Class 1-A.
Mashima-sensei stood before the podium, explaining the final special exam of the first year.
Special Exam:
March 8th—Special Exam Announcement Day. Opponent classes decided the same day.
March 15th—Ten events decided. Opponent classes announce ten events and their rules.
March 22nd—Event Selection Exam Day.
Event Selection Exam—Rules for deciding exam events.
Overly niche events, overly complex events, and event rule restrictions:
If a field is classified too narrowly, it might not be approved.
If written tests are used as events, the school will create the questions to maintain fairness.
Events are forbidden from deviating from or changing basic rules.
Regarding usable facilities:
On the day of the special exam, the Command Tower will conduct the exam events in the multi-purpose classroom. Additionally, the gymnasium, sports field, music room, and science lab can basically all be used, with some exceptions.
Regarding event and time limits:
If events are judged to have identical content, each class can only adopt one of them. Furthermore, if an event takes too long to complete or has no time limit, it may not be adopted.
Regarding participant numbers:
The required number of people for an event, excluding substitutes, must be different for all ten proposed events.
The minimum is one person, and the maximum is twenty (including substitutes, the total must not exceed twenty).
Including substitutes, a class can register a maximum of two events with more than ten people.
Regarding participation conditions:
Each student can participate in one event. They cannot participate in two or more.
However, if every single student has already participated in an event, they may participate in two or more.
Regarding the Command Tower's duties:
The Command Tower has the right to intervene in seven events. How they intervene will be decided by the class that chooses the event. Interventions must be approved by the school before they are adopted.
After hearing the rules, Class A fell into silence. Understanding the rules wasn't difficult.
Each event would increase or decrease class points by 30.
Winning an event adds 30 points; losing subtracts 30. If a class wins all seven events, they gain 210 points.
A Commander would be selected to handle remote commands from the multi-purpose room, while the other students would act as soldiers participating in the competitions according to orders.
In other words, almost all the weight of this exam was placed on the Commander.
It depended entirely on the Commander's mental fortitude and their individual ability to adapt. Everyone else was just a pawn.
The difficulty lay in the fact that if they lost, the Commander would face expulsion.
Originally, this wouldn't have been a difficult problem.
If the Protection Point had been on Sakayanagi Arisu, she would naturally be the most reliable person to serve as the Commander.
However, the Protection Point was now on Katsuragi!
If they forcefully demanded Sakayanagi serve as Commander and they lost, Class A would not only lose their leader but might drop straight to Class B.
The best way was undoubtedly for Katsuragi to serve as the leader.
However, Katsuragi sat with his arms crossed, silent, feeling almost like laughing inside.
He hadn't expected the opportunity to come so quickly!
However, being too pushy always led to Sakayanagi pulling him down. Not only was it unrewarding, but the blame would always be pinned on him.
This time, Katsuragi had become smarter. He sat in his seat, as steady as a mountain!
Retreat to advance!
If you guys don't speak up, I won't say a word!
Come on, speak!
Beg me to be the Commander. Otherwise, if Sakayanagi dares to take the role, he'll trip her up this time and send her packing.
Let's see if she's afraid.
Of course, Katsuragi wouldn't abandon any teammates and naturally wouldn't actually get Sakayanagi expelled, but this was certainly his chance for a comeback.
Most importantly, he not only had to win, but he had to keep all the credit for himself! He couldn't give Sakayanagi another chance to sabotage him!
With both leaders silent, Class A fell into an eerie stillness.
On the other side, Sakayanagi, sitting in the middle, was turning green with anger!
She had finally gotten the chance to face off against Ayanokouji. It was a perfect opportunity.
Yet, she couldn't intervene!
Facing that perfect masterpiece from the White Room, Sakayanagi naturally didn't have an absolute guarantee of victory.
Defeat meant expulsion!
She wasn't particularly afraid of expulsion. Sakayanagi didn't care about the privilege of choosing any career.
However, that Hikigaya guy had interrupted her plans several times and she hadn't retaliated yet. And then there was the person who instigated the first-years to give the outside praise votes to Katsuragi.
Sakayanagi truly couldn't swallow this!
So things were stuck in a stalemate.
After a long time, Sakayanagi spoke with a gentle, fake smile.
"For this exam, I will naturally serve as the Commander."
"Wait."
Matoba Shinji quickly stood up, slamming the table. "That won't do! Although I don't think the Princess will lose, what if? Losing Sakayanagi would be a huge loss for us no matter how you look at it."
At this level...
Many things were already out of Sakayanagi's control. Even if she wanted to take the lead, it would be difficult for the others to agree.
Of course.
If Sakayanagi were forceful, it wouldn't be impossible, but her attitude wasn't particularly forceful either.
"Yeah."
Takuro Morishige pointed at Katsuragi and said indignantly, "Clearly, it should be Katsuragi, who has the Protection Point, who acts as the commander. Katsuragi, stop playing dumb over there."
"Mm."
Katsuragi sat in his seat as steady as a mountain, his expression flat as he spoke:
"If you all insist on me being the commander, I can naturally accept it. But if someone continues to drag us down, whether we win or not will have nothing to do with me."
The underlying meaning was:
It was time for Sakayanagi to show her stance!
If she continued to sabotage the class, they would surely fall from Class A, and Katsuragi wouldn't take the blame for that!
For a moment.
Everyone in the class looked at Sakayanagi instinctively with complex gazes. Now was really not the time to continue the internal feuding.
However.
Feeling everyone's eyes on her, although Sakayanagi remained calm on the surface, her heart felt stifled to the extreme.
She naturally didn't care about this class.
However.
She was also very aware of Ayanokouji's true strength. If things continued as before, the exam might end with Ayanokouji winning before it even reached the final stage.
At that time.
Ayanokouji might even directly "go easy" in the one-on-one duel.
She had worked so hard to secure this chance to face Ayanokouji.
Arisu Sakayanagi was absolutely unwilling to give it up.
However.
Katsuragi's strength wasn't weak, and his overall vision was strong.
If no one dragged him down.
The exam could indeed progress to the final match.
But if that happened.
Sakayanagi would be stuck regardless of winning or losing. She naturally didn't want to lose, but if she won, the credit would go to the commander, Katsuragi.
Then.
Katsuragi would rise again! The Katsuragi faction might be revived, and to stop the internal fighting, some members of the Sakayanagi faction might even defect.
It was a stalemate again.
"Whew."
Sakayanagi took a deep breath secretly. After weighing the pros and cons, she felt the duel with Ayanokouji was more important.
"Only, Katsuragi-kun, do you really have the strength to lead everyone to victory?"
Hearing this.
Everyone breathed a sigh of relief. The implication was that she agreed; she wouldn't sabotage him, but if they couldn't win, it would be a problem with Katsuragi's ability.
"I don't know."
Katsuragi wasn't going to fall for that trap now. He said with a flat expression: "Even if we lose, I only lose my Protection Point. Isn't that exactly what you want?"
"In any case, I'm not guaranteeing anything now. You are all the ones begging me to do this. If there's credit, I'll take it. If there's a mistake, it's what you wanted!"
Hearing this.
The expressions of the people in Class A turned even more sour.
To be honest, they really didn't want Katsuragi to keep the Protection Point; they even wanted to strip it from him directly.
But not in this way.
Katsuragi's sudden "laying flat" attitude made things difficult for them instead.
"Um..."
Koji Machida, a former member of the Katsuragi faction, said hesitantly, "Katsuragi-kun, we still hope to win as much as possible."
"I'll do my best!"
Katsuragi's face was steady, and his expression was composed.
Refreshing!
You people kept dragging me down, using despicable and low-handed methods to oppose me.
Now your retribution has come!
You all have to come and beg me!