Volume 2 - CH 16

The first day of school after the sports festival.

Early in the morning of that day, the (second) national mock exam results from the summer vacation were returned.

After the exam results were returned, the students were …… in a state of uproar.

Not many of them had happy expressions on their faces.

Yuzuru’s high school is classified as an “advanced school”.

Therefore, the students who gather at this high school are made up of honor students who can study well in middle school. ……

The level of difficulty in studying is one level different between junior high school and high school.

In addition, this high school has very loose school rules and hardly any assignments.

In Yuzuru’s experience, the summer vacation assignments were less than a tenth of what they had been in middle school.

In short, ……

If you’re a slacker, then you’ll end up staying a slacker.

Due to the difference in the number of students in the population of the mock exams, it seems that most of the students had worse results than expected.

Incidentally, regarding Yuzuru’s results……

(……Well, that’s pretty good.)

Although Yuzuru is not very serious,……, he does put in a good amount of effort in his schoolwork.

In other words, he tries to make sure that he can keep up with his classes.

It’s not the best, but it’s a better grade.

By the way, how was Arisa?

Yuzuru turned his head slightly to check her face.

She seemed to have already finished looking at the results and was folding the individual chart paper and storing it in a file.

Her expression was the usual calm, cool, and expressionless.

The people around her were gossiping about her, saying things like “Yukishiro-san, you look like you can relax” and “I’m sure you did well”.

But ……

(That’s probably because she’s depressed.)

Tomorrow is Saturday.

He decided to give her a little comfort.

After school that day.

As Yuzuru was about to leave, someone hit him hard from behind.

When he turned around to see who it was ……

There was a girl he had known since childhood who seemed to be in a very good mood.

“Hey, Yuzurun. How was the mock exam?”

It was a beautiful girl with semi-long black hair who was smiling broadly.

It was Ayaka Tachibana.

Her slightly reddish amber eyes were glowing brightly.

“Is there any reason why I should tell you?”

“Just go along with it. We’re childhood friends. I mean, is there any reason you shouldn’t tell me?”

“Well, no.”

It’s nothing to hide.

Yuzuru took out a file from his bag.

Then Ayaka rounded her eyes.

“Yuzurun is filing the individual sheets of the mock exam!　It’s going to rain tomorrow.”

“You’re so rude.”

However, Ayaka was understandably surprised, since he had been sloppy with his management in middle school.

The reason why Yuzuru thought of organizing the mock exams in a file in the first place was that he heard that that’s how Arisa saved her exam results and such.

It may be a bit of a hassle now, but it will be easier later, okay?

So he was told, and he decided to give it a try.

“Wow, as expected of Yuzurun. You’re really strong in these off-campus mock exams, aren’t you?”

Then she made a little exclamation of admiration.

“Ah, You’re second. In the school rankings.”.

“Looks like it.”

“You don’t seem too happy about it.”

“I mean, what good is a school ranking?”

College entrance exams are fought on a national level.

There’s nothing wrong with good standing in the school, but there’s no point in being happy about it.

Besides, ……

He’s losing to the girl in front of him anyway.

“By the way, I’m …..”.

“You’re in the first place anyway, aren’t you?”

Yuzuru asked, and Ayaka’s eyes narrowed.

“How did you know?”

“You’re strong in off-campus exams. I mean, you can’t be worse than me.”

Yuzuru had a certain amount of faith in this girl Ayaka Tachibana when it came to the quality of her brain.

She was very smart.

Yuzuru had never beaten Ayaka in a test like this before in his life.

“Haha, well …… I’m good at these ‘papers’.”

An examination is just a paper.

But despite her words, she proudly showed Yuzuru her results.

“……That’s impressive.”

He looked at Ayaka’s individual chart and muttered to himself.

Yuzuru was only able to beat Ayaka in one of the three subjects.

“But it’s so frustrating. I lost in English, didn’t I?”

“If I lose to ‘Tachibana’ in all subjects, I won’t be able to stand as ‘Takasegawa’. …… You can cut corners a little, okay?”

He lost to ‘Tachibana’ again.

Yuzuru thought to himself that he would rather not have to report this to his parents.

Although there is no clear conflict, the Takasegawa family has a slight rivalry with the Tachibana family.

“I can’t let up. I want to tell my uncle that I’ve beaten ‘Takasegawa’ again.”

Ayaka’s parents had died.

So her guardian is her paternal uncle.

In that respect, her situation is a bit similar to Arisa’s.

However…… The relationship between Ayaka and her uncle is very good, so that is completely different.

“Well, but, Yuzurun… It’s just a paper, after all.”

Ayaka tapped Yuzuru on the shoulder.

This is what you call the luxury of being a winner.

“I wish I could say those words to Ayaka someday.”

It might be a good idea to make a real effort to win against Ayaka.

Yuzuru suddenly thought of such a thing.

Later that day, in the evening.

Unusually, a package arrived from his parents’ house.

It said that it needed to be refrigerated.

It seemed to be some food item.

When he opened the cardboard, he found styrofoam and a letter.

The letter said, “I got this from someone I know, so I’ll share it with you. Have Arisa cook it for you.” The letter was short and to the point.

The sender seemed to be his mother.

When he opened the Styrofoam……

“Mmm ……”

A strong smell stimulated Yuzuru’s nostrils.

That smell was coming from ……

“I see. I guess when you have this many of them, it gets smelly.”

It was a large number of matsutake mushrooms.