"Not as simple as it looks on the surface?"
Although she had already made up her mind to ignore Natsuki Subaru and Kiyotaka Ayanokōji, after hearing Natsuki Subaru's words, Suzune Horikita still subconsciously looked at the grade sheet on the blackboard.
"Kiyotaka Ayanokōji… scores for each subject?"
"Fifty… fifty… fifty?"
At first, her tone was still very impatient, but when she saw that Kiyotaka Ayanokōji's subsequent scores for every subject were also fifty, the expression on Suzune Horikita's face changed.
With a hint of bewildered doubt, Suzune Horikita once again fixed her gaze on Kiyotaka Ayanokōji.
The signs of score manipulation were too obvious.
It was almost to the point where one could say he was deliberately 'showing off'.
"Hey, Natsuki-kun."
"Tell me, do I really not seem ordinary at all?"
Seeing Suzune Horikita's clearly stunned expression, Kiyotaka Ayanokōji sighed.
Kiyotaka Ayanokōji's voice was less flat than usual, with an added touch of indescribable helplessness. However, since he had been found out, Kiyotaka Ayanokōji didn't deny Natsuki Subaru's deduction.
In fact, Kiyotaka Ayanokōji had been thinking about his last conversation with Natsuki Subaru for some time now, highly suspecting that Natsuki Subaru had already seen through his disguise. This just confirmed it.
"Ayanokōji, your line of thinking is really rather bizarre."
"Why would you think that controlling your scores to be half of the maximum is equivalent to being ordinary?"
Looking at Kiyotaka Ayanokōji's 'confused' appearance, Suzune Horikita subconsciously let out a cold snort.
"To precisely control every single one of your subject scores to be fifty…"
"That is indeed not something an 'ordinary' student can do."
Suzune Horikita turned her head slightly, her gaze falling on Kiyotaka Ayanokōji's expressionless face. Her cold voice carried a faint, almost imperceptible hint of ridicule as she said, "Should I say your calculation skills are superb, or that your aesthetic sense is just too unique?"
"After all, when it comes to the matter of 'mediocrity,' you've certainly displayed astonishing 'talent' and 'effort'."
'In other words, was controlling my scores to fifty a completely wrong move?'
Kiyotaka Ayanokōji listened to Suzune Horikita's words with a blank expression.
From Suzune Horikita's reaction, he knew that his actions had not only failed to achieve his desired goal, but had instead exposed a huge flaw in Natsuki Subaru's eyes, leading him to deduce his true abilities.
'In that case, next time I'll need to reference more cases and diversify the scores.'
'But is that the only thing?'
Kiyotaka Ayanokōji pondered.
Today was just the first time the quiz results had come out.
A week ago, Natsuki Subaru had already told him that his behavior wasn't ordinary.
This time with the test scores was just a newly exposed point. There must be more about him that wasn't ordinary; it was these key points that had led Natsuki Subaru to see through him.
"Of course it's not just that."
"Ayanokōji-kun, I roughly understand some of your thoughts. You don't want to be so conspicuous."
Natsuki Subaru looked at the thoughtful Kiyotaka Ayanokōji and smiled slightly.
Although Kiyotaka Ayanokōji was expressionless, from some of his actions, his state, and their previous conversation, one could roughly deduce his thought process and behavioral logic.
Kiyotaka Ayanokōji was very concerned with whether he was 'ordinary' or 'mediocre'. Now that this matter had been brought up by him, what Kiyotaka Ayanokōji was naturally thinking about was how to remedy it.
To learn from the lesson of being discovered by Natsuki Subaru this time, and to make himself look even more ordinary next time.
Impeccably ordinary.
And after hearing Natsuki Subaru's words, Suzune Horikita, on the side, showed an expression of incomprehension.
Until a moment ago, Suzune Horikita had thought Kiyotaka Ayanokōji was playing some special trick, deliberately scoring fifty in all subjects to demonstrate his strength in another way.
But as it turned out, Kiyotaka Ayanokōji was deliberately pursuing 'ordinariness' and 'mediocrity'?
What kind of absurd goal was that?
In Suzune Horikita's personal creed, 'ability' was the standard for measuring everything.
Striving for excellence and constantly climbing upward was the natural path. Hiding one's ability, in Suzune Horikita's eyes, was nothing less than a waste and a desecration of one's own talent.
Horikita simply could not understand why someone with ability would go to such lengths to bury it, willingly indulging in the illusion of 'mediocrity'.
In Suzune Horikita's eyes, this behavior was not only meaningless, but even somewhat… pathetic.
Subconsciously, Suzune Horikita compared Kiyotaka Ayanokōji to her brother, Manabu Horikita, whom she admired so much.
Her brother was always so brilliant, standing at the pinnacle with absolute strength, leading the masses. That was the stance that a strong person, a person with ability, should have.
As for the idle and inexplicable behavior of Natsuki Subaru and Kiyotaka Ayanokōji, in Suzune Horikita's view, it was a waste of their inherent abilities. Suzune Horikita couldn't empathize with it, let alone understand it.
"The idea isn't the problem."
"Whether it's the score manipulation or befriending Haruki Yamauchi and Kanji Ike, the actions themselves aren't the problem."
Ignoring the shock in Suzune Horikita's heart, Natsuki Subaru continued his explanation to Kiyotaka Ayanokōji.
Kiyotaka Ayanokōji's idea was very simple: he wanted to control his scores to be a bit more ordinary, then make a few friends like an ordinary person. Just like that, very simple.
But what wasn't simple was that Kiyotaka Ayanokōji had no concept, no standard, for the definition of 'ordinary'.
Kiyotaka Ayanokōji didn't know what truly ordinary was.
"The only problem is one thing, and that's perception."
"Perception?"
Kiyotaka Ayanokōji had been listening intently to Natsuki Subaru's words.
Hearing this, Kiyotaka Ayanokōji appropriately voiced his confusion.
"That's right, perception."
"Your ordinary is too precise. Precision itself represents something not ordinary."
Natsuki Subaru looked at Kiyotaka Ayanokōji, whose attention was now completely captured by him, and smiled. He shifted his gaze to Suzune Horikita and said, "I believe Horikita-san should be able to make you recognize the definition of ordinary, Ayanokōji-kun."
"As for me…"
"I already have plans, so I won't elaborate any further."
As his voice fell, the bell for the end of class rang, and Natsuki Subaru decisively ended the topic.
___
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