The Odd One Out

Chapter 8.2 - Limitless Growth

It was Saturday, the day of the exam. We were all sitting in class.

"Let's pass this exam all together!"

"Yeah! Nobody will get expelled!"

Kushida came to my room yesterday. She told me that even though the class had supposedly agreed to Horikita's strategy, some secretly decided to give their criticism vote to me and expel me.

How troublesome.

Luckily, Arisu offered me her class' praise votes.

On a side note, she told me that Horikita had asked to meet her today after the results of the special exam, to which she agreed.

My thoughts were interrupted when Chabashira arrived in the classroom, announcing the start of the exam. She looked at me with a look of worry on her face. I just shrugged.

"The Class Poll exam will now begin. Each student will receive seven small sheet of paper, three red, three green and one yellow. Use the red ones to cast your criticism votes, the green ones for the praise votes, and the yellow one to give your praise vote to another class' student. You will all have ten minutes to write the names on the paper. The writing part will then stop. When I call your name, come up and cast your votes. There are three colored bins. Put your papers in the appropriate bins. The results will be announced this afternoon at 1 PM in this classroom."

Her explanation was solid. It was pretty self explanatory.

After she handed out the papers, the ten minutes began.

Now, who's names should I write?

Horikita and I agreed on names beforehand as we were a pair. However, considering the circumstances, I decided to write other names.

For the criticism votes, I gave them to Ike, Yamauchi and Shinohara. Not only were they academically weak, they also had a complete lack of common sense and showed no proof of growth.

For the praise votes, I gave them to Horikita, Hirata and Kushida. Those three will no doubt be leading the class in the future.

I also gave Arisu a praise vote.

One by one, the students cast their votes. Some occasionally looked at me with mocking looks.

"Ayanokouji, please come forward."

I stood up, put my votes in the appropriate bins and went back to my seat.

Before I knew it, the exam ended.

"Did everyone do their job?" Hirata said.

"Yes!" Yamauchi said

"Of course!" Ike cried out.

The class responded to Hirata's question. However, many visibly voted for me.

People are all born liars and are mostly used to lying. If a person that has never lied even once in their lives exists, that existence itself would be a lie. For humans, lies are an inseparable part of ourselves.

I left the classroom to have lunch while the class continued talking.

When I walked in front of Class B's classroom, they had just finished their exam. Ichinose smiled at me and gave me a thumbs up.

When I walked in front of Class A's classroom, students were coming out of the classroom. Arisu was sitting and talking to Kamuro so she didn't notice me. Hashimoto did though, and he gave me a thumbs up of his own.

I decided to have lunch alone as usual. It was best if I didn't interact with other classes at this time.

I went to the cafeteria to grab a bento box and ate my lunch on a small table, reading a book I had previously borrowed from Hiyori.