A lunch with Kushida.

A

The study group is going well. Aomine quickly recalled what he had learned during middle school and immediately caught up with the current lessons.

Ike and the others of course are having a hard time, but with the temptation of going on a date with Kushida they didn't quit halfway through.

During classes though, Aomine could sense the stares of the girls in class were somewhat different. Like they were looking at him longingly.

Not just some of his classmates, but also some girls in the other classes and some students above his grade level too.

As if his social status climbed up several levels without him doing anything. He thought it was something trivial so he didn't bother asking anyone.

After the class had ended, Aomine invited Miyake to eat together when Kushida went to his desk.

Kushida: "Aomine-kun! Do you want to eat lunch together? I don't have any plans today!"

Aomine: "Kushida-san? Eh, what do you think?"

Aomine asked Miyake beside him.

Miyake: "I'll be fine. Kushida-san looks like she wanted to invite you alone."

Aomine: "I see... Okay let's go."

Kushida: "Thanks Aomine-kun, Miyake-kun!"

And so an unusual pair went their way to eat lunch.

They decided to go on a cafe together. When they arrived the absolute flood of women overwhelmed them.

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Aomine: "What's going on? There are an insane number of girls here."

Looking at it, it was made up of approximately 80% girls. Looking at the menu at his peripheral vision, he was sad.

Aomine: "This isn't really a place where boys come to eat. And the portions are too small to fill me up."

It's the same cafe where Karuizawa called him during the first week. The menu included items like pasta and pancakes, food that only girls would like. Athletic people like Aomine would think it's a waste of points.

Aomine: "How about we go to the cafeteria after all? I feel kind of uncomfortable here.

Kushida: "You'll be fine once you get used to it. It seems like Kouenji-kun comes here every day. See?"

Kushida pointed to a table in the back, where Kouenji sat surrounded by girls. He looked just as grand and imposing as ever. His rich kid aura never fades away, with some older girls feeding him.

Kushida: "He seems really popular. Those girls around him are all third years."

She looked surprised too.

Aomine: "What a sad world."

In a world of Capitalism, money makes the world go round. That's the reality of this world, in his own perspective.

Kushida: "Those girls are just being realists. You can't afford to eat on dreams alone.

Aomine: "Are you a realist, Kushida?"

Kushida: "I'd say I'm a bit of a dreamer. Something like a knight in shining armor would be nice."

Aomine: "A knight in shining armor huh..."

He totally understands her. After all he was also a dreamer himself. Like his first crush had been an anime character, and in 3D it would be some Idols.

Kushida: "What about you, Ayanokouji-kun? Do you like girls like Horikita-san?"

Aomine: "Who knows? It's still the start of the school year. I think it's too soon to have romantic feelings with any girls."

Now he's starting to remember Karuizawa. Hirata was dating her, even without any romantic feelings.

Kushida: "Remember when I told you you caught the first year girls eyes Aomine-kun? There is some news spreading around the school you know?"

Aomine: "News? About what news?"

Kushida: "Here, take a good look at it. You look very cool."

She let him show her smartphone. In the public electronic bulletin board of the school. There is a picture of him jumping to make a dunk making him look so cool. There were also some words aligned posted below.

[Aomine Daiki, the Japan's future superstar in the world of basketball joined the Kodou Ikuse High School's basketball club! Our school's basketball club looks bright!...]

There is still a long line of words that will caught anyone's attention.

It was posted by the newspaper club of the school. Though it wasn't in any newspaper, it would be more accurate to say it was a journalist's club.

It gathered many views and several comments of students there.

Aomine: "So that's why some students are giving me weird looks since this morning. It was because of this?"

Even in this school he had to deal with paparazzi. That's why being a popular celebrity tire him out in middle school.

Kushida: "And did you know? You're on a first-year students' ranking chart."

Aomine: "What the hell kind of ranking?"

Apparently, the boys had been rated without even noticing. It's like how the boys in the swimming lessons making their own rankings on the girl's breasts.

Kushida: "Well, there are lots of different rankings, you know? The hot guy rankings. The rich guy rankings. The creeper rankings. And—"

Aomine: "Okay, that's enough..."

Aomine just realized how girls could be so terrifying.

Kushida: "Don't worry. You're ranked a respectable fourth place in the hot guy rankings. Congratulations! By the way, Satonaka-kun in Class A is in first place. Hirata-kun's in second. The third and fifth place boys are in Class A. I feel like Hirata-kun gets lots of points because of his looks and personality."

Aomine: "Wow. I definitely didn't expect that. Hirata is the pride in Class-D in looks. I'd guess my rankings shot up just this morning."

Kushida: "Hehe that's true. And I think your rankings will just climb more and more."

Because of this, there might be frequent visitors coming to see him practice.

Aomine: "I don't know wether to be happy or sad. Does everyone participate in this?"

Kushida: "Well, not everyone, but lots of people do. I don't know the exact number of votes, though. The comments are also anonymous."

That means lots of Unkown factors are in play.

Kushida: "I think you're probably at a disadvantage, Aomine-kun. From my point of view, you're definitely attractive enough to be considered a hot guy, but I don't think people would say you're as beautiful or stand out as much as Hirata-kun. You're not a great conversationalist, you're not really that smart, but you are very athletic at least?"

Aomine: "So I'm just a muscle brain who didn't know how to study? Ouch..."

Kushida: "S-sorry. I probably should have held back a bit."

She appeared sheepish.

Kushida: "Hey, Aomine-kun. Did you have a girlfriend in junior high school?"

Aomine: "Not, really no? Something bad about that?"

Kushida: "So, you didn't have one? Ha ha, no. No, it's not bad."

Aomine: "Rankings, huh? What would the girls think if the boys did something like that?"

Kushida: "They'd probably consider them the lowest of the low."

Her smile didn't reach her eyes. Well, that was to be expected. If the boys ranked girls by cuteness, the girls would vehemently object.

Aomine gulped seeing that smile, and be careful not to spill any beans to her about the boy's rankings.

Aomine: "Anyway do you have any reason why you want to talk with me?"

Kushida: "Hehe, some girls in class were interested in yo, you see. But they don't have enough courage to get close to you. You looked very mean with those eyes, they said."

Aomine: "I was born with this eyes. I didn't want it to be like this."

Kushida: "If you could, I would like to see you smile. I never seen you smile before Aomine-kun!"

Aomine: "Smile?"

Kushida: "You, Ayanokouji-kun, and Horikita-san. I never seen the three of you smile before."

Ayanokouji always had his poker face, but he expressed his emotions only subtly. Horikita always is the Ice Queen, calm and cold. And Aomine looked very strict when making eye contact with someone.

Kushida: "That's not the only reason. To tell you the truth, I invited you out to lunch today because I wanted to check with you. Hypothetically, if you had to choose either Horikita-san or me as your ally, whom would you choose, Aomine-kun? Would you choose me?"

Aomine smiled bitterly by the question.

Aomine: "...Do I really have to answer this?"

Kushida: "Yes, but in behalf of the class I would like for you to answer."

Aomine: "The hurdle is to high don't you think?"

Aomine mulled trying to find a proper answer.

To be perfectly honest, his type of girls would those with big breasts. The category of breast size will always be there when it comes to a girl's attractiveness.

If the question comes to who he would prefer going out by breast size alone, then Kushida will win over Horikita.

But going out with someone just because they got big breasts sounds like a trashy person would do. There were also other factors.

Horikita was much closer to him than Kushida by the time spent they were together, especially after that thing yesterday.

Personality-wise, he thought they were at equal rank. Horikita's strong, cold, intelligent, and stubborn attitude. Kushida had her angelic innocent and cute attitude.

Appearance-wise, he thought Horikita's mature feminine aura was more charming.

After considering lots of things, he arrived to his answer...

Aomine: "I think I'll have to refuse. I'll stay neutral."

Kushida: "There are some situations where you can't avoid trouble by staying neutral. It's wonderful to oppose war, for example, but you may find yourself in the middle of turmoil at some point, you know? If Horikita and I happen to clash, I hope that you'll cooperate with me, Aomine-kun."

Aomine: "When you say that, you should hate her in some way right?"

Kushida stayed silent and didn't bother to answer.

Aomine took that silence as a yes. Despite wearing the mask of an angel, at the end Kushida is still a human.

Kushida: "Anyway, try to remember that I'm expecting your help."

Aomine: "Expecting, huh? I don't think you'll count on me with that."

He owed Horikita a little bit of debt for tutoring him after all. Helping someone who hated her would be ungrateful.

Kushida: "First, we'd need to build a relationship of mutual trust."

Aomine: "There's no harm with that, I guess..."

They gave each other a handshake.

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It was at night when Horikita is tutoring Miyake and Aomine at the library.

Aomine: "Well... That sucks..."

Miyake: "What a pain..."

Horikita: "What's done is done. Anyway let's start from the beginning on the materials we. need to study in the tests."

This lunch Horikita and Kushida found out from Class C that the materials they were studying won't appear in the exams.

Now they have to start from scratch.

Aomine now have no choice but use Internal Energy to increase his Brain Power to study more efficiently.

Being stingy now in this late in the game wouldn't do him good at this rate. And besides the date with Horikita is riding in this exam.

With his consistent of practicing on his handwriting, his notebook already looked very orderly and proper. He could write his name perfectly even without looking now, the biggest obstacle of his grades is now solved. The only problem is to get that perfect score.

In the following days the study group had made significant progress.

Aomine had been studying his textbooks until midnight using his Internal Energy at full blast.

Miyake is somewhere in the middle of the class when it comes to academics. But he had some weak subjects that he needed to study more to ensure he won't get expelled.

As for Ike and Yamauchi, they were extremely motivated with Kushida helping them study.

At this rate they were studying, they should pass easily no sweat... If there are no accidents, then everything would be fine...