"Upupupu... now that is impeccable timing... barging in thirty seconds before ten..."
"Hinata-kun! Hurry!"
"...Ghk!"
Grinding his teeth against the pain twisting through his abdomen, Hinata snatched up the paper lying on the table.
"I... trust those three!"
Leaving those words behind, Hinata scrawled "approve" across the sheet and shoved it into the ballot box.
"Fifty-three point five three... that was a close one..."
"Monokuma! That makes the vote ten in favor and five opposed! The yes votes did not exceed double the no votes! This vote is... a victory for the observers...!"
"I know that already, so stop explaining it!! Take this! Monokuma Punch!"
Monomi took Monokuma's rocket punch head-on and went flying into the distance. Normally it would've looked utterly pathetic, but this time? Not even close. Monomi had pulled off a miracle.
'You did good, Monomi...!'
As I praised Monomi in my head, Komaeda muttered from beside me.
"This isn't the hope I was looking for... I wanted something more grandiose..."
"Please shut your damn mouth, you deranged hope-fetish freak."
"Shut it."
"Komaeda-kun, sorry, but I'd really appreciate it if you'd keep your mouth shut."
"....."
Hit by the synchronized verbal execution from me, Kyoko Kirigiri, and Nanami, Komaeda immediately clammed up and awkwardly scratched his head.
"Komaeda... your whole hope theory is wrong..."
Hinata, breathing hard, started speaking to him.
"Hope can... be trampled by despair... that easily..."
"....."
"So if you don't want that to happen... then don't get in the way of everyone trying... with your delusions..."
"....."
"...Ugh!"
After forcing out that rebuke, Hinata suddenly clutched his stomach and collapsed to his knees.
"H-Hinata-san...!"
"Tsumiki, hurry...!"
"I-I told him not to push himself...!"
Tsumiki and Pigami supported the groaning Hinata and rushed out of the dining hall. After that, silence pooled over the room like stagnant water.
"...What a shame."
The one who shattered that silence was Monokuma. Perched on the dining table, he glared at Monomi, who was still trembling in the distance after being blasted away.
"Monomi... why do you keep getting so cheeky with me...?"
"I-I can't just... stand by and watch your atrocities any longer...!"
"Go on, then. Struggle all you want... before the few authorities you have left get hacked away too...! Upupupupupu...!"
"M-my authority...!"
"Oh, right. I was just starting to get bored anyway... so let's shake things up a little, shall we? I'll be opening the second island, so make sure you all pay it a visit! Well then, bye-bye!"
With that, Monokuma vanished.
"Somehow... I... will protect everyone...!"
Even Monomi disappeared after crying that out in a voice thick with frustration, leaving only the students behind in the dining hall.
"...So what do we do now?"
"Night has already fallen, so we'll postpone exploring the second island until tomorrow. First, we deal with that bastard. Everyone agree?"
The others silently nodded. Then, keeping just shy of anything that would count as outright assault, they subdued the still-silent Komaeda as violently as possible, tied him up from head to toe, and carried him off toward the old building.
.
.
.
.
.
"Phew... there were a lot of twists and turns, but it worked out in the end."
"The real problem starts now. We need to stay sharp from here on out."
"Do you think Hinata will be okay...?"
After everyone dumped Komaeda into the storage room in the old building, they split up there since it was late and there was nothing else left to do.
Nanami, Kyoko Kirigiri, and I had won the vote, so there was no longer any real need for us to stay glued together. Still, after spending the last few days side by side, we naturally kept talking as we walked.
"K, look at me for a second."
"Hm? Togami...?"
Pigami suddenly appeared in front of us, looking like he had something to say to me.
Come to think of it, I'd asked him before to stop anyone from playing the game. But judging from Koizumi's reaction, Kuzuryu had already played it and sent a threatening letter to Koizumi, the person tied to the motive. So what had happened?
"About what you asked me to do before... I failed you. I couldn't stop Kuzuryu from playing the game."
"Kuzuryu...?"
"He approached the game console, so I tried to stop him. But he'd already seen me play it. Once he asked whether I was allowed to play it but he wasn't, I had no choice but to step aside."
"Hmm..."
"Of course, I could have forced the issue. But under those circumstances, causing more conflict would've been bad for everyone. Sorry I couldn't keep my promise..."
"It's fine. It couldn't be helped. Thanks for trying, Togami."
"...Then I'll be going."
So that was it. Kuzuryu really had played the game and sent Koizumi that threatening letter. If we left this alone, Chapter 2 could repeat itself. We needed a countermeasure, fast.
Thankfully, the [clear bonus] that went to Kuzuryu in the original story was in our possession now. Most likely, since Kuzuryu hadn't seen the [clear bonus], he couldn't tell whether the game's contents were real or fake.
In other words, if we could just keep the [clear bonus] hidden, stopping Kuzuryu's rampage might be easier than expected. We needed to guard it carefully.
"Hey, about the [clear bonus]... where is it right now?"
"Ah...! I hid it in the dining hall of the old building!"
"Hmm... up until now, we've always been stationed in the old building, so it wasn't a problem. But now that we won't be staying there, leaving it there feels a little..."
"I'll take care of it."
"Ah, then I'm counting on you... Let's split up here."
With that, Kyoko Kirigiri headed back toward the old building, Nanami returned to the cottages, and I was left alone.
'...Damn it.'
Once I was by myself, the bright expression I'd been forcing onto my face twisted apart, and a deep sigh spilled out.
'What's coming next is the real problem.'
What happened today was, technically, a victory. The first one I'd tasted in a while. And yet it didn't make me happy at all. Of course it didn't. We hadn't stopped the motive. We hadn't prevented a murder. All we'd won was the right to move around freely again.
We still hadn't even resolved the motive we'd already been given. And even if we somehow dealt with this one, the third and fourth motives... just imagining them made my skin crawl. Honestly, I couldn't even begin to picture how we were supposed to handle them.
'The third and fourth... they're basically just Monokuma demanding that someone die no matter what... Haaah, what do I even do...'
Come to think of it, the motives weren't the only problem. Monokuma's changed attitude compared to the last killing game was a problem too.
He'd been petty in the previous killing game too, sure, but this time? His pettiness had metastasized into something far uglier, far more shameless.
The reason was probably the changed objective behind this killing game. And because of that, every time I thought about the future, my chest tightened and breathing itself started to feel difficult.
'Standing here brooding won't change anything. I just need to pull myself together and... no, what good is that gonna do? Haaah...'
I tried to steady my mind and force myself into my usual positive mode, but too much stress had piled up lately. It was unbelievably hard. In the end, after standing there sighing for a while, I decided I needed to clear my head and headed for Jabberwock Park.
.
.
.
.
.
"Phew... my head's a complete mess..."
I tried meditating as I wandered through the park at night, but there was still no sign of my mental state recovering. Even so, it felt better than standing still, so I kept roaming through the dark, deserted park for quite a while.
Come to think of it, taking a walk this late at night was something the old me never would've even dreamed of doing. But after surviving so many brushes with death, being scared of a nighttime stroll felt almost laughable.
If anything, it was so quiet I was starting to yawn...
"I'm telling you!! I don't know anything about it!!!"
"Waugh!!!"
The sudden shout startled a scream right out of me. Clutching my pounding heart, I turned toward the source of the noise and found Koizumi and Kuzuryu glaring at me.
"You... what the hell are you...?"
"Screaming out of nowhere, you little shit... why don't you get lost already?"
Normally, I would've tucked my tail between my legs and run. But the two people fighting were Koizumi and Kuzuryu, so I couldn't exactly do that.
"What are you two doing out here?"
"Idiot, mind your own damn business and get the hell out of here...!"
"No, why are you cursing at me..."
"You wanna go?"
Watching Kuzuryu spit abuse with a scowl on his face gave me the bizarre urge to flick him right in the forehead. Barely suppressing that impulse, I studied the two of them more carefully. Kuzuryu was in a state of obvious agitation, while Koizumi was trembling with anxiety.
"I don't know what's going on, but Koizumi looks really shaken up, so maybe calm down a little and—"
"This is our business, so stay out of it, asshole!! Don't make me say it twice...!"
"God, what a pain. You damn pint-sized brat."
'He's way too worked up. Calm down first... what the hell happened to make him like this...?'
"W-what...!?"
Ah. Oops. I said that last part out loud.
Maybe he hadn't expected to get cursed out so suddenly, because Kuzuryu just stared at me blankly for a second. Then his face flushed red and he exploded.
"Pint-sized!? Did you just call me pint-sized!? You bastard!!"
I hadn't expected him to react more violently to "pint-sized" than to all the swearing. At first I was going to apologize, but once I let one good insult fly, it felt like all the resentment I'd been bottling up since the last killing game up through today came erupting out at once.
...At this point, I might as well shut my eyes and let it all out. If I didn't vent somehow, I really was going to lose my mind from the stress.
"Yeah, I did, you pint-sized little bastard! Tiny as hell and whining all the time like some spoiled little kid!!"
"....."
"....."
Wow. That felt incredible. I felt so refreshed I could've floated away. I should've gone off on Komaeda too while I had the chance. Maybe tomorrow I ought to visit him and finish the job—
".....!"
Suddenly, I felt a monstrous killing intent behind me and whipped around in shock. Pekoyama was striding toward us, eyes wide and sharp.
With every step she took, that murderous pressure thickened until it felt hard to breathe. My hand instinctively moved toward the personal alarm hanging around my neck, but—
".....I still suspect you."
Pekoyama lightly blocked my hand from reaching the alarm with her wooden sword, then brushed past me after whispering those icy words.
"Kuzuryu. Someone is looking for you. Come with me."
"....."
Then Kuzuryu and Pekoyama, both radiating lethal menace, walked away and left Koizumi and me behind.
'...Did I almost just die?'
If I'd been alone, I might've ended up the next victim, buried somewhere in this park before morning. A chill ran through my whole body. Yeah... I should probably end tonight's little act of rebellion here.
"H-hh..."
"Hm?"
I turned at the strange sound beside me and saw Koizumi collapsed on the ground. Well, that made sense. She'd already been trembling with anxiety, and then Pekoyama's killing intent had crashed down on top of that.
"Hey, Koizumi... are you okay?"
"....."
"Here, take my hand and get up slowly."
"Uugh..."
I helped Koizumi to her feet, and she lowered her eyes with a pale face as she spoke.
"Th-thank you... for helping me..."
"It's nothing. More importantly... you look like you've got a lot on your mind. For now, get some real sleep and settle your heart. Then tomorrow, come talk to me. I'll help you as much as I can with my talent as the [Ultimate Counselor]."
If I were being honest, I wanted to talk about the motive right then and there. But she looked far too shaken, so I decided to put it off until tomorrow.
"...Okay."
"Then I'll see you tomorrow. It's night, so be careful on your way back."
Leaving those words behind, I finally headed back to my cottage for the first time in a while, hoping to shake off the stress and exhaustion that had piled up over the past few days.
"What the heck... sticking his nose in for no reason... what an idiot..."
Meanwhile, Koizumi watched K's back disappear into the darkness and muttered to herself, her face flushed red.
========================================
The website for reading paid chapters is available on my Patreon. The number of chapters on Patreon: 132
Link: patreon.com/UltraMagnus_T