Crossover Fan Fiction ❯ Bitter And Murky ❯ Philosophy For Beginners ( Chapter 2 )

There was a car accident this morning. I’d been delayed making breakfast for Komachi, who was having a hard time waking up for the first day of school. I’d carried her to school on my bike, which for some reason no police officer seemed to notice despite this technically being illegal in Japan. Mostly because it is dangerous and leads to accidents. A few minutes after I dropped her off, a few kilometers closer to school I heard tires squeal and a yelp. I rode closer and found, a dog had leapt out into the road and was hit by a car. Its owner, a girl with orange hair, was cradling its body.

“Sable! Sable!” she wept. It didn’t look good for the dog, and the owner was distraught. A uniformed man, probably the chauffeur, stood nearby looking uncertainly between the girl and his damaged car. It was a fancy car, one of those expensive V12 Toyota Century limousines. There were two women in the back seat.

I’d run late thanks to helping Komachi. If I’d been as early as I’d planned, I might have been in the thick of this, maybe even gotten hit by the big car. I would probably have broken my leg, or maybe died and been isekaied into some stupid world where people wave sharpened thin slabs of metal at large animals and get told to defeat some demon lord. Demon Lord? Ha! That’s the Prime Minister Abe. All anime demon lords are Japan’s PM. He kept Japan poor for twenty years now, and everything he does makes sure things won’t improve. Foreign economists write articles about this, because Japanese won’t dare. The law would see them jailed for dishonoring his name, or killed by a policemen while “resisting arrest”. Or hit by one of those box trucks that speed through town centers and neighborhoods all the time. They never get stopped by the police, of course.

I averted my eyes from the weeping girl with her orange hair, a warning sign of red flags if ever there was one. I left that moment of drama behind and got to school.

“Drop your bag off at your classroom, then return here to join for roll call,” reminded a bored student council person, a girl with glasses and tousled hair. Kind of cute, I suppose, if I were superficial. I changed my shoes with my assigned locker and climbed the staired to drop off my bag in our classroom 2F, as directed. Returned outside to join my new classmates. Banners pointed us to where each class went for roll call.

Milling around the 2F sign were a number of students, my classmates apparently. There were some bleach blonde gyaru, a meganeko woman fountaining blood from her nose, some nerds looking nervous, a pretty woman with blue-grey long hair standing alone with nicotine stains on her fingers, a boyish girl or girlish boy, and a few RBFs glaring at everyone. RBF stands for “resting bitch face” and it really says it all in the title. There were also some Beta-Bros near the gyaru and a yankee Alpha male with bleach-blonde hair and a fake smile.

I gave them plenty of room and waited, observing behaviors. The biggest red flag of them all is the sensei. She was pretty, but wore no ring, thus was unmarried. A pretty woman without a wedding ring is a big red flag by itself. She wore a lab coat over her black lady-suit and body hugging trousers. Her tousled hair ran down to her calves, and her breasts were relatively large without being too big. This woman in that outfit would probably attract a man at a bar or izakaya, but the lack of ring meant there was a bigger problem. She was physically attractive, but her RBF was another huge red flag. My contemplation of this dangerous sensei was interrupted by one of the bald senseis. He emerged from the building, handing her a note. She glanced at it, then read it again, before marking a clipboard where the roll sheet and other information presumably lay. I waited. With the others. A signal was given and we lined up, as ordered.

Shortly we entered the gymnasium and lined up by classroom, then greeted the principal and were eventually seated. There were speeches about youth and integrity and advancing ourselves through education and the various other things that are said in public schools. A slightly more grown up version of what we got in Middle School. I noted that my only male friend, Zaimokuza Yoshiteru, was in a different part of the gym, meaning a different classroom. He looked to be daydreaming again.

Yoshi’s confession back in Middle School had gone poorly. Orimoto had rejected him, acting shocked that her demeanour had caused her to send wrong signals to ordinary males suggesting she was open to potential dating requests. This was not so, and her behavior was just Female Chameleon behavior. Considering her family were minions in some company in Chiba, this is not surprising. Minions exist to say yes and to work too hard. My own parents are similar. The classroom students had opted to bully him over it for the next few months, defacing his desk, putting tacks in his shoes, and leaving messages on the chalkboard. As is traditional in Japan, the teachers sided with the bullies, demanding the victim clean up the mess and stop whining about it. Strangely enough, the lack of available firearms has probably prevented a lot of school shootings in retaliation, because this sort of thing happens in every city, all the time. It is also the leading cause of suicide in Japan, though ending this problem is completely beyond the school administrators because Japan is a crappy country.

Yoshi went mad from the bullying and ended up avoiding school and transferred to another, then applied to and passed the entrance exams for Soubu. And good for him. None of those shit-bird clowns were smart enough to get in here. We are the cream of the crop for Chiba City and its million residents and one hundred thousand kids. The best of the best. That’s us.

I’d done well on my exam, since I’d quickly realized, seeing Orimoto’s disgust, that women are poison to a man. You can be happy or you can get married, but you can’t be both. Schopenhauer was right about that. He believed in Nietzsche and man’s purpose being self-improvement. It is a shame that the Nazis managed to completely misunderstand Nietzsche and thus defamed him because as a philosophy it is valid. Be the best you can be, and let no one interfere in that. Distractions are everywhere. Orimoto made me give up video games and light novels, and all forms of fantasy and distraction. I’d turned my spare time to study, gaining the best marks of my year.

Rather than get into the International class, most of which are women and half the lectures are in English, I’d opted for placement in general studies. I have little interest in impressing corporations, or suffering the RBF of two dozen angry women with Princess Complexes. They would hate me for being better than them, and attack me for being Weak with English. I am learning it, but I am not fluent yet. Attracting hatred from inherently retaliatory beings is harmful to my education and my goals. I phrased my request without using such obvious references or language, but I still managed to land an ordinary classroom in the best high school in a city of a million people. And I am the top student of my year. It will take a lot of work to retain that position. Even now, sitting in this auditorium, I am reciting verb tenses in English, silently. English is needed for my future. I listen to economic news online when I get home, trying to understand the American monetary system. After all, it never helps to do all the work and make the right choices when a single wrong choice finds you multiplying by Zero and getting nothing for all your effort. Be careful about that. Multiplying by Zero can destroy you for good.

Japan is a dying economy. Japan has multiplied by zero. You cannot succeed here. You have to go where things are rational and sane. One needs English to succeed in the business world. All the really cool things in the world are happening in America. So much software and hardware development. New robotics that can move like animals. New aircraft invisible to radar, or able to nearly fly itself for wealthy owners. Even small private aircraft are valuable and advanced luxury goods. Things Japanese don’t own, because we are too poor, too backwards, too unable to adapt to the modern world. A simple search on the internet turns up we are at least ten years in the past compared with everyone else. Only tropical islanders are more backwards than we are. And most of those are communists with drug problems.

We went to our classroom and were assigned seats by the sensei. I managed to land a seat on the right side of the classroom, midway down, next to the interior wall. No windows to distract me. I listened to sensei’s lecture on classroom behavior, expectations for homework quality, and various things she wanted us to do, including classroom cleanup and class rep assignment. I ignored it as best as I could, preferring to focus on study, getting ahead on my modern Japanese as she gave us introductory reading assignments on her subject. The hour finished and we briefly left for bathroom breaks, it being two hours since we arrived.

The next teacher rotated in and began his introductory lecture on history. Repeat the next hour with a lecture on Mathematics and a quiz. It was simple enough and I aced it. I had been weak in math back in Middle School, but I studied hard and got some online assistance so I wouldn’t have to spend my youth with a bunch of future minions and union employees. No thank you. Math is the way out of that sewer. Yoshiteru went mad with chuuni delusions and wore ridiculous clothes as a defense. I studied and got educated. It was paying off now. The quiz was easy, so I am sure I aced every question.

Lunch break came soon enough and I took my bento and left the classroom to find a seat under that big cherry tree I could barely see the top of out the window. May as well enjoy this temporary thing. The national obsession with cherry blossoms as metaphors for youth sounds great to foreigners, but to Japanese it’s a tired cliché. Still pretty, but a cliché. For most Japanese over 20, it is an excuse for a picnic and public drunkenness.

The sakura petals fell and I enjoyed my bento and thermos of slightly sweetened black tea. It was nice. Solitude has a certain idyllic quality I have learned to enjoy. Naturally this meant I was interrupted by the arrival of Zaimokuza.

“Hachiman, my comrade in arms! I greet you in the way of our forefathers and as a fellow veteran, I declare!” he boisterously shouted with then ending “de gozaru”. I waved and pointed for him to sit down.

“Congratulations on your entry in our new school. The grounds are nice and it’s well maintained. How is your class?” I asked him politely and at a reasonable volume, indicating my disapproval. His inflated chest collapsed to what I knew to be its true state. Yoshiteru does not do pushups. He does not do situps. He does, as we say, eat potato chips. And he fashions himself a fiction writer. He wants to publish. I am not hopeful, and after struggling with his prior drafts and his ignoring my advice I am left refusing to read drafts until he makes major changes. Like incorporating basic grammar and removing English words as spells. Those tropes are garbage, and they won’t sell. This entire Isekai genre is dead. Nobody will be watching that in 10 years. Just you see. Time will prove me right. By 2021 nobody will remember isekai ever existed.

We chatted over lunch, him waxing poetic about girls in his class and maidens he’d noticed in the auditorium. I neither encouraged nor discouraged him. Our opinions of women were different. We agreed to disagree.

“So did you notice the hot girls in your class, Hachiman?” Yoshi asked me.

“There are young and attractive women, yes. There’s also several with RBF which are repellant.”

“What about the really cute one?” Yoshi asked.

“I think that’s a guy, actually. Don’t fall for the trap.”

“How about the tall Nadesico with the blue-gray hair?” he asked. I had to think for a minute. The one with the ponytail. She was pretty, physically. For now.

“Eh? Oh her. Haven’t spoken to her. We’ve mostly been listening to lectures by the senseis. I expect everyone else is the same.”

“Really? Oh well. Did you like her look?” he asked me, excited.

“Whatever. Most of these women aren’t going to stay pretty for long, you know. You can put a ring on her and get her best years, or you can play the field and discard when she starts to get mean and demanding,” I reminded him.  

“Hachiman, you’re such a player. You can’t keep thinking all girls are like Orimoto,” Yoshi insisted. It was an old argument. He’d mostly come out of his catatonia, at least, and included females in his stories. They were fictional girls, who were grateful for being rescued from certain death or being enslaved, or nearly dying in an accident, and rewarded the hero in the story with affection and devotion. So they were fantasy girls, not at all realistic.

“No, most of them are worse. Orimoto was a nice girl at our school. The other girls were bitches, and their simps were just using them as an excuse to bully you. Don’t go stirring up trouble while seeking romance at this Feeder School. All these girls are here to go to college, not find a husband or sweet romance,” I warned him. He shook his head with denial. Again, this is an argument we’ll never settle until he’s in divorce court. It can’t be helped. Optimism is a disease.

“Besides,” I added,” I’m not the one playing. You are. And you’ll get burned, but you are the type that won’t learn until there’s scarring.”

“You and your Monk Mode, Hachiman. I don’t know how you can do it. It is springtime and the flower of womanhood is all around us.”

“Those are sakura blossoms, and they wither and fall in a couple more days. Then it’s just a tree and its beauty is gone for another year. If ever there was a metaphor you could stand to learn from, it’s the one literally over our heads,” I reminded, pointing up at the pink blossoms.

The bell rang. Lunch was ended. Time to get back to class.

“Yeah, right. See you later, Hachiman. I hope you figure out how to enjoy your life,” he said sadly. For some reason I think he pities me.

I quickly shut my bento and returned to 2F for afternoon classes. Today was economics, then PE followed. We ran laps and did pull ups for the coach. I enjoyed the exercise and made an effort not to ogle the teenage girls in their short-shorts. It was too warm for sweat suits. The shorts exposed a lot of leg, and their tops were able to give just a bit of bounce. These girls aren’t fully grown, though a few of them were more grown than others. I made more effort to focus on myself and not lose sight of my goals of self-improvement. Don’t fall for the female trap. Don’t chase your hormones or let them control you. Women need men to slave for them. Especially Japanese women. They are really mean, and pretty much hate men. To a Japanese woman, all men are lazy ATMs, whose sole purpose is earning them spending money, and maybe give them babies. Or maybe not. Cheating is common, after all. But money most of all. In return he gets abuse and a small allowance, around 30,000 yen a month, which is less than a teenager makes at a part time job. The obvious message here is teenagers are literally happier than married men. And knowing this truth while still a teenager should make me happy, but unfortunately I’m not.

Honestly, I’m bitter. Who could accept how things are in this country and not be bitter? The entire culture is messed up. It is irrational, wrong, and the abuse goes round and round.

Round and round, like the laps I’m running on this track. Round and round. One step after another. One stride after another. I can’t fix Japan. I don’t need to. If I embrace the Suck, as they say in all those books about military training and the apocalypse too, come to think about it, I can become stronger than other people. I can gain fortitude. I can resist the nonsense and just be better than all of them. And that’s what Nietzsche was all about. Ignore the sexy women. Ignore their temporary appeal. It won’t last. They get mean and fat and ugly and take all your money in the divorce they put you through in a couple years because they were bored. They think it’s awesome if you kill yourself in despair after they take your money and throw you away. It shows you really cared. That you literally could not live without them. No sane man wants that. Understanding your risks and avoiding the danger are survival strategies. But it still leaves me bitter.

After a good shower, classes ended and gathered my stuff and swapped back to street shoes, mounted my bicycle, and headed home. I found my sister already there, forming a list for the grocery store. The parents were staying late for work again.

“Always remember that having a poor education leads to a rotten life, Komachi-chan,” I warned her. I added some things to the list, checking cupboards and noting a need for shampoo. We walked together to our neighborhood supermarket and shopped, gathering things in the basket, noting sale items and considering the math on whether they were actually a good deal or not. The California rice was a good deal. The Italian olive oil was not. The shampoo had an economy size, which was slightly larger and a good deal. The miso paste was regular price. The soy sauce was a good deal. The pork shoulder was a good deal, so we bought some for meals for the next few days. A few more items and it was through the checkout and soon we were walking home together.

“Brother, do you think this is sort of like what being married is like, day to day?” she asked me.

“Probably. Once you set aside the bedroom stuff, most of life is just ordinary stuff like shopping and cooking and cleaning and doing your job. You still sleep and take baths to keep clean. Many people like to define their lives around their hobbies, as the thing that actually makes them happy and is what they actually choose to do for themselves.”

“I don’t have a hobby, bro,” pointed out Komachi.

“You’ll find one when the time comes. Even housewives have hobbies, Komachi.”

“Do you really think I’ll be a good wife?” she asked me.

“You’re learning to cook. That’s better than most of the girls I’m going to high school with. Most of those minions at my junior high aspired to be office ladies, and party through their twenties in hopes of marrying their boss with a better wage.”

“That sounds like a recipe for disappointment and single motherhood,” my sister quipped.

“Probably. Sixty percent of single mothers get no child support, either because the father of their baby is missing or dead, or because they don’t know who it is,” I reminded.

“That’s gross, bro. How do girls do things like that?” she recoiled.

“Alcohol is a powerful drug. And our nation is full of drunks. You’ve heard about the love hotels just off of downtown?” I asked her.

“Yes. They warned us about them in health class a couple weeks ago. Never go near them.”

“It is good advice. That school you’re going to right now is full of future minions and single mothers. Don’t fall for the same bad choices they do,” I urged her. We arrived home and put things away, then got washed up so we could start dinner together. Komachi is competent with her santoku knife, dicing up vegetables to saute then simmer, and I washed rice, enough for dinners and maybe some leftover for breakfast and bento tomorrow. Wash the rice, rinse it, add the correct amount into the cooker, and a teaspoon of rice vinegar so it sticks together. Result is tasty and easy to eat with sticks.

I packed away the leftovers after we ate together and covered some plates for the parents, if they came home on time. I have no idea if they used those love hotels, or were simply very discreet about it when they were home. I haven’t asked and my room is far enough away I don’t need to know.

After a soak in the furo I dressed for bed and did homework for a few hours before turning in.