Hiyori had joined the Student Council so she could spend time with Ryunosuke in a way that made logical sense. That was more or less the situation.
There were two Secretary positions on the council, and one of them went to Hachiman. Ryunosuke recognized the guy's work ethic and sharp mind, so he had dragged him in as something close to forced labor. The bait was a salary of 100,000 personal points per month, a tempting offer for someone who had been scraping by on 2,000 points a month before enrolling.
It worked remarkably well. For the sake of 100,000 points, Hachiman willingly threw himself into the work like a beast of burden. His reason, however, was a little strange. When Ryunosuke asked what he planned to do with all that money, Hachiman answered with a perfectly straight face.
"I want to save up an allowance for my little sister, Komachi, so she doesn't fall behind at the starting line and can buy whatever she wants."
Ryunosuke hit him with a dry remark. "Your sister isn't enrolled at Advanced Nurturing High School, is she?"
Hachiman went silent on the spot. Even so, Ryunosuke brought him on board in the end.
The Vice President positions also came in pairs. One went to Suzune, and the other went to Asuna, who was in desperate need of money. One day, Asuna had shown up in tears, begging him to "take her in."
Before anyone gets the wrong idea, it was nothing like that. She was asking to be placed in the Student Council so she could earn some spending money. Her gaming hobby had drained every last one of her personal points. She was surviving on nothing but the free meal options at the cafeteria every single day. In short, her situation was genuinely tragic.
Ryunosuke took pity on her and brought Asuna on board, appointing her as Vice President with a monthly salary of 100,000 points. The only issue was that whenever Asuna showed up for work, there was something, well, how to put it? You'll just have to see for yourselves.
Picture the execution theme from Overlord playing in your head.
The music begins.
The sound of perfectly synchronized footsteps, like a military column on the march, echoed down the hallway toward the Student Council President's office. It was the entire Class B, all forty-one of them, minus Arisu and Masumi who hadn't come. Standing at the very center of the formation was none other than Asuna.
A flash of red flickered across Asuna's eyes. Katsuragi and Hashimoto flanked her on either side, dropping to one knee as if receiving their queen. Her close friend Misumi rolled out a red carpet leading straight to the entrance of the Student Council office, kneeling alongside it with an expression of grave solemnity.
The rest of Class B lined up on both sides like soldiers, throwing crisp military salutes as though paying tribute to a dictator. The only thing missing was someone shouting "Heil."
Asuna walked down the red carpet with the unmistakable aura of a sovereign, her long flaxen hair catching the breeze as she moved.
She settled into the Student Council President's chair, crossed her long, elegant legs, folded her arms, and fixed the assembled group before her with an ice-cold, utterly crushing stare.
"Raise your heads!"
"Yes, Asuna-sama!!!" Every member of Class B lifted their gaze to their leader in unison.
Ryunosuke stood off to the side, desperately wanting to point out that it was his chair, but not daring to say a word. Looking at how reverently Class B worshipped her, he was fairly sure that if he protested, things would not end well for him. So he kept his mouth shut.
Hachiman also said nothing out loud, too wary of drawing attention. He could only mutter to himself internally. (Where did this fake emperor come from... the audacity is unreal...)
Every member of Class B knelt and pledged their undying allegiance. "We will be loyal to Asuna-sama until death! (×N)"
Asuna waved her hand with a grand, sweeping gesture. "Dismissed! There is nothing more for you here."
"Yes!" Class B disbanded at once and filed out obediently.
Only once everyone had gone did Ryunosuke dare to speak. "What was that all about, Asuna?"
Asuna instantly dropped back into her normal self. She stood up from the President's chair, gave Ryunosuke a sheepish little push to sit back down, and scratched the back of her head with an awkward laugh.
"Haha, sorry, sorry. The people under me are just so devoted, I felt bad ruining the moment, so I went along with it."
Ryunosuke sank into his rightful chair, eyes practically rolling back from the sheer absurdity of it all, though he didn't actually blame Asuna. He was just curious where she had picked up behavior like that.
Asuna didn't hide it. She pulled out a book she had bought online, titled How to Be a Quality Ruler, and handed it over.
Ryunosuke looked at the cover, and for a moment, he was completely at a loss for words.
◆━⊰✿✧✿⊱━◆
Elsewhere.
Ichika was busy familiarizing herself with the school's rules. Since it was the first day of classes for the first-years, there were no formal lessons, which gave her plenty of free time to study the school's regulations in detail.
She had already worked through nearly the entire rulebook and had begun mapping out a strategy for dealing with Ryunosuke. All that remained was to test how well it would actually work.
A smile curved at the corners of Ichika's lips. She skipped her way toward the dormitory assigned to her, pulled out her room key card, looked it over for a moment, and tapped it against the reader. The door clicked open. She stepped inside and took in her surroundings.
Dormitory rooms at this school were almost certainly built to a uniform size and layout, right down to the kitchenette and furniture arrangement. If she understood her own room well enough, she could map out what anyone else's looked like.
Ichika turned her attention to her key card. She had been given two, which was standard, the second one being a spare in case the first was lost. She took one apart and examined the internal structure, wondering whether it could be hacked to create a master key, something that would let her slip into anyone's room and make what she had planned considerably easier.
The school, however, seemed to have anticipated exactly that. The card's data was protected by an anti-tampering system, and try as she might, she couldn't crack it.
Ichika gave up on that approach and fell back on her contingency plan. She tracked down Yagami from Class B and asked to borrow one of his key cards. Since she had already taken apart one of her own, she needed a replacement to carry out her plan.
Before handing it over, Yagami asked what she needed it for. Ichika answered honestly that it was for dealing with Ryunosuke. Yagami's interest sharpened immediately.
"Oh? Care to explain in more detail? Now I'm curious."
Ichika wasn't foolish enough to lay everything out. She kept the full picture to herself so Yagami wouldn't interfere with her plan. But since he wasn't getting the information he wanted, he naturally wasn't inclined to lend the card.
In the end, they struck a compromise. Ichika shared part of the plan without revealing the whole thing, though the broad outline was easy enough to infer. With Yagami's mind, honed as the top graduate of the fifth generation from the White Room, piecing together the complete picture was only a matter of time.
Ichika wasn't hoping to hold him off for long. She just needed him to stay out of her way.
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