Mother Is...

But for the students in Class A and Class B, they were simply blinded by the illusion that "this question is very easy" and "I have a chance to be in the top three" for a moment, and then they fell for Ayanokoji Kiyotaka's trick.

This is exactly Ayanokoji Kiyotaka's strategy in this round.

Seize that fleeting moment of greed when everyone wants to score.

However, with Ayanokoji Kiyotaka's successful strategy in this round, he inevitably took the lead with an absolute advantage.

"First place: Ayanokoji Kiyotaka, twenty-two points."

"Second place: Ichinose Honami, 16 points."

Third place: Matoba Shinji, 14 points.

The point difference has widened to six points.

Moreover, given Ayanokoji Kiyotaka's surprise attack, the rest of Class A and Class B would never fall for such a trick again.

Sakayanagi Arisu stepped onto the stage, her steps heavy, she began to ponder which existing approach, or perhaps a new one, she should use to tackle this round of challenges.

Then she saw the words she needed to describe.

Sakayanagi Arisu calmly began to wait.

After calculating the time, she began to write.

With just a few strokes, the flowing water is first outlined, and then a little person swimming in the water is drawn.

Next, Sakayanagi Arisu wrote down the number 120.

It's exactly two minutes to go.

The first keyword hint is three characters.

Some people started submitting the answer 'swimming pool,' since 120 seemed like the entrance fee. Others submitted 'ambulance,' thinking that 120 was the emergency number and the person in the water was drowning.

Ichinose Honami and Horikita Suzune gave a wry smile, but their hands didn't stop; they quickly submitted the correct answer together.

Telescope!

Please take one day off.

The first draft of the paper has been printed; I need to revise it today according to my teacher's comments.

The new book company sent me a precious chapter from their archives, and it hurt my heart a little.

All I can say is, thank you school! After I graduate, I'll have absolutely nothing to do with you anymore. I never planned to write any groundbreaking academic papers; my only wish now is to graduate peacefully. _(:з"∠)_

Chapter 184: Mother is...

One minute to go.

The second keyword suggests it refers to an optical instrument.

Most students were still clueless, unable to see any connection between what Sakayanagi Arisu and optical instruments. However, they were quick to send a series of answers such as "microscope," "magnifying glass," and "telescope."

Countdown to tens of seconds.

"One of the principles is to utilize the refraction of light through a lens."

"This round is over."

The correct answer is a telescope.

The teacher in charge quickly announced the top three in this round:

"First place: Ichinose Honami, plus 3 points."

"Second place: Horikita Suzune, plus two points."

"Third place: Beppu Ryota, plus one point."

"Five students answered correctly; Sakayanagi Arisu five points."

Beppu Ryota, a student in Himeno Yuki's group in Class B, accidentally guessed "telescope" as his answer after the second keyword was revealed. Meanwhile, Ayanokoji Kiyotaka was enumerating the possibilities as usual, and because he sent "microscope" first, he was two seconds slower.

As for the fifth student who answered correctly, it should also be one of the students in Class A. However, since he was no longer in the top three, it actually gave Sakayanagi Arisu an extra point.

After this round, Ayanokoji Kiyotaka and Matoba Shinji, who were originally ranked first and third respectively, did not score any points. On the contrary, Ichinose Honami got three points, narrowing the gap between herself and Ayanokoji Kiyotaka from six points to three points.

The ideal outcome of the information gap tactic is to ensure that teammates achieve the top two or even top three rankings, thus maximizing the score.

Ayanokoji Kiyotaka shook his head slightly. It was indeed excellent that Fukuyama Shinobu from Class A could come up with this solution, but the problem was that Ayanokoji Kiyotaka himself had never actually participated in the daily study life of Class A.

If it were Katsuragi Kohei on stage, it wouldn't be so bad, but Ayanokoji Kiyotaka wasn't very familiar with the four members of Matoba Shinji. As a result, he couldn't answer questions in the rounds after Fukuyama Shinobu and even Class A. Although they were all classmates, there was a clear information gap between them.

In fact, if he could have scored a few points in those rounds with Class A like Ichinose Honami, he should have already secured the victory, given his impressive nine points in his own round.

Ayanokoji Kiyotaka's goal from beginning to end has always been only first place. The scores and even the food rewards for second and third place are not attractive to him. He went to great lengths to deceive Ryuen Kakeru and infiltrate the southern area alone, all for this opportunity to upgrade his ordinary card.

After Sakayanagi Arisu, Horikita Suzune was the second to last to take the stage.

In this final moment, every minute was crucial, and everyone was on high alert, intently waiting for Horikita Suzune to begin her drawing.

"Iris."

This is the vocabulary word that Horikita Suzune was assigned. To be honest, the moment she saw this word, Horikita Suzune felt that it was tricky.

Compared to a telescope, the word "iris" could not be conveyed to Sakayanagi Arisu and Ichinose Honami through information asymmetry tactics.

If the information gap tactic doesn't work, then only two options remain.

Without making a single stroke, leave the Fate to the keyword deduction process, or, like Ayanokoji Kiyotaka, draw out the words exactly as they are.

But either way, it's possible for Ayanokoji Kiyotaka to score points.

The final artist was Ichinose Honami, who is now almost the only student with a chance to surpass Ayanokoji Kiyotaka.

If we think about it from this perspective, perhaps we can adopt this approach...

Horikita Suzune recalled the pattern of keyword prompts given by the teachers in charge in all previous rounds, and also thought back to the description of irises that she had seen in the <Plant Encyclopedia>.

Taking a deep breath, Horikita Suzune began to write, keeping time for the deadline.

Two minutes left.

The first keyword hint is two words.

The outline of a flower has begun to appear in the center of the screen, but Horikita Suzune has only depicted the stem and receptacle. The most crucial and easily recognizable parts, such as the petals and even the shapes of the pistil and stamen, have not been drawn.

Aside from a few students who had already started guessing the answers, most students were staring intently at Horikita Suzune's pen strokes, watching her sketch out a shape that was all too familiar.

The second keyword suggests it refers to a type of plant.

As the teacher in charge spoke, he ignored the same answer that was sent to his tablet in an instant. He looked thoughtfully at Horikita Suzune, and guessed what she was thinking.

In a sense, the opposing team successfully utilized the school in this round.

With ten seconds left, Horikita Suzune stopped drawing. Before her was a vibrant Red Rose, and the teacher in charge announced the final keyword:

"Related to love."

"This round is over."

The teacher in charge took a deep breath and read out an answer that most of the students hadn't expected:

The correct answer is 'iris'.

The audience erupted in uproar.

Horikita Suzune nodded slightly. She had made the right bet this time. This scam that fooled everyone had two prerequisites.

First, the Iris itself is regarded as the "messenger of love" in love, and its flower language is long-lasting longing, which is similar to the flower language of the rose to some extent. In each round of keyword prompts in the school, the first round is always about the number of words, the second round is always about the general scope, and the third round is about the description of the words themselves. This leaves room for manipulation.

Second, in this project called "[Draw and Guess]", only three situations have occurred so far: no strokes at all, strokes that only acquaintances would recognize but are often unrelated to the words themselves, and strokes that are drawn very clearly and carefully.

But there is actually a fourth way: deliberately drawing it wrong.

After several rounds of the game, almost everyone agreed on the basic premise that the images must contain information, since it's Draw and Guess where the drawing is meant to be guessed.

However, this scam can be accomplished if you don't intend for anyone to score in the first place.

After a brief moment of hesitation upon receiving the term, Horikita Suzune quickly devised a plan: to ensure that everyone, including herself, would fail to score in this round, keeping the score difference between Ayanokoji Kiyotaka and Ichinose Honami at three points, and ultimately deciding the winner in Ichinose Honami's final round.

However, the teacher in charge did not follow Horikita Suzune's plan to say something that no one answered correctly. Instead, he looked through all the answers and then read out the two names:

"First place: Ichinose Honami, plus 3 points."

"Second place: Ayanokoji Kiyotaka, plus two points."

"Third place: Sakayanagi Arisu, plus one point."

"Three people answered correctly this round, Horikita Suzune gets three points."

Three people actually got it right... First place went to Honami... That seems acceptable... But what exactly happened?

With this thought flashing through her mind for a moment, Horikita Suzune walked off the stage with some confusion.

At the same time, Ayanokoji Kiyotaka was slightly surprised. He had never fully believed Horikita Suzune's painting from the beginning. Although he submitted the answer "rose" when he heard the second hint in the last minute, after the last hint came out, Ayanokoji Kiyotaka was still quite cautious and typed as many two-word flowers and plants related to love as possible in the last ten seconds.

Roses, lilies, Kikyo, daisies, irises...

If I'm not mistaken, Sakayanagi Arisu also used the same exhaustive method.

But how did Ichinose Honami answer correctly? And even before herself?

However, such doubts did not last long, because Ichinose Honami, as the final artist for the project, had already prepared to draw.

Although Ayanokoji Kiyotaka still holds the top spot in the overall score, the gap between him and Ichinose Honami, Matoba Shinji is in third place, is too far behind the top two and has lost any possibility of advancing further.

So theoretically, Ichinose Honami and Ayanokoji Kiyotaka have already secured the top two spots in this competition, but who will ultimately come in first and second will depend on the scores in this final round.

Ichinose Honami was naturally aware of this as well.

Actually, she won first place in the previous round by sheer luck.

At first, Ichinose Honami submitted the answer "rose" like most other students, but in the countdown of ten seconds, when the third keyword was announced, Ichinose Honami suddenly remembered the iris.

This is the kind of flower planted in the green belt downstairs from her apartment.

For Ichinose Honami, the earliest flower associated with love that she knew was not actually the "rose," but rather those unremarkable irises.

Because in Ichinose Honami's memory, Kitagawa Ryo would wait for her on that path lined with irises on many mornings—until that very moment.

Perhaps it was because of this feeling of nostalgia that I subconsciously sent out the answer about irises, and unexpectedly, it worked out by accident.

However, this would give them a better chance to defeat Ayanokoji Kiyotaka, which would also be a help to Ryo.

With this in mind, Ichinose Honami looked at the given words.

Her jewel-like blue pupils shrank to the size of pinpoints in surprise, as if Ichinose Honami had seen something unbelievable.

Under everyone's gaze, Ichinose Honami stood there, motionless.

Her pen strokes trembled slightly in the center of the screen, leaving a small, ever-spreading black dot in the center of the pure white page.

Three minutes passed in the blink of an eye.

The first keyword hint is two words.

Some people, as if suddenly enlightened, confidently sent the answer "Go" to the teacher in charge, but many more, because of Horikita Suzune's previous deception, remained on the sidelines, waiting for the next keyword to provide a clue.

"The second keyword suggests that there is a special holiday to commemorate it."

Ayanokoji Kiyotaka began to exert his influence, sending out messages not only for Japan holidays but also for China festivals and mythological figures such as Qu Yuan Chang'e.

Sakayanagi Arisu somewhat surprised, frowning and completely unable to understand Ichinose Honami's current behavior. She had a strong sense of observation and could sense that this was definitely not a strategy like Horikita Suzune's, but genuine confusion. Ichinose Honami stood there as if she had lost her soul. The black dot had never meant anything from beginning to end; it was just that the brushstroke happened to be there.

In Sakayanagi Arisu's memory, Ichinose Honami rarely behaved so out of sorts. The last time she saw him with such an expression was... a few nights ago during the game of Truth or Dare.

In that instant, Sakayanagi Arisu immediately noticed the unusual situation.

"There is a special holiday to commemorate it..."

This answer also matches perfectly.

Countdown to tens of seconds.

"It is a type of immediate family member."

Combined with the second keyword clue, the final answer is already quite obvious.

But all four students in Class A stopped writing and did not submit their answers.

"Help them."