Homeroom
Chabashira stood at the front with a smirk on her face.
"Welcome to your second year at Advanced Nurturing High School. Class 2-B"
Everyone seemed ecstatic as Suzuki looked next to him to find Kiyomi sitting there.
'Second Year... Only two months left and she'll tell me everything...'
Suzuki sighed as Chabashira took everyone's attention.
"Alright. Before we begin. We'll be arranging the seating plan."
'Oh right... I guess I was being a bit naive to think that I'd get to sit beside her every year.'
"To decide the seating plan we'll be running an auction for the seats in class."
Everyone looked shocked.
"Of course, the payment will be private points. There will be three rounds in which each seat number will be called out and you may make a bid for them. Whoever makes the highest bid will claim the seat. After the three rounds are over any left over people will be assigned to seats randomly and will not have to use their Private points. Naturally you can all choose to abstain from the auction if you wish."
Chabashira drew up the values of each seat.
'I'll abstain from the first round...'
Chabashira pointed to the middle seat.
"Seat 20. The starting bid is 1,000 Private Points."
Kiyomi raised her hand.
"I'll take it. I'll put forward 1,500 Private Points"
"Any others?"
No one seemed to want the seat as Chabshira nodded.
"Alright. Seat 20 is Ayanokoji's."
A few seats went by as the seat next to Kiyomi was brought up, Suzuki held his hand up.
"4,000 Private Points."
Sudo put his hand up.
"5,000!"
Suzuki glared at Sudo.
'She's not your girlfriend. Back off! Oh right... I haven't told him that he's lost the bet.'
Kushida spoke up.
"15,000"
Everyone seemed shocked, but Suzuki sighed.
'Of course she'd get involved.'
"25, 000"
Suzuki said this firmly as Kiyomi seemed confused.
"What is going on?"
"I just want to sit next to you."
Suzuki answered quickly.
"...Oh."
Kushida then spoke up.
"No way! I want to sit next to Kiyomi-san!"
Sudo then spoke up.
"I want to too!"
Kiyomi looked even more confused now.
"Since when have I been so popular?"
"..."
Sudo threw up his hand.
"40, 000!"
"... Isn't this taking it a bit far? You don't have to spend so many points just to sit next..."
Before Kiyomi could finish what she was saying, Suzuki spoke up again.
"50, 000"
"Eh?"
Kiyomi was surprised.
"You can't be serious."
Sudo then looked defeated.
"Just give up Sudo."
Sudo gritted his teeth.
"60,000 okay?"
Kushida said this dumbfounding Suzuki.
'Damn it. Any more of this and it could cause problems later on. I'll have to let this go and go for Seat 12 in the second round.'
Chabashira nodded.
"Alright. Seat 28 is now Kushida's."
Kushida smiled a lot, looking at Kiyomi.
"You didn't have to spend that much Kikyo."
"I really wanted to sit next to you though Kiyomi."
"Well, you got what you wanted. I look forward to sitting next to you this year."
The round went on as Chabashira pointed to another seat. It was Seat 36, which was next to Kushida's Seat (28). Ike put his hand up.
"I'll take it! 15, 000 Private Points!"
There was a lot of attention to that seat, but eventually, Ike won out spending 50, 000 Private Points. Chabashira nodded.
"Alright. Seat 36 is Ike's."
The second round started as Chabashira pointed to Seat 12.
"Let's begin the bids."
Suzuki raised his hand.
"30, 000."
Sudo and he competed for a while with Suzuki, spending 45, 000 causing Kiyomi to sigh.
"Next year I'm not going to bid for any seat at all."
"Huh?"
"I mean if you're going to be like this what choice do I have?"
Suzuki looked at it, embarrassed.
"How about next year... I follow your lead?"
Suzuki looked surprised but nodded.
"Yeah... alright."
Eventually, the three rounds were over, and the seating was made official. Everyone sat down in the new seat arrangements as Kiyomi felt a bit surrounded from all sides.
"Kiyomi. Do you want to go out to karaoke with me?"
Kushida asked this vibrantly.
"Um... I don't have all that great a voice so I don't know."
Kushida smiled.
"Come on. You'll do great."
Kiyomi shook her head.
"Kay. Fine. We can do something else."
Suzuki sighed.
'If only the two of us could at least be a decent bit alone with each other.'
Chabashira then took everyone's attention again.
"Now. The next bit of business is a new system that is being put into practice."
'New system?'
"The system is known as the Over All Ability or OAA system. It formulates data based on your performance at school and then converts it into data that is viewable to all students and teachers. People whose rating is near an E will be subject to penalties."
Yamauchi gulped at this as Sakura, Sudo, and Ike looked a bit nervous. Suzuki pulled up his OAA;
Name: Horikita Suzuki
Class: 2-B
Academic Ability: 82 (A)
Adaptability: 73 (B)
Physical Ability: 89 (A)
Social Contribution: 77 (B+)
Overall Ability: 80.7 (A-)
Suzuki smiled.
'Not bad... what about...'
Suzuki pulled up Kiyomi's OAA;
Name: Ayanokoji Kiyomi
Class: 2-B
Academic Ability: 72 (B)
Adaptability: 48 (C)
Physical Ability: 77 (B+)
Social Contribution: 70 (B)
Overall Ability: 66.2 (B)
"..."
'Well... she does tend to not show off.'
Suzuki then turned his attention to Chabashira.
"Now. For the next Special Exam you will be partnering with the First Years."
Everyone went into an uproar of confusion. Suzuki noticed Kiyomi's expression become more focused. Not many people would notice this, but he could.
'Hm? Why is it interesting to her?'
Chabashira continued.
"You'll be taking the tests as partners. Once a partnership has been made official it cannot be undone. Keep that in mind. Your scores will be added up. If your pair fails to get a combined score of 500 then you will be punished."
"Punished?"
Yamauchi looked a bit apprehensive. Chabshira nodded.
"First Years will not receive Private Points for 3 months. As for Second Years... you'll be expelled."
Everyone looked shocked at this news.
'Expelled!? Why is it so harsh on us? Wait... is... Kiyomi being targetted? Is that why she got more interested all of a sudden?'
Suzuki tensed his forehead.
'What in the world is going on?'
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Park Bench
Suzuki met with Kiyomi as he sat down next to her, and she opened her bento. She gave him one as well.
"You made one for me?"
"Yeah, I did."
"Um, thanks."
Suzuki took the bento, opening it. It was a welcome surprise, to say the least. He took a bite, enjoying the flavour.
"Kiyomi. Are you going to be okay?"
"Hm? I'll be fine."
"It's just..."
"I seemed focused on Chabashira-Sensei's words?"
"Um... yeah."
"It'll be alright. You don't have to worry about me."
"Alright. About your past..."
"Not yet. I told you one year. I still have two months left."
Suzuki nodded.
"I know but..."
"It won't be pretty. You should prepare yourself. I honestly wouldn't be surprised if you flat out thought I was lying."
"Is it really that bad?"
"It is."
Kiyomi finished her bento and got up.
"That's all I can tell you for now. "
Suzuki nodded, finished the bento in his hands, and got up as well.
"Suzuki right now you should focus on finding a partner for this exam."
Suzuki nodded. Then he got a notice on his phone.
"Ichinose is forming a gathering where 2nd Year and 1st Year students can greet each other?"
"That sounds interesting. Let's go and check it out."
Suzuki nodded.
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Gathering Place
They arrived and saw Ichinose socialising with the first years.
'Well, that is her strong point.'
"There are 40 students missing."
"What?"
Suzuki was surprised by this announcement from Kiyomi, but looked closely and acknowledged it.
"You're right."
"Most likely it's Class 1-D that's missing."
"That does seem likely. None of them look as bad as we did in our first year."
Kiyomi agreed.
"So should we ignore them?"
"If our class was academically deserving of our position as Class B I would say yes but we have quite a few who aren't capable."
"Sudo, Ike, Yamauchi, Sakura... ugh. We have quite a few."
"There are a couple others as well but they are the main ones."
"So should we try recruiting Class 1-D?"
"It's not like we'll get anywhere in this area. All of these students will be more inclined to partner with Ichinose's Class. After all her class is academically superior and much more well mannered."
"Right... they'd be able to tell from the OAA ratings."
Kiyomi nodded.
"Class 1-D might be our only option."
"I guess that it's unlikely that any of our Kohais would take our class standing at face value so easily."
'Class 1-D. They don't seem very cooperative though.'
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Hallway
They made their way to Class 1-D when they saw Ryuen walking away from the homeroom.
"Ah if it isn't Kiyomi and Horikita."
"Ryuen. What were you doing?"
"Huh? Same as you two."
Suzuki's gaze was fixed on Ryuen.
"Hey now. Don't look at me like that. I haven't gotten any of them to help me."
'I find that hard to believe.'
Suzuki sighed.
"You should know by now that coercing them won't end well for you. If you're caught you'll be expelled."
Ryuen laughed.
"I know that already. I haven't done anything like that but even if I did do that I'd never get caught anyways."
Ryuen smirked and looked at Kiyomi.
"You two are looking awfully close."
"He is my boyfriend."
"Kuku. Hey Horikita. Does she feel good?"
He said this with a smirk as Suzuki's temper got the better of him for a second.
"You!"
Suzuki got pissed but then restrained himself as Ryuen's eyes focused on him.
"Not bad. Kuku."
Ryuen walked away as Kiyomi and Suzuki headed towards the Class 1-D homeroom. They opened the door to find no one there.
"There's not a single student here..."
Suzuki sighed
"If there were 3 or 4 students here I wouldn't find it as strange but it feels like they're avoiding us on purpose."
Kiyomi looked inside the room.
"I agree that they're trying to avoid their upperclassmen."
Suzuki closed the door and walked out.
"What now?"
"There will be other chances to talk to them. In fact I think it's likely this is more to avoid the other classes than us in particular."
"What do you mean?"
"They have no intention of participating with any class but ours."
"What? But why us?"
"Because we have the worst students academically."
"Then why? That... oh... They're planning to..."
"Yes. They want to force Private Points out of us in exchange for their cooperation."
Suzuki sighed.
"We can't do that. We can't be spending points like that."
"That's obvious. Using points like that recklessly would make it problematic later on."
"If we need to save our classmates later it'll reduce our ability to do so. Also there's no telling as to whether Private Ppoints might eventually play a role in Special Exams later on."
"Using Private Points in a special exam... that's never happened before."
"That's true but it could be the school is waiting for us to gather enough Private Points for such an exam to be fair."
"That's true but I feel like this school wouldn't be so lenient."
Kiyomi leaned against the wall.
"Whatever the case is we'll have to wait for Class 1-D to approach us."
"For them to approach us. How will we convince them to cooperate without the use of Class Points? Maybe instead we'll have to rely on the other classes as much as we can."
"That's an option but Class 1-D is a class we must get to our side. If we don't we'll fail this exam."
'Having to side with a class as uncooperative as them... this won't be easy.'
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To Be Continued
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Rating Out Of 10 For This Part:
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