Motivated to be lazy

SS A deal with a devil

"How did he make Ryuen-kun submit the wrong names?"

Although she was rather blunt and undignified in her analysis, Himeno is right. We truly are... in a tight spot. How was he able to pull this off?

Everything seems to make perfect sense now. I sat and analyzed everything that happened in the lead-up to my first day at this school. My father was completely against my enrollment at advanced nurturing high school. Many of the people I know from my social circles aren't here. Most of the people in my year come from relatively modest backgrounds.

Why was my father so adamantly fighting against my desire to come here?

It's because he knew. My father knew that he was here.

It's only obvious now that I'm here and know how the school functions. My father was adamant, anything other than a finish in Class A was unacceptable. Anything less would be a stain on the Kanzaki name within those influential circles, it's why so many of them weren't here. Many of the families we have ties to have sent their children overseas. It allowed them to save face, no one would begrudge a foreign education from a renowned institution.

I thought nothing of it at the time, studying abroad was intriguing. Being exposed to a foreign culture, and learning a new language. I prefer Japanese cuisine, so that would have been an issue for me. Irrespective, it didn't raise any alarm bells for me. Older and younger friends of mine have already made arrangements or have already gone to study in the US or England.

Pondering those points doesn't get me out of my conundrum; how are we supposed to compete against...that?

There's a part of me that thinks that there isn't an immediate threat. He's notoriously disinterested and isn't even leading his class. Without him, they're Class D. It isn't even a question, they've shown nothing remarkable and they're infamously disjointed and inept. It's obvious by their standings before he intervened, zero points for three months is surely some sort of record in the school. One that no one should be proud to have.

What to do though? What to do... Aim for minor victories and hope that we will be good enough to fight that demon a year in the future? Two years? Will he be able to overcome insurmountable odds? Just like how he had done on the Zodiac Special Test? It took him a few hours, how do we beat that?

To be frank, I'm not so sure. I have no issues with taking the backseat in pursuit of achieving a goal, pride and ego have no place in a team effort. The only thing that matters is the goal, I used to think that Ichinose would be the key to our rise to Class A. In an ideal world, she'd be the best choice.

Morale and the ability to hold a large group together, keeping everyone happy and in high spirits is a tall task. Ichinose has charisma in spades. She's kind-hearted and everyone loves her. The class adores her, blindly following along with anything she suggests because she has that ability. Her biggest problem was her inability to prioritize, willing to go so far for her enemies as much as her friends.

I don't understand it if I can be frank. She's willing to deceive and lie yet she isn't willing to use stronger underhanded methods. She's capable of recognizing when she's being cheated but turns the other cheek. She wants to win and yet would rather lose than hurt others. Willing to shoulder the pain than inflict it on others.

So, why can't she see that by imposing these sanctions on our class that she is hurting us more than she's hurting our enemies? Why should our class have to suffer losses and lose by attrition, simply because she allows others to cheat us? Why will she not do the same to them? It was frustrating, I could see that it would be a problem early. I could see it all when she first joined the Student Council and started to spend more time with him.