The match between Shikime Natsu and Nagumo Miyabi was an event that had captured the attention of most of the school, so after Nagumo Miyabi's defeat, the news quickly spread throughout the entire campus.
After all, Nagumo Miyabi was a big shot among the second-years. Losing to a first-year naturally generated a high level of discussion.
Moreover... someone was anonymously fanning the flames, claiming that Nagumo Miyabi had lost the second-years' points this time around and had played all the second-years for fools. As the leader of the second-years, was it really right for him to waste their points like this?
Of course, Shikime Natsu didn't know exactly who was spreading these rumors behind the scenes, nor did he particularly care.
According to the grapevine, the source seemed to be someone from the second year.
However, no matter how much the rumor spread, it didn't have any negative impact on Shikime Natsu.
After all, he was the winner who had claimed an overwhelming victory.
No matter where you go, most people enjoy beating a drowning dog. This was especially true since Nagumo Miyabi had accumulated a lot of resentment over time. Many people had wanted to deal with him, but previously, Nagumo Miyabi had enough of a track record to suppress them to the point where they couldn't even catch their breath.
Now, that invincible Nagumo Miyabi—the Nagumo Miyabi who had maintained an excellent record ever since enrollment—had actually lost to a first-year student. As a result, some people's minds began to work actively, and they became slightly restless.
As for the vast majority of harmless doubts and questions, Nagumo Miyabi chose to ignore them.
However, for those small fries who jumped too high and provoked him too excessively, he directly applied thunderous measures to sanction them.
After all...
He had only lost in academic ability to Shikime Natsu, who was practically using a cheat ability.
Could it be that he couldn't even handle these nobodies who only knew how to take advantage of a fire to loot?
One must know, the vast majority of the entire second year's private points were still firmly in Nagumo Miyabi's grasp.
His foundational base was still there, and his methods were still intact.
Suppressing this unruly mob was still an easy task for him. One must remember that he had climbed from Class B to the position of Class A, defeating many opponents to get here. Did they really think they could settle the score with him over just a single defeat? What a joke. Besides, since those points were in his hands, they belonged to him. Was it their place to make irresponsible remarks?
He just needed to ensure that the tickets he had promised would be delivered without any unexpected issues.
Time quickly advanced to Friday.
The grades for the midterm exams were completely published on this day.
Fortunately, not a single unlucky soul in the entire first year faced expulsion due to failing the midterms.
That made sense. One must remember that the entire first year had access to the past exam questions. Moreover, they knew the contents of the past exams several days in advance. With so many days to memorize the past questions beforehand, if someone still managed to get expelled, Shikime Natsu would truly have to say that their level of humanity was even lower than Yamauchi Haruki's. After all, even Yamauchi Haruki had passed.
As for the class points, it was exactly as Shikime Natsu had guessed from the very beginning.
As long as there were no expulsions, every class would unconditionally receive 100 class points as a reward.
To Shikime Natsu, this was undoubtedly a good thing.
Not just because Class A's points had increased, which subsequently increased everyone's monthly allowance.
More importantly...
Yamauchi Haruki and Ike Kanji, those two massive debtors, finally had the money to pay back their debts.
Of course, Yamauchi Haruki had previously caused an incident—namely, Nagumo Miyabi's underwear incident. The impact at the time had been quite severe. However, Yamauchi Haruki was only hit with a personal points penalty and a suspension from school. As for deducting class points, since Class D was originally at zero points anyway, no additional penalty could be applied.
Class D managing to reduce their class points to zero in the very first month could be considered a blessing in disguise. If they had possessed any class points, who knows how many would have been deducted over this incident.
There was another good thing. According to the school's rules, there was a priority system for these deductions.
Before anything else, they had to fully repay their personal point debt to Shikime Natsu before paying the personal points deducted by the school.
In other words, as long as they behaved themselves throughout the upcoming month of May and didn't cause any major news that would result in point deductions, Shikime Natsu would receive this owed sum when points were distributed at the beginning of next month.
Of course, the prerequisite was that these two idiots could actually resist the urge to act stupid.
Otherwise, paying off this debt would probably be delayed indefinitely.
...
The school dismissal bell rang.
Shikime Natsu packed his schoolbag and glanced at Kamuro Masumi beside him, who was also packing her things.
"Let's go," he said with a light smile.
Kamuro Masumi nodded, shouldered her bag, and followed him.
Today was Friday.
Tomorrow was the day of her official showdown with Sakayanagi Arisu.
The three competition subjects had already been selected, and the test papers had also been prepared by neutral teachers.
To prevent Sakayanagi Arisu, who was known as a smug brat, from pulling any petty tricks behind the scenes, Shikime Natsu directly used 'Observer' on her to ensure she wasn't up to anything shady.
After all... that was Sakayanagi Arisu. Shikime Natsu had to be on guard. What if that girl had asked for the exam questions in advance?
Fortunately, that smug brat Sakayanagi Arisu was behaving rather obediently.
Today, Shikime Natsu would personally create mock questions for Kamuro Masumi. With his infinite printing capability paired with the knowledge in his head and his photographic memory, producing three sets of exam papers was a matter of minutes.
Shikime Natsu essentially geared the difficulty of the three sets of papers toward the harder side. After all, doing simple questions didn't hold much meaning. Moreover... Shikime Natsu ensured that Kamuro Masumi hadn't seen a single one of the questions before.
"Natsu... thank you..."
During their walk back to the dormitory, Kamuro Masumi suddenly said this to Shikime Natsu. The young girl's cheeks were flushed red, looking incredibly cute.
"Thank me for what?" Shikime Natsu chuckled.
Seeing the smile on Shikime Natsu's face, Kamuro Masumi immediately knew what this guy was thinking. He probably wanted to tease her again.
"Thank you for specifically making these mock questions for me, and for always helping me review."
However... Kamuro Masumi still offered her thanks very earnestly. When it came to learning ability, the current Kamuro Masumi was probably only second to Shikime Natsu himself. After all, over the past two weeks, she had spent a considerable amount of time specifically seeking him out to study.
To allow someone like her, whose academic performance hadn't originally been very good, to reach this level of proficiency, Shikime Natsu must have poured a lot of effort into it.
Looking at the young girl's expression, a gentle arc formed at the corners of Shikime Natsu's mouth.
"There's no need to be so polite. We're deskmates, after all."
Hearing the word 'deskmates', Kamuro Masumi felt slightly uncomfortable in her heart. Even though the two of them were indeed deskmates, and sometimes the title of 'deskmate' sounded a bit better than 'friend' or something similar, but... it always felt like it was lacking something.
She wished Shikime Natsu had given a different answer—a much more intimate one.
Unfortunately...
Kamuro Masumi looked at Shikime Natsu. Did this guy really not understand her feelings?
Soon, the two of them arrived at Shikime Natsu's dormitory.
Opening the door, Shikime Natsu skillfully changed into his slippers and turned his head to look at Kamuro Masumi.
"Are you staying for dinner tonight as well?"
Kamuro Masumi could be considered a regular guest for his dinners. Most of the time, she and Shiina Hiyori came over together to eat. Especially after learning that Shiina Hiyori was studying cooking from Shikime Natsu and feeding him her dishes, this beautiful girl—who usually felt that cooking herself was incredibly troublesome—unexpectedly started wanting to learn how to cook too.
"Mm," Kamuro Masumi nodded.
After all...
This was a meal personally prepared by Shikime Natsu.
Moreover, it tasted absolutely delicious.
What reason did she have to refuse?
"However, it will only be the two of us eating dinner tonight. Hiyori has some things to take care of today," Shikime Natsu added.
"Mm," Kamuro Masumi nodded gently, but a hint of joy surfaced in those purple eyes. This meant that tonight's dinner would only be her and Shikime Natsu.
The amount of time she could spend alone with Shikime Natsu had increased a little.
"Have a seat," Shikime Natsu pointed to the chair in front of the desk, then pulled out three test papers from the cabinet beside him.
He pulled over another chair, sat down next to her, and smiled.
"If you can solve all of these and get a good score..."
"Then, dealing with Sakayanagi in tomorrow's exam will be a piece of cake."
Looking at the densely packed questions before her, Kamuro Masumi took a deep breath and nodded.
"I know."
It was still early, only a bit past three in the afternoon, so Shikime Natsu wasn't in a hurry to go to the kitchen to prepare dinner.
Instead, he simply sat beside her, acting as her proctor.
The room was very quiet. The only sound was the rustling of the pen tip scraping against the paper.
Being stared at from such a close distance while answering the questions, Kamuro Masumi inevitably felt a bit nervous in her heart.
Especially right now...
In this somewhat cramped and private space, the distance between the two of them was much closer than when they were deskmates in the classroom.
It was so close that she could even smell the faint, pleasant, refreshing scent coming from his body.
This sense of proximity caused her heartbeat to involuntarily quicken a few beats.
Calm down... Kamuro Masumi, you need to calm down!
Now is the time to do exam questions. Don't think about random, pointless things!
She gave herself a harsh warning in her mind, trying to shake away all those weird and wonderful thoughts filling her head.
Of course...
Compared to the time Shikime Natsu gave her a massage or pressed his forehead against hers, this distance was actually still quite manageable.
Kamuro Masumi forcibly gathered her scattered thoughts and concentrated all her attention on the test papers in front of her.
She had to win. Defeating Sakayanagi Arisu was her goal. She absolutely could not let Sakayanagi Arisu win. Otherwise, Shikime Natsu would become Sakayanagi Arisu's male servant. How could she possibly let such a thing happen?!
The tip of her pen moved rapidly.
Shikime Natsu sat to the side, quietly watching her every problem-solving step.
Although he didn't say a word, the smile in his eyes grew increasingly deep.
Her accuracy rate... up until now, had been completely perfect.
Moreover, even her previously somewhat messy handwriting had noticeably improved, becoming much neater and more elegant.
Even when encountering some of the traps and difficult points he had intentionally set in the questions, Kamuro Masumi was able to analyze them calmly and provide the correct answers.
It seemed the results of her special training during this period were extremely remarkable.
That made sense.
Shikime Natsu chuckled lightly in his heart.
He was a famously renowned cheat-user, possessing the ability to transfer mastery. If Kamuro Masumi still lost under these conditions, Shikime Natsu would truly feel that his cheat ability was incredibly watered down.
As long as she answered the questions normally, Kamuro Masumi wouldn't lose. Of course, unless she completely messed up filling out the answer sheet, in which case it would be game over.
But... Kamuro Masumi probably wouldn't make such a careless mistake.
Time ticked by, minute by minute, second by second.
Because she was already quite familiar with the knowledge points, Kamuro Masumi's speed in solving the questions was extremely fast.
In less than two hours, she set down her pen. All three test papers had been completely answered.
"Phew..."
She let out a long sigh of relief and looked up at Shikime Natsu. Those purple eyes carried a trace of anticipation and apprehension.
"How is it? Did I do... okay?"
Shikime Natsu took the test papers and quickly scanned over them.
Actually, while he was watching her from the side just now, he had already mentally calculated the results.
But he still put on a show of checking them over. Then, he looked up, meeting the young girl's nervous gaze, and delivered the final verdict.
"A perfect score."
Hearing these two words, Kamuro Masumi's tightly wound body instantly relaxed.
A hard-to-conceal smile finally flashed across those initially serious purple eyes.
A perfect score...
And on mock exams of this level of difficulty, no less.
This meant that for tomorrow's exam, as long as she performed normally, she essentially had it in the bag.
"As expected of my deskmate. Well then... to celebrate Masumi achieving such a wonderful result of a perfect score..."
He stood up and walked toward the kitchen, his voice carrying a hint of indulgence.
"Tonight, I'll show off my skills and make you a delicious meal."
No matter what he made, Shikime Natsu could produce incredibly delicious dishes. Furthermore... Kamuro Masumi had been coming here for quite a while now. Naturally, Shikime Natsu was very clear about what kind of food the young girl preferred.
Today, he was naturally going to cook Kamuro Masumi's favorite dishes.
Kamuro Masumi watched Shikime Natsu's busy figure in the kitchen and wanted to step forward to help, but Shikime Natsu told her to just sit back down and relax.
"Wait until next time, then Masumi can personally cook a meal for me. I'm really looking forward to Masumi's cooking," Shikime Natsu said with a light chuckle.
Hearing Shikime Natsu say this, Kamuro Masumi nodded and agreed. Over these past few days, she had followed Shikime Natsu and learned quite a bit about cooking; it shouldn't turn out too terrible, right?
If it turned out terrible, that would be bad. Kamuro Masumi tried to recall the steps Shikime Natsu had taught her for making the dishes. Every step was very clear in her mind, but... actually executing it with her own hands was a different story.
Once she finished defeating Sakayanagi Arisu, she would have to properly train her cooking skills.
No, wait. She couldn't set a flag this early. Kamuro Masumi had heard that Nagumo Miyabi had been wildly flaunting in front of Shikime Natsu right before the exam started and before the results were out, and then he ended up losing. She absolutely could not end up like that.
Flags must not be set recklessly.
...
Saturday, the day of the exam.
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