"Hey, hey, what are you talking about, Haruki? We're definitely leaving together."
Seeing that regretful look, Kanji Ike felt confused.
He waved his hand, brushing away his disappointment, and began imagining the future instead.
"If we both get expelled, we won't have to eat that cafeteria mountain-vegetable set every day anymore. We won't have to get looked down on by the other classes either. If we transfer to some other school, we can go out on weekends whenever we want. Who knows, maybe we'll even get girlfriends as transfer students!"
Getting expelled wasn't the end.
This lousy school could keep whoever wanted to stay.
Losing him and Haruki Yamauchi would only be the school's loss!
When the time came, the two of them would transfer somewhere else and complain to their new classmates about how terrible this school was.
Not even a dog should stay here.
Sure, the midterms were a disaster and the scores probably meant expulsion—but instead of sighing in despair, it was better to imagine a brighter future.
As long as he wasn't the only one getting expelled, it was fine.
If Ike alone were expelled, he probably wouldn't be able to keep such a positive mindset.
But if Yamauchi was leaving with him, what was there to fear?
The two of them were brothers!
Wherever they went, they'd be unstoppable!
And maybe it wasn't just the two of them.
When Ike glanced at the scores earlier, he noticed Ken Sudō's English score too—it was in the twenties.
Definitely a fail.
Hmph. After pretending to study so hard for so long, he still failed.
When the time came, Lord Ike would kindly comfort him!
But wait…
Now that he thought about it, he hadn't actually looked at Haruki's score yet.
Ike suddenly remembered and lifted his head toward the board.
There was no need to look at other subjects.
Only English mattered.
After all, the three of them were hopeless at English. No saving it.
Starting from his own name and moving upward…
Huh?
The name above his wasn't Haruki?
What the heck—did his score improve because of Hirata's tutoring?
Let's see…
Above him was Sotomura.
Then Inogashira.
Then Mori Nene.
Then Sudō Ken.
And only then…
"Haruki Yamauchi."
Huh?!
Since when did he climb that high?!
Even though he was still near the bottom, he wasn't even in the bottom five anymore!
Yamauchi's English score was 32.
Exactly the passing line from the last quiz!
"Hey, hey, Haruki—you actually studied seriously?!" Ike was stunned.
He never expected his best buddy to betray him!
"Ah, yeah…" Yamauchi turned his head away.
"So Ike… take care."
His voice was heavy with sorrow.
"No no no no no! What do you mean take care?! You're supposed to get expelled with me!"
Ike couldn't accept it.
Anyone else would be fine—but Yamauchi telling him to "take care"?!
"You only passed English! Why are you acting so proud?!"
He suddenly turned back to the score sheet, scanning upward again through the other subjects.
But—
"Thirty-one… thirty… thirty-three… thirty-five… thirty-two…"
The more he searched, the quieter his voice became.
Every subject.
Every single one of Yamauchi's scores was above thirty.
What the hell was this?!
What kind of nonsense was this?!
Betrayal.
Absolute betrayal!
He had abandoned the Failed Subjects Alliance!!!
But it was okay.
It was fine.
There was still Sudō!
Like grabbing a lifeline, Ike suddenly remembered the student behind him.
Sudō's English was the worst.
He definitely failed too!
Almost instantly, Ike found Sudō's English score.
"Twenty-nine!"
He clenched his fist in excitement.
"See?! That's right! I knew it! There's no way I'm the only one getting expelled! If we're leaving, we're leaving together!"
"Honestly, I've had enough of living with zero money. The sooner we get expelled, the sooner we're free!"
"Who wants to fight for Class A anyway? Let the other three classes fight over it!"
His voice was loud.
But the other students didn't say much.
They were waiting for one person to speak.
Yōsuke Hirata.
After staring at Ike for a long moment, Hirata finally sighed quietly.
"Chabashira-sensei, please draw the passing lines."
Passing or failing was determined by the class average score.
This had already been explained many times.
Half of the class average would become the passing line for each subject.
Just moments ago, after scanning the class scores and roughly calculating them, Hirata already knew the result.
…So it still wasn't enough?
He had already tried his best.
He had even abandoned his gentle persona, using a more forceful approach to push everyone to study harder.
He organized as many study sessions as possible.
He supported and tutored as many classmates as he could.
But even after lowering his own scores to control the class average—
The result was still like this.
…What else could he do?
Hirata felt lost.
He believed he had done everything he could.
Yet the result was still the same.
He couldn't stop classmates from being expelled.
He couldn't ensure everyone graduated together.
Was his use of force not enough?
Was he still too soft?
Was it—
"Pop."
Saé Chabashira silently removed the cap of her red pen.
Then, across the five subjects, she drew five bright red lines.
Unlike Class A, where everyone had passed—
Below each of these lines, there were student names.
And the English passing line Ike cared about the most…
Was drawn at 29 points.
Drawn below the name Sudō Ken.
Which meant—
Sudō Ken had passed.
"…Huh?"
Ike froze.
How could Sudō pass?!
How was that even possible?!
Although the red line clearly showed several other students failing below it, Ike didn't care about them.
He didn't know them well.
The only people he cared about were Haruki Yamauchi and Ken Sudō.
And Sudō was supposed to be the most hopeless one!
But Ike's thoughts didn't matter.
No one cared about Ike's feelings.
Leaning tiredly against the podium, Chabashira spoke in a half-dead voice:
"Kanji Ike.
Hideo Sotomura.
Kokoro Inogashira.
Nene Mori."
"You four have failed."
"In other words…"
"…this is the end for you."
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