You're No Good at This Either

It was noon the next day, and the sun blazed overhead.

Ayanokoji followed Horikita to the scene of the incident—and he was even walking ahead of her!

Watching his determined stride, Horikita Suzune felt momentarily dazed.

How did this guy know where it happened?

She'd only learned about that little corner with no camera coverage yesterday, after attending the disciplinary hearing.

Weird. Really weird...

Had he unlocked some kind of cheat?

Actually, Ayanokoji had just happened to be passing by.

"So, how do you plan to prove Sudo's innocence?"

Ayanokoji's listless voice brought Horikita back to the present. She smoothed her furrowed brows and said, "We'll call them here and use verbal persuasion to make them admit it themselves."

A master of persuasion?

At that, Ayanokoji was taken aback, surprise showing on his face.

He was faking it.

For some reason, Horikita felt sure of that.

But she didn't plan to argue with him. She still needed his cooperation.

Because... Horikita simply couldn't reach a spot where she could install a camera, even if she stood on a desk...

"Here. Put these up over there."

Horikita handed Ayanokoji the two cameras she was carrying, then pointed to a spot on the wall.

Ayanokoji took them and sighed without drawing attention to himself.

So she'd called him here to be her assistant.

He looked at the spot on the wall and thought it over.

It wasn't that he didn't understand Horikita's plan. She wanted to make the cameras look real, trick them into thinking they'd carelessly failed to check for surveillance, and throw them into a panic. Then she'd persuade them to withdraw their complaint.

But what if they'd already checked the area and deliberately lured Sudo here?

Wouldn't that make her the clown?

No. One clown was enough, and that was her.

He thought that, but couldn't withstand her stare, so Ayanokoji obediently did as he was told.

"Do you think... this will work?"

Ayanokoji asked with a hint of helplessness.

"A little higher."

"Like this?"

"A little lower."

"..."

"How about this?"

"Uh... let's go back to where you had it at first."

You've got to be kidding me!

What is this, dealing with a client?

The trauma from his previous life came rushing back, and now his fists were genuinely clenched.

But Ayanokoji was a polite person. He didn't show any irritation. He could only feel that the girl behind him seemed to be enjoying herself a little too much, and he was utterly helpless.

As expected, what went around came around.

Once he'd paid this debt, he'd make sure to owe her a bigger one next time, he decided silently.

"All right, that'll do."

Horikita's usual cool voice reached him, and Ayanokoji finally breathed a little easier.

He climbed down from the desk with a disgruntled look, then glanced at Horikita's forced air of aloofness and the corners of her mouth, which kept trying to curl upward. His fists clenched again.

If her brother weren't his creditor, he'd definitely teach this girl a lesson.

As for what kind of lesson, well, you know.

Before long, the three students from Class C arrived for the meeting.

"? Why is it you two? Where's Kushida?"

Ishizaki, who was leading the group, took one look at the two stone-faced students before him, and his expression said he'd been had.

He'd thought the adorable Kushida would come and soothe his wounded heart. These two stone-faced people were just too much!

Ayanokoji gave him a brief once-over and couldn't help thinking about how viciously Ryuen had beaten them.

All three men had at least ten injuries of various sizes, and Ishizaki, who was in front, had one arm in a cast. And those were only the injuries they could see.

That was excessive.

Good thing this fight hadn't been fatal. Otherwise, Ryuen and that big, burly guy beside him would've already been locked up.

Ayanokoji grumbled to himself.

At the same time, the three of them were disappointed not to see Kushida. After throwing the pair a disdainful look, they turned to leave, but Horikita wasn't about to let her prey get away.

"Stop!" she said, raising her voice higher than usual. "You deliberately angered Sudo and provoked him into attacking you, didn't you?"

"Hey, don't go making things up. Anyone can see what happened, right? He beat all three of us up like this. Don't you have any conscience?"

Ishizaki complained in a pitiful tone, putting on an injured act.

"Exactly. Why would we deliberately provoke him into beating us up? He already had a record."

"Forget them. Let's go!"

"Hold on." Horikita curled her lips into a cold smile and directed their attention to the wall. "Look over there."

The moment they spotted the camera, the three men froze. Then smiles tugged at their lips.

"No way, Horikita. Do you think we're children?"

"Hahaha! You really think we didn't check for cameras before we acted?"

"That's hilarious. You went and bought a camera just to put it up here? What, are you trying to mend the fence after the sheep are gone?"

At that, Horikita's eyes trembled and her gaze went blank. Ishizaki and the other two took in her expression, which looked just like a plan exposed.

Now they laughed even more wildly.

"Hahaha, this is the backbone of Class D? That's it? Class D really is a bunch of useless losers."

"Yeah. I don't get why Ryuen went to all that trouble to target them. He might as well just let them fend for themselves."

"Exactly. Sigh, we took that beating from Ryuen for nothing. He insisted we provoke that hothead and wouldn't let us fight back. What's the point of getting him expelled..."

"Shh. Don't say that."

Ishizaki, who was leading the group, seemed to realize something and suddenly cut them off warily. The two lackeys behind him looked confused.

"What are you worried about, Ishizaki? Look at her face. It practically says, 'How did I not think they'd check for cameras?' She's obviously just a bookworm who's good at exams."

"Hahaha, exactly. Coming up with a plan like this to scare us is definitely the kind of thing Class D would do."

Ishizaki said nothing. He just thought the other side was far too calm, given the situation. It didn't fit. Had they really come here just to humiliate themselves?

The very next second, he got his answer.

Horikita Suzune's lips curved into a composed smile. Then she slowly took a phone from her skirt pocket, tapped play, and let their conversation from moments earlier pour out of its speaker!

At the sight of that, the smiles on Ishizaki and the other two froze.

So Horikita Suzune hadn't been after the camera at all!

She'd only put it up to make an obvious mistake, so the three of them would let their guard down and think that was the whole plan.

On top of that, her Oscar-worthy acting had made them think she was an idiot. They'd dropped their guard completely and even started mocking her for failing.

And she'd just been waiting for them to get so carried away that they let something slip...

So that was it... That was it!

For a moment, all three of them stood with their mouths agape, unable to close them, their faces filled with disbelief.

But after a brief panic, Ishizaki quickly regained his composure and shouted to his accomplices, "Don't panic!"

"Recordings can be tampered with. As long as we insist they led us on and edited the audio, we can get it thrown out!"

After he finished speaking, the three of them finally recovered a little of their composure. They managed a sneer, as if to say, "Good thing we had a backup plan."

So now it was Horikita's turn to be troubled.

She really hadn't considered whether the evidence was reliable and conclusive. A recording could indeed be faked in many ways.

Her expression grew serious, and her eyes, which had cleared for a moment, clouded over with confusion again.

Beside her, Ayanokoji watched it all impassively, unmoved.

That was because Ichinose had already delivered another, far more compelling piece of evidence to the Student Council.