Classroom of the Elite: Free Will

V4: Chapter 15 - Cards on the Table

Ayanokouji Kiyotaka POV

As 23:00 approached, the café Blue Ocean, which was usually empty on the mornings, started to fill up with people. Soon, the place was completely packed. Akito and I managed to secure six places though.

Under normal circumstances I wouldn't have called Akito here but since he had played a major part in the Snake group, I thought he deserved to be here. Additionally, Kushida had refused to come arguing that she had plans with her friends.

"You should calm down, Akito."

"I know. It's just... I can't! What if something gave me away? Or if Hashimoto was just playing with me? Or—"

"Calm down," I repeated. "You did your best, right? Besides, the deal you signed it's a good one. I think you did great."

That was true. If Hashimoto knew who the real VIP was then his intentions with the deal were elsewhere but that wasn't important. Akito had managed to secure 700,000 private points for our class, and that was a fact.

He nodded and took a sip of his smoothie. It was weird to see him this nervous, but I suspected it had to do more with the anticipation for the results rather than a fear of failing the mission I had given him. Although, I couldn't be sure. Perhaps it was because of both things?

"Miyake-kun, Ayanokouji-kun."

We turned to find Hirata and Karuizawa approaching us. They sat down on two of the vacant seats.

"Ahhh, it's finally over," Karuizawa stated, sighing with relief. "Do you really think it worked, Ayanokouji-kun?"

"Yeah, don't worry."

Both Karuizawa and Hirata nodded at my words. I knew for certain that the Rabbit group was ours since Manabe had confirmed it this afternoon. She even sent me a screenshot of the email she sent to the school.

Manabe had been really cooperative after I threatened her with reporting her and her friends to the school.

I had used an anonymous account but I was pretty much certain that she knew who I was, so to cover a bit I told her that if she went to Ryuuen, Mikoto or someone else for help, her friends would be expelled and she would follow. And since no one had confronted me about it, I had to guess she had kept her mouth shut.

"So, you also help end other groups, Kiyotaka?" Akito asked me.

"Just a bit."

"You're being too generous, Ayanokouji-kun. If it hadn't been for you, we would have lost the Rabbit group for sure."

"You give me too much credit. You were the ones who acted during the discussions," I brushed off Hirata's comment.

I grabbed my smoothie and drank a bit meeting Karuizawa's eyes.

"Huh? Ehm... and what about Horikita-san? She's still not here."

"She's the type to arrive at the last second, so we should have some more time. And Matsushita?"

"Oh, she went to one of the restaurants with Sana-chan and Kokoro-chan."

"I see."

So, the sixth seat would stay vacant.

"And since we're at it," Akito spoke again. "Do you know anything about the other groups? I mean, they all ended pretty early."