'So this is what they meant by feeling the weight of your actions...'

From the futon were he was laying in to sleep, Izuru stared up at the dark ceiling of Ban's room. It was deep into the night, and whilst Ban had long gone to sleep and began snoring, all that happened on that day kept Izuru awake. That and the weight of Mona and Lisa's heads, who used his chest as a pillow.

"Or maybe it's just you two..." Izuru muttered, looking at the dogs.

He sighed and slowly moved their heads off his chest and into the futon, then left the futon to go the bathroom, with the now awake canines following him.

Once he was done with his business, Izuru stepped into the hallway, where the two dogs sat looking at the door and then at him. With them was Rio, who was patting their heads.

"Did you really had to wake Mona and Lisa up?" Rio asked.

"They were the ones who didn't let me sleep."

"I bet." Rio sighed. "Come with me."

"Huh?"

"Don't 'huh' me and come on."

After guiding Izuru and the pitbulls to the living room downstairs, and after setting the dogs on the couch for them to sleep, Rio guided Izuru to a small black couch on the balconny, where the two sat.

"It's freezing out here..." Izuru muttered.

"I know. This stupid cold is what makes the brain work better. My older brother may be a gigantic tactless idiot, but I'm not. Tough day?" Rio asked.

"Eh, more like tough week... I haven't screwed up this much in a while."

"Wanna share?"

"Do I have to?"

"Do you want me to push you into the pool? I swear the water is colder than the air."

"Alright, alright... This whole year has been a major screw up for me, where do I even begin..."

"Whenever we start preparing for a new play, we usually go over the setting and characters first. So why not starting there?"

"Sure, that works. It all began when this second year began in Heiwa. I heard from your brother through a friend of mine in his class and my mind jumped to all sorts of conclusions about him. It got so bad that I got into a fight with him."

"Did you win?"

"Does it look like I won?" Izuru chuckled. "And once that was over, everything really started to go wrong. A true shit hits the fan sequence of moments. First there's Yumi, a friend of mine from middle school who confessed her love to me and I act like an idiot and just play it like it's something related to midterms."

"Yikes."

"And then there's Chika-senpai. We spent a day out in Ikubukuro and I happened to walk her home, then we kissed and I've been avoiding her since then."

"That's shitty of you."

"And then, just as I thought things were slowing down, they go downhill again! I put on this stupid Takagi Ren farse thing and have a fight with Aimi... And then to go two for two, I get into another fight, this time with Minami! I called her such horrible things... I made her cry, I made her be scared of me! I really looked like I was going to hit her, and then she said things would be better if we never met... Dammit, where did I go wrong?!" Izuru exclaimed.

"Shit really hit the fan. The four girls that are always around you just up and left you. You avoided two and the other two just ran away from you. Care for an outsider's opinion?"

"Give me your best shot."

"It's time to take these harem goggles off. This is real life, not some show where you can keep having all girls around you and expect them to accept all those times when you're oblivious. Do you think this Yumi chick felt good seeing you just dodge her confession? What about this senpai girl and you avoiding her? Aimi's been your partner since what, last year? Of course she'd feel betrayed upon seeing you be someone else, specially after the way you treated her during the fight with my brother. And as far as this Minami girl goes, even if she is tied to all that happened with Katsu-nii, it didn't give you the right to unload all your anger on her. Of course she'd feel scared of this guy she looked up to protect her and now is yelling at her and almost hitting her. Each of these girls as their own different feelings when it comes to you, but you can only get so far playing the oblivious card. They'll eventually want to know how you feel, and each time you act like an ignorant fool to dodge their feelings, you'll only keep hurting them."

"Hm..." Izuru frowned. "Why are you doing this for me?"

"Call it a payback of sorts." Rio sighed, but then smiled. "Katsu-nii hasn't been the happiest ever since the whole Yamagishi thing went down, but now he's happier than ever. You've been a great friend for him, so this is what I can do to say thanks. But I also hate what you're doing to these girls. You're trying to be a hero without even noticing it."

"H-hero?"

"Yeah. You're trying to go on with your life without hurting any of them, but what you're actually doing is making each of them suffer. I... I really hate heroes. Stupid people trying too hard to help others leading to nothing is something I truly despise with all my being. My brother tried to be a hero who'd save his friends from that stupid teacher, but how did the world treat him? They turned their backs on him and he got expelled, without any school other than Heiwa accepting him. He didn't deserved to be treated like that. And you? You got beaten up for trying to protect your school and now the girls you tried so hard to avoid hurting all got hurt because of your actions. Nothing good ever happens to heroes, so what's the point of trying so hard to be one?" Rio asked, looking out at Tokyo's skyline.

"You're in your first year of high school, right? How come you're so realistic already?"

"It was the only choice I had. I could either be ignorant of what people said about my brother, or I could be realistic and stand up for the truth. At school, I put the whole nice and happy girl act, but that's just a scam. To be honest, I also hate the current youth. So many dumbasses willing to follow whoever speaks up first and looking away from the truth. If I was paid whenever a stupid teenager did a stupid thing, I'd have more money than my family."

"Pffff." Izuru briefly held back a laugh, but then let it out.

"Hey, what are you laughing at?! This includes you too!"

"I know, I know! But I agree with everything you said! The current youth really is a piece of shit." Izuru laughed.

"It is, isn't it?" Rio chuckled with a smile.

"Yeah... Thank you, Rio."

"I can't have your sadness get passed on to Katsu-nii, now can I? I won't tell you to start fixing your crap right away. Do it at your own pace. Talk with these girls and clear everything. Tell them what they really need to know, not what you want to tell them to make them feel better. It'll hurt at the start, but they'll eventually get better. Now come on." Rio got up from the couch and looked back at Izuru. "You barelly touching your dinner made it obvious that you were going through something, and sleeping on an empty stomach won't do you any good. I'll make you something good, so come on."

"Eh, don't mind if I do." Izuru chuckled, following her.