Three days before the cross-class group assignment deadline, on the third floor of Keyaki Mall, at an Italian restaurant.
By the time Kanzaki Toru arrived, Karuizawa Kei was already seated by the window. She wasn't wearing her uniform today, but a light blue cardigan instead. Her long blond hair, usually left loose, was gathered loosely at the back with a plain hairband. A half-finished iced coffee sat on the table, droplets of condensation slowly sliding down the side of the glass.
"You're two minutes late." She looked up. There was no reproach in her voice, just a statement of fact.
"I ran into Sudo by the vending machines."
"Was he agonizing over whether to buy a sports drink or soda again?"
"He was agonizing over which one was cheaper. He said he was saving up for new wrist guards, so he'd even stopped drinking coffee."
Karuizawa laughed, then pressed him into his seat and pushed the menu over to him. "Lunch is on me today. I still haven't paid you for the advice about the red bean soup."
"You were the one who put it on Sakura's desk."
"So what? Were you going to stop me? Today's meal isn't on Sakura's behalf." She opened the menu, her movements elegant but her tone unusually serious. "It's for me. There's something I want to ask you."
Kanzaki Toru put down the menu and looked at her. Karuizawa had chosen the restaurant herself—Italian food, a little on the pricey side, by a window on the third floor of Keyaki Mall. Afternoon sunlight streamed through the glass and fell on the white tablecloth, reflecting a soft glow. There weren't many students dining around them, but a few tables were occupied by girls from Class D and Class C. Karuizawa had chosen this place on purpose. She needed a public setting, where certain things could be overheard—but not so public that they would spread too far.
"Are you and Horikita working together against Class C lately?" she asked bluntly.
"We're not against Class C. We're against Ryuen Kakeru."
"What's the difference? Isn't Ryuen part of Class C?"
"Class C also has Shiina Hiyori. And the people Ryuen has pushed to the margins, who are afraid to speak up." Kanzaki Toru picked up his glass and took a sip of water. "Going after Ryuen isn't targeting a class. It's stripping one person of his control. Why do you ask?"
Karuizawa didn't answer right away. She stirred the ice in her drink with a straw, watching the cubes clink against the glass with a crisp sound.
"Sakura told me what happened with Manabe. Not through you—she told me herself. After class, when the room was empty, she told me everything: how Manabe kicked her chair during the cross-class group assignment, how she spammed the group chat and called her a deadweight. She said, 'Kanzaki-kun told me it was enough to thank you,' and then she told me the whole story. She didn't cry afterward. She said it was the first time she'd realized that telling someone else everything she'd suffered didn't have to make her feel ashamed."
"That took courage on her part. I was just a catalyst, at most," Kanzaki Toru said.
"I know." Karuizawa put down her straw and raised her eyes. There was a seriousness in her blue eyes that he hadn't seen before. "I have several people on my side now. They don't listen to Ryuen or Kushida. They listen to me. You're collecting information about Ryuen's false testimony, aren't you? My group is in the same discussion room as the girls from Class C. I hear what they talk about in private before Horikita does." She slid a folded note in front of Kanzaki Toru. "This is a screenshot of a message Manabe sent in the girls' group chat last week—about Sakura. I saved a copy."
As Kanzaki Toru took the note, his fingertips brushed the back of her hand. She didn't tease him with a smile like she usually did. She simply withdrew her hand and went back to stirring the ice.
"Thank you."
"Don't mention it." She paused. "Like I said, I asked you here to talk about something for my own sake. If Ryuen really is brought down, there'll be a brief power vacuum within Class C. Whoever steps in to fill it will have an easier time uniting the scattered forces in the class. I want to know—will you push Shiina Hiyori into that position?"
"I'm not pushing her into it. She should be standing where she belongs."
Karuizawa studied him, thoughtful. "You really believe that?"
"I do."
She leaned back against her chair, folded her hands in her lap, and slowly raised the proud curve of her lips. "Then our goals might not completely align." Her fingers tapped lightly twice beneath the table, as if silently confirming her resolve. "But for now, I'm willing to help you. Not for your sake—for Sakura's. That girl can endure as much as any of us."
A few tables away, several girls from Class C seemed to catch Sakura's name and glanced over. Karuizawa immediately put on a carefree expression and raised her voice. "The seafood pasta here is amazing." Then she flipped open the menu as if nothing had happened.
Kanzaki Toru quietly played along, smoothly steering the conversation toward the restaurant's recommendations. Only after all those gazes had turned away did he quickly write another line on a napkin and slide it toward her: "Send Manabe's backup over an encrypted channel. Shiina can help you encode it."
Karuizawa lowered her eyes to the note, folded the napkin into a small square, and tucked it into her bag. For her, this was the first time she'd put her social network to use on a battlefield that had nothing to do with socializing.
After lunch, the two of them walked to the restaurant entrance. The humid air made the distant sports field look as if it were floating beneath a thin veil of vapor. A book-delivery cart was parked at the back entrance of the Library, where a few students were unloading books.
"Karuizawa—" he suddenly called after her.
She turned around. "What is it?"
"Be careful."
Karuizawa froze for a moment, then smiled. It wasn't her usual proud smile, with its hint of distance, but something more genuine, her eyes and brows curving upward. In a midday when every front was slowly closing in, she seemed like someone who had just recalibrated her aim. She was still proud, but no longer using all of that pride to hide her unease.
"You too."
She walked into the elevator. Just before the doors closed, Kanzaki Toru saw her lower her head, apparently looking at the folded napkin again.
He stood at the restaurant entrance for a moment, then headed toward the Library. There were still three unread messages on his phone. One was from Horikita: "Ryuen requested the full roster of Class D's cross-class group assignment members today. His stated reason was 'serious communication problems within the cross-class groups.' I blocked the transfer request once, but I can only delay it until the afternoon of the day after tomorrow. How much longer do you need?" Another was from Sakura Airi: "The rooftop photos have been developed. One of them caught something that shouldn't have been there." He opened the photo, and his fingertips abruptly stopped—the attachment Sakura had sent was a high-resolution picture taken from the rooftop, looking down at an angle. At its center was a figure in a school uniform, one hand gripping a pipe on the outside wall of the Old School Building, about to climb over the campus wall. The image was clear for only a few seconds, but that was enough to identify the figure from behind—Ishizaki Daichi. The last message was from an unknown number. It had no name attached, just two words: "Be careful."
Standing on the steps outside the Library, he reread the three messages together. Ryuen was tightening his information net, Ishizaki was trying to escape, and someone had sent an anonymous warning. The rain still hadn't fallen. Low clouds hung overhead, pressing everyone's shadows into a thin layer of gray.
He slipped his phone into his pocket and pushed open the Library door. Shiina Hiyori was already waiting inside, with the report that was about to change everything spread out in front of her.
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