"What's this supposed to be?"
"Give me some money. I'll give up my seat for just 500 yen."
"I'll do it for 100."
"I'll do it for free."
"I'll even pay you. Please, just give me a chance to give up my seat. I'll do anything."
The viewers watching the livestream were all confused.
Paying someone to give up their seat? What kind of bizarre thing was that?
But Fan Gege's eyes lit up, and he found himself warming to this new character.
After the new character paid 2,000 yen to get the student sitting next to the brown-haired boy to stand up and give up his seat,
Fan Gege hit pause and began sharing his thoughts.
"I think..."
"This anime leaves a really strong impression."
"The animation is very well made, and then they use one little incident to establish all these characters."
"Like the poker-faced guy, who seems expressionless on the surface but has some pretty outrageous thoughts, and the girl with the classic long, straight black hair. The production team made a strong impression on us in just a few minutes."
"Of course, the character who left the deepest impression on me was the student who paid someone to give up their seat at the end. He made the best impression."
"In everyday life, this kind of behavior would seem really weird. You might even think this guy was kind of stupid."
"But when you compare him to the others, he seems like a genuinely kind person. Something that was strange at first suddenly becomes easy to accept."
"Also, this... Money Brother actually had plenty of ways to deal with the situation. He could've tried persuading the other person, asking them to respect the elderly, or something like that. If he'd handled it that way, even though he'd be doing a good deed, it would still feel a bit like moral blackmail."
"But what did Money Brother do? He just paid them. Simple and direct. And even if some contrarian came along, they couldn't call him a self-righteous do-gooder, because he paid up and sacrificed his own interests."
"I can see from the comments that everyone likes this character. If he were the protagonist of this anime, then the production team did a pretty good job with this scene. They've established what kind of person the protagonist is."
But as he watched the next part, Fan Gege was proven wrong.
The brown-haired boy with the outrageous inner monologue really was the protagonist.
Then, on his way to school, the boy ran into the long-haired girl from the bus again.
After discussing why neither of them had given up their seat, they each headed toward their classroom.
"Refusing to give up your seat out of conviction? Really?"
"Who was just saying this girl was like Yukino? They're not alike at all, come on!"
"I can't. If you don't want to give up your seat, then don't. Why make up all these ridiculous theories?"
"Just like Fan Gege said, they're making a huge fuss over something trivial."
Seeing that the viewers agreed with his take, Fan Gege laughed happily and continued watching.
The brown-haired boy in the scene arrived in the classroom and ended up sitting next to the black-haired girl. After a brief conversation, they learned each other's names.
The brown-haired boy was Ayanokouji Kiyotaka, and the black-haired girl was Horikita Suzune.
Next, their homeroom teacher came in and explained the school rules. Ayanokouji's inner monologue also introduced the benefits the school offered.
"Choose whatever job you want? There's definitely a catch."
"Everyone knows there's got to be a problem with something this good falling right into your lap."
"They promise you a good job, cut you off from the outside world, and won't even let you contact anyone by phone. Are we sure this isn't some scam compound in northern Myanmar?"
When the homeroom teacher explained that students would receive points every month and announced that they'd be getting 100,000 points this month, Fan Gege hit pause.
"Everyone, I think I'm a little confused about what's going on."
"Didn't the teacher only say they'd give out points every month, and that we're getting 100,000 this month?"
"How come everyone in this class just assumed they'd get 100,000 every month?"
Fan Gege was completely baffled.
He thought he must have missed something.
So he dragged the progress bar back and rewatched the homeroom teacher explaining the exam rules.
He hadn't missed anything.
"The students in this anime seem to have some weird thought processes, huh?"
Fan Gege ran both hands through his hair. "Maybe they're just background characters there to make the protagonist look good. The protagonist shouldn't be that stupid."
Sure enough, Horikita Suzune, sitting in the back row, furrowed her pretty brows, sensing that something was off.
She was surprised the school would give the students so much money.
She brought it up with Ayanokouji, but all he said were vague, noncommittal things that amounted to nothing.
Fan Gege watched patiently.
During the self-introductions, a short-tempered guy with red hair angrily shouted his dissatisfaction, then left.
As for the protagonist, Ayanokouji, he stumbled over his words and gave a thoroughly unsuccessful introduction.
The opening ceremony passed in a flash.
After returning to his dorm and checking what he needed, Ayanokouji went shopping at a nearby convenience store, where he ran into Horikita Suzune again.
Trying to find something to talk about, he introduced the girl to hair removal cream.
"Hahaha!"
Fan Gege couldn't help laughing. "I don't think this is a mind-game anime at all. It's a comedy!"
Watching the poker-faced protagonist earnestly explain what hair removal cream was for to a girl was just too funny.
"Come to think of it, Ayanokouji and Horikita must've realized by now that the school won't give them 100,000 points every month, right?"
Even Fan Gege, just watching as an audience member, had caught on to what the school was up to.
If they were giving out 100,000 points every month, the teacher would've just said so, instead of saying that they'd receive 100,000 this month and that points would be deposited on the first of every month.
And then the convenience store was offering a limited number of free products.
That clearly meant the school had an ulterior motive. There was no way they'd get 100,000 points next month.
Horikita Suzune seemed to have caught on too, so when choosing what to buy, she deliberately picked the cheapest brands.
Just when the viewers were looking forward to hearing her thoughts on the school's various actions, she inexplicably started talking to Ayanokouji about their self-introductions—and kept at it for ages.
"The pacing's not great."
Fan Gege shook his head.
As a longtime anime fan, he'd never made an anime himself, but he still knew what the best thing for a character to do here would be.
After piecing together the clues, Horikita Suzune should explain her reasoning and reveal that the school wouldn't give out 100,000 points every month, solving the first mystery.
Instead, the audience had just gotten hooked, and now the characters were discussing an irrelevant self-introduction.
It made for a really poor viewing experience.
Just then, a familiar figure approached and spoke to Horikita Suzune.
"I've noticed you keep deliberately picking the cheaper products."
"Did you figure out the school's hidden rules?"
Before you continue