#what’s the point in life if I can’t be a pervy lil ghost to my faves

[voidcat]

Btw mari I saw your ask and let me tell u- the thing u said abt being a ghost has been on my mind for SO LONG im glad someone else was thinking like me in that regard LMAO

[evergreen-dryad]

day 6 - reverse au

As I Thought, My High School Life with A Ghost Is Wrong (2040 words)

Our Very Shounen MC is Yashiro Nezu, grey hair with green tips, and bright red eyes. And don’t forget the little ahoge! It sprouted from his head like a little spring onion.

“It’s the start of a new term, I should join a club...” He scratched his head, ducking his chin as a gaggle of girls passed him by. “Where can I go to be popular?” He murmured under his breath, ticking off his fingers. “The anime club didn’t work out, neither did the supernatural club sadly...”

He sighed morosely, deflating as he filed into his classroom. Taking his seat second from the back by the window, he gazed outside. Nothing really happens in this school.

His longtime friend from middle school Aoi tapped him on the back at break. “What’s got you so eaten up?” He smiled, indigo hair artfully tousled.

Nezu stared at him. Abruptly, he kowtowed. “Please teach me your riajuu ways, O Crown Prince of the Popularity Rankings.”

The top spot, of course, naturally belonged to the Queen, with golden hair and blue eyes and charming smile, Minamoto Teruko. Whom he only dared admire from afar.

“Eh, this again, Nezu?” Aoi chuckled, leaning on his cheek as he pulled up a chair. “Have you found a club, first of all?”

“Not really.” He wasn’t particularly interested in any of the sports offered, but that was the logical path to popularity, really.

Aoi, darling prince of the school, was in the Gardening Club, and all the girls adored him for it, cooing over him from afar as he clipped and pruned roses. He could make it work, Nezu not so much. Beside the vegetable patches girls had giggled at him for looking like a radish sprouting from the earth. A radish! He covered his face just thinking about it now, terrifically embarrassed.

Aoi patted his shoulder consolingly. “Now, now. You’ll get there. But you should keep coming to the Gardening Club with me, Nezu. It was fun, wasn't it?"

"Yeah... it wasn't half bad."

"Mm, and you look very focused when you dig, Nezu. It's a good look on you."

"Really...?" Nezu felt his spirits perk up.

"Really! I'm sure you can continue to cultivate your 'manly charms' if you keep working out," Aoi said, mimicking him whining about his lack of muscles last time.

"Stooop." Nezu wrinkled his nose. "Some charming farmer I am."

Aoi laughed. "Alright, let me tell you about this cool new rumour that’s been floating around...”

“The girls’ toilets, are you for real.” Nezu said flatly after he had finished the tale.

Aoi raised an eyebrow enquiringly.

"That means only girls can go in to wish then," he groaned, slumping onto his elbows.

"Hmm, but it's the old building though, not many classes are held there. So you can just sneak in," Aoi suggested cheerily.

Nezu mock gasped. "Aoi-kun! I didn't expect you of all people to have this side to you!" He clapped out a hand to tousle his friend's head. "What would the girls say if they heard their Prince was like this..." He ruffled his head mercilessly.

"Nezu, please!" Aoi chortled, trying to wriggle free from his grasp. "Mercy, SOS!"

~

So he had said, but he was curious enough to actually consider trying. Walking casually down the corridor, he looked left and right. Coast was clear. Yashiro Nezu burst into the girls’ bathrooms, grey-green locks flapping about his ears.

“Phew, mission accomplished.” He passed a hand over his brow, huffing a breath.

He knocked and said the words. Even if it was nothing, it’d just be a laugh with him and Aoi later. Sneaking into the girls’ toilets for a wish, really...

And so here he was in this situation. He had let out a particularly girly scream he was not proud of, and Hanako-san was laughing at him. The Hanako-san was holding her stomach, laughing. Two white wisps bobbed alongside her.

It's a loli, thought Nezu with some fear, a loli ghost in a red mini-skirt-!

"Oya~ you're thinking pervy thoughts, aren't you?" The little girl snickered at him, stepping on his toes.

"Ow- wait, it doesn't hurt?"

"Just joking." She winked at him. "Now let's hear it, what's your wish?"

He stared at her.

She wriggled, affecting a sigh. "Ooh, don't stare so much, your eyes are burning through me~"

Nezu jerked away, extremely embarrassed. He heard her snigger. "No, I was just surprised you actually - offer wishes.” He peeked at her from a corner of his eye.

“I do! The rumours you’ve heard about me are all true!” Her choppy black bangs hung over her face as she floated over to sit on a toilet tank. “Of course, all wishes come with a price as well.” Her golden eyes glinted like coins. “Did you come here with a wish?” The corners of her lips curved in a smile.

Nezu swallowed. “I want to be popular,” he admitted quietly. “I want girls to like me and stop rejecting me for my height.”

Hanako-san nodded encouragingly, floating over with a notebook in hand. “And your name?”

“Yashiro Nezu. Does that notebook help you grant wishes like Death Note...?”

“My, my. You’re an imaginative one.”

~

How did this happen? Nezu despaired internally. It appeared he was now in a stand-off with a middle-school student, taller than him. And this blonde, blue-eyed guy had him pinned to a wall with a golden trident at his throat.

This was not how I wanted my first kabedon to be like, he thought wryly.

“Hey, listen to me! You know where Hanako is, don’t you?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, please let me go, kouhai.” I haven’t got my wish granted yet, I can’t tell him.

Besides, it didn’t seem fair to tell a towering guy with a weapon where a little girl is, even if she’s a ghost and has magic powers...?

“Liar, I saw you conspiring with her yesterday!”

Yesterday...? Yesterday he had been trying out all of Hanako-san’s suggestions, which had included smiling at and offering to help the Student Council President and Popularity Queen Minamoto Teruko carry some of her paperwork...

(Hanako-san had initially suggested bumping into her at a corner and then helping her pick up her things. Nezu didn’t have the guts for that, he knew his bishounen stats would not Pass.)

Oh, the boy beside her then.

“...you must have mistaken me for someone else.” He tried to deny.

The boy eyed him. “No one else has hair like you, senpai.”

Shit. Well then. “I’m sorry, I can’t tell you. Let me go.” He pushed at the arm.

“H-hey! Wait a sec-”

He walked away, shrugging off the boy’s hand. All that gardening work came in useful for this moment, huh.

“Wait, senpai!” The boy trotted beside him. “Let me explain. It’s my duty as a Minamoto to exorcise her!” Yadda yadda, backstory. He’d heard about Minamoto no Yorimitsu before. Was this guy still in his chuunibyo phase? “-barely managed to seal Hanako-san,” he tuned in right there, “she’s a dangerous spirit! You’ve seen her use her knife, right?”

“No...?” he said slowly, turning to look at Minamoto.

“She’s a murderer, she definitely used it in her lifetime-”

“Oh? Who’s been gossiping about lil ol’ me?” Hanako-san sat atop his shoulders, elbows on his head. Both boys froze.

Do not, Nezu thought with a chill, think about what’s behind me right now.

~

“Don’t you have something that’ll make me grow taller,” he griped, sneaking into the toilets yet once again.

“Drink milk,” she said sweetly, swinging her stockinged leg from where she was sitting on the window ledge. She was playing Hanafuda by herself as usual. Cards floated on their own accord.

“Or something that’ll give me that mystical bishounen aura with sparkles?”

She squinted up at him briefly. “I heard there’s this thing called plastic surgery.”

He gritted his teeth. “Stop messing around with me. You grant wishes, don’t you? But you haven’t pulled out anything other than that tatty manual!”

She looked at him, cards fanned out in her hand.“The more power the method takes, the higher the price.”

“If you don’t even tell me what the price is, how can I pay it?” He stared back, as he walked right up to her.

The air was tense as they stared each other down. She lowered her eyes in thought.

“You’re willing to pay anything?” Her eyes smouldered against the backdrop of the stained window.

He gulped. “Yes.”

~

Nezu stared at the silvery discs on his palm, glinting softly opalescent whenever he moved them. Unworldly, they were definitely magical items. Finally, the real deal.

But he could get any girl he chose to return his feelings with this...? Anyone? Was there a girl he really liked?

There was Minamoto Teruko, with the highest social capital.

She smiled at him when she made eye contact with him in the hallway. He smiled awkwardly back.

If he dated her, he’d definitely be popular. Not just a short guy with a baby face and radish hair.

He watched her move away, hand twitching to call out to her.

This... isn’t right.

~

“So you didn’t use them after all,” Hanako-san marvelled, seemingly amused.

“No... it felt like a date rape drug.” He scratched his head, sheepish. “I would have been just using her, whoever it was just because,” he ducked his head, “I want to be liked.”

“Hmm...” Hanako-san was in his face, amber eyes wide and affectionate, “You’ve actually got spine after all, I like you.”

“Eh?!” He leaned away from her, face reddening despite himself. “N-not like that!”

“Really?” She tilted her head, a teasing smile crawling across her face. “Who came in here begging to be a popular bishie with the ladies~” She singsonged.

“I-”

“Multiple times too~”

He deflated, defeated. He mumbled a vague assent.

“Though, I can still grant your wish, in a way.” She flipped one of the mermaid scales into the air, watching it spin.

“How do you mean?”

“Your wish for popularity stems from wanting to be liked. In conclusion, you want someone to like you back, or someone to like you more than you like yourself.” The scale landed on her open palm. She took it up in her fingers, pointing at him. “Am I right?”

“...you didn’t need to expose me like that,” Nezu said stiffly. “And?”

She looked into his eyes directly, a smile rising. “I like you. Ah-ha, not romantically of course, I’m a decades old ghost,” she laughed, flapping a hand at him. “And for the price...” she rose up on her tiptoes to whisper into his ear, “I need you,” he gulped, not breathing, “as a human assistant.”

“What?” He croaked.

She giggled, her breath tickling his skin. “You heard me right.” Her hand on his arm. “I need help in some things, so this arrangement should work out fine, right?”

“Wait, what things-” His head was reeling.

“Labour, of course,” She tilted her head innocently. “Oh wow, you perv~” She flapped at his back, exhaling laughter.

He tallied some things in his head. “So I work for you, and you just like me back? That’s it?”

“I gave you some good advice, didn’t I? You’ve been making progress in your social interactions.” It was true. He had been talking to people more, more people greeted him in the corridors now.

“What did I tell you? I dispense good advise, don’t I?” She kicked him lightly in the shin. “I can still continue to be your wise advisor if you choose to be my assistant,” she said, smugly.

“I see...”

“What do you say?” She stuck out a hand.

“...Okay.” Why not, he told himself, shaking her small hand. How bad can it be?

“Okay! For your first task~ open up.” She prodded the mermaid scale between his lips.

“Mm-!” He turned away. “Why? Didn’t you just tell me it’s cursed?!”

“It’s to sign the contract.” She smiled widely. “This bonds us in such a way I can find you, no matter what happens to you. Humans are so fragile after all.” She sighed.

Is this because you’re truly concerned for me or you’re afraid to lose a worker, he did not say. He sighed through his nose, and swallowed the scale.

Hanako-san smiled at him gently, and ate hers too.

He felt nothing. He thought that was it.

It was not until he got back home, when he got under the showerhead, that he regretted everything.

“Damn you, Hanako...!” Nezufish blubbed, flopping on the bathroom tiles.

//I’m unsure if the bond between supernatural and kannagi can just be their word or they all need some sort of binding item. Though I suppose it’s needed so Yashiro is partly supernatural so she can see supernatural activity, like enter Boundaries and such.

concept: try to make jshk an actual shonen anime. Kou remains male as a rival/foe. Though it came out as ‘Nezu becomes the star of a yes shonen comedy slice-of-life with lots of BL shiptease’ (it’s not really jshk anymore if Nezu can somehow fight because Hanako’s powers don’t work like that?)

Yes, there are fujoshi classmates that ship him and Aoi. And after what happened in the corridor with Kou they’re getting shipped too. Fuel for the rumour mill lolol

So he did become popular after all, just not the way he wanted pffftttt

On another note, the fic for day 5 has expanded into a monster of its own, so...it’ll take a while oof