[demino_hellsin]

Spoiler for Chifuyu's opening statement:

Tonight was depressing. That was how Chifuyu felt as she shambled against the wooden fences of the suburban district. Another session of drinking her day's stresses away and her usual stubbornness forced her to refuse the help of her closest friend and colleague Yamada Maya. It was probably for the better, no one had to see the pitiful state she was in now. Drunk and barely on her feet, the normally proud woman known worldwide for her beauty and skill was reduced to the form of a has-been alcoholic trying to forget everything wrong in her life. Really, there was nothing wrong with this life after all. She was an orphan living with her younger brother. Said younger brother was now on a decently paced road to a good life. He also had five potential lovers all vying to be the one true love for him. She was adored as the most perfect woman on this Earth.

All this made Chifuyu puke her guts out as alcohol mixed in with those putrid thoughts. The truth was far from how people wanted to paint it. As far back as Chifuyu could remember, her parents had abandoned the two of them as young as she was at age 13. Ever since she'd been struggling to keep the both of them together, fighting against social services that ushered them to orphanages where the chances of separation were far too high. She'd gained a friend who was probably more likely to stab her in the back out of good will than do anything that positively impacted her life. Chifuyu was forced to enroll Ichika in the most prestigious school on Earth because it was either that or have him sent to a lab to be dissected, either way he'd be treated as a freak for life. Now that he's grown up, he has girls falling for him left and right and Chifuyu felt her duty as both elder sister and guardian of the boy to chase them all away with her prized katana in hand. Despite all that she let them come, because she knew her little brother wasn't so little anymore. He needed space. But the worst of Chifuyu's troubles was that no matter how she tried to reason to herself her own actions, no matter how she wanted to play the reasonable adult, the real reason she wanted to chase those girls away and let them come close in remorse is because she was in love with her brother.

Yes, Orimura Chifuyu was in love with Orimura Ichika. The thought of it sent the raven-haired woman into another bout of retching. She loved him as a woman would a man. She wanted him and yet hated the fact that she did. It tore her inside and out watching those five flirt with her prize, but she had to let it go. It wasn't right, it wasn't her place.

Chifuyu stumbled through her melancholy haze. The buzz of alcohol becoming increasingly less and less as she deposited most of the substance on the sidewalk. Her chest burned as her heart beat faster with every step she took. Anxiety mixing with anger and self-loathing that threatened to spill over the brim of her cool facade. Chifuyu was a mess and deeply regretted not taking Maya's offer of walking home together.