Chapter 4 (Boxes)

In a building, probably the highest in Tokyo, a round table meeting was being held. It was private meeting between various politicians and military officers. They were all sitting waiting for the prime minister to arrive. There were many of them which did not know a thing about the topic and some who were looking forward to the decisions. And also some who wanted to collect information, as they had their own plans.

Everyone was silently looking at the door anxiously until the door opened along with the sound of footsteps of 5 men.

The prime minister entered the room and sat on his chair without a word. When he had everyone's attention, he said only one sentence.

"Gentlemen, today we are going to talk about Saints and the paradox boxes which started to appear in Tokyo yesterday."

Paradox boxes, they are strange relics which suddenly started to appear around the world. Some countries used them as weapons as they would explode with some great power. But soon after the incidence in Europe when a huge and even stranger box was used, it evaporated the whole city. The casualties were about 1 million. Ever since that, the boxes were not used in wars. Instead, more priority was on how to deactivate them as they had a self-destruction counter on them. No one knew exactly when they would blow off. The estimated time was calculated using the radiation around it.

But soon, saints were discovered. They were simple women who by unknown source got the shield of saint. They received the knowledge on how to undo the effects of the paradox boxes.

But there was still an issue. When these saints get near the paradox boxes, they would get possessed by the source of the power. The human would be asleep so they won't have any memory of what happened. It was to hide the secrets of these boxes and the truth about saints. But sometimes they would go berserk and destroy. So, to look over them, a normal person was needed. Someone with high compatibility with the saints. Someone who could dominate these saints.

These people were overlookers and they were identified by the saint themselves. The compatibility varied so only those with above 70 compatibility score were selected. Powerful saints could sense them over distances so they were allowed to look for such overlooker.

And in some cases, even after the paradox box was disabled, the saint would remain and coexist with the human.

The theme of the meeting was all about the explanation and strategies on how to deal with the boxes.

It has been a week since the start of the school and there has been no sign of interaction of Yaku with anyone. He only talks with miss Akane because he finds her comfortable. As with Mie, they don't even look at each other. It is what they want anyway.

Its Monday again, another day of school for Yaku after a day of constant sleep. As always, the area around the main gate is filled with students and their friend groups.

"So noisy." he spluttered.

Everything was as it usually should have been. Unless he looked at the gate. There was this odd lady standing next to the door. She was dressed elegantly, wearing sunglasses and looking at the students, or more like she was analyzing them. She seemed like she was waiting for someone.

"What an odd lady." says Yaku.

He was curious but not interested so he looked away and kept on walking,

As he passed by the lady, she grabbed his shoulder. Yaku turned to her with a surprised look. But his eyes were not really giving all accompanying vibe,

"Don't look at me like that. I don't want to bite you or anything." she politely implies,

By her words and face, Yaku feels a weird sense of security. He looked deeper in her blue eyes and felt some sort of attraction. Suddenly, he finds himself drown in them.

The lady smiles, a little too sudden she does. She knew what was going on. Yaku upon seeing that, snaps back to reality and speaks.

"I am sorry, but I don't have time to talk to you right now. Goodbye." and goes off.

"What was that...it was as she was attracting me. But that feeling, I want to feel it again. That sense of security and support.." he utters as he goes to his class.

The moment he opens the door, he is once again surprised by the abnormality.

Mei, out of all the students in the class, Mei was staring at his desk.

"What...what she staring at huh. Is she actually interested in talking with me or something? Is she that dumb to think I would accept her? Unexpected but I have to use this interest as an opportunity." he says to himself.

Smack!

Yaku gets smacked on his head by the mighty home room teacher.

"Stop staring at girls and come to the faculty office right now, someone important is calling for you." she says while swinging the book in her hand,

Yaku turns with his hand rubbing his head.

"Don't accuse me with a normie behavior. I was staring at a girl who was staring at my desk. I am innocent. And what's with me getting called to the faculty office? Did I do something wrong?"

She pats Yaku and says,

"Just come, no questions asked."

Yaku does as he is told and walks to the office with his teacher. The whole time, she had this super strict face. An expression Yaku never saw on her face.

When he entered the office, there were several unknown men with guns on their back, the school principal and surprisingly, the lady he met outside the school.

Yaku stands over the gate as he still is surprised and cautious because of the guns.

The lady signs the men to lower their guns and they do so.

"Stay focused me, they probably just want to talk. You can't let yourself look pathetic here." he scratches these words in his mind as he walks in.

"Yo." The lady waves.

"Hey, the super weird looking lady with tons of men beside her." Yaku replies

The room goes quiet.

Yaku rethinks what he just said and realizes how it sounded.

"I DID NOT MEAN IT THAT WAY-" he shouts in panic.

The lady bursts out in laughter.

"I am Sonia." she says while laughing.

"Oh, so Miss Sonia, what can I, a normal good for nothing human do for you?" Yaku asks in a polite way.

"So polite, you are an interesting one." she smirks as she puts her left leg over the right one and relaxes.

Yaku notices this and taunts her by saying

"Oh? You were vary of me?"

Her eye twitches, a sign of annoyance.

"And what do you mean 'one'. Is collected broken people a hobby of yours?' Yaku continues.

"Its not that. But fair enough, I did sense a huge lump of darkness covering a pure light." she sighs.

"Nevertheless, Katsuki Yaku, let me tell you about saints and boxes."