Classroom of the Elite: Free Will

V5: Chapter 1 - Sports Festival

Ayanokouji Kiyotaka POV

"Good morning, Ayanokouji-kun," Horikita greeted me as she arrived at the lobby where I was waiting for her.

"Morning. Shall we go?"

She nodded, and we began heading towards the school building for today's classes.

"So?" she asked as we walked.

"What?"

"Are you going to explain me what happened on the cruise?" she inquired with a side glance.

"Right... Well, you know that all the leaders knew who the VIPs were."

"Yes, Sakayanagi-san, Ryuuen-kun and Karma-kun discerned the pattern."

"That's not exactly right."

"Care to elaborate?"

I sighed.

"Only Karma discerned the pattern. You know about Mikoto's favour. He gave Class C the list, then they gave it to Class A."

"Class A? So, Ryuuen did accept the alliance?"

I nodded.

"Class A was supposed to attack Class D's groups and Class C would attack Class B's groups."

"That's why Karma-kun sent those emails," she concluded. "And your part in all of that?"

"I managed to get my hands on the list of VIPs and Karma gave me some intel."

I couldn't tell her that Chikujoin had basically explained most of Class A and C's plan.

"I see, so you convinced our classmates to send emails with the right name before Class A could send them."

I shrugged.

"You could say it was a minute difference."

"And can I assume you know what the pattern was?"

"Well, with the list it was quite obvious..." I continued seeing Horikita's glare. "It was the students' surnames. They were assigned in the order of the animals of the zodiac."

"I see. That means Kocho-san was the fifth name in our group and Kushida-san the sixth."

I nodded.

"To think it was that simple," she stated with exasperation. "It's like only six people presented that exam while all of us just sat and watch."

To some extent that was what had happened since the leaders of each class had controlled everything but telling her that would be meaningless.

"That's good, though. Since you didn't have to plot anything you were free to analyse all the leaders during the meetings. If you understand their behaviour better you should be able to come up with better strategies in the future," I commented.

"I suppose that's true..."

I also kept myself from telling her that we only managed to come up with such a result because Sakayanagi wanted me to join the class competition. If Nao had been the one leading, I wouldn't have had the time to counterattack. It would have been a swift and deadly blow.