“Ah~ we’re almost there!”

“I’m so excited!!”

“Whoo! Let’s get ready!”

The group of girls was getting so excited for just this ship to arrive on the island, which was right in front of them. This year, the school’s fieldtrip will be on this island far west of Seoul. It seemed the chairman of the school and the chief of the island were good friends, and thus they planned for this fieldtrip. This was one of the last boats that were about to arrive on another side… however; there was this raven-haired girl that wished to stay home instead. She hated fieldtrips especially with her colleagues in the same year. She didn’t have this best friend relationship with anyone at all. She hated associated with others and simply she generally hates humans.

“Ms. Chou, I was looking for you.”

She turned out and met with my classmate, Myoui Mina, her roommate for the whole 5-days trip on this island. She’s a nerdy girl and always read her books, she was a good fiend to talk to as well comparing to those loud mouth girls.

“The teachers are telling us to make sure our stuffs are ready.”

“Sounds good to me.”

Another 5 days on this island… Tzuyu hope it won’t be horrible like those other years she experienced. Just as much as she hated many people from her own year…many of them don’t like her either. She doubted any of them would even care she live or die.
 

-

The old man at the deck seemed to be frustrated somehow as if something wasn’t going right. Another adult came up to him out of curiosity to ask him after he had done escorting last group of students to the hotel that they would be staying for their whole course of the fieldtrip.

“Chief, what’s the matter?”

“Another two boats are coming and we’re not having enough room at Jeongyeon’s hotel as we planned! It seemed something was malfunctioning and the rooms are not available for use.”

“Ehh?? Then what are we going to do?”
The man started to panic but the chief was trying to stay calm and think things through and the only way was to act fast before it would be too late for him. They had to use another hotel close by to the chief’s place and they needed to make a reservation for 40 rooms. But before the man would be on his way to another hotel, the chief made another request for him.

“Do call Sana over to help, tell her to meet at the Nayeon’s hotel.”

“Yes sir will do!”

The man stared out in the ocean and could saw the boat coming from a far distance. He started to worry whether his daughter wouldn’t be late since this was an important day after all. She would probably be that the shrine with the priest as usual and also loitering around too.

“Hope she makes it…”
 

-

The sound of the boats arrived on the deck competed against the clashes of waves against the shore. The students carried their bags out from the boat and onto the land with excitement for their trip on this unknown island. The teacher went up to the chief and discussed about the plans from now, and informed him how there was a technical issue with the hotel they booked. However, they were making reservations with another hotel at the moment. In the end, the adults came to an agreement that they should head there before students would start to wonder what would happen.

“Everyone~ Welcome to this island, the bada no byeol island.”

The chief gave a brief narration before he started to take them over to their destination and hoped that nothing went wrong out of the plan. Just as much he was worried about the plan, he wondered whether his daughter had arrived at the hotel or not by the time he reached there or not. She could be very fast, just as much as slow like a turtle.
 

-

As soon as they arrived at the hotel the chief went to talk to the owner, Nayeon, and hoped she would compromise with him since this was an important plan after all. In the end the hotel owner didn’t have a choice but to lend the rooms to the students to stay for the time being despite there were reservations made already.

“You owe me this time, chief.”

“Thanks so much Nayeon! By the way…is Sana here yet?”

“She did, and went out already.”

He sighed once again, as if this wasn’t the first time that his daughter acted so carelessly like this. He went to tell the teacher for the updating information and he informed the students to come in and pick up their keys. They didn’t have any schedule until dinner so they’re free to wander around the whole island for the time being. However, despite most students went up to their room already, his daughter still didn’t show up yet and it made him sighed again while Nayeon was standing right beside him at the lobby.

“That girl…did she say where is she going?”

“She said the ocean is prettier than usual today.”

“I see…well, everything went well, so it’s alright.”

“She’ll be alright, Sana is a grown up girl.”

“…Indeed.”
 

-

Tzuyu had come down from the hotel after unpacked her bags and she hated this free time the most. What could she do without a friend to be with? Even someone nerdy like Mina had a life with her friends, how fortunate she was to have childhood friend whom was a popular girl named Chaeyoung. It made Tzuyu jealous a little and while she was walking around the road she could hear the ocean tackling against the beach clearly. It was the first time she got away from the mainland and never knew that the ocean could be so blue like a jewel. She always had this good eye vision allowing her to see things in detail…that’s why she had so much fascination in the beauty of nature and art. These eyes allowed her to give appreciation to its true beauty.

“…So pretty.”

Maybe the trip here wasn’t as bad after all. However, as she tried to figure out a way to get closer to the ocean she wasn’t sure how she would make it there. She couldn’t possibly jump down from the footpath since the differences between the beach floor and the footpath was too high. She would be injured if she jumped down recklessly despite the soft sand below her. Also, there were wall of rocks all over the places as to protect strong tidal waves from breaking through. As she kept scouting for the path she wasn’t watching her steps properly, but before she would step on the unstable rock a yell came out from nowhere and startled her.

“Don’t step on that spot!”

Tzuyu was startled but it just made things worse, in the end she slipped down from the side of the steep footpath down to the beach area. She yelped out with surprise and fear, but before she realized that the landing wasn’t as rough as she thought but it was…soft? Slowly, she opened her eyes up again and saw this girl’s face right close to her as Tzuyu landed straight into her arms. This young looking girl caught her from the fall.

“Hello~”

She replied in a very relaxing tone as if nothing happened at all despite Tzuyu’s fall from that steep footpath above them. She observed her facial features and could see those brown gentle eyes as well as her silky black hair. She wasn’t tying her hair properly so it looked rather messy, but somehow it looked quite natural on her. Apparently, she was shorter than Tzuyu but she was able to carry her in a bridal style easily without breaking a sweat.

“E-Eh!? Who are you??”

“I’m Sana!”

“I-I mean…Uh…”

“I warned you not to step there. It’s dangerous if you don’t know which areas are not good to use to come down to the beach.”

This mysterious girl named Sana that she accidently met suddenly walked towards the beach and it’s making the poor student panic. She didn’t know what this mysterious girl would do to her after they just met a few seconds ago.

“L-Let me down?”

“Didn’t you want to come to the beach?”

“Yes! But put me down!”
 

“Okay~”

Sana gently put her down and Tzuyu was finally able to grasp for some air of relief. On the bright side, the young girl was obedient with the taller one. Tzuyu turned back to look at the shorter girl from top to bottom and she seemed to be one of the people living on this island. She was dressed in her plain white long-sleeve shirt, blue shorts and black sandals.

“The ocean is nice today right~”

“Huh? Oh…”

Sana seemed to be a person who talked out of blue and Tzuyu diverted her eyes to the huge blue surface in front of her. The ocean breeze brushed against her cheeks and the scent calmed her mind down as well. It was indeed a pleasant scene and it’s worth coming down here just to see it clearly and closely like this.
“You’re not from around here, are you a student from Seoul?”

“Y-Yeah.”

“Awesome~ nice to meet you! I’m Minatozaki Sana, just call me Sana.”

The innocent girl extended her hand towards Tzuyu and caught Tzuyu off guard. She never has received such a response from someone like this before and it just felt very weird to her. Tzuyu didn’t extend her hand out to Sana and just replied back instead. She didn’t want to have any physical contact with this whacky stranger she just met.

“…Chou Tzuyu.”

“Hmmmmm, Chewy?”

“H-Huh!?”

Sana suddenly blurted out a nickname she gave to the student she just met. Then she had a huge smile across her face as she seemed to be delighted to meet with Tzuyu, but as she stared back at her…it gave Tzuyu a creepy feeling though. How did this stranger know her nickname? She never used it ever since she moved on from 3rd Year in primary school until now…

“What?”

“Hmmm, you’re a bit too cloudy black, but you’re actually so pure white like a pearl.”

“…Huhhh??”

Tzuyu let out her reaction, as she couldn’t understand any single word from Sana at all and it was driving her crazy. Out of all the people she could’ve met, she encountered this weird abnormal girl at the beach that was speaking of random things at her. Nothing was making sense ever since she was having this conversation with her. What a bad luck she had.

“Do you want to go to the hotel? I can take you there!”

“Eh? How did you know about the hotel?”

“My dad asked me to go over, but the ocean is prettier than usual today so I took my time.”

Tzuyu wasn’t sure she grasped everything that Sana said or not. She had a feeling that this girl had a mental issue or something so she shouldn’t be bothered with her odd behaviors. As Sana led the way and told Tzuyu that she needed to take this path if she wanted to come down to the beach safely. As the younger girl got up to the top first, she extended her hand to Tzuyu and pulled her up. That was when Tzuyu couldn’t believe such strength those arms had.

“…You’re strong.”

“I know I am~ I always help my dad and uncle with their job!”

“Uh, okay?”

“The hotel is that way, I bet dad is mad now.”

“Who’s your dad?”

“The chief of the island.”

“S-Seriously?”

“Yup~ he’s a very awesome man!”

As the shorter one escorted Tzuyu back to the hotel, they could see the chief standing at the front of the entrance as if he was waiting for someone to show up right now. His eyes had met with Sana’s and it allowed him to sigh with relief. Sana skipped towards him with that innocent smile across her face.

“Hey