I, the mastermind behind the scenes at Soubu High, refuse to be caught in a bloodbath.

The wooden stool slapped his chest repeatedly.

The two spoke at the same time, and looked at each other.

"Good luck! Uh... Material? Scumbag Bug?"

That's basically correct. (The pronunciation of "zaimokuza" does sound a bit like "zazamushi"...)

However, Zha Zha Chong Yi Hui seemed even more displeased as he trembled with his fist.

"Don't laugh! I'll win this reporting duel! And, and don't call me a piece of trash! You, you shrimp! (In Japanese, 'ebi' means shrimp, so 'ebi's name'... can also be considered a shrimp's name, but the pronunciation is different.)"

After spewing out some childish insults, the timber saddle ran away.

Well, that guy seems to have developed a rivalry with Ebina-kun... His otaku pride is probably about not losing to a fujoshi or something.

"When did it turn into a duel...?"

Yukinoshita said incredulously.

"Who knows? But using the principle of competition might work quite well."

"That's true."

As expected of Yukino, who sees right and wrong even in victory and defeat. I like her because she accepted it so readily, is that Mr. Panda Pan's? That one also sees right and wrong clearly. By the way, is your alias Kizu Chisato?

And so, the battle of wits between the worm and the shrimp is about to begin.

"Everyone, thank you for your hard work. That's all for today. Go back now."

Himeko started tidying up the scattered documents, and Hiratsuka Shizuka came to help him. Her legs were really eye-catching when she squatted down. Why did you have to wear such long pants that reduced your charm? Learn from Shiwa, who weighs 100 pounds, sitting next to me. Wearing pantyhose would be so much better.

Ah, no, Hiratsuka Shizuka-sensei would be more suited to lace stockings paired with a professional mini skirt. Tsk tsk, a perfect match, a perfect match, I'm totally drooling over it!

"Hey, what are you thinking, kid?"

Hiratsuka Shizuka, who keenly noticed that Himekoji's gaze was a little strange, glared at him.

"I was thinking, why do you smell so sweet, you damn woman, Shizuka-sensei? (laughs)"

Himekoji was just joking. If she said, "Ah, I wasn't thinking about anything," she'd probably get punched by Hiratsuka Shizuma.

"...If I weren't a match for you, you would be dead by now."

Hiratsuka Shizuka gritted her teeth and crumpled the document in her hand.

The members of the leadership team gradually left, leaving only Himekoji and Hiratsuka Shizuka to tidy up. After everything was done, the two came out together, and Himekoji locked the door.

What are your thoughts on Sagami?

It was clear that Hiratsuka Shizuya had discovered the problem; Sagami had been of little use.

"I don't watch it much. She's already been sidelined."

"Wouldn't it be better to just appoint Yukinoshita as the chairperson of the operations committee?"

"I want to see just how badly she messes things up. If I then get Yukinoshita and Mariya to step in, wouldn't that win over even more people?"

"Oh, are you paving the way for the snow?"

"The main purpose is to utilize Yukinoshita and then train Mariya. When he retires, someone has to take over."

"But I guess she'll think that way. She's much smarter than most people, or maybe she's just too clever for her own good?"

Chapter 155 Something's not right, [Touma Kazusa] has some suspicions

“What she thinks is her business. Some misunderstandings are better left unresolved than clarified.” When Himekoji brought this up, Hiratsuka Shizuka’s cheeks immediately turned red. She stomped her foot angrily, glared at Himekoji, and turned away with a “humph.”

The last time the two almost had sex in the hotel, Himekoji used the same trick to fool her.

The Sports Festival, in Hachiman's words, is probably a festival for idiots with excess energy. The school-wide frenzy is caused by the passionate aura emanating from those idiots. During the Sports Festival, quite a few couples get together because a girl gets a bottle of water for a boy or a boy prepares something for a girl. Normally, this is an event that Hachiman himself should avoid at all costs.

In elementary school, clinging to his last hope that winning an award would bring him attention, he was chosen to participate in the least competitive shot put tournament. However, he nearly hit the referee's foot, becoming a laughingstock. From then on, he went home early every day, earning him the nickname "Frog" (in Japanese, "frog" and "go home" sound very similar).

Perhaps in Sagami’s eyes, who volunteered to be elected as the chairman of the operations committee, this position is just a part of youth. Even if he fails, it doesn’t matter. As long as he doesn’t treat failure as failure, failure is not failure. As long as he doesn’t treat problems as problems, problems don’t exist. He might even cry because he failed in his first time participating in such a big event and then be comforted by those around him.

If Himekoji were just an ordinary student, he would never have bothered with this. Let Sagami Minami do whatever she wants, do whatever she wants to do. But he is the student council president, and he has to take responsibility when it's his turn. With great power comes great responsibility.

The campus didn't immediately become deserted after school. The setting sun dyed the corridor of the main teaching building crimson. Every time you passed a classroom, you could see a cute girl lying on her desk, exhausted. Although it was already autumn, the huge ginkgo tree in the courtyard still kept its tender green due to the humid climate of Qianye. Only a cold wind that occasionally blew by at sunset made people shiver and reminded them that it was already autumn.

Liszt's "Hungarian Rhapsody" echoed in the main teaching building. The students, who were used to someone playing the piano at this time, were still busy with their own things. Ji Xiaolu felt a little warm in her heart, took a step and walked to the second music classroom, and quietly opened the door with the key that Kazusa had given her.

Push the door open with very light force, without making a sound.

Beside the flaxen curtains that fluttered like a dancer's gown, the girl he knew so well was silently closing her eyes, her fingers flying across the piano keys, her hair seeming to dance rhythmically behind her.

After pressing the last key, Himekoji finally walked in and closed the door. Hearing the commotion, Kazusa subconsciously turned her head, and after seeing it was him, she turned back and lightly tapped the other grand piano opposite with her chin, saying, "What are you waiting for? Come on."

"Don't rush, I have something to tell you."

Himekoji leaned against the piano, showing no intention of opening the lid.

"Is the work of the student council too difficult for you, so you're complaining to me?"

Kazusa also temporarily removed her hands from the piano keys, placing them flat on her lap and glancing at him sideways.

"No, it's just that I might not be able to come and play the piano with you every day for the next month or two."

"...All right."

"Because of the connection between the sports festival and the cultural festival, I have to attend the meeting. If the meeting drags on for too long, I won't be able to make it to the time to play the piano with you."

"I don't necessarily need you to come..."

Kazusa looked out the window and bit her lip.

"If you can wait a little longer, that's fine. If the meeting goes on late, I'll email you to go home and not wait for me. Missing mealtimes is bad for your health."

"I'm not a child anymore. You don't need to lecture me about eating." Kazusa stood up and went to the window, leaning down to look at the lush ginkgo tree in the courtyard below. "When will it shed its leaves?" she asked.

"It will be at least October, but of course no one can say for sure what the exact time will be."

"By the way, will Kazusa be attending the cultural festival?"

"I'm not interested, and... I'm too lazy to perform on stage right now. But what about you? Would you like to participate?"

"It's hard to say now. If my mother suddenly decides to come to the school to watch my performance, then I'll have no choice but to go on stage."

"That's true, and I might even be forced to go up there..."

“Speaking of which, Aunt Yaozi told me the other day that if you perform on stage, she will come back to Japan to see you. However, I told her that the dates for this year’s cultural festival and sports festival have been changed, so it’s better to discuss this matter a month later.”

According to past practice, the cultural festival should start on October 10th.

"Mom... okay, we'll talk about it later."

After reconciling with her mother, Kazusa seemed less resistant and even expressed joy at her mother's upcoming arrival. However, she had just said she didn't plan to participate in the cultural festival, and now she wanted to change her mind? She couldn't do that.

"But wait a minute," Kazusa suddenly turned and glared at Himekoji, "Why did Mom contact you instead of me when she said she was going to come see my performance?"

"Huh? Ah? Well—it was just something I mentioned casually, just something I mentioned casually."

Himekoji was a little flustered by Kazusa's sudden glare.

The last time I had a video call with Yaozi, we chatted casually after the call connected, but after a while she deliberately covered the camera and made that strange sound, which really made people think a lot.

Of course, she was just teasing Himekoji.

"Is that so... But never mind, it doesn't really matter, it's the same whether you ask me or me." She nodded suspiciously, grabbed Himekoji's arm and led him to the piano in front, pressed his shoulders down to make him sit down, lifted the piano lid, grabbed his wrists and placed them on the keys. After finishing, Kazusa clapped her hands twice, leaned back against Himekoji's piano and said, "To punish you for possibly not being able to come here on time to keep your promise in the future, you will play for me today."

From Himekoji's perspective, he could easily lift Kazusa's skirt with just a slight stretch of his left hand... However, if he did that, he'd probably be pinned down on the piano and beaten until his head bled. Kazusa has some training, after all, and she's quite intimidating if Himekoji doesn't fight back.

In Chapter 156, at the very end, [Yoshiteru Zaimokuza] took to the stage.

Shortly after school, shortly after the declaration of war by the timber embankment.

An unusual atmosphere permeated the meeting room of the Sports Festival Operations Committee.

Finally, the moment of decisive battle arrived.

Eastern Army, Zaimokuza Yoshiki

The Western Army's name is Jicai.

A nightmarish showdown between a hardcore otaku and a sophisticated fujoshi (female fan of BL) has begun.

Himekoji and her team were making arrangements to prepare for this unexpected showdown. They pushed aside the two whiteboards in the middle of the blackboard to reveal the whiteboards between them, turned on the projector, checked the computer connection, and inspected the actual projection effect—handling various tasks.

During the preparation, Ms. Hiratsuka observed from behind and remarked with deep emotion.

"Oh? Is it a PowerPoint presentation? High school students these days are really good with equipment."

"If you're not proficient in high school, it'll be a real problem in college. You'll always have to ask others for help, and they'll look at you with disdain and tell you, 'Isn't that stuff pretty simple?' That's about it." Himekoji said, then instructed Hayama, "Adjust the focus a little more. It seems like the autofocus has been acting up for a while since I used it."

"Wouldn't that trap us in darkness, where we can no longer ask anyone for advice?"

Hiratsuka Shizuka paused, recalling the OHP she used during her university days, and hugged her chest with her arms.

By the way, OHP is a technology that involves writing on extremely thin, transparent plastic and then projecting the writing onto it. Some of you might have used it when you were kids.

"So the less you know, the more you want to ask for help, and the more you want to ask for help, the more you get scorned, and eventually you end up like the idiot in a certain college or department who can't even make a PPT and keeps bothering people."

"Ugh...Are all college students these days this scary?"

Yuihama, who was helping Ebina check the USB drive, looked up and replied.

"It's so terrifying that it will force you to eat several giant slugs."

"Wow! Really?! That's disgusting. Suddenly I don't want to go to college anymore."

"Hey," Yukino said impatiently, glaring at him as she sorted through the files, "Don't deliberately use plots from Haruki Murakami's novels to scare Yuihama Yuki."

“Novels are based on life, after all. Who knows if the world we live in now isn’t someone else’s novel?” As she spoke, Ji Xiaolu pouted and said, “I’m actually a little envious of that ‘Watanabe,’ who went on dates with girls every day after going to university with Nagasawa.”

Watanabe is the protagonist of "Norwegian Wood". Nagasawa is his later friend. He is a very charming playboy with first-class skills in picking up girls. Incidentally, Nagasawa was also forced to eat several large slugs...

"Bang!" Hiratsuka Shizuka tapped Himekoji's head and raised her voice, "Stop dreaming and come back to reality. In this day and age, there won't be any girls who will sleep with you just because you brag in a bar."

"That's probably because Ms. Hiratsuka rarely goes to bars... When I go, I don't even need to brag or treat anyone; girls keep coming up to chat me up."

Himekoji would occasionally randomly choose a bar with a piano and secretly play it when there was no pianist around. At that time, girls would often order him drinks and invite him down to chat with them, but Himekoji would usually politely decline—except for the time with Touma Yoko.

"You bastard, shut up! Minors aren't allowed in places like that!"

Enraged, Hiratsuka Shizuka gave Himekoji a flick on the forehead.