Liar, Liar - Volume 2 - Chapter 3

Chapter 3

The Little Devil’s Scheme

“Hahhh…”

My deep sigh echoed through the mansion late Sunday night. The girl slumped on the table across from me flashed an exhausted look as she propped her head up with one hand.

“Sheesh… This is a real mess.”

Sarasa Saionji, the (fake) little rich girl, responded to my SOS immediately. She had been all prim and proper (and blond) when I had last seen her a few hours ago. She’d since abandoned that disguise for her usual hoodie one.

“You know,” she said after a long exhalation. Her eyes watched me from beneath the hood. “I was just about to have a nice bath. Thanks to you, my evening plans are all messed up.”

“Yeah, um, I’m really sorry about that… You got here pretty quick, though.”

“Yeah, I guess. I mean, if one of my friends is—wait, no! Um, umm… Yuki. I’m doing it for Yuki’s sake. You told me Yuki’s missing, I got worried, and now I’m here. I’m not doing it for you or anything.”

“Either way’s fine, really…”

I shook my head, lacking the mental energy to deal with Saionji’s typical routine. Despite psyching myself up earlier, I was clearly in a bad spot. Himeji, who’d been constantly at my side, was gone, and I was pretty mentally exhausted.

“Mmm…”

Saionji pouted a bit, evidently irked that I wasn’t playing along. She sighed.

“This really has you rattled, huh? Okay, tell me everything. We won’t get anywhere otherwise.”

“Um…are you sure?”

“Whether I am or not, you called me over because you wanted my help, didn’t you? Or did you just want to cry and have me tell you everything will be okay?”

“N-no… Thanks, Saionji.”

Saionji’s blunt tone helped straighten me out, and I lifted my head.

“Y-you don’t need to thank me,” she said, a tad abashed. Maybe that speech had just been meant to cheer me up. Despite how prickly Saionji could be, she was oddly empathetic when necessary.

“…Ahem.” I needed to be considerate in turn, so I coughed to change the subject.

“I already told you that Himeji’s gone, so let me explain why. Simply put, Akizuki kidnapped her.”

“…What?”

“Noa Akizuki…the Little Devil of Eimei. She took Himeji. Before that, Himeji sent me a Trial as a last-ditch effort to protect me from incoming challenges. We intended to have her forfeit that Trial at the last moment, but she won’t be able to do that anymore.”

“Huh?! W-wait, that’s a serious problem, isn’t it?!”

Saionji put both hands on the table and leaned forward, bringing her face dangerously close to mine. My nose caught a sweet aroma.

“How did it come to that?”

“W-well…it’s kind of a long story…”

Saionji was understandably confused, so I gave her the full rundown. Saionji already knew about the provost’s request and Akizuki’s weird behavior, so all I really had to tell her about was the recent attack and subsequent phone call.

“…Hmm. All right.” Once I was done, Saionji nodded with her right hand over her mouth. “So the Little Devil was the mastermind all along?”

“In all probability. However, there’s still no evidence. We’re smack-dab in the middle of the 4WC, so her trying to defeat me isn’t exactly bizarre. And she’s far from the only one who’s after me. Unless I know for certain she’s working with some outside element, I can’t do very much. She’s good at deflecting accusations. She speaks at this very practiced pace, always ensuring she never shows anything genuine about herself.”

“Well, that’s how a Six Star is. I’m sure she’s well versed in tactical deception.” Saionji sighed. I’m sure she’d grown quite experienced with people like Akizuki as the Empress. She raised her hood a bit and fixed me in her ruby eyes.

“Basically, this is a big crisis and a big chance for you. You’re standing on a cliff right now. If you can find a way through this, you might be able to pull ahead of Akizuki.”

“Right. No doubt about that… But there’s one major problem I need to deal with if I want any chance at beating Himeji in this Trial.”

“A problem? What kind of problem?”

“It’s pretty obvious if you think about it. I can’t rely on Himeji’s support this time.”

“…Oh.”

It only took a moment for Saionji to comprehend. Himeji was my opponent, so I couldn’t expect her help. If she employed cheats, it wouldn’t be to help me. Plus, it was likely too dangerous to reach out to any other members of the Company. Himeji, their leader, was in Akizuki’s clutches. Any conversations with the Company might be overheard.

Saionji leaned toward me again in obvious concern. “S-so what’re we gonna do? I want to help, but cheating isn’t really part of my skill set!”

“Yeah…”

I passed myself off as a Seven Star using a mix of lying and cheating. Saionji, meanwhile, was a true genius who’d clawed her way up to Seven Star with nothing but sheer talent. And while her intelligence was a definite asset, it took more than that to win a challenge on the Academy. The winning move might be obvious, but without a high-enough rank to access the necessary Ability, it was hopeless. That’s why I had to cheat.

““…””

Saionji and I fell silent, thinking for a while, but we couldn’t produce anything useful.

“You know, Saionji,” I said, shaking my head a little, “I know I’m in no position to say this, but why don’t we think about that stuff later? Maybe I’ll figure out a way to win by myself. We can look at what kind of Trial it is first—”

“Hey, heyyy…”

““…?!””

We both jumped in our seats as we heard the living room door click open and a cheerful voice called to us. After confirming that Saionji had pulled her hood back over her head, I looked over my shoulder.

“…Kagaya?”

The somewhat disheveled slacker girl had arrived. She had a decent outfit on today—business casual, I guess. However, it looked like she’d been out drinking somewhere. Her blouse was unbuttoned around her chest, and her eyes looked sunken. There was a mature sexiness to her.

“Yeah, it’s me, Kagaya… I’m pretty sure it is, anyway…”

She half walked, half wandered up to me, dropped her bag on the ground, and threw herself on the sofa.

“Phewww, okay, good night… Oh, wait, Hiro, why’re you at my place? Lookin’ for some funnn??”

“No. Are you drunk?”

“Sure am! You had me wait on standby while you went on that flirty date with a mystery beauty for hours. I got soooo jealous. How was I s’posed to deal with that sober, huh?”

“Um…sorry, I guess?”

I turned my gaze away from her as she threw off her stockings (maybe they were too tight for her?). Someone as pretty as Kagaya could easily find a lover, but she didn’t bother to dress nicely, she had nearly zero life skills, and her work at the Company was…

“Wait a minute. Um, Kagaya, did someone order you to come here? Maybe someone with twin ponytails?”

“Twin what? Nahhhh, why would she ever do that? I was drinking that whole time myself… Drinking… Oh, wait…this isn’t my home.”

Her mind must’ve cleared up a little, because now Kagaya blinked as she looked at me. She must have been so drunk that she’d come here instead of her own place. And that meant I had the Company’s leading electronics and programming expert safe in my dorm.

“Well…good timing, at least,” I muttered.

“Hwuh?” Kagaya responded, tilting her head a bit as she sprawled out on my couch.

“Sh-Sh-Shirayuki is gone?!!?!?!”

Approximately twenty minutes later, following a barrage of cold water, ice, sports drinks, fruit, massages, and every other surefire cure we could think of, I finally managed to explain matters to Kagaya. All her sluggishness immediately vanished, and her eyes went wide.

“Yeah.” I nodded. “She’s gone. I think you remember Akizuki’s attack at the schoo—”

“Wh-why?! Why did you force yourself on her like that?! No matter how cute and erotic Shirayuki’s body is… You gotta walk before you can run, you know! How could you?!”

“She didn’t run to Akizuki because I got pervy on her!”

Kagaya had me by the collar, shaking me around while saying horrible things about me. I explained what had happened as quickly as I could, and she responded with an “Oh my God…” before slumping into a chair. Only then did she realize there was someone else in the room, I guess. She blinked at the figure in the hoodie, raising an eyebrow.

“Um…are you a home invader?”

“No!”

I suppose I couldn’t blame Kagaya for her reaction. Saionji had the zipper on her hoodie pulled up to her mouth, and the hood came as low as her nose. It certainly made her look ready for some criminal activity. I’d had the same sort of reaction when I first saw her, too.

Regardless, Saionji the home invader shook her head vigorously. “Look, I…I’m just a poor student from another ward who was called over to this guy’s place. And I’d appreciate you not prying further than that, okay?”

“Hiro called you over? Ohhhh… So I guess we’re pals, then, Hoodie Girl.”

“I-in a way, maybe. Are you going to address me as ‘Hoodie Girl’ now? That beats ‘home invader,’ but I really wish you’d, um…”

“What? I know nothing about you apart from your clothes. Take it off if you don’t like it.”

“Ugh… Okay, fine, address me however you want.”

Saionji raised her hands, grudgingly keeping herself hidden. Kagaya, seemingly satisfied with this, turned back toward me.

Honestly, her staggering into my place was a godsend. Here was Kagaya, the Company’s leading IT expert and a girl who could add all sorts of cheats to my device. I had her in the same room with Saionji, a genius capable of devising a strategy to survive this. They ought to be a great pair—the perfect one to face Akizuki.

So I decided to make it official.

“All right… I’d like to kick off a strategy meeting so we can get Himeji back.”

“Okay, guys! The first order of business is explaining the rules! Woo-hoo!”

A few minutes and a change of seating later, we plunged into our tactics conference. We stayed here in the living room instead of moving to the home theater. Saionji sat next to me while Kagaya occupied a chair across from us. We could check the rules on my device, of course, but it was more convenient for us to view them all at once.

After clearing her throat to act authoritative, Kagaya got started. “The name of Shirayuki’s Trial is ‘Clash of Triangles.’ Basically, it’s a card game featuring a unique deck. Each player receives a hand with ten cards, and they both play one at the same time each turn. Each card is stronger or weaker than certain others. Win, and you add your opponent’s card to your capture pile, and vice versa. This repeats until your hands are empty. Whoever takes the most cards by the end wins.”

“Hmm, I see… Sounds pretty easy to follow.”

“Right? You want to capture as many cards as possible. There are two hands of ten cards, plus a bonus card placed in the pot to start. Those are the only cards available during the Trial. You’re after a majority. The moment you have eleven cards in your capture pile, you win. Of course, we gotta consider Abilities, too, so it’s not that straightforward.”

After breezing through that, Kagaya showed all the info she had so far on her PC screen—not just text, but weirdly well-animated video, too. She made it seem like a walk in the park, yet she’d only learned the rules of Clash of Triangles a few minutes ago. She was producing these videos on the fly using her tablet behind the PC. It was mind blowing.

“…”

I wasn’t about to praise her talents, though. I guess I didn’t want to admit it.

“So, um…what are the cards? And how do they stack up against each other?”

“Hee-hee-hee…! I’m so glad you asked, Hiro! I just finished a slide that goes over all of that… Here it is!”

With an awe-inspiringly smug look on her face, Kagaya jammed a finger on the Enter key. The computer display shifted to a large diagram.

Clash of Triangles: Card Relationships

This Game uses six different types of cards—the king, the prince, the queen, the knight, the assassin, and the peasant. For ease in explaining the rules, the king, prince, and queen will be referred to collectively as “royalty.”

Matchup 1: Royalty beats knight, knight beats assassin, assassin beats royalty.

Matchup 2: Royalty and knight both beat peasant. Assassin ties with peasant. All cards tie with a twin of themselves.

Matchup 3: King beats prince, prince beats queen, and queen beats king.

“Hmm…”

While viewing the chart Kagaya had created for us, I began thinking quietly. I’d wondered why the word triangle was used when there were six types of cards. Now I understood that the Game was designed around a pair of triangles. The first was royalty, knight, and assassin, and the second was king, prince, and queen. Basically, it was a more complex version of rock-paper-scissors.

The role of the peasant cards also stuck out as odd. The peasant couldn’t beat anything. That made them sound like bad cards to have.

“…Aren’t the peasants kind of weak? It seems like a detriment to have one.”

“Mmm, kind of,” Kagaya replied. “You have a point, but the peasant cards have special effects that none of the others do. That’s why they don’t do much otherwise. Lemme go through all the other rules first, okay? You’ll learn the secret behind the peasants in just a sec!”

She tapped away at her laptop again, moving to a different slide. This one had illustrations of all the cards, divided into two even rows of ten as follows:

Set A: King – Queen – Prince – Knight x2 – Assassin x2 – Peasant x3

Set B: King – Queen – Prince – Knight x1 – Assassin x1 – Peasant x5

There was no other text on the slide, but I understood.

“Are these the two players’ hands?”

“Bingo! You got it, Hiro! In fact, these are the exact hands that will be dealt at the start. Which you will receive is random.”

“Wow… One sure seems stronger than the other.”

“Right? The second loses a knight and assassin in exchange for more peasants, those seemingly useless cards, so the first’s a lot more powerful. If you wind up with the second, you’ll be at a big disadvantage.”

“…I see,” I said, organizing my thoughts as I gazed at the twenty cards. “But regardless of which hand I’m given, I’ll start the Trial with one of them, and I’ll have to choose a card to play while guessing what my opponent will throw out. By the way, how’s the Game itself work? You said I could capture cards or lose them based on their strength. If I played a queen and Himeji played a knight, would I capture the knight from her?”

“A lot more than that, actually. You’d win everything on the table!”

“The pot, you mean?”

“Yeah! Let me explain. In Clash of Triangles, two things can happen after each side plays a card. First, if it’s a tie, the cards are placed in the pot.”

“Okay.”

“Then there’s the other case, if one card’s stronger than the other. When that happens, the winning player captures all cards on the board, not just the ones you and your opponent played. The whole pot! They’re all added to the winner’s capture pile, and like I said, whoever captures eleven cards first wins.”

“Oh… All right. So that’s how it works.”

I nodded a few times. It was like how the lottery carried over the big prize if nobody won. Continual ties would add more to the pot. And it would all go to whoever won a round. You could potentially capture four or eight cards in a single play.

“Yup.” Kagaya appeared satisfied that I was keeping up. “As for the other rules… Well, I should mention this one first. Clash of Triangles immediately ends when the players use the final cards in their hands…but if one player somehow has at least one card left when their opponent runs out, they’ll capture all the cards left in the pot. Of course, that can’t happen under the standard rules, so that’ll come into play only if an Ability affects the hands. I think that’s about it!”

Kagaya wrapped up her rundown, and I looked over the rules one last time. I didn’t see anything else I wanted to ask about.

“Okay, let’s go over the effects of the peasant cards. Then we can figure out how to conquer this Trial. Hmm?”

Just as I attempted to move on with this meeting, my device vibrated on the table, interrupting me. I thought about ignoring it but reached for it anyway, fearing the worst.

“…What’s this?”

“Something wrong, Shinohara?” Saionji asked, on high alert.

“Um…”

I shook my head at her and projected the message I’d received in the air. It contained a short passage and the names of two nasty-sounding Abilities—Change Probability level 4 and Force Control.

“It’s from Himeji,” I stated, brow furrowed in doubt and confusion. “To be exact, it was sent from her device. ‘Here’s the list of Abilities I will be using in Clash of Triangles.’”

Saionji narrowed her eyes. “So…Yuki’s revealing her strategy to us? Why?”

“I don’t know. I doubt this was sent without Akizuki’s knowledge. Himeji didn’t type those Ability names in. She sent me a log from her settings screen. It’s probably genuine.”

“Yeah, I don’t think Yuki or the Little Devil would try a cheap trick like that. It’s safe to believe this message…but I can’t say I get the motive behind it. Maybe it’s just to prove she’s better than us? Akizuki knows she has the advantage, so this could be an attempt to get under your skin.”

“Hmm… I could see Akizuki doing that, yeah.”

However, it was just as likely to be some other tactic. Regardless, we knew the abilities Himeji would use.

“Mmm.” Saionji nodded next to me, arms crossed. “Akizuki’s taken a pretty simple approach. Change Probability is a higher-level version of Luck. Yuki will be able to mess with any probability-driven variables that may appear in a Trial. At level four, she can turn a fifty percent chance into a sure thing. I think Yuki’s first move will be to alter the random hand selection to ensure she gets the better set. That means you’re guaranteed the weaker one, Shinohara.”

“Ahhh… Yeah, looks like you’re right. So what about Force Control? Because I sure don’t like the sound of it.”

“You shouldn’t. Force Control is exclusive to higher ranks. It allows the user to dictate decisions from their opponent. It’s only useful in Games with commands and doesn’t last for many turns, but it’s real trouble for us.”

“Dictate decisions?”

I was speechless. It was even more devious than I’d thought. If I had that used on me, I’d be crushed no matter my strategy.

“If she uses it in this Trial, how long will the effect last?”

“Exactly three turns. She’ll probably trigger it at the start, when it’ll be most effective. Then she’ll take all your best cards and build up a huge advantage in her capture pile. Only after that would you finally get to start. That’s what she wants, I think.”

“Man, what a nightmare…”

“I know,” Saionji replied while watching the projection. “It’s clear Yuki’s playing to win.”

Kagaya, who was busying herself typing information on Himeji’s Abilities or something into her tablet, took the news with an easy smile. “Yeah,” she said, returning her attention to us. “Shirayuki’s pretty serious about this. Nothing’s off the table…but that doesn’t mean we’re totally helpless.”

“How so?”

“Heh! Come on, Hiro! I can’t have you downplaying the powers of the Company, the world’s greatest secret organization! If we can’t win the normal way, we’ll just cheat or do whatever else we need to! That’s our take on justice! I, Kagaya, am loved by all electrons of the world! If I can hack into the Trial system from outside the school, and Shirayuki breaks the security from the inside…”

“…”

“…Oh, right, we don’t have our fearless leader!”

Kagaya deflated so quickly that it was jarring. Despite all her technical skills, she was the type who couldn’t achieve much without the right person in charge.

“Well, we’re screwed, then… The Company’s finished…”

“Could you please not surrender for me?”

“Sorry, but not having Shirayuki makes a lot of things difficult, you know? I rely on her constantly. Without her, we don’t have anyone to create a decent strategy…”

“Sure you do. Right here.”

That’s right. We had a perfect replacement. Sarasa Saionji, still buried deep in her hoodie, leaned back in her seat leisurely as she threw her hat into the ring.

“I’ll do it. I’m sure Yuki’s a lot more experienced and popular with you guys, but when it comes to tactics, I won’t lose to her.”

“R-really? Hmm… Hey, Hiro, do you think we can trust her?”

“Huh? Oh, sure, no problem there. She might look a little funny, but she’s not lying.”

Nope. In fact, I doubted we’d ever find someone more qualified for the job. I nodded to give my approval, which was enough for Kagaya to lift her head.

“All right,” she said. “We’ll be counting on you, Hoodie Girl.”

“Of course. I’ll be putting you to work, though. So, for starters, can you show us what the peasant cards can do? You skipped over that.”

“Oh, right, right. One second.”

Kagaya’s fingers went to work on her tablet. The screen on her laptop PC displayed a list after a few moments.

Peasant Skills (Set A)

Cardectomy: Permanently removes one card in the opponent’s hand from the Game.

Unbeatable Hero: A special card that beats all others.

Reset All: Places all the opponent’s captured cards back in the pot.

Peasant Skills (Set B)

Explosive Growth: Boosts your number of captured cards by the current turn number.

Glorious Revolution: From now on, all card relationships are reversed.

Trojan Horse: Lose against a royalty or knight card with this, and half of the player’s captured cards are added to your captured cards. Fractions are rounded up.

“That’s how they work,” Kagaya said once Saionji and I had finished reading. “Each peasant card stays in effect as long as they remain in the pot. In other words, there needs to be a tie for these effects to trigger. That doesn’t apply with Unbeatable Hero and Trojan Horse, though, obviously.”

“You know, these effects all seem huge.”

“Maybe, but you need a tie to activate them, which is a pretty tough restriction. Unless your opponent plays a peasant or assassin, they really are useless cards. Plus…”

“She’ll cancel them out anyway.”

“Yeah, I bet she will.”

“…”

I winced a bit as I listened to Kagaya and Saionji. They were right. No matter how many power cards with mega-effects I had, Himeji had Force Control in her pocket. Presumably she’d use it to eliminate anything I tried to turn the Trial around.

“Okay. We have the info we need.” Saionji turned toward me, finger in the air. “Let’s put it all together. First off, in Clash of Triangles, the peasant cards are more powerful than you’d expect. Royalty, knights, and assassins are all stronger by themselves, but if you can sneak a peasant into the pot, the return is massive. It’s enough that a losing player could make a comeback.”

“The important question then becomes how to put my peasants into play…or how to keep Himeji from playing hers,” I said.

“Mm-hmm. And even when you play some other card, you have to base every move on your peasants, I think. For example, you’ll want to get rid of your assassins early because they can’t beat peasants… However, if the assassins leave the Game early, that lowers the value of the knights, and so on. You have to piece a million factors together to figure out what your best move is.”

“Normally, yeah. But not this time, sadly.”

“True…” Saionji nodded, pulling down the top of her hood. “Yuki’s going to break out Force Control, so she can engineer the first three turns any way she likes. She’ll set it up in the best way possible for her, and the worst possible way for us. But that means we can predict what she’ll do, because we know exactly how the first few turns will go.”

“Mhmmm. So what will happen, exactly?” Kagaya asked.

“I’ve actually been considering that. There are two cards she’ll want out of Shinohara’s deck immediately: the Explosive Growth peasant, because it could boost his capture count by up to ten, and the Trojan Horse peasant, which gives him a shot at recovering at any point during the Trial. Glorious Revolution has a huge effect on the Game, too, but the first two are far more dangerous. She’d never want those in play, that’s for sure.”

“That sounds true enough…,” I said. “But Force Control lasts for three turns, right? That gives her one more card to capture. Won’t she make that Glorious Revolution?”

“Hmm… It’s possible. However, Yuki already has Cardectomy, the peasant that can capture any card she wants from our hand. So really, she can remove four of our cards in three turns. Assuming two of them are Explosive Growth and Trojan Horse, I think it’s pretty clear what the other two will be, right?”

“Is it?” I pondered a bit. “Well, in terms of strength, I think it’d either be Glorious Revolution or the king. Oh, wait. The knight and assassin, maybe?”

“You got it. That’s what I’d do, at least.”

A smile peeked from beneath Saionji’s hoodie.

Removing the knight and assassin was critical. My hand would only have one of each. Without them, I’d have only royalty and peasant cards. In a Game about triangular relationships, that would leave me extremely vulnerable. Recovering after Force Control promised to be challenging.

“All right. Let me see if I have this straight,” I said, gathering my thoughts. “Himeji will use Force Control for the first three turns of the Game. She’ll start by playing her Cardectomy peasant against my assassin, triggering a tie and allowing her to use Cardectomy to capture my Trojan Horse. Then she’ll play her knight against my Explosive Growth peasant to defeat it, capturing the pot in the process, and finally, she’ll play a royalty card to take out my knight. The exact order may differ, but those’ll be her moves.”

“I think they will be, yeah. And if it all goes like we predict, Yuki will be at a significant advantage. All those cards will be going to her capture pile. By the time you’re allowed to play, she’ll be ahead by seven cards, counting the bonus one.”

“Seven…”

I knew Saionji was right, but I couldn’t help but groan at the sheer number. Seven cards. And given that eleven cards made for a victory in Clash of Triangles, she’d only need to add four more to her capture pile to win.

“Damn… It’s impossible. By that point, I could never win, even if I knew all of Himeji’s moves. I won’t have any knights or assassins, so it will be impossible to end every turn with a tie or win.”

“Yeah, our cards are gonna be a little too weak to turn this around. But…”

“Huh…?”

“On the other hand, if we can just turn that initial seven-card advantage around, we’ll have a decent shot.”

Saionji was grinning again. Her voice was heavy with confidence. She sounded bolder than ever, and her eyes being hidden by the hood only magnified it.

“Listen,” she continued. “You may not know this, but there’s an Ability called Enchant reserved for Six Stars and Seven Stars. Basically, it’s a support Ability that lets you add additional effects to certain elements. In the context of this Trial, you could use it to add any skill you want to one of the peasant cards in your hand. There are some limits to what you can write in, but I think stuff like ‘trade capture piles’ ought to be permissible.”

“Trade capture piles?”

Saionji’s suggestion made me bring a hand up to my mouth. Swapping capture piles would certainly make things seem more favorable for me. My hand would still be weak, but I’d only need four more cards to win. Even with nothing but royalty and peasants, I might pull out a win.

The question was how I’d get access to a Six Star Ability.

“You think you can make it happen, Kagaya?”

“Huh?”

“I’m asking if you can create a cheat that works as closely as possible to the Enchant Ability Hoodie Girl described. To be exact, I’d need something that would break into the Clash of Triangles system and swap Himeji’s capture pile with mine. That, and you need to override our device displays to make it look like the effect of one of my peasant cards. The goal is to fool Akizuki and have her believe I’m using Enchant to take the lead.”

“…Right. And like we discussed, we can’t contact the Company right now because Akizuki might listen in on us. We literally can’t ask anyone besides you, Kagaya.”

“Ohhhh… It sounds tough when you lay it all out like that, Hiro…” Kagaya groaned for a bit, but she must have decided to do it because she bobbed her head in the affirmative a few seconds later.

“All right. I feel a little out of my element, but I’m still the Company’s electronics girl. I’m gonna give you the best cheats you’ve ever seen, Hiro!”

“Thank you very much, Kagaya.”

“Anytime,” she replied with a wink. “You can repay the favor by getting Himeji back!” Kagaya stood, evidently recharged, and zoomed out of the living room, shouting “I’m gonna go check the server room!” over her shoulder.

“Hmm.” Saionji lifted her hood as she watched Kagaya go. “Well, at least we’ve got a firm direction now. Hopefully she makes it in time.”

“Ah, I wouldn’t worry about that. Despite everything else, she’s a true genius. The provost handpicked her to be a part of this team.”

“That only makes it sound more precarious…but all right. Just make sure you install the Abilities you need, all right? You need something that can make things go your way. Peek is the classic choice. In fact, filling all your slots with Peek isn’t a bad idea.”

“All of them…?”

“Yeah. It’s powerful, but as a Two Star, you only get a level-two Peek, which lasts two or three turns at best. And no matter how much the Company’s cheats interfere, you’ll still be at a hand disadvantage.”

“Oh… Right.”

I nodded a little. Installing as many Peeks as I could was certainly a safe bet. Himeji would have every card type from king to assassin in her hand once I got to play, plus a Reset All peasant that could put my capture pile back into the pot. I’d only be able to deal with that if I had extra knowledge.

“…”

The more closely I looked at things, the more concerns I had, but this was the best course of action. Clash of Triangles had seemed impossible at first, but thanks to Saionji and Kagaya, I saw victory in the distance. I knew we would win, as long as there were no more unpleasant surprises. I was going to crush Akizuki’s schemes.

“But,” I blurted out, “do you really think that’s good enough?”

“Huh?” Saionji looked up. “What do you mean, is it good enough? You’re confident you’re up to this, right?”

“Sure, but Himeji told me not to aim for victory. I still don’t know what she meant by that, but I’m not sure we should ignore it. I definitely can’t lose, but…”

“…”

I knew I was being uselessly vague. Unfortunately, it was all I could do to blurt out my concern. Had Himeji only meant it to be a threat? Perhaps it was a line Akizuki had fed her. Maybe there was some other meaning to it. I didn’t know.

Kagaya wound up spending the night at my place as she coded her cheats for me. Our strategy meeting didn’t wrap up until one thirty in the morning, so she didn’t want to bother traveling back home. By her own admission, she had all the equipment she needed here. Apparently, this was a more convenient workplace for her. I offered my help, but she shooed me away, warning that staying up too late would affect my behavior at school, to say nothing of my performance in the Trial. She was totally right, and although I hated to leave her alone, I went ahead with my evening routine, showering and preparing for bed.

Everything went fine until there was a soft knock on the door.

“I-I’m all set, Shinohara.”

“…”

An embarrassed voice announced Saionji’s arrival, and the door opened to reveal her fresh from a bath. She wasn’t going around in a bath towel, of course, but her identity-concealing hoodie was gone. She’d changed into some light pajamas pulled from the guest closet. She must have taken pains to dry that long hair of hers, because it didn’t look wet at all. Still, one look at the light steam rising from her, and it was clear she had only just gotten out of the bath. It was accompanied by a powerful, mind-bending aroma from either the shampoo or the body soap.

“Y-you don’t have to stare at me like that…idiot.”

Time had all but stopped for me from the moment Saionji entered my room. She didn’t take it well. Embarrassed, she turned her back to me. Then, kneeling in a very ladylike fashion, she climbed into the futon I’d laid for her on the floor.

That’s right.

Why was Saionji inviting herself into my bedroom in her pajamas? Well, because she apparently wanted to sleep in this room. She reasoned it would allow her to come to Kagaya’s aid should the need arise, but other concerns were also involved.

Here’s what she’d had to say about it half an hour before.

“Hey, there’s a curfew at the Saionji house. It’s actually eight in the evening. Usually, I stick to it to retain my prim rich-girl image, but…you called me out here late at night. I had to sneak past my maid to get out of the place. I left a note, so I don’t think it’ll become a huge problem, but if I go home now, I’m gonna get yelled at a whole lot. At worst, they might start monitoring my activities. What will I do if that keeps me from helping you in the future? I can’t take that risk until we’ve got Yuki back.

“So if it’s all right with you, I’d like to stay here toni—Wha?!

“?!?!?! ………?!!

“Me? Stay here?! In your room?! You and me, in the same bed, your head resting on my arm?! B-b-but we haven’t even known each other for a month! We haven’t sent our papers over to city hall yet! You haven’t even met my parents…

“A-and yeah, we did hold hands a little, but…ohhh.”

Looking back, she all but dug her own grave. There was no retracting a suggestion she’d made, so she agreed to stay over. Admittedly, I could envision a world where I didn’t mind her sleeping here. The mansion had many empty rooms, including ones specifically for guests. Saionji wasn’t happy taking any of those, however.

“Jeez…”

I glared at the ceiling, feeling the heat in my cheeks. “If you’re that embarrassed about it, why don’t you use some other room?”

“I—I told you I don’t want to. I’d feel so lonely, staying by myself in one of those huge chambers.”

“Then how do you normally sleep, my lady?”

“Well, after the maid leaves my room, I have a big stuffed anima—Ahem. I mean, I’m usually better at enduring it, all right? I’m just a little short on MP tonight.”

After that poor excuse, she rustled around a bit, turning her back to me… Evidently, Saionji liked to tie her hair up when she was in bed. It gave me a chance to see the back of her neck, something I never got a glimpse at. Below, her shoulders and the start of her back peeked through her pajamas. I immediately reached for my device to turn off all the lights.

Close one…

Why it had been close, I couldn’t really say. In the dark, there was only a ticking clock, slow breathing, and the occasional rustling of fabric when one of us changed position. It felt almost deafening, and that’s how things were for the next ten minutes.

“Hey… Are you still awake, Shinohara?”

A whisper floated through the lightless room. The voice sounded nearer than before. I presumed Saionji had rolled over to face me.

“Um,” I said, heart beating fast. “Yes.”

“Really? Hee-hee! Good. I didn’t know what I’d do if you fell asleep first. I’m kind of a night owl, so I’m usually not too sleepy around this time.”

“Really? It’s almost three.”

“Normally, I only sleep three hours, between four and seven. Sometimes I stay in bed all day on weekends, but…”

“Wow…”

She was one of those short sleepers? I was a bit jealous of all the extra time it afforded her. And not to get off topic, but the dark had us chatting in pretty hushed tones. It made Saionji’s breaths between her words more prevalent. Even when she snickered, it sounded more mature than usual. It made me tingle a little.

“Hee-hee! So anyway, Shinohara…”

We continued chatting while my consciousness began to grow hazy. Topics included acting, lies, complaints about school life, and the real Saionji, whom she occasionally contacted over video calls.

“I’m counting on you, okay? With Yuki, I mean.”

“Mmph…”

“Because I know you can do it. You beat Kugasaki—that proves you’re better at cheating than pretty much anyone I know. And you’re my partner in crime… So I know Noa Akizuki won’t beat you.”

That encouragement, delivered just before I passed out, had a strangely kind ring to it in my ears.

Monday morning, the fifth day of the 4WC.

After I had Kagaya install her completed program on my device, I watched Saionji head off for school. The Company had lent her an Ohga uniform. Apparently, it kept an inventory of them for disguise purposes. After seeing Saionji off, I left for Eimei School.

“…”

Obviously, people would be able to send me Trial requests the moment I set foot on school premises. However, word that I was in the middle of a Trial with someone had evidently spread pretty quickly after yesterday’s events, so I didn’t have any would-be challengers running over. I felt the typical sort of attention I garnered as a Seven Star, but nothing else.

Himeji attended school as usual, and we ran into each other on the way. When her pure-blue eyes met mine, I lost my breath for a moment. We didn’t talk about anything. She toyed with her silvery hair while acting apologetic, then bowed and entered the classroom.

I was prepared for this, but it stings that she won’t even speak with me.

None of it showed on my face, but I was pretty upset. I took my seat at my desk and stared ahead vacantly.

“Phew…”

“Oh, I know just how you feel, Hiro! Wanna hear my impression of Shirayuki? I’ve been practicing, and I know I’ll do it really great after pulling an all-nighter with a hangover!”

“No thank you. Also, go to bed already.”

I shook my head, banishing the eerily perky voice from my earpiece.

According to Ms. Nanachan, who arrived after the bell rang a few minutes later, fewer than two thousand students remained in the Fourth Ward Challenge as of last night. The event had begun with roughly nine thousand participants, which meant over seven thousand had been knocked out. Ms. Nanachan explained we might have a winner as soon as midday tomorrow at this rate.

“…”

Everyone immediately threw their gazes at me, and I took them in stride. No matter how the 4WC shook out, getting through my Trial with Himeji came first.

The school day felt like a marathon. I didn’t have to run from any potential opponents, yet the mental fatigue made it feel exhaustingly long. I sat next to Himeji almost the entire time, yet she didn’t say a word to me. We even spent our lunch break separated from each other. That alone, the mere absence of Himeji, made me feel as though I’d been thrown into some alternate timeline. It was bizarre.

I’d better get going.

Once Tsuji, Tatara, and the other classmates I frequently talked to were gone, I picked up my bag and stood from my seat. Quietly walking forward, I slid open the door at the back of the room.

“…I’ve been expecting you, Master.”

Himeji was there, having left class a short while before me. She was back in her uniform for the first time since Friday, and the tension in her voice made her seem rougher than usual.

“Hey. It’s been a while. At least, it feels that way.”

“It’s not even been a full day since I called you.”

“Guess not…”

“Still, I was thinking the same thing, Master.”

With those softly spoken words, Himeji turned away from me. It was probably her way of saying “Don’t pry any further.” I’m sure Akizuki had forbidden her from giving me any information. She could be monitoring us right now. Keeping my guard up was for the best.

I started walking at a slow pace that I’ll charitably call hesitant. I didn’t get very far before Himeji spoke again.

“The fourth floor of Building F, the Applied Sciences Building, isn’t being used today. I’d like to hold the Trial there. A large audience will make things difficult.”

“All right. That’s fine.”

I quickly agreed to the perfectly reasonable request. Himeji and I garnered enough attention already, but something so commercially alluring as a Trial between a maid and her master was too exciting for Libra to ignore. It’d be a pain, especially because I intended to cheat my ass off. The fewer spectators the better.

Kagaya was up from her nap, so I had her guide me down a more secluded route to the Applied Sciences Building without incident.

“Oh! Wow! Eh-heh-heh! We meet again! What a coincidence, Hiroto!  ”

The moment I made it to the entrance, a girl popped out from nearby—Noa Akizuki. The upperclassman with the twin chestnut ponytails. The Six Star Little Devil who never showed her real self. The girl who had used Himeji to concoct this whole scenario beamed, bright and cunning.

“…”

Her demeanor was hardly a surprise anymore. I glared at her, but Akizuki insisted on acting like she’d simply run into me.

“We keep meeting each other by coincidence,” she said, tilting her head as she leaned forward. “It’s really gotta be fate or something, doesn’t it? Hee-hee-hee! And I’d be perfectly okay with that, Hiroto!  ”

“You’re shameless,” I replied. The words were only partially an act. “If you mean that, then you’ve got some serious problems with your memory.”

“Aww, that’s sooo mean!” Akizuki puffed up her cheeks in faux anger. “This is your chance to make Noa all yours.”

She was suddenly wearing a very different sort of smile as she stomped her way toward me. She peered up at my face. Her citrus scent threatened to knock me over.

“You’ve got a Trial against your maid coming up, don’t you, Hiroto? I think it’d be really nice if I could watch!  ”

“Watch…? Don’t you mean interfere?”

“Aw, c’mon, I’m not gonna do that! I just wanna see you at your coolest in the middle of a battle! And I wanna cheer you on, too! ‘You can do it, Hiroto!   You can do it!  ’”

Every gesture, every intonation, was as cloying as possible. I hardly felt inclined to agree to her spectating, but Trials were public events. If someone wished to watch, there was nothing I could do. Refusing wouldn’t accomplish much for me. It was better to keep this girl in sight than let her run around doing whatever she pleased.

“Hahhh… Do whatever you want, Akizuki. I was worried I wouldn’t have much of an audience anyway.”

The secretive mastermind before me received my response with a playful grin.

Game: Clash of Triangles

• Players begin the Game carrying a hand of ten cards.

• There are six different types of cards: king, prince, queen, knight, assassin, and peasant.

• The players each pick a card from their hands and play them simultaneously. This comprises one turn. The winner is decided depending on the cards played.

• Royalty (the king, prince, and queen) beats knights, knights beat assassins, and assassins beat royalty.

• Royalty and knights beat peasants. Assassins and peasants tie, as do any two identical cards.

• Kings beat princes, princes beat queens, and queens beat kings.

• If the two played cards are tied, they are added to the pot. If one beats the other, the winning player captures both played cards, as well as any cards in the pot at that time. (A bonus card is placed in the pot at the start of the Game.)

• The Game continues until at least one side runs out of cards in their hand. Whoever has captured more cards at that point is the winner.

We were in a classroom on the western edge of the Applied Sciences Building. At some point, it had been repurposed into a makeshift storehouse.

“Okay… That ought to do it.”

Himeji and I were setting up the Trial, not that it took much work. We only had to move the cardboard boxes and folders strewn around to the back of the room, clearing enough space in front of the teacher’s desk to play. There we set desks facing each other to create an impromptu battlefield.

“Thanks, Himeji.”

“It had to be done anyway. I apologize for making you help with this.”

She bowed and pulled a seat out for me. I obliged, and with another bow, she quietly turned around and briskly took the chair opposite mine.

“Ohhhh! Hee-hee! Wow. A real maid and everything!  ”

Akizuki threw me a sly smile from her spot at the teacher’s desk. Neither Himeji nor I told her the rules of Clash of Triangles, but she undoubtedly knew them already. I saw no reason to offer her any courtesy. I turned my attention from her to my opponent.

“Okay…I think we’re ready, Himeji. Feel free to start whenever you like.”

“…All right.”

Her shoulders jerked slightly. Had I startled her? She released that tension after a moment, however, and nodded. Those pure-blue eyes were trained on me below silver locks. After a glance at Akizuki, Himeji spoke.

“Master… First, I want to thank you very much for agreeing to this selfish request of mine. Under normal circumstances, I’d be at your side, not facing you. I know it makes me a failure as a maid, Master, yet here we are.”

“…”

“As I made clear yesterday, I will not lose this Trial. Not even against you… In fact, it’s because you’re my opponent that I absolutely cannot afford to fail.”

“…I see.”

“I promise…I will give this my full effort.”

The challenge had been issued. As though in response, her device, which she’d set on the desk, released a soft white light, signaling the start of the Trial. Numerous projected screens surrounded Himeji instantly, and ten cards appeared before her, floating in the air.

“I have invoked the support Ability Change Probability level four. Of the two hands normally assigned at random, I will choose set A.”

“…Okay.”

The spectacle had me in awe for a moment, but I managed to reply. You’re all right. You’re all right. You prepared for this. Just stay calm, do what you have to, and you can totally win this.

“Phew…”

I picked up my device, and the same projected displays formed around me, albeit without Himeji’s theatrics. Ten cards appeared before me—one king, one prince, one queen, one knight, one assassin, and five peasants. It was definitely set B, the “weaker” hand.

All I have to do now is work out Himeji’s strategy and make the best move. That would be the best approach to Clash of Triangles, but…

I looked up from my hand. Himeji nodded.

“I apologize, Master. My turn is not over yet. I’m activating the Four Star Ability Force Control. I will make your card selections for the next three turns.”

“Ohhhhh!”

Akizuki cheered at Himeji’s flat statement.

“Force Control! The maid’s going full throttle from the start!   Hee-hee-hee… C’mon, Hiroto! If you let up, you’re gonna lose! Am I gonna see a Seven Star go tumbling down today?”

“…”

I did my best to ignore Akizuki’s obnoxious remarks. Things had played out as expected so far.

Force Control…an Ability that lets her control my moves. Himeji can remove all randomness and put herself in the best position possible. If our predictions from the strategy conference are correct, then by the third turn, I’ll have lost my knight, my assassins, and both of the peasants I can use to recover.

By that, I meant my peasant with Explosive Growth and the one with Trojan Horse. The former upped my capture count by the current turn number, and the latter took half my opponent’s captured cards and made them mine. Both were significant threats. I was confident Himeji would remove them from play.

If so, the Peek Abilities I brought won’t be enough to stage a comeback. It will be impossible, no matter how hard I try. I’ll need to start cheating the moment Force Control ends.

“I will now make our moves for the first turn.”

While I busied myself reviewing strategy, Himeji looked right at me and quietly raised her right hand to tap one of the cards lined up in front of her. Normally, I’d make a selection, too, but under Force Control, I wasn’t free to make a selection. A white light outlined one of the cards in my hand, despite me doing nothing.

“Okay… This is our first turn.”

At Himeji’s announcement, the two cards flipped around. Himeji had picked a knight for herself, and for me, she’d selected the peasant with Glorious Revolution. Knights beat peasants, so Himeji naturally won. Glorious Revolution didn’t trigger. Three cards were placed in Himeji’s capture pile, the two she’d won and the bonus added to the pot at the start (likely placed there to ensure the total number of cards was odd). I had seen this coming, but it was still a pretty lethal first turn.

There was one thing that differed from my expectations, though.

Why Glorious Revolution?

My eyebrows bunched up while I thought on this. The Glorious Revolution peasant switched all cards’ strengths and weaknesses for the rest of the match when invoked. It could certainly have given me an advantage over Himeji, but did she need to spend a Force Control turn getting rid of it?

“Continuing…I will play this.”

Before I could think on it much longer, Himeji made her next selections. Force Control would end after the third turn, and I had no way of stopping it. All I could do was sit silently and observe.

Here’s how things shook out:

Turn two:

Himeji: Peasant (Cardectomy). Me: Peasant (no effect).

Result: Tie. Both cards placed in pot. Cardectomy takes effect, and my peasant (Explosive Growth) card is removed from my hand.

Turn three:

Himeji: Peasant (Unbeatable Hero). Me: King.

Result: Unbeatable Hero takes effect, defeating my king. Himeji captures all cards, including the ones left in the pot after the last turn.

“…”

“Eh-heh-heh… Boy, this is one merciless maid!  ” Akizuki was clearly enjoying herself immensely from her spot on the teacher’s desk. “In just two turns, you’ve taken two peasant skills from Hiroto, and just look at how big your captured-card lead is… I guess the maid’s revolting against her master, huh? Does Hiroto not matter to you anymore?”

“…Quiet, please.”

“Awww! You could at least play along! Also…” Akizuki hopped off the desk, her feet lightly tapping on the floor. She was all smiles as she walked up to Himeji with her hands behind her back. Bending her knees a little, Akizuki brought her face close to Himeji’s ear. “Did I say you could talk to me like that, maid?”

“…I’m sorry.”

“No prob! Just be more careful, okay?  ”

Akizuki enthusiastically nodded at the slightly pale Himeji, then hopped back up on her desk. I watched this in silence, secretly thinking about something else.

This is weird.

Honestly, that much was obvious. Himeji’s moves while Force Control was active were bizarre, no matter how many times I reviewed them. They were just too far removed from the scenario Saionji had given me. It would have been impossible to anticipate Himeji’s selections exactly, but they should have resembled our predictions somewhat. She should have done as Saionji expected if she wanted to build a strong advantage.

This wasn’t adding up. There didn’t seem to be any meaning to it at all.

She left Trojan Horse untouched, the card that gives me the best chance at turning this around. I still have my knight and assassin, too, which gives me options to compete with next turn. And she used Unbeatable Hero, which can defeat anything, to take out a completely middling card… What’s going on?

Perhaps Himeji had made a mistake? That felt pretty unlikely. It’d be one thing if we were playing on the fly, but we had half a day of preparation behind us. There was no way Himeji had made a simple error.

Plus…Akizuki was acting weird, too.

“Eh-heh-heh… Looking pretty lost there, Hiroto. You okay? You’re going to lose to the maid at this rate. I sure wish I could see you do something cool…  ”

“…”

She leaned in from the teacher’s desk, smiling sweetly.

Admittedly, I was at an overwhelming disadvantage, yet Akizuki acted like this was already over, and that didn’t feel right. We were nowhere near a checkmate yet. I still had a chance to recover. If she thought I was set up for inevitable defeat, then she was mistaken.

However, it was prudent not to assume Akizuki had grown overconfident and missed the reality of the Trial. She was a Six Star and ranked higher than Kugasaki. This was the Little Devil of Eimei, who always concealed her true feelings. Noa Akizuki was a powerful enemy to have, someone even Saionji acknowledged as a major threat.

This has to be some kind of bait.

I slowly brought my right hand to my mouth. What if Akizuki had forced this situation to have me win as dramatically as possible while she watched from a superior position? If that was her aim, then things fell into place. Chances were, something bad would happen to Himeji if she lost. That’s why Akizuki needled me with that sly grin of hers while leaving a clear path to victory for me.

That was her real goal. This Trial was a trap.

Shoot. I realized it a bit too late.

I gritted my teeth a little as I chided myself. My picking up on it at all was fortunate, of course, but I didn’t feel very lucky. Acting on this knowledge would be difficult. If I beat Himeji, everything would go as Akizuki planned, and if I lost, I’d be eliminated from the Fourth Ward Challenge. Actually, given how blatantly Akizuki and that anonymous external element targeted me, I’d probably have worse things to worry about than losing the event. Akizuki’s scheme was perfect. I could see why they called her the Little Devil.

Another question occurred to me.

Would Himeji really just do everything Akizuki says?

She was the head of the Company, a powerful, cheating maid who stopped at nothing to win her Games. Yes, Shirayuki Himeji was technically in the service industry, but she wasn’t some pawn who obeyed every command. If Akizuki had ordered her to lose this Trial on purpose, Himeji would have pressed the Give Up button on her device instead of going to all this trouble. That would’ve been more efficient.

But she hadn’t, so something had to be up. Himeji wasn’t mindlessly dancing to Akizuki’s tune at all. She had some kind of plan, one I hadn’t caught on to yet.

Think… Think. There must be a signal. How would she communicate without alerting Akizuki?

I stared at my desk, plumbing the depths of my memories. Himeji’s only opportunity to signal me would’ve been the phone call last night. What had she said? I recalled she’d mentioned not being able to be with me, and that she couldn’t explain why. She’d insisted that I had to lose, making it clear she’d compete to win in our Trial…

…Hang on.

She didn’t say that. She only asked me not to win.

I brought my head up, my eyes wide open. I finally understood. Akizuki had set it up so that Himeji couldn’t lose for some reason, and Himeji had begged me not to win. But that was all she’d said. She’d never said that she had to win. When I reviewed the Trial’s progression, things fell into place. She’d spared my Trojan Horse—my lifeline—to ensure I wasn’t instantly eliminated. She’d left my knight and assassin untouched to guarantee the three-way competition between the cards continued. She’d gotten rid of her Unbeatable Hero card, which could’ve been a menacing threat in the endgame.

And most of all…

The Cardectomy peasant… Its skill forcibly removes a powerful card from an opponent’s hand, but that’s not all. The card removed is out of the Trial for good, so the number of cards in play drops from twenty-one to twenty. An even number.

That had to be it.

A single bonus card appeared in the pot when the Trial began. It brought the total number of cards in Clash of Triangles up to an odd number to prevent ties. However, Cardectomy had brought the total back down to twenty. We were playing with an even number of winnable cards. A tie game was possible.

In a Trial where neither winning nor losing was permissible, a draw was the only way to end it safely.

Of course, I had no conclusive evidence that was Himeji’s intention. Her ignoring my Trojan Horse for Explosive Growth felt like pretty convincing evidence, though. Explosive Growth awarded me a bonus based on the current turn number. Apart from Cardectomy, that was the only way a player could alter the number of available cards.

“…”

Himeji was staring at me, looking much the same as before—with that colorless, transparent gaze. Perhaps that was her way of praying I would take notice.

All right.

I steeled my resolve and tapped my earpiece, signaling to Kagaya that I wanted any current cheats deactivated. “Huh?!” I heard her exclaim, but I wasn’t in any position to explain.

“…?”

I could tell that Akizuki was looking at me closely. She’d noticed my unusual movements. I didn’t need her commenting on that, so I coughed and gave Himeji a bold grin.

“Sorry for the wait. Let’s move on to the fourth turn.”

“…Yes, Master.”

Himeji nodded and promptly chose a card. Although it was placed face down, my Peek Ability was active, so I knew what she’d selected. It was her second knight. No matter how you tried to justify it, this wasn’t a normal move.

“Okay,” I calmly stated, “I’ll go…with this.”

I chose my assassin. In Clash of Triangles, an assassin beat a king, but lost to a knight. I deliberately picked a losing card, and with that, Himeji’s capture pile increased by two.

“Ah…”

It was Akizuki, not Himeji, who was surprised. That little gasp couldn’t have been on purpose. I shot her a glance. She was already waving her hands and looking for an excuse.

“Ah, um… Sorry, Hiroto! I was just a little startled.”

“Startled? Why? Are things not going as you expected?”

“! …Hmm? What’s that mean, huh? ’Cause I sure don’t know. I don’t have a plan. I’m just a little antsy because you’re getting pushed around so much!  ”

“Oh, really?” Akizuki’s expression seemed stonier than before. “You might be on the edge of your seat for the remainder of the Trial, then.”

I focused back on my cards.

My next choice was the queen, which was knocked out by Himeji’s assassin. That brought her number of captured cards up to eleven. She had the majority required to win. However, we both still had cards in our hands, so the Game wasn’t over. I played a prince to Himeji’s king, then a knight to her prince, increasing her capture pile. She used the Reset All peasant card (the one that would put all my captured cards back into the pot), but since I had yet to win any cards, it had no effect. I countered it with one of my no-effect peasants, ensuring Reset All swung and missed.

“…Hey, what’s going on?” Akizuki asked in a strained voice, her hands balled into little fists. “What are you up to, Hiroto? You should play a little more seriously.”

“Just keep quiet and watch for me, okay?” I replied curtly, brushing her off.

Before much longer, we were at the end of the eighth turn. Himeji had two cards left, and thanks to Cardectomy, I had only one in my hand.

“Your next turn will be the last, Master,” Himeji said quietly. “I have fifteen captured cards, and only two are in the pot, so I have essentially won the match. But your final card is the peasant with the Trojan Horse skill…letting you steal half of my captured cards. It’s the most vicious and effective peasant card remaining. However, that skill only works if the peasant is defeated by royalty or a knight. Nothing will happen otherwise.”

“Yep, that’s right. And based on your previous plays, you’re currently holding a queen and an assassin. Play your assassin, and you win.”

“That seems to be the case… I’ve already picked my card.”

Himeji’s selection lit up and floated toward me face down. If this was her assassin, the Trial would end in my defeat. After all of Saionji’s and Kagaya’s help, I’d be knocked out of the 4WC, a bad ending if ever there was one. It would torpedo my reputation as a Seven Star. I’d been acting like I was the best on the Academy, yet I stood to lose to my own servant. People would deride and mock me, and Eimei would fall into Noa Akizuki’s hands.

Yet for all the risk…I believed in Himeji. This Clash of Triangles Game wasn’t some pointless conflict. It was the perfect stage for us to double-cross Akizuki, and I knew it.

“…”

I took one final look into Himeji’s blue eyes. She reciprocated, drawing her gaze down only to raise it back to me again. Akizuki cocked an eyebrow, ignorant of the meaning of this gesture, but I got the message. This was one of the many signals Himeji had worked out with me before she transferred to Eimei and the 4WC started. Its meaning could be summed up in three words.

Yes, my master.

“Hahhh…”

I smiled fearlessly, paying no mind to Akizuki’s reaction.

“My final Peek Ability ran out last turn. I can’t see what you just picked…but I don’t need any Abilities to know. That’s a queen, Himeji.”

“A queen… Are you sure?”

“If it’s not, I’ll tell you dozens of my most embarrassing secrets.”

“…Heh-heh. I see. That’s a shame.”

After a lengthy pause, Himeji narrowed her eyes at me. They brimmed with a soft grace. A gentle smile spread across her face.

“I would’ve liked to hear all those secrets.”

The card flipped over. It was a queen.

“…!”

Akizuki must have known this was coming for a while now, but her usual sickly-sweet demeanor had vanished. Frustration contorted her expression. Her dainty shoulders quivered, and her fists pressed so hard against the teacher’s desk that it undoubtedly hurt.

We let her be to wrap up the Trial. A queen beat a peasant, so Himeji won the final turn. She captured the cards in play and those in the pot. However, the conditions for Trojan Horse were fulfilled, so I took half of her capture pile, rounding up in case of fractions. Himeji possessed nineteen captured cards, so ten of them went to me.

I had no hand remaining, meaning the Game ended with the ninth turn. The single card left in Himeji’s hand was automatically added to her capture pile for a total of ten.

The score was even, and the Clash of Triangles concluded in a draw.

““…””

Nobody said anything for a little while after the Trial ended. Normally, Akizuki would be bounding around the room, annoying everyone present, yet she sat quietly, head lowered, making the whole place feel awkward.

However, she soon forced herself up and off the desk. She approached us with her hands behind her back and a smile carved into her face.

“Eh…heh-heh… A draw, huh? How will this be treated?”

“It won’t be treated as anything, Ms. Akizuki. A tie is a tie. The Trial itself has been conducted, so we will no longer be ‘In Combat,’ but neither of us lost, so my master and I will remain in the Fourth Ward Challenge.”

“Hmm… Wow, neat. Nice one, Hiroto. Guess you sure do care about that maid, huh? Sorry, I think I’m feeling a little tired. I got to watch Hiroto in a Trial, so I think I’ll just go home and—”

“Hold it, Akizuki.”

The moment the erratic Akizuki turned around, I quietly stood and grabbed her wrist. This startled her, and her shoulders jumped. Her legs froze before they could take her to the hallway.

“…! Um, what is it, Hiroto? I know I’m so angelically cute that you can’t help but want me around, but nobody likes a guy who acts all aggressive, y’know?”

“Drop it. There’s no point in pretending anymore. Why don’t you tell me what you’re up to?”

“Wh…what do you mean?”

“Stop playing dumb. You used Himeji to try and take me out, didn’t you? And not just so I’d be dropped from the 4WC. You’ve been working to drag down the greatest student on the Academy since before this event began.”

“…!”

Akizuki stiffened a bit, but it only lasted an instant before she plastered that smile back on. “Huhhh?” she asked. “What’re you talking about? I have no idea what that means. I just happened to be—”

“No, that couldn’t be the case.”

Himeji stood, too, shooting down Akizuki’s excuse. She quickly checked her device and nodded with relief, then fixed her pure-blue eyes on the Little Devil.

“Last night, Ms. Akizuki, you stopped me on the way to the convenience store long enough to hack into my device, installing an illegal application called Emissary on it. The program logs all data transferred to and from the device and uses its microphone and camera to spy on the owner. It’s a very unpleasant and vicious set of features.”

“Oh… I see. That’s why you couldn’t go back to our dorm, huh? And why I never heard from you before that call.”

“Yes. Our relationship is cleaner than the mineral water bottled near Mt. Fuji, but we still share a few things that don’t need to be made public. After neutralizing my ability to resist, Ms. Akizuki gave me an ultimatum. ‘You can’t drop out of the 4WC or abandon your current Trial. Follow my instructions, and I’ll remove Emissary from your device.’”

“So your only choice was to fight against me instead. Did Akizuki choose the Game we played, too?”

“She did, yes. She didn’t explicitly order me to win or lose…but my victory would mean you’d be out of the 4WC, a result we had to avoid at all costs. Your winning would also result in tragedy, however.”

“Yeah, I had an inkling, but what, exactly?”

“The Emissary program. The Ability contains special code that triggers when the device owner loses a Game or Trial. It moves the program to the winner’s device. Had I lost, all of that data snooping and video monitoring would have been installed on your device.”

“…”

Himeji’s explanation left me silent. That was frightening. Emissary would have made it impossible to keep my lie going. If Himeji hadn’t been quick-witted enough to leave the door open for a tie, if Saionji and Kagaya hadn’t provided their assistance, if I hadn’t picked up on Himeji’s signal, if any of the pieces had been missing, things would have ended very badly. Even thinking about it made me shudder a bit.

“That is all I know.” Himeji clasped her hands together in front of her and faced Akizuki. “Obviously, I was forbidden from telling you any of that before, but now that Emissary can’t activate, I have no reason to cooperate. So, Ms. Akizuki, do you still intend to play innocent?”

“Er, I told you, I don’t know anything about that. Are you two trying to bully me or something? I might be laid back, but I’ll seriously get upset if you don’t stop!”

“Play dumb if you like, but last night’s access logs are still intact. They’re currently bugged, but if we have the old vixen of Eimei—Provost Ichinose, I mean—examine them, I think it will be clear that your device was used to hack into mine.”

“…”

Himeji’s follow-up attack was enough to finally make Akizuki hang her head. She bit her lip, as though holding something back. Her clenched hands trembled. A few seconds later, she looked up and glared at me.

“Why…?”

“Hmm?”

“Why…why did it have to be you?!”

The pained shout echoed through the classroom and carried unimaginably intense anger. Once Akizuki had been soft and sweet, but now everything she’d bottled up was flowing free.

“Why?!” she raged, slamming her right hand on a nearby desk. “Why?! Why?! I did everything I could, all this prep work, and I still couldn’t beat you?! Why do I have to be the loser?! This is crazy… All of this is crazy! I know you’re cheating, Hiroto! I know you used cheap, cowardly tricks to work your way up! And I have to exist beneath you? It’s insane!”

“…Cheating? What do you mean?”

“Heh-heh… What do you think? All of it. It’s unthinkable that some new transfer student would instantly become a Seven Star. Someone rising to the top of the Academy while putting in zero work? You have to be cheating. I’m a cute girl and a good one. I hate cheaters. Didn’t I tell you before? That survey said most people believed you’d win the 4WC, Hiroto.”

“Yeah, I remember.”

“Well, you know what? At the end of the last school year, a similar survey asked who’d win the next 4WC. I was first back then. People just assumed that I’d win, that I’d totally hold out until the end. And I thought so, too. But…but the moment you came to this school, everyone immediately turned their backs to me and went straight to you!”

“…”

“It makes no sense… This has to be some kind of mistake. Or a disaster, one of the two. Because I’ve spent years working, building all of this up, and you just swooped in and took it all from me.”

Akizuki took a step toward me, a sharpened glint in her eye. She was certain that I’d cheated, but not because she had any sort of evidence. She just found it unacceptable that I’d become the best on the Academy so quickly after arriving. That sort of viewpoint wasn’t uncommon. Considering the world she lived in, I couldn’t dismiss her feelings callously. Once, she’d been favored to win the Fourth Ward Challenge, considered worthy of becoming champion of Eimei School. To her, my presence really must’ve been a nuisance. All the expectations, praise, trust, envy, and everything else meant to come her way—I had taken it all.

“So…so I wanted revenge,” she continued, something like a boastful sneer on her face. “And the 4WC, the clash of Eimei students, was the perfect opportunity. I knew from your previous Games that your maid is your confidant. So I scouted things out a few times to make sure of it. Heh-heh… You’re partners, right? I bet she’s really important to you. I figured that with the maid out of the picture, you wouldn’t be able to fight the way you typically do. I created this situation to make you battle her. I got rid of the other high-ranked students by making them take each other out before they could get in my way, and I cleaned up the dorks who’d try to cheat their way to victory. And it was all for nothing…”

“Hmm… Is that why more players have been eliminated than usual?” I asked.

“Hee-hee-hee! It sure is!   After all, Hiroto, I don’t need anyone but you!  ”

Akizuki was using her cutesy voice to say some pretty scary things. She grinned at me eerily for a bit, but ultimately, her shoulders slumped.

“But…all that preparation didn’t help. I even made a deal with that devil…”

“Devil?” I parroted.

“Forget it. It’s just an expression.”

Akizuki looked conflicted for a moment, but shook her head, trying to play it off as nothing. I considered this, studying her expression and body language.

The devil… She’s probably referring to the mastermind, the external meddler the provost mentioned. Akizuki only got this far because she worked with someone. In other words, she cheated. She briefly deactivated the 4WC’s time restrictions…and that Emissary Ability’s clearly illegal, too. I doubt Akizuki made all that happen alone.

Noa Akizuki had turned out to be directly involved in the case the provost had asked me to investigate. That was lucky. I let out a light exhalation.

“Regardless, your scheme’s finished, and you’re going to tell me everything you know. About your revenge and anything else relev—”

“Eh-heh-heh! What’re you talking about, Hiroto?” Akizuki’s abruptly low voice cut me off. With a dry “Ah-ha!” she gave me another twisted grin. “It’s not over yet… I can’t let something like this defeat me.”

“Not over? How?”

“Ha! How do you think?” Pure joy entered her smile. “Look, Hiroto, I’m cute and smart, so I had another plan in place for just such an occasion.”

She put a finger in the air. Anxiety built in my gut.

“You know the Emissary I installed on your maid’s device? Well, it’s got a special feature I didn’t tell her about. It’s a dual-layer Ability, and when the Emissary effect is disabled, it automatically switches to the other function.”

“…What other function?”

“It’s called Destructive Impulse, and it’s just as bad as it sounds. It completely destroys all the data on the device. All I have to do is press the button, and your maid’s device is nothing but a paperweight.”

“Wha…?!”

“And I’m talking about more than losing a couple of photo albums. Don’t forget, all your personal information and wallet contents are stored on your Academy device. When that data is blown away, everything about you vanishes with it. You’ll lose your school enrollment, and your rank will drop to zero. Your maid won’t even be allowed to stay on the island!  ”

“That’s a whole new level of illegal,” Himeji spat, words trembling slightly. “Are you sure about this, Ms. Akizuki? Because if word gets out that you’ve done this, you’ll be hated across the entire Academy.”

“I know, but…but I can’t go back now!”

Akizuki stormed up to us, went behind Himeji’s back, and grabbed one of her arms. With her free hand, Akizuki made the shape of a gun and pressed her pointer finger against Himeji like a bank robber with a hostage.

“Hiroto,” she said with a faint smile, “I want you to play a Game with me right now. None of these boring Trials. A real Game, with stars on the line.”

“…”

“But I don’t want a fair match, all right? Because I’m sick of being all goody-goody. I’ve sold my soul to the devil, and there’s no changing that. So…if you want your maid back, you better lose. Give up a star to me and tell me I deserve to be a Seven Star, not you, okay? Then bow down to everyone and atone for what you’ve done. That’s not asking too much, is it? It’s all been a lie anyway.”

Akizuki’s gaze bored into me.

Ngh…!

I, meanwhile, watched her quietly, even as violent bewilderment threatened to overpower me internally. My first reaction was to assume she was joking. Akizuki had used the Trial system to force Himeji and me to fight each other. That was her primary plan. Now she was going a step further. She’d considered what we’d do if we bested her and came up with the best possible response.

This really is insane… Something’s absolutely wrong.

It felt like my actions were being read suspiciously well.

The entire Fourth Ward Challenge had felt odd, and now I was sure of it. The green Unique Star stolen from Eimei School was a detector with strength relative to its owner’s. Perhaps Akizuki was using that star to read my mind. It would explain how she always seemed to know where I was and how she kept making the best possible choices.

“…”

That’s how far the would-be Eimei champion was willing to go to crush me. Such was the strength of her grudge over losing her place. I still knew almost nothing about the real mastermind, but I didn’t have much of a future as a Seven Star if I couldn’t make it past Akizuki. I had taken from her. Now it was her turn to take from me.

“And I’m not gonna settle for a tie this time, either,” Akizuki sweetly whispered with a chuckle as she took out her device.

“This Game’s gonna be a treasure hunt, a final battle fixed from the start. Let’s get started, shall we?  ”