Ch 4

POV Akari

That smile. That\'s the smile of someone with hidden motives. I can feel it. He had that fake smile plastered on his face all the time while talking. It seems his name is Shinji Makoto. I can feel him doing something weird to the atmosphere. He is giving the perfect add-ons and examples at timings that make them feel as if they are good friends. It\'s like he has rehearsed this conversation. As if… As if everyone is just his puppet. But no one else feels out of place. Maybe it\'s only me. I was observing his actions when our gazes met again.

"hmph", I turned away. Who cares? As long as he doesn\'t set his foot in my business, I won\'t bother him.

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"Am I late?"

came a voice causing me to look towards the door. What came into my vision was an unremarkable boy, I turned back only to notice Makoto looking at the new guy like a kid who found a new toy.

Is he gay? Was the thought that echoed in my mind before the teacher arrived and homeroom started.

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POV Shinji Makoto

Okay. I got over the pre-class minigame nicely. If it wasn\'t for last year\'s effort and progress, there is no way I would have gotten these results. I was so close to getting shut down by this girl beside me. Anyways, I can take care of my relationship with her later. What is important right now is my role as the matchmaker for the protagonist. If I am right in my observations and inferences, then Hiwari and the MC should know each other already. Although I have declared her as the heroine already, I still don\'t know if this guy\'s story has a harem tag or not.

When you read a novel and your favourite girl doesn\'t win, the one you blame is the MC. But after being in this role for a greater part of my life, I can say, with great certainty, that the one who chooses the winning girl is the supporting character. If you pay close attention, you may notice that the tendency of the MC\'s heart is often shifted after having conversations with his friend. This is the true power granted to the supporting character. The power to determine the protagonist\'s route. He is the filter beside the protagonist who removes toxic and unhealthy relationships. In any novel, with a great supporting character, and multiple girls, the protagonist\'s choice is nothing more than an illusion.

I didn\'t let Amano get together with his childhood friend not because I don\'t like her, but because her attitude is not fit for him. Her violent and forceful behaviour suppresses his natural kindness. Love blooms between two complementary people not competitive people. Well, although I will not deny that I really really don\'t like childhood friend romances, especially violent childhood friends. I still think sometimes, what if I chose the other person, what if the childhood friend won, but it is as the saying goes, if it ain\'t broke don\'t fix it. If I had to sum up my role I would say, and I quote, "With great power comes great responsibility ", rather fancy, isn\'t it?

Still Shizuo Hiwari. I would have thought that the heroine would be Nakano. I glanced at her and caught her staring at me. She quickly averted her eyes.

"huh?" I exclaimed softly. Was she staring at me? No, I am not dense and unsure of myself like a protagonist, this girl was definitely staring. But why? In the middle of an ongoing class to boot. Possible reasons could be — one, she fell in love. Not possible since she refused to talk to me in the morning, two, I have done something that caught her attention. I should act more carefully around her, after all she is the secret ruler of this class. No need to piss her off anymore.

While all of this was going on in my head, the teacher was giving a mini speech about getting along, not bullying, helping people and yada-yada-yada. Finally, she told us to do self-introduction. Again, this is important for me. Not because I am nervous about giving an introduction, I can give one perfectly fine, but because this is the stage where I can micro-inspect people. In the morning all I could do was to gain a rough idea about everybody and I chose the central group as my focus. But right now, they will each speak one-by-one, I can attach names, behaviour and speech patterns to the faces I remembered from morning. Yes, this ability is very draining on your mental energy. This is why I can\'t keep it on at max capacity forever. If I did that I would get just pass out after a while.

And so, the self-introduction started

The girl on the rightmost column first row stood up.

"I am Kaname Akatsuki. I am good at…"

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"My name is Akari Nakano. I like going to places. I don\'t really have any hobbies"

After each person\'s introduction there is a reaction from the class. For the popular one\'s it is clapping or maybe even cheering, as for the loners, well, not much.

When it was Nakano\'s turn however no one really reacted at her introduction, except for a few claps from her trio of friends. But if you look closely, it was not that no reacted, but no one dared to react. The normal students don\'t react much anyways but even those who are at the top of the social hierarchy didn\'t react. The reasons probably are that if they react positively, they offend Hagihara (Fake Queen) and no one dares to react negatively to the "Secret Ruler" anyways.

After a few more people…

My turn finally came,

"Hello, I am Shinji Makoto. I am good at studying, bad at sports, and my hobbies include reading books", I said and sat down.

A few chuckles were heard. Pay attention to them. Those who laughed at my self-depreciative humour just now were those who had a good impression of me. No one clicked their tongues, except of course, my one and only neighbour – Akari Nakano san.

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"Good morning. My name is Hinata Tsukumo. I am good at sports. Please take care of me" She bowed and sat down.

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Finally, two people are left and both are important. My brain is getting pretty tired already, the first day is definitely the most exhausting.

Hiwari san stood up

"Good morning everyone, I am Shizuo Hiwari. My hobby is photography. I am looking forward to the new term with all of you"

And now the last person our beloved protagonist.

" He-Hello, good morning. My name is Haruto Nishikawa. My hobbies consist of playing videogames. Please take care of me" He bowed and sat down.

As it was the last person not many people were paying attention. And after the stutter more people lost interest. But what they didn\'t notice was a beautiful girl was listening to him attentively, furtively glancing at person seated behind her.. Ah it\'s decided I thought, there is no harem, the final heroine, no, the future girlfriend is Shizuo Hiwari.