Midterm Examination Day

　　On the day that Ogata avoided and returned to the study room, she found Shinichi lying on the sofa with disheveled clothes, pale face, and exhausted, while Furuhashi was sipping coffee with a beaming face.

...

　　Three days have passed.

　　May 10, Thursday, was the first day of the midterms at Shuchi'in Academy, a day that made the atmosphere in the whole school tense.

　　During these days, Nino fears being dragged by Shinichi to a meeting with the greasy uncle. Nino and the others didn't come to the Sakura Pavilion to bother Shinichi, and Itsuki took care of the business he left behind.

Shinichi hasn't seen the quintuplets since that day.

　　He spent his morning with Yotsuba.

　　As Yotsuba trained him, he also tutored her in studying, and the two even devised a breathing method to recite texts while running.

　　After running on the field for a few laps, not only was Shinichi less out of breath, Yotsuba could also memorize texts, let alone write math problems in her hand.

　　The next break between classes was the time to clarify Itsuki's doubts.

　　Like the two of them, Itsuki had always carefully reviewed courses and practiced questions at home, but her clumsy head hadn't gotten sharp and intelligent so quickly.

　　Despite her embarrassment, Itsuki still takes lots of questions and notes to ask Shinichi after class, and then tries to get him to eat meat buns in return.

　　Seeing how sincerely she wanted to return the salute, Shinichi refused.

　　When Itsuki gave him a meat bun, her expression of reluctance was like cutting her own flesh and giving it to someone else to eat, Shinichi was completely terrified of the illusion of cannibalism after eating it.

　　Furthermore, around 7 PM was Miku's video teaching time.

　　At that time, she was usually after a shower and she was wearing loose pajamas.

　　Shinichi didn't have to keep his eyes on the screen, as long as he could speak, he didn't feel any charm, he managed to keep his integrity as a gentleman.

　　After an hour, Miku reluctantly ended the video call.

　　Next, just wait for ten seconds, Ichika will call and fill in Shinichi's time after Miku.

Shinichi suspected... no, it must be said that he was very sure, they must be colluding, they didn't even give him a break.

　　Maybe it's just boredom?

Ichika chats with him via video call, talking about her acting skills, accounting and interesting things and difficulties one faces at work. She can always find a topic that Shinichi won't get bored of, and deliberately after sent out several waves of benefits.

　　But it was clear that her smile was more natural than before, and her demeanor had become intimate. Shinichi has a heart like a mirror, always having complex moods after hanging up the phone.

　　This damn relationship...

　　As for Nino, he really didn't contact her for three days, and Shinichi didn't meet her at school. If he wasn't asking out of curiosity, Shinichi thought Nino didn't want to take the midterms, so she skipped class.

　　According to the spy… Ahem, Itsuki reports that after Nino finished her task, she didn't know what to do. Not only does she not go out with her friends, she also doesn't look through fashion magazines after dinner And watch idol dramas, always hiding in the room, it takes a minute to get a response after knocking on her door, she is very suspicious.

　　Anyway, no matter what Nino does, Shinichi has no interest in knowing what secret she has, but after confirming that she is still alive, he is relieved.

　　Looking back now... Shinichi always felt he was hanging out with girls every day.

　　From morning to night, from school to home, almost half the time, there would be a beautiful girl talking to him. Even though most of the topics of conversation were related to schoolwork, and there was no romance, but this life...

　　Could this be the so-called winner in life?

　　Shinichi thought about it seriously for a moment: It seemed, indeed, it didn't matter from which angle he looked at it.

　　But why didn't he feel happy at all?

　　Recently, Nariyuki rarely looked for him. Looks like he taught Uruka well. He didn't ask about teaching anymore, and he didn't ask him for lessons like before.

　　And Fuutarou was concentrating on preparing for the midterm exams. He doesn't like having meaningless conversations with people. Despite the usual rank-and-file provocations and war declarations, he of course pays no heed to Shinichi.

　　As for the student council members, ever since the festival, they could only communicate on the Internet, and Shirogane and Ishigami wouldn't chat with anyone casually. Say that Shirogane is currently in self-study hell, and Ishigami is being tutored by Kaguya, the two of them probably won't return to the human world until they finish their midterms, and Shinichi basically won't see them again.

　　In other words, the time he spent with same-sex friends was almost zero compared to groups of beautiful girls.

　　And concluded that more than 80% of people who maintain good relations with him are of the opposite sex.

　 Why is that? Is it success or failure?

　　As a masculine man, why isn't his usual activity of playing basketball, playing games, and chatting with boys, but studying and working hard with girls every day?

　　His life seems a bit strange, where did it start to turn out like this...

....

　　Thirty minutes after the literature exam, Shinichi covered the test paper, closed his eyes and meditated.

　　While teaching others, he would also continuously review. In the past few days, he had almost vomited after seeing the sophomore topic in high school. He always felt that this midterm was much better than the previous one.

　　If he had not spent 20 minutes writing the composition, he would have spent less than 10 minutes writing this exam paper.

　　He glanced sideways, ignoring the supervisor's cough.

Furuhashi sleeps so well, she really hopes she won't cry during the math test...

...

　　Soon, it was time for the next test.

Contrary to her normal state of feeling sleepy at the sight of math formulas, Furuhashi concentrated on the math test paper, scribbling on the paper.

　　Only after the bell rang did she exhale and the corner of her mouth curved into a satisfied smile.

　　Shinichi only glanced at the sheet, and found that three of the five calculation questions were wrong. He really didn't know what Furuhashi was proud of.

　　Shinichi doesn't slack off in the next exam of various subjects, and gets more serious.

　 The midterm exams are finally over.

...

　　Monday, May 14th.

　　Early in the morning, grades were posted on the wall, and a group of students gathered in front of the bulletin board, looking for their names.