COTE: The Unfamiliar Familiar World

Joke Chapter: Holding Back

"Wait what?!" Sudou seems to be caught off guard with this- I on the other hand, would have to intervene.

"What ideas? I was just making an observation at that time"

"Oh yeah? What about the Island Exam!"

"How can I have orchestrated the entire events when I fell off the cliff"

"WE fell off the cliff"

"How would you know that?" If I recalled correctly, Horikita was unconscious at that time.

"W-wha what about the zodiac exam?"

"We lost that one, Horikita"

"Not your group! HAH! How do you plan to explain that?"

"It was Karuizawa's Idea" 

"Heeh?! Why am I getting involved in this, Kiy- Ayanokouji-kun?!" Kei immediately reacted as i threw the ball towards her.

"Wait a second, Kiyotaka was said to be the VIP at that time" Keisei remarked but he looked over towards Kei. "Does that mean that Kiyotaka was never the VIP and it was Karuizawa all along?! And she thought about how to keep herself from being discovered by cooperating with you, Kiyotaka?"

"That was her thought process, yes-"

"No it was not!" Kei cried out.

"See? She's being too humble about it... A contrary to your statement about her being so difficult to work with." Somehow I had gotten everyone to look at her at a different light.

"Wow Kei-chan! I didn't know you had it in you back then!" Satou grinned as she hugged her friend from behind, flustering my girlfriend in the process.

"B-but it wasn't meee!!!" She defended herself. But it seems her friends were just too busy trying to praise her.

Horikita clicked her tongue "Well! What about that time back in the sports festival!"

"Don't remember, be specific"

"You called me useless for not making any progress back then"

"Bruh?! Ayanokouji, what the fuck man?" Of course Sudou would be the first to react.

"Ah yeah..."

"Ah yeah?" Horikita raised an eyebrow, expecting me to explain myself.

"I was frustrated because you were being difficult to deal with"

"That's not true! You were trying to get me to wield Sudou-kun as my weapon!"

"As her wuh now?" Sudou seems to be dumbfounded.

"No I wasn't I was just telling you that he needed your encouragement... After all, he has a crush on you"

"Not cool Ayanokouji!" Sudou wailed in anguish, now that his feelings were shed to light-

"Irrelevant! You would have still done the same even if Sudou kun doesn't like me." And just like that, Sudou's feelings were invalidated like some trivial fact.

"What about Ryuuen kun?! Ever since winter break started, he started to be a little more cautious of our class! Why is this?! You probably have something to do with it" She tried to come up with a situation that resembled a scene in which she was never relevant to in the first place.

"What do you mean? I wasn't near Ryuuen at that time"

"Huh?"

"I was at Karaoke-"

"But you-" Haruka was about to say something but I repeated myself.

"I was at Karaoke with my friends"