Dimensional Descent

"It started off fairly innocent. I liked to learn things about you and found methods of doing so. I couldn't go to your games because they were often at night and there was a small period of time between classes and curfew I could use to train. But, I always watched the livestreams.

"During one of your postgame interviews, the interviewer asked you whether you preferred girls with short or long hair. I remember not liking the question. Shouldn't she have been asking you about football? And why was she so flirty? But I distinctly remember you saying long hair.

"Back then, I remember being traumatized and I agonized over it for several days. A part of me thought you just answered randomly because the interviewer made you uncomfortable. But, another part of me couldn't help but look in the mirror, hating my short hair.

"I always found long hair to be annoying. It also got in the way, it took way too long to dry after a shower, and whenever I trained I had to make extra care not to let it get tangled or caught by an opponent. But, after that day, I couldn't bring myself to cut it anymore."

Aina thought too highly of Leonel's opinion. Even if it was a joke, even if it was an off handed comment to get the interviewer off of his back, she still did it at a great inconvenience to herself. She had always been about optimizing her training, but for the first time in her life, she chose to do something decidedly against her philosophy, just for the small chance at making Leonel happy.

She lost count of the number of times she had done exactly that.

She stopped wearing tomboyish clothes and started wearing dresses to school. She began to worry about her appearance a lot, even changing the settings of the mask that hid her scars to a slightly more beautiful setting. She even remembered regretting choosing a setting that was so normal when she could have made herself the most beautiful girl in school with the change of a few settings.

the table, and many of them happened over such a long course of time that Leonel would have never thought that he was the

charms more as she matured just like every other little girl did. How many young girls were boorish tomboys

against everything she was, just to fit into

outside a classroom setting without her brain turning into a bonfire, so all she could do was pick up

built an entire persona, a woman that wasn't even truly herself, just to make Leonel happy. And

had already liked her. He had already said as much. In fact, he told her almost everyday, without reserve and without

remember every time you confessed, I could recall them all. And each time, I respected you so much more, liked you so much more, because you could do exactly what I seemed to

time she painted the nails on one hand blue and the other violet and tried to see which one Leonel noticed because she couldn't figure out which

end of her training, hoping she would lengthen her

earned during one of her summer internships on a jersey signed by Leonel that, to this day, sat in a corner of her spatial ring… A jersey

her crush. Except the difference was that normally nobody else but her should have been aware of