2nd Year Room 8

This is the eighth chapter for the 2nd Year arc of You-Zitsu manga series.

Summary
As Kiyotaka and Ichika enter his room, She remarks that everything appears to be clean. While she waits, he offers her a cup of coffee and allows her to watch TV. He made sure to leave his bag on the kitchen floor, where Ichika could see it while sitting. This was all a part of his plan to lower her guard. After drinking the coffee, she informs him that he is not allowed to use his phone to check the recipe and asks him to make a Thai dish called Tom yum goong. As he walks into the kitchen, he leaves his phone charging in the living room.

Kiyotaka claims he will be able to make it. He recalls Suzune teaching him how to use cooking utensils properly. Even though he could learn to use basic knives and some cooking techniques in a single night, he couldn't remember all of the recipes. Keeping this in mind, he and Suzune came up with a new strategy. The plan was for him to keep Sudou's phone hidden in his bag and to cook the dish with Suzune guiding him through the wireless headset. So, while concealing in a corner away from Ichika's sight, Kiyotaka retrieves a wireless headset from his pocket, puts it in his right ear, and hears Suzune's voice, who claims to have heard everything.

Suzune had been listening to Kiyotaka and Ichika through Sudou's phone, which was in Kiyotaka's bag, to help Kiyotaka get through Ichika's cooking test. Before he began cooking, Suzune asked him to confirm something with Ichika. Kiyotaka comes out of the kitchen and remarks that there was no need to use a whisk or a small knife to prepare Tom yum goong, and asks if she needed him to make anything else apart from Tom yum goong. She responds that she only wants him to peel an apple for now, and that the rest of the utensils were for when she wants him to cook for her again later.

About half an hour later, Kiyotaka completes the dish and serves it to Ichika. She admits that she liked the dish enough to try it again in the future. After eating, she offered to clean the dishes. While she was cleaning the dishes, he asked about the result of the cooking test and whether she would pair with Sudō. She tells him that even though he barely passed her test, she would agree to pair with Sudō for the special exam, and she sends Sudō a pairing request right there from her phone in front of Kiyotaka as proof. As she was leaving, Kiyotaka asked if she could also act as an intermediary for her class. She claims that she could not do that because she was not close to her classmates.

After Ichika has departed, Kiyotaka calls Suzune on his own phone. She commends him on a job well done and inquires as to why he requested Ichika to act as his intermediary. He says that it was only a formality since he didn't want Ichika to realise that they were primarily focused on negotiating with Class 1-D and 1-B. He said that because they had no idea what sort of person she was, knowledge about today's event may be leaked to other classes. Suzune remarks that his way of thinking was highly analytical and argues with him when he claims that it was nothing special.

After he finishes the call, he goes to the kitchen and finds that everything is in its proper place. Kiyotaka suspected that if Ichika was the White Room enforcer, it wouldn't be strange for her to try and do something, but he noticed nothing out of the ordinary. He believes that her behavior would be hard for a White Room student to imitate, and the fact that she paired up with Sudō also contradicts that notion. However, knowing that pairing with him was not the only way to expel him, Kiyotaka suspected that the white room student might have given up on trying to expel him during this particular exam.

Later that night, he received a message from Nanase requesting him to meet him after school the next day.

Characters
In order of appearance:
 * Ichika Amasawa
 * Kiyotaka Ayanokōji
 * Suzune Horikita
 * Ken Sudō (Flashback)
 * Takuya Yagami (Visual)
 * Tsubasa Nanase(Visual)
 * Kazuomi Hōsen(Visual)