Although outwardly Kaoru Hanabishi appears to be an ordinary student and a member of the photo club, none of his friends know that in reality Kaoru is an heir to the influential Hanabishi family—a dynasty of businessmen—from whom he fled, unable to reconcile with their rules and the abuse toward the memory of his late mother. Kaoru did everything to forget his past forever, but it returned to him from an entirely unexpected side. Returning home from university, he saw a beautiful girl in a blue kimono who looked very lonely and confused. Her hanao—traditional Japanese sandals—were torn, and Kaoru, who has been able to fix hanao since childhood, helped the girl. Finding out that she was heading in the same direction as he was, Kaoru offered to escort her to her destination. During the trip, the girl told him she was going to see her fiancé, a person of extraordinary inner qualities whom she had not seen for a long time. However, the address written on a scrap of paper led them to an unoccupied plot with a long‑burnt house. Kaoru suggested that the stranger wait for the rain to start in his neighboring house. In the house, the girl showed Kaoru an old photograph in which he was astonished to see himself as a child and his friend, Aoi. It turned out that long ago the Hanabishi family and the Sakuraba family—also a large dynasty of businessmen whose heir was Aoi—had made an engagement agreement, but they dissolved it after the Hanabishi heir fled. Aoi, for whom a wedding with Kaoru was the dream of her life, could not accept that she would be married off to someone else and set out in search of her chosen one.
J.C. Staff Japan