"Is that how you're supposed to eat it?"
The owner of the ice pop frowned in dissatisfaction.
"Put it in."
As soon as he finished speaking, Asakusa Tetsu reached out and shoved the entire ice pop straight into Horikita Suzune's mouth.
"Mmm—!"
The icy cold instantly flooded her mouth.
Her lips and teeth briefly stuck together, melting the surface ice with their warmth. The moisture coating the ice pop allowed it to slide straight down her throat.
Her mouth was suddenly stuffed, even pushed deep enough to touch her throat. The freezing sensation sent a sharp jolt through her head.
She hurriedly pulled the ice pop back out and glared at Asakusa.
"What are you doing?!" she snapped instinctively, sounding almost like a pout.
Under the sunlight, her usually cold expression looked unexpectedly lively.
Asakusa didn't care at all.
He casually explained, "If you eat it like that, it'll start dripping all over your hands in a few minutes. Gross."
"If you want to eat slowly, just hold it in your mouth. At least it won't drip everywhere."
His words were so reasonable that Horikita couldn't find anything to argue back.
Her irritation got blocked halfway.
All she could do was puff out her cheeks, turn her head away, and stuff the ice pop back into her mouth.
Honestly, it was really sweet.
Her soft tongue wrapped around the melting ice, and thin streams of sweetness slid slowly down her throat.
Before long, only the wooden stick remained.
Horikita lifted the stick and looked up at the unexpectedly clear sky.
Her stiff, frozen thoughts seemed to begin thawing.
"...Your name," she muttered quietly.
Her voice was very soft.
If it were any noisier, it probably wouldn't have been heard.
But Asakusa's hearing was decent.
"Asakusa Tetsu," he replied.
"Asakusa… Tetsu?!"
Horikita suddenly turned her head, eyes wide.
She stared at the man beside her.
So he was Asakusa Tetsu?
The one mentioned in the diary as having traded information with Ryuen from Class C early on?!
Before this, she hadn't known his name.
Now, she finally did.
In that instant, countless thoughts exploded in her head.
Why was he here?
Why did he give her an ice pop?
What did he want?
What was he planning?
After a brief mental storm, she reached a conclusion.
"Are you here to laugh at me?" Horikita stared straight at him.
She bit her lip, a hint of grievance welling up inside her.
"I'm clearly my brother's sister… I thought I wasn't that useless person in his eyes anymore…"
"But I still ended up in Class D. I couldn't see through the school. I couldn't even understand other people's hints."
"In the end, I became a tool for shifting blame. I don't even know what I'm supposed to do anymore…"
The more she spoke, the more that suppressed grievance quietly expanded.
She knew she shouldn't be saying this in front of him.
But she couldn't help it.
"Are you an idiot?" Asakusa looked at her, completely baffled.
Was something wrong with this girl's brain?
After the exam results, classes were basically pointless.
He didn't feel like staying in his classroom, so he came out to sit and enjoy the breeze.
He hadn't even been there long before Horikita sat down beside him, looking dazed and absent-minded.
He gave her an ice pop because the gloomy aura around her annoyed him.
Even though it was only an E-rank reward, it had some calming effect.
Who knew that after eating it, this idiot would start dumping emotional garbage on him?
Unbelievable.
I'm about to use movable-type printing.
Asakusa pulled out his Infinite Recorder and opened up the recordings from back when he was near Horikita Manabu.
As mentioned before, the recorder saved all nearby sounds.
He could freely cut any segment—
Even if it was just one word.
In other words, as long as someone had said something near him, he could shamelessly remix it.
This was different from voice modeling and sound transmission.
That combo couldn't be exposed and had to be used secretly.
But this?
This was different.
He wanted the obvious stitching.
Like those parody edits online—if it sounded too real, it wouldn't feel right.
What he wanted was something that clearly sounded like the person…
But was obviously fake.
A perfect weapon between rumor and slander.
"You… are… stu… pid?"
"You… learned… that?"
"You… chose… this?"
Mechanical.
Stiff.
Fragmented.
Only a few similar syllables were extracted.
Asakusa hadn't spent much time with Horikita Manabu.
Only during the club orientation days.
Usable recordings were few.
But they were enough.
Manabu never swore, so Asakusa couldn't extract exact curse words.
But with similar sounds and some pitch adjustment…
It was workable.
And so—
Movable-type printing was complete.
"Are·you·an·'i·di·ot'?"
From the recorder came Horikita Manabu's stiff voice repeating the sentence.
"..."
Horikita Suzune froze.
She was still holding the saliva-stained wooden stick.
She sat there, completely dumbfounded.
She…
What did she just hear?
My… brother…
He…
He called me an idiot.
He called me stupid.
And he even played it with a recorder.
My brother… called me stupid.
No, no, no, that's not right.
It's a recording.
And even though it sounded like him, it was wrong.
He would never talk like that.
So crude.
So contemptuous.
So unclear.
…It was obviously stitched together.
But even so—
For some reason, her brain short-circuited and produced one thought.
This school has ruined everything.
My brother called me a huge idiot.
Back then…
He only ever called me a useless person.
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