Light Novel Volume 9/Summary

Below is the long summary of volume 9 of the You-Zitsu light novel series.

Prologue
Ichinose talks about how she strives to become an honest girl who tries her best at everything. She even became the student council president in Junior High, but she made one mistake that ruined every aspect of her life and family. She could never forget the furious face and tears of her mother that had collapsed from illness at that moment, nor the bitter face of her little sister that was hurt and became a shell of her former self. She thought that coming to the school would bring back the smiles of her family and change her situation for the better, but suddenly, someone wrote her a letter saying ‘Ichinose Honami is a criminal’.

She has a meeting concerning the student council with Nagumo (before he became president, which he invited her to join later on). He was also formally a Class B student before advancing to Class A which is what Ichinose also aims to do. Nagumo deceives her into telling him her past sin by falsifying stuff like Manabu the president only accepting Class A students and such. He then pressured Ichinose to tell him her secret and 'promising' that it would be confined in those four walls, after telling her that Manabu would never accept nor acknowledge her. On the other hand, he was willing to compromise if she was willing to trust him with her sensitive information. Ichinose then reveals that her action caused her to be sorted into Class B. A mistake that will come to haunt her later on.

It was revealed that Nagumo chooses people into the council particularly (girls) primarily based on their looks and them having outstanding grades, but most importantly on whether they suit his 'tastes'.

Chapter 1
Early February just after the training camp, Arisu is in the student council room and points out that it looks more like a room for Nagumo's sake. Arisu has come to talk about her upcoming strike against Ichinose. Nagumo persistently pressures Arisu to join the student council as she perfectly fits his criteria but was flat out rejected as she reasons that there was no place in having two leaders in an organisation.

Moving on, Arisu informs Nagumo her wish to attack Ichinose that may result in her expulsion. Thus, as gratitude for the other day, she decides to warn the president beforehand as they both know that Ichinose has a high probability of becoming the next student council president. For the first time, Nagumo's smile vanishes as he remarked that he had only given Arisu permission to weaken Ichinose just a tad bit. Arisu also told Nagumo that the school's authority was bigger than she once initially anticipated, and so she wished that he won’t intervened to save her some trouble. Nagumo was amused as to how she stands on equal footing with him and wasn’t scared of him. He finally gave his consent and said that the council would turn a blind eye to her actions. He also answers Arisu's question that he won't be as harsh on 'violent' cases like Manabu was and doesn’t particularly dislike them, but adds that if the school doesn't tolerate it, the council hands would also be tied and would have to comply with them. Before this exchange, it was implied that Nagumo told Arisu of Ichinose's 'sweet-spot' that she plans on exploiting soon.

Before leaving, Nagumo shares with her an efficient strategy he uses which was gaining the trust of people and using it against them. They then talk about Nagumo's past situation concerning trust and how they are more alike than initially thought. As she leaves the room, she was asked about Ayanokōji but chose to play dumb. She was able to study Nagumo's personality during their brief exchange, remarking that it was fruitful after all. After exiting, she sees Kushida enter who is trying to apply for the student council. Arisu ponders of what Kushida's intentions are and comes to the conclusion that she's the most likely to have a surreptitious 'hidden' side that she doesn’t show others.

Chapter 2
In the morning, there's quite a commotion in Class C, as the news of Kei dumping Hirata circulated. Despite just being dumped, Hirata showed no signs of despair, which even the aloof Sudou and Ike have picked up on. But not Yamauchi, who is constantly teasing Hirata. He's eventually dragged away, by an apologetic Sudou and Ike.

While people are gossiping about Kei and Hirata, Suzune brings up the rumours of Ichinose with Ayanokōji. She writes on a note that she may have: (most likely spread by Arisu)
 * A history of violence
 * Engagement in Paid Dating
 * Engagement in theft and robbery
 * A noted history of drug usage.

They discuss the rumours further, and Suzune concludes that there is most likely some veracity to the rumours. After class, Arisu comes to Class C and calls for Yamauchi. The whole class starts gossiping if they're dating. Suzune warns him not to leak information concerning their class.

The Ayanokōji group goes to a cafe. They first started talking about Arisu and Yamauchi but moved on the Class C's love stories, which changes to the end of year exam topic. Hasebe spots Ichinose, which causes them to talk about her situation a bit (Ayanokōji noting that her right-hand man isn't present with her), before she gets a call from Miyake. She replied saying she might run late, due to a fight between Class A and B. They decide to go to the fight (Sakura, Ayanokōji and Hasebe)

After some searching, they enter the gymnasium. They're surprised to see Hashimoto and Kanzaki quarrelling. Kanzaki ignores the Ayanokōji group and confronts Hashimoto about just wanting to spread the rumours of Ichinose. Hashimoto asks Kanzaki if he's really certain that Ichinose doesn't have a dark past.

Hashimoto finally admits to spreading the rumours but denies being the source. Kanzaki says that he already knew he wasn't the source, but someone in Class A is (as he even asked the 2nd and 3rd years where they heard the rumours). While Hashimoto leaves, Ayanokōji notes that he was acting a tiny bit off.

Before the Ayanokōji group leaves, Ayanokōji brings up the rumours from Hasebe that Miyake was a delinquent. He responds that he was from a delinquent school, but wasn't the big boss. He also reveals that he went to the school next to Ryuuen's school, so they used to interact often. He then asks them to keep quiet.

Chapter 3
On the way home on a Thursday, Ayanokōji spots Ichinose alone. He suspects Hashimoto was tailing him. The other person there, who turns out to be Wang Mei-Yu calls out to him and asks for a consultation with him. They then go to a cafe to have a talk. Due to Mii-chan (her nickname) being as shy as Sakura, Ayanokōji decides to excuse himself by saying that he needs to grab some more sugar. He then decides to check if Hashimoto was at the cafe too, which he was. He deduced that Hashimoto followed him out of his own will.

After returning, Mii-chan asks him about Hirata whom she has a huge crush on. She asks if Hirata is interested in anyone, to which he replies ‘not really’ and probably not looking for someone else after the recent incident. Mii-chan reveals that she fell in love with Hirata from the first day and that both her parents are Chinese, but she came to Japan as her father had business here. He notes that she mastered Japanese in 3 years and that she's very good at English.

Hiyori suddenly appears and asks if they're on a date. Mii-chan hurriedly denies. Hiyori joins in and asks what they've been talking about. Ayanokōji says he's interested in China as an excuse. Ayanokōji then excuses himself and goes back.

He states that most students only check for mails from the school every two weeks, but he has regularly checked for letters from his father.

On his way to the elevator, he meets Hiyori again, who asks to talk about Ichinose. She says that she doesn't like people targeting Ichinose, and offers a Class C-D cooperative relationship to help Ichinose. Ayanokōji declines, instead referring her to Suzune and Hirata as they are the leaders for Class D, at which point she decides not to take it further.

When he got back to his room, he got an invite from Suzune asking him to join her in meeting with Ichinose at her room at 7pm to hear from Ichinose's side.

At the meeting, Suzune apologizes for the late timing of the meeting and asks if Ichinose knows who the source is. Ichinose suspects Arisu (Ayanokōji was surprised at this, as she wouldn’t have given a name she wasn't sure of). However, she refuses to confirm or deny the rumours. Ichinose replied that although she sees them as friends and are in a cooperative class relationship, they would inevitably have to fight against each other due to their class difference, lamenting that she can’t reveal anything else as she was still getting over her trust being manipulated against her. The reason for the meeting was for Ichinose to tell them that there was no need for them to get involved. In her mind, it was something akin to bullying which she decided to stay silent so that it would just blow over. However, if people from both sides continued to either deny or fuel the speculations, it would had taken a longer time to resolve. She also didn’t want Class C to incur the wrath of Arisu just because they decided to help her out. Horikita then praises her indomitable will and selflessness which caused Ichinose to become modest and deny her claims.

Ayanokōji chimes in and asks if she knows about Kanzaki engaging in a fight with Hashimoto, which she replies she didn't and instead had told him not to take any actions for her sake. Kiyotaka then revealed that a number of her classmates are struggling to help her to which she replied by saying that she'll speak with them once again. Ichinose then asked if they could end their conversation here, drawing a final question from Horikita on whether she was 'really okay' which she replied 'of course' with no signs of hesitation. She then wished them goodnight and promptly left the room.

Ayanokōji discourages Suzune from trying to help Ichinose, arguing the fact that it'd be better if the big shots took each other out and not have Arisu turn her attention to their class. Horikita called him cold-hearted which he spun it around saying that was exactly what she was like when she first enrolled. Kiyotaka thinks to himself that ultimately, it would still be Horikita's decision on what their class' next action would be and decides to take his leave, stealing a final glance at her who seemed to be deep in thought, remarking that she has begun to change little by little.

After he left, Ichinose who was standing by the elevator called out to Kiyotaka in a low voice while smiling. She then asked if he could keep her company for a while to which he obliges. The two then went outside as they didn’t want to attract unwanted attention. Ichinose began by apologising for the trouble and burden she placed upon him and asked him not to worry any further. She elaborates that this may be the best option for her, afterwards, she told him that it’ll be best if he goes back first so they won’t be seen together. Kiyotaka then reflects on how he is just passing time by passively drifting along with his surroundings.

At 1:00 AM, someone calls Ayanokōji from an unknown ID. After 30 sec of silence, Ayanokōji threatens to hang up, at which point the caler says "Ayanokoji Kiyotaka", and soon hangs up. Ayanokōji deduces that ‘that man’ has begun making moves.

Chapter 4
Five days after the Kanzaki and Hashimoto incident, it was Friday. The rumours of Ichinose have gotten so bad that the whole school knows about it, but they eventually died down, with people even starting to defend her. However, the rumours reappeared.

When Ayanokōji was returning to the dorm, he again stumbled upon Katsuragi with a commotion around the mailboxes (like in vol 6, but this time Yahiko was with Katsuragi). He's asked to check his mail. In his mailbox, there is a piece of paper and it says 『Ichinose Honami is a criminal』. The three then ponder on who the sender is (Katsuragi says he has a good idea who, as Ayanokōji strongly suspects Arisu being the mastermind). Although the letter takes less than 1 second to read, Ichinose stared blankly at it, reading it over and over again.

Ichinose appeals to the angry people defending her to just let the rumours slide and not fuel the fire as they suggested bringing it up to the teachers. She then told them that something like these wouldn’t be enough to get to her. However, it was risky as even if 9 out of 10 students doesn’t believe in the rumour, the impression of Honami Ichinose would be drastically impacted. Even if she can stay silent, the people around her would still have a hard time accepting it. As Ayanokōji goes to the elevator Kamuro, who was observing the situation smugly, joined him and followed him to his room. Kamuro asks to talk to Ayanokōji in his room and he accepts.

She asks for his opinion on the letter about Ichinose. Ayanokōji responds that he is indifferent to it. She then goes on to reveal it's Arisu's doing, and that she ‘betrayed’ Arisu by going to talk with Ayanokōji without Arisu's knowledge. She plans on telling him about Ichinose's secret which will soon be told to everyone else but first, she explains why she allowed Arisu to manipulate her. Despite being disinterested, she continued on.

A week after enrolment at ANHS, at a convenience store was when Arisu first made contact with Kamuro. Arisu points out that Kamuro just shoplifted, and not only just randomly shoplifted, but made it seem almost like a routine. She deducts that Kamuro isn't shoplifting to get stuff, but for the thrill of it. Arisu offers Kamuro to be her pawn as it'd be more thrilling than shoplifting (in return for not reporting it to the school).

Ayanokōji thinks back to the training camp, where Arisu had revealed that Kamuro's and Ichinose's secret were the same (deducing that Ichinose also had a history of shoplifting). She tasks Ayanokōji with helping Ichinose as she predicts her heart will be broken from this. She also relates to Ichinose on a deep level because of their shared history.

However, Ayanokōji doubts if she was actually a shoplifter and speculates whether Arisu sent her to do this. Kamuro notices his doubt and decides to clear them. She gives him her student ID and comes back 10 minutes later with a beer proving she is a seasoned shoplifter (as there's no other way to get a beer). Kamuro told him that she specifically chose him as there was no one else she could rely on to accomplish this. Kiyotaka reflects that although the task is troublesome, he decides not to ignore Ichinose's situation any longer and began formulating a plan to help her.

After a while, Ayanokōji decides to leave for the convenience store, but on the way gets a call from Manabu, who wants to talk about Suzune. He says, Kushida has asked Nagumo to help expel Suzune, but she also mentioned Ayanokōji as a troublesome existence. Ayanokōji adds that Nagumo might also be talking to Hashimoto.

Chapter 5
On Monday morning, after coming out of the shower, Ayanokōji turned on his phone to see a message asking to come over from Sakura and a missed call from Kei. Both are then ignored.

He goes to the elevator and weirdly finds Hirata there, although he usually goes to school early.

When the two get down to the lobby, many girls from different classes starts surrounding and giving Hirata Valentines Day chocolates. Ayanokōji figures that was why he was late.

In class, Sudou brings Ayanokōji over to ask if he got chocolates from Suzune. They then talk about various relationship-related things and whatnot (Kushida gave chocolate to every 1st-year male, and Miyake got chocolate from a Class-B girl).

Chabashira announces, that a test tomorrow will be held to see the student's current strengths and it won't have an effect on final grades. The test will have similar questions to the final exam.

After class Sakura hurriedly asks Ayanokōji to attend the Ayanokōji group meeting. He agrees and says after 6:00 PM. He then goes to class B but doesn't find anyone approachable, so he leaves. While leaving, he overhears that Ichinose was absent. He wonders if anyone else knows her secret but doesn't find it likely. He reflects on how Ichinose is clever enough and wouldn’t have allowed her secret to slipped easily from her mouth. He then speculates that the only way would be that Nagumo betrayed Ichinose for Arisu. Ayanokōji decides to go to her room with Hashimoto trailing him (he notes that's he's experienced in trailing). He then sees a group of girls in front of her door, so he decides against going there at that moment.

He meets up with Kei, who wants him to tutor her for the final exam. He agrees but is only available late at night which she reasons that it was better than dropping out. He then asks her to check out a number, which called him some days ago. After keying in the number in her contact lists, nothing showed up. Kiyotaka then tried to end their conversation there but Kei called out to him in a hurry. She then gives him a box of chocolates.

Chapter 6
Someone talks about Hashimoto. Hashimoto is a man who'd do anything to ensure that he'll stay on top. He has made connections with every class to prepare for if Class A were to fall. He had even made a connection with Ryuuen.

A girl named Motodoi gave him chocolates for Valentine's Day, but he doesn't want to date her as he has nothing to gain from it. He doesn't reject her either, in case she becomes useful later.

Hashimoto had no impression of Ayanokōji (other than the relay), before the training camp. Due to what Nagumo had told him, he'd started to doubt if Ayanokōji was truly just a normal student. He doesn't know if it was a joke from Nagumo or if it was real, so he went to confirm it.

While following Ayanokōji to the entrance, he notes that, unlike the leaders, he was very easy to tail and didn't show any cards in his day-to-day life. He then gets a call from a classmate called Shimizu Naoki, who caused an incident this morning by confessing to a girl named Nishikawa, but he got rejected. He's mad that she caused the spread of his failure. Hashimoto tells him, that's he's busy now, and he'll get to it later.

He follows Ayanokōji back to the dorm and sees him go to Ichinose's floor, but concludes he couldn't get to her. He decides to stay in the lobby on the off chance Ayanokōji would reappear, which he did. He then witnesses Ayanokōji and Kei's meeting, which threw him off quite a bit. He notes that Kei was exuding signs of endearment for him which wasn’t seen when she was with Hirata.

He decides to confront the two to try and shake things up. He asks about the situation, but they shake it off. After ‘convincing’ Hashimoto that Ayanokōji was a middleman to give another person the chocolate, Hashimoto decides to make a move on Kei, stating he liked her to get a reaction out of Ayanokōji, but he nonchalantly tell them that he'll be leaving first. Kei frantically pushed him off and ran after Kiyotaka.

On the way back, Hashimoto was able to get Ayanokōji's contact info. Ayanokōji then goes to meet Hiyori at the library. He also has another meeting later.

He arrives back at his dorm at 7, so he missed the Ayanokōji group meeting. He comes home to find boxes of chocolates from 5 girls: Kei, Hiyori, Hasebe, Sakura, and someone else.

At 10:00 PM, he goes to Ichinose's room and sees that she's actually sick. He suspects its indirectly caused by the rumours finally having an effect of her. He attempts to talk to her but was politely turned away.

On the day of the provisional exam, new rumours have popped up. Horikita showed them to Ayanokōji: The rumours had spread from the rarely used school forum's app (checking private points). Yamauchi unwelcomely asks Shinohara about the rumours, which causes Ike and him to get into a quarrel.
 * Ayanokōji Kiyotaka has a crush on Karuizawa Kei
 * Ryōtarō Hondō is into obese girls
 * Satsuki Shinohara was a prostitute in middle school
 * Maya Satō hates Kayano Onodera

Ayanokōji, Hondo, and Shinohara have denied their rumours. Maezono then whispers that Satou doesn't really like Onodera, but she defends herself.

Suzune gets a message from Kanzaki, which said that Ichinose was absent again, and that class B also had four rumours spread about them. She then checks and finds out rumours had been spread from every class apart from class A. She invites Ayanokōji to come to her meeting with Kanzaki to her about Ichinose.

The provisional exam is very hard, but the average student could clear it. However, the ones who've been scraping by would have a hard time.

He meets Kanzaki to let the trailing Hashimoto know he was in contact with class A, to get them to be suspicious.

While talking, Arisu and her gang show up (Hashimoto, Kamuro, and a boy name Kitou), who asks about the Ichinose and the exam. Kanzaki confronts her about the rumours, but she plays ignorant.

After school, Ayanokōji gets a call from Kei about the rumours. He tells her they'd actually help as they act as an excuse for being seen together, but Kei doesn't agree.

Three days after the provisional exams, people from Class A, C and D have met up (Hashimoto & Kitou from Class A, the Ayanokōji group from Class C, and Ishizaki, Albert, Hiyori & Ibuki from Class D). Class D has come to confront Hashimoto about the rumours, and the Ayanokōji stumbled across them but smelt trouble.

After arguing for a bit, Ishizaki initiates a fight but is stopped by Miyake. Hashimoto gladly continues and kicks at Ishizaki, but is blocked by Miyake again. Hashimoto reveals that Nagumo is very lenient towards violence and would overlook this incident. They then argue a bit more, before a 2v2 between Ibuki & Ishizaki vs Hashimoto & Kitou breaks out. As Ibuki kicks at Hashimoto, her student ID and phone drops. Miyake takes her phone and goes to break the fight up, while Ayanokōji grabs her student ID and notices something odd.

Albert comes from behind and tackles Miyake to the floor. Ayanokōji suspects Hashimoto for spreading his rumours mentioning their run-in 4 days ago. Hashimoto laughs it off, while Hasebe and Sakura are surprised about it. Ayanokōji's intended to let Hashimoto know about others' knowledge of the two, so he'd write it off as nothing unusual.

Hiyori stops Ishizaki from continuing the fight. She then ‘resolves’ the incident.

That night, Ayanokōji called Manabu. He tells him about the oddities in 2 student IDs, which Manabu marks as a first. Manabu reveals that the first years should only have one more special exam left, where the 3rd years should have 2 left. He then asks about Kushida, but Ayanokōji states it's been solved. Manabu suspects Kushida to have something to do with the rumours regarding Ichinose.

Ichinose didn't show up to school, until one day before the final exam (Feb 24th). Yukimura gives the Ayanokōji group his mock exam results. From the results, Yukimura deducts they'll make it through the exam with no problems.

As they talked about the upcoming exam, Ike flung the door open, announcing that Class A had marched into Class B. Suzune, Sudou, Hirata, Ayanokōji, Yukimura and Miyake decides to investigate immediately.

Arisu announces that she's come to 'save' Class B, who's currently all valiantly protecting Ichinose. Kanzaki confronts her about the rumours but she denies it. She has deduced that Ichinose is the bank of Class B and warns them against entrusting her with such a role.

Ichinose gets up to the teacher's podium and apologises, admitting to the rumours of being a shoplifter in the past to all those who were present. She opens up about her single mother, who overworked herself to raise her and her younger sister. In Ichinose's 3rd year of middle school she studied hard and managed to reach the top of the school but her mother collapsed from overworking. She shared of how she wanted to find a job to support her family after finishing middle school but was strongly opposed by her mother whom she knew only wanted the best for both her daughters. Her mother had been overworking to get Ichinose's selfless sister, who has never asked for anything in the past, the hair-clip she told them she really wanted. She could recall her mother's sobbing profusely and apologising for not being able to get her daughter she wanted, and her little sister shouting back for not being able to get the only gift she ever wanted. Ichinose who was in the middle couldn’t bring herself to blame either of them.

Seeing no way out, and as the elder sister, Ichinose decided to steal it for her sister so as to get back her smile, but she was overwhelmed with guilt after the incident and has been carrying it with her ever since, although she wasn't caught and her sister was very happy (the hair clip was worth around $100). She knew that the decision would make everyone unhappy if it was revealed but she was willing to give it all up just to do something for her beloved sister. She attempted to reason with herself that after all, there were so many people in the world who were constantly doing bad things, but she still couldn’t forgive herself of her sin.

Her mother who still sickly, noticed the stolen hair clip and forcefully dragged Ichinose to the store to hand it back. Despite the store choosing not to press charges, news eventually still spread which caused her to shut herself out. This caused Ichinose to get depressed for the rest of the school year. Her teacher advised her that if she graduates, she can find a job anywhere. She then chose this school to start anew.

After finishing her story, Ichinose bowed deeply towards her classmates, berating herself for being a pathetic and useless leader. Shibata spoke up and refutes her statement, drawing echos from everyone else in the room that she was being too hard on herself and that she is still a good person with good intentions. Arisu displeased decides to interject, claiming that Ichinose is just trying to guilt-trip her class and bringing frivolous and unnecessary excuses to cover up her action, ending off that her action was purely driven out of self-interest. Even Kamuro, Arisu's aide, was stiffened up by her comment.

The class instead unanimously starts sympathising with her, but Arisu proclaims that a crime is a crime regardless of circumstances or intentions behind the action, be it out of good or bad. She then questions if Ichinose would steal the class’ points like she stole the hair clip. She denies she would ever do such a thing. Arisu then turned her attention to Class B and told them that if they continued to have a thief as a leader, they can never dream of reaching Class A. Finally, she returns her focus back to Ichinose and told her that the least she could do was to return back all their private points and step down as leader if she wants the rumours to disappear. Kanzaki as the representative for Class B asked Ichinose what she intends to do, a decision she has to make herself.

Ichinose already had her spirit broken once but now it was stronger than ever before.

Ichinose then turned to face Arisu with a smile, admitting that she is certainly a shoplifter and has no room for sympathy. However, she has no intention of running away, adding on that she was never persecuted for her crime and effectively has no reason to atone for it now. This annoyed Arisu who continued shaming her, but Ichinose cut her off by saying that she won’t let her past control her present and future.

She then turned her smiling face towards her class and asks them whether they'll would still follow her to the very end despite knowing her truth. It was readily apparent that she was deeply ashamed and on the verge of tears but her class knew what she had done and sacrificed for them, making it impossible for them not to understand what she is going through. Showcasing Class B most fearsome trait their unity, every single one them agreed to support and cheer her on. The students from other classes were all taken aback by how resolute they all were but Class A was wearing a vexed expression. Arisu's attack was completely negated which caused her to laugh out loud. Arisu voiced how Ichinose was able to trick her classmates but she doesn’t intent to let her off easily which Ichinose responded undauntedly to her provocations. Before continuing her onslaught...

Chabashira, Hoshinomiya and Nagumo abruptly enters and announce that spreading rumours is now punishable by the school. Arisu knew that she outplayed her hand which caught the school's attention and decides to withdraw. Her faction could no longer attack Ichinose easily anymore due to this incident.

With only 10 minutes left of lunch break, Ayanokōji gets a call from Arisu asking to meet up. Arisu confronts him for his part in helping Ichinose stand on her feet by listening to her story beforehand. He then confronts her about sending Kamuro to him to get him to make a move. He points out the beer can she presented to him being 4 months old.

She then challenges him to a battle in the next special exam. If she wins, she'd reveal his past history. If he wins she'll drop out. She'll use her father as the guarantor. Despite initially trying to refuse, Arisu threatens to expose his identity of being the mastermind of his class which would had ended his peaceful life in the school. He then agrees to the battle, to which Arisu thanked him for livening up her otherwise boring school life. He then goes to call the central figure of the incident.

Chapter 7
Feb 11th, after Ichinose saw the mailbox letters and Kamuro came Ayanokōji. Around midnight, Ayanokōji made his moves against Arisu by inviting Kushida over. She comes in and gives him a box of chocolates.

He says, that he has a plan that involves Kushida revealing secrets of the classes to him. She's doubtful of the plan as he's allied with her enemy. He then points out her overly nice tone and the fact that she's been recording the whole time. She stops recording and immediately switches faces.

He explains that his plan involves revealing small but annoying secrets to get the school notified about it. The school would take action in fear of the rumours leading to cases of bullying.

She would agree to the plan on a condition, either his or Suzune's expulsion, which he obviously declined. He then offers the condition that he'll give half his private points each month to her, with the intention of making himself a valuable person to her so she wouldn't want to dispense him.

She agrees to his condition and shows him a second recorder. She then starts spewing the secrets left-right. Ayanokōji's true intentions being to see how large of a bomb she wields.

She uses an example, that there are 2 group chats for Kei's group. One with Nene and one without. The one without is just used to badmouth her (pretty much). She said that there are dozens of groups like this.

On Valentine's Day, Ayanokōji had intentionally turned off his phone the night before to avoid having Kei ask him to meet up in the morning. He had predicted for her to give him chocolates, so he'd picked the time right before Hashimoto would stop tailing him.

He'd predicted that Hashimoto was getting bored of tailing him, so he chose to give him a little treat. This incident in turn caused Hashimoto to stop tailing him. After that, he went to have an idle talk with Hiyori, before making his way to meet up with Kiriyama. He asks him to spread the rumours for him and to deepen their connections. At first, he declines, but after Ayanokōji explained how he could just brush it off as Kushida's doings, and threatening to tell Manabu that Kiriyama has given in to Nagumo, he accepts.

Some days after the mail letters incident, Ayanokōji had gone to Ichinose's dorm countless times during his lunch break.

She has been frequently absent which meant that Arisu's strategy was still effective in breaking down her spirit somewhat. Ichinose's class began becoming worried and restless as their leader was missing. It has been 5 days and her physical and mental health had taken a turn for the worst. On Monday, he went to her room and said a few heartfelt words to her behind her door. He gently asked if she could could come outside for a moment as he had something to say. Ichinose apologised and pleaded for him to visit her sometime later as she wasn’t feeling well. Just from her speech, he deduced that she didn’t seem to be suffering from a cold anymore but is still weak. He then asked if those letter were important to her before sitting down with his back against her door. Seeing as she wasn’t ready to answer him, he instead asked if she was coming to school on Monday which she replied saying she wasn’t sure of.

It seemed that Ichinose was willing to respond to him but he decides not to dive in too deeply other than those that are at the heart of the matter. He then told her that he'll spend his time staying outside of her door until the end of lunch break. True to his words, until the very last second, he then informed her that he’d be heading back which caused Ichinose to tell him that she still needs some time to sort out herself. She then promises that she will go back to school after that and begged him to not have to come back and waste his time with her.

Monday the 21st, despite the end of year exam beginning on the Friday of this week, Ichinose still showed no signs of attending school. Her friends have all tried to contact her using text messages, calls and even emails but to no avail. It was likely that she told them the same as to what she told Kiyotaka. Kiyotaka then slipped from the school building during lunch break and headed to Ichinose dorm once again, despite being told not to. He gently knocked on her door to subtly make her aware of his presence. He heard that she was taking today off as well, but got no reply from her. Just like the week before, he said nothing else and sat outside her door until the end of lunch break.

He did the same process on Tuesday. This causes Ichinose to start thinking of how he was stalwartly being there for her despite seemingly not making any progress, letting his actions speak louder than his words. Kiyotaka reasons that she shouldn’t come to hate her classmates if they do the same thing but he was from another class and so, he had nothing to lose if she decides to break off all contact with him. He was worried that if her absences continued, she may even end up missing the examination entirely. Even if she showed up the last day, her class may be dealt a great deal of stress and not be able to perform up to standard. Therefore, Kiyotaka knew that his time limit was tomorrow, which would finally give Class B a peace of mind.

Wednesday came, he repeats this trend. Both he and Ichinose knew how this was the last day that she would be able to stay cooped up in her room. Kiyotaka was certain that she would take action. He then rambles on about what they’ve been through in the past year and wonders how their Second Year would be like. After listening to him, she weakly speaks up for the first time, as if she was talking to herself and asked for permission to ask him something. He then welcomed her question with open arms. She asks him as to why he’s coming to her room every day, but not trying to convince her to come back. Throughout the week, Kiyotaka hadn’t said anything. She explained how her classmates and even friends from other classes all attempted to reach out to her, yet Kiyotaka never ask or force her to say anything, all the while coming to visit her every single day. She didn’t want others to worry about her and couldn’t understand his rationale.

He reasons that his human relations are shallow and that if he had tried to appeal to her emotionally, it wouldn’t had resonated well. Ichinose then begins walking to the door and sat on the other side. Effectively sitting back-to-back, with only the door between them, he tells her that he knows that she isn’t very good at confiding in others. She is great at saving others but can’t save herself, giving him more reasons for him being there. He reveals that he knows her secret and that he has come to save her instead of her always saving others.

He tells her that he will be her door, she can’t see his face nor touch him, like how a door would be, he would patiently and silently listen to whatever she needs to release, letting her know that someone else is there for her at the time she needed someone the most, hearing and answering her silent pleas for a companion. He knows that wanting to pour out one's feelings is painful when there is no one to talk with, most of the time, it is usually because we pushed people away. Kiyotaka had seen many people break down and disappear, countless children in the White Room being beyond hope of recovery. He sincerely did not want Ichinose to have to go through that. The feelings he wanted to convey should've gradually made their way to Ichinose.

Kiyotaka knows that her close friends are quiet and modest, no doubt offering many words of encouragement to her. Yet, those would only serve to do the opposite effect. Yes, it may be the 'correct' way to support her but it was a mistake for someone who was trying to fix their problem. The right thing would be to pressure her into confronting and defeating her past. Ichinose tearfully asked whether it was 'really okay' despite her being so pathetic. Asking whether a criminal like her ever truly deserves forgiveness. Kiyotaka dispels all those thoughts by saying that no one has the right to deny her of it and everyone has the right to be forgiven. Ichinose then told Kiyotaka everything - of how she skipped school for half a year, of how she never consulted anyone before and would just shut herself in her room, blaming herself for everything.

Kiyotaka knows how tough it must have been for her to act strong and not being able to share any signs of weakness as a leader. Even leaders are human and needs someone to lean on when they're down. She had to come to terms of how her friend and superior made used and betrayed her after she trusted them and told them something she kept hidden for so long. Many have sinned before, yet her guilty conscience did not allow herself to forgive her actions. She was finally being released from her shackles of the past, breaking free of them and not letting them haunt her for the rest of her life. She needed to go past this to continue moving forward.

For now at least, despite knowing lunch break had ended and class beginning, none of that matters as he listens to her sob and speak her mind, not offering a single word of comfort as it would had been meaningless. Her enemy was clear from the start with it being herself. When she finally embraces herself, she would then be able to take the next step and bloom. That was how their entire exchange began and ended, before she could open her heart to her colleagues.

Epilogue
The morning of the exam, Ichinose greeted Ayanokōji cheerfully as they talked about the whole incident. Kiyotaka remarked how "You were cool yesterday, Ichinose. It was almost enough to charm even a man like me." She was surprised and gave him all the credit for helping her get back on her feet.

She told him that she has accepted her past and that what’s done is done, and now will face whatever challenge that lies ahead directly. After her declaration, in the future, she would definitely be a more powerful rival to every student. He then tells her that she can talk to him whenever he faces another difficult challenge, adding on that that he would always be willing to hear her out. She then asked if she can depend of him with his reply being that she can as long as she was fine with someone like him. She became flustered and timidly thanked him which Kiyotaka reflected that it was an unusual reaction for her who was always upbeat.

She then politely greets Nagumo who appeared before them and he was surprised by her action. He then asked if she resents him, which she denies despite knowing his actions against her. She instead changed the subject by thanking him for recruiting her and promising to do well in council. Nagumo then praised her for doing better than he expected and not holding a grudge which others would definitely have done so. Nagumo then gives a quick unsatisfied glance at Kiyotaka, knowing he had some part to play in her unexpected development. Nagumo had planned to break Ichinose and build her up himself so that she would have full dominion over her, but Ayanokōji got in the way of that.

She then runs back to Kiyotaka and reached her hand to her bag. After frantically searching her bag in fear that she may had misplaced it, she then handed him her personalised Valentine's Day chocolates, revealing that it was the first time she has ever given a gift, much more a significant one to another person. She then tells him that she wasn’t forcing herself and fearfully asked if he didn’t want it. He then gratefully accepted her chocolate. She then takes her leave, trying to quieten her heart and asked herself what this inexplicable feeling in her chest was.

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