6.5

In a few minutes, Sakagami-sensei would signal the beginning of the 11th turn, but Horikita was standing at the podium, gathering the students' eyes.

"Class A is truly a formidable enemy. They held the top spot for all 10 turns of the first half. But it's important not to focus too much on that and face the special exam seriously. After all, the only way for us to accumulate points is for us to solve the questions correctly."

Horikita's target for the offensive was Sakayanagi's class, the most troublesome of the three classes.

During the first half, she successfully protected against Ryūen's attacks, and the students achieved a high rate of correct answers.

"How are we going to attack?"

In response to Sudō's innocent question, Horikita scanned her classmates in the room.

There might have been someone here who was connected to Sakayanagi.

Naturally, she couldn't recklessly announce her strategy.

"Do you remember when I asked for your ideas during the preparation period? I've organized that information and I believe I've found a hole."

Simplicity was best.

She seemed to prefer a method that targeted individual weaknesses rather than trying to read the opponent.

However, compared to Ichinose's class, information seemed scarce, and it would've been tightly controlled to prevent any leaks since the announcement of this special exam.

In that case, it wouldn't be easy to discover everyone's strengths and weaknesses.

Only Horikita truly knew how effective a strategy she had devised from all this information was.

On the 11th turn, Horikita's first attack on Sakayanagi's class came.

She used one point off the bat and chose a 'Literature' problem with a difficulty of two.

Unfortunately, one person was successfully protected, but three of the four students who faced the challenging problem got it wrong, ensuring a gain of two points.

After deducting the points used to increase the difficulty, getting three points would break us even, and gaining more than four points would give us a surplus on that turn.

Next up to attack was Sakayanagi's class, which must have felt some pressure.

And Sakayanagi unexpectedly spent two points, choosing a 'Sports' problem with difficulty three.

She showed her intent to mercilessly attack against the bottom-ranked Ryūen.

"She really is out to corner Ryūen-kun… How bold."

The second half started off differently, unconcerned about the point difference Class B had.

But immediately after, the result on the monitor caused a surprised outcry from the class.

Defensive's Successfully Protected Members:

'Katsuragi Kōhei,' 'Shiina Hiyori,' 'Tokitō Hiroya,' 'Nomura Yūji,' 'Ibuki Mio'

In this special exam, for the first time, a perfect score was achieved within the protection slots, securing a whopping five points. If everyone was protected, a difficulty level three became meaningless. It was a severe blow.

On the other hand, Ryūen, who had been lagging behind, quickly caught up with 24 points and temporarily tied with Ichinose.

"They have four eliminations, the most so far, but this is... this is too good to be true."

Given that many had anticipated they would steadily fall behind, the outcome must have come as quite a shock.

It seemed that the momentum would continue, but Ryūen's attack on Ichinose's class didn't go as sharply as expected, with three people being protected. However, one person made a mistake in the problem, so it stopped at four points for a total of 28.

All that was left was this class's turn on the defensive, but the gap was quickly closing.

Indeed, I wondered what Ichinose would choose as the category and who she'd choose to target.

Category 'Sports' Difficulty 1

Defensive's Successfully Protected Members:

'Wang Mei-Yui,' 'Shinohara Satsuki'

Offensive's Nominees:

'Ayanokōji Kiyotaka,' 'Miyamoto Sōshi,' 'Karuizawa Kei'

Ichinose's first attack nomination included my name.

And whether intentionally or by coincidence, Kei's name was also named at the same time.

'Sports' difficulty level one was manageable, it could be called neither a strength nor a weakness.

I was confident I could get it if it was based on history or rules, but if current events were involved, it would put me at a disadvantage.

On the other hand, Kei might be able to solve a global question like she would have seen on TV. She used to talk about watching volleyball games regularly.

'What do you call a situation where there's one out or less, with runners on first and second bases, or on first, second, and third bases, and the batter hits a fly ball that an infielder could catch with a standard defensive action?'

Apparently, this question was related to the rules. Fortunately, I had hammered sports rules into my head to some extent, so I could answer this without difficulty. The correct answer was an 'Infield Fly.'

However, I doubt Kei would be able to answer this, let alone Miyamoto. I could only hope that she learned about this in the last few days of cramming…

Only two of us, Miyamoto and I, got the answer correct.

Unfortunately, Kei got the question wrong. However, this was her first mistake.

The situation wasn't dire yet, but Kei seemed filled with anxiety on her way back to her seat.

On the other hand, Miyamoto, who had the correct answer, was high-fiving and sharing joy with his classmates.

From the conversation I heard, it seemed he learned about baseball's rules from games, and they were helping him a lot today.

Knowledge could come in handy from unexpected places.

This made it four points. We temporarily surpassed Sakayanagi's class and ranked first.

In the following 12th turn, Sakayanagi's class steadily scored four points with four correct answers, but what surprised the class was once again Ryūen's class.

As if watching a replay, five names were lined up in the list of successful protections.

In other words, they achieved a perfect score solely with the protection slots for the second consecutive time.

"What kind of odds are those!? They're too lucky!?"

Ike, having probably assumed that Ryūen's class would be at the bottom, screamed out while clutching his head.

"...I wonder if we can just dismiss this as good luck."

I could hear Horikita's sense of heaviness in her voice as she calmly stared at the monitor next to me.

Understandably so. They had managed to achieve perfect selection twice in a row, which was an incredibly low-probability event.

If they managed to get another perfect selection in the next turn…

During the incredulous state of surprise, the next attack on Ichinose saw two people protected and two people who answered correctly.

It was now time for Ichinose to attack.

Defensive's Successfully Protected Members:

'Ishikura Kayoko,' 'Sudō Ken'

Offensive's Nominees:

'Ayanokōji Kiyotaka,' 'Matsushita Chiaki,' 'Karuizawa Kei'

My name and Kei's name were called out, nominated for the second time in a row.

The moment she saw her name, Kei sprang to her feet, raising her voice in an obviously agitated manner.

"I'm not being targeted, am I!?"

"Calm down. Just because we've been nominated twice in a row doesn't necessarily mean we're being specially targeted."

"B-but…!"

It was understandable that Kei panicked.

It would've been better if this nomination was due to Ichinose targeting weaker opponents.

However, the opponent was Ichinose. She must've suspected that she was getting targeted for personal reasons.

Given that I was included as well, it was a nomination indicative of such intent…

Whether there was personal bias involved or not, it was best to consider this as a provocation.

Even so, it was a solid move.

Horikita didn't use the valuable protection slot on me.

Perhaps it was because she foresaw this strategy.

If the category had been academic, Kei might have been protected. But the category was 'News.' It was a field in which even Kei could potentially answer correctly, hence the decision to leave her unprotected. On the other hand, I had to be more cautious since I had already missed a question in the same category earlier.

'What does 'tapiru'[12] mean?'

[12 : タピる : Literally translates to "to drink bubble tea." It's slang, so of course Ayanokouji has no idea what it means]

Upon seeing the question, I was instantly frozen.

What…? Huh…? What is it? Tapiru? Tapi...?

As I was frozen, the time limit arrived, leaving me unable to write any answer.

The 'News' category questions that other students received mostly revolved around politics or annual events.

Why are curveball questions being thrown when it's my turn?

As a result of the challenging question, this time it was me who was mistaken and Kei who answered correctly.

Looking relieved that we hadn't landed on the brink of defeat, we were able to calm down for the time being.

Matsushita naturally seemed to have gotten the correct answer, securing four points. On the other hand, due to my two mistakes, I was suddenly a candidate for elimination. By the way, the correct answer seemed to be 'sipping a drink with tapioca pearls.'

"Do you... know even less about the world than I thought?"

Immediately upon returning to my seat, I endured a remark from a disgusted Horikita and had no choice but to hunch my back.

It was the 13th turn of Horikita's class's attack.

The genre was 'Kanji' with a difficulty level of 1. However, to my surprise, Horikita's words unexpectedly came to a halt.

Though she was smoothly nominating till the fourth person, she seemed to be at a loss at the last one.

Sorting out the information in her head at this point was also a challenge.

Who was good at what, and who was weak at what.

She might've prematurely exhausted the valuable information about Class A.

There was still time left. Horikita took a deep breath, calming herself.

Then, a helping hand was extended.

"Why not choose Satonaka?"

A bored student simply murmured.

This was Kushida, the person who hadn't been selected once during the special exam and had too much free time.

"Thank you, Kushida-san. Then, Sensei, I would like the last person to be Satonaka-kun."

Without asking for a reason, Horikita entirely trusted her advice.

As a result, Satonaka wasn't protected, and he answered incorrectly.

"Where did you find out that Satonaka has trouble with kanji?"

(Illustration)

Makida clapped, admiring her.

"That kind of information comes from everywhere."

Kushida said as if it wasn't a big deal, and her gaze wandered off nonchalantly.

"You've been very helpful. Thank you."

"Not really."

Even after receiving words of gratitude from Horikita, Kushida didn't seem pleased.

However, since her position within the class wasn't great, visibly contributing like this wasn't a bad thing.

It seemed this was one of the reasons why Horikita could challenge the second half of the battle with confidence.

The rare information network that Kushida Kikyō possessed.

Not only did she have a wide circle of friends, but Kushida also constantly collected information about her opponents' weaknesses. That was why she boasted exceptional memory when it came to their weaknesses.

She hadn't shown all her cards yet, but she probably provided Horikita with lots of information in advance. A truly reassuring presence.

On the 13th turn, Ichinose's attack came. It was our third defensive turn, and this time, Horikita chose to protect Karuizawa. It seemed I was left behind without protection.

However, her guess seemed correct, and Karuizawa Kei's name appeared as having been successfully protected.

Although she usually would be pleased to avoid the question, Kei's complexion was clearly off.

"Do they intend to eliminate me...!? They're targeting me, no matter how I look at it!?"

"Maybe… It's a bit too much."

Satō responded in agreement. But such strange misconceptions only led to unnecessary confusion.

"She's not the type to specifically set someone up."

"But that's because...!"

Kei was about to retort that it was because they didn't know the circumstances, but stopped herself.

"Anyway, we don't know what their aim is, but now that the protection was successful, they're likely to shift their target next time."

"...Yeah..."

"But it stands out that the nominations continued three times in a row like when Kōenji-kun was targeted in the first half. I wonder what Ichinose-san is thinking."

Ichinose's attack arrived again on the 14th turn.

"...What should we do?"

Horikita showed hesitation in how to allocate the protection slots. No matter what, a fourth consecutive nomination for Kei was unlikely. Should she make such a judgment? Or should she be wary of being outsmarted?

"What about trying to protect her once more? I think she might be aiming for it."

Kushida advised the thinking Horikita.

"Do you think so from the flow so far?"

"Not really. I just judged it based on what I've seen of Ichinose-san up until now."

Kushida sensed the signs within Ichinose Honami's thoughts, not from the flow of selections so far.

"That's true. It might be best to protect once more."

She wasn't one step away from elimination yet, but if they were aiming for it, they'd want to securely score points.

Then, the successful protections were disclosed, and Kei's name was shown once again. She set a four-consecutive selection record in this exam, surpassing Kōenji's three consecutive nominations. There were some inexplicable aspects, but being able to compete with other classes without losing seemed like a good thing.

However, the situation was starting to turn for the worse.

Both Horikita and Sakayanagi's classes scored points with a balance of both offensive and defensive measures, but in the second half, Ichinose's class had a high rate of successful protections.

However, Ryūen's class showed even more momentum. Even though Sakayanagi was fighting back by repeating irregular categories and nominations, the situation wasn't improving; they had achieved four consecutive perfect protection results.

There was no doubt that an abnormal situation was occurring that could no longer be explained by luck alone.

But in that situation, there was nothing else Horikita could do.

Just calmly, quietly, and steadily score points.