Chapter 71: Guilt

Because of repairs needed for the corridor damaged during the fight, Soubu High had a week off. The students of Soubu High were thrilled with the unexpected extended holiday. 

Only a small group of people truly felt sorrow over Ooka's death.

Hayashizaki and Yukinoshita Yukino, making use of the break, spent their time searching in Chiba Prefecture for traces of the person who killed Ooka.

Ooka's parents had decided to leave Chiba and return to their hometown, and Yukinoshita Yukino and Hayashizaki took the opportunity to visit Ooka's house. In Ooka's room, they found remnants of cursed energy left by the killer.

However, despite searching all over Chiba, they couldn't find any other traces of the cursed energy. They did, however, manage to exorcise a few weaker cursed spirits along the way.

"It seems like that guy with the weird taste has already left Chiba," Hayashizaki said helplessly.

Even he couldn't find the killer's location without any clues.

"But that guy seems just like Gojo Satoru, that cocky white-haired guy. If he wanted to cover up the traces of cursed energy, there's plenty of ways to do that. But he didn't even try to hide his tracks. If he shows up again, we'll definitely be able to find him."

Hayashizaki wasn't worried the killer would vanish without a trace. After all, cursed spirits and cursed users were the type of beings who couldn't resist the urge to cause trouble.

"You're right. We've also asked the Tokyo offices to collect missing persons reports and any traces of cursed energy found."

Ijichi Kiyotaka agreed. "As long as this person appears again, we'll definitely be able to find a lead."

After saying that, he took out a thick envelope from his briefcase. "This is the reward for the recent work you did to help the Jujutsu High school."

"There's a reward for this?" Yukinoshita Yukino said, surprised, as she took the envelope. When she held it, she could immediately feel its weight, and it seemed to carry the a lot of Fukuzawa Yukichi's image. (10.000 Yen)

"Of course. Jujutsu sorcerers have a high mortality rate. It's a job where your life is on the line, so the pay and rewards are naturally high," Ijichi Kiyotaka explained with a smile.

Yukinoshita Yukino thought about it for a moment, realizing he was right. She then accepted the money without hesitation.

After saying goodbye to Ijichi Kiyotaka, Yukinoshita Yukino took the train back to Chiba from Tokyo.

Although Soubu High's students got an unexpected week off, unfortunately, after the week-long break, the midterm exams were just around the corner.

As everyone knew, during holidays before exams, most students spent their time anxiously playing around, and Yuigahama Yui was no exception to this.

However, after joining the Service Club, she now had a friend who was always at the top of the grade—Yukinoshita Yukino. The saying "birds of a feather flock together" held true; the girl who used to be content with just passing the average mark now felt a sense of competition, not wanting to fall too far behind her friend.

After all, even Hikigaya Hachiman had managed to get third place in his Japanese class. Although his other grades were pretty average, and his math score was barely above the bottom, at least he had one subject he could be proud of.

Yuigahama Yui spontaneously suggested holding a study session and invited Yukinoshita Yukino and Hikigaya Hachiman. 

Hikigaya was initially going to refuse, but when he heard that Totsuka Saika would also be attending, he quickly changed his mind and agreed. 

When you ask Hikigaya Hachiman to join a group activity, he'll often refuse at first. But if you mention that Totsuka Saika will be there, he'll soften up and agree to join. 

The study session was scheduled for this Friday, and it would take place at a family restaurant near the school. 

Although it was called a study session, it was essentially Yukinoshita Yukino giving the three of them a private lesson. Her grades were already fine, but the other three weren't in the same situation. 

Among the three, Totsuka Saika had the highest overall score, followed by Hikigaya Hachiman, and then, naturally, Yuigahama Yui. 

However, Hayashizaki had no real interest in the content of Japanese high school exams. Even though he had a bachelor's degree, his university was just an average one, and his college life was pretty laid-back. Aside from eating four meals a day, he didn't have any particular skills. 

And since he'd been transported here two years after graduation, if he had crossed over right after finishing the university entrance exams, maybe he could have helped them out a bit. 

But for now, he'd just take a look at the system shop. 

By completing assignments at the technical college and hunting wild cursed spirits with Yukinoshita Yukino, not even small ones like the flies were spared, his points had already reached over 60,000. 

Hayashizaki sat on a seat made of stacked bones, resting his cheek in his hand while boredly swiping through the floating system panel, looking a bit like someone endlessly flipping through pages on a website but still unable to find anything interesting. 

He kind of wanted to try using the Limitless Cursed Technique in front of that white-haired fool Gojo Satoru to see his reaction, but he didn't have enough points. 

However, to use the Limitless Technique perfectly, he'd also need to exchange for a pair of Six Eyes, which cost 400,000 points, and that seemed like a bad deal. 

"Hey, Tsukiko, why is it that other systems have lottery draws, but yours doesn't have that feature?" 

Hayashizaki complained. 

[This system is newly created, so it doesn't have all the features yet...] 

"It's fine, I'm used to it. After all, you're a system that can even mess up a TP. I'm not mad at you." 

[Apologies...] 

Even though the system's response sounded mechanical, Hayashizaki strangely picked up on a sense of embarrassment and guilt from the system's words. 

The system couldn't help it; it was tough for it too. 

It was created in a small factory, unlike other systems that had complete features right from the start, quickly helping their hosts grow and reach goals. Some older systems could even control their hosts, erasing them if the targets weren't met. 

The factory that made it focused on personalized service, taking an emotional route. Its only advantage over other systems was its emotional module, which would always be loyal to the host, but it couldn't do much else due to lack of resources. 

This advantage, though, became useless among all the systems designed to be powerful tools. 

The system went silent for a moment. 

"Hmm?" 

While browsing the exchange shop, Hayashizaki suddenly noticed discount tags appearing in the top-left corners of the products. 

"Things are on sale?" 

Well, it had no choice. Being such a useless system, the only thing it could do was use its energy to provide benefits to its host. That was probably the only thing it could offer now. 

...

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