Act 17: Scene 5

Kiyotaka shook his head and quickly dismissed the two notifications that showed up out of nowhere before he could get distracted any further, not wanting to lose his focus because of the system and especially not in front of Suzune and Kikyo. Plus, they may still have a few things that they could tell him about their little adventure earlier towards Class C.

"That's not all, though. We've realized something strange from all of this."

Yep, he was right. They still had more to tell him, which means now is not the time to get carried away and distracted by the craziness of the system.

He nodded in response, before gesturing for them to continue.

"Shiina-san said that Miyake-kun's attackers weren't able to go to school because they were injured. But Miyake-kun told us that they outnumbered him and they easily took him out, so he couldn't have given them their injuries," Kushida began, before her friend took over for her.

"Moreover, it is very strange that they brought Miyake-kun to a secluded area where there are no cameras first before they made their move. If they began a fight for the sole purpose of inflicting violence on another person, then they would have not cared about where they are and proceed to attack Miyake-kun either way. However, they cared about being seen, otherwise they wouldn't have bothered. They knew the risk of being seen by other students, which is why they had to move the conflict to a place with no possible witnesses.

"Are you saying that this whole attack on Miyake was planned?"

Suzune nodded. "Exactly."

Kiyotaka stared at her for a few moments, observing every aspect of the expression on her face. He was trying to gauge just how certain she was regarding her assumption.

"What makes you so sure that this was all planned, Horikita?"

"Because it's the only way for the culprits' actions to make sense," she donned a more serious look upon saying those words. "Why would they bring Miyake-kun somewhere where there are no cameras? A place where their actions can't be recorded by the school? Because they don't want to get caught in the act. By attacking our classmate without anyone else to see what happened, it allowed them the opportunity to frame Miyake-kun for the whole incident by injuring themselves. In their eyes, with no one around to see what was happening, they can get away with this incident without any repercussions."

Ayanokouji nodded his head in acknowledgement. "You really thought hard about this, Horikita."

"Unfortunately, those three attackers were so confident in having no witnesses to their actions that they couldn't comprehend the possibility of one existing. As I have said earlier, Sudo-kun made the wise choice of leaving his two clubmates alone because they would have realized that we're currently trying to find someone who has witnessed the incident, which will give us the advantage for Miyake-kun's upcoming trial."

Kikyo chose this moment to voice out her concern about one particular issue. "This still leaves the issue of who's our witness, though. Even if Miyake-kun confirms that Kondo-kun, Komiya-kun, and Ishizaki-kun were his attackers after Shiina-san sends us a picture of them, it won't mean anything because no one can prove that he's telling the truth."

Suzune turned to face her friend, looking unbothered by that slight mishap. "That's true, but now that we have accomplished our goal of getting information from Shiina-san, we can shift our attention back to searching for the person who witnessed the incident."

"You're right, Horikita-san! We can get back to helping Hasebe-san and everyone else now that we're done getting what we need from Shiina-san," the beige-haired girl exclaimed, her mood changing once again in a snap.

The sound of someone chuckling softly then got their attention, as they shifted their gazes towards Ayanokouji. Their eyes widened slightly when they saw the smile on his face; they've already witnessed it several times before yet it still felt like the first time... and for that reason, it made them flustered.

"Well done, you two. You brought us one step closer to saving our classmate. Especially you, Horikita. After all, talking to Shiina was your plan. I trusted that you'd be able to pull off your idea and you didn't disappoint at all. I'm proud of you."

[You have gained 15 Affection Points with Horikita Suzune!]

[You have gained 5 Affection Points with Kushida Kikyo!]

Kikyo beamed at the praise she received, especially because it came from the person she had feelings for. It reached the point that she didn't even care about the fact that he praised Horikita even more.

Speaking of which, Suzune couldn't even react properly at first. Her face had been consumed by embarrassment that she didn't know what to do. How could she? She wasn't even expecting to be praised by him!

But after a few moments, she managed to recompose herself and accepted his words of acknowledgement by putting her arms on her hips and showing off a proud smirk.

"Did you expect anything less from me, Ayanokouji-kun?"

"No. If anything, I knew you were capable of pulling off your plan."

[You have gained 10 Affection Points with Horikita Suzune!]

Kiyotaka blinked a few times in wonder. That was a very quick change in the rate of Suzune's Affection Points, which is something that has never happened before.

Also, twenty-five in so little time?

The Suzune whom he knew two months ago wasn't like this at all. He could still remember the time when he could only get one Affection Point from their interactions back then, and that was during their first week here.

But then again, she did change a lot in such little time that it's hard to argue against this development. It's still a bit unsettling that he raised Affection Points with her by simply praising her efforts, though.

"Is Horikita weak to compliments or does she just like to get praised?" he thought to himself.

"Your praise means a lot, Ayanokouji-kun."

Meanwhile, the smirk on Suzune's face grew wider as she puffed out her chest, feeling more and more confident and proud of herself just from his compliments. In fact, the expression on her face screamed, "Praise me more, Ayanokouji-kun!"

"Yeah, I guess I have to give you credit, Horikita-san. Your plan went really well in our favor," Kushida added, deciding to give credit where it's due for once, even if it was towards someone whom she loathed.

"Thank you, Kushida-san."

Kiyotaka shook his head, deciding to get his mind back on track. "Anyway, what are you two going to do regarding the witness? Gonna join us in asking students and other people around?"

"Hmm..." the black-haired girl muttered, calming down from the moment of euphoria brought by Kiyotaka's words of acknowledgement. "Has anyone tried to ask the owner of the bathhouse if he had seen anyone then?

"Not to my knowledge, no. Everyone else is completely focused on asking students to try and talk to him."

"Then Kushida-san and I will try to ask him as soon as possible. Since the incident happened at a place within the premises of his establishment, he must have a clue on who attacked our classmate, if he's not the witness we're looking for."

The young man nodded, understanding the new goal that she had set her sights on. "You may be onto something here, Horikita. While I was talking to Miyake yesterday, he mentioned that he woke up at the clinic with Hasebe by his side. Of course, he couldn't have gone there on his own, so someone brought him there."

"I remember Miyake-kun also said that when he passed out after he was attacked, he heard two voices and not one. One of them belonged to the girl who might have witnessed the whole thing, but what about the other voice?" Kikyo spoke up as she thought about the possible identity of that voice.

"Then this means the owner of the bathhouse is of our utmost priority now," Suzune concluded, connecting their three statements altogether. "There is a big chance that he couldn't have seen the fight itself, but he knows the person who witnessed the incident. It is also unlikely that he knows the identity of that person, but he should at least be able to describe what this girl looks like, bringing us even closer to unraveling the mystery of who is the witness. Well done, Kushida-san."

Kikyo chuckled nervously at that. "Ahaha, don't mention it... I just wanted to help..."

"Looks like you two already have an idea of what you're gonna do next. Should I tell the others about everything you gathered today?" asked Kiyotaka.

"I believe that it would be wise to keep the information to ourselves for now, at least until we talk to the owner... Tomose-san, was it? I still remember his name when we went there."

"Are you sure, Horikita-san? Hasebe-san would want to know about this as soon as possible because she's the most concerned out of all of us regarding Miyake-kun," Kikyo raised an eyebrow, wanting to be sure if this is what Suzune intended to do. "And maybe Inogashira-san and Mori-san too."

Suzune nodded and folded her arms across her chest. "It's better to not get their hopes up without any concrete proof to support our side. Until we confirm our hypothesis that the owner was with our witness on the day of the incident, it's nothing but pure conjecture. However, we can show everyone else the photos of our three suspects later after class. Shiina-san sent me a message earlier that she'll be able to do it while our lunch break is taking place."

"Oh yeah, she sent me the same thing too! I can't believe I forgot about it, hehe..."

While the three continued with their discussion, a certain red-haired girl stood outside of the classroom with a shocked expression on her face.

The girl had made the embarrassing mistake of forgetting her phone when she left the classroom earlier so she went back there, only to stumble upon the sight of Kiyotaka discussing something with Horikita and Kushida.

Out of respect and because of her shyness, Airi didn't go inside and simply remained where she was for the moment. However, it was because of that very decision that she overheard everything that the trio of students were discussing inside.

"Ayanokouji-kun and everyone else... they're all looking for someone who can help them..."

Airi leaned against the wall beside the door, the expression on her face being a mixture of nervousness and regret. Her mind immediately went back to that day, when she saw her classmate completely helpless against three other students.

It was a day that she would rather not remember.

"That day... when I saw Miyake-kun... I couldn't handle the sight of him getting attacked relentlessly... I wanted to help him... but I was too scared of doing anything!"

She would rather forget about that day because it served as a reminder of how useless she was. A reminder of how her personality brings nothing but trouble to the people around her.

Yet at the same time, she couldn't forget about that day because that's not who she was. Someone got hurt that day in front of her own eyes, there's no way she could forget something like that.

"...I was useless... because I was afraid of facing other people. Because of me, Miyake-kun was helpless against the students who attacked him. Even if I did help him by calling for help, he still got injured. And now, even when everyone's helping him, I still can't do a thing..."

Somehow, Airi blamed herself for Miyake's situation, even though she was but a mere bystander in the whole incident. She did nothing but stand in the background while her classmate was beaten up, and only made a move once his attackers had left.

She did nothing but watch.

Why?

Because she was too nervous to approach other people.

It was a stupid reason, and Airi knew it. Even though she had a friend in Kei and a great tutor in Kiyotaka, she was still the same girl who couldn't have a proper conversation with another person to save her life.

It's because of this flaw that she didn't have the courage to raise her hand when Chabashira-sensei asked the class if there was a witness to the incident. Her guilt was also eating her up that day which kept her from even thinking of raising her hand.

If only she had a bit of courage or even a little burst of confidence in herself, then she could walk into the room right now and tell her classmates that she"s the witness...

"What do I do...? I don't want to be a bystander in all this... I want to help too... I don't want to be someone useless..."

Airi leaned against the wall behind her, as her legs started wobbling. She slid down until she was sitting on the floor, completely helpless. Tears began to flow down the girl's eyes, causing her to remove her glasses and cover her face with her hands. She tried to keep herself from openly sobbing, but fell victim to the urge anyway.

From inside the classroom, Kiyotaka had finished his discussion with Suzune and Kikyo, now they were planning to head to the cafeteria altogether.

But before he could follow his two heroines out of the classroom, a pink screen manifested in front of him which prompted him to read its text right away.

['To Protect Her Smile' has been Activated!]

For the first time ever since he learned what this particular skill was capable of, Kiyotaka didn't look like he wanted to bang his head against a hard surface.

Instead, he only stared at the notification with a serious look on his face, as though he could already tell what this was about.