Given her physique, she wouldn’t sweat even if she wore winter clothes in June. How could there be a problem like “underwear soaked through with sweat”?
She looked down at her winter school uniform jacket—thick black fabric, double-layer lining, tight ribbed cuffs.
With that thickness, forget sweat—even if someone poured water directly on it, the white shirt underneath probably wouldn’t show through.
And as for sweating… Rinna laughed bitterly to herself.
She did have a non-sweating physique, medically called “hypohidrosis” or “sweat gland dysfunction.” In simple terms, her sweat glands barely worked.
To ordinary people, that might seem like a plus—no sweating in summer, clean and refreshing.
But for Rinna, it was actually a sign of her weak constitution.
Normal people use sweat glands to regulate body temperature. When it’s hot, they sweat; the sweat evaporates, carrying away heat, and body temperature stays stable.
Her sweat glands were practically on strike. The only way she regulated her temperature was by relying on her winter clothes.
If she actually got hot enough to sweat, that would mean something was wrong with her body.
The only time Rinna could work up a little sweat was during strenuous exercise in physical education class.
When the term “strenuous exercise” floated through her mind, she couldn’t help letting out a meaningless sigh in her heart.
PE class.
Ah, PE class.
The scene on the playground uncontrollably surfaced in her mind.
***
On the basketball court, a few boys were playing three-on-three.
Sneakers screeched against the concrete floor. The basketball hit the backboard, bounced back, was caught by someone jumping up, then passed again.
A series of movements, crisp and clean. Sweat flew off their foreheads, glistening as it traced an arc in the sunlight.
Running, sudden stops, turns, jumps—these actions looked to Rinna like a slowed-down dance, every detail clear and vivid.
She used to be able to do those things too.
Dribbling, driving past defenders, layups—she wasn’t amazing at it, but at least she could run and jump, could sweat freely on the playground.
Now she could only sit on the bench at the edge of the playground, a thin blanket brought by Hisaki covering her knees, a cup of warm honey water in her hands, watching others run, watching others jump, watching others do the things she once took for granted.
Sometimes when she got absorbed, the tips of her toes would unconsciously tap along with the rhythm—and then a familiar, dull ache would press in her chest, reminding her not to forget who she was.
A little sweat.
With her physique, if she really did strenuous exercise in PE class—say, running fifty meters or doing several squat jumps—she might sweat a little.
But after sweating, what then?
Rinna played out that scenario in her mind.
Heart racing, breathing rapid, black spots before her eyes, chest tight as if someone were gripping it, then her legs giving way, falling forward… thump.
She might die.
That wasn’t an exaggeration. It really seemed like she would die.
Last PE class, she’d only stood up to hand a classmate a bottle of water and walked about seven or eight steps, and her heart rate had shot up to 120. She’d sat back on the bench, gasping for three full minutes before recovering.
The PE teacher’s look when he saw her was like he was watching a fragile piece of porcelain that could break at any moment.
After that, he never called her name for roll call. Every PE class, she was automatically marked as “observing.”
Hisaki would sit with her on the sidelines every PE class, a book on her lap, not turning a page for half an hour, her eyes completely on Rinna.
Rinna wanted to play basketball so badly.
Really, so badly.
It wasn’t a dream of “becoming a basketball star”—just a simple, physical craving.
She wanted to run on the playground, to feel the sensation of the ball leaving her palm for that instant, to hear the screech of sneakers braking on concrete, to curse under her breath after a missed shot, then laugh and chase the ball away.
Sometimes, that craving would suddenly surface during a particular moment in PE class, like a thin needle pricking her heart. It didn’t hurt much, but it made her go completely quiet.
She pulled her thoughts back and refocused on the podium.
The teacher had already filled an entire blackboard and was wiping the leftmost section with an eraser, making room for new example problems.
The eraser smacked against the blackboard with a dull thump, thump, white chalk dust rising like smoke, swirling and scattering in the beam of light.
Rinna suddenly remembered something very important.
The system.
She murmured it in her heart, and a pale blue, translucent panel silently appeared in her vision.
[Host: Shirase Rinna]
[Age: 16]
[Strength: 4]
[Agility: 5]
[Endurance: 3]
[Intelligence: 11]
[Spirit: 9]
[Malice Points: 7]
Rinna’s eyes swept back and forth over the last line twice.
Malice Points: 7.
She stared at that “7,” and a wave of mixed emotions flooded her heart.
Seven? Just seven?
She recalled the scene in the stairwell earlier.
At that time, besides her, Hisaki, Kikyo, and the boy who had rushed out, there were at least twenty-something people gathered around.
She remembered their expressions clearly. Some were surprised, some frowned, some had faces that practically screamed “How can he act like that?” Others whispered to each other.
Logically, quite a few of those people should have generated “malice” toward her.
After all, from the perspective of an outsider who didn’t know the situation, her behavior made her look like a frail, white-haired girl bullying a poor pink-haired girl.
Arrogant expression, provoking lines—”Zako,” “Zako,” “Ohohoho,” a triple combo. It would be strange if normal people didn’t feel malice.
But the system had only received malice from seven people.
Seven.
Rinna chewed on that number in her mind over and over, and the more she chewed, the more unsettled she felt.
What was going on?
Could it be that more than half of those twenty-something people were perverts who enjoyed being insulted by a beautiful girl playing a tiny devil?
Rinna was startled by that thought, but after thinking about it carefully, it didn’t seem entirely impossible.
With how developed the anime culture was in this world, who knew if there were actually people who would feel… other… emotions about being called a “zako” by a white-haired beautiful girl?
Hmm.
But that thought lasted less than two seconds before she dismissed it.
Twenty-something people—how could they all be perverts? Probability didn’t add up.
So where was the problem?
Rinna lowered her head and reached up to smooth a strand of white hair hanging in front of her chest.
As her fingertips passed through the hair, that strand of white caught the sunlight streaming in through the window, glowing with a soft luster, as if mixed with silver powder.
Sunlight from the window traced a gentle outline of her profile. The shadow of her eyelashes fell on her cheekbones. Her lips were a very light pink, like cherry blossom juice diluted with water.
Suddenly, she had an inkling.
Could it be… with her current appearance, people simply couldn’t bring themselves to feel malice?