Chapitre 40: Chapter 40 - Horikita 1 - Omnincience?
---Notice---
You know the jig powerstones comments reviews etc. I appreciate all of them but anyways enjoy.
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"For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow." ~Ecclesiastes 1:18
"So, Ryuen, does Yagami just have a thing for last-minute entrances?" Ichinose asked, glancing at the lounge screen, which showed Horikita and an exam administrator alone in a room. The lounge was even more crowded than yesterday, with everyone eager to see the strategies unfold.
"It's strange. Yagami is usually timely and responsible, but this is the second time he's shown up at the last minute," Kanzaki added.
"It doesn't matter. He'll make it to the game on time," Ryuen responded, pausing to think. "But maybe these games don't interest him."
Hearing Ryuen's words, the students of Class B turned to him with interest, and Ichinose and Kanzaki followed suit.
"What do you mean?" Ichinose wondered.
"I think Ryuen's saying that Yagami is so confident in his victory that the games lose all meaning to him. It's like rewatching a movie; after a while, it gets boring," Kanzaki replied, analyzing Ryuen's answer and Yagami's demeanor.
"I see. If that's true, then It's quite sad in a way," Ichinose said, continuing to watch the screen. "It makes sense, though. In his game against you, Katsuragi, he seemed overly critical at the end, but it felt like he was disappointed you couldn't compete with him. Even on the uninhabited island exam, he showed up late and seemed disappointed with Class A, as if he was hoping for something that never came."
"Maybe he's underestimating Class D, though. There's still a chance—" Kanzaki began, but Ryuen's laughter cut through the room.
"HAHAHA," Ryuen laughed hysterically. "I wouldn't dream of it. Yagami knows more about Class D than anyone here, including most of Class D itself."
Ichinose looked at Ryuen, confused, waiting for him to elaborate, but he only offered a smile. That was enough for everyone to understand why Ryuen said what he did.
"Ryuen, you have no evidence of this mastermind in Class D," Kanzaki stated.
"You're right. I can't prove their existence, but I have enough to know it's likely. Plus, I don't need to be sure. Yagami has already confirmed their existence. No, he's done more than that; he's figured out their identity," Ryuen snapped back.
It came as a surprise to most, but many didn't take Ryuen seriously. He wasn't considered the most trustworthy individual, after all. So he looked at someone who was, even if just slightly more than him. "Explain it to them, Katsuragi."
Katsuragi hesitated a moment before responding. "It doesn't take a genius to figure it out. I was surprised by the outcome of the last special exam. We had a deal with Class B—I won't get into specifics—but in return for payment, Class B would give us information on other class leaders. Obviously, I needed evidence, and Class B provided Suzune Horikita's keycard."
Katsuragi sighed. "When the exam results came, they were completely unexpected. If Horikita were the leader of Class D, we would have finished with more points. But Yagami finished with over 150 points for his class, meaning he guessed all the class leaders."
Ichinose seemed confused. "Huh? But Class D confirmed their leader was Horikita. I don't think they'd lie about such a thing."
"They weren't lying," Katsuragi said, shaking his head. "Even Class D themselves don't know who was elected leader after Horikita. They have no clue a change even happened. They wholeheartedly believed Horikita was still the leader of their class. But Yagami didn't. Out of 34 students, he accurately deduced which one was trying to hide in the shadows from the night I was handed Horikita's keycard to the following morning—a measly 12-hour notice, or maybe even more impressively he figured it out way before that before the mastermind had even made any major moves."
"So there really is some kind of mystery genius in our class?" Shinohara asked, intrigued.
"Yes, Horikita should know that better than anyone else," Ryuen responded.
At that moment, a boy in Class D let out a defeated sigh. This event could be an annoyance to deal with; it seemed like the world didn't want to allow him a normal life.
"If we can get him to agree to come out and help our class, wouldn't Class A be possible?" Matsushita asked, and many other Class D students wondered the same thing.
It seemed that this was part of Ryuen's plan to draw out the Class D mastermind.
But Yukimura cut the conversation short before the discussion could get too serious. "The mastermind, if they really exist, has no plans to reveal themselves. We can assume that much given the fact Yagami has kept their name a complete secret. It's likely Yagami did so as a favor to them, but it shows the mastermind's intention to stay hidden," he said, crushing the hopes of Class D.
"But Horikita knows about them. Can't we just ask her?" Sato asked.
Yukimura quickly replied, "I doubt she would tell us. If the mastermind revealed their identity to her, they did so trusting her. If Horikita tells us, not only would she be breaking that trust, but also the trust of someone who took a chance with her. It's better to leave the mastermind be."
Understanding this, the students of Class D nodded gloomily.
Ryuen seemed disappointed that his strategy of getting Class D themselves to hunt for this mastermind didn't work, but at the same time, he was pleased. He wasn't done yet; he'd keep pushing until he learned who the elusive X was.
***
The atmosphere in the bar area was completely different from the lounge. It was quiet, especially around Chabashira and Sakagami.
"Sae-chan, come on, why aren't you talking? It hasn't even started yet, and you're so focused," Hoshinomiya said, tugging on Chabashira's suit.
"Yes, it's true. The two of them are completely quiet. It's normal for Chabashira to be interested in her class, but it's weirder for Sakagami, who was so confident about Yagami's ability yesterday, not to be boasting right now. Tell me, Sakagami, are you actually scared?" Mashima questioned.
"Ha, I guess that's closer to the truth than you probably believe," Sakagami said, staring at the television as he took a long sip from his drink. "But it's not for the reasons you might think. Class B has a monster. That's not exactly a bad thing, but I guess it's taking me a while to process it all."
"Ohhhhhh? Really, Sakagami? Does that mean Yagami has something in store for us? If so, I'm excited to see!" Hoshinomiya said happily, probably curious about the treatment Class D would receive from Yagami.
"Haha, someone with his level of intelligence would have obviously accomplished great things in this exam. That isn't the part of him that's scary. No, what's scary is how much more there is to him than just intellect and how much more he may be hiding," Sakagami replied, not sure how to explain his thoughts. He still didn't fully understand Light, but he was beginning to realize that the ace of Class B might not actually be Kakeru Ryuen but Light Yagami.
Hoshinomiya looked confused as Sakagami spoke. "I don't understand what you mean. Like Sae-chan said last time, the only thing Yagami is different from someone like Ichinose is in terms of his willingness to act."
Sakagami shook his head. "I thought that too, but now I'm sure that's a definite oversimplification of Yagami's character."
Hoshinomiya once again looked questioningly at Sakagami, but he no longer spoke. Instead, it was Mashima who spoke.
"We should just leave them be. I'm sure if we watch the game, we'll understand."
And with that, Hoshinomiya stopped her incessant questions and watched as Yagami walked into the game room.
***
"Look, he's finally here!" Ichinose said, pointing at the screen.
"Shush, be quiet. Are you not going to let me watch in peace this time either?" Ryuen responded, causing everyone to refocus on the game.
The game room was similar to last time, with a red carpet, white walls, and Victorian-style architecture. In the middle of the empty room was a table with two chairs. Horikita was sitting in one while the exam administrator stood overseeing the table and game.
As Yagami walked towards the middle of the room, the cameras focused on him, making his expression easier to read. He seemed tired, like someone who had just woken up to do work. It was clear he was playing this game out of obligation, not interest.
"It seems I barely made it," Yagami said with a light chuckle as he pulled the chair by the table to seat himself. "Sorry about the wait."
"If you were truly sorry, you wouldn't have shown up at the last second to begin with," Horikita snapped back.
"You're right; it was rude of me. I—"
"I'm not interested in listening to any explanations," Horikita said before Yagami could finish speaking.
With that, Yagami simply nodded at her with a smile before looking at the exam administrator, waiting for the game rules to be given.
"Light Yagami of Class B and Suzune Horikita of Class D shall now officially commence their game. Before anything, I shall now quickly explain the game rules," the administrator began, taking a deep breath.
"Yagami and Horikita will be considered players of this game and will play a game of 'Chomp.' It is a game played on a rectangular grid of squares. You can think of this grid made of squares like a chocolate bar. You will see it appear on the screens of your desk in a second." Just as the administrator said that the image appeared.
[o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o]
[o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o]
[o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o]
[x], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o]
"Both players will take turns 'eating' a square and, by doing that, removing all squares to the right and above of the square eaten. An on-screen example will now be given. In this example, imagine the 5th square in the 2nd row is eaten."
[o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o]
[o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o]
[o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o]
[x], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o]
5th square in the second row is eaten:
[o], [o], [o], [o]
[o], [o], [o], [o]
[o], [o], [o], [o]
[x], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o], [o]
"This example shows the squares left after the 5th square on the second row is eaten. The goal of both players in this game is simple. As you may have noticed, the bottom left square is different from the rest of the squares. On the screen displays, your goal in this game is to force your opponent into eating this bottom left square and avoid eating it yourself. In other words, whoever 'eats' this bottom left square will be considered the loser of this game; consider that piece of chocolate poisoned."
"I'm assuming we'll play on our desks' screens themselves, then? It wouldn't just be for demonstration, right?" Yagami asked.
"Correct. It makes things simpler to have everything done electronically and allows for little chance of error going unnoticed. The screens on each desk are touch screens, so both of you will be able to take turns playing," the administrator explained.
Quickly after the game was explained, the students in the lounge began to talk about it, filling the room with chatter about possible winning strategies.
"It's surprisingly simple," Kushida, who was near the other class leaders, mumbled.
"Yes, it is. Especially compared to the game Yagami set up against Katsuragi, which had so many hidden layers. This is as simple as it gets. It seems like Horikita's gamble paid off in a way if you look at it that way," Kanzaki said.
"It's too early to really say anything about Horikita's plan yet. The game just started, but she did at least accomplish her goal of undermining Yagami's potential preparation," Ichinose responded.
Katsuragi replied, "I wouldn't give much credit to Horikita yet. After all, Yagami looks thoroughly unimpressed by her and has been uncaring leading up to this exam."
Ichinose nodded. "Still, it's better than nothing. It's a fair game, and that's all Horikita wanted."
As Ichinose spoke, the TV roared loudly throughout the lounge.
"What is the meaning of this!?" Horikita said loudly, standing while facing the exam administrator. "This must be some kind of mistake!"
"I can assure you no mistakes have been made in preparing and conducting this exam, so please seat yourself," the administrator responded, resulting in Horikita slowly returning to her seat.
Horikita gathered herself. As she was seated, she glanced at the exam administrator before turning towards the one she was playing against, Light Yagami, with eyes filled with caution.
The situation that just occurred confused all those watching the game from the lounge. Most of them couldn't tell what was currently wrong due to the loud discussion in the lounge, but even to those concentrated, there didn't seem to be any reason for Horikita to be acting as frenzied as she was. It begged the question, what was the reason behind Horikita's outburst?
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I'll start this off saying now that everything has begun i would love to hear theories.
Let me know your thoughts on everything, the game has now begun and I think there are enough hints to come to a conclusion on what Light has planned although I think it would be extremely difficult, I think this is one of the more complex scenarios I've made, but I think it's quite easy to understand so don't worry, I aimed to fix what I disliked about Katsuragi v Light with this game. I liked Katsuragi v Light, but I thought everything may have been a little confusing for some to understand so I'm trying to keep the complexity intact here while not compromising the enjoyability of the scenario.
Semi Important: Just curious I'm not planning for this to be in this arc but how do you guys feel about chess? I feel like the adaptation of the chess game in the anime was so bad I couldn't help but to laugh at it when they would show the board. Yes, I do know how to play chess (and although I don't play as much anymore, I don't mean I just know the basics) and think I can make an actual entertaining game in the future (once again not in this arc) so let me know your thoughts.
Sadly the board I'm working on looks like it needs work idk if I should keep trying to fix it that will depend on whether you guys are interested or not.
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Below I am testing a fix for part of it
…a b c d e f g h
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