Sakura Kiss (Wizard School Romance)

Enter ARASHI and FURUTA, stage right. Each wears a school uniform of dark blue with white ties. On their breasts is a black mountain tipped in pink.


Enter HARADA and NEZU, stage left. Each wears a female version of Arashi and Furuta's uniforms.


ARASHI, HARADA, and NEZU all stare at him.


Exit ARASHI and FURUTA, stage right. Exit HARADA and NEZU, stage left.



A train snakes through the Japanese countryside, a silver knife through great swathes of springtime color. In it sits you. A boy, a magi. Or rather, someone who will one day be a magi. Hopefully. If you can survive three years of high school. Which at this point, seems as distant a prospect as you've ever heard.

In the distance the mountain looms, enormous. Even from here you can see the pink of cherry blossoms at the peak. All your life you have heard of Hiyari, but the sight of it is alien to you. It is enormous, and unknowable.

The door behind you slides open and Ban Naoya ends your solitude. His face, at least, is familiar. Heir to the Ban family empire, one day he will rule the third-largest clan of magi in Japan. Yet always he has been there by your side, the closest thing to a brother you've ever had. He wears his usual half smile, as if he can't quite decide how he feels so he might as well be happy, as he sits across from you and looks out the window.

"I thought I should warn you," he says abruptly. "Before the ambush."


"What?" You ask. But the door slides open again before Ban can clarify.

There are two of them, one short and dark and neat, the other tall and fair and unruly. Both wear the Hiyari uniform, white ties marking them as first years.

"Ban," says the one who is short and dark and neat. "You ran away!"

"I made a tactical retreat," Ban says. He catches your eye and nods to the boy. "This is Arashi Hatsu."

"And this waste of space," Arashi says, nodding to the one who is tall and fair and unruly, "is Furuta Ren."


Furuta takes the insult in stride. "We know who you are though," he says. "Takami Yuta."


Ban's smile twists to worry. "Ah, lay off it," he says to the pair. "Don't pay them any mind, Yuta. They're both too dramatic for their own goods."

The third son of clan Takami, tenth most powerful of Japan's magi clans. Your two older brothers have already graduated Hiyari and are in the height of their powers, leaving very little for you to do besides smile and stay out of the way.


Relationships
Hinata Chidori (the Delinquent) - Met
Yuhara Kanoko (the Princess) - Met
Arashi Tatsuko (the Musician) - Met
Koshimoto Sachi (the Seer) - Met
Shimada Natsume (The Partner-in-Crime) - Met
The Rival -

The Heroines

Kind of the point of the whole thing.

Hinata Chidori

Hinata Chidori
The Delinquent
Terror in Blonde
Class 1-B
​

The only girl in school who dares to dye her hair. She beat you up! And Ban too, you guess.

Year 1​

Summer​	Autumn​	Winter​	Spring​
3​	-​	-​	-​

Yuhara Kanoko

Yuhara Kanoko
The Princess
As if Carved from Marble
Class 1-A

​

Heir to Japan's greatest magi clan. Has a thing (specifically, romantically) for Ban. What does she want with you?

Year 1​

Summer​	Autumn​	Winter​	Spring​
3​	-​	-​	-​

​

Arashi Tatsuko

Arashi Tatsuko
The Musician
The Phantom of the Attic
Class 1-A
​

Plays piano. Not a ghost!

Year 1​

Summer​	Autumn​	Winter​	Spring​
2​	-​	-​	-​

​

Koshimoto Sachi

Koshimoto Sachi
The Seer
The Angel of Hiyari's Halls
Class 2-C
​

A seer from a middling clan. Each day she sees another future misfortune, and each day she does her best to make it right.

Year 1​

Summer​	Autumn​	Winter​	Spring​
2​	-​	-​	-​

​

Shimada Natsume

Shimada Natsume
The Partner in Crime
As well resent the wind or rain
Class 1-D​

A clanless magi. As her family is sworn to clan Ban, so is she. You have known each other practically all your lives. Avoiding you, for some reason.

Year 1​

Summer​	Autumn​	Winter​	Spring​
3​	-​	-​	-​

​

The Rival

I'll bet you think it's funny that you keep avoiding this character huh well guess what this was best girl the whole time and you've played yourselves.​

The Boys

Also important.

Ban Naoya

Ban Naoya
The Best Friend
Class 1-A​

Heir to the Ban family, Japan's third-largest magi clan. Your friend since childhood. Has his eye on someone, won't tell you who.

Arashi Hatsu & Furuta Ren

Furuta Ren (L) & Arashi Hatsu (R)
Those two guys
Class 1-A​

Claim they have better things to do than follow you around, but you can't confirm that's true.

The Girls

Best girl will inevitably be here.

Harada Midori & Nezu Iroha

Harada Midori (L) & Nezu Iroha (R)
Those two girls.
Class 1-A​

Harada is on the soccer team and Nezu fancies herself an ace reporter.

Sakura Kiss is primarily a time management quest. Each year is broken up into 48 events, with each event typically separated by roughly one week. Each event will progress the route of a chosen heroine, and at the end of each year, the heroines will re-evaluate their relationship with you based on how much (and how) you engaged with their route.

"A little drama does us good," you tell Ban, flashing Arashi and Furuta a smile. "Beats boredom."

"Oh, my heart's aflutter," Furuta says, tapping his fingers rapidly on his chest.

"It is nice to be appreciated for what we bring to the table," Arashi. "You could learn from him, Ban."

Ban rolls his eyes. "Should've known he'd have you two eating out of his hand."

You just smile guilelessly at him. As the third son of the tenth most powerful magi clan in the country, your life has been an endless procession of polite small talk while the real business happens elsewhere. Ingratiating yourself with others has essentially been your job since you were old enough to carry a conversation. For as close as the two of you are, it's never been the same for Ban. People flock to him because of his birth – he's never really had to work to keep them happy.

If he were anyone other than Ban Naoya, that might've made him cold, or arrogant. Instead you think it mostly makes him sad.

"Ah, ah, ah, you can see them from here!" Furuta shouts, the sound enormous in the now-cramped compartment. His face is pressed tight against the glass. "It's already summer, but they're still so pretty…"

"Sorry, he's weird about the cherry blossoms," Arashi says. "Really, really thinks they're magic."

"And Arashi is just a stick in the mud with a big stone heart," Furuta says. "I don't believe they're magic, okay? I know they are. My clan cousin had a friend who met his wife at Hiyari, and it worked for them!" He looks to Ban, then you. "What about you guys? You're with me, right?"

Ban shrugs. "Belief is magic," he says, "so if enough magi believe it, it really can be true."

The most noncommittal answer in the universe. You lean your forehead against the window and look up at the pink that paints the mountaintop. Furuta is right – spring has already faded into summer, leaving the peak of the trees' beauty behind, but even still the sight is breathtaking. "I don't know if it's real," you say, "but...



Those first days at Hiyari are a rush of color and noise and people. The summer heat is stifling, lessened only briefly by the rare breeze coming in off the ocean, and each day is packed full with meetings and greetings and orientations. You're moved into the first year dorms, large traditionally built complexes like the ones you grew up in on your family's estates. Ban is your roommate, which you consider an excellent deal because he's a neat freak and doesn't mind doing most of your share of the work.

There are more magi here than you have ever before seen in one place, and every day the halls run thick with spellwork. Animated furniture lumbers from room to room, filing cabinets talking to each other with series of slamming drawers as they move. Students shoot jets of light from their fingers, embroiling half the school in an elaborate game of magi's tag. Sometimes you think you hear music drifting airily through the hallways, even though the orchestra room is on the other side of campus.

It's overwhelming, in its way, but you're not totally unprepared. Both your parents and both your brothers before you attended school in these hallowed halls, and you were raised on stories of it. And when the initial hectic sprint fades, you find yourself acclimating to the strange new rhythm of your life.

It is all just prologue. Looking back, you would say that your days at Hiyari did not really begin until…