The three walked out of Ichinose Class's base. The sunlight in the sky had unknowingly hidden away, and a few dark clouds appeared.
It seemed that even if it didn't rain today, it would rain tomorrow or the day after.
But the three's mood didn't turn gloomy due to the change in weather; instead, they were all in good spirits.
Because the trade with Class B had been settled.
Now they just had to wait for the time, and then they could split the money.
So their steps back seemed much lighter.
Even Kushida felt a lot happier.
She was now thinking that Hikigaya's agreement with Class B was to get living expenses worth 100 Class evaluation points.
All paid by Class B, and until graduation.
Then each month, she could receive 400,000.
She didn't think she played a big role in this plan, but Hikigaya would surely give her a portion, right?
So.
She was in a decent mood.
But Horikita Suzune said at this moment.
"Speaking of the trade with Class B, do you already know Class A's and Class D's Team Leader information?"
Hmm.
This was the basis of the trade with Class B. If they couldn't guess the Team Leaders of the other Classes, then these 100 Class evaluation points couldn't be obtained at all.
So Kushida was also brought back to reality from her previous joy, as if a bucket of cold water had been splashed on her.
"Not yet," Hachiman said.
"Eh?" X2
These words made Horikita Suzune and Kushida both freeze.
Because could they trade without knowing?
"Although I don't know, Ibuki will know," Hachiman said. "So we need to find an opportunity to trick her."
"Oh." X2
However, even though obtaining information from Ibuki seemed quite difficult, Horikita's and Kushida's previously tense expressions completely relaxed.
Because, both Kushida and Horikita felt that Ibuki seemed relatively easy to deceive.
After all,
Ibuki had no idea she was being used as a guinea pig, testing poisons for everyone.
And even though she had hidden a device to contact Ryuen, she didn't bother to wash her hands and erase the traces.
She left behind incriminating evidence.
The location where Hachiman found Ibuki's hidden communication device had fresh soil, and a small branch was stuck in it, seemingly used as her marker.
However, such a marker could easily be discovered.
Meanwhile, stealing Karuizawa's underwear seemed like a good plan. On one hand, it could undermine the cohesion of Hachiman's Class, and on the other, it could create chaos, allowing her to obtain information about Class C's Team Leader.
She was just too naive. If Hachiman and Horikita hadn't deliberately cooperated to suppress the risk of "outside Class crime, Ibuki is the biggest suspect," then she wouldn't have succeeded so smoothly.
Because the students in Hachiman's Class were not pushovers; once falsely accused, they would quickly shift the blame, and as an outsider, she would quickly become the target of attack if anyone suggested it.
And once she was expelled, what good would getting information about Class C's Team Leader do?
Also, the person Ibuki wanted to frame was wrong. Since everyone disliked Yamauchi, she should have framed Yamauchi.
Instead of framing Hikigaya.
See? Wasn't she just bitten back by Hikigaya?
In other words, while Ibuki had some intelligence, her brain wasn't quite sufficient.
"And although it's said Ibuki needs to be used..."
"However," Hachiman said, "I think as long as Ryuen is still on the island, Class C's Team Leader should be Ryuen."
"Ryuen rules with violence; he's a dictator. I don't believe he would hand over the role of Team Leader to anyone else," Hachiman said.
"Furthermore, since Ryuen was able to sell the initial point and ally with Class A, while it's an excellent solution for this exam, it also indirectly shows that Ryuen is someone who will react if given enough leverage."
"So, making him betray Class A is also possible."
"Therefore, to obtain information about Class A's Team Leader, I want to start with Ryuen."
"And now," Hachiman said, "is the chance to give Ryuen the opportunity to get information about Class A's Team Leader."
"I hope he doesn't disappoint me."
...
"I hope you don't disappoint me, Ibuki." Ryuen was also thinking the same thing at this moment.
After Class C became desolate due to the underwear incident, Ibuki left Class C's camp.
Since the students' condition wasn't good, no one paid attention to her whereabouts.
At this time, Ibuki had already successfully met with Ryuen.
According to Ryuen's rules, they would meet once in this area on the morning of the second day.
The deadline was 12 o'clock.
It was now 11 o'clock.
"So, what did you find today?" Ryuen asked. "You know Kaneda has already completed his task."
"Kaneda finished his task so quickly?" Ibuki was surprised.
It was then that she saw a figure emerge from behind Ryuen.
It was Kaneda, wearing glasses and with bruises on the corner of his mouth from being hit.
Kaneda was a boy with yellow hair, similar to Isekai Ojisan, and not particularly handsome, but he was very smart.
He was one of the few students in Ryuen Class with Academic Ability B or higher.
He was also the one Ryuen assigned to contact Class B to obtain Team Leader information.
"Not at all, it was just good luck," Kaneda said. "Ichinose and her group occupied the stronghold at an unusual time."
"They held onto a vegetable patch stronghold that Class C had previously occupied. Then, I timed it, and when it was time to swipe the Team Leader card to re-occupy it in the morning, I hid nearby and watched."
"I saw Ichinose and Shirabo Chihiro go to swipe the card together."
"Although it was the two of them together, it was ultimately Shirabo Chihiro who swiped the card."
"Then..."
"I took a picture."
"Although I didn't capture the Team Leader card, I did capture Shirabo Chihiro swiping the card."
"Only the Team Leader can swipe the card, and Class B is working very hard to save initial point this time. They shouldn't make a move that would deduct their own point, so I infer that Class B's Team Leader should be Shirabo Chihiro," Kaneda said.
"Then the task is basically complete," Ryuen said. "But don't alert them; continue to lie low."
"Right, that's what I'm doing too," Kaneda said. "After getting the Team Leader's information, I plan to stay with Class B today as well."
"Then today I saw Hikigaya and Horikita Suzune from Class C, along with Kushida Kikyo, come to Class B."
Although he was assigned a task by Ryuen, he wasn't stupid and knew how to maximize his own utility.
"Then they seemed to have discussed for quite a long time," Kaneda said.
"Heh heh, these two Classes have long been allied," Ryuen said. "But we can't let our guard down. So what did they discuss?"
"Sorry, I was worried they'd suspect me, so I left then," Kaneda shook his head.
"It's fine," Ryuen said. "Rather, it was right for you to leave. Horikita made us suffer a great loss in the Sudo incident."
"And Hikigaya was also a sharp guy on the cruise ship."
"Before, on the cruise ship, I wanted to take a photo of Horikita Suzune, but Hikigaya Hachiman ended up taking 18 photos of me."
"That guy's reaction was quite strange," Ryuen said. "Moreover, their Class got so many stronghold point this time, they will definitely increase their vigilance."
"So," Ryuen looked at Ibuki.
This was also why he specifically stayed so long today.
"Class C occupied so many strongholds this time; logically, they wouldn't casually take in outsiders from other Classes. After all, if other Classes guessed their Team Leader information, all those stronghold point would be cleared," Ryuen said. "So if they discovered you, I think Hikigaya or Horikita might hand you over to Class B."
"They can do that?" Ibuki was surprised.
She was surprised by Ryuen's hypothesis.
"Why not? Because they can't afford to lose," Ryuen said.
"Hikigaya and Horikita seized the initiative and occupied most of the strongholds on the island. I myself explored deeper areas and only found 1 stronghold, so the strongholds they currently occupy must be the majority. Therefore, they definitely don't want to lose."
"Actually, their strategy has similarities to ours."
"We converted initial point into living expenses."
"And they are stubbornly defending stronghold point above 300."
"We can both gain huge benefits from this exam."
"Their exam strategy and our exam strategy are both excellent solutions for this exam," Ryuen said. "But Hikigaya and Horikita said, didn't they, that they still want to get into Class A."
"So they can only take risks to obtain Class evaluation points, rather than simply taking money like us."
"Therefore, they won't feel at ease with an outsider from another Class coming to their Class."
"So sending you to Class B is a good plan."
"Yet they were able to take you in. I think there's a problem," Ryuen said.
"A problem? Actually, they had an argument, and in the end, most of the students agreed to take me in," Ibuki said. "Then Horikita and Hikigaya had no choice."
"..."
"..." Ryuen.
Is that so?
Then that means Class C has a lot of incompetent teammates.
So, getting one or two spies might not be difficult.
"It's just that I haven't obtained specific Team Leader information yet," Ibuki said. "When it was time to swipe the Team Leader card, Sudo, Kouenji, and Hikigaya acted together in Class C."
"So they were still guarding against you?" Kaneda said.
He gently pushed up his glasses.
"Probably."
"But I also have my own observations," Ibuki said. "Last night, when Class C was eating dinner, I noticed Kushida's attitude towards Kouenji was a bit special. Everyone else only had one bowl of fish soup, but she served Kouenji a large piece of fish. And the people in Class C didn't seem to have any objections to this."
"Kouenji?"
Ryuen was a little surprised. He also knew a bit about Kushida Kikyo; she was talented.
Despite being a student from another Class, she had almost all of his Class's students' contact information, and even Ishizaki and Komiyama thought Kushida was an angel.
Willing to talk to them.
However, just like Ibuki Mio, according to their understanding of Kushida, while Kushida was an angel, she was everyone's angel and should treat everyone equally.
Among all the First Year students, there was no one who didn't know Kushida.
But she did something clearly biased towards Kouenji.
More importantly, no one else had any objections!
Why?
If it was because Kouenji was Kushida's boyfriend, leading to her favoritism towards Kouenji, it could explain her behavior.
But if that were the case, Class C students would definitely have strong objections.
After all, Kushida was like an idol now, and if fans knew their idol had a boyfriend or even got married...
They would definitely go crazy.
Instead of Ishizaki and the others thinking about whether to invite Kushida to drink milk tea together if they could get point in this exam, which was a doting behavior.
So, Ibuki's observation was somewhat interesting.
But...
"That's it?"
Ryuen looked at Ibuki Mio, his tone somewhat dissatisfied.
Because this wasn't solid evidence.
"Actually, this observation is also very useful," Kaneda said. "First, for Class C to quickly occupy so many strongholds, someone must have excellent athletic ability."
"And according to the information Ibuki obtained, the people who went to swipe the card together were Sudo, Hikigaya Hachiman, and Kouenji."
"While a stronghold area isn't extremely large, it would still take over ten minutes to walk according to an average person's pace. So this is a big project."
"As far as I know, Sudo is a sports freak. Komiyama and the others know this very well; Sudo has a lot of talent in Basketball. At the same time, his physical fitness is also very strong, so he could potentially be the Team Leader," Kaneda said. "It's just that the probability isn't very high."
"I also don't think it's Sudo," Ryuen said.
"Why?" Ibuki asked.
"Because Sudo is an idiot," Ryuen said. "After we landed on the island, although we procrastinated a bit, our speed in searching for strongholds wasn't slow."
"It's just that the surrounding strongholds were all swiped by Class C."
"Class C gained the initiative and obtained a large amount of stronghold information, but do you think that idiot Sudo could remember so much stronghold information?" Ryuen said. "So Sudo is directly ruled out."
"Then Hikigaya..." Ibuki continued.
"It shouldn't be him either," Kaneda said. "Because he's already famous in other Classes. If their Class occupies so many strongholds and people guess it's him because he's famous, that would be bad."
"Which means the most likely is Kouenji Rokusuke," Ryuen said.
"The probability is very high," Kaneda said. "Kouenji seems to have gained the favor of Third Year students; someone saw him eating with a Third Year. At the same time, his physique is very well-built, looking like someone good at sports. And I haven't heard of him making any contributions in Class C, so he can be favored by Kushida."
"It's very likely that he made contributions in this exam," Kaneda said.
"..." Ryuen. "Kaneda, did you think of this yourself?"
Kaneda was a classmate Ryuen valued, and someone he thought he could assign special tasks to.
And Kaneda was somewhat smart, but he didn't think Kaneda could analyze it so thoroughly.
"Actually, it was Shiina's speculation," Kaneda said. "She believes that Class C's Team Leader couldn't possibly be Horikita Suzune, Hikigaya Hachiman, or even Kushida Kikyo."
"In fact, all the girls can be ruled out, because to clear so many strongholds at high intensity, it's difficult for girls' physical stamina to keep up."
"And Shiina thinks Hikigaya's physical stamina probably can't keep up either," Kaneda said.
"Shiina, huh." Ryuen had long ago discovered that Shiina Hiyori's academic ability was quite good, and although she was often alone, she was never ostracized or isolated. She was a very sensible person.
At the same time, her mind was also very sharp.
It's just that for this Uninhabited Island Exam, he initially thought that someone with poor physical stamina like Shiina wouldn't be useful.
So he had her return to the ship like the other ordinary students.
But looking at it now, it was a slight miscalculation.
If she had stayed, she could have at least served as a strategist. However, since she could analyze Kouenji, then all he needed to do was let Ibuki continue to lie low, and preferably get a clear photo of Kouenji using the Team Leader card or a photo of the Team Leader card itself.
Meanwhile, on the other side.
Hikigaya and his two companions returned to the campsite.
However.
After watching the still not fully recovered Horikita return to her tent, Hikigaya looked towards Kushida.
"Would you mind accompanying me somewhere?" Hikigaya extended an invitation.
"Of course," Kushida maintained her angelic demeanor.
She seemed to accept all comers.
But after the two had walked out several tens of meters.
Hikigaya suddenly stopped in his tracks.
"You lead the way now," Hikigaya said.
"Huh?" Kushida turned her head, blinking softly.
What did Hikigaya mean by that?
What did he mean by her leading the way?
Could it be…
Kushida suddenly thought of something.
-----------------------------
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