After the announcement of the exam results for each class, the remaining students returned to the cruise ship one after another.
On the ship's deck, the sea breeze, carrying the salty scent of the ocean, buffeted every face, each hiding different thoughts. The afterglow of the setting sun was like a thin layer of gold powder, yet it could not mask the heaviness and treacherous atmosphere permeating the air.
The students of Class A gathered on one side of the ship's rail. Unlike usual, they did not surround Honami Ichinose with talking and laughter. Instead, they formed small clusters, whispering in low voices. The air was filled with unwillingness and confusion.
"0 points... We actually got 0 points, how could this happen!"
A boy held his head, his voice dry and hoarse, even carrying a hint of sobbing.
"Those 'accidents' were too coincidental! The team going to the east coast fell into a pit, the one going to the north slope encountered falling rocks, and Kanzaki-kun and his group even encountered a landslide..."
A girl's voice carried lingering fear, as if she had experienced something incomparably terrifying.
"This doesn't look like it happened naturally at all!"
"It was that monster from Class D, right? Subaru! Otherwise, how do you explain that only their class has such a high score!"
Someone gritted their teeth but was immediately held back by a companion.
"Shh! No evidence! Even the teachers haven't reached a conclusion!"
If Subaru himself were to hear these words, they feared they would face retaliation.
"We absolutely cannot let this slide! Let's go, let's go find the teacher to report it! We must investigate this clearly! Such behavior has already crossed the line!"
Honami Ichinose stood alone a little further away, her back turned to her classmates.
Her usually straight back looked somewhat hunched at this moment. Her hands gripped the cold railing tightly, her knuckles turning white from the force.
Her beautiful blue eyes had lost their usual warm luster, leaving only vast confusion and exhaustion.
It wasn't that she hadn't suspected Subaru, but what truly frustrated her was that in the face of this blow—which transcended common sense and was akin to a natural disaster—the "unity," "communication," and "positive effort" she relied on had all failed.
She couldn't even organize an effective response because the enemy seemed to be everywhere, yet nowhere to be found.
This sense of powerlessness chilled her heart more than the failure itself.
She heard faint whispers from behind her: "Ichinose-san couldn't do anything this time either." She didn't look back, only gripping the railing tighter.
A crack in the depths of her conviction was quietly spreading.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the cruise ship.
The atmosphere in Class B was relatively dull, but the undercurrents were surging even more violently.
The students of the Kohei Katsuragi faction gathered around him, every one of them looking ashen.
"Katsuragi-kun, we..."
A boy stopped halfway through his sentence. Their initial secret cooperation with Ryuen of Class C—though it quickly broke down—and their subsequent steady approach that met with repeated failures, gave them a suffocating feeling of punching cotton.
The scrape on Kohei Katsuragi's face was even clearer in the twilight. He looked in the direction of the uninhabited island, his voice low.
"We lost. Not because of a lack of strength, but because we underestimated the factors 'outside the rules'."
The "rules" he referred to were based on the scope of strength, intelligence, and reasonable competition.
And the person who created all this obviously walked on, or even overrode, this scope.
His painstakingly built "solid fortress" had been dismantled by the opponent from both the outside and the inside in the most unreasonable way.
On the other side, a portion of the Sakayanagi faction students, represented by Masayoshi Hashimoto, faintly revealed a different kind of emotion.
"Katsuragi! It was because of you that we signed the agreement with Class C!"
"You clearly promised us that we could win!"
"How are you going to explain this to us!"
The students of the Sakayanagi faction immediately pressured Kohei Katsuragi, who could only respond with silence.
Masayoshi Hashimoto stroked his chin, his eyes flickering as he looked in the direction of Class D, whispering to the person next to him:
"Although it's a pity to lose points... don't you think Class D's performance is very interesting? They don't care about superficial rules at all, only pursuing results. Isn't Katsuragi's style a bit outdated in front of such people?"
His words elicited a few ambiguous chuckles. Inside Class B, Katsuragi's authority had suffered a severe blow due to this crushing defeat.
Masayoshi Hashimoto took out his terminal, dialed Arisu Sakayanagi's number, and reported the situation here to her.
And Arisu Sakayanagi's laughter came from the other end of the terminal.
"As expected, with merely Katsuragi's level, it is impossible to be an enemy of Subaru."
Arisu Sakayanagi had long anticipated this failure.
She knew very well what kind of person Subaru was.
Kohei Katsuragi could absolutely not outplay him.
Perhaps from beginning to end, Subaru hadn't even looked at Kohei Katsuragi directly.
And all of this was a good thing for Arisu Sakayanagi.
This way, the balance of factions within the class would be completely broken. Katsuragi's faction would suffer a huge impact in this exam.
On the other side, Class C's area was the quietest, quiet to the point of near deathly stillness.
Students sat or stood in twos and threes, mostly with their heads down, avoiding eye contact with others, especially avoiding looking at that corner.
Kakeru Ryuen leaned alone in the shadow at the furthest edge, keeping a distance from everyone.
The redness and swelling on his face had subsided, but a deeper, more morbid greenish-grey pallor shrouded his countenance.
He didn't look at the sea, didn't look at anyone; his hollow eyes fell on a certain point on the deck.
His right hand was unconsciously, neurotically, rubbing his own neck repeatedly, as if there were an invisible strangle mark or pinch mark there.
Occasionally, his body would tremble slightly uncontrollably, as if he recalled something extremely terrifying.
The tragic state of Albert and the others withdrawing due to severe injuries, the blinding white of the cast on Daichi Ishizaki... none of it compared to the mental shock brought by that final glance Subaru gave him—that darkness stripped of all emotion, leaving only a pure intent to "erase".
His so-called "never resting until death" became a child's laughable slogan in front of the opponent's indifferent killing intent that was akin to a law of nature.
Domination? Violence? Calculation?
Everything he relied on for survival was completely denied and crushed in that instant.
He wasn't defeated; he was thoroughly destroyed from the cognitive level of a hunter. At this moment, he was more like an empty shell with its soul extracted, leaving only the residual fear like an instinct.
Kakeru Ryuen realized one thing.
From start to finish, Subaru was just playing with him...
Only, he couldn't understand.
What exactly was that killing intent on Subaru?
It was as if he ignored school rules and even the law, able to kill people at will.
As if his hands had already been stained with countless amounts of blood.
Subaru, what did he experience in the past?
Why did that killing intent disappear in the end?
That wasn't the opponent showing mercy.
It was more like...
He didn't even have the qualification to be killed.
Kakeru Ryuen's body trembled; this was the first time he felt fear.
Mio Ibuki sat in a wheelchair, a cast on her leg, her face pale.
The look she gave Kakeru Ryuen was incredibly complex, containing confusion and disappointment at the leader's collapse, but mostly the chill of surviving a disaster.
She had personally experienced that trap—a perfectly camouflaged deep pit, with slippery moss arranged on the edge. That wasn't something that could be done on a whim.
Subaru not only predicted their movement route but also carried out meticulous "arrangements" in advance.
This gave her a creeping horror of being completely seen through, like a marionette.
The other Class C students were even more silent as cicadas in winter. The lesson from Daichi Ishizaki and the others, coupled with the tragic state of the core members being almost completely wiped out this time, made the name "Subaru" an unspeakable taboo in Class C.
They didn't even dare to discuss it loudly, only exchanging fear and relief with their eyes—relief that they weren't the targets, relief that the exam ended early.
Class C's cohesion, under the double blow of Ryuen's personal collapse and collective terror, existed in name only.
Over at Class D, the atmosphere was the most bizarre and divided.
After the brief exclamations when the 500-point victory was initially announced, the crowd quickly polarized.
A portion of the students simply didn't know how they won, but their faces revealed genuine ecstasy.
"500 points! Hahaha! We struck it rich!"
Some students waved their arms excitedly.
"Who cares how we won, winning is winning! The points are real!"
Another student also grinned, slapping the shoulder of the person next to him forcefully:
"Let's see who dares to look down on our Class D in the future!"
They didn't know what happened in between, immersed in the simple thrill of being victors, and even developed a twisted worship for Subaru—following him meant winning.
Fear arose in the hearts of some.
Clearly, the atmosphere within the class during the exam was oppressed to the extreme, feeling like it was about to collapse.
But in the end, they won.
What exactly happened?
More people were in a middle state, like Yosuke Hirata. He wore a forced smile, trying hard to maintain the facade of class harmony and comfort the uneasy classmates:
"Everyone calm down, we indeed achieved a good result, this is worth celebrating."
But his eyes revealed deep worry; this kind of "victory" was definitely not a good thing for the class's long-term unity.
Suzune Horikita crossed her arms, watching all this coldly.
She looked at the ecstatic ones, the fearful ones, and the peacemakers, understanding clearly in her heart.
Subaru used the most extreme method to forcibly push Class D to the position of victory, but he also completely tore apart the fragile balance on the class's surface.
The cost of this "victory" might far exceed 500 points.
Her gaze swept over Kiyotaka Ayanokoji in the corner, who maintained his usual indifferent appearance of having nothing to do with the matter.
Kikyo Kushida's isolation.
Right in this delicate atmosphere, Kikyo Kushida stayed silently to the side.
Kikyo Kushida didn't cry out, didn't make a performative accusation.
She stood quietly at the edge of the crowd. Her face had even recovered some of her usual, slightly pale gentle expression, only the arc of her mouth was a bit stiff.
She lowered her eyelashes, seemingly calming her emotions, but in reality, poisonous flames were churning in her heart.
Kakeru Ryuen, this trash!
She almost crushed her molars.
Swearing solemnly that he controlled everything, only to be crushed like garbage by Subaru!
She clearly felt that the gazes cast from around her had become different.
No longer total trust or admiration, but laced with suspicion, alienation, and even... contempt.
Several girls huddled together, their voices suppressed extremely low, but just enough for the nearby Kushida to hear faintly:
"Class C targeting us so much at the start was all because of Kushida..."
"Some people act one way to your face and another behind your back. To get ahead, what wouldn't they do?"
"Traitor, she should just get out of the class."
"Shh... keep it down, she's right over there."
These whispers were like cold needles, constantly piercing Kikyo Kushida.
She maintained her superficial calm, but her fingernails dug deeply into her palms.
She realized that her carefully cultivated "angel of the people" image had developed huge cracks amidst the redistribution of benefits and the crisis of trust brought about by this bizarre victory.
Classmates no longer flocked to her unconditionally; instead, they began to insult her ulterior motives behind her back.
The image she had worked so hard to build was destroyed in one fell swoop—
The past she tried her best to hide was ultimately exposed in front of everyone.
Damn it, damn it, damn it!
Damn Suzune Horikita!
Damn Kakeru Ryuen!
And damn...
Subaru!
The sense of isolation, like a cold tide, slowly soaked through her limbs and bones.
She buried this humiliation and resentment deeper in her heart. The curses against Ryuen, the dread of Subaru, the hatred for Suzune Horikita, and the cold fury against the entire Class D's "ingratitude" all fermented in silence.
Meanwhile, Subaru was in a corner of the deck, looking at the scenery in the distance.
The class won, but there were no ripples on his face.
Ryuen's color had completely faded before the illusion of death, disappearing without a trace.
Kikyo Kushida's color, after her mask was torn, didn't reveal itself either.
Still... it was a tiresome monotony.
The deep grey indifference in the bottom of his eyes was like the ocean outside the window—bottomless, reflecting no vivid colors.
In the end, those two people couldn't reach that level.
Was I too impatient?
No, they originally had no color.
It was just that I held expectations that were too high for them.
Right at this moment, Sae Chabashira walked to his side.
Her expression seemed a bit nervous. After a moment of silence, she spoke:
"Natsuki-kun, please come with me. Regarding this exam, the teachers have some things they want to ask you."
Instantly, one could hear a pin drop on the deck.
The eyes of people from all classes focused like searchlights on the boy who was named.
Fear, awe, reliance.
The emotions contained in those gazes were all different.
However, for Subaru, there was no difference.
Under the baptism of countless gazes, Subaru's expression didn't change at all, as if he were just being called to collect an ordinary item.
He calmly responded with an "Okay," and followed the teacher away. His pace was steady, his retreating figure appearing somewhat solitary in the darkening sky, yet carrying a palpitating calmness.
His departure seemed to draw away some oppressive and powerful force field. The air on the deck began to flow again, but the discussions became even more turbulent and private.
____
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