Act 13: Scene 6

"You're right, Ayanokouji-kun. Amasawa-san will be staying in this school from now on, but since she is a year younger than you and the class arrangements have already been decided, she cannot join your class. Because of that, she will live with you instead and will be treated as a guest to the school."

Kiyotaka's mind backtracked for a few seconds, particularly at some certain words that the chairman said. "Wait, what do you mean 'live with you'? Are you saying that she'll live in my unit?"

"What do you think it means?"

The young man stared at him for a few moments, as though he was waiting for Sakayanagi-sensei to say that he was only kidding, but nothing happened.

It was all the confirmation he needed to realize that he was being serious.

"I get to live with senpai?!" Ichika asked, sounding ecstatic. "Sounds fun, let's do it~!"

"Not gonna bother arguing against this because this has the system written all over it," the young man sighed to himself. "However, that doesn't mean I can't ask for the reason why this is happening."

The system really planned for this to happen, huh? Not only did it influence that man to send Amasawa here but it also caused things to happen as they did. The girl hugging him in front of everyone and the chairman's decision to assign her to his dorm unit were a result of the system's intervention.

"Why have her live with me? Surely there are still unused dorm units around that she can use, right?" he asked.

"You are correct. However, your father wished for Amasawa-san to be able to keep you in her sights as much as possible, and this was my only solution to that because being your classmate is out of the question."

"That makes almost no sense at all..." he complained in his thoughts, before sighing in defeat. There's no other outcome for him even if he tried. "Alright, I'll let her live with me. But I want something from you in return, Sakayanagi-sensei."

The older man flashed a gentle smile. "As long as it's within my power, I'll see if I can grant it."

Kiyotaka smiled to himself. The request that he had in mind will surely make things easier not just for him, but also for the girl who was now his roommate.

~XoX~

Ike Kanji didn't think that this would be how he ends his month.

Don't get him wrong, he was really happy and proud of himself for passing the midterm exams. He was even motivated to put in the same effort for their finals because of the vacation that they were promised, but it only lasted until he saw Sudo's test scores.

A month ago, he and Ken made a bet regarding how they would fare in the midterm examination. It was because of a petty argument that the bet was created and looking back at it, Ike felt even more of an idiot for being so eager to push through with the wager.

The winner would simply be determined by who has the higher score between them and, to his complete surprise, Sudo ended up with a higher overall score than him. But to an even bigger shock, it seemed like the guy forgot all about the bet because he was too busy celebrating his accomplishment.

At first, Ike thought that he was free from the punishment that Sudo had for him, which relieved him greatly. After all, his collection of naughty stuff was important to him and he didn't want to burn any of it! It would destroy him to say goodbye to his treasures!

But he was wrong.

Apparently, Sudo only made it seem like he had forgotten about the bet and reminded him of it today... right after he watched Kushida-chan kissing Ayanokouji (which also hurt a lot).

Despite his pathetic attempt in apologizing and his pleas to simply forget about the wager, Sudo insisted that he honor his side of the bet otherwise he'll face the consequences. It's not like he could deny it, though. No matter how someone looked at it, it was his loss and Ike had no one to blame but himself.

It was he who came up with the idea of setting up the stakes for that bet he and Sudo made. It was he who agreed to his classmate's terms. And it was he who failed to gather a higher score in his midterms.

So, as he stood next to a barbecue grill (that Sudo let him borrow as added insult to injury), he placed another set of his beloved magazines as well as some of the doujinshis that he bought and stoked the fire underneath the metal bars.

"I thought it would be harder than this, honestly..." the boy said in his mind. He had been standing out here for an hour now, behind the dorm building where he could burn some of his stuff without being caught or anything.

What he placed on the grill just now was the last batch of magazines and doujins that he had. Within the past hour, all that he had been doing was dumping the materials that he supposedly treasured into the fire that he made.

Kanji had nothing more and yet, despite all this, he didn't feel anything about it.

Honestly, he expected himself to kneel over and be overly dramatic about burning his magazines and doujins, but he didn't do anything like that. All that he had been doing for the past hour was standing nearby, watching his belongings burn.

It's not as if he didn't care about these things, though. They still belonged to him and he paid a good amount of points for those doujins but in spite of that, the only thing he did was watch in silence.

"Here I thought you'd be crying your eyes out while burning these, but you're just standing there and doing nothing," a familiar voice spoke up, getting his attention right away. "I guess those things were just trash, and you chose to let them pile up in your room without ever thinking of throwing them away."

He turned around to see Satsuki walking towards him with a smug look on her face. The girl was thoroughly pleased with recent events, especially because she wanted Kanji to lose his wager with Sudo.

Of course, she wouldn't miss an opportunity to laugh at the pervert's misfortune.

"They're not just porn magazines, you know?" he sighed. Ike didn't really like bantering with Shinohara right now, and for good reason. "Believe it or not, there's a reason why I have these things."

"Oh? Do tell. I'd love to hear it," she said in a sarcastic tone.

He stared at her for a brief moment, wondering if it would be a good thing to tell her something so personal but eventually shrugged to himself. Maybe once he does, she'll stop with the insults and bantering... for the rest of the day, at least.

"In my old school, I had a completely different life. The me that you keep seeing everyday? I wasn't like that back then. If anything, I was more like Yukimura or the Professor in how I acted," Ike explained.

Satsuki smirked, obviously unconvinced. "So you're a nerd back then. Am I supposed to feel bad for you now?"

"I don't need your pity," he glared at her, surprising the girl at how angry he looked.

It wasn't anything like how he would get angry at Ayanokouji or Sudo... it was completely different and it felt like he was really giving in to his emotions.

It wasn't anything like how he would get angry at Ayanokouji or Sudo... it was completely different and it felt like he was really giving in to his emotions.

"I hated how I was back then. I hated how I was ignored like I was the plague. I hated how I got pushed around if I did something to get someone's attention. If I had to be honest, I'm treated better here than my old school."

Shinohara snapped out of her trance after taking a moment to recompose herself. Never before had she seen him like that and it caught her off guard.

"Okay, so what does this have to do with those stupid magazines?"

Kanji took a deep breath, which was successful in calming himself down. "Some guys from another class saw me having lunch on my own one day, and they felt bad for me, I guess. They called me to their table and we hit it off from there. Those guys were huge perverts and I know that I'm gonna sound really hypocritical here, but they were down bad. If you think I'm bad, then they're worse."

"If you're the one saying that those idiots are worse than you, then it must be serious. What exactly did they do?" the girl asked, now looking more interested in knowing more.

"Hmm... I remember there was a little hole in the wall of the girls' changing room at the gym in our school, and they always used it to peek at our classmates or any other girl who changed clothes there."

"And you never took a peek at your female classmates through that hole?"

"I only did it once but after that, I didn't do it anymore."

She laughed. "Really? I find that hard to believe."

"You're the one asking questions," Ike shrugged. "After I had my turn getting a peek at the girls, we were caught in the act by some of their friends and chased us all down. I managed to slip away but my friends? They weren't so lucky. I watched them get beaten up and because of that, I never wanted to peek at girls again because the same could happen to me."

Satsuki wanted to catch him in the act and accuse him of peeking again right after that incident, but stopped herself when she thought about it more deeply.

Of course, she knew that this idiot was a pervert from the start. Kanji made that perfectly clear during his introduction but apart from that, all he did was ogle the girls at every opportunity he could get, as well as making perverted comments about their bodies.

She couldn't think of an instance where he did something as bad as watching the girls change clothes... or even getting close to them in order to cop a feel or something. At most, all he did was 'admire' her classmates from afar and say a lot of disgusting stuff regarding their bodies.

Maybe... there was some merit in what this idiot was telling her, after all.

"Was that all that they did?" she asked, wanting to know more.

"Well... I guess there's also the regular hangouts that we've had. They'd invite me to one of their houses, and we'd talk about the things we like about girls. We also read a lot of magazines and doujins from their collections. Those dudes were hoarders, I tell you..."

The blue-haired girl remained quiet after that. Of course, Ike could be lying about all of this just to save himself, but it didn't feel like that at all.

It's crazy, but... it felt like everything he said just now was the truth.

"Hmph. Don't think that just because you were influenced by idiots, you're absolved of your wrongdoings. You're still a pervert in my eyes," Shinohara folded her arms and pouted.

"Why, yes I am. I'm a pervert and I'm proud of it," Ike did the same as her and smirked, showing no regrets for his actions. "It's not like those guys forced me to join them. I may have wanted to have friends but in the end, I chose to hang out with them. And just to tell you, ugly? I don't regret it. At all."

"I still don't get how your 'friends' have anything to do with those things you're burning right now," she pointed out, ignoring the jab he sent towards her as she was already used to it by now.

Ike blink a few times in realization. "Oh, right. Well, these porn magazines weren't really mine. All of these belonged to them. They just gave these things to me as some kind of souvenir for hanging out with them, I suppose."

"You brought those with you when you came here?" she asked, completely surprised at the fact that his collection of magazines weren't bought around here. She was even more surprised to learn that those things didn't belong to him. "How did those things even go unnoticed by the teachers? Surely they must have checked our belongings when we came here!"

The boy shrugged. "I have no idea."

"Okay, so you're telling me... that you didn't buy these things here? Other people gave them to you?" she asked, looking at him for confirmation.

"I bought the doujinshis here but other than that, pretty much. What a waste of points, though... I enjoyed reading them, but now I have to burn them."

"Huh... what do you know? Maybe he's not as bad as I thought he was."

If Satsuki had to be honest, she wasn't really expecting the idiot to honor the bet and would back out because he valued these things too much. However, she was clearly wrong in that aspect because here he was, honoring his side of the wager and wasn't even complaining about it.

"So the reason why you have these things..." she paused for a moment, trying to think of the right words to say. "...is it because they remind you of how you used to have friends that stick by your side?"

"Well, I'm not going to deny that reading these magazines is fun. It's always a good feeling to appreciate a girl's body, but I guess that's also part of the reason."

"Then why didn't you tell Sudo-kun that? Maybe he would have understood your situation and you wouldn't have to go through this."

"It wouldn't matter. I still lost, so I have to do this," he shrugged again. "Besides, it's not like those boys I mentioned remember me. They probably moved on with their lives. They're just like my old classmates, they never really cared but still... they were people that I called 'friends'. That's not gonna change anytime soon."

Much to her own surprise, Satsuki began to feel bad for him. Kanji may have started that wager with their classmate for the wrong reasons but despite being on the losing end, here he was, honoring the terms of their bet and not even caring that he spent points in buying some of this stuff.

He was right... what a waste of points if he was going to get rid of them, anyway.

The atmosphere between them became quiet for the next few minutes. The only sound that could be heard were the scorching flames from the barbecue grill. While Kanji turned his attention back to his books that continued to burn in the fire, Satsuki seemed like she was contemplating something in her mind.

After the last stack of magazines and doujins were reduced to nothing but ash, Shinohara finally spoke again.

"Hey, uh... do you want to go get something to eat?" she asked, a hint of a blush dusting her cheeks.

Ike turned to her, looking surprised at the girl's question. "I'd rather wait until the month ends before spending any more points. I'm kinda drained right now on points..." he chuckled nervously.

"You don't have to. I'll pay for us both."

Now he was really surprised. For as long as he knew this girl, she would never ask him to eat with her or anything similar, let alone pay for the two of them. As a matter of fact, it was already shocking that they weren't having one of their usual banters right now.

For a better comparison, they were like oil and water despite being classmates and neighbors at the same time.

And yet... Shinohara asked him if he wanted to join her for a meal.

"This isn't you trying to ask me out on a date, is it?" he asked jokingly, an amused grin forming on his face.

"Haha. In your dreams, pervert," she rolled her eyes in amusement, before chuckling to herself. "So what do you say?"

Kanji shrugged. "I'd be an even bigger idiot to decline an offer from a cute girl, so sure. I guess I can leave this grill out here for now and let the fire die out first."

"Cute? I thought I looked ugly in your eyes?" she asked as they began to walk off.

"Ah, that was just me messing around with you since we argue a lot. If I had to be honest, you're pretty cute yourself, Shinohara-san."

Satsuki immediately stopped in her tracks as she heard that last statement from him.

"D-Did he just...?" she thought to herself, shifting her gaze to the ground which hid her face from sight. Her cheeks slowly began turning red as a sign of her growing embarrassment.

Ike quickly noticed how his companion stopped walking all of a sudden. She was looking at the ground, so he couldn't see her face at the moment.

"Shinohara-san? Are you okay?" he asked out of concern.

"S-Shut up and just follow me...!" she snapped at him with a red face, before resuming her walking. Satsuki tried ignoring a strange feeling that was building up in her chest, but it continued to bother her regardless. "This is nothing... I just feel embarrassed about treating a guy to some food. Yeah, that's it...!"

The boy only looked at her in confusion for a few moments, before shrugging and then following after her.

Who knows? Shinohara might just be going through her period right now, that's why she snapped at him.