The Queen's Gaze

The heat waves over the field, mixed with the boiling roar of the crowd, seemed ready to tear the roof off the entire gymnasium.

Over the broadcast, the announcer screamed at the top of his lungs, whipping everyone's emotions into a frenzy.

"Students! The final showdown! The Grade-wide Relay Race that will decide your fate—begins now!"

The starting gun fired.

The air was torn apart.

To everyone watching, Class D's lineup looked utterly ordinary.

They had no athletic ace like Sudo Ken leading off, nor did they have a popular figure like Hirata Yosuke anchoring the team.

Natsume Yu had even placed himself in an unremarkable position just before the second-to-last leg, a "slacking" slot that required neither explosive sprinting nor sustained endurance.

The moment the race began, Class C bared its fangs without restraint.

Ryuen Kakeru stood by the track with his arms folded, a cruel sneer on his face.

His gaze was like that of someone enjoying a massacre whose outcome had long been decided.

"Bang!"

Class D's first runner, a quiet girl in everyday life, was viciously shoulder-checked by a Class C runner while taking a turn. She staggered several steps, and her speed immediately dropped.

"Hey! What are you doing?!"

"Referee! They fouled her!"

Angry shouts rose from Class D's cheering section.

But Class C's actions were extremely subtle. At such high speeds, that level of physical contact could hardly be ruled deliberate foul play.

The referee merely blew his whistle and issued a warning before allowing the race to continue.

Then came the second leg, then the third.

Like a pack of hyenas acting under the same command, Class C's runners constantly harassed Class D's runners with every kind of underhanded trick.

An accidental stomp on the foot.

An "unintentional" obstruction during a baton handoff.

Class D's rhythm was completely disrupted. Their ranking kept falling, and they soon dropped to the very back.

Despair began spreading through Class D's ranks.

"Damn it! Those bastards!"

"That's too underhanded! How are we supposed to compete like this?"

Horikita Suzune stood in the relay zone, her expression icy.

Her lips were pressed tightly together as she stared at the figure from her class drawing closer and closer.

She knew it was her turn.

She had to catch up.

She had to make up the distance!

"Horikita! Take it!"

The previous runner rushed up to her, panting hard, and held out the baton.

Just as Horikita reached for it, a Class C boy in the neighboring lane curled his lips into a malicious grin.

His foot stretched out "carelessly."

"—!"

Horikita's pupils contracted sharply.

She tried to dodge, but with her body leaning forward at full speed, she had no time to react.

Her foot caught, and she lost her balance, crashing heavily forward onto the ground!

"Scrrrape—"

The fabric of her track pants rubbed against the rough synthetic track, making an ear-grating sound.

Intense pain shot through her body from her knee.

The entire stadium erupted.

Every student from Class D sprang to their feet in shock.

Horikita lay sprawled on the ground, the baton rolling away beside her.

She pushed herself up and looked down. The knee of her right leg had torn through her track pants, bright red blood mixing with grit and smearing across the wound.

It hurt.

It burned.

But stronger than the pain was the humiliation.

The humiliation of falling so disgracefully in front of the entire school, in front of that lofty older brother of hers!

The Class C boy who had tripped her even looked back and gave her a contemptuous, provocative glance.

Horikita Suzune's mind buzzed.

Blood rushed to her head.

She ignored the gasps around her and paid no attention to the piercing pain in her knee.

She merely reached out, her fingernails digging into the track from the force, and crawled inch by inch toward the fallen baton.

Grab it.

She grabbed it.

Then she struggled to her feet with every ounce of strength she had.

Every movement tugged at the wound on her knee, making the pain darken her vision.

But she stayed standing.

Limping but utterly determined, she handed the baton to the next runner.

"Run!"

She forced out that single word through clenched teeth.

In that instant, everyone in Class D's eyes turned red.

All their previous complaints, all their despair, were completely ignited by Horikita Suzune's back as she struggled to rise.

"Charge!!!"

"Let's fight them!!"

"For Horikita!!"

A sense of unity unlike anything before erupted from Class D.

Everyone ran like mad, using every bit of strength they possessed to charge forward.

And at that moment, Natsume Yu's strategy finally began to reveal its savage face.

Ayanokoji Kiyotaka stood expressionlessly among the team, rapidly issuing instructions in a quiet voice that still carried clearly to everyone.

"Ike, you still have sixty percent of your stamina left. Don't take the inside lane at the next turn. Overtake from the outside. That Class C runner's rhythm is breaking down!"

"Yamauchi, take half a step farther left during the handoff. The Class A runner will block his route!"

"Shinohara, don't look behind you. Your only opponent is the heels of the person in front of you!"

One precise instruction after another came from Ayanokoji's mouth.

These were all the optimal solutions Natsume Yu had reached after analyzing every participant's running habits, stamina distribution, and mental resilience over the past few days.

The pace they had deliberately slowed to preserve stamina now became their sharpest weapon.

Class D's ranking began to rise at an unbelievable speed, as if a miracle were unfolding!

Eighth.

Seventh.

Sixth!

In the Student Council stands.

Horikita Manabu stood with his arms folded, watching everything below without expression.

When he saw his younger sister fall, then struggle back to her feet and pass on the baton, an almost imperceptible ripple finally appeared in his normally placid eyes.

Meanwhile.

In Class A's private stands.

Sakayanagi Arisu sat quietly with her cane in hand.

Most of her attention had been focused on Ayanokoji Kiyotaka.

But she soon noticed Class D's strange rhythm of pursuit.

It was not merely passion or desperate effort.

It was an efficiency so calm that it was frightening.

Every overtake, every handoff, was as precise as a machine.

This was absolutely not something a disorganized mob could accomplish.

There had to be a commander behind it.

For the first time, Sakayanagi Arisu slowly shifted her gaze away from Ayanokoji.

Her eyes swept across Class D's formation like the most precise radar.

Not Horikita Suzune, whose face was full of frustration after her fall.

Nor Hirata Yosuke, who was shouting at the top of his lungs.

At last.

Her gaze settled on the boy who had shown no presence from beginning to end.

Natsume Yu.

He merely stood there quietly. He was not even looking at the track, his eyes unfocused as though he were thinking about something else.

Yet Sakayanagi Arisu's intuition told her.

It was him.

The true brain hidden behind the beast that was Class D.

Inside the medical tent.

Horikita Suzune gritted her teeth as the nurse treated the wound on her knee.

The sting of disinfectant brought cold sweat to her forehead.

Yet her eyes remained fixed on the field without blinking.

She watched Class D's ranking rise bit by bit. She watched the classmates she had usually looked down on unleash astonishing energy.

Her heart was filled with complicated emotions.

Humiliation.

Unwillingness.

She hated her own weakness. She hated how easily she had fallen into the other side's trap.

At the same time, toward the man who had devised such a precise plan, one that had even accounted for her "sacrifice,"

A sense of awe that even she herself had not noticed quietly began to grow.

"Natsume! Take the baton!"

At last, it was Natsume Yu's turn.

He took the baton and began to run.

He was neither fast nor slow.

There was no blazing sprint, nor was there any dramatic comeback.

He simply ran steadily, perfectly holding on to the fifth-place position Class D had fought so hard to regain.

Then, in the handoff zone, he firmly passed the baton to the final runner.

Ayanokoji Kiyotaka.

The entire stadium's attention instantly focused there.

The final leg!

Class A's fastest runner was far ahead of everyone else.

Ryuen Kakeru of Class C followed close behind, a savage grin of certain victory on his face.

And Ayanokoji Kiyotaka of Class D was still in third place when he received the baton.

Everyone believed the outcome had already been decided.

Class D's miracle had ended here.

Natsume Yu came to a stop and watched Ayanokoji's back, the curve of his lips turning teasing.

He spoke softly, his voice not loud but clear enough to reach Ayanokoji's ears.

"Kiyotaka."

"Show him what a 'masterpiece' is."