Chapter 75: Forest School
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 75: Forest School
Passing through the school gate, where a different teacher than usual was conducting the dress code inspection, I could see several tour buses lined up in front of the school grounds.
"Oppa! Have a great time at the forest school!"
"Yeah, I will. See you, Yuika."
"Make sure you eat well, Yui."
With her orange hair, the same color as Sakamoto's, fluttering behind her, his younger sister ran off toward the middle school building.
Watching her go, Kishimoto asked.
"Your sister's cute. How old is she?"
Sakamoto answered with a bashful smile.
"She's two years younger than me. A third-year in middle school now."
"Yui is a sharp kid. Unlike her lazy older brother, she handles everything herself perfectly," Yaguchi said with a chuckle, patting Sakamoto on the back.
"Hey, cut it out! Are you my mom or something?" Sakamoto grumbled, looking annoyed.
Walking along while watching the two childhood friends bicker, we soon arrived at the sports field.
Satoru, who seemed to have been waiting for us, waved in our direction.
"Hey! Over here!"
Having had an impromptu meet-up on the subway, we all flocked over to him.
Since the departure time was 8:20, many students had already arrived and were lining up.
With the rare sight of the class president in casual clothes, along with Satoru and Sasha, all of Class 2-B's Group D was now assembled.
"Yoo-Sung, you brought all the stuff we bought yesterday, right?"
"Of course."
I nodded and shook the icebox slung over my shoulder.
My bag currently contained not only a change of clothes and toiletries for the campsite but also a variety of seasonings.
"By the way, what's that on your back?"
At Satoru's question, I turned slightly to show him.
"It's the wok I use at home. I brought it to make a Chinese-style rice bowl."
Satoru narrowed his eyes and muttered.
"You look like a villain from a cooking manga with that thing."
Hearing that, Kishimoto chimed in.
"Oh, I know what you mean. The one with the Dark Cooking World and the Legendary Cooking Utensils, right?"
"You've seen it too, Kishimoto?"
"Yeah. I loved watching it when I was a kid."
I stared incredulously at the two of them calling me a villain from a cooking manga right to my face, then decided to put the icebox I'd brought from home into the bus's luggage compartment.
It seemed like it would just be a hassle to keep carrying it.
Clunk!
After stowing the icebox, I returned to my spot just as Matsuda, dressed in blue hiking clothes and fluorescent sunglasses instead of his usual tracksuit, climbed onto a platform and shouted.
"Alright! Quiet down! Quiet down! I know you're all excited for the forest school, but let's not have any unnecessary accidents and come back safely! Safety first! Safety second! If anyone feels sick, contact a teacher immediately. And if they're not around, check the emergency contact list we handed out and call any teacher! Buses will board starting with the classes that are ready first, so if you want to leave quickly, get in line!"
He wasn't even using a megaphone, but the way his voice carried so clearly proved that Matsuda really had a booming voice.
I guess there was a reason he'd been the grade-level head for three years running.
Anyway, after he finished organizing the crowd, we completed our attendance check and began boarding the tour buses one by one.
"This is my first forest school, so I'm really looking forward to it," Sasha murmured, her face flushed with excitement.
Her words sparked a question in my mind.
"You guys don't have things like forest schools in Russia?"
Sasha shook her head.
"We might go with family or friends, but the school doesn't organize them. There are a lot of wild bears in Russia."
"..."
It was such a brutally realistic reason that I understood immediately.
If students went camping in the forest and ran into a bear, the school would obviously be thrown into chaos.
*
Chiba is about an hour to an hour and a half by bus from Tokyo's Minato Ward, where Ichijo Academy is located.
It could be considered a long or short amount of time, but everyone seemed so full of anticipation for the trip that not a single person looked like they were about to fall asleep.
The same went for my Group D. We had claimed the back seats of the bus and were sitting in a circle playing the Werewolf game.
Since we had a small number of players, we only included the most basic roles of Fortune Teller and Hunter, but everyone's acting was so top-notch that the game was surprisingly thrilling.
The hour vanished as if by magic.
The most shocking werewolf was the class president. She led the mood from start to finish, killing off all the citizens without batting an eye. She was practically a psychopath.
Anyway, we arrived safely in Chiba.
One of Chiba's most distinct features is that, out of Japan's 47 prefectures, it's the only one with no mountains.
So, the campsite where we would be staying for two nights and three days was more like a recreational forest, with the only notable feature being a river flowing behind it.
It wasn't bad in terms of securing drinking water, but it was a bit disappointing that there wasn't a valley suitable for playing in the water like you'd find in a typical mountain area.
In any case, as soon as we arrived at the campsite, we got straight to setting up our tents.
The campsite generally rented out all the necessary equipment, so all we had to do was assemble them.
One medium-sized tent for the three guys and one large tent for the four girls.
After we quickly set up the two tents, I checked the time and saw it was already 12 o'clock.
For lunch on the first day of forest school, it's customary to eat lunchboxes brought from home, so we gathered in our groups to eat.
"Whoa! Chili shrimp! How'd you know it's my favorite?"
"You asked me to make it for you last time."
I deadpanned as I held out the lunchbox to Satoru, who was shamelessly extending his chopsticks.
Beside him, Sasha showed interest and asked me, "Kim Yoo-Sung, since you like working out, I thought you'd only eat things like chicken breast. I'm surprised you don't seem to be controlling your diet."
I nodded while eating the egg fried rice I'd made this morning.
"A diet plan can't keep up with the calories I burn in a day. So when it comes to eating, I'm pretty liberal."
One of the reasons I liked Chinese cuisine was that it involved a lot of grilling and frying, making it high in calories.
It also used a lot of strong spices, which meant I could use less salt and sugar.
Watching Satoru eat so deliciously must have whetted her appetite, because Rika asked with her chopsticks in her mouth, "Can I have one too?"
"Be my guest."
As I offered her the lunchbox, Rika's chopsticks swiftly snatched a chili shrimp.
I could feel the others' eyes on us, but I had made plenty of chili shrimp with the intention of sharing anyway, so I placed the lunchbox in the middle of the picnic mat.
"Everyone, have some. I'm pretty proud of this batch."
At that, the other four, who had been trying to act indifferent but were clearly curious, each took a chili shrimp and ate it.
"It must have been a while since you made this, so how is it still so crispy?"
"That's because I fried it with starch powder. Frying with starch powder keeps it from getting soggy easily."
"Really? I'll have to try that sometime."
Yaguchi, who always seemed interested in cooking, muttered to herself as she studied the half-eaten chili shrimp as if analyzing it.
Seeing the class president, Sakamoto, and even Sasha from Russia enjoying the food made me feel that waking up at the crack of dawn to prepare it had been worthwhile.
We finished our lunch in a cheerful atmosphere, sharing side dishes from each other's lunchboxes.
*
Forest schools are usually held under the pretext of promoting students' health, so unlike regular school, they involve a lot of physical activities.
If we had gone to the mountains, we would have been hiking, but since we were in Chiba, which is all forest, we were assigned an environmental cleanup activity instead.
Each group was given a trash bag and told to walk around the forest picking up trash with tongs.
Thanks to that, before our lunch had even digested, we had to leave the campsite and roam through the forest to pick up trash.
Naturally, the students weren't happy about it.
"Ugh, damn it. I bet the teachers are just lazing around back at the lodgings."
As Satoru grumbled while picking up trash, the class president pushed up her glasses and said, "That's just what forest school is like. I'm just glad we're not hiking."
"Hiking in this weather would've been even worse. Oh, there's some trash over there."
I grabbed a snack bag caught on a bush with my tongs and dropped it into our trash bag. Satoru, who had been watching with a listless expression, asked, "By the way, for the test of courage tonight, who's playing the ghost again?"
Hearing that, I meekly raised my right hand.
"I am."
Unfortunately, my luck with the draw hadn't been great.
Satoru looked at me with a horrified expression.
"Whatever you do, don't wear ghost makeup. I feel like someone's going to faint."
"Alright, I won't."
I wasn't sure why, but there was no harm in listening to Satoru, so I agreed.