Hifumi can't get the boys' conversation out of her head

Ren and Yusuke had left not too long after they determined that it would not be a good idea to have Ren strip there, taking away all of Hifumi's distractions from practicing her shogi. Or it should have.

No, even though she was staring at her shogi board now, her mind wandered. She couldn't get the boys' discussion out of her head for some reason. So distracted in her thoughts, she did not notice the time passing by. To the average passerby, she probably looked like she was still practicing diligently but really she was just going through the motions without thinking, so preoccupied with her thoughts that the world seemed to disappear around her, which is why she hadn't noticed the pastor of the church until he poked her shoulder. She nearly jumped.

"Ye-yes?" Hifumi said.

"Oh sorry, I didn't mean to scare you, Hifumi" the older gentleman said. "You were so focused on your shogi that you might not have realized it, but we're locking up for the day."

"Oh," Hifumi said, a slight frown stretched across her face. She had been so distracted today by something so trivial that she completely lost track of time and wasted a day that could have been spent practicing.

"...But I saw how diligently you were practicing," he said. "And I think we could let you stay here a little longer if you want."

A small smile graced her features, "that's too kind, thank you." This wouldn't be the first time that the pastor had decided to let her stay after hours. He usually didn't want to disrupt her practice, especially if she had gotten into a good flow, so on the rare occasion she was too absorbed into the game, he'd come around to offer to let her stay a little longer. And Hifumi decided she would take him up on the offer if for no reason other than she hadn't actually gotten much practice in.

"You're welcome," the pastor said. "Just be sure that you pull the door all the way closed on your way out. When it clicks shut, it'll lock."

Hifumi said her thanks once more, and after a short while all the remaining visitors and church staff slowly trickled out of the building, leaving her all alone. Just her and her shogi board in an empty church. The only noise to speak of was the sounds of her tiles hitting the board. Finally, she would be able to focus. But only for a short while.

Not long after everyone left, and she started to make some progress practicing, did one intrusive thought cut through her mind. The boys had decided against stripping because the problems it could have caused... but now she was the only person there...

She shook the thought out of her head, trying to ignore any implications it might have had, and directing her focus back to her shogi board. She mentally chastised herself for being so distracted. She placed a few more tiles on board, analyzing what moves she could make and what potential counter-attacks she would invite with them. Finally, she felt like she could focus. Until the heel of her foot popped out of her shoe while she was bobbing her foot on the floor while she played. The moment her sock-covered foot was freed from the confines of her shoe, her eyes snapped to it, heart fluttering for a moment as she felt the cool air envelop her foot. It was only a moment more before the bobbing of her foot had returned her heel to her shoe. The bobbing stopped the moment her foot was confined.

Hifumi stared at her feet for a few seconds, gears turning in her head. Before her heel popped out, she had felt comfortable. But now that it had been returned, she felt less so. She suddenly found her shoes feeling stifling and confining, uncomfortable. She could rectify that. With no one else around, no one could be bothered by her if she happened to take off her shoes to help her get more comfortable. She bobbed her foot again, letting her heel free itself from the shoe once more, except this time she let the shoe slip off her foot. Then she used her free foot to help extract the other. Once both were free, she planted both of her sock-clad feet on the ground. A shiver ran down Hifumi's spine as her soles hit the cold tile floor. When she started to catch her bearings, she pushed her now discarded shoes under her pew. This was fine - it was fine. All she did was take off some shoes. It wasn't like she was stripping or anything. She was completely decent still - all she did was expose the foot portion of her knee-high socks. She was just trying to get more comfortable to practice her shogi, honest.

With that in mind, she turned back toward the gameboard and resumed plotting her next strategy. She moved piece back and forth, imagining an army clashing. But for some reason, she kept getting dragged out of her imaginings. Every time she stretched her arm out to reach a tile on the far side of the board, she was painfully aware of how her blue uniform blazer seemed to be tugging against her movements right now. It felt so rigid and restricting. She wouldn't be able to put her all into this practice if her concentration was broken every time she moved her arms. No, she needed to get her blazer off so it would stop distracting her - that was the reason, the only reason. Hifumi stood for a moment before swiftly undoing the buttons that held her blazer shut. A second later, she shimmied out of her constricting blazer, folding it and placing it on the pew beside her, and took a seat. She felt better now. Surely now she'd be able to focus.

Hifumi continued playing for a couple minutes, making decisive blow after decisive blow against an imagined enemy's forces. The battlefield in her head was still just heating up, however. And she was feeling that heat. She stared over the board as she absentmindedly popped some buttons on her white collared dress shirt. She started with the first button up top. Then she popped a few more. And a few more. Soon, she would have fewer than half of the buttons buttoned, her bra exposed through the opening. In her mind, she had barely avoided an enemy's attack, it slicing through her clothes but not managing to find skin. She vigorously slapped a tile down to respond, then another immediately after as the enemy responded to her counterattack. Soon enough, the shirt slipped off her shoulders into a crumpled heap behind her, but it barely registered for her - her mind focused solely on her imagined battlefield. She slapped tiles down in rapid succession, imagining a duel between commanders in her mind. Her imagined adversary, who just happened to resemble Ren, throwing words of ridicule her way about how he would expose her piece by piece for what she was. She made a slight misplay that her opponent jumped on immediately. Mentally, she pictured trying to dodge a downward slash from a blade. In slow motion, her flesh escapes its bite, but as it descends to her lower body, it catches on the waistband of her skirt, slicing through it with ease, making the fabric flutter uselessly to the ground, pooling at her ankles. She stepped out of the garment to avoid it becoming a liability in the ongoing fight. In reality, Hifumi had just stood up and unclasped her skirt, letting it drop unceremoniously to the ground before sliding it under her pew. Now she was standing there in the middle of the church in just her lacy, white underwear...