Faced with the junior's question, Horikita was the first to react. "Our academic level is pretty good. We get full marks on exams."
The junior's eyes lit up with delight, but she also glanced back at the café behind her, a trace of hesitation in her gaze.
That tangled expression left Matsushita and Horikita a little confused for a moment.
"Um… this café?" Matsushita asked.
"Ah, sorry, that was rude of me." The junior also realized her reaction was a bit impolite, so she bowed her head and explained. "It's because second-year Class A's Yukio-senpai rented out this whole shop. He's inside right now, recruiting freshmen he thinks will be suitable to team up with."
"Yukio-kun?"
"Yukio?"
The two from Class D were both a little surprised. He'd moved that fast? Faster than them—he'd come to Keyaki Center before they did, and even rented out a café to recruit, but thinking about it, since it was Yukio, it was actually pretty normal.
Horikita quickly took a step forward, closing the distance. "So you're all lining up here so you can team up with someone from Yukio's class?"
"But as far as I know, some of the students in his class aren't exactly strong academically."
That was just stating facts—but it was also, in a way, talking behind their backs.
Normally Horikita wouldn't say something like that, but during a special exam she couldn't afford to care about feelings. She didn't hesitate to point out someone's weak points.
"Ah, we know that already," the junior answered honestly. "Yukio-senpai didn't hide it from us either. He told us up front that he needs some freshmen with good grades to be teammates and help the weaker upperclassmen get through the exam."
"For that, Yukio-senpai even offered a high price of two hundred thousand private points."
"W-What?" Matsushita blurted it out in sheer shock. Two hundred thousand just to hire a top student once? If that was real, what freshman could resist that kind of temptation?
Back in last year's Class D—when their class points hit zero—anyone with good grades would probably have agreed no matter what, but… was that really worth it? Two hundred thousand per person.
The number of weak students in Yukio's class should be about the same as in Class D—around a dozen or so. That meant at least over two million in total.
In this exam, even if a pair took first overall in total score, each of them only got a million. The top class in average score got just two hundred class points. With a two-million outlay, they'd need at least five months to earn it back from the whole class.
And that's if they actually took first in class average. And at a rate of two hundred thousand per person, they might not even attract truly top-tier students—those might demand even more.
In that case, all they'd really be doing is helping their underachievers survive the exam—no guarantee of ranking first in class average at all. The risk of losing out was huge, but if you only looked at it as spending two hundred thousand to keep a weaker classmate from being expelled, then it was still cheaper than paying twenty million to cancel an expulsion—exactly a hundred times cheaper.
As the only daughter of a wealthy family, Matsushita subconsciously cared about profit and loss. Her first reaction was that this was a slightly money-losing move, but then she remembered the thirty billion Yukio had raked in during the intra-class vote exam. Compared to that, two million really was pocket change.
Even so… no matter how much money you had, you couldn't just throw it away like this, right? This was basically charity, wasn't it?
The junior still hadn't realized there was anything odd about it and kept talking.
"Um, if you two senpai have confidence, I—I can team up with you instead, and we can try to aim for a high ranking and get the private rewards."
"No need," Horikita cut her off.
She had never planned on going for the individual prizes. The whole reason she'd come out today was simply to help Class D's weaker students find reliable freshman teammates.
She coldly turned her down and walked straight into the café. She wanted to see with her own eyes just what Yukio—who had taught her to approach everything from the standpoint of profit—thought he was doing, playing at charity here.
Matsushita could only apologize to the junior in her stead, then hurried after Horikita.
Inside the café, some of the freshmen grumbled about people cutting the line, but Nomura, who was in charge of keeping order, peeked in. Yukio was seated near the entrance.
Nomura got a signal from him, and only then did he let the two in. Since it went through that little process, the freshmen didn't really have grounds to complain.
So long as they weren't rival upperclassmen coming to steal their points, they were fine. They were all hoping that with this one big score, they'd be free to splurge at Keyaki Center afterward.
Quite a few of them looked at the nicely decorated café with burning eyes.
Renting out an entire shop? Amazing... One day they'd live this kind of luxurious campus life too.
Yukio was seated at a table with the seat across from him empty, while the freshmen were still queued outside. Horikita glanced around and noticed some stairs leading up to the second floor.
So that's where they go write the test first, she guessed. Prove their grades, then come downstairs to negotiate.
She shelved that train of thought for now, sat directly across from Yukio, and went straight to the point.
"What are you trying to pull this time? There's no way you'd do charity. You have no intention of actually giving the freshmen two hundred thousand, do you?"
Matsushita followed Horikita and quickly took the seat beside Yukio, giving him a light, graceful smile before nodding.
Her expression clearly said she agreed with Horikita. She didn't believe for a second that Yukio would pay honestly like that—it was just too unprofitable.
Yukio leaned back in his chair, expression twisting. "So in your eyes, I'm that much of a bastard, huh."
"N-No, not exactly," Matsushita said, hesitating a little, unsure how to phrase it.
"Yukio-kun… sometimes you're pretty gentle. It's just that, most of the time, should I say you're a bit mean? Or maybe a little… bad?"
"Wow, not a single nice word in there. Still, I kinda like 'mean' and 'bad' as reviews." Yukio just took it as casual chat. "It's not as exploitative as you think."
"Two hundred thousand is, of course, just talk. Once the freshmen go upstairs and finish the test—" He jabbed a finger upward toward the ceiling. "—on their way back down, Ryuen is up there explaining things to them. He tells them the two hundred thousand is only payable if our class takes first in class ranking.
"If we don't take first, then each person only gets one hundred thousand."
What he didn't say was that those one hundred thousand points would be paid out by the weaker students like Ishizaki and the others themselves.
Right now, Class Yukio's class points had passed 2,500, which meant everyone was receiving 250,000 private points a month. Using a portion of that to hire a teammate and clear the exam? Ishizaki and the rest had no objections at all.
"Eh? Only a hundred thousand?"
Matsushita widened her eyes. Run the math that way and it was much more reasonable. The risk wasn't nearly as high, and from Yukio's tone, they weren't even aiming to be overall number one in this exam.
If that was the case, there was no need to overpay for super genius. As long as they found freshmen who could pull their weaker members above the danger line, that was enough.
"And the freshmen agree to that?" Horikita sensed something was off and pointed at the line of top students outside.
"You promise two hundred thousand and then just cut it in half? They don't complain?"
"Pff." Yukio burst into laughter, and Ishizaki sitting nearby also snorted.
Only then did Horikita notice there were other people at the table. That huge build next to them was… Albert?
No wonder the freshmen didn't dare complain. Under the watchful eyes of Yukio's delinquent squad, honor students really weren't going to kick up a fuss. Besides, it wasn't like they were getting skinned alive—they were still getting a hundred thousand out of it.
"That's just today's price," Yukio said, switching to a downward press of his hand, telling them not to be so shocked. "If you two move any slower, by tomorrow this price might have to go way up—three hundred thousand, four hundred thousand, all possible."
"Anyway, our class already has enough freshmen lined up. You three classes can take your time dividing the rest of them."
"..." Only now did Horikita and Matsushita truly feel the weight of it.
In terms of efficiency, they were miles behind.
....
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