It took Suzumiya Haruhi a little over a week to fully adapt to life at Toyogasaki Academy, and just like in the past, she had experienced all the clubs in Toyogasaki that seemed slightly interesting based on their reputation.
Unsurprisingly, in just one week, the name of the genius Suzumiya Haruhi had spread throughout Toyogasaki.
But she had confirmed that these clubs were all traditional clubs with nothing new, completely different from the level of things she was pursuing.
However, during her mutual probing with Kasumigaoka Utaha, she finally discovered some of Kasumigaoka Utaha's secrets.
She was the author of the popular light novel Metronome in Love, Kasumi Utako. Although she was from Tokyo, she had moved out to live alone after entering high school.
Suzumiya Haruhi carefully analyzed Kasumigaoka Utaha's novel in conjunction with the Saekano manga that had just started serialization in the weekly magazine.
The first volume was actually a rather cliché romance novel to her. The male protagonist had no distinguishing features, and the female protagonist, when compared with the Saekano manga, was obviously a replica Kasumigaoka Utaha created based on her own template.
There was no particularly memorable plot; it became popular entirely due to Kasumigaoka Utaha's own writing style and the promotion by a large number of internet bloggers.
But in the second volume released a few days ago, Kasumigaoka Utaha had completed an evolution.
A second female lead appeared suddenly yet logically, inserting herself into the ambiguous relationship between the male and female protagonists like a hurricane.
The description of the female protagonist was no different from the first volume, but the descriptions of both the second female lead and the male protagonist were thoroughly established in just one volume.
Especially the image of the male protagonist.
For some reason, after being deskmates with Miyauchi Hikage for ten days, when reading Kasumigaoka Utaha's novel, even though the illustration of the male protagonist bore almost no resemblance to Miyauchi Hikage, Suzumiya Haruhi could smoothly substitute Miyauchi Hikage's image into the male protagonist of the second volume in her heart.
When writing, Kasumigaoka Utaha must have referenced Miyauchi Hikage's image, just not as blatantly as Shiina Mashiro did.
But seeing Kasumigaoka Utaha occasionally coming to find Miyauchi Hikage during lunch breaks and after school to discuss things, Suzumiya Haruhi still felt a sense of incongruity.
Kasumigaoka Utaha definitely knew about the intimate relationship between Miyauchi Hikage and Shiina Mashiro.
Because Shiina Mashiro was most likely another diary holder. It was just that due to Miyauchi Hikage's protection and Shiina Mashiro's own indifference to social interaction, Haruhi hadn't found an opportunity to communicate with her until now.
Moreover, even Suzumiya Haruhi herself sometimes felt that the scene of Miyauchi Hikage and Shiina Mashiro eating lunch together in silent understanding was pleasing to the eye. Yet a beautiful girl like Kasumigaoka Utaha would still frequently run over alone to find Miyauchi Hikage, seemingly not caring about other people's gazes at all.
Although Suzumiya Haruhi could sense that every time she came to find Miyauchi Hikage, a part of her attention was placed on Haruhi, wanting to observe her situation.
But the serious attitude when Kasumigaoka Utaha chatted with Miyauchi Hikage was not fake; it seemed they were really discussing something serious with Miyauchi Hikage.
So after observing Kasumigaoka Utaha for more than ten days, a bold idea suddenly appeared in Suzumiya Haruhi's mind.
Could it be that Kasumigaoka Utaha's daily mission was related to Miyauchi Hikage?
After all, her attitude towards Miyauchi Hikage was indeed the biggest anomaly about Kasumigaoka Utaha. Even Miyauchi Hikage himself stated that Kasumigaoka Utaha would often come to consult him about novel creation.
Originally, Suzumiya Haruhi planned to continue observing for a while to verify her guess.
After all, one of the goals of her mission was to hide her identity for as long as possible. She hadn't lost her curiosity about Kasumigaoka Utaha and Miyauchi Hikage yet, so maintaining such a life for another half month wouldn't be a problem for her.
But after practicing the Kusanagi style taijutsu for one night, when she came to school today, Suzumiya Haruhi had a feeling that she might not be able to hide any longer.
After all, investing the reading value obtained over ten days all at once into this taijutsu, and practicing it by herself for a night, Suzumiya Haruhi could clearly feel the changes in her body.
So, after realizing that she had really taken that step and was no longer an ordinary person, she didn't want to endure any longer. She wanted to come into contact with more secrets of this world.
Thus, she decisively shifted her target and prepared to start with Miyauchi Hikage.
Having been deskmates for more than ten days but without much communication, Suzumiya Haruhi didn't have a showdown with Miyauchi Hikage directly.
Although Miyauchi Hikage didn't talk much in class usually and his interactions with other classmates were quite easygoing, both Mashiro's manga and Kasumigaoka Utaha's second volume showed the dominant side of the male protagonist in some subtle places.
When discussing the future creative direction of the videos and his views on Shiina Mashiro with Miyauchi Hikage, Suzumiya Haruhi could also clearly feel Miyauchi Hikage's dominance.
With an equally dominant personality, she wanted to make Miyauchi Hikage her underling and obey her commands to explore more interesting places. But looking at it now, starting with Miyauchi Hikage himself or Shiina Mashiro might only make the relationship between the two stiff.
Although it was impossible for Suzumiya Haruhi to bow her head, she felt she could start from other aspects, such as Sakakibara Kouichi, whose relationship with Miyauchi Hikage seemed to have changed slightly recently.
Not only Suzumiya Haruhi noticed it, but other people in the class who followed Miyauchi Hikage's account could also notice that although the few videos filmed by Miyauchi Hikage after the Golden Week holiday were equally interesting in terms of the cases themselves, and even the shooting conditions in all aspects had become more refined than before, they just didn't reach the level of popularity of the Kanoe Yuuko one.
But Sakakibara Kouichi's state during filming was visibly not as good as before, or rather, in front of Itou Kaiji's increasingly natural performance, he was suppressed by Itou Kaiji.
Including his screen time and the number of lines, there was a certain reduction.
Even the comments under the video reflected whether Sakakibara Kouichi couldn't keep up with the team's progress.
Suzumiya Haruhi also asked Miyauchi Hikage directly about this matter.
And Miyauchi Hikage's answer was also very simple: now was the most important period for Sakakibara Kouichi, and he couldn't interfere with Sakakibara Kouichi's own choice.
So Suzumiya Haruhi went to win over Sakakibara Kouichi.
However, when Sakakibara Kouichi saw Suzumiya Haruhi really coming to find him, saying words like helping him untie the knot in his heart, his expression couldn't help but be a little subtle.
His state these days was indeed not very good.
In fact, he had already decided to continue following Miyauchi Hikage last week, but he hadn't given Miyauchi Hikage a definite answer yet.
He was thinking that he could only fully determine to continue following Miyauchi Hikage after he truly awakened to the supernatural.
After all, his curiosity about this world was also very strong.
Coupled with his hometown's name that sounded like "Yomi" (Underworld), and the mysterious girl with an eyepatch he saw when he returned to his hometown, he vaguely felt that his hometown might also hide some terrible secrets.
Even if he might encounter various futures, if he missed Miyauchi Hikage's side, he felt he would regret it for the rest of his life.
At least he had to confirm whether he could awaken to the supernatural or not.
If he really couldn't awaken to the supernatural, there would be no point in him continuing to stay in the team if he couldn't keep up with Miyauchi Hikage's pace.
And the reason for his poor state was that Miyauchi Hikage, this guy, was treating his congenitally weak body with some special power on the one hand, and on the other hand, he kept letting the evil ghost whom Miyauchi Hikage called Shadow Yuuko, but whom he couldn't see at all, try to activate the power in his body.
Mental attacks, hallucinations, serial dreams, ghost possession, inducing negative emotions in his heart...
Although the degree was not large and was maintained by Miyauchi Hikage at a level that would not cause psychological problems, after such tossing, although his spirit was tougher than before, and he could really vaguely see the outlines of some spirits, his state was indeed much worse than before.
He just didn't expect that Suzumiya Haruhi, whom Miyauchi Hikage had specially warned him about before, really came to find him.
Help me untie the knot?
My knot is that I haven't been able to complete the supernatural awakening. Can you help me?
However, Sakakibara Kouichi was a smart person. He knew that Miyauchi Hikage had seen the potential of this girl from somewhere on the first day Suzumiya Haruhi transferred here and planned to recruit her.
So he said directly to Suzumiya Haruhi: "Tomorrow is the weekend. We are going to scout for locations after school this afternoon, and the place we are going to is quite far away, so we might come back very late. If you are interested in our team, do you want to come and experience it?"
Suzumiya Haruhi was a little surprised by his frankness.
She was still thinking about winning him over, so why did he directly try to recruit her instead?
"Can you make the decision yourself?"
Sakakibara Kouichi gestured with his mouth towards Miyauchi Hikage, who was still sitting in his seat seemingly deep in thought but actually wondering if he could perform an infinite combo in reality.
"Our boss said that if you came to find me, I should tell you this."
Suzumiya Haruhi's face immediately became a little embarrassed.
Her idea of winning over the other party's underling, then hollowing out Miyauchi Hikage's authority step by step, and finally making Miyauchi Hikage succumb to her amazing abilities, had been seen through by Miyauchi Hikage before it even started?
Although she didn't know how Miyauchi Hikage saw through her intentions, she wasn't the shrinking type. Since she had decided, she naturally wouldn't retreat.
She nodded, then ran back to her seat and nudged Miyauchi Hikage, telling him that she would go location scouting with them this afternoon.
Miyauchi Hikage was not surprised at all, and even felt it was a matter of course.
After all, the place they were going to scout tonight was the location of the Bandaged Man case, known as the scariest case in the early stages of Detective Conan.
It was indeed time for Suzumiya Haruhi, the "Chosen Girl," to come and join in the fun.
That place was the private property of the Suzuki family and was not open to the public, especially after that accident happened, no one would go there anymore.
However, Miyauchi Hikage's connections were decent now.
He mentioned it to Shinomiya Kaguya, who helped him contact Suzuki Ayako, the eldest daughter of the Suzuki family, to get her consent. Then Miyauchi Hikage went to ask Conan and Ran about the specific situation at the time, and by the way, contacted Suzuki Sonoko, who openly "solved the mystery of the case" at that time. This was no longer a difficult task for Miyauchi Hikage.
When filming those videos before, Miyauchi Hikage had already easily become acquainted with Mori Kogoro through financial offensives.
In the end, Miyauchi Hikage very easily obtained first-hand information and the consent of the Suzuki family. Even Suzuki Sonoko was willing to appear on camera to review the case at that time.
The only price was letting Sakakibara Kouichi show off his charm to Suzuki Sonoko a little, calling her "Sonoko-neechan" against his will.
It was just that something unexpected happened to Miyauchi Hikage.
When school was over and they were welcoming the weekend, two luxury cars were already parked at the school gate.
One from the Shinomiya family, one from the Suzuki family.
He decisively threw Sakakibara Kouichi, this "puppy-dog boy," into the Suzuki family's car.
He didn't want to deal with the boy-crazy Suzuki Sonoko, and Shinomiya Kaguya, who was sitting in the car, wouldn't let him sit in the Suzuki family's car either.
When they first met, Suzuki Sonoko had already fawned over him.
After all, Miyauchi Hikage was handsome himself, and the Pure Yang Body and the Card Master template more or less added some charm to him.
It was only because Miyauchi Hikage decisively sold out Sakakibara Kouichi, a thin puppy-dog type who could more easily gain girls' sympathy, that he successfully diverted Suzuki Sonoko's attention.
However, looking at Suzumiya Haruhi who got into her family's car with Miyauchi Hikage, Shinomiya Kaguya's eyes couldn't help but become cautious.
The mysterious person had already mentioned it in the diary last night.
Do not provoke Suzumiya Haruhi.
She really possessed the ability to change the world.
Even if they didn't know why she came to this world or why she appeared beside Miyauchi Hikage, it was best not to provoke this willful woman.
Anyway, Shinomiya Kaguya decisively chose to ignore this woman.
Although Suzumiya Haruhi looked like a thicker thigh (backer) than Tohru.
But Tohru was reasonable, and her personality wasn't bad.
Suzumiya Haruhi was too unknown and too dangerous; she didn't want to bow to such a woman.
The best choice was not to appear around her.
But who knew that Suzumiya Haruhi, who had kept a distance from Miyauchi Hikage a few days ago, suddenly joined Miyauchi Hikage's team today?
And it seemed that Miyauchi Hikage was acting as if it was normal?
Was Miyauchi Hikage's cognition also imperceptibly distorted by this woman?
Shinomiya Kaguya thought so in her heart, feeling more uneasy, when she heard Miyauchi Hikage ask why she came specially today and if the school matters were handled well.
Shinomiya Kaguya gathered her mind and briefly explained her situation to Miyauchi Hikage.
After various coercion and inducements, although the former Student Council President hadn't really committed any major mistakes, he still bowed his head before the power of the Shinomiya Zaibatsu and resigned taking the blame.
Next Monday would be when everything ended.
Her plan was to finish being a student at Shuchiin this month, drop out next month to enter Jujutsu High, and work hard in the inner world with peace of mind.
Of course, because of Suzumiya Haruhi, she didn't say the latter things, only saying that the school matters had been almost dealt with.
As for why she came specially today.
Shinomiya Kaguya's gaze fell on Miyauchi Hikage.
It was all because that mysterious guy said in the diary yesterday that he wanted to find time to beat up Miyauchi Hikage. She was a little worried about Miyauchi Hikage's safety, so she specially came over to see the situation.