Chapter 6: You Need a Nickname
A certain day. The day when they decided on Kyouya’s nickname.
“I guess a nickname really is a must, right?”
Mao suddenly said.
“It is, isn’t it?”
Shion expressed her agreement.
“That’s a nice idea.”
“Aye, aye.”
Megumi nodded. Kirara showed her agreement with a somewhat weird voice.
“A nickname for who?”
Kyouya asked.
He wasn’t following their conversation very well. These four would sometimes talk as if they could communicate through telepathy.
“Yours, of course!”
Mao suddenly bit him hard in the forearm.
“Ouch! Ouch! That hurts, president!”
Once she had bitten down, Mao wouldn’t let go easily.
She finally got separated when Shion and the others held her by the legs and pulled her off.
“Jeez, you didn’t have to bite so deep. Look, now I have teeth marks.”
“It’s because you acted as if it was somebody else’s business, and here we were talking about choosing a nickname for you.”
“That’s a nice dental arc, president.”
Kyouya said, looking at the bite mark left on his arm.
“Shut up! I’ll bite you again.”
“Why?”
“When dealing with people who ignore what others are saying, or people who don’t listen to you, they won’t get it unless you bite them.”
“Aren’t those two the same thing?”
“Gaah!”
He got bitten again.
This time, Shion didn’t come to pull Mao off.
“What do you mean with a nickname, anyway? If you need a name I already have one. It’s Kyouya.”
Kyouya said, ma.s.saging his arms which now had twice as many teeth marks.
“Rejected. That’s too respectable.”
“Choosing a pet name is a very big deal after all.”
Megumi said joining the palms of her hands.
“In that case, I think the only way to do it is deciding based on our impressions. How about it, Shion-san?”
The girl was an angel, but in this case he couldn’t expect any help from her. Kyouya’s predicament was no doubt viewed through those angel eyes as some sort of heartwarming story. The fact that she was the only one saying “pet name” while everyone else said “nickname” was evidence of that.
“Impressions, huh?”
Mao folded her arms. Her face showed that she was enjoying herself tremendously.
“White Rice.”
Shion said absentmindedly.
“Why White Rice?”
“It goes with everything. I was thinking about how it could express his lack of idiosyncrasies.”
“Right…”
Mao had an uncomfortable face.
“I’m sorry… I guess that wasn’t funny. I’m not good with jokes.”
Shion earnestly put herself to think about her next joke. “Plain Yogurt?” Her lips murmured.
“Kirara, you have anything?”
Mao switched the conversation to Kirara.
Kyouya felt an uneasiness as the girl’s mysterious eyes gazed at him.
His eyes restlessly darted around. (1)
“Tasty?”
Kirara abruptly said something weird.
The meaning for that was… even Kyouya couldn’t understand it.
“Alright, Tasty White Rice it is.”
Delighted, Mao slapped her knees.
“Please, don’t settle on that! And please don’t combine them either!”
“How about Kyoro-san?”
Megumi, who had been deep in thought all this time, said then.
“Just take Kyouya-san and mix it with how his eyes were darting around just now.”
“Oh yeah, he’s always doing that, isn’t he? Alright, it’s decided!”
Kyouya didn’t say a word. He felt that if he said anything they might go back to Tasty White Rice. On top of that, he had no complaints about it. After all; it felt like a normal nickname and it had been given to him by Megumi.
And that’s how Kyouya’s nickname was decided.
“Isn’t Kyoro kinda pitiful?”
CHARACTER PROFILE:
Shinomiya Kyouya – Part 1
An easygoing pacifist. He won’t complain about or oppose anything.
He doesn’t really have any strong points, nor any weak points for that matter.
A protagonist who’s the personification of normality.
TRANSLATOR’S NOTES
(1) This paragraph describes Kyouya’s action with “Kyoro Kyoro”, which is a j.a.panese onomatopoeia for eyes wandering around.