Western Politics

Year 2270; East Asian Alliance Shores.

Tokyo, Japan.

He sat listlessly, gazing out the open window, as he sat with his hand supporting his chin. He was bored, but then again, he was always bored. His eyes flicked to his professor, lecturing straight from the text module again. He was especially tired today, but he didn't know why. He had just always felt this way, ever since that particular hazy night, and even more so recently.

"Araya," A voice called out to him, bringing him out from his thoughts.

He had just now noticed the lecture was over, and everyone else was leaving the classroom.

"Where's your head at?" The voice continued. "You have Western politics next, don't you? Shouldn't you be getting a move on?"

It was Chiaki Ayane. The girl who always sat next to him, and spoke to him occasionally, though he could never be bothered to remember her name until they were put in the same class again for their second year.

"... Yeah," He began, a bit thrown off by how she always spoke to him so casually. He didn't have any friends, so he imagined this was what it felt like to be conversing with someone close enough to be referred to as a friend. "That's right. Thanks."

He also wondered how she knew his schedule, but brushed it off. He wasn't really invested enough to care about that right at the moment. He could only focus on so much these days.

He hated his western politics class. In fact, he only chose this elective because the only other elective available, was the History of the Eastern Asia Alliance class, that he took during his first year. This class was the only elective he took this year that he hated greatly. He quite enjoyed the others, like Music, and Geology, but he was displeased with being fed straight out of the text information he didn't terribly care to know.

He stalked along the hallways, his school commissioned academic assistant tablet tucked under his arm, and a juice box he had gotten from the vending machine on the other hand. As he walked, he pondered why it was exactly he hated this class.

When he first signed up for it, he thought it would educate him on actual western politics, like policies involving the United States, or even the East European Federation, instead, the class still revolved around the Eastern Asian Alliance. There was no difference between this class, and the History of the Eastern Asian Alliance class he took last year. It almost offended him how similar the topics taught in both classes were.

'For a private school, this almost seems like a fraud,' He thought to himself as he made his way to his destination, and took his usual seat at the back, next to the window.

There were only eight private schools in all of Japan, and three in Tokyo. And though they were referred to as private schools, they were actually owned and funded by the ministry of education. He had always wondered how an orphan like himself got into one. It wasn't that he was particularly interested, or uninterested, just that he didn't really know what exactly it was he wanted for himself. So unlike everyone else who worked hard to stay here, he had no set plans for his future, or even what it might vaguely look like.

"All right class," The teacher spoke, as he walked into the classroom, taking his spot behind the podium and desk. "Settle down. Let's pick up where we left off in our last session."

He tapped on the screen of his tablet, causing the class information to appear. He searched through his notes to see if he had actually gotten anything down during the last class...

Nope. He sighed, flipping to the textbook module. He never took any notes in this class anyways, or any of his other classes.

"Aright so we were talking about the Descan pact with all the allying nation clusters," The professor started, displaying the information on the light board. "Who can tell me what this pact is?"

As usual in this class, the only hand up was Mizuno's. Mizuno Hiromi, the class representative of class four, and the student council secretary. She seemed to him as the kind to always do too much. A devastatingly bad match for him, as he was the kind to always prefer to do too little, or just barely enough.

"The Descan pact is the oldest treaty amongst all allying nations, and is considered a legend," Mizuno began, tucking a strand of her long black hair behind her ear. "Though the pact allows open borders, free market, and trade, it is said that the pact was first formed to share information regarding the legendary 'child of hope'."

"That's right," The professor commended. "Thank you Mizuno. The Descan pact in modern times acts as the oldest form of negotiations after the great war, two hundred years ago, by the warring nations to build an era of peace. Though it was allegedly brought up to help the rest of humanity find the fabled 'child of hope' or the 'savior from the Descenders', currently it serves as the few standing treaties between all the nation clusters of the world."

"Sensei!" A student called, raising his hand as he asked. "Do you really think the Descenders exist? I mean, wasn't that just a story used during the great war?"

The professor sighed before answering. "It is unclear whether or not they existed, however, the Descenders and the Child of Hope, real or not, are a part of our history."

'Descenders' He mouthed to himself, before a sigh. Pre-school, elementary, middle school, and Highschool. Even in college, everyone is taught about the Child of Hope, and the mythical Descenders, and the fabled illegitimate excuse for the start of the great war.

To almost everyone else, this piece of history is nothing but a story. A mere fairytale used as an excuse to validate the reason for the great war that left the world devastated two hundred years ago. In fact, he had thought this for a short while as well, until about a month ago. To him, this was not a mere fairytale, he thought as he licked his fangs that would occasionally appear whenever he was hungry, and went a long while without feeding.

'The Descenders are a fairytale,'

Those words now have no meaning for someone who had just finally come to terms with the fact that he was a vampire, or so he thought anyway. The information on Descenders available to the public was extremely limited. He only knew that some Descenders didn't have ordinary human constitutions, and if he wasn't a human, then he could only be a Descender. His conclusion...

Araya Tsuki, age 16, Second Year at Aomori Private Highschool, Orphan and... Is a Descender.