Scale (as in fish scales or snake scales)

# English Translation 2002, Shinjuku. A systems engineer named Ichinose Takeshi, standing 186 centimeters tall with a taciturn demeanor and an impassive face, was feared by those around him as "the rock." Wrapped in thick emotional "scales" that kept others at a distance, he lived a solitary existence in the sterile world of code. What changed his mundane daily life was a small gay bar in a back alley called "Yoten" (Night Sky), where desire and affection swirled about. There he met Akira—a boy fragile and precarious enough to break, yet who smiled like a sunflower.