COTE : Oh No, I've Become the Substitute

The last week of September, Friday afternoon after school.

Class A's entry form had already been submitted on time. Judging by the Class C students' reactions after yesterday's transaction, Class C had undoubtedly stepped right into the trap.

The problem was...

Including today, that bastard Ryuen had already skipped class for two full days. The reason remained unknown, and probing any further would likely alert Class C and scare them off.

Still, Fuyuji Mikage already had a rough idea of the direction this was heading. With only two days left until the Sports Festival opened, there was no need to rush for now.

Rustle—!

The soft sound of a turning page was especially crisp in the quiet stillness. Fuyuji slowly raised his head.

The girl sat quietly by the window, bathed in the golden glow of the afternoon sun. The sunlight poured generously over her, tracing the outline of her profile until it seemed nearly translucent. Her long lashes, clearly discernible in the sunlight, quivered faintly with each flutter of her eyes.

Lowering his head, he glanced at the book in his hand—only a third of the way through—then looked again at the girl's flawless profile. Decisively, Fuyuji pushed the book aside and propped his chin on his hand, dedicating himself wholeheartedly to the serious academic question of exactly how beautiful Shiina Hiyori truly was.

The library after school already had very few students to begin with, and with the weekend approaching, the originally spacious library seemed even more sparsely populated.

The gentle afternoon sunlight streamed through the tall windows, forming several warm pillars of light. Tiny dust motes danced endlessly within the beams, cycling in an eternal loop.

Time itself seemed to have stopped flowing around her. All that remained was the occasional rustle of a turning page and the girl's soft, gentle breathing...

A long while passed.

Those tranquil, water-still eyes finally lifted from the pages, as if at last noticing the person across from her—the one who wasn't reading at all, but only looking at her, utterly entranced.

The fingers flipping through the pages froze abruptly. Shiina's eyelids fluttered rapidly a few times. Her legs, wrapped in grey knee-high socks, unconsciously drew together and tightened, the tips of her toes curling slightly inward. Her blue-white hair cascaded down from her shoulders like silk, veiling the base of her ears, which had instantly flushed crimson. That blush even spread all the way to her petite earlobes.

"Why did you stop?" Fuyuji teased with a grin.

"Nn..."

Shiina's cheeks were faintly flushed. She gripped the hem of her skirt and shot him a reproachful glare, as if she wanted to say something—but her quiet, introverted nature made it impossible for her to utter any truly sharp words.

This person was far too wicked. She could only glare with her eyes!

"It's fine. Hiyori can just focus on her own reading. I'm fine just staying here." Fuyuji continued with thick-skinned cheer, his tone light and buoyant.

"You're still saying that!" The girl's cheeks flushed even redder.

"Because Hiyori really is very beautiful."

At last, Shiina drew a deep breath, as if summoning tremendous courage. Struggling to keep her small face stern, she pointed a fair hand at the book beside him and addressed Fuyuji with the most serious, commanding tone she could muster.

"Stop saying that! Read!"

As for the effect, however—it was akin to a tiny kitten brandishing its utterly non-threatening pink paw pads and letting out a soft, plush "mew."

Fuyuji abruptly clutched his chest, as if struck by a perfectly aimed arrow. He felt as though his heart, steeped in schemes and machinations, had been instantly purified and healed.

Ryu-chan or whoever—to hell with him. Let him die for all I care. Schemes and plots can wait until after today.

As for why Miss Holmes had, contrary to her usual nature, taken the initiative to invite him to the library today... there was no need to delve into that now. She wouldn't harm him, after all.

Today, his Miss Hiyori was the one and only heaven!

"Alright, alright." Fuyuji cheerfully pulled the novel beside him back over.

"Don't you dare look over here again. I'll ask you questions later."

"Mm, mm." Fuyuji nodded repeatedly.

Thirty seconds later.

"You're still looking!"

The girl's voice abruptly spiked in volume, carrying even thicker shyness and fluster. Her eyes were watery, as if veiled by a thin layer of mist, as if on the verge of condensing into liquid form in the very next second.

"Alright, alright. I'm not looking anymore." Fuyuji raised both hands in mock surrender with a grin. "I surrender. I surrender." With that, he flipped open the mystery novel titled "The Tragedy of X" and began reading.

Seeing Fuyuji lower his head, Shiina relaxed slightly—but still hadn't entirely lowered her guard. Her gaze drifted toward him from time to time.

His black hair hung down, veiling a small portion of his forehead. A few unruly strands stuck up rebelliously. His lashes were dark and dense, like a border tracing the edge of his lower eyelid. The silhouette of his nose bridge resembled the ridgeline of a mountain range, faintly illuminated by the reflected light from the pages. Most captivating of all were those eyes—deep and dark, blinking only once in a very long while. When his eyelids lifted, the lingering afterimage of the pages still remained within his pupils...

A long moment passed.

Rustle—! A crisp page-turn sounded.

Fuyuji turned a page.

The girl jolted awake as if from a dream. Her body trembled faintly as she suddenly realized what she had been doing. Hurriedly, she lowered her head and struggled to focus on the tiny printed words before her.

But the text that usually drew her in so effortlessly now squirmed like tadpoles. No matter what, she couldn't settle her heart. Her cheeks burned as if aflame.

Nn... what on earth am I doing?!

She clearly still hadn't accomplished the objective for which she'd sought out Mister Watson, so how had it...

Before long, the shadows of the clouds crept across the white walls. Three shirts fluttered on the distant dormitory building. As the sun gilded the corners of the buildings, birds spiraled back to their nests. The originally golden, warm light had quietly transformed into a deep madder red, spilling across half a chapter's worth of turned pages.

Gradually, only the corner by the window of the vast library remained brimming with vitality.

Two hours later.

Fuyuji quietly closed his book and let out a long sigh, speaking with deep, heartfelt emotion.

"Extremely impressive. I can see the traces of countless later mystery novels within it. It's practically a model work."

"A very precise summary. I feel the same way." Shiina sat upright in her chair, her hands properly folded upon the expanse of snow-white thigh between her grey knee-high socks and her school uniform skirt. Her eyes sparkled as she nodded repeatedly. "Each murder case is tightly interlinked with the next, the logic between them rigorous and meticulous, and revenge forms the closed loop."

"However..." Just then, Fuyuji's tone shifted. Out of nowhere, he remarked, "I never expected the protagonist would deliberately spread incorrect conclusions to make the culprit let their guard down, and then, once their vigilance was relaxed, capture them in one fell swoop."

Shiina tilted her head quizzically. After all, such a plot device was hardly novel in mystery fiction.

Still, she played along and responded, her fingertip lightly tapping her chin. "Probably because there was no decisive evidence. So they set a trap through logical deduction, making the culprit believe they had escaped conviction—only for the chain of evidence to be snapped shut in an instant."

"Is that so..." Fuyuji nodded thoughtfully.

By now, the scene outside the window had begun to dim. The distant ginkgo forest was draped in a wash of madder red. The horizon blazed with billowing, fire-lit clouds.

Withdrawing his distant gaze, Fuyuji slowly pushed "The Tragedy of X" back across the desk toward Shiina and rose from his chair.

"Well then, Miss Hiyori. It's getting late. Let's end here for today. Spending a few hours reading every day feels like a lifetime removed from the world."

"Then I'll see you next time, Fuyuji-kun." Her voice carrying a note of joy, Shiina accepted the book and hugged it to her chest.

"Bye-bye. Do your best at the Sports Festival in a couple of days." Fuyuji strode forward, waving casually over his back at her.

"Of course. I'll do my— W-Wait!"

In that instant, as if suddenly recalling something, Shiina clattered forward in her small leather shoes. In three hurried steps, she closed the distance and grasped Fuyuji's hand with a sharp slap.

"Mister Watson, wait! I still have something to tell you." A flustered, slightly panicked voice followed right behind.

"Hm?" Fuyuji turned around and asked, rather puzzled. "Is there something else Miss Holmes wishes to say?"

"Um... well... that..." Her fair, slender hand gripped tighter and tighter. A layer of warmth transmitted from her palm.

Shiina's gaze drifted aimlessly, flitting across the library's many bookshelves with no fixed point. Her cheeks flushed red at a speed visible to the naked eye, spreading from the base of her ears down to her neck. Finally, she squeezed her eyes shut and grit her teeth.

"There's a breakfast shop I've always wanted to visit. Could Mister Watson go with me tomorrow?"

"A breakfast shop?"

"Mm." A response as faint as a mosquito's whine, tinged with a nasal note.

Fuyuji cupped his chin and tilted his head back in a thinking pose. "Mm... of course I can. Tomorrow's the weekend, so I've got nothing going on. Is eight o'clock okay?"

"Dame dame~"

An airy, drifting tone spilled from her throat. Shiina's eyes were squeezed tightly shut. Her little head shook back and forth like a rattle drum, her voice growing increasingly urgent.

"It's just... um... that shop's breakfast items are limited. If we go too late, they'll be sold out."

"Then what time should we go?"

"Seven! No, six-thirty!"

"..."

For a girl so serene and tranquil to become this frantic in this moment...

Standing still on the spot, Fuyuji stared blankly for a moment.

A gentle, doting smile rippled through the depths of his eyes. With a soft laugh, he bent down at the waist. One hand clasped that fair, tender little hand that was still stubbornly gripping his own. The other hand lifted with the utmost natural ease and slowly stroked downward along the smooth, silken strands of her hair.

"I understand. Tomorrow at six, I'll be waiting at the dormitory entrance for Hiyori."

Her hip-length hair was as smooth as silk, carrying a faint, delicate fragrance that made Fuyuji unconsciously deepen his breaths.

"Then," Shiina lifted her eyes and looked at him timidly, her voice so faint it was barely audible, "Mister Watson... it's a promise, okay."

"Mm. It's a promise."

Inside the library, the central air conditioning blew with a steady hum. The novel spread open on the table gently turned another page on its own...

A few minutes later.

When Fuyuji stepped out of the library alone, the street lamps along both sides of the school path had already lit up one after another. Their halos pushed back small pools of light against the gradually deepening dusk.

The sun had completely sunk beneath the distant horizon of the sea.

Tap— tap— tap—

The heels of his uniform shoes struck the tiles in a steady, methodical rhythm, producing crisp, clear sounds.

Fuyuji lowered his head and walked silently along the school path. His hanging bangs veiled his eyes, making his expression unreadable. After walking a stretch further, he slowly pulled his phone from his pocket, lit up the screen, tapped a few quick keystrokes, and raised it to his ear.

The phone rang a few times before connecting. A voice so calm it carried not a single ripple came through.

"Hello, Katsuragi. Tomorrow, cancel that final morning training session. And don't organize any group activities for the next couple of days."

"That's right. And when it comes to meals, don't go out in groups either."

"Mm. I'm leaving it to you."

With a sharp snap, he ended the call. Fuyuji let out a long breath, raised his head once more, and the corner of his mouth split open.

"That bastard Ryuen... he actually has the nerve! To come up with a method like this!"

Hiyori's invitation just now—so utterly out of keeping with her character—had filled in the final piece of the puzzle.

To briefly sort through the threads of logic:

Yesterday evening, Yamauchi Haruki conducted a transaction with the Class C students—one that could single-handedly affect the outcome of the competition. Ryuen Kakeru hadn't shown up.

Through simple reconnaissance, Hashimoto Masayoshi had learned that Ryuen had been absent for the past two days. The reason was unknown.

Finally, Miss Hiyori had, against all logic and reason, proactively invited him out just now—at a time when Class A normally conducted their morning training.

Put these three together, and the answer was more or less clear.

Normally, the only transaction that could influence the Sports Festival—Ryuen hadn't come. That proved he had something even more important to attend to, something that, in his view, could decide the success or failure of the Sports Festival in a single stroke.

No matter how one thought about it, if he wanted to deliver a checkmate in one move, he could only target the opposing class's students.

This exam was different from the previous two, where one person could carry thirty-nine. It required the entire class to participate. Missing one person would put them at a disadvantage. Missing two, and they'd have to grit their teeth and struggle just to break even. If they were missing four or five, catching up again would be nearly impossible.

But conventional methods like drugging were far too easy to get caught—that was absolutely out of the question. Once discovered, it wouldn't just be expulsion. Being handed over to the police for processing wasn't out of the question either.

So—was there a method to make someone unwell, or even directly withdraw from the competition, without anyone being the wiser?

Yes. There was.

Hiyori had proactively invited him out. Anyone with eyes could see it absolutely wasn't because she wanted to go to some breakfast shop. It was because, if he followed his usual schedule, he would run into something unpleasant. That was why she had desperately tried to stop him.

Combine that with Ryuen's unknown reason for being absent from Class C for two days, and the answer practically screamed itself.

Coincidentally, Fuyuji had experienced this very same thing before.

—Influenza.

Based on his own experience with Morishita-sama at the time, if it acted quickly, symptoms of full-body muscle and joint soreness, along with extreme fatigue, could appear within a single day.

Yet the recovery rate was also extremely fast. Rest and medication for just one or two days would cure it, with no lasting harm to the body.

What Ryuen needed to do was very simple. Deliberately catch a cold, then act as if nothing were wrong and go sit near his target. That gave him a chance to eliminate an opposing class's combat strength.

And so long as he didn't actively and maliciously spread the infection—merely walking around the school grounds—basically no one could catch him in the act.

Still...

The corner of Fuyuji's mouth twitched violently.

One had to understand—precisely controlling the onset time of a cold was an incredibly difficult feat. Never mind exactly what kind of deranged, depraved acts he'd committed just to get himself sick in the first place.

And with Shoji's constitution—the kind that could still bounce around full of life after getting elbowed by a goat—if he wanted the cold to linger without recovery, he could only artificially suppress his immune system.

Then, for these two days, he'd have to avoid taking even a single pill. Using sheer willpower, dragging his sick body along, without a single Class C student to help him—he'd scour the entire school for his targets.

This move was practically on par with the Seven Injuries Fist. One misstep, and he could take himself out entirely.

Ryu-chan... you absolute madman...

...

At the same time, inside Keyaki Mall, in a cafe saturated with the roasted fragrance of coffee beans and the sweet scent of pastries.

Beneath the warm yellow lights, over a dozen students from second-year Class A were gathered together, the atmosphere relaxed and lively.

"Hey, Nagumo-kun! Tomorrow's a day off. How about our class goes to watch a movie at the theater?"

"Hmm... that's not a great idea, is it? The Sports Festival starts next week, you know. We should still take it somewhat seriously."

"Eh? What's the big deal? We've got Nagumo-kun with us anyway, so aren't we guaranteed to win? Just think of it as celebrating our Sports Festival victory in advance."

"Haha, well, that's not wrong, but even I can get embarrassed, you know~ Alright then, it's happily decided! My treat!"

"As expected of Nagumo-kun!" A wave of cheers and exclamations instantly rose from the surrounding students.

Directly behind the clamorous second-year Class A students, Ryuen Kakeru was nestled in a booth. Cold sweat beaded on his pale temples. Forcing himself, he lifted the coffee cup before him and drank as if swallowing razor blades. A cruel, vicious grin curved at the corner of his mouth.

"Heh..."

Class A honors students. Truly, so high and mighty!

No matter. One more made no difference.

They were all Class A. Second-year Class A was also fine prey. After all, if the Red Team lost, every class uniformly lost one hundred points.

A movie theater... now that really is a wonderful place...

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