(Sorry, the previous chapter wasn't pasted in full, which made the story disjointed. I've updated it, so I hope you'll go back and take a look.)
Only after Yuta Okkotsu pointed out the sources behind all of Maki's annotations did Aikawa Kaze realize how much thought she had put into them, including details that had never even occurred to him.
In all fairness, if they took this opportunity to eliminate that entire group, it might not resolve every problem those people posed, but it would at least relieve a great deal of pressure.
Aikawa Kaze felt a little ashamed.
In his mind, Maki was the future second-generation "Heavenly Tyrant," a queen who preferred action to pointless chatter. Yet he had overlooked her other strengths.
Likewise, he had thought he was hiding things well. It had never occurred to him that others had already noticed his actions, or that Yuta had followed the clues and figured something out.
Part of that was certainly because he and Gojo Sensei trusted everyone and unconsciously let their guard down, but from another perspective, wasn't that also a kind of "arrogance"?
Perhaps Maki, Panda, and Toge weren't entirely oblivious either. They might simply have been helping them keep their secrets through an unspoken understanding.
And to think he had once shamelessly declared, "Ignorance and weakness aren't obstacles to survival. Arrogance is." After all the twists and turns, people still knowingly repeated the same mistakes.
Realizing he had underestimated everyone, Aikawa Kaze adjusted his attitude and answered Yuta Okkotsu seriously.
"Personally, I'd be very happy to have you, Yuta, and I don't think there would be any problem with you joining us. But we still need to let Gojo Sensei and our partners know."
At that point, Aikawa Kaze hesitated, then decided to share some of