Chapter 8: All the Tricks

THIS PART OF THE STORY went back to Friday, February 11th. The day when those letters stating Ichinose was a criminal were dropped in our mailboxes. After seeing Ichinose be affected by them, and having Kamuro get in touch with me to talk about her past as a shoplifter, I decided to lay out my pieces in advance so I'd be prepared for Sakayanagi's strategy.

To execute that plan, I called a certain female student on her phone and asked her to come and meet me in my room.

The time of our meeting arrived, and I heard the sound of light knocking on my door, rather than the doorbell. Since the door was already unlocked, I simply opened it. The faint scent of flowers tickled my nose at the same time that I felt the cold air rush in from the hallway.

"Good evening, Ayanokouji-kun." Since it was around midnight, Kushida spoke in a lowered tone.

"Sorry for calling you at such a late hour. If you don't mind, please come on in."

"Are you sure?"

"It'd be cold if we stayed out by the front door, wouldn't it?" I replied. "Yes, that's true. Thank you."

Going into a boy's room in the middle of the night. And being alone together, on top of that. Anyone would find the idea fishy, but Kushida had come to my room without any hesitation.

"It's a little early, but this is for you, Ayanokouji-kun."

She took out a box of chocolates that had been wrapped with a pink ribbon. She must have been keeping it inside her jacket.

"You're okay with giving me this?" I asked.

"I have quite a few to give out on the 14th, so if there's anyone I can give them to early, I've been doing just that."

Since that was the case, I accepted them graciously. There was no reason for me to refuse.

"So then, what did you want to talk to me about? It's rather unusual for you to call at this time of night." If this were a casual conversation, I could've approached her in the morning or afternoon. It was natural for her to be suspicious.

"There's something I want to discuss with you."

"Hm…" Kushida sounded surprised. "I thought you hated me, Ayanokouji-kun. And that you wouldn't want to discuss anything with me."

"I don't really hate you. Actually, if anything, I thought you'd prefer to avoid me. Right?"

"Ah ha ha ha! I see, well, I suppose you're right about that."

The laugh she released wasn't that of the persona she showed everyone else, but it wasn't a true reflection of the self she hid underneath either. It was something in between.

"But don't you have Horikita-san? Isn't she far more reliable than someone like me?" she asked.

"I can't rely on anyone but you for this, Kushida."

"Well, I don't really know if I can be of much help, but I don't mind hearing you out, at least. But what do you mean when you say I'm the only one who can help you?" she asked, tilting her head to the side in apparent confusion.

"I want personal information about some first-year students that would embarrass them if it got out. In other words, I want you to tell me their secrets."

"…What do you mean?" Kushida still had a smile on her face, but it no longer reached her eyes.

"You said it yourself before, didn't you? That you already have enough information to bring a whole class to ruin. And you didn't just mean our own class either. You have information on the other classes too."

Kushida always worked hard to keep up appearances as a popular person, a person of strong character. People told her all kinds of things, all

the time. She might not have quite as much information about the other classes as she did about Class C, but I was betting she knew something useful.

"And why do you want to know something like that, Ayanokouji- kun?" she asked.

"Do you know that Ichinose is suffering because of some rumors doing the rounds right now?"

"Yes, I know about that. There were those awful letters that went out today too…"

"I'm doing this for the sake of putting a stop to it," I told her. "Hm. I don't really understand. Is that really your intention,

Ayanokouji-kun? Or is it—"

"It has nothing to do with Horikita."

"Hm? Wow, you're quite compassionate then, Ayanokouji-kun. You did save Sudou-kun back then too, I suppose." Naturally, Kushida knew about the actions I had taken in order to prevent Sudou's expulsion shortly after we started school here. "So you're saying that knowing other people's personal information is somehow related to stopping the rumors?"

"Yes."

"I don't understand. If you start rumors that'll hurt more people, won't the situation just get worse? Or are you saying that that's okay, as long as it diverts attention from Ichinose-san?"

She might have assumed my strategy was to save one person by sacrificing many others. While it was certainly a logical strategy, she was wrong about it being what I had in mind.

"I'm pretty close to Ichinose-san," Kushida continued. "So if there's anything that I can do to help, then I want to help. It's certainly true that I may know more secrets than the average person. But that doesn't mean I can simply reveal them to you. Especially since they were only confided in me after I promised I wouldn't share them."

Another natural response. You'd be hard-pressed to find someone who'd react well to having their closely guarded secrets made public. One might think it was safest to simply not tell anyone your secrets at all, but

human beings weren't that simple. Everyone laid bare their secrets to their families, to close friends, to lovers. Everyone wanted to share their feelings with another.

"I can't do anything to betray my friends. Besides, even if I do cooperate with you for Ichinose-san's sake, wouldn't I get found out as the person who spread the rumors?" she asked.

"We'd have to take precautions to make sure that doesn't happen, of course."

We couldn't use secrets that were so serious that they'd only been confided in Kushida. Conversely, secrets so trivial as to be shared with all of someone's friends didn't work either. We needed to pick secrets that were the perfect balance of known by some people, but not very many.

"Do you really think I'll help you enact a plan that I don't entirely understand? One that asks me to betray my friends like that?" she asked.

"Convincing you won't be easy, I suppose."

If I didn't know about Kushida's hidden side, then our negotiations would be dead in the water. There was no way that Kushida, who went to such trouble to play the part of an angel, would help do something that would throw others into turmoil.

But I did know about her true, hidden nature. Which meant we had room to talk.

"If you give me adequate information, I'm prepared to compensate you appropriately," I said.

"Compensate?"

"I intend to work on giving you what you wish for, Kushida, to the best of my ability."

"So you're saying that you'll get me what I want?"

"Yes, in a manner of speaking. That's exactly what I'll do." "There's no guarantee that you'll keep your word. You're Horikita-

san's ally, Ayanokouji-kun."

"Then consider this conversation your insurance." "What do you mean?"

"You know what I mean. You don't need me to actually come out and say it, do you?" I briefly lowered my gaze, shooting a glance at Kushida's pocket.

"Hm?"

She was still playing dumb, so I decided to push a step further. "Even if I don't say it out loud, you should understand what I mean. A cell phone or a voice recorder. Or maybe both?"

"So, you knew, huh? That I've been recording this."

"I thought you'd at least do that much to buy yourself some insurance." It was a given that she'd try to make use of our conversation. "I mean, I expected as much from you, Kushida."

"But you were absolutely certain of it, weren't you?" She was still trying to talk her way out of it, probably because she thought I was trying to bait her into something.

"A recording would significantly lose credibility if you cut it up to remove the parts that are inconvenient to you," I said. "You'd want to use the data in its unedited form if possible. And to be able to do that, you have to be cautious with what you say and do."

Since coming to my room today, Kushida had been carefully choosing her words to be as polite as possible. She was making sure there were no faults in her behavior during our conversation, just in case something did happen.

"Hm, for you to be so sure of it from just that… Not bad."

Kushida took out her cell phone and showed me the screen to prove that she'd stopped recording.

"Okay. I'm finished recording. Ugh, that was so uncomfortable," she said. The graceful, mild-mannered vibe she'd been giving off had completely vanished. "Well, you may have expected as much, coming from me, but I knew that you were the one helping Horikita-san after all."

"I admit that I gave Horikita some ideas."

"Well, whatever, it's no big deal. I can always ask you about that in the future," said Kushida, getting to the crux of the matter. "So, how do you plan to use other people's personal information to stop the rumors about Ichinose- san?"

She leaned in forward, intent on hearing what I had to say. "By getting the school, which has been quietly monitoring the

situation, involved."

"Getting the school involved…?"

"As of this moment, Ichinose has taken no action regarding the rumors.

So, naturally, the school hasn't done anything either."

"Is it safe to assume that, though? That the school will take action for Ichinose-san's sake?"

"In a manner of speaking, yes. Even if the homeroom teacher heard about what was going on, the reason nothing is being done is because Ichinose herself has yet to request the school's help. Which is why we need to escalate the situation to the point where the school can no longer ignore it."

No matter how isolated you were from the rest of the world, the world was no longer a place where information could be simply swept under the rug. If this school became a place where rumors and defamation ran rampant, which in turn led to students dropping out—or, in the worst-case scenario, committing suicide—then its status and prestige would be reduced to ruins.

The school wouldn't let something that could escalate into full-fledged bullying go unchecked. Naturally, Sakayanagi was keeping her tactics just barely on the acceptable side of the line. In that case, I would go behind her

back and push her over the line. By doing so, I would force matters to come to a head, and to eventually die down.

That was my goal.

"Not everyone is capable of remaining silent, like Ichinose-san has. So they'll go crying to the school. Is that what you're saying?"

"Yep. And even if no one does go to the school, the year-end exams are coming up. That, coupled with these rumors going around, should create a tense atmosphere. There might be arguments, perhaps even almost fights."

"And when that happens, the school will be forced to take action… Right?"

We'd disperse information that contained a mixture of truth and lies about a few students from each class. Most likely, more than half of the students targeted by the rumors would claim that they're just lies. Perhaps even all of them would refuse to admit to anything. However, the fact that some of the rumors contained elements of truth would naturally be exposed.

"If more rumors crop up right now, Class A will be the first to come under suspicion. That works to our advantage."

Sakayanagi's faction, who'd started spreading rumors to mess with Ichinose, would realize these new ones were coming from a third party. But even if they noticed, it's not like they could do anything about it. Try as they might to deny that they had anything to do with the new rumors, they couldn't deny the fact that they'd helped spread the rumors about Ichinose.

As long as that remained true, there was no avoiding the fact that people would suspect them before anyone else.

Now that Kushida realized how things might go, she seemed to have figured out my plan. "But how are you going to spread so many rumors? That won't be easy."

"How? We'll use the school bulletin boards."

"Wait, bulletin boards? You mean the ones in the school app? You know that no one uses those, right? And besides, if the school does take action, won't they also punish the person who posted the rumors? Even if you can post anonymously on the bulletin boards, won't the school immediately be able to track down who the posts came from?" She peppered me with

question after question.

"Naturally, I've already taken those risks into consideration." "You're saying you're prepared for what might happen in the worst-

case scenario, Ayanokouji-kun? That you might be found out?"

"Yes. And of course, if that does happen, then I won't say a word about your involvement."

I already had countermeasures in mind, of course, but I couldn't say anything was certain at this stage. Regardless, I had no intention of posting anything on the bulletin boards that could point back to me.

"This still poses a danger to me," said Kushida.

"I suppose that's true. It would be completely unnatural for me to know so much about other people's private affairs. If this did get traced back to me, people might think I'd gotten information from someone else," I replied.

It was important that I didn't handle myself too perfectly before Kushida. I needed to make her think there were some things I'd missed.

"So, for our own safety, we need to be extremely selective about what the rumors say."

"…Okay. I understand what your goal is, Ayanokouji-kun. I'll consider cooperating with you."

In other words, she hadn't yet decided if she actually would.

"So you're saying you'll cooperate if I accept your terms then. Is that

it?"

"That's exactly it."

It would be difficult to execute this strategy without Kushida. I could

easily come up with a bunch of lies, but that wouldn't be enough to really get under people's skin. It would be precisely the fact that the rumors had truth woven in with the lies that would cause people to panic. And that panic, like fire, would spread.

"Okay, then, what are your conditions?" I asked. If they were unacceptable, then our negotiations would break down.

"Horikita Suzune's expulsion."

"Unacceptable."

"I suppose so, hm?" That was Kushida's dearest wish. She knew I wouldn't grant it, but she'd asked anyway, just in case. "I suppose that asking for you to drop out would be unacceptable too, Ayanokouji-kun?"

"That would be even more unacceptable than having Horikita expelled."

"Ah ha ha." Kushida must have found my answers somewhat amusing, because she laughed out loud. "But there isn't anything else that I want."

"In that case, can I make a suggestion?" I decided to make her an offer myself.

"All right. What?"

"I'll give you half. Half of all of the private points I get moving forward."

"Wait, what? That sounds like the deal that Ryuuen made…"

Of course she already knew about the details of Ryuuen's agreement with Class A.

"Yes, it's pretty much the same thing. Of course, I'll share my statements with you if necessary, showing all my deposits and withdrawals each month so you can be sure I'm not shorting you. This will result in you getting hundreds of thousands or even millions of points by the time you reach graduation. This is an exceptional price for the information you'd be giving me."

There was a brief silence. Kushida considered it.

"It's certainly not a bad offer, I suppose. But unfortunately, I'm not really hurting for private points. It's certainly better to have more money than none, but I'm fine where I am now."

Kushida had obtained a large sum of money during the exam on the cruise ship. Even if she had spent those points lavishly, I imagined she still had quite the nest egg remaining. Still, in the end, the clearest and most effective way to negotiate was with money.

"You might have more than enough points to use for spending money, but it's never a bad thing to have more tucked away for an emergency," I

said. "Chabashira-sensei said as much too, I believe. That private points may become necessary in order to protect yourself."

If you thought of it as your very own insurance policy, then it was wise to hold onto as many points as you could, even if it wasn't much.

"No matter how I look at this proposal of yours, it looks like you're putting yourself at a disadvantage, Ayanokouji-kun. If you said that you were in danger of being expelled from school, I could understand, I suppose. But the idea that you're basically willing to give up half of your own soul in order to save Ichinose-san sounds weird to me."

"I like Ichinose." "Spare me the jokes."

I'd thought she might laugh, but apparently, she didn't find it funny.

"I'll tell you the truth," I said. "Yes, it'll certainly hurt for me to lose out on half of my private points. But by doing so, I'll be able to protect myself."

"What are you saying?" she asked.

"I'm one of the people that you want to get expelled. There's no telling when you'll stab me in the back. In other words, this is my defense plan."

"You're saying that if you're supplying me with your private points, then you'll be a valuable resource to me, Ayanokouji-kun? Is that it?"

"Yes. Having you for an enemy is trouble I don't need. I think it's worth giving you half my points to avoid that."

The offer of private points would cement this arrangement. As long as neither one of us abandoned the other, she would continue to gain private points, which wasn't a bad deal at all.

"…I see."

After thinking it over, Kushida came to a conclusion.

"All right. I'll go along with your plan. But does that mean you're okay with the precise condition that I not do anything to antagonize you, Ayanokouji-kun, and only you? Don't you want to add some kind of guarantee that includes Horikita-san too?" she asked.

"I'm not that greedy. Besides, it would be more trouble for me if our

agreement fell apart because I tried to protect Horikita too." "These are extremely good conditions for me."

"If you're not comfortable with a verbal agreement, how about we put this in writing?" I asked.

"No, that won't be necessary," said Kushida, removing something from her pocket.

It wasn't a phone this time, but a voice recorder. Apparently, she hadn't just been recording on her phone; she had a backup running as well.

"I have all the evidence I need here. If you ever betray me, in any way, shape, or form… You understand what'll happen, yes?"

"Yep."

If I broke our agreement, in the worst-case scenario, she'd talk to the school. She could then bleed me dry without anyone being the wiser.

"You're really something, Ayanokouji-kun. You're completely different from Horikita-san."

Give and take. You couldn't ask someone to trust you based on emotion alone. Emotions were intangible, but numbers were concrete.

Horikita's way of doing things wasn't wrong. A relationship built on emotion could sometimes be stronger than one built on numbers and agreements. In this instance, however, such an approach would be a hard sell. I could have tried to persuade Kushida to swallow her feelings of resentment, but that would've been a mistake.

"Are you really okay with giving me half your points?" "I didn't think a smaller share would really entice you."

Of course, it would be a real drain on my resources to keep paying up

private points.

…But I was sure that problem would be cleared up before long. "Well, now that we're both on the same , can you tell me what I

want to know?" I asked.

"Sure. What do you want to know?"

"Misdeeds or embarrassing stories from people's pasts would be fine.

Basically, anything that would discomfit them if it was made public." "I see… Well, I'll tell you some things, then."

Kushida, seemingly amused by the situation, started to give me the secrets that she had been holding onto. She started by telling me things like who people were crushing on, or who they didn't like, then moved onto information about students' family situations or their histories of juvenile delinquency.

Her voice was enthusiastic and engaged. We'd made it to this stage, and she still didn't understand my true goal.

Saving Ichinose. Responding to Sakayanagi's provocation. Diverting Hashimoto's attention from me. The threat of Nagumo. All these were just components of my larger plan.

In the midst of everything going on, there was one thing I had particularly wanted to ascertain. The quantity and quality of the information that Kushida Kikyou held.

Everything I'd done was in the service of confirming that…and of getting her expelled from school.

Of course, it wasn't going to be that easy. If I went about this the wrong way, I'd be the one in trouble. I had to estimate the explosive power of the ordinance at her disposal—in other words, her overwhelming information network. And then I had to analyze that information.

Who told her these secrets? And how many other people knew them? Her grasp on the personalities and characteristics of the other students was terrifying. I could say with certainty that no one at this school held as much information as she did, at least among the first-year students.

This was Kushida's power. The ability that she had cultivated to protect herself and to make others recognize her as a shining beacon.

"I see…"

"So was that all useful?"

Of course, the information she had given me just now wasn't nearly everything that Kushida knew.

"For Class C, I want to release information about two people," I said.

"Hondou and Satou."

"I guess that's fine. Satou-san's dislike of Onodera is already pretty well known." Meaning it was probably only a matter of time before Onodera found out, anyway. "I'm not the nicest person, myself…but it might be a good idea for you to remember that girls are just like that."

Kushida took out her phone and showed me her chat app. The size of my friendlist couldn't even begin to compare to hers. She was in a ton of group chats too.

"For example," she said, "look at this one chat group I made with some girls from our class. This is Group A. You can see that there are six people in it, right? But actually, there's another group, Group B, which is made up of the same members…save one. One person has been excluded from group B. It's a girl named Nene, by the way."

Mori Nene. She was one of the girls from Kei's group of friends. "So you're saying that people dislike Mori?"

"Exactly. If the girls post their surface feelings in Group A, then they say what they keep hidden deep down in Group B. Sometimes they'll come together in Group B and badmouth Nene. Of course, I'd never be so careless as to do something of the sort…but regardless, people might act like they get along and be all smiles on the surface, but secretly, they all have someone they don't like. It's normal for people to badmouth others behind their backs. It's not like there are only one or two examples of public and hidden groups like this. I know of dozens and dozens."

Kushida stood up, seemingly satisfied that she'd been able to talk about something she normally couldn't.

"It's late. I'm going to go back to my room now. I look forward to what comes of our agreement, Ayanokouji-kun," she said, putting on her shoes near the entrance, with her back turned to me.

"Kushida." "Hm?"

"You've helped me a lot today."

"Oh, no, it was nothing. Well, then, goodnight, Ayanokouji-kun. I look forward to the future."

This was my chance to ask Kushida about her closeness with Nagumo. But I deliberately decided not to touch on that subject. Kushida and Nagumo coming into contact with one another was a coincidence, nothing more… which didn't mean I couldn't still use it to my advantage.

And so, using Kushida's information as my source, I began preparing "rumors" about each class to send out into the world.

8.1

FEBRUARY 14TH. Valentine's Day. That was the day I decided to deal with Hashimoto, who had been continuously tailing me during lunch and after class.

I anticipated that Kei was going to give me Valentine's Day chocolates, so I decided to take advantage of that. My guess was that she'd try to do it either early in the morning or later in the evening. There was no way she'd do it in the middle of the day, while we were at school. She'd just broken up with Hirata, and had no reason to be carrying chocolate around in her bag. Besides, even the fact that she was giving chocolates to someone would have caused a huge stir if it got out.

Therefore, I turned my phone off on the night before Valentine's Day.

There was no chance we'd casually run into each other, but I turned it off anyway, just so I wouldn't have to come up with excuses for why it wasn't convenient to meet up in the morning. When we did meet, it had to feel natural.

Hashimoto had to be feeling pretty impatient by this point, since he had yet to see any significant results from tailing me. Which was exactly why I decided to give him a hint that something was going to happen. And what happened was Kei and I having our secret meeting, and me accepting chocolate from her.

The reason I settled on meeting with her at five o'clock was because Hashimoto had been tailing me until around six. Sure enough, he was watching the surveillance cameras in the lobby to see what I did. This was the first inexplicable opportunity he'd seen since he started tailing me, and so he boldly approached and talked directly to the two of us. Well, the results would've been much the same even if he'd just stayed back and watched.

Hashimoto was satisfied by the answer that Kei might have been the person that I was in frequent contact with. The next day, he stopped tailing me. He'd shifted his attention to preparing for the year-end exam.

And so, that was the day that I was able to move about freely.

I headed to the school building with the Valentine's chocolates I'd received from Kei still in my bag. Then, I met up with Shiina Hiyori in the library. The majority of our conversation consisted of talking about silly books, but I had an ulterior motive. Our conversation was just a lead-up to the countless rumors I planned to start circulating the next day.

I had decided to plant the seeds of the idea that Class A might be up to more than just starting rumors about Ichinose. Those seeds began to bloom a few days later. I'd deliberately chosen Ishizaki and Ibuki, both volatile and combative people, as targets of the rumors because I knew they might fly off the handle.

That was just a bonus, though. Even if the situation never deteriorated into violence, it wouldn't have made a difference in the end. What really mattered was when and how those messages were going to be posted on the bulletin boards.

I got in touch with the person I'd selected to solve that problem for me.

Vice President Kiriyama. A student from second-year Class B who was working toward Nagumo's downfall.

After I was done talking to Hiyori in the library, I met with Kiriyama at the school building, at a time when there weren't many people around anymore. I revealed my entire plan to him. My strategy to save Ichinose.

"I see. So you're asking me to post the rumors using my own phone? I have absolutely nothing to gain from doing that."

"That's not true. You stand to benefit from acting as my intermediary in this, Vice President Kiriyama. You see, this establishes a relationship between you and me. If I keep waiting for you to take action, that relationship would never progress."

In fact, Kiriyama had yet to instruct me to do a single thing since we had met.

"That's only to be expected," he said. "I still have my fair share of doubts about your abilities."

"I understand. Which is exactly why, rather than thinking of this as me asking for help, I'm asking you to think of it as me owing you a favor. In the unlikely event that things go bad, this will make it easier for you to rely on me. Besides, posting on the bulletin boards wouldn't be all bad for you, Vice

President Kiriyama."

"…What do you mean?"

"Ichinose Honami is a valuable addition to the student council. It would be a shame to lose her. If we can get the school involved by spreading rumors on the bulletin boards, that will help protect her."

"But, if I post these rumors about the first-years, it could lead to people calling the credibility of the student council into question."

"And why is that a bad thing?" "What…?"

"If the student council loses credibility, it hurts President Nagumo more than anyone else. If you wish for his downfall, then I think you should welcome that idea with open arms."

"That's ridiculous. It would be real bad for me if the school discovers I was the one who posted the rumors on the bulletin boards. Not only they would punish me, but there's also the possibility that Nagumo would relieve me of my position as vice pres—"

"You're capable of taking enough evasive measures to avoid that happening, aren't you? Honestly. I mean, you are going up against President Nagumo, aren't you? Or perhaps you don't have what it takes to oppose him?"

"What would a first-year like you know…?!" Kiriyama glared at me, his eyes full of anger.

"According to information I've gotten from the former student council president, President Nagumo has made contact with Kushida."

"How do you… Horikita-senpai really has placed a lot of trust in you, it seems."

"She's one of the most informed people in our entire school, regardless of grade level. So it's possible that this whole situation could be explained away as a strategy devised by President Nagumo, wherein he leaked information that he got from her via the posts on the bulletin boards. You could easily pass off a made-up scenario like that as what really happened."

This imaginary sequence of events slowly began to take shape. The

idea that Kushida gave Nagumo the information, which he, in turn, instructed Kiriyama to use in order to save Ichinose.

"…You thought that far ahead about this before contacting me?" Kiriyama thought it over, probably imagining what might happen if he posted these rumors on the bulletin boards. But judging from how the conversation had gone so far, he wasn't ready to cooperate yet.

"If you say no to me here, I'll have to conclude that it means you've yielded to Nagumo. Or perhaps… I'll go ahead and report to the former student council president that Nagumo's already won you over to his side?"

What I said could have been interpreted as a threat, but it was the deciding factor in getting Kiriyama to cooperate with me.

"So will you do this for me?" I asked. "…When should I post them?" "Right here and now. Immediately."

If I carelessly gave him time to delay, there was a risk he might post the message using someone else's phone. I wouldn't necessarily mind it if he did that, of course, but I wanted to avoid any chance, no matter how minute, of my plans going awry later. More importantly, I needed to keep in mind the possibility that Kiriyama might leak the information to a third party too.

"All right. But you're going to owe me a big one for this." "Thank you very much."

I showed Kiriyama my phone screen, which displayed the rumors I'd

prepared for each class. I then had him write them all down by hand. After about ten minutes of work, the entire process had been completed. I doubted any students would notice the posts right away, but I'd make sure they'd be the talk of the town tomorrow.

8.2

AND SO, the groundwork had been laid. All that remained were the finishing touches to my plans. Crushing Ichinose Honami's spirit was the last item on my to-do list…since I knew Sakayanagi would crush it herself before long, anyway.

Sakayanagi's scheme had succeeded beautifully. Ichinose continued to be absent from class even after it was thought she had recovered from her illness. It was February 18th the day that Class A and Class D clashed. It had been five days since she had gotten sick, and Ichinose still wasn't coming to class.

I was sure she'd physically recovered, but the same might not be true of her emotional scars. Knowing she was absent from class yet again, I decided to get in touch with her. But if I tried to go see her after class or during a day off, chances were high that someone would spot me. Instead, I opted to visit her on a weekday afternoon, when nearly all the dorms were empty.

I didn't contact her by phone ahead of time. I didn't plan on giving her a way out. I just showed up at her door and rang the doorbell.

"Hey, I want to talk to you a bit. Can you come out?" I asked. A little while after, a response came from inside the room.

"I'm sorry, Ayanokouji-kun. I'm sorry to turn you away since you came out of your way to visit me, but could you please come back some time later?" she replied.

Judging by the sound of her voice, she was still in low spirits. But it seemed safe to assume that she'd completely recovered from her cold by now.

"Were those letters really such a big deal to you, Ichinose?" I asked.

She didn't respond.

I sat down, leaning back against her door.

"Will you be coming to class on Monday?" I asked.

"…I'm sorry. I don't know."

It seemed like she was willing to answer questions that didn't touch on the heart of the matter, for now.

"I have some time until lunch break is over," I said. "So I think I'll hang out here for a little bit."

I just proceeded to sit quietly there until the last possible minute before lunch break ended.

"All right," I said. "Guess I'll be heading back to class."

"I…just want a little more time is all. When I'm feeling a little more put together, then I'll definitely be coming back to class. So please don't come here anymore, okay…?" I heard Ichinose say in a strained voice.

I returned to class.

8.3

THE WEEKEND HAD PASSED, and it was now the 21st. It was now Monday, and the year-end exams would start on Friday, but Ichinose was still nowhere to be seen. Kanzaki, Shibata, and some other girls who Ichinose was close to were trying to call, text, and email her, doing everything in their power to get in contact. But I didn't see them showing up at Ichinose's room after class, which I could only assume was because Ichinose had asked them not to come anymore, just like she'd asked me.

During lunch break, I slipped out of the school building and went over to Ichinose's room. I knocked lightly on her door and called out to her without waiting for an answer.

"I heard you're taking today off too?" I asked.

It was a reckless move on my part. She had told me not to come anymore, and I was ignoring her wishes.

This time, Ichinose didn't say anything back to me from the other side of the door. I didn't say anything to her either. I just sat in front of her door until the last possible minute, just like I had done the previous week.

8.4

THE SAME THING HAPPENED on Tuesday too. After confirming that she was absent from class once more, I went to Ichinose's room. I don't need to reiterate it all again.

If I were one of her classmates, she wouldn't have been able to bring herself to be really mad at me. But I wasn't. And yet, it was precisely because I belonged to another class that it wouldn't inconvenience me that much if Ichinose decided to cut all ties with me. That was the main reason why I was being so assertive.

There wasn't much time left until the year-end exam. If things continued this way, it was possible that Ichinose might be absent even on the day of the exam. Well, even if she did show up to class that day, the students of Class B were currently undergoing a great deal of mental anguish. It was possible that their test scores would be negatively impacted by these unforeseen troubles. Even if no one wound up expelled, it would still have a big impact on their class points.

Ichinose needed to come to class on Thursday, and the students of Class B needed to feel reassured. The window in which that could be made to happen would end the next day, Wednesday.

8.5

THE END OF THAT WINDOW approached in a flash. Before I knew it, it was Wednesday.

I held a can of coffee that I bought from the convenience store in my hand. I let out a sigh, my breath visible in the air.

I wasn't going to press Ichinose that day, even though we were out of time. Because there was no way Ichinose, herself, didn't understand that today was her last chance. She would definitely take action. I was sure of it.

"February's already almost over. If we can get through the special exam next month, we'll have officially made it to our second year. They say, 'once on shore, we pray no more,' but I have to wonder if there's really any truth to that," I said aloud.

The Uninhabited Island Exam. The Cruise Ship Exam. Paper Shuffle.

Time and time again, we'd been subjected to a series of bizarre exams.

"Once we're second-year students, I wonder if the special exams will get even stranger than they are now?" I added.

"…Hey. Can I… ask you something kind of strange…?" asked Ichinose, mumbling in a quiet voice, as if she were talking to herself. It was the first time in a while she'd responded to me.

"Sure. As long as you're okay with talking to me through the door, you can ask me anything," I replied, welcoming her with open arms. But she didn't respond immediately.

"Why haven't you said anything to me, Ayanokouji-kun? Asked me anything?"

"Like what?"

"My classmates and my friends from other classes have all come by, trying to convince me to come back to school. They all say they want me to talk to them about anything that might be bothering me. And yet, Ayanokouji-kun, you've been coming here every single day without saying anything like that at all… Why?"

She probably didn't want me to worry about her, just as she hoped the other students wouldn't. She couldn't understand why I was slipping away from school every day and wasting my lunch break just to come here.

"Well, that's because those other students are really, really worried about you, Ichinose. Their attempts to convince you, again and again…that's something I could never do. My ability to connect with other people is so limited that if I tried to use my emotions to appeal to your emotions, I can't imagine it would really resonate."

I heard the faint sound of footsteps within her room. I had a feeling she was sitting on the other side of the door now. The door was the only thing separating us.

"Maybe I've been coming here every day because I'm waiting for you to just unload everything and tell me," I said.

"Waiting for me… to unload everything and tell you?"

I decided to break down the walls of Ichinose's heart for the first time. "I know what crime you committed."

"…!"

"Well, I say that, but I don't actually know the background details or anything. But the fact that Sakayanagi dug so deeply into this, and spread it around so much that it's caused you to take time off from school, tells me how much this is weighing on you, Ichinose. But I guess there's no point in me saying that to you."

"How…do you know that?"

"That's not really important right now. I don't intend to get any deeper into it."

If Ichinose didn't want to talk about it, then our conversation would be over right here and now.

"You're probably not very good at opening up to other people about your own troubles, Ichinose. Even though you can save others, you can't save yourself. That's the kind of person you are. That's why I'm here now."

The feelings I wanted to convey had to be reaching Ichinose, little by

little.

There was a brief silence. It was hard, wanting to let your emotions out, but having no one you could let them out to. I'd seen countless children suffer through the same thing back in the White Room. Eventually, they broke down and disappeared. Became broken people with no hope of ever recovering.

"I'm your door right now. I can't see your face and I can't reach out and touch you. I'm just a door. No one will laugh at you if you reveal your weakness to a door."

There was a light clack as I set my coffee down on the ground.

"So what are you going to do, Ichinose? This moment, right now, is your moment of truth."

All of Ichinose Honami's friends were reserved, gentle people. It wasn't hard to imagine them offering a deluge of kind words to their dependable leader. However, that wasn't going to work. It might seem like the correct approach to the people supporting Ichinose, but you couldn't handle this situation like it was a problem to be fixed. You just had to apply enough pressure to make her crack.

"Even someone so pathetic like me… Can I really…?" "Who has the right to deny you that?" I asked.

"Can a criminal like me…ever really be forgiven…?" "Everyone has the right to be forgiven."

I'd knocked on the door to her heart. All that was left now was to see how Ichinose would respond.

From the other side of the door, Ichinose slowly opened her mouth to

speak.

"I… I shoplifted. And then I missed out on half a year of school during

my third-year of junior high, because I was in so much pain. I couldn't talk to anyone about it. I just kept blaming myself. I holed up in a small room, just like I'm doing now…"

Ichinose started speaking, finally pulling her hands away from the wound on her heart that she'd been so desperately trying to cover for so long. She talked about what she had done. About her weakness, about how she'd retreated inward and hid herself away.

About how she told this story to Nagumo, and only him. About how Sakayanagi had approached her, asking for advice on a classmate, and told her that there was a shoplifter at our school. Ichinose had known then that it couldn't be a coincidence. She'd known Sakayanagi had probably found out about her past because she heard it from Nagumo. With no room to lie about it, all she could do was confess it all.

Ichinose had been putting on a brave face, unable to let herself be weak. Do you know how hard and scary it is to admit to your own crimes? Many immature young people have shoplifted… No, have committed some kind of "crime" at least once in their lives. But if you said that to a large crowd of people, they'd all probably say something like "I'd never do such a thing."

And that was only natural. Admitting to your own crimes was terrifying, as was talking about them in public. Our society is one that deals out harsh punishments in the name of justice, after all. Such is the tragic fate of a criminal. That's why they hide. That's why they never speak of their crimes, burying them deep within themselves instead. That's why they try to live on under the guise of being good people.

Ichinose, overcome by her guilty conscience, spent half a year completely alone. And then, finally, she was released from her shackles…no, she broke free of them. But her guilt would continue to follow her, no matter where she went. It would be with her until the day she died.

In fact, her guilty conscience was standing in her way right now, attacking her heart. Which was why she had no choice but to confront it.

By the time she was done telling me her whole story, lunch break was already over, but that didn't matter. Even though afternoon classes had already started, I just sat there and listened to what Ichinose had to say, without trying to console her or reprimand her.

Ichinose was softly crying on the other side of the door, trying to hold back her tears. I offered her no words of comfort, because that would have been meaningless right now. It had been clear from the very beginning who her real opponent in this battle was: herself.

It all came down to whether or not she could put an end to this herself by coming to terms with what she'd done. Very, very few people are capable of honestly facing their crimes in the true sense of the word. But when we do

face our crimes…then we're able to grow and take one step forward.

And that was the conversation Ichinose and I had, before she opened up and told her friends about everything she was going through. Everything.