Selling Answers

The next day at noon.

Shinjo crept up to the entrance of Class 1-C, intending to sell the answers in his hand before anyone else caught on.

Just as he decided to knock on the door, a volatile voice rang out from behind him.

"Hey! What do you think you're doing?!"

Shinjo instinctively dodged to the side, and when he turned around, he found only a short-haired girl of small stature.

Because this girl had tagged along when Ryuen took his underlings to the cafeteria to back someone up, and she seemed to intentionally keep a distance from others, Shinjo had a very deep impression of her.

"Uh, hello."

"What are you doing, you creep?! Sneaking around... don't tell me you're planning to steal something?!"

"Steal? What could your class possibly have worth stealing? I'm here to find your boss, he..."

Perhaps because she heard a disgusting word, the girl opposite him spat in annoyance.

"Heh, if you're looking for Ryuen, he's not here, and nobody knows when he'll be back."

With that, she couldn't be bothered to look at Shinjo again and intended to head straight back to her seat.

"Wait!"

Shinjo hurriedly called out to stop her.

"What do you want now? Let me warn you, don't think that just because Ryuen let you off the hook last time, you can get cocky. If you really want to cause trouble here, having guts isn't enough!"

"I actually..."

"Shinjo-kun? Why are you here?"

Because Ibuki had pushed the classroom door open, Shiina, who was resting in the front row, spotted Shinjo immediately.

"Ah, it's Shiina. Actually, I have some business with a student from your class. If Ryuen isn't here, could I ask you to step out for a moment?"

Shiina pointed to herself in confusion, then followed Shinjo toward the rooftop with a questioning look.

Ibuki, who originally didn't want to meddle in other people's business, thought about it seriously and decided to follow them to hear what it was about.

"This classmate, you really don't have to force yourself to come along..."

Shinjo could tell that this short-haired girl seemed to really dislike him. But that was inevitable; after all, he had somewhat caused their boss to lose face.

Who knew that Ibuki didn't care about any boss at all? The reason she had that expression was simply because she was like that with everyone.

Furthermore, she absolutely loathed slick-talking men—even more than she hated Ryuen!

She always felt they were harboring a belly full of bad intentions, ready to stab you in the back when you least expected it, striking both ruthlessly and cruelly.

"I'm just afraid you'll do something bad to Shiina."

Ibuki found an excuse for herself.

"Shinjo-kun, don't mind her. That's just Ibuki-san's personality, but she doesn't mean any harm."

"Ah... haha, that's good then..."

After a while, the three of them arrived at the school building's rooftop.

"Shinjo-kun, can you tell me now?"

Shiina's impression of Shinjo was surprisingly good; after all, people who like to read aren't bad people!

"Of course... the truth is, I know many people in your class are struggling with the midterm exams, right?"

"What's it to you?!"

Before Shiina could speak, Ibuki, standing to the side, couldn't hold it in anymore.

Clearly, she felt that Shinjo had said this just to mock her.

"Ibuki-san, you can't be like that. I don't think Shinjo-kun is trying to ridicule you."

"Tch, who knows?"

It is just as the saying goes: those who always view others through stereotypes will one day be viewed by others through stereotypes themselves.

"Haha, of course I have no need to do something so boring. In fact, I want to discuss a deal with you. Since it doesn't involve many points, even you should be able to make the call."

"A deal?"

Shinjo nodded and waved the file folder in his hand:

"This contains the answers to this exam, which I obtained by chance."

"What did you say?! The answers?! Hah! You're trying to fool a three-year-old, aren't you? How could exam answers be so easy to get?"

Ibuki didn't believe for a second that he could actually get the answers, and even if he did, why would he share them with them?

Class C and Class D were essentially mortal enemies!

For anyone with a normal brain, doing something like aiding the enemy would be impossible, right?

This barrage of verbal fire nearly made Shinjo choke. In a sense, he actually quite liked dealing with people like Ibuki, because her single-minded personality made her easier to fool.

But this was actually a double-edged sword; if the single-minded Ibuki had an opinion about Shinjo from the start, then no matter how eloquently he spoke, she would remain as immovable as a fortress.

Fortunately, Shinjo was very experienced in dealing with such situations, so he simply ignored her; after all, the person he really wanted to trade with was Shiina.

"Hmm, Shinjo-kun, are you telling the truth?"

It wasn't that Shiina didn't believe him, but she was trying to fish for information from Shinjo. If she could find out the source of the answers, they could go find them themselves without worrying about a middleman skimming off the top.

"Of course it's true! I guarantee these are genuine answers; otherwise, wouldn't I be ruining the reputation of my own Yorozuya?"

"Yorozuya?! Are you talking about that Yorozuya from the text message a while ago?"

Shiina appeared surprised, but it was mostly just an act for Shinjo's benefit.

Even though she buried herself in a sea of books, Shiina was no mere bookworm; she had long since mastered the application of micro-expressions in social interactions.

"That's right. If you need any help in the future, don't hesitate to ask me~"

Ibuki, who had been ignored on the side, snuck a glance at Shinjo, then rolled her eyes as if she had thought of something.

"Hehe, I'll be sure to if the opportunity arises. Let's get back to the answers. Since Shinjo-kun can guarantee the answers are real, may I ask how much you intend to sell them for?"

"To be honest, I spent quite a lot of points to get these... so... actually, I quite like the auspicious number of 20,000."

Ibuki's expression wavered, but she knew that haggling wasn't her specialty, let alone doing business with someone who looked like a profiteer.

So, she surprisingly kept her mouth shut, leaving everything for Shiina to decide.

Shiina was inwardly grateful that Ibuki hadn't stepped in to make things difficult; otherwise, she might have really had to pay 20,000 to secure these answers.

"20,000 points... Shinjo-kun surely doesn't intend to sell them to me for that price, right?"

I actually wanted to sell them to you for 50,000!

But it was impossible to price this thing so outrageously. Although Class 1-C could receive nearly 50,000 in living expenses this month, they might not necessarily have that much money on hand.