With only a few days left before the cruise trip ended, why had she gone to such lengths—taking a helicopter all the way to the ship?
What exactly was going through this Sakayanagi Arisu's mind, Fuyuji couldn't begin to guess.
In her own words: "I was growing rather bored at the school. I heard that my classmates performed exceptionally well in this deserted island special exam. Such an experience—I would like to share in it together with everyone as well."
In common parlance: looking for entertainment.
Still, this scummy loli Sakayanagi seemed to have some connection to the school.
A student who had spent her summer vacation holed up in the school dorms—knowing about the deserted island exam was one thing. It wouldn't be strange if someone from Class D had told her. But she'd even gone a step further, knowing there would be another special exam ahead, and directly boarded a helicopter to come participate.
This wasn't a privilege an ordinary student could enjoy. Even using points, it would probably cost several hundred thousand, if not over a million.
Fuyuji rubbed his chin, the corner of his eye twitching violently as he watched her retreating figure, leaning on her cane.
Sakayanagi... that was also the surname of the school's board chairman, wasn't it?
He'd previously wondered how an ojou-sama like that scummy loli could have her family's consent to come alone to a closed-off school like Advanced Nurturing.
So Advanced Nurturing is your family's school. Well, that explains everything.
The next two days passed just as the school had promised—peacefully and without incident aboard the cruise ship.
At first, a small portion of students remained on guard, suspecting this was a smokescreen released by the school. But as time passed, that initial wariness gradually faded, and they too joined the other students in their dreamlike luxury cruise journey, enjoying the ship's various services—completely free for students—the theater, spa, cafe, and more...
Of course, that small portion of students included Fuyuji, who knew full well there was another special exam ahead.
Unlike the deserted island exam, this time there were absolutely no clues to be found. All they knew was that it would take place on the cruise ship.
With an attitude of "since we're here, let's make the best of it," Fuyuji embarked on his own pleasure cruise.
The day before yesterday, after visiting the sick Horikita, Morishita had dragged him to see a theater performance called Prometheus Bound. Both of them ended up falling asleep. In the end, only Yamamura had watched the entire play from start to finish.
Yesterday, he'd gone to the ship's library to read with Shiina Hiyori. He wasn't sure if it was his imagination, but Miss Holmes seemed to be in somewhat lower spirits these past few days.
Even so, she was still happy to see him and enthusiastically shared the books she'd been reading.
In stark contrast was a certain Cha-Cha, from whom Fuyuji had taken considerable advantage.
After that day, Cha-Cha's attitude toward him hadn't grown gentler in the slightest. Instead, it had become increasingly violent. The eye candy diminished, and her resentment toward Horikita girl grew with each passing day.
Although he stubbornly refused to admit he was the one behind that alt account, it did him no good against Cha-Cha. He himself was added to Cha-Cha's Zaun list, subjected to veiled insults every now and then, with her making snide remarks about him being a scumbag.
Truly shaking and shivering with cold!
...
The fourth deck of the cruise ship, inside a girls' cabin.
The boundless blue Pacific sent wave after wave of sea breeze through the window, gently lifting the gauze curtain by the sill. A wave of drowsiness washed over him.
"So, what business do you have here?"
Kamuro Masumi sat on the bed with her arms folded and legs crossed, casting a sidelong glare at the guy who had commandeered her bed.
"I'm here seeking asylum."
Fuyuji rolled over and casually pulled over the blanket beside him, which carried a faint scent of lavender.
"The exam still hasn't started. Katsuragi's getting more and more anxious. He comes to harass me in my cabin every few hours. He's like this because of the class—I can't turn him away. So I had no choice but to come take refuge over here."
Wrapped in the blanket with only half his head peeking out, Fuyuji peacefully closed his eyes. His entire body sank into the mattress as he drew a deep breath.
The blanket curved inward with the motion.
Mm... fragrant. The scent of my pal—
"Smack!"
A slender yet forceful hand shot out and clamped over his nose and mouth in the blink of an eye, pressing his face into the pillow as if to thoroughly smother him to death.
"What... are... you... sniffing?!"
A murderous glare—the kind reserved for human trash—bored into Fuyuji. Her voice was tinged with pure outrage.
A vivid pink flush spread instantly from her small earlobes, dyeing her entire ear crimson.
"Mmph mmph, mmph mmph!" (Don't be so stingy! We're pals!)
"Get lost. Who's pals with you?" Kamuro ground the words out from between clenched teeth. Even if they were pals, he couldn't do this kind of thing! She pressed down with another half measure of force.
Still refusing to accept his fate, Fuyuji's voice struggled through the gaps between her fingers. "Mmph mmph, mmph mmph!" (What's yours is mine, and what's mine is yours!)
"Heh heh..." Kamuro's lips pulled back in a smile that didn't reach her eyes.
Shameless bastard. Pretty words, but in the end, you're the one putting me to work.
Fuyuji shook his head with great effort. "Mm—"
"Mm?"
Another pale, slender hand silently reached out and sealed the gap Kamuro had deliberately left open, cutting off Fuyuji's final lifeline with a single palm.
"Mm——!!"
Fuyuji, who had been lounging comfortably on the bed and chatting idly with Kamuro, abruptly shot his eyes wide open.
Two small braids swaying before her chest, Morishita Ai—freshly returned from outside—barged imposingly into Fuyuji's field of vision.
At the same time, Yamamura Miki's little head poked out from the side. Her hand gently brushed aside a few stray strands of hair that had obscured her vision. She blinked her large eyes and curiously studied Fuyuji on the bed.
"No wonder the great Morishita couldn't find you outside. Hashimoto Masayoshi also said he had no idea where you'd disappeared to. So you'd secretly run off here."
Morishita spoke without any discernible emotional fluctuation, as if stating a simple fact. Her clear voice rang out with particular distinctness in the quiet room.
And she silently stacked her other free hand on top as well.
"I knew you were lying. As if a guy like you could possibly be afraid of Katsuragi—Katsuragi's the one who should be afraid of you!" Kamuro sneered as she put away her phone.
"Mm mmph!" (I was wrong! I won't do it again!)
Fuyuji desperately gripped Morishita's small hands with both of his own, but unable to find any leverage, he could only flop around on the bed like a salted fish.
The truth was, the three of them had been playing hide-and-seek on the ship. When it was Fuyuji's turn to seek, faced with Yamamura's fully activated divine concealment abilities, he'd simply declared "I'm not playing anymore" and magnificently stood the two of them up.
This had sent the great Morishita into a towering rage, and she'd been hunting him down all over the ship.
Operating on the principle that the most dangerous place is the safest, Fuyuji had come here to take shelter.
"After you die, I'll scatter your ashes across the ocean. That way, I'll never have to worry about not being able to find you again." A smile that could heal the human heart surfaced on Morishita's face.
"Mm!" (Spare my life!)
"Fuyuji Mikage, who loves lying more than anything—don't think I don't know you're faking it." A small knee suddenly pressed against Fuyuji's ribs. Using the leverage, Morishita nimbly climbed onto the bed and straddled his waist without the slightest courtesy, pinning him firmly to the mattress. "Off you go. The great Morishita will send you on your way!"
Just as Fuyuji was lamenting to the heavens that his life was over—
"Buzz— Buzz— Buzz— Buzz—!"
Four sharp, air-raid-siren-pitched ringtones, at the exact same instant, erupted with eardrum-piercing volume inside the small cabin!
Immediately after, the shipboard broadcast rang out simultaneously.
[Attention, all students. The school has just sent an email containing important notification items to every student. Please check your individual phones and follow the instructions. Additionally, if there are any cases where the email was not received, please contact a nearby faculty member to submit a request. Due to the critical nature of the contents, please ensure nothing is missed during confirmation. Repeating once more—]
The pressure on his face vanished.
"Hahh... hahh..."
Having narrowly escaped death, Fuyuji lay on the bed, greedily gulping down fresh air.
Thank you, school, for saving this miserable dog's life.
Pulling her phone from her skirt, Morishita continued pressing down on the struggling Fuyuji with one hand while reading aloud in a flat, emotionless voice.
"The special exam is about to begin. Students are to assemble at their individually designated rooms and times. Those arriving more than ten minutes late will be penalized. Please assemble in Room 203 on the second deck before 6:40 this evening. Since the required time is approximately twenty minutes, please use the restroom and such beforehand, and switch your phones to vibrate mode or turn off the power."
Having finished, she turned her head and stared at Fuyuji. "And Fuyuji Mikage's?"
With great difficulty, Fuyuji fished his phone out of his pocket and held it up. "Six in the evening. Room 204 on the second deck."
"..."
Yamamura lit up her screen and said softly, "Mine is 7:20. Room 201 on the second deck."
"Tch..."
Kamuro clicked her tongue with a look of pure disgust, pointing a finger at the guy on the bed who had just nearly been smothered to death. "Same as this guy. Six in the evening. Room 204 on the second deck."
Oi, oi. Could you not look so disgusted? I'm still your direct superior. So what if I let you wander around idle for seven days on the deserted island?
Still, they'd been split into different groups, huh?
Fuyuji rubbed his slightly numb cheeks, feeling like something was a bit off.
Twenty minutes—such a short span probably wasn't enough to conduct a special exam. That meant it could only be an explanation of the rules.
Conducting the explanations separately—was it because the exam rules differed for each student group? If so, the workload the school had undertaken was no small amount.
Barely a dozen seconds later, his phone buzzed again.
Katsuragi had pinged the entire class in the group chat. It seemed he wanted to get a grasp on the situation and make some arrangements before the exam started.
"Let's go."
Kamuro pocketed her phone, swung her long legs forward, and headed toward the assembly point with swift, decisive strides.
Yamamura put her phone away, gave Fuyuji a small smile, then lifted her little feet and followed right behind.
"What's wrong?"
Morishita was still staring fixedly at the school's text message on her screen. The white light illuminated her cold, indifferent little face.
"Nothing." Morishita averted her head and casually slipped her phone back into her skirt.
Beyond the balcony, the azure seawater reflected in Morishita's eyes—glistening, sparkling, flickering.
"Let's go..."
Fuyuji propped up his upper body without effort, pulled his legs free, and extended his hand toward Morishita, still sitting duck-style on the bed.
"I'll always be with the great Morishita."
"Liar..." Morishita took his hand and climbed off the bed, muttering quietly.
"When have I ever lied to the great Morishita?"
"Every single day. Just now, you said you couldn't breathe, but actually you could've broken free in an instant."
"Ahem. Wasn't that just to cheer Morishita-sama up?"
"That's still lying."
...
Class A's impromptu meeting yielded practically nothing. All they learned was that the entire class had been divided into twelve groups, roughly three to four people per group, with the grouping method unknown.
The rule explanation sessions were all twenty minutes long, running from six o'clock to nine in the evening.
The only thing they could do was bring recording pens and phones to record the rules explained by each group's teacher, then take them back and see if any relevant clues could be found.
"This should be the place. It's about time, too."
As six o'clock approached and twilight spread across the sea's surface, the three of them walked through the now amber-lit corridor.
Fuyuji, along with his two loyal companions in the same group—Kamuro Masumi and Kito Hayato—looked at the doorplate for Room 204 and knocked lightly.
"Enter!"
A flat voice tinged with a hint of cold aloofness drifted out from within the room.
This voice...
Fuyuji's face darkened. Extremely unwillingly, he pushed the door open.
A female teacher with a high ponytail, dressed in an OL skirt suit, sat on a chair with her arms folded, calmly appraising the three who had entered.
The homeroom teacher who led Class D's humanoids—the heaven-chosen master of internal strife—the root cause of Class D's expulsions—the pressure monster who specialized in CPU-ing students—Chabashira Sae!
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