Chapter 2 Part VI

It happened after dinner, when I had decided to go back to my room ahead of the others. Perhaps there's some sort of trouble in the corridor, as I could see several boys and girls crowded together.

"Sorry, sorry. Are you ok?"

"Yes…no need for concern."

Yamauchi from our class apologetically extended his hand. The person who fell appears to be Sakayanagi Arisu from the 1st years' Class A. Sakayanagi did not take Yamauchi's hand, rather, she tried to get back up on her own. It doesn't seem like she's able to get back up on her own, as she grasped her cane. Then, leaning on the wall, she slowly got back up. It was only a short period of time between her fall and her standing back up. However, in a situation like this where she'd attract attention from her surroundings, Sakayanagi must have felt that an extremely long amount of time time has passed.

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Yamauchi awkwardly drew his hand back and left behind these words.

"Then, umm, I'll be off?"

"Yes. Please don't concern yourself with me."

Sakayanagi gave a slight smile and averted her eyes from Yamauchi. Both boys and girls felt relief at the fact that it didn't turn into a problem before scattering.

"Really though, Sakayanagi-chan is cute but isn't she clumsy?"

Yamauchi did not even entertain the possibility that it was his carelessness that caused the collision.

"Are you alright?"

Somehow, since our eyes made contact, I approached Sakayanagi and called out to her.

"Thank you for your concern but it's not a big deal."

"I'll give Yamauchi an earful later."

"It's not like he deliberately did it, I only fell once at most."

Sakayanagi laughed thinly at that but her eyes weren't laughing one bit.

"Well then, please excuse me."

Since they were in different groups, Kamuro, who's usually always by her side, isn't here. I have no way of knowing what sort of battles are taking place on the girls' side and I have no interest towards it either. But Sakayanagi, who had walked off, stopped and looked back. Did she notice that I had been staring?

"I just remembered now that I have something to discuss with you, Ayanokouji-kun."

Tapping her cane once, she gave a faint smile.

"Class B certainly is a unified class. You could say that this is because Ichinose Honami-san has earned the trust of her comrades by giving it her all up until now. However, is it really fine to trust her so much, is what I'm thinking."

"This sounds like something that has nothing to do with me."

But Sakayanagi continued on without even a hint of paying attention to what I had to say.

"A while back, there was this sort of rumor about her. That she possesses a tremendous amount of points. That despite her not yet having accomplished anything significant in the special exams until now, she possesses enough points to warrant an investigation from the school. That honestly surprised me. However, is it normal for one to earn that many points? In all likelihood, don't you think she's acting as Class B's safe?"

"I wonder. The only ones who'd know that for sure would be Ichinose herself, or her classmates. What meaning can there possibly be in telling me something like this?"

"What I'm trying to say is...whether or not it's really fine to entrust all those private points to her. For instance, if due to a mistake she's made, she's fallen into a predicament where a massive sum of points would be necessary and she used them to protect herself, or using those accumulated points in order to save a classmate. These are actions that nobody can blame her for in all likelihood. You could say that her acting as their safe is for that purpose."

"It's probably that."

"However…if she were to use that massive sum of points selfishly for her own pleasure, then the school may make a move on the basis that it's fraud."

In any case, this is something that's relevant to the students of Class B other than Ichinose and not me. If she truly is acting as their safe, the only ones who have the right to complain about that are the students who deposited it with her.

"I doubt Ichinose will use up private points for her own sake though."

"Yes, that is true. At the very least, for now nobody's doubting her."

In other words, from this point onwards, there will be suspicion cast on her, is what she's trying to say.

"I am looking forward to when we return to the school after this exam ends."

Perhaps she's satisfied after saying what she had to say from start to finish, Sakayanagi walked off without so much as looking back.