"Why Didn't the Counter Move?"
I was standing in the middle of my room that morning before heading to school, staring at my phone screen displaying my personal points. Normally, points are added at the beginning of every month, but today the number hadn't changed from what it was yesterday.
Maybe the reason was that we had just finished the exams, and the class points for the new month hadn't been announced yet.
Or maybe the punishment for canceling the expulsion was resetting the class points to zero.
No, impossible. If there was something like that, Chabashira-sensei would have mentioned it.
Well, no problem. I'd find everything out once I got to class.
I put my phone back into my jacket pocket, then slung my bag over my shoulder to leave.
The moment I opened my room door, I heard the sound of the neighboring door opening at the exact same time.
Ayanokouji appeared, stepping out of the room beside mine while observing me with his calm eyes.
"Good morning..." he greeted after noticing me, still standing in front of his room door.
"Ah... good morning."
I usually leave at the same time every day, but this was the first time I'd met him in the morning. Maybe he decided to leave early today.
I closed my room door properly, then walked toward the elevator to leave. I heard Ayanokouji's footsteps behind me as he headed toward the elevator as well.
I stood in front of the elevator doors with Ayanokouji beside me, waiting for them to open so we could get in.
Silence filled the space between us, which was fine with me, especially since he didn't seem like the type who enjoyed talking much.
But at this moment, the opposite seemed true, as Ayanokouji began trying to start a conversation.
"Things ended well yesterday..."
I glanced at him from the corner of my eye and found him looking at me the same way.
What's this? Is he trying to force a conversation somehow?
"Yeah, everything's over now..." I replied lazily to his monotonous words, and silence returned once again.
But apparently, he was determined to continue.
"I didn't expect you to step in like that..." Ayanokouji continued talking about yesterday's events as if he didn't know how to bring up any other topic.
He was really bad at handling conversations.
But I was good at giving boring replies.
"I did what I thought was appropriate." I shoved my hands into my pockets while staring at the elevator doors impatiently. Why was it taking so long today?
"Ah..." Ayanokouji suddenly looked like he had just remembered something he wanted to mention. "I told everyone that Horikita was the one who stepped in regarding Sudou's case. You don't mind, right?"
Ayanokouji was trying to find out whether I had any objections to what he did yesterday.
"That works for me." As long as I didn't have to get involved in explanations or justifications, I had no problem with it.
That might've been the best thing he had done so far.
Silence once again dominated the atmosphere, so I decided to watch the elevator indicator moving between floors before it finally reached ours.
"Hikigaya, I want to ask you something."
Ayanokouji, unusually enough, seemed to have a lot of things he wanted to talk about this morning.
Was his breakfast bad or something?
Usually, he'd start trying to extract information from me in some suspicious way that made me uncomfortable and pushed me to avoid him.
But if he was going to ask directly, then I'd try to answer.
I looked at him from the corner of my eye, waiting for his question, and he looked back at me the same way.
"Are people truly equal?"
A serious and sharp tone came from his voice at the same time. I wasn't used to hearing something like that from him—anything other than his usual calm, dull voice.
"Haaaah...?"
I quickly turned to look at him. I never imagined he'd ask me something like that.
Are humans equal?
I lowered my gaze to the floor while contemplating his question. I don't usually think about things like this, but I already had my own thoughts about it.
Well, for me...
The elevator finally arrived at our floor, and the doors opened, interrupting our conversation. Behind them were two familiar faces, though not ones you'd expect to see together.
Horikita and Kushida.
Ayanokouji and I stood outside watching them, completely forgetting what we had been talking about.
Well, the topic was over already.
"Are you getting in, or are you going to stay standing there?" Horikita spoke in her usual annoyed tone while glaring at us angrily.
Ayanokouji and I looked at each other before entering the elevator together. I moved toward the far corner while Ayanokouji stood between me and Kushida.
What a strange elevator.
Ayanokouji calmly observed the situation before leaning toward Horikita and speaking in a voice that was almost impossible to hear.
"I didn't expect to see you with Kushida."
"I just found her in front of me this morning." Unlike Ayanokouji, Horikita didn't hesitate to reply in an audible voice.
Oh, Kushida... such a kind girl trying to pull Horikita out of her isolation, yet look at how the other one responds.
Let's ignore her response for now.
But the strange thing was Ayanokouji's reaction toward Kushida, as if he was wary of her. Had he noticed something?
Well, anyone with decent eyes could tell how fake she was.
"Good morning, Hikigaya-kun..." Even though Ayanokouji was standing between us, Kushida didn't hesitate to try starting a conversation with me.
I nodded in response to her greeting. Let's keep talking to a minimum.
But Kushida wouldn't stop at just that. What was wrong with everyone this morning? Everyone suddenly wanted to chatter endlessly.
"Sudou-kun's problem was resolved yesterday. I heard Horikita-san was the one who stepped in." Kushida also started talking about the biggest topic in our class right now.
"Ah... yeah."
"I heard she caused quite a scene and said that expelling Sudou-kun like that was unfair." Kushida continued recounting the events.
But wait, did Ayanokouji tell them all that?
This sounded good. I'd join in.
"Yeah... when I arrived, she had already started yelling at everyone to the point where she was about to climb onto the director's desk..." I started telling my version of the events while watching Horikita's back tremble with every word.
She was seriously annoyed.
"Yeah, I saw that too." Ayanokouji decided to support my lie as well, probably just to irritate Horikita.
But strangely enough, I also felt extremely irritated by Kushida. Why was that?
"Hikigaya, if you say one more word, I'll stab you." Horikita turned around and shot me a hostile glare.
Was she threatening me?
At least threaten me with something you could actually do. Stabbing someone isn't easy.
As if Ayanokouji had read my mind and realized I doubted the seriousness of her threat, he turned toward me as well.
"She's not joking... she might actually do it..."
"What?"
I stared at Ayanokouji, whose face showed absolutely no signs of joking.
Well, you could never tell anything from his expression anyway.
But if he was serious...
"Has she stabbed you before?"
I waited eagerly for Ayanokouji's response, but he didn't answer and simply continued staring as if confirming my words.
Then I should probably lock my room door properly tonight.
"You poor guy, sitting alone beside a monster, pretending not to care while staring out the window and suffering in silence." I tried acting sympathetic toward poor Ayanokouji's situation.
But suddenly, I heard a muffled laugh inside the elevator. It was coming from Kushida.
She lowered her hand from her face after trying to hold back her laughter and spoke.
"I didn't expect Ayanokouji-kun and Hikigaya-kun to be friends."
"No, we're not friends." I replied immediately to her words, leaving absolutely no room for misunderstanding.
"Really? But you two seem close." She placed a finger on her cheek while showing an innocent expression.
"It's simply the result of convergent evolution among loners." This time, Ayanokouji answered before giving me any chance to speak.
What profound words. Where did he even learn that from?
Wait... that was mine. Why did he steal it?
I shot him a protesting look, but he didn't seem to care and simply ignored it.
The elevator finally reached the ground floor, and the doors opened as the students inside began stepping out.
Horikita shot off like an arrow toward her destination while the three of us remained standing there.
"What a shame. I was hoping we could walk to school together." Kushida looked genuinely disappointed by how quickly Horikita left.
She really was trying to get closer to her by any means possible.
Well, it was time for me to leave too.
I started walking away toward the opposite direction as well, but Kushida noticed me.
"Hikigaya-kun, aren't you coming with us to school?"
"I'm going to grab my drink first." I didn't want to walk with them. I could walk alone just fine. Besides, I needed to get my Max Coffee first.
I cast one final glance at them, where Ayanokouji looked as though he didn't want to be left alone with her, but there was nothing I could do for him.
He could deal with his own problems.
×××
I dragged my feet as I made my way back to the classroom, but on the way I heard several students complaining about not receiving any personal points today.
So the problem wasn't only with Class C or just me. That was good.
As I approached the classroom, unlike the previous days where silence dominated the area around it, chatter filled the place today. I quickly entered and saw noisy groups talking everywhere.
"Did we return to Class D this quickly?"
"Could there be some kind of mistake?"
"Is there a reason we didn't receive any points?"
Questions spread everywhere, but what caught my attention was the mention of Class D.
What exactly did they mean? We had risen in the rankings after the first month, although the gap between us and the class below us hadn't been that large.
I looked toward Yukinoshita, who was sitting in her seat with a gloomy expression, unmoving, while Hirata stood at the front trying to calm everyone down.
"Just sit down. Chabashira-sensei will come and explain everything to us."
So there really was a problem.
I stuck my head out of the classroom door and stared at the board in front of it, where the letter D had been written once again.
So we had returned to the place we deserved.
Honestly, this was expected. The class had struggled just to pass the last exam to the point where we almost lost another student. Maybe Yukinoshita was affected by the loss.
I quickly sat down in my seat, waiting for the teacher so I could understand the situation better. She didn't take long before the bell rang and she entered through the door.
She looked slightly irritated through her sharp eyes. Had she been affected by the result as well?
"Sensei, we didn't receive any points this month. Why?" Yamauchi was the first to speak up, demanding an explanation.
"Sit in your seat. I'll explain everything." Chabashira-sensei walked toward the podium to begin yet another presentation.
"As for the personal points, there will be a delay because of the school. All points will be distributed tomorrow." Chabashira-sensei explained the reason behind the first issue that had been bothering everyone.
"What?"
"We won't even get compensation?"
Nobody cared about the class rank dropping, and they continued questioning the personal points instead.
"No, you'll receive your full points tomorrow..." The teacher took out a marker and began writing on the board.
Class A: 1009
Class B: 660
Class C: 587
Class D: 600
The teacher wrote the results of the four classes for this month. It was obvious that Class D had surpassed us.
"Your class points dropped, so you will return to Class D once again." Shocked voices erupted throughout the classroom after the announcement.
By a difference of 13 points, our class had fallen back to last place once again.
As if our early success had been nothing more than beginner's momentum, and the other class had simply proven its superiority.
A loss that could break the spirit of the class.
"So... we really returned to last place?" Hirata stood up among everyone else, worried about the current situation.
But Chabashira-sensei merely nodded to confirm it.
We had returned to the bottom.