Ai Yori Aoshi cover

Ai Yori Aoshi

Summary: Kaoru Hanabishi appears to be an average university student; in actuality he is the eldest son of Yuji Hanabishi, the head of Hanabishi Zaibatsu, and was set to take over the zaibatsu after his father retired. His mother, Kumi Honjo, and his father never married, and this had made life difficult for both him and his mother. Kaoru's father died when he was five years old. Since then, Yuji's father, grandfather to Kaoru, took Kaoru under his wing and began educating him for the eventual succession. Yet Kaoru never was at home in the Hanabishi family and left to live by himself after his mother died. Day by day he felt alone, with him thinking that he is living a life with no reason pushing him on. There is, however, someone who loved Kaoru so much that she would do whatever was necessary to be with him. Her name is Aoi Sakuraba. Aoi is the only daughter of the owner of Sakuraba Kimono Store (later renamed to Sakuraba Department Store). Kaoru's family and Sakuraba's family had agreed for Kaoru to wed Aoi but after Kaoru walked out, the marriage was canceled. Both families had a friendly relationship and Aoi had been in love with Kaoru from the start, which Kaoru was unaware of. The Sakuraba family had already been searching for someone suitable but Aoi was unwilling to marry someone else and walked out, chasing Kaoru.