He went to his seat.
But as soon as he sat down, he could feel the eyes of many classmates on him.
"Congrats, Shirogane! You became the student council secretary. Are you aiming to be vice president next?" The first person to come over and congratulate him was a short-haired girl with green hair and a hair clip.
She looked pretty cute, but it was clear she was a typical flashy girl.
Her name was Shiho Manabe, one of the few students from the former Class C who were known by name.
She usually hung out with three other girls. One of them was Rika, who was quiet and shy, while the other two—Saki Yamashita, with her coffee-colored hair, and Nanami Yabu—were much more outgoing.
But Shirogane didn't think much of them.
Even though he spent a lot of time studying at this school, he still kept an eye on what was happening in class. Manabe was definitely one of the more troublesome types.
Just yesterday, when Shirogane was at the buffet hosted by Sakagami-sensei, he noticed Manabe getting into an argument with students from another class over seating.
It looked like she had forced some students from another class to leave their seats.
Basically, she only acted tough when she thought she could get away with it.
"If I want to become vice president, the class will have to move up first," Shirogane said. "As a student council member, under President Horikita's leadership, I'll follow the rules he sets."
"So before being classmates, I'm a member of the student council. I'll act according to the student council's rules," Shirogane added in a very official tone.
In other words, if someone got in trouble, they shouldn't expect Shirogane to bend the rules for them.
Hearing that, Manabe quickly backed off and went back to chat with her group of friends.
It was a very honest reaction.
But Shirogane didn't expect much from them anyway. If you don't expect too much from the start, you won't be too disappointed later.
Otherwise—
Shirogane wouldn't have agreed at the beginning to let Ryuen rule the class with violence as a quick fix to pull the class together.
[That girl just now is Shiho Manabe.] At that moment, the narrator system spoke.
"..." Shirogane.
Shirogane was a bit speechless. Even though Manabe could be a bit much sometimes, she was still a classmate. They had been sharing the same classroom for a month now.
And yet—
The narrator system had completely ignored her until now?
Or maybe—
Shirogane picked up his notebook and wrote:
"Is there anything special about her?"
Shirogane and Shiina had asked Kushida to help gather information on Sakayanagi's class and Ichinose's class. They had even traded info with Horikita to get Class D's student profiles.
But when it came to their own Class C, there was no detailed information at all.
Part of the reason was that last month, everyone had been focused on the Behavior Assessment, and Ryuen had been very strict, even banning students from talking to students in other classes. With Shirogane's social skills, there was no way he could get the kind of full reports that Kushida could.
So the plan was to wait until the Behavior Assessment ended, Ryuen lifted the ban, and Kushida could freely interact with students from Ryuen's class. Then they could have Kushida help fill in the missing information on Class C.
It would save time and effort.
That was another tricky part.
Even though they were classmates, Shirogane knew he wouldn't be able to gather as much information about them as Kushida could.
Just like Ichinose, Kushida was good at quickly getting close to people.
But it seemed Kushida was a little different from Ichinose.
Kushida could dig up even more personal information about people.
It was like Ichinose could find out surface-level stuff, but Kushida could even get a hold of what people were feeling deep inside — though she didn't actually write that down.
If you had to rank communication skills, both Kushida and Ichinose would easily be ranked A.
But.
Kushida might even get a little plus added to hers.
That's what Shirogane was thinking.
But for now, he decided to focus on Manabe Shiho.
[The girl just now was Manabe Shiho. If it's Manabe Shiho, there is actually some info about her.]
Oh?
What kind?
Shirogane got interested and kept listening.
[She's had a few run-ins with Karuizawa Kei from Class D. I mentioned it before, right? If you want to "raise" a pet, Class D's girls are a good place to start.]
[A lot of people in Class D have secrets. Karuizawa Kei has one too. Before you know her secret, it's very hard to "train" her, but once you do, it basically becomes zero difficulty.
And if you follow Manabe Shiho, you might have a chance to find out Karuizawa Kei's secret.]
No, no, no.
Seriously, where did you learn this awful habit of treating people like pets?
[But the real thing about Manabe Shiho is — she's going to be the first one to drop out from your class.]
"..." Shirogane.
That's pretty rough, Manabe.
But now the system had pointed out something important.
What would happen if someone in the class got expelled?
Since there were special exams every month, the chances of facing dropouts would just keep getting higher, which was why almost every second and third-year class had already lost students.
From what he heard from Sakayanagi, if you could gather 20 million points, you could cancel a dropout punishment once.
Obviously.
Their class couldn't gather that many points right now.
Even Sakayanagi herself hadn't managed to prepare for that yet.
Her Class A was split into two factions, so Sakayanagi's plan to collect points from her classmates was probably going to be delayed too.
Besides, even if someone really did have 20 million points, it didn't mean they should definitely spend it to cancel a dropout.
If you could make sure your class would graduate as Class A, then it would be worth spending a lot to save a classmate.
But if you couldn't be sure of that, then using that much to save someone might not be worth it.
Also.
Shirogane didn't think Ryuuen, who ruled with violence, would be willing to spend 20 million points to save Manabe.
And he also didn't think the other students would agree to each pay 500,000 points to save her either.
As for himself, he thought honestly — if it was just 500,000 points, he could probably do it.
But getting everyone to agree?
No way.
After thinking it over, the conclusion was clear.
If Manabe ever faced expulsion, then she would probably really get kicked out.
And even if there were some special cases — like if she dropped out for the sake of the class — then maybe the class could come together to help.
Ryuen wasn't willing to spend a huge amount of points to save someone, but giving up a smaller amount as compensation — Shirogane thought both the class and the student who was expelled would accept that.
Of course, it also depended on the situation.
For example, if the expelled student was someone the class couldn't afford to lose, then spending 20 million points to save them might actually be the right call.
With that in mind,
Shirogane started thinking about what 20 million points were really worth.
"By the way."
Just then, a girl's voice came from in front of him.
Shiina had turned around from her seat.
"By the way, I often see you writing in that little notebook of yours," Shiina Hiyori said. "Are you writing something important?"
"It's nothing," Shirogane quickly said, startled, and hurried to put the notebook away.
"Oh."
Shiina blinked lightly, clearly thinking Shirogane was hiding something.
Of course, if they had more time, she wouldn't mind teasing Shirogane a little.
But the homeroom teacher was about to arrive, and there was still something she was very curious about that she hadn't gotten an answer to yet, so she decided to ask quickly.
"Actually, Shirogane... was what you said at the gym really true?" Hiyori asked.
Huh?
Shirogane looked over at her.
"I mean... when you said you would invite Sakayanagi to be your vice president after you became student council president — was that just a trick to stir up A-Class?" Hiyori quickly added.
Oh.
Shirogane nodded.
"So, are you saying you want to be the student council vice president?" Shirogane asked.
Eh?
Now it was Shiina's turn to be confused.
"That's not what I meant," she quickly waved her hands.
She was just a simple book-loving girl. Even after learning about how the school worked and being forced to act more like a strategist for her class, deep down she hadn't changed.
Joining the student council or becoming vice president wasn't something she wanted at all.
Actually,
Being in the student council would mean standing in the spotlight and getting a lot of attention, and that kind of life was definitely not something Hiyori wanted.
She preferred staying in the background.
So taking on a position like student council vice president, which would put her under a lot of eyes, wasn't something she was looking for.
Shirogane didn't push her and said,
"Actually, when I announced at the gym that if I became student council president, I would invite Sakayanagi as my vice president—"