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EARLY ACCESS SNIPPET - The Summer Festival (P3:HEX)

Post's Word Count: 2408 (The actual Chapter in my doc has 13668 words, which will be posted in a couple days on my Ao3)

Summary: The cast are going to the Summer Festival at the shrine. Enjoying their summer night hanging out with their friends, a couple of surprises turned up for the better.

As soon as the sun begins to set, the time for the festival arises. The luminous lights from the lanterns brightens the nightly atmosphere as the crowds gather to enjoy the special occasion with their friends and loved ones. The shrine isn’t overly crowded, thankfully enough, even as the people chatter and make the place appear louder than usual for a small place. Decorations are hung up all around the Naganaki Shrine as well, with bright colors of fabrics and masks giving a nice touch to the festivities. With the public enjoying their time playing games and snacking on the delights for sale, it's about time for the high schoolers to arrive at the scene.

All the girls go out in their own unique yet colorful yukatas, while the guys that arrive stick with their casual clothing comfortable for the warm weather. That is, with the exception of Takaya— who chose to wear a lined violet-colored yukata with a yellow obi belt at the waistline. He even holds a black and yellow patterned fan up while he waits for the rest of the students to arrive. Ikutsuki happened to show up with a yukata of his own, being brown and beige colored with a dark gray obi. Both of the yukata wearers tied their hair up as well, with the Chairman in particular having it in a half up man bun.

The rest of the group finally arrive at the occasion, Aigis and Ken getting there at the last minute, gathering up with the others in a small huddle as some of the guys take a chance to witness the young women in their yukatas. Chidori’s is mostly silver and white with red-colored floral designs overlapping the inklike branch designs, with an ebony-colored obi wrapped around her waist to break up the light contrast. She also decided to put her hair in a large bun as well as having some makeup and eyeliner on to show off more of her beauty. Of course Junpei should be more mindful than staring right at her in a faze, based on his experiences with the brothers always glaring at him whenever he does so. Yukari then approaches next, wearing a pink and white checker patterned yukata with miniature flower designs on occasional areas of the fabric, and a yellow obi wrapped around her. Meanwhile Fuuka wears a bright blue yukata with simple sunflower designs and a red obi, and Mitsuru is a more elegant white yukata containing simple plant patterns while wearing a dark green obi. Aigis then shows up with a dark blue yukata with white flower designs throughout the fabric, wearing a bright red obi around her waist.

“Hey hey hey, looking good everyone! Now we can finally get this festival started!” Junpei becomes the first to announce with such excitement, glancing at all the girls gathered together before staring at one girl in particular at the end. His eyes widened with awe. “Oh wow, Chidori— you look really nice in black and white.” The man knows better than to make any sort of comment that can make her uncomfortable, being as admirable as he can be with his choice of words.

The girl then simply hums and looks down at her clothes. “Oh, you mean this dull thing?”

“Yeah, you look fantastic!” Yukari compliments the redhead’s wear as well. “It looks really good on you.”

The blonde android then hums in admiration. “How fascinating— the yukatas we all chose to wear are all different from one another. Assuming there’s hundreds if not thousands of uniquely designed materials to choose from,” Aigis states this with a curious tone, already learning so much about the cultural wear. “This kind of decorative attire is meant to be worn by men and women alike. Speaking of… Makoto-san, Junpei-san— why aren’t you two wearing your own?” The android girl turns to look at the two in question. With the corner of her eye she also spotted two other young men in their casual clothes as well. “As a matter of fact, I also realized both Sanada-san and Shirato-san did not put one on either. Isn’t this to be in the spirits of the festival?”

Ikutsuki gives a chuckle at that, given the fact the Chairman himself also noticed the oddity as well, but not so much bothered by it. “You could say that, yes. While it is part of cultural appropriation, it is not obligatory by any means, so not everyone is required to put one on.”

This only has Aigis become more puzzled. “Then why would one even come to the festival without wearing the decorative attire in the first place? I do not understand.”

Akihiko then calmly decides to give his two cents on it, not to say it’s even a correct answer to begin with. “I’d say don’t overthink it too much. Some of us are just here for a good time without getting all nice and fancy.”

“Heh, you sure took the words outta my mouth Sanada-senpai.” Junpei then rubs the back of his head with a wide grin, given he was going to throw some lame excuse in instead.

“Tch, says the one who wears a baseball cap all the time, every time. Seriously, do you ever take that off?” Yukari however gives some sass to the young guy as she lays one hand on her waist with an attitude.

“H-Hey, gimme some slack, will ya…?” He resents that, no surprise there, and kindly ignores her remark as he then glances over to Takaya as the man fans himself with a proper fashion. Junpei then takes a moment to comment, “By the way, you look a little too natural in a yukata.”

Takaya of course takes the compliment in stride, smiling over to the young uncultured man. “Hmph. Why thank you. Doesn't take much at all to look this stunning, if I do say so myself.”

Jin rolls his eyes with a snarky response. “I think the word you're looking for is ‘snobbish’.”

“Excuse you?” That earned Jin a glare from the eldest brother, his voice lowering to a hiss. “You shall regret those words, brother.”

Chidori then makes a disapproving huff, not feeling like dealing with her argumentative brothers first thing when coming to the festival. She then looks over at the bright colored stands and the decorative folks towards that general direction. “Well I don't know about you, but I'm willing to try out some of the food now. If anyone would like to accompany me, well, feel free I suppose.”

“Oh, you kiddin’?” Junpei then takes the chance and moves right over to join her on their stroll. “I’m all here for the munchies! Which one do you wanna try first? We could start with the takoyakis, the mochis. Oh oh oh, have you ever tried the geppeis? I mean— I suppose everyone has, but—”

“Now hold on just a moment,” Ikutsuki comes in to stop them before they go and take off. While Chidori goes to make a sigh in mere annoyance, the two turn to look at the Chairman to hear him out. Ikutsuki makes sure they’re looking at him first before mentioning, “If there’s one thing to try first— I recommend the karaage. They make it with the finest ingredients, it’s completely im-peck-able!”

Few of the team members just shake their heads and groan at the pun joke, wanting to pretend they didn’t hear that. Meanwhile the Chairman shamelessly grins at it. “Aw come ooonn— that was good, wasn’t it? Anyways, you go and have fun now. Don’t eat too much, you hear?”

Mitsuru then adds in. “And do recommend keeping your phones on you, just in case.”

The students respond with some mumbles and a few ‘yeahs’ before the first two take off in one direction, as Kotone asks to join up with Akihiko and Ken before they go their way. With the rest still in their group circle, one random person coming from the entrance suddenly comes up to one of the students in the group, particularly at Jin, and pulls him closer before giving a proper hello to everyone else.

“Heyy, looks like you’re all here!”

Jin then smiles over to the person, being Izumi, while kindly pulling away for the sake of maintaining his balance. “Well look who finally showed up. Takaya and I were just wondering where you might’ve gotten lost.”

“Ha, very funny,” Izumi smiles through the joke as well, as he doesn’t take offense one bit from his friends who like to tease him all the time. He wears a simple two-toned gray jinbei which consists of a loose top and shorts. Right behind him is a little girl, not even four feet tall, who is wearing a cute pink-and-red yukata with a yellow obi wrapped around at the waist. Some of the female students notice the smaller figure immediately.

“Oh hey there. Who’s this?” Yukari asks with a gentle surprise in tone, seeing that she hasn’t seen the little one before.

Izumi smiles fondly and goes to introduce her to the rest of the group. “This one’s my little sis, Saya. She loves going to these festivals, but can be a little shy of people. Come one Saya, don’t you wanna say hi…?”

The girl only hid away out of clear bashfulness, trying to be out of sight by hiding behind Izumi’s legs. The girls only made an ‘aww’ with adoration.

Fuuka made a small giggle, seeing how endearing the girl is. “Heh, she is quite adorable. How old is she?”

“She’ll be turning seven in September. And just like any other Libra— she can be a kind and honest person. Wouldn’t you say so?”

Takaya can’t help but smile fondly over hearing that, given he was the one who said that to Izumi about what each zodiac means personality-wise a while back. Based on his experience of how much he knows about the little girl too, and vice versa, it’s not too far from the truth either. The young man with the bun then goes to kneel down and holds one arm out to the child, even waving his hands to get her attention. “Oh what’s the matter? Too bashful to even say hi to little old me?”

The girl then perks behind the older brother and smiles right away, walking over to the man while grabbing the one arm he had out. She then jumps up and down and giggles out, “Hehe, Taka-yaki!”

This only leaves the man in a dismayed look, practically rolling his eyes into the back of his head if he could. “I told you many, many times already. It’s not Taka-yaki. And it’s definitely not ‘Takitaki’ either!” The girl then pleads to get picked up, though while Takaya does so, he has some trouble holding her up with both of his slim arms. “My goodness, look how big you’re getting. You’re growing way too fast!”

Mitsuru only smiles after seeing that exchange. “Well how charming. Seems like you two have known each other for quite a while now.”

Takaya, realizing he never mentioned this to anyone else, goes and smiles with a firm nod of his own. “Oh, why yes— Izumi and I would hang out with Saya-chan all the time after school. I usually like to come over whenever and play some games while she invites me to her ‘tea party’ with her adorable little friends. She’s a real sweetheart once you get to know her too.”

Jin definitely recalls him being absent going over to Izumi’s on occasion, giving off a judgmental glare. “You mean rather than doing homework, right?”

“Oh tsk tsk— you do know life isn’t always about school, hm? We both know we’re more than free to take a break now and then. Do whatever, whenever. Isn’t that right, young one?”

Saya, being held by Takaya with one arm as she looks around to see all the others nearby, immediately agrees. “Yeah, school work is for school, not for home!”

“Well, sheesh, sounds like she’s taking that from you, huh? Who knew?” Ikutsuki smiles at the girl and even laughs in response to that, with Jin glaring at the side.

As the settling dies down, the girl then pulls on the fabric from Takaya’s shoulder. “Hey, can we do that fishing game? Please please pleeeaassee, my momma would really love to have a fishy!”

While Takaya glances over to Izumi to see if that’s something that’ll be okay to do, he then turns his head back and smiles softly at Saya. “Well I’d say that’ll be a lovely idea! Now then: Are you going to be the one fishing, or am I going to end up doing all the work for you?”

Given that something like that has happened before, the girl just giggles and demands the man to ‘march forth’ and head their way to the attraction, with Izumi staying where he’s at.

This had Ikutsuki confused for a moment. “Hm, what’s the matter? Don’t you want to tag along with her?”

“Ah, nah. It’s fine,” The unkempt-hair teen waves it off. “I thought it would be best to give them their time together to play some of the games. Besides, she probably got tired of me following her around everywhere.”

This only has the Chairman chuckle once more. “Fair enough. You kids have fun, I’ll join up with the two over there. Just to keep an eye on them.”

After that exchange, the students then parted ways to spend their own time enjoying the festival. Makoto, Yukari, Mitsuru and Aigis went together as a group to find some enjoyment with some activities, eventually splitting up later on. Fuuka, given she did ask Jin to tag along with her for the festival, goes to ask Izumi as well. “Oh, Uchitani-san, would you like to join us for the ring toss? We're thinking about heading there first before checking out the other attractions around.”

Without a beat, the teen lays an arm on Jin’s shoulder with a welcoming grin. “Oh yeah, you bet! Been a while since I played that one.” He didn't need to be asked twice in this case, partnering up with the two immediately and following their lead before nudging the bespectacled friend on the side. “Oh, Jin— we gotta do a rematch of that yo-yo ball game. Still need to beat you after last year.”

“Oh yeah? Bring it!”

#fic #story

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