I Think Kushida Likes Me!

Class 1-A: 836 points

Class 1-B: 710 points

Class 1-C: 503 points

Class 1-D: 0 points

Class A and Class C's scores were easy to understand, and it was no surprise that Class D had zero points. But Class B's score seemed off. In the original, they had 650 points, but now they had 710. That was only 60 points higher, and it could have been a butterfly effect caused by his transmigration, but Nakano Yuu still felt that something was wrong.

It was as if Class B had been buffed.

How strange.

At any rate.

He was still wondering about it the next morning when he opened his door and saw a cute girl with short blond hair standing outside his dorm room. Nakano-kun's mood... took a strange turn.

Because...

"Good morning, Nakano-kun." A cute girl with short blond hair and an extremely pretty face waved gently at him, like a little angel. Her voice was lovely, too, as refreshing as a spring breeze.

And this girl was the most popular girl in Class D: Kushida Kikyou.

Kushida Kikyou, the white-lotus girl, had suddenly appeared in front of him. And she was being so friendly.

"Kushida-san? Why are you standing outside my dorm room?" Nakano Yuu seemed surprised.

But that was a perfectly normal reaction, wasn't it?

They barely ever talked in class.

And when someone suddenly showed up at your door, you'd usually assume they wanted to borrow money or needed your help with something.

That was what Kushida-san had been thinking. But just as she opened her mouth, she heard Nakano-kun speak.

"Does this mean you've finally added me to your friendship itinerary?" Nakano Yuu said. "I've seen you playing your little friendship game with the other students, winning them over one by one. We're in the same class, but you've made no progress with me at all. I was starting to think you'd skipped me."

"..." Kushida.

Kushida almost choked, but she still managed to put on a cute smile.

"Sure! Actually, I've been thinking that I'd like to become good friends with you, Nakano-kun. We haven't talked before, but it's perfectly normal to save the tastiest thing for last, just like you would with food."

When Kushida had introduced herself at the start of the school year, she'd said she wanted to become friends with lots of people. So Nakano Yuu interpreting her behavior as a friendship-winning game was, more or less, reasonable.

Kushida-san was very forgiving.

"So you actually think highly of me, Kushida-san?" Nakano Yuu seemed delighted.

"Well, I... I guess you could say... that... huh?" But Kushida-san's words trailed off when she noticed Nakano-kun take out his phone and open the voice recorder.

Recording.

Recording.

??

What was Nakano-kun doing? Was he recording her saying, "I think highly of you"?

If he were an ordinary guy, she could understand it as something he'd use to comfort himself, something he could play back over and over.

But Nakano Yuu seemed like a popular guy, judging by both his looks and how he acted. She'd reached that conclusion after noticing that even though he'd only recently started interacting with Horikita Suzune, they were already going shopping together. And Sakura-san often looked his way during class.

Those were both signs that he was popular.

So Kushida had categorized him as one of the popular crowd.

Then why was a popular guy doing something that only an unpopular boy would do?

"Kushida-san has lots of friends, so does that mean the people who became friends with you before me aren't important after all?"

"I think they'd be pretty hurt to hear that," Nakano Yuu said.

?

"..." Kushida.

Kushida wanted to give Nakano Yuu a six out of ten for that.

What was wrong with this guy?

At first, she'd only been worried that Horikita Suzune had told Nakano Yuu about her embarrassing past. To protect her peaceful school life from being disrupted, she'd decided to get on good terms with Nakano Yuu, just as she was trying to do with Horikita. At the very least, she needed to find out how much he knew about her.

That was why she'd come here first thing in the morning.

But after just a little interaction, she was ready to snap.

Since she wanted to be friends with lots of people, she wasn't too picky about who she befriended. Even unpopular, trashy guys like Ike got a warm smile from her.

By rights, Nakano-kun wasn't one of those low-level guys, yet he'd nearly shattered her composure.

"Just kidding," Nakano-kun said quickly, having been watching Kushida-san closely. "But since you want to be friends with me, why don't we exchange phone numbers and add each other?"

Nakano Yuu suggested.

"C-can I?" Kushida-san seemed a little surprised, probably because she hadn't expected Nakano Yuu to be won over so easily.

People didn't exchange phone numbers so directly unless they'd decided to get along.

Thinking this, Kushida-san agreed to exchange numbers with Nakano Yuu, and they added each other as friends.

Kushida-san also noticed that Nakano-kun's contact list... only had two people. One was saved as "Big Brother," and the other was Chabashira-sensei.

Horikita Suzune wasn't there.

Did that mean she'd misunderstood? Maybe Nakano Yuu wasn't that close to Horikita Suzune after all.

Could she have been worrying over nothing? Maybe Horikita Suzune hadn't told Nakano Yuu about her embarrassing past.

Watching Kushida-san's expression, Nakano-kun kept smiling.

Because...

Kushida had probably come to him after failing to win over Horikita, hoping to reach her indirectly. Or maybe she was worried Horikita had told him about her, so she'd come to test whether it was true.

But Kushida-san, adding him as a friend wasn't a good idea.

Once you added someone as a friend, you could track their location with GPS.

Whatever you did, they could check where you were at any time.

And so, the two of them, each with their own agenda, headed to class together.

Horikita Suzune was already in the classroom.

When she saw Nakano Yuu come in, she seemed to frown. But...

"Did you come with Kushida today?" she asked.

"She was waiting outside my dorm room first thing this morning," Nakano Yuu said.

"Did she do that to you, too?" Horikita furrowed her brow slightly.

Too.

Did that mean Kushida-san treated you like this regularly?

Nakano-kun had somehow earned Horikita Suzune's special treatment.

But...

"Kushida-san suddenly showed up outside my dorm room today to wait for me. It seemed like she wanted to walk to school with me. Then she exchanged phone numbers with me so quickly."

Nakano-kun paused.

He'd also noticed that Kushida-san had come into the classroom. She was chatting with her best friend, Wang Meiyu, but she seemed to be looking over at them.

When she caught Nakano-kun's eye, she even smiled.

"I suspect Kushida-san likes me," Nakano Yuu said honestly. "That's why she's so eager."

Then he noticed Kushida-san, who was talking to a friend, staring straight at them.

"I think you're about to drive her crazy," Horikita Suzune remarked.

And so, Nakano-kun obediently took out his textbook and got ready for class.

That day, after getting the better of Nakano Yuu, Kushida Kikyou lost focus several times.

Ever since Nakano-kun had stood up for Sakura-san, she'd often paid attention to him. By chance, she noticed that Kushida-san, who sat in front of her, had turned around to sneak a glance at Nakano-kun several times.

Nakano-kun sure was popular, Sakura Airi thought.

Chapter 16: I Think Kushida-san Likes Me!

Although he'd run into Kushida Kikyou waiting outside his door that morning, nothing unusual happened with Kushida-san apart from her being able to track Nakano-kun's location with GPS.

Still, something did happen at school that day.

As school was about to let out in the afternoon, Hirata-kun asked everyone to wait a moment.

He stood near the podium.

"Everyone, what do you think about this month's Special Exam? The midterm exam, I mean."

This was Hirata Yousuke, the public leader of Class D in the original story.

Back in middle school, he hadn't stepped in when his friend was being bullied. His friend had been driven to despair and jumped from a building, though he survived. The experience had deeply affected Hirata.

He regretted not realizing that his friend had intended to take his own life, and regretted not helping him.

So he'd resolved to change. He'd come to Ikusei High School and transformed himself, becoming someone who paid attention to everyone, especially the outcasts, and tried to help them.

It was a way of making amends.

You could call him a hypocrite, but he really was doing all that. You could call him normal, but he'd accept even Yamauchi and Ike, the likes of whom no one else wanted around.

He was a little obsessed, to say the least.

Still, Hirata-kun was pretty reliable most of the time.

As Nakano-kun searched his memories, he recalled that since he was often alone, Hirata had even called him aside to talk.

He'd said he could help him make friends.

But Hirata-kun... sometimes being alone didn't mean you were lonely.

Maybe you were just aloof.

At least when it came to choosing friends among the boys, there were few in Class D worth confiding in.

The current Hirata-kun presented himself as kind and almost saintly.

"I'll ask Chabashira-sensei about the exam scope."

"But I hope everyone can pass."

Anyone who failed the exam would be expelled, so Hirata also wanted to assess everyone's grades, identify the top students and the struggling ones, then organize study groups in pairs or groups of three.

Ikusei High School had three terms each year, with an exam every three months. Since they were now in their second month after starting school, calling it a midterm exam wasn't wrong.

And according to Chabashira-sensei, the midterm would be a written exam, so naturally it would test everyone's academic ability.

So Hirata's proposal made sense.

Most of the students agreed, but some didn't.

"Our free time is valuable, too."

"If we're going to tutor people who are bad at studying..." said a boy with glasses named Yukimura Teruhiko. He was an academic achiever in the original story, so it was understandable that he'd say that.

"We'll deal with that later. It's only the beginning of the month!" some struggling students shouted. "There's no need to rush."

"I have club activities to go to."

The speaker was in the same row as Nakano Yuu, Horikita Suzune, and Sakura.