Study Session (1)

Ding-ding-ding...

As the dismissal bell rang, Class D's first study session officially began.

Five boys and five girls walked along together.

"Say... Suzuki, have you and Horikita made things official? And what was the deal with that girl you carried during the club recruitment fair?"

Yamaguchi, walking behind him, asked with a curious look on his face.

"Yeah, yeah! Suzuki, you seriously have way too much luck with girls!"

Ike Kanji beside him looked utterly envious.

Even Sudo and Ayanokoji were curious.

Now that they finally had a chance to ask, they hoped to pick up a trick or two as well.

Yamaguchi and Ike had been easy enough to persuade. They had already been worried about the end-of-month exam.

As for Sudo, Suzuki Tsubame had promised to teach him basketball, so he agreed without much fuss.

Suzuki Tsubame looked toward Horikita in the distance. At the moment, she was dealing with Kushida Kikyo.

Kushida had not been invited, yet she had come anyway.

It seemed she was worried that Horikita would make new friends and raise her standing in the class.

That would make it even harder for her to get Horikita expelled.

The two were so absorbed in their clash that they had not noticed what was happening over here at all.

"As for Suzune and me, we haven't reached the point of making things official yet."

"As for the girl at the club recruitment fair, she was anemic and nearly fell over. I had no choice but to carry her to the infirmary."

He answered Yamaguchi's questions one by one.

This guy was known as the Black Room Masterpiece. What he did best was twist right and wrong and muddy the waters.

He absolutely could not be given a chance to spread rumors.

"Eh? Why did she ask Suzuki for help? Shouldn't there have been other upperclassmen in the club?"

[Matsushita Chiaki]

[Looks: 9.6]

[Intelligence: 9.2]

[Constitution: 7.7]

As the girl asked her question, her azure eyes gleamed with mischief.

Matsushita had suddenly approached him at noon.

She had said that she wanted to go to the library with Suzuki Tsubame during the study session.

Suzuki Tsubame had naturally welcomed her. He also wanted to help this girl change her overly opportunistic personality.

Because a subtle tension had formed between Horikita and Kushida Kikyo, the boys and girls traveling with them had all chosen to stay by Suzuki Tsubame's side.

Once Matsushita Chiaki caught the key point, Yamaguchi and the others realized it too.

"Yeah, yeah."

"There must've been some special reason, right?"

There were so many people in the club, so why did it have to be Suzuki Tsubame carrying her? Just because he was handsome?

"Uh... Actually, we were playing chess in the Chess Club at the time. That girl had been sitting in seiza for too long, became anemic, and couldn't stand properly."

"There wasn't any special reason."

Suzuki Tsubame smiled awkwardly. Sakayanagi had mobility issues; he had merely helped her. That was all.

Matsushita smiled meaningfully and did not ask any more questions.

The group chatted and laughed as they headed toward the library.

The library was rather empty at the moment. After finding seats not far from Horikita and the others, Suzuki Tsubame called the three girls over to sit down.

That was right. There were simply too few people in Class D who were good at studying. Aside from Matsushita, who had chosen to join herself, the other two had been personally selected by Suzuki.

They were Sakura Airi, who feared other people's gazes so much that she had become withdrawn, and Hasebe Haruka, who had recently fallen out with the Gyaru Group.

"Ugh, walking all this way was so tiring."

As she complained, the girl sprawled her entire weight across the library desk.

Sakura sat beside her, curling nearly her entire body into the corner.

"Well, there's nothing we can do about it, right? After all, we're both fringe members of the class."

The girl smiled noncommittally, then suddenly thought of something.

"Say... Qiuqiu, weren't you pretty close with them? Why didn't you go with them?"

Hasebe asked curiously. Suzuki Tsubame had been wondering the same thing.

"Because Hirata-kun has it hard enough tutoring everyone by himself. I thought that if he had one less person to tutor, things might be a little easier for him."

The girl answered calmly, as though she had rehearsed the line countless times in her heart.

If Suzuki Tsubame had not known what she was capable of, he might really have been fooled.

Hasebe beside them did not see through her at all.

Putting the subject aside, Suzuki Tsubame first gave them a few simple questions to test the three girls' foundations.

Once he understood their actual level, he could teach them according to their abilities.

Meanwhile...

"Even elementary school students can solve questions this simple, can't they? I'm really curious how you managed to get into this school."

Horikita put down the workbook and calmly looked at Sudo, her eyes seeming to ask: Is this guy really human?

Perhaps her words were too hurtful, or perhaps her gaze was too full of contempt.

Sudo could not even hold out for a second before exploding.

Bang!

"You! What the hell are you saying?!"

He slammed both hands onto the desk and rose to his feet furiously.

He reached out to grab Horikita by the collar, but she easily dodged him.

"If it weren't for Suzuki, I wouldn't even have come to this stupid study session!"

"Heh. Even if you say that, you're still worried about failing the exam, aren't you?"

"Given your current level, you might as well leave at the end of the month."

Even in the face of Sudo's rage, Horikita remained relentlessly sharp-tongued, with no fear on her face.

Seeing that she was not afraid of him in the slightest,

Sudo turned even redder with anger, his eyes bloodshot and his breathing heavy.

"You!"

Just as Sudo was about to lose control, a hand suddenly reached in from the side and pressed down on his shoulder.

"Enough."

"Sudo, calm down first."

That hand naturally belonged to Suzuki Tsubame.

Yamaguchi and Ike shrank into their seats, pretending to be ostriches. Ayanokoji watched blankly from the side, while Kushida Kikyo only regretted that Suzuki Tsubame had arrived too quickly.

In any case, Suzuki Tsubame still had to mediate between the two of them.

"It's because Horikita's words were too harsh."

"Exactly! If we already knew everything, why would we even come to a study session?"

The two had been cowering in the corner when things were tense, but now they jumped out to speak.

Kushida Kikyo on the other side did not miss this chance to badmouth Horikita either. With a troubled expression, she said:

"What Horikita said was indeed a little too much. We're all classmates, so if there's a problem, we can talk it out properly."

"There's no need to say such hurtful things."

Her words immediately resonated with the two fools, who hurriedly echoed her.

Horikita's expression darkened somewhat.

"Enough. Both of you, say less."

He shot Yamaguchi an irritated glance. This idiot had been the one to start it.

Yamaguchi was still a little unconvinced, muttering something under his breath.

Sudo was indeed stronger than most people, but compared to Suzuki Tsubame, he was far weaker.

Suzuki Tsubame lightly patted his shoulder.

"Alright, Sudo. For the sake of your dream, just bear with it a little."

Surely Sudo could see it himself as well.

At this school, he did not need to worry about food or shelter, so he could pursue his basketball dream without concern.

If he got expelled now, he would have to return home and go back to the kind of life where he never knew when his next meal would come.