Who Could That Person Be?

After learning how powerful his opponent was, Mikage Touji stopped holding back. He let out a roar and unleashed a punch from the Heavenly Emperor Fist, piercing through his opponent's domain and heading straight for Morishita Ran's face.

"Surveillance? No wonder..." Morishita Ran murmured under her breath.

Mikage Touji's move seemed to be beyond Morishita Ran's expectations. Could this be where Morishita Ran's journey came to an end?

"The school is holding a month-long conduct examination for the first-year students, deducting points for any student who breaks the rules."

No!

At this critical moment, Morishita Ran summoned the Antimatter Mirror Knight to take the blow head-on, then fired a Dimensional Refraction at Mikage Touji, completely tipping the scales of victory!

"W-What?!" Mikage Touji panicked a little. "How could you know about that? You shouldn't have been able to find out."

Mikage Touji shook his head violently, quickly regaining his composure. "Points can buy anything. That's the ultimate rule for clearing this school. All you need is twenty million to graduate directly from Class A."

Faced with such a dire situation, Mikage Touji had nowhere to dodge. He took the attack head-on and used every ounce of his strength to unleash his ultimate technique, "Shining Supernova Burst—Limit Flash," vowing to destroy this enemy right here.

"Class Points are the system the school uses to evaluate each class. The school adds points to the students' accounts every month at a ratio of one to one hundred. In other words, our class started with a thousand Class Points." Morishita Ran had taken in Mikage Touji's predicament. Victory was already hers.

Morishita Ran unleashed her own ultimate technique, "Dimensional Quake: Rainbow Big Bang," and met his attack head-on. This time, there was no surging energy—only a suffocating surge, only a suffocating silence. The space cracked like glass, and pitch-black dimensional rifts split open throughout the classroom.

"..."

Mikage Touji opened his mouth, frozen in place, like a giant who had lost his light and turned to stone.

"Looks like I win, Mikage Touji~"

Her voice brimming with delight, Morishita Ran followed up with one last attack. "The students in Class D all have flaws to some degree. The school calls them defective products."

Facing the powerless giant, Morishita Ran showed no mercy. Her "Great Severance: Cosmic Annihilation" instantly stretched out, cutting off Mikage Touji's hopes—and Mikage Touji himself.

Mikage

Touji

died!

What a thoroughly exhilarating battle!

"I won."

Morishita Ran put one hand on her hip and flashed a victory sign, striking a victory-screen pose. "Mikage Touji, who stole my seat."

"Impossible!"

Mikage Touji pounded the floor like a shoddy villain trying to struggle after his defeat.

"Refusing to admit defeat? That's so like you, Mikage Touji."

"Wait!"

Mikage Touji's thoughts suddenly fell into place. He looked up at Morishita Ran, who was basking in her victory.

"Did you cheat?"

"With the upperclassmen under orders to keep their mouths shut, there's no way you could know that the thing used to measure a class's worth is called Class Points. At most, you could know there was such a thing, just like me."

The more Mikage Touji spoke, the more excited he became. "Tell me! Did you go and buy information from the school?!"

"Hey, Mikage Touji," Morishita Ran said, a rare smile appearing on her face. "Do you know the biggest difference between boys and girls?"

"Don't change the subject. Please answer my question directly, Morishita."

"I knew you were clever when we were on the public bus."

With her revenge complete and her spirits high, Morishita Ran clasped her hands behind her back and strolled around beside Mikage Touji.

"Even if I'd used the same method as you, I'd only have ended up about as well-informed as you. From the beginning, I never planned to beat you at that."

"Later, when I was eavesdropping on people at a café, I discovered something..."

A faint sense of unease stirred in Mikage Touji.

Morishita Ran circled around in front of Mikage Touji, pulled out a voice recorder, and held it up in front of him, wagging it cheerfully. Her voice brimmed with delight. "Girls take... longer than boys to use the bathroom~"

The instant he saw the voice recorder, all color drained from Mikage Touji. He turned into a pale stone statue.

"Mikage Touji, hurry up and admit it! Lady Morishita won!"

"No!" Mikage Touji suddenly snapped back to his senses. "There's still a problem!" His gaze shifted from Morishita Ran's black stockings to the face that had never looked this happy since he'd known her. "I can understand the rest of what you said as good luck—that you just happened to hear people mention those rules."

"But—"

"How did you know the ratio between Class Points and individual points was one to one hundred? No matter how much the upperclassmen like to talk, they wouldn't recite this kind of unwritten rule that everyone knows like they were reading from a manual."

The topic still had to be relevant to the conversation. Someone might bring up the conduct examination while chatting, but the ratio of Class Points was common knowledge among the upperclassmen. There was no reason for them to go out of their way to mention it.

"Did you buy information from the school? That's cheating! You said it yourself: treasure is more fun when you discover it yourself." Mikage Touji rallied again, exposing her conspiracy to extinguish the light.

"..." Morishita Ran fell silent.

"Please answer my question directly, Morishita. Don't let your eyes wander, don't stand there with your hands on your hips, and bring your legs together. Show some respect."

"Just you wait, Mikage Touji..."

Morishita Ran looked down on Mikage Touji's desperate struggle. She turned toward the door and called out:

"Then it's all right if I tell him, right?"

"Y-Yes, it's all right, if Morishita wants to." A timid voice came from behind the door.

There was a third person here?

"You're..." Mikage Touji looked toward the voice. "Yamamura?"

"Yes, Mikage," Yamamura Miki replied, lowering her head.

"My secret weapon." Morishita Ran went around behind Yamamura Miki, clapped her hands on Yamamura Miki's shoulders, and nudged her forward. "Those upperclassmen at the Student Cafeteria didn't seem to notice her. They opened their phones right in front of her, and she got to see all sorts of things."

"..."

Mikage Touji's lips moved. He wanted to loudly condemn such an unfair tactic, but that would make him look like a sore loser.

Was that allowed?

He stared blankly at the dim ceiling. What had all his suffering over the past two days been for, then?

"Um..." Yamamura Miki walked over to Mikage Touji. "Mikage, are you okay?"

"Don't mind him. He's already fallen into hell..."

"No!"

Mikage Touji still found a flaw. "You said treasure belongs to the first person to discover it. The first person to discover it was obviously Yamamura."

"Did I say that?" Morishita Ran blinked.

"You change your tune faster than a page turns."

Morishita Ran wasn't ashamed in the slightest. In fact, she sounded rather proud as she said, "My mother told me that girls should learn how to lie when they're out and about."

"Anyway..."

Their eyes met, and they spoke in unison. "I won! Ultraman (Kamen Rider) isn't real!"

Who Was That Person?

By the time Mikage Touji and Morishita Ran reached a temporary ceasefire agreement for the first phase, the sun had already dipped below the horizon, and the moon had climbed into the treetops.

After checking the doors and windows, the three of them left the classroom.

Morishita Ran walked in front, Mikage Touji followed behind, and Yamamura Miki trailed far behind them. The streetlights came on, and the three of them cast uneven shadows across the school path.

As they walked, Mikage Touji realized something was wrong. "Morishita, this isn't the way to the Student Cafeteria, is it?"

Morishita Ran paused, then continued walking as though nothing had happened.

She was definitely pretending she hadn't heard him, wasn't she?

Mikage Touji watched Morishita Ran, whose pace had clearly quickened, and continued following her.

Before long, Morishita Ran reached their destination.

Mikage Touji looked up at the sign. "A ramen shop? No wonder you dragged me here."

As far as Mikage Touji knew, places like ramen shops and beef restaurants seemed to be considered male territory. For a girl to go alone would go against Japan's "unspoken rules."

Morishita Ran lightly touched her chin with a fingertip, striking a thoughtful pose. "To tell the truth, I've been very curious about this place."

"You've never been here?" Mikage Touji was surprised.

Morishita Ran wasn't the sort of person who cared about what other people thought. In theory, she should have walked right into the shop alone and calmly told the owner, "One bowl of ramen, please."

"No." A hint of excitement flashed in Morishita Ran's eyes. "My family won't let me come to places like this."

Looks like she was going to let loose now that she was at school.

Mikage Touji turned to Yamamura Miki. "What about you, Yamamura?"

"Huh? Me? I haven't been here either."

"Then go!" Morishita Ran pointed with her slender hand, fire burning in her eyes. "You'll be the one to lead us as we explore this brave new world."

"I haven't been here either," Mikage Touji replied calmly.

"..."

A gust of wind blew by, sweeping fallen leaves from the roadside trees along the ground.

"Morishita Ran, the plan has failed spectacularly..." Morishita Ran covered her forehead and muttered, head bowed.

Come on, I'm a transmigrator. I'm already lucky I can speak Japanese. My handwriting still looks like a dog's paw.

A little setback obviously wasn't enough to deter Morishita Ran. She quickly recovered her spirits and charged toward the ramen shop again.

"We're already here. We can't back down now!"

"Could you stop pushing me, then?" Mikage Touji said helplessly, feeling the hands shoving him from behind.

"Those who are the light must never back down."

"You're admitting I'm the light now?"

The two of them shoved and jostled their way into the ramen shop together. Yamamura Miki was still outside, clutching the hem of her clothes. After hesitating for a moment, she finally worked up the courage to follow them in.

The shop's interior had nothing special about it; it was just a traditional ramen shop, with a long counter. There weren't many customers, but one person everyone knew was there too.

Mashima Tomoya, the homeroom teacher for Class 1-A.

"Hey, Mr. Mashima! You're here for ramen too?" Mikage Touji greeted him first.

"Good evening, Mr. Mashima." Morishita Ran poked her head out from behind him and greeted the teacher quite politely.

Mashima Tomoya had noticed the strange trio who'd barged in. He put down his chopsticks, picked up a napkin from the table, cleared his throat, and then nodded to the three of them.

"Good evening, Mikage, Morishita, Yamamura."

"G-Good evening to you too." Yamamura Miki, who had come in last, seemed startled. She lowered her head as she spoke.

Mikage Touji took the seat beside Mashima Tomoya and picked up the menu. "This is our first time here. Do you have any recommendations, Mr. Mashima?"

Mashima Tomoya folded his arms and gave the question serious thought. Then he enthusiastically recommended, "Their soy sauce ramen is quite good. If you have a big appetite, the chashu is a must-have here. You can order an extra serving." After that, he turned toward Morishita Ran and Yamamura Miki and continued, "If you're girls, tonkotsu ramen should suit you. Just remember to ask the owner to make the broth lighter."

Morishita Ran seemed not to have heard any of Mashima Tomoya's suggestions at all. She stared fixedly at the menu in Mikage Touji's hands, pointed at a bowl of vividly colored ramen, and said, "Mikage Touji, I want this one!"

"Are you serious? You can tell just by looking that it's incredibly spicy."

"The Morishita Family fears no challenge!"

Not only was this girl childish, she was also a thrill-seeker!

In the end, Mikage Touji didn't stop Morishita Ran's charge to her doom. He and Yamamura Miki ordered the soy sauce ramen and tonkotsu ramen Mashima Tomoya had recommended.

When the ramen arrived, Morishita Ran looked at the bright red broth, bubbling like lava, fell silent for a moment, then turned to Mikage Touji. "Mikage Touji, switch with me."

"Not a chance!" Mikage Touji shielded his ramen.

The instant that ramen chef had given him a kind smile, Mikage Touji had realized this was a fight to the death over the chef's dignity.

Morishita Ran gazed at the ramen sending up clouds of steam and decided to let it cool down first. She struck up a conversation with Mikage Touji.

"Are you going to tell everyone in class about the school's rules?"

Mashima Tomoya, who was eating nearby, quietly pricked up his ears.

"I think either way is fine. The class is doing pretty well as it is." Mikage Touji ate his ramen and scratched his forehead with his thumb, uncertain. "But if this sort of thing gets out, we in Class A will be the ones in trouble."