A heavy sigh emitted from Asuka the moment she took a seat at the table she had reserved at a sumptuous modernized Chinese tea house in some five-star hotel. She, with the company of a half-willing Izumi, leaned back in their respective chairs as they took in the evening cityscape through the giant window beside them before each reaching for the menu.

From the way she was welcomed extra warmly by the hotelier earlier, Izumi assumed two things: she either owned the hotel or she was acquainted with the owner of the hotel—he had quickly looked the Shirakiins up on the web just now and found very sparse information about them, which were mostly uninteresting superficial facts such as Asuka's family owning a luxury hotel chain before it was absorbed into the Shirakiin Conglomerate as a subsidiary when she, the sole offspring of her family, was married off to her late husband.

Other than that, there seemed to be a significant lack of information about them despite allegedly being such a big shot in the business and financial world.

"Since it's still too early for dinner, let's have tea. Don't be shy, order whatever you want. The dim sum here is quite good, you know?" The woman glanced up from her menu and finally smiled at him after a whole car ride of quietly gazing out the window with a pensive expression plastered on her visage.

Contrary to his first impression of her as a snobby and domineering matriarch, Izumi realized the tension in his face and shoulders had gradually eased away upon witnessing her brief display of genuine hospitality. The memory of this woman having hit her daughter to the point that blood was shed temporarily dissipated from his mind.

"That reminds me... I never got your name," Asuka wondered aloud. "Care to introduce yourself?"

"My name is Sena Izumi. I'm a classmate of Shira— your daughter's." Izumi gave himself a mental pat on the back for the quick save. "Elder daughter."

"Sena Izumi-kun, hm? You are quite a looker..." Asuka muttered. "So, mind sharing a pot of tea with me, Sena-kun?"

Izumi shook his head, earning another fleeting smile from her. "Splendid. Now, should we order?"

With a nod, Asuka gestured for the waiter and Izumi took that opportunity to order the shrimp har gow that managed to retain his attention despite having flipped the pages of the menu thrice. Once the waiter had gone, Asuka turned her attention back to her young companion.

"Since you said you two are classmates, that must mean you're a celebrity or something, right? That girl never tells me anything, so I'm a little bit clueless about how your school works."

Izumi proceeded to summarize the kind of institution Yumenosaki Academy was—excluding the details about the cesspool that it was not too long ago—and vaguely elaborated on what he was doing as a model and idol, less the fact that he was actually undergoing a disciplinary action at the moment.

In the middle of his explanation, he managed to pick up a few traits of Asuka's that distinctly resembled her daughter—the way she would provide her utmost attention to the person she was interacting with and nod every so often to indicate that she was actively listening, and how she was adept at subtly leading people into opening up in her presence. Her overall demeanor would sometimes make him forget that he was not actually speaking to his classmate, but an older, less aggravating version of her.

"So you're a model..." Asuka tapped her chin with her forefinger before slowly nodding. "An aspiring one at that. No wonder you would go to such lengths..." She flashed him a closed-eye smile. "Well, I don't blame you. To achieve your ambitions, you have to do what you have to do. Am I right?"

Izumi couldn't quite catch if there was some kind of double meaning behind her words, but when taken literally, she was right. Being a professional model is no easy feat—it's not the kind of job you just wake up and go to. Having modeling as a career means you have to invest a whole lifetime living a certain lifestyle.

And while external beauty is a key feature of a model, you don't become one simply by being beautiful. So many people in the world are good-looking, but not everyone can be a model. Beauty is highly valued because it has an expiration date—a very short one. If you wish to preserve it, you have no choice but to put in effort, yet that's not all there is to it.

Just as how the outside counts, the inside does, too. Models need soft skills including a personal charm, self-confidence (if they don't have any, they'll have to make sure they look like they do), and the mental durability to pick themselves up with grace and elegance every time they trip on the runway that is the world. The modeling industry is a tough one to thrive in and requires a great amount of sacrifice, thus Izumi upheld her words.

However, seeing her lips morph from a cryptic smile into what looked like a bitter one made him blink questioningly. His slight change of expression was caught on by the woman, causing her to chuckle.

"Sorry, I'm just... amused. She is becoming exactly like him. No matter how I look at her, she is undeniably her father's daughter." And it seems that she's continuing his legacy as a successful model magnet, too, Asuka added in her mind.

"What a coincidence—I was just thinking how much she resembles you," said Izumi. His unprecedented confession made Asuka raise her eyebrows.

"Me?" She pointed to herself. "Really? How so?"

"It's hard to explain, but... I think it's your mannerism? The way you talk and how you carry yourselves are very similar to each other."

"Huh. This is truly a first... All my life, people have only remarked how similar she and her father were—even calling her a miniature version him. No one has ever said she's like me, and to be honest, I don't think she's like me, either..." Asuka trailed off. "I suppose it's because you've never met her father. If you have, I'm positive you'd also think the same."

"What was her father like?"

Asuka laughed wholeheartedly at the question, catching Izumi by surprise—this was not a typical reaction you would expect from a widow talking about her deceased husband.

"Are you sure you're ready to have this conversation?" She squinted. "I'll warn you beforehand—my husband may be dead, but I barely have anything good to say about him."

"Oh, uh... You don't have to answer if you don't want to."

"No, no. I want to answer. If possible, I want his ghost to hear everything I have to say. But... do I really I want to badmouth a dead man?" Asuka closed her eyes and sighed. "Even if I do, where do I even start?"

After spending some time contemplating whether bitching about her late husband to a child would make her seem pitiful, Asuka reopened her eyes and stared blankly into the tabletop. "I'll try to be nice," she muttered.

"For starters, he was the philandering source of endless headache to the family, particularly to the more conservative elders... He was always butting heads with them by purposely doing the exact opposite of what he was told, simply because he can. You could say that watching their distress was a kind of pastime for him."

Izumi nodded; the philandering aside, that sounded like something his classmate would do, too.

"When I said I barely have anything good to say about him, I didn't mean it in a way that he was a monster or some sort. In fact, I think he was one of the most considerate men I've ever met—well, maybe a little bit twisted at some parts...

"It's just that, despite being his wife, just like everyone else who claimed they were alike, I also didn't know him or her very well past their public persona. Unlike most households, family affairs are akin to formal engagements to us, and we tend to keep our lives outside of home private and separate. Those two are particularly difficult to understand because of how individualistic they are. They're the kind of people who, unless you ask, won't tell anything—and if you do ask, their answers are usually really vague."

Asuka paused for a moment and glanced upwards to see Izumi still listening to her mundane rambling like a dedicated therapist trying to make sense of his patient's past traumas.

"Even so, he was a very charismatic man—well-liked by almost everyone he knew and who knew him. I'm sure you've heard of the proverb, 'a friend to all is a friend to none,' Sena-kun, but do you know what it means?"

Izumi nodded again—though at this point, the image of Taylor Swift was the first thing to pop up in his mind.

"In Aristotle's opinion, those who have many friends and mix intimately with them all are thought to be no one's friend. It is possible to be the friend of many and not be obsequious—basically, just a genuinely good man—but one cannot have, with many people, the friendship based on virtue.

"Aristotle argues that there are natural constraints that prevent one from being everyone else's intimate friend. Being a close friend entails certain obligations such as availability, sympathy, shared ethical standards, and shared emotions when the friend feels elation or grief. Regular humans do not have that level of mental and emotional capacity, which means...?"

"It's ultimately impossible to be friends with everyone," Izumi concluded, making Asuka smile.

"Do you know where I learned this?" she asked.

Izumi shook his head.

"My late husband," the woman answered. "It appears that that man must've thought he was superhuman because, ironically, he also used to tell me that everyone is his 'friend' and I should treat them as if they are my own.

"For me, personally, I don't view it as a merit, because that's exactly how it was; despite his generous treatment, no one was as special as he made them think they were. Behind their backs, he was only exploiting those so-called friendships... It was no more than a mere tactic to have those people act in his best interest for his own benefit.

"From the trust and dependency he had instilled in their minds, he manipulated them into becoming his little pawns, who would do just about anything he asked. It might've looked like he was the fool for tending to their every wish—giving and giving and giving unconditionally—but in reality, he was the one reaping the most benefit in ways you wouldn't expect.

"Tell me, Sena-kun... Wouldn't you feel betrayed if you were in their shoes and found out that instead of a knight, you were only a pawn?"

Izumi didn't answer. Instead, he lowered his gaze, opting to contemplate the matter more deeply instead of agreeing right off the bat. Asuka herself had said that her late husband was a difficult person to understand—there must be some kind of rationale behind his actions that she might have overlooked. Besides, it's not as if he was the only one using others for his own gain; those people were also doing the same to him. Disregarding the moral aspect of it, the mutuality makes it fair.

With that in mind, Izumi firmly held onto his principle of 'If you're curious about someone, ask questions to the person themselves' he had once preached to Arashi—though asking would be quite impossible at this stage without conducting a seance.

Having perceived his reluctance, Asuka chose to leave her pending conundrum to linger at the back of Izumi's mind and proceeded.

"The bottom line here is that, behind his amiable exterior, that man was cold and unfeeling. He may appear affectionate, but he was undeniably distant—emotionally and, more often than not, physically. But that's what you would expect from a womanizer, I suppose." Asuka shrugged her shoulders indifferently.

Since day one, Asuka was never bothered by the fact that her late husband never loved her. If anything, the freedom he had granted her to maintain a clandestine, polyamorous relationship with her long-lasting paramour was a blessing in disguise. It was just another mutually agreed condition they had set prior to their engagement and eventual marriage of convenience. Unbeknownst to most, both of them had spent all their married lives getting in other people's beds.

It was kind of silly now that she thought about it. One would typically expect to feel constrained after marriage, but for her, it was the opposite. She had never felt more liberated. Per her late husband's suggestion, they even prearranged a divorce to free her from his and her family's clutches, but it seems that fate decided to take matters into its own hands.

"He was secretive to a fault," Asuka continued. "I never knew his whereabouts or what he was up to. But then again, I never cared to begin with—only the kids did. While I'm grateful he never dragged me or them into whatever he was scheming, that girl was quite deeply involved... And with how things currently are, I reckon she still is."

Speaking of involvements, Asuka's mind took a short trip down memory lane as she recalled her elder daughter's inhumanely hectic childhood. Even before she entered elementary school, her daily schedule would be packed with an overwhelming array of different lessons and social affairs her father and (mostly) grandparents had put together to shape her into a perfect heir worthy of being called their own.

Nevertheless, the little girl fulfilled all their ideals and expectations without much say or delay and eventually freed herself from the shackles of her grandparents' decade-long scrutiny.

As high-school began to creep up on her, she made the decision to leave her posh boarding schools and fly across the globe to permanently return to the Land of the Rising Sun she so dearly missed. With the trust she had gained out of her reliability and excellence, she was allowed to do whatever she desired thanks to the special autonomy they had bestowed on her.

However, after a long time of letting them live in blissful ignorance in the peace of her overall unproblematic nature, only recently did she begin to capture the attention of the elders when they finally found out about her secret-but-not-so-secret relationship with the Tenshouins not only condoned, but endorsed by her father, the head of the family himself. An intrafamilial conflict precipitated from this discovery, with her grandfather acting as the leader of the opposition.

But now, with her father gone, she was caught between the devil and the deep blue sea.

As someone who had always been viewed as the jewel in their family crown, her increasingly apparent telltale signs of defiance had become a legitimate concern to the entire clan. Especially considering how much she had in common with her deceased father, they couldn't help but think: is this the reawakening of the same source of endless headache that had been lying dormant? The continuation of an unstoppable, dreaded legacy? Because if so, they wanted it gone.

Looking in as a bystander, Asuka couldn't help but pity the girl. As an heir herself, she could empathize to a certain extent—maybe she was acting up because her father's unorthodox tendencies rubbed off on her, or maybe she really was rebelling. It might as well be both.

Regardless, Asuka had no say in the matters involving the firstborn. Even after she had become an official member of the household, she was still treated somewhat like an outsider by her relatives. Every decision regarding her elder daughter's life was in the hands of those top three members of the family hierarchy, which recently went down to two. To them, Asuka was no more than a nominal head whose role was to implement their orders and cater to their heirs' needs.

"He used to make her take part in a lot of things normal people would consider 'too advanced' for a child and dragged her almost everywhere he went, flaunting her like some trophy child..." Asuka murmured thoughtfully.

"I thought you said her father was considerate...?"

"He was. She just never complained or showed any signs of discontent for him to ease up on her," she replied. "Of course she didn't... That girl's sole existence is to please her father. It was the main reason why he had always favored her over the twins... And the fact that she is the only thing his ex-lover left behind just accentuates it."

"...Huh?"

With her chin resting inside her palm, Asuka kept her eyes glued to the horizon beside her, letting the sun's warm rays softly illuminate about half her face.

"Haruki is not my child," she said as a meaningful smile tugged at the corners of her lips. "We are not related by blood. That's why I was surprised when you said she resembled me in one way or another."

Seeing him speechless made Asuka laugh; she had expected as much since not many people were made aware of this fact. Nearly everything about the seventeen-year-old girl's birth was carefully altered and buried beneath the family's strong influence and pristine reputation, together with their other dirty little secrets. Asuka only revealed it to him because she was curious how he would react after everything he had said about her and her stepdaughter sharing similarities—purely for the sake of her own amusement.

Nothing to be fretted about; all would be well after she buys his silence after this.

"Has she ever mentioned she has younger half-siblings? Twins. A boy and a girl," Asuka asked, trying to help him ease out of his state of confusion. "My youngest, Kaede, is in modeling, too. Though she's primarily focused on acting. I wonder if you've heard of her..."

Having recovered from his shock, Izumi's face slowly molded back to neutral.

"Yes," he finally answered, "but she didn't say much about them... Or the fact that they're half-siblings."

Asuka chuckled softly. "That's because no one is supposed to know they're not full siblings. Not even themselves."

Izumi's eyes grew as wide as saucers as he stared at the woman in front of him in absolute horror, petrified by the words that had so smoothly rolled off her tongue—he didn't expect his little detour today would lead him to open a mind-boggling Pandora's box.

"The kids were very close when they were children. But just as most if not all siblings do, they gradually grew distant over time—even more so after the events that followed their father's death," she further explained. "It's unfortunate, but inevitable. Truth be told, I never had anything against Haruki; she was a good child and a doting sister to her siblings—but due to certain circumstances... some of us can't help but resent her."

Izumi pursed his lips as he took a moment to rummage through the drawers of his memories in an attempt to recall the times where said girl had mentioned her family. Little by little, he managed to piece a rough picture out of the small collection of seemingly trivial details she had divulged in the past and it all somewhat made sense to him why she was the way she was.

Now, Izumi couldn't help but feel sorry for her.

"Is that why you hit her?" he asked as he shifted in his chair. "Out of resentment?"

Asuka was about to reply when the waiter came to serve them their food. The brief interruption prompted her to decide to steer the direction of their conversation elsewhere. She had aired more than enough of her darling daughter's dirty laundry for him to use against her if need be. This time, Asuka wanted to ask him questions—that was the purpose of her bringing him here, after all.

"I would never hit her," she said after the waiter withdrew. "Especially considering the fact that she is not my child."

"Saying that won't undo the past. You did hit her. Very harshly, might I add," Izumi spoke calmly. "Whatever it is that she did, is it deserving of such a treatment?"

"Oh, I'm not the judge of that. All I did was follow someone else's instructions."

"Is this person so powerful that even you, her own stepmother, can't defy?"

Asuka merely smiled as she handed Izumi his pair of chopsticks, slipping the sleeve off for him in one swift pull. It seems that her daughter's friend had gotten a tad overfamiliar with her for her liking.

"Let's eat, Sena-kun."