"Will Bai Lan be attending the briefing this afternoon?"
Bai Lan nodded without giving it much thought.
He did indeed plan to join a club.
The main reason was to leave the school and go out.
Although the school rules stated that students could not leave campus or contact the outside world,
he had looked up this school online before enrolling and discovered that its clubs had won honors in all kinds of high school competitions across the country and even internationally.
If they really could not leave, how did students represent the school in competitions?
Was the entire team made up of outside reinforcements?
That was impossible, right?
In other words, students could actually leave the school. One way was through club activities!
If he could join a club that frequently went out, then even before successfully dropping out, he could occasionally go outside to "stretch his legs."
Although Kushida had already agreed to help him drop out, he did not mind making an extra backup plan. Otherwise, would all his preparations before enrollment have been for nothing?
"Are you planning to join one? I thought you seemed very eager. In that case, let's go together after school."
Bai Lan stared into Ayanokoji's eyes and observed him for several seconds.
They were still as indifferent as ever.
He did not look like he was trying to provoke anyone. It seemed to have been an offhand remark.
That made it even more infuriating!
"He's more than eager. He's utterly overflowing with desire. It's become a rampant disease, and he's about to be terminally ill. The source of the illness needs to be cut off in time before the problem can be solved. Am I right, trash?"
Before Bai Lan could respond to Ayanokoji, Horikita seemed to have spotted an opening through him and, unwilling to be left out, added another stab.
At that, Bai Lan clamped his legs together and folded his arms. "That's sexual harassment! You female pervert! I'm reporting you!"
"What?" Horikita looked somewhat flustered. "What sexual harassment? I was talking about the frontal lobe. If you cut out the frontal lobe, humans lose the ability to feel desire and entertain wild thoughts. What does that have to do with sexual harassment?"
"Huh? The frontal lobe?" Bai Lan froze for a moment, but quickly reacted. "The frontal lobe counts as sexual harassment too! Think about it. If someone of the opposite sex who isn't very close to you ignored your refusal and insisted on touching your head, wouldn't you feel that they were sexually harassing you?"
Horikita tapped her fist against her lips and actually began to think seriously. "I suppose I would, but I was talking about the frontal lobe."
Bai Lan: "
"Let me ask you this: If I touched your face, would that be sexual harassment?"
"Yes."
"What about your ears?"
"Yes."
"Your nose?"
"Yes."
"Your hair?"
"Yes."
"Your tongue?"
"No."
"Then... huh?" Bai Lan was startled.
Horikita said indignantly, "If you touch my tongue, then... you've already touched the inside. That would be molestation! How perverted!"
"Oh, so you're not sexually harassing me."
"I never was."
"So you were planning to molest me?"
"Huh?!"
"Didn't you say that touching the ears, nose, and hair on the 'outside' counted as molestation, while touching the tongue on the 'inside' counted as harassment? Isn't the frontal lobe part of the head? Isn't it 'inside'? You actually wanted to tamper with my frontal lobe! Horikita, you actually wanted to..."
Horikita instantly realized what was happening. Deep down, she absolutely did not want Bai Lan to say what came next.
Unable to beat him with words, Horikita momentarily forgot how thoroughly she had been crushed by force the previous day. She struck out boldly, throwing a punch to inflict "stun" and interrupt his spellcasting.
Bai Lan easily dodged, but he did not continue with the rest of his sentence.
"You two have such a good relationship." At that moment, after watching their interaction, Ayanokoji spoke.
Bai Lan was shocked. "You call this a 'good relationship'?"
Horikita merely stared coldly at Ayanokoji.
Being stared at by both Bai Lan and Horikita, two highly intimidating and prominent figures,
Ayanokoji worried that this might attract unnecessary attention, so he hurriedly explained, "I don't really understand it either. I only heard it from them. They said you two were flirting and bickering in public just now, and that this meant you had a very good relationship."
Upon hearing that, Bai Lan smiled, looking pleased with himself as though his scheme had succeeded.
31, Introductions, Learning to Mock on the Spot
Although Horikita was unwilling to cooperate voluntarily, now that people had misunderstood them, the situation could at least provide some of the cover a "fake couple" needed and draw the resentment of simps.
Thinking of that, Bai Lan could not help laughing after learning from Ayanokoji that others had misunderstood his relationship with Horikita.
Horikita, however, said coldly, "Heh. If you think throwing punches means showing affection, I can satisfy your need for 'friendly interaction.' I'll keep interacting until you can't move!"
Ayanokoji now only wanted to quickly set this dangerous topic aside. After thinking for a moment, he said, "Horikita, we're going to attend the club briefing this afternoon. Would you like to come with us?"
Horikita said, "I don't want to... Wait, the club briefing? I was planning to go, but I'm not going because you invited me. You just happened to mention it, which reminded me that I wanted to go..."
At that point, Bai Lan interrupted her. "Stop, stop! Don't explain! I won't misunderstand what you mean, but if other people hear you say all that, they'll think you're a tsundere. Your ice-queen persona is very important to me, so please don't casually shatter it!"
"Is that what 'tsundere' means?" Ayanokoji silently recorded his "observations of ordinary people" nearby. Then he glanced at Bai Lan and thought, "Bai-san, you don't know this, but because of Hirata, in the eyes of everyone else in class, you're already a 'tsundere.' I bear some responsibility too, but Hirata forced me into it. Please forgive me. Honto ni sumimasen!"
Soon, lunch break ended, and afternoon classes began.
There was a self-study period in the afternoon.
Hirata submitted a request to Chabashira, who was supervising the class, hoping to use the period to have everyone give their self-introductions.
It was something that should have been completed yesterday, but Bai Lan had prevented it from happening.
"Self-introductions? This seems like a good chance to lower my likability a bit." That was what Bai Lan thought.
For one thing, he was about to be expelled for "molesting a female classmate."
He needed to hurry and make the people in class who liked him turn against him, so that after the incident, they would not try to investigate the truth on his behalf, clear his name, or ask Kushida to mediate.
It would also help ease Kushida's concerns.
In Bai Lan's eyes, many of the girls in the class who liked him were unpredictable love-struck idiots.
Kushida's goal was to befriend everyone, which naturally included those girls.
If Kushida got Bai Lan expelled, she might end up being resented by those love-struck girls.
If that happened, it would be difficult for Kushida to become friends with them.
If Kushida became concerned because of this and was unwilling to give up the chance to befriend those girls, deciding not to report Bai Lan and consequently failing to get him expelled, that would be bad.
Therefore, Bai Lan had to quickly develop a "good" relationship with his classmates, lest they get in the way and interfere with Kushida's plans.
Interfering with Kushida's plans meant interfering with Bai Lan's plans.
Following the seating order, Bai Lan, who sat in the last row by the window, was the final student.
This time, he did not plan to improvise.
After all, most of the people in this class had behavior and thought patterns that differed from ordinary people's. Improvising could lead to unpredictable consequences.
Therefore, Bai Lan planned to carefully observe the patterns in his classmates' introductions, as well as how everyone reacted to each person's introduction.
He would pick out the introductions that received the worst feedback, or even provoked disgust in others, and "borrow" from them.
When it was Bai Lan's turn, he would combine all those most irritating patterns of speech.
He would step on every single land mine he had identified and found acceptable among the various ways to annoy people!
Surely it was impossible to copy an answer and still get it wrong, right?
Soon, with Hirata leading the way, everyone in class began introducing themselves one after another.
"I... My name is..."
The girl at the front was extremely shy and could barely speak smoothly. However, with encouragement from her enthusiastic classmates, she adjusted her state of mind and, after quite some time, successfully gave her name, Inokashira, and her hobby, sewing.
"My name is Yamauchi Haruki..."
Bai Lan felt that everything Yamauchi said was a lie.
He claimed that he had reached the national championships in table tennis during elementary school.
In middle school, he had made it to the high school baseball league. He had stopped training because of an injury; otherwise, he would have been the future of Japanese baseball.
Bai Lan wanted to complain:
Leaving aside an elementary school student reaching the national table tennis championships—
a middle school student had entered a high school baseball league?
Would they even let you register?
Besides, this person was also one of the founders of the Sese Group and was currently one of the most hated people among the girls in the class.
The holes in his speech were far too obvious, and many people in class had noticed them.
Those willing to show him some courtesy pretended not to hear.
Those who were not gave up on courtesy and snickered aloud.
Bai Lan thought: This one's good. He's a complete idiot. I'm copying it.
Soon, Kushida stood up, introduced herself, and spoke of her ambition to become friends with everyone.
Sudo stared at Hirata, who had attracted everyone's attention like a star while standing at the podium just now, and felt extremely irritated.
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