What’s Unnecessary?

"Kamikawa Ren?"

Reiji repeated his name as if to make sure.

"Yes."

Ren responded.

After assessing him, Reiji commented, "You're very good."

"It's just an average level." Ren rebutted.

His response momentarily stunned Reiji, but he continued, "But don't waste your time on unnecessary things."

"Unnecessary things?"

Ren didn't quite understand what this sentence meant.

"There are still things I need to do, so I'll leave now. You can do whatever you want."

Without waiting for his answer, Reiji turned and walked out of the house without any intention of stopping.

As the door closed, only the three of them were left in the room again.

Seeing what happened earlier, Itsuki didn't know what to say.

She always felt like nothing she said was appropriate.

Fumino was the most appropriate one to speak at the moment.

With this thought in mind, she looked at Fumino, who had just turned away from them.

There was only silence.

As she was considering whether to bring up another topic to lighten the mood, Fumino suddenly responded:

"The unnecessary thing my father meant is you, Kamikawa, giving me lessons."

"Is this unnecessary?" Ren asked.

To him, helping a classmate couldn't be considered wasteful.

Itsuki also strongly agreed, "How is this useless? You're ranked 16th in the school!"

Being ranked 16th in Shuchi'in Academy was clearly a commendable achievement.

"Because in my father's eyes, being ranked 16th in school surely isn't worthy of that name." Fumino said as casually as possible, "Anyway, all of this is because of Kamikawa. There's no way my science scores could have improved that much."

"That's also part of Fumino's own efforts." Itsuki completely disagreed with this perspective.

"Let's not talk about this. Let's go to my room."

Fumino didn't want to discuss this topic further, so she took the initiative to end the conversation.

"Alright."

Although still a little worried about Fumino's relationship with her father, seeing her reluctant expression, Itsuki had no choice but to suppress her curiosity.

"I'll put the stuff in the kitchen first, and you guys wait in my room." Fumino said.

"Yes."

Itsuki walked upstairs, followed by Ren.

"That wasn't futile."

As they passed by Fumino, Ren whispered to her.

"W-what do you mean?"

Fumino didn't expect him to speak up now.

"I think, my help to you in the lessons wasn't futile, and your efforts weren't futile either."

Ren said what he had long thought.

How could help and effort be unnecessary?

"I know." Fumino replied with a smile.

She understood this basic common sense, and Ren didn't need to explain it specifically.

At most, her heart was slightly shaken, and it would quickly recover.

It didn't matter at all.

"That's good."

After receiving this answer, Ren felt relieved and continued walking upstairs.

After seeing the two of them enter the room, Fumino walked to the kitchen.

Although she couldn't cook, she still often came to the kitchen. Moreover, juice and other things were stored in the fridge, and she couldn't get them without entering the kitchen.

While grumbling about some irrelevant things in her heart, Fumino unpacked the snacks and sweets she had bought one by one.

"That wasn't futile at all..."

Thinking of her father's appearance when saying those words, Fumino stopped her movements.

"Ranked 16th in the entire school... If I maintain this score, I can apply to my preferred university, even if my father disagrees."

Fumino muttered to herself to shift her focus.

"I don't need my father's approval at all, yes, that's it."

"Not necessary!"

"Not necessary at all!!"

"No matter from which perspective, it's not necessary!!!"

...

"Sorry for making you wait."

Pushing open the door to her room, Fumino entered with a plate in her hand, a thin smile on her face.

"Not... huh? Fumino, why is your shoulder wet?"

Itsuki noticed a little water on her shoulder.

"I just washed my face, maybe I accidentally splashed water at that time." Fumino said this while searching for the AC remote control and turning on the AC. "Today is so hot. Once for going out... Thank you for your hard work."

"Yes, today might be the hottest day in the past few days." Itsuki nodded in agreement.

"Quickly try it. These snacks, I think, are delicious."

Further conversation about the weather would be awkward, so Fumino handed the newly taken snacks from the plate to both of them.

"Then I won't be polite."

After saying this, Itsuki took a piece of cake and put it in her mouth.

"Kamikawa, is there anything you always like?"

As Ren tasted the snacks, Fumino suddenly asked him.

"Like? Not yet."

Ren shook his head.

His liking for ordinary people only started recently and didn't always fall into this range.

"Fumino, why are you suddenly asking this?" After swallowing the cake in her mouth, Itsuki asked with concern, "Didn't you already finish delivering the gift to Kamikawa?"

"...To prepare a birthday present for him."

After a moment of silence, Fumino found a reason for her question.

"Almost forgot about this."

As she said this, Itsuki also remembered this.

"I still need to prepare a birthday present for Kamikawa."

"Yes."

In fact, her purpose in asking that question was not to prepare a gift for him.

She just wanted to use that question to start a topic, but she misjudged Ren's answer, causing the topic to not go smoothly.

It would have been more appropriate to use the question "Is there something you want to work hard on?" as the topic.

She wanted to know Ren's answer to this question and his reasons.

Unfortunately, this question was not appropriate to ask.