Chapter 3

SAKURA AIRI POV

"Can we talk?"

I remember Shiro asking. When I saw her sharp eyes, I felt like she was going to say something I didn't want to hear.

"S-sorry-"

I tried to send her away, but she drew in close and whispered in my ear.

"I'm sorry, but I can't have you running away this time. It's really important that we talk. Before things get worse."

Before things get worse? Does she already know? She was there at the incident so she must have seen me. So why didn't she rat me out?

"Let's head back to the dorms. I'm sure you wouldn't want us to talk about it here."

She said. I gulped and began to pack up my stuff, but then,

"Hey Shiro, come with us."

"Yea yea, we're going to search for witnesses."

"Sorry Airi, but can we meet at 5?"

Before I knew it, they had dragged her away. So I headed back to the dorms myself. I doubted she would even make it at the time she appointed. Her friends would probably not allow it.

So, at the moment I was editing my pictures so I could post them on my site for all the viewers who loved me. There was this happiness I got from hearing people praise me. The feeling of getting something you normally wouldn't was really amazing. Addictive, even.

DING!

While I was editing my Zero Two cosplay, I heard my doorbell go off. It startled me a bit. (A/N : Darling in the FranXX, anyone?:))

"Airi! Open up!"

It was Shiro-san's voice. I looked at the time and it was exactly 5pm. She actually came on time.

DING!

"Airi? It's Shiro!"

She rang it again and this time she named herself. I closed the open applications on my computer and went towards the door. I opened up and she walked in hurriedly, sweating a bit.

"What took so long? Don't you know how hot it is out there?"

She sat on the couch and dropped her bag next to her, while basking in the cool air of the air conditioner. She even opened the top buttons on her uniform while fanning herself with her palms. I could only stare at her. She looked as gorgeous as ever. A true beauty, smart, popular, seemingly childish but actually mature, and she even possessed good athletic prowess, although she hides that for some reason. She was what most would call a perfect human being. It was for this reason I was cautious of her. She was just too good to be true. Both she and Kushida-san. Is there not another side to them, like there is another side to me?

"What are you doing? Won't you sit?"

She snapped me back into reality.

"O-oh, y-yes."

I sat across her. She looked at me intensely. I met her beautiful crimson red eyes for a second, but I averted my gaze immediately.

"W-what did you want to talk about?"

I decided to ask first since I wanted us to move past this awkward situation.

"Ah yes. I believe you already know what I want to talk about."

She sat forward and I flinched. That look of hers was seriously unnerving.

"You were there, weren't you?"

I gulped and a cold sweat trickled down my cheek.

"W-what are yo-"

"Don't bother lying to me, because I saw you running from the annex room that day."

She knew. She had seen me. Was she going to force me to confess then?

"Don't worry, I haven't told anyone and I also don't plan on telling anyone."

I looked at her, completely confused.

She hadn't told anyone? But why?

Almost as if she had been reading my mind, she said

"I'm sure you have your reasons for not speaking up earlier and I'm also not going to force you to fess up. I want you to do whatever you want to do. However, I want you to tell me what you saw. Don't worry, I promise that not a word of what you say will leave this room."

When she promised I knew she meant what she said. She wouldn't tell anybody. I knew Shiro to be somewhat proud and as such, she would never break a promise she made. So, I told her everything. She quietly listened and didn't ask any questions even after I was done. Rather, as soon as I finished she went back to leaning on the couch and basking in the cool air. She let out an exasperated sigh.

"Did I mention how much I love your air conditioner?"

"I thought you hated the cold."

"With the heat wave out there? No please."

A short while later, she began to shiver and complain about how cold it was. I couldn't help but smile. In the end, Shiro was just Shiro. She took her leave and left me to myself.

"Yea, Shiro is just Shiro. No second side to her, I guess. Then there is me. A hypocrite. How are both of us even friends?"

I whispered to myself as I sunk into my chair.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Shiro's POV

After my conversation with Airi, I had acquired proof that Sudou was not in the wrong and he was somewhat innocent. However this did not change my stance on the matter. I would still not contribute anything to helping Sudou out of this situation. If losing all our points in the first month wasn't enough of a wakeup call for him, then this should suffice. Although I highly doubt it, a small part of me believes that should he survive this predicament, I might see a change in his attitude. A change for the better. However should he not make it out of this, he tried his best and that was all for him. I honestly preferred the latter.

The next day, a portion of the class, the groups that went to search for evidence, gathered and were quickly exchanging information. As I was a part of Hirata's group, I was obviously invited to partake in the matter, but I lightly turned them down on the premise that I did not acquire any more information than Hirata's group. As a matter of fact, I didn't even question anybody. I just walked around with them and left later on.

So I was seated at the back of the classroom, silently preparing myself for the next class. It seems I wasn't the only one who had this notion on the matter, as my neighbor, Horikita did the same, turning down Kushida's offer and preparing for class. I glanced at Airi who had been sneaking a peak at me from time to time. She was probably nervous from our talk yesterday. Although I saw no need for her to be so worried, so I just decided to ignore her. Then I looked over at Sudou's empty desk. It seems I was wrong. Sudou won't ever change.

"That's a surprise."

Horikita said. I figured she was talking to me, so I responded

"What is?"

"I expected you to partake in the meeting."

"I'm sorry but what I do and do not do are none of your concern. Besides, my presence there would hold absolutely no value."

She looked at me from the corner of her eyes and I did the same.

"What is it?"

I asked, as I felt she was creating unnecessary tension.

"… Nothing."

"Humph."

I fixed ear piece in my ear and played Georges Bizet: Carmen Suite No.2 to drown out the noise in the classroom and rested my head on my desk. Classical music truly was the epitome of music. I ended up taking a short nap. Why? There was literally nothing to do. And I ended up watching a movie till late last night so I was actually tired. A 1o minute nap was all I needed.

Next thing I knew I heard the bell go off and sensei walked into the class. I was a bit reluctant to lift my head.

"Tatsumaki-san sensei is in class. I believe you would want to be waking up now."

Horikita said.

"Ugh, 5 minutes more."

I sleepily responded.

"Please lift your head. I believe you will want to hear this. Or I will resort to drastic measures."

She had instantly gone to threatening me.

"I'd like to see you try."

I doubted she could do anything, but when I opened my eyes I saw Horikita holding something shiny and sharp. A compass. Was she planning on using that on me?

Our eyes met then she put it away and I lifted my head.

"W-wait, were you actually going to use that?"

"Use what?"

"Oh please, I saw that compass."

"I believe I told you I would resort to drastic measures."

"Humph."

You have no idea how close you were to suffering hell.

I thought to myself then I looked at sensei. As usual the class was attentive. So what was going on that I would be so interested in homeroom?

"I'm being serious. There are such special methods in this school."

Special methods? What's happening?

"Sensei, what are those 'special methods' you speak of…?"

Ike asked in a polite tone. That was a first.

It was scary how everyone had their eyes glued on sensei. What was going on?

"On the first day of school, I said that there's nothing you can't buy with points. In other words, if you use your private points, you can force a class change."

Class change? Private points? Was that all?

Sensei looked at me, Ayanokouji and Horikita. Probably because we were the only students to have already tested this 'special method' she spoke off. Honestly if class points wouldn't have been subtracted, I would return to sleeping right now.

"S-seriously!? How many points do we need to make that happen!?"

A very good question was asked, gaining my attention.

"20 million points. Do your best to save up. Then you'll be able to get to the class you want."

Ike fell off his chair in shock.

I don't know why, maybe it was because I was tired and wasn't thinking straight, but I didn't care at that moment. I just wanted Sensei to leave so I could sleep, although I have my first class after this. Yea, I was just too tired.

Damn you Taki Tachibana. All you had to do was write your name.

"Isn't that just impossible?"

The class was in an uproar. I understood them perfectly. Such a task was the equivalent of asking for the very difficult.

"It's usually impossible. But since it's a surefire way to get to class A, it's only natural that the price is high. Even if you reduced the number by a single digit, there would be a hundred class A students graduating every year. Then there would be no point in having a 'class A'."

"I'm just curious, but…. Has there ever been a class that successfully bought their way out?"

"Regrettably, there has never been such a case. The reason is as clear as day. If you save up for three years by maintaining the initial value, you'll get about 3.6 million points in three years. As class A, you can maybe get up to 4 million points. Ordinarily, it's not something that can be done."

The class completely gave up after what sensei said, however, Horikita lifted her hand.

"If I may, ever since he founding of the school, what is the highest number of points that a student saved up? I would like to know for reference."

"A very good question, Horikita. It was about three years ago, but it was a class B student that was close to graduating. He saved up about 12 million points."

"T-Twelve million!? And a class B student on top of that!?"

"But before he could reach 20 million, he was forced to leave the school. He was expelled because he was carrying out a large-scale fraudulent scheme."

"Fraud?"

So apparently this dude scammed points out of the first years and he would have gotten away with it to if it weren't for the fact the school got suspicious when he got 12 million points. The school was basically saying they felt it was impossible for anyone to get that many points.

For some reason I found that highly amusing.

"So you're saying that even if you resort to shady methods, 12 million is pretty much the limit."

"Give up on this method and try to cooperate with your class to move up."

Oh? So that's all she wanted to say. I put my head on the desk once again. She just didn't want the excellent students to try to run away from this class.

"Oh, right. None of you have gotten points from club activities, huh."

Sensei completely changed the topic and she had gotten me interested.

"What do you mean?"

"There are cases where points are given to individuals for participating in club activities and for their own contribution to the club. For example, if a person in the calligraphy club wins a prize in a competition, the school will award them point that correspond to the award."

Oh? This was news to me.

"W-we can get points for participating in club activities?"

"That's right. The other classes probably know about this already."

I swear, this woman was just the worst.

"Hey, that's mean! Why didn't you tell us earlier, I-"

"Are you saying you would have joined a club? Do you think you would be able to achieve anything by joining a club and going out to competitions with such a weak will?"

"That's- That might be true, but…! It might've happened!"

This woman. Does she even want our class to rise to class A?

"Thinking back on it, it was pretty obvious."

"What do you mean? Hirata-kun."

"During swimming class, our P.E instructor Higashiyama-sensei said that the student who got first place would receive 5000 points, right? Even that hints towards the fact that the club activities give points."

I remembered what he was talking about, although I didn't participate in the race.

Clubs, huh? Sounds interesting, however, I promised to myself that I would not engage in physical labor while in this school and I do not plan on breaking that promise now. Even if I did join a club, I most likely won't put in more than an half-assed effort and that could only prove counter effective.

I looked at my two sitting partners. They were discussing something about Sudou's importance and I completely ignored them. Anything about Sudou was going to get tuned out.

Seems like I'll have to find other ways to generate 20 million private points. Every day in this school is a curse in a blessing.