Motivated to be lazy

Chapter 36

I was about to head to breakfast to eat but as luck would have it my path was impeded. Before I could say anything, Satou and Shinohara had grabbed both of my arms and stopped me in my tracks.

It would have been easy to overpower them but I'm not one to physically deal with women so I simply allowed them to stop me and change our trajectory.

"Not this time, Ayanokouji-kun! You went to sleep before any of us could get an explanation. Matsuo-kun's orders, you're coming with us." Satou said firmly.

"Is that right?" I asked in amusement.

"That's right, you won't stop us either," Shinohara said with determination.

O'kawaii koto.

"You do realize that I could get out of this hold rather easily, right?"

"Matsuo-kun said you'd say that and he said to say 'If you try and get away, I'll start sending spoilers for I tripped over a vine, fell off a cliff and now I'm engaged to a water sprite volume two.'"

Joke's on him, I've already read up to volume three.

We descended down to the lower decks where there was a Japanese Restaurant that I'd never been to before, it wasn't really frequented by the rest of the school. Most people either ate at the Ocean Cafe because of the view of the water or they'd eat in the buffet because of the selection. This place was rather formal normally, I'd actually planned to take Honami on a date here before we got back to the school.

When we arrived, both of the hostesses bowed before opening the double doors and suddenly the sounds of eating had died out instantly and the sounds of chopsticks being put down on plates clattered throughout the restaurant. Ignoring them all, I took a seat next to Eiichiro who continued to flick through his phone as though I wasn't even there.

Slowly but surely when they realized I wasn't going to say anything, they all started to eat again. The chatter was subdued though, most talked simply to fill the uncomfortable silence but tried to remain quiet enough either to not be a hindrance or to eavesdrop on the eventual expected explanation.

"Anything good here?"

"Salmon Nigiri's good, the miso soup is tasty too," Eiichiro said absentmindedly, continuing to look through his phone.

I decided to go with his recommendation and placed my order before taking out my own phone and having a look at the school boards. It was everywhere, people discussing how the Zodiac Exam had already concluded and varying theories on how it had happened.

Curiously, that meddlesome sister of mine had liked and upvoted every theory that had me involved as the reason behind the win. Posts praising Manabu for finding a gem in the rough in Class D, posts that I'd been hiding my intelligence by pretending to be lazy. Some of them were utterly ridiculous but if they praised me, there was a notification underneath that said 'liked by Sakayanagi Arisu'.

"Well?" Horikita cut through the ambience of the table suddenly.

I looked up at her with confusion as I sipped on the tea that the waitress generously poured for me.

At our table Horikita, Matsushita, Kushida, Hirata and Eiichiro all stopped what they were doing and feigned as though they weren't listening intently. The chatter started to die down around the room again and it descended into silence once again.

"Well, what?"

"Well... how did you do it?" Horikita said with gritted teeth, attempting not to lose her patience.

"How did I do what?"

"Are you purposefully trying to make me throw my tea at you?"

"Is it working?"