile. "Okay, I'll make you look as great as the President of the United States."
...
"...I'm very happy to have studied at Ivy University. That's all."
Ayatsuki Ayaka stood at the podium and bowed to those below.
She wasn't just bowing to the teachers and students below, but also bidding farewell to the four years of youth she had spent at this university.
She had graduated.
From now on, she would never again be able to come back here as a student.
Saeko, Kaoru, Maru—they too would scatter in all directions because of their respective jobs.
In the future, the chances of them meeting would become fewer and fewer.
Once they got married and had children, being able to see each other even once a year might already count as lucky.
Thinking about those things, Ayatsuki Ayaka couldn't help feeling a wave of sadness, and tears welled up in her eyes.
Some of the fourth-years and the first-years in the audience also couldn't help looking sad.
It was just that their reasons for being sad weren't the same.
The fourth-years were feeling it from the heart.
The first-years felt more of a regret: they had only just enrolled, and this beautiful senior, this Treasure User you usually only saw on TV, was already about to leave the school.
