"..."
Huh, wait?
Chihaya Rei blinked twice in quick succession.
How had Horikita Suzune gone from wanting to earn her brother's approval to wanting to earn his approval?
Th-this was right, wasn't it?
There shouldn't be a problem with just being recognized as a friend, right?
"Then I'll look forward to it. I won't give my trust away so easily."
Horikita Suzune nodded earnestly, as if she meant every word.
After they finished discussing the issues she'd kept bottled up, her expression relaxed as well, and her usually cool face softened considerably.
Horikita Suzune lowered her head slightly and began savoring her food, one bite at a time.
After the two had nearly finished their lunch, Horikita Suzune carefully chose her words and asked:
"What do you think about the midterm exams?"
"I think that if things keep going like this, Ken Sudō and the others will fail."
Horikita Suzune stated her assessment.
She'd noticed that Ken Sudō, Kanji Ike, and Yamauchi Haruki had neither joined Hirata Yousuke's study group nor reviewed their lessons on their own.
Based on their quiz scores, all three had subjects in which they were at risk of failing. They wouldn't pass the upcoming midterm exams like that.
And that would hinder the class's rise to Class A.
Although she'd resolved to be herself again, Horikita Suzune still intended to work hard and make it to Class A.
"Don't you think this is a chance to clear the dead weight out of the class?"
Chihaya Rei raised his head with a slightly wicked smile and said it bluntly.
Still, he hadn't actually thought that the Black House's three masterpieces would be eliminated so soon.
After all, he hadn't personally gotten around to torturing those three oddballs yet.
But even after being put through the wringer, probably only Ken Sudō, who wasn't truly a bad person by nature, could change.
Yamauchi Haruki and Kanji Ike could only be left as sacrifices for the expulsion vote exam.
But as things stood, if he didn't step in, it seemed no one in Class D would discover the shortcut to passing the midterm exams.
From what he'd observed, Ayanokoji Kiyotaka hadn't done a thing. He was even living a perfectly ordinary school life.
And here Chihaya Rei was, trailing the Black House trio around every day.
Horikita Suzune nodded in agreement.
"I used to think that way, but after giving it some serious thought last night, I decided that maybe we shouldn't do that."
"What's your reason?" Chihaya Rei asked.
"We can't rule out the possibility that an expulsion would have a negative impact on the class. And having too few students could put us at a disadvantage in future exams."
Horikita Suzune gave him her analysis.
Chihaya Rei looked at Horikita Suzune with a little more surprise.
He realized that once she'd resolved to be herself again, she'd gotten smarter, too.
"You're right. If even one person in the class gets expelled, we lose 300 Class Points."
Chihaya Rei didn't mind sharing a little information with the changed Horikita Suzune.
"That much?!"
Horikita Suzune froze for a moment.
She hadn't known that, and she didn't doubt the information Chihaya Rei had given her.
For a moment, Horikita Suzune was actually relieved that Class D currently had zero Class Points.
That way, even in the worst-case scenario, if someone in Class D failed the midterm exams and was expelled, Class D wouldn't lose any Class Points.
While Chihaya Rei and Horikita Suzune ate and talked,
several pairs of eyes in the cafeteria quietly watched them.
Kushida Kikyo sat a few tables away from them, chewing on dry rice with little enthusiasm. Her side dish was a green vegetable soup.
It was so awful...
And she wasn't even a vegetarian.
Why not eat something better?
Because all her points had been borrowed by the bunch of weirdos in Class D!
With her image as the class's little angel, she couldn't refuse, so she had to swallow her frustration and suffer in silence.
Kushida Kikyo had once again spotted Chihaya Rei and Horikita Suzune eating together. Every so often, her gaze wandered over to them.
She now felt that she couldn't trust a single word Chihaya Rei said.
Heh... What a flirt. That band guy was always surrounded by a different girl.
He'd even said he wasn't close with Horikita, and now they were eating together.
Besides Kushida Kikyo, Karuizawa Kei's gal group had also noticed Chihaya Rei and Horikita Suzune.
Even Sakura Airi was quietly watching Chihaya Rei from an unremarkable corner.
Chihaya Rei had no idea that he was just having an ordinary lunch with Horikita Suzune.
He never imagined that so many pairs of eyes would be watching him.
As a skilled band member, he wasn't very sensitive to the gazes of people around him in a crowd.
After all, when you played an instrument onstage, you had an audience staring at you.
Besides the students of Class D, Sakayanagi Arisu was also in the cafeteria at that moment.
Naturally, she'd seen Chihaya Rei.
Sakayanagi wore a sly smile. She already had a plan to strike back at Chihaya Rei.
That put her in an excellent mood.
After observing things for the past few days and testing the students of Class D, Sakayanagi Arisu had easily realized that they didn't know they could buy the answers to the midterm exams.
That meant—
Chihaya Rei hadn't told Class D about the answers.
He hadn't told Class D about the school rules in the first month, and he wasn't telling them about the midterm exams in the second month, either.
Putting those two things together,
Sakayanagi Arisu reached a conclusion:
Chihaya Rei wanted to use the upcoming midterm exams to weed out the students who were dragging Class D down while the class had zero Class Points!
It was a pretty good plan.
Sakayanagi Arisu quite approved of what Chihaya Rei was doing.
He really was a worthy opponent. He'd come up with exactly the same idea she had.
If she'd been assigned to Class D, she would've done the same thing.
Expelling those few notorious deadweights would even improve Class D's overall ability.
Too bad, Chihaya. I've already seen through your plan, so I, Sakayanagi Arisu, won't let you have your way.
Sakayanagi Arisu stood up, leaned on her cane, and headed toward Kushida Kikyo.
She was going to tell the brown-haired girl the answers to the midterm exams.
Before you continue