10 Chapter 7.6: Epilogue: The Dropouts Part 5

Part 5

At just past ten on the night before the exam, my phone rang.

[It's me. I've gotten all of Ryūen's private points.]

Ibuki spoke, stating the bare minimum and nothing else.

"It's a good thing you figured out my contact information, isn't it?"

I tried questioning her, but Ibuki remained completely silent.

I remembered that I had given Shiina my number, so she had probably gotten ahold of it through her.

"Hmm. So, you've gotten ahold of the points?"

Although I had expected her to make a move, this was pushing it until the last minute.

"Can you grab Ishizaki and come to my room right now?"

[Eh? Right now?]

"Is that a problem? I have something to discuss with you about the points you've gotten your hands on."

[Not exactly, it's just... No, I'll be there.]

With those few short words of consent, Ibuki said she would get in contact with Ishizaki right away and then ended the call.

The two of them showed up at my door less than ten minutes later. Did they have some sort of premonition that something important was about to happen?

Just like that, Ishizaki and Ibuki immediately stepped into my room.

"How many points did Ryūen have?"

"A little more than five million."

"That's plenty. If there weren't enough, I'd have to do some last-minute preparations to make up for the rest."

As I expected, there wasn't any evidence that Ryūen had used them for himself.

"What are you talking about? What are you doing?"

Ishizaki didn't seem to have any clue where I was going with this.

On the other hand, Ibuki had already resolved herself, so she wasn't lagging behind as much.

"You're going to use these to do something, aren't you?"

"Correct."

"He's gonna use them...?"

"These private points will be used for one thing and one thing only. Saving Ryūen."

"N-no wait a second. Don't we need twenty million points in order to do that?"

No matter how Ishizaki looked at it, there simply weren't enough points to do that.

"Before I get into that, I have something to ask you. Ishizaki. Are you prepared to take responsibility for this?"

"W-what're you getting at all of a sudden? Prepared to take responsibility for what...?"

"Saving Ryūen means that you have to abandon someone else. I told you this before, didn't I?"

"...Yeah."

Despite being a bit flustered, Ishizaki nodded in agreement.

"I've resolved myself."

"Is that so? It's nice to see you've made up your mind. So who will it be?"

"Who..."

It seemed that Ishizaki hadn't decided on who would be taking Ryūen's place yet.

"If you haven't decided, I can decide for you if you want. It'd be easier to get rid of any feelings of guilt that way. Of course, if you think that I'd carelessly get rid of an important member of your class, you don't have to listen to me at all."

"P-please hold on. Let me think about it for a bit..."

"There's no time."

"I-I'll make the decision quickly."

Despite saying that, if he could make the decision quickly, he wouldn't be having such a hard time in the first place.

"Hold up. I don't care who we get rid of, but what's the plan here? You said you were gonna save him with the points, but aren't we short by like fifteen million?"

Ibuki cut in, and her irritation was understandable.

Be that as it may, I had my own circumstances to consider as well.

"If you want to prevent Ryūen's expulsion, you need to decide on who will take the fall instead."

We would talk about the plan in detail afterward.

"For example, how about the troublemakers in your class?"

While I felt bad that Ibuki was dissatisfied with not getting an answer from me, I moved the conversation forward.

"Troublemakers... Well, I guess there's me and Komiya, and out of the girls, there's Nishino and Manabe."

"Honestly Ishizaki, as far as Ryūen's safety is concerned, I don't think it's a very good idea to get rid of somebody like you who understands the importance of Ryūen's presence in your class. If there's another exam similar to this one in the future, there's no guarantee Ryūen will be able to make it through that one either."

Ishizaki seemed to agree with my logic.

"So either Nishino or Manabe..."

Ishizaki listed two names, both of whom I was familiar with. Manabe, in particular, was the student I had been thinking of expelling.

Either way, he was the one who had to make the final call.

I intended to respect his decision, regardless of who he ended up choosing.

"Whether it's one of them, or someone else, the decision is entirely up to you."

Ishizaki was also aware of what had taken place between Manabe and Kei during the Cruise Ship Special Exam. If that incident had even the slightest influence on his considerations, in all probability, he would choose to get rid of Manabe.

He was searching for flaws. Searching for some sort of justification where he could throw up his hands and say she had brought this upon herself. Manabe had put her hands on Kei, and by doing so, had brought unnecessary trouble upon her class.

Gradually, Ishizaki would begin to think that expelling Manabe wouldn't be too unreasonable.

As far as Kei was concerned, even though she had already put the incident behind her, Manabe's presence would always be a constant source of uneasiness. Resolving this issue would be enough to allow Kei to relax a little more. Additionally, if I were to have Kei presume that I had been responsible for the expulsion, her confidence in me would also increase yet again.

However, Ibuki unexpectedly spoke up just as Ishizaki was finalizing his decision.

"Is it fine if I make the choice?"

"Eh? You want to?"

"Yeah. There's someone I want gone."

"Who?"

I asked without waiting for Ishizaki's response.

"Manabe. It's just my personal preference though."

"And is it alright to make the decision based on that alone?"

"I don't have any problems with it. Are you saying I should?"

With a single look at Ibuki's eyes, I understood immediately. She didn't have even the slightest bit of hesitation.

"If Ishizaki has no objection to it, then it's settled. That said, there are no guarantees that everything will work out. By preventing Ryūen's expulsion, the person who ends up with the second most censure votes will be expelled. Now, the overall goal is to reduce the possibility that that person will end up being one of you two. There isn't very much time left."

"I get it... I'll tell the guys that there've been some changes and that they should use one of their votes on Manabe. I think they'll agree to it if I tell them that the plan is to scare her by giving her the second most censure votes."

"That's not a bad idea."

I approved of Ishizaki's idea.

As long as they were under the impression that Ryūen's expulsion was set in stone, the rest of his classmates wouldn't particularly care about who they used the other censure votes on.

"...Well, I might be in trouble here though."

"Hmm? What do you mean, Ibuki?"

"Manabe and her friends will probably vote for me along with Ryūen. It really doesn't look very good for me."

"W-wait. Are you being serious?"

"Even you should know that Manabe and I don't get along very well, right?"

"That's, well, that's true but..."

Ishizaki trailed off, shaken from his inability to wrap his head around the conversation.

"It sounds like you've already steeled your resolve, Ibuki."

Of course, if Manabe didn't get expelled, Ibuki wouldn't have any other option but to resign herself to her fate.

"It might be a good idea to consult with Hiyori about it."

"With Shiina?"

"She might be able to help you with this. I think it'd be fine for you to contact her and tell her you want to concentrate the censure votes on Manabe in order to save Ryūen."

"...Fine."

With a nod, Ibuki promptly sent a text message to Hiyori.

"You're in touch with Shiina, Ayanokōji? I don't think she'd be on board with the plan to expel Manabe."

"She just happened to tell me her thoughts about this exam."

While Hiyori may be a pacifist, she also has a strong desire to respect the wishes of her class.

"She told me she'd cooperate as long as it was for the sake of the class; since she thinks that Ryūen is important for Class D, I'm sure she'll choose to lend a hand."

We would control their classmate's votes as much as possible, reducing the praise votes and increasing the censure votes for Manabe.

Conversely, we'd increase the praise votes and decrease the censure votes for Ibuki.

That way, the disparity between Ibuki and Manabe would be closed in one fell swoop.

"Well then, tell us your plan. How are we saving him with only five million points?"

Ibuki stared at me, the look in her eyes telling me to speed things up.

I took out my phone and sent a text message to a certain someone.

It was marked as read almost immediately, with the person responding shortly thereafter, saying they would come to my room.

There were less than two hours remaining until the time limit.

It was fortunate that this person had the patience to wait until now.

"What are you doing?"

"Somebody's going to pay us a visit soon. They'll be the secret weapon that'll stop Ryūen's expulsion."

"The secret weapon... that'll stop the expulsion?"

It didn't seem like they would believe me with words alone.

A few minutes later, my doorbell rang, increasing Ibuki and Ishizaki's skepticism even more.

"Is it alright for this person to see us with you?"

"Don't worry about it. Provided that you get your stories straight right now."

In the brief period before the visitor came in, I instructed them on what exactly they needed to say.