Akira quickly walked through the corridor leading to the dormitories. The night breeze poured in from the open windows, carrying the unique warmth of early summer.
"Horikita Manabu is indeed the Student Council President."
The reflective lenses in the Student Council office reappeared in his mind.
Horikita Manabu sat behind the large desk, his gaze behind his glasses sharp enough to penetrate people's hearts.
That sense of pressure, rather than coming from the Student Council President's authority, was more from his calm demeanor, which was identical to Gendo Ikari.
He even secretly rejoiced that Horikita Manabu hadn't made that iconic gesture of clasping his hands together and resting his chin on them, otherwise he might've really felt compelled to turn and run.
The negotiation process went unexpectedly smoothly.
Horikita Manabu was like a mind-reader. Often, he'd only say half a sentence, and the other party would already grasp the entire intention.
A conversation originally expected to last an hour was concluded in less than twenty minutes.
What surprised Akira the most were the terms of the transaction.
He'd expected to pay a huge amount of personal points, but to his surprise, Horikita Manabu merely pushed up his glasses and said he owed him a favor, his eyes behind the lenses slightly narrowed, making it impossible to guess his thoughts.
"This favor debt doesn't feel simple..." Akira stopped, looking at the light at the end of the dormitory corridor.
Based on his understanding of Horikita Manabu's character, he shouldn't make excessive demands.
Hopefully, it wouldn't be anything troublesome.
The night wind carried the shouts of the sports clubs from the distant athletic field.
Akira suddenly remembered Horikita Suzune's unapproachable demeanor and couldn't help but smile wryly.
They were clearly siblings, one insightful and sophisticated, the other stubbornly difficult. The difference was simply too great.
His phone suddenly popped up a new notification—an email from Horikita Manabu.
After their conversation, the two had successfully exchanged contact information.
{Regarding today's conversation, I will give you a reply before school ends on Thursday.}
{Shimizu, I think highly of you. Don't disappoint me.}
{If you perform well, the position of Vice President will be yours before I leave.}
He stared at the screen for a long time, looking at the first message, and unconsciously nodded.
As expected of the President, his efficiency was very high.
The other party was, after all, the Student Council President. A reply before school ended on Thursday was already quite fast.
But as he looked at the next two messages, his brows furrowed tightly.
When did Akira ever want to join the Student Council?
{Shimizu Akira: President, I'm not interested in the Student Council. I'm quite good at boxing.}
The message was instantly read, but there was no reply.
Classic read-but-no-reply.
The other party seemed to not take his answer seriously.
"Looking at it this way, this President is quite stubborn. Could it be that he's also the type who finds it hard to listen to other people's opinions?" Akira muttered.
Retracting his previous statement, these siblings, in a sense, were both quite troublesome.
He thought for a moment and sent a text message to Horikita Suzune.
{Shimizu Akira: You two are truly siblings.}
{Horikita Suzune: ? Why are you suddenly praising me?}
"Uh... She actually thinks I'm praising her?"
However, before he could complain too much in his mind, his phone vibrated slightly.
It was a message received on his alternate account.
The sender was Ichinose.
And the content of the message surprised him quite a bit:
{Sorry, Shimizu-kun. We already know about the rules that the school authorities deliberately hid, so we cannot trade with you for a million points.}
This was beyond his expectation.
Within just one day, the other party had already cracked the hidden rules.
After all, the other party wasn't an NPC in a game, but a living person—the sharp-minded honor students of Class B, and Ichinose possessed social skills that Akira could only dream of.
If Class A could discover the hidden rules, and Class D could sense something was off, why couldn't Class B do it?
"This is getting more and more interesting..." Akira murmured to himself.
He suddenly felt that this school was much more interesting than he'd imagined—the four classes all seemed to harbor formidable strength.
Sakayanagi, who loved playing intellectual games.
Ichinose, the social genius.
Ryuuen, the violence-first leader of Class C.
Except for Class D, it seemed every single one of them was a force to be reckoned with.
When Akira returned to his room door, he found Ayanokoji's room next door to be quite lively.
Through the not-so-thin wall, he could vaguely hear the voices of several boys and girls talking.
As for what exactly was said, it was too indistinct to hear clearly.
Akira couldn't help but raise an eyebrow, feeling a slight surprise in his heart—he hadn't expected the usually quiet Ayanokoji to have such a good private social life.
He glanced at his phone. The time already pointed to eight in the evening.
The school regulations manual clearly stated: "Boys are forbidden to stay on the girls' floor after eight-thirty."
However, regarding whether girls could stay in the boys' dormitory for an extended period, the manual made no mention.
But the voices next door clearly indicated more than one person—it seemed most likely that friends had come over to visit.
It was probably Yamauchi, Ike, and those few.
Just as Akira was about to take out his room card from his pocket, the door next door suddenly opened.
"Shimizu-kun, we've been waiting for you for a long time!"
A familiar voice came, and he turned his head to see Kushida standing at the doorway.
She wore her usual fake smile, but her eyes held a hint of undeniable resolve.
"I heard you had something after school, so after we had dinner and sang karaoke, we specifically came to Ayanokoji-kun's place to wait for you." She tilted her head slightly, her tone light. "After all, I asked Ayanokoji-kun, and he said you live next door."
Akira was silent for a moment, and before he could respond, Kushida stepped forward, her smile unchanged but subtly carrying a sense of pressure.
"I'm sorry, I know this might seem a bit persistent..." She lowered her voice slightly, her gaze fixed on him. "But no matter what, Shimizu-kun is indispensable to me."
Akira hadn't expected Kushida to be so persistent.
He'd only politely declined an invitation once, and she'd actually come directly to his dorm door.
—And Ayanokoji had revealed his whereabouts?
'This time I misjudged him. He usually acts so aloof, but he's surprisingly quick to sell out his teammates. I misjudged you, Ayanokoji.'
"...Alright."
After a moment of silence, Akira finally gave in.
After all, he really didn't have any plans for tonight after returning from the Student Council.
Refusing any further would only seem deliberate.
"That's great! I knew Shimizu-kun wasn't deliberately rejecting me! How could you possibly reject me! Hehehe~"
Kushida patted her chest in relief, a brilliant smile blossoming on her face.
But in her slightly narrowed eyes, Akira clearly caught a hint of a "just as I thought" smugness.