The Assassin Within

Part 41~The Bet

Nagisa tapped his pencil against his chin as he looked over his notes. He sighed as he tried his best to solve the practice question.

"Well, if it isn't the E Class gang! This library is wasted on the likes of you," Araki claimed smugly with the other members of the big five standing behind him. Strangely, Asano wasn't with them. "Pearls before swine, am I right?"

Nagisa bit back a groan as he looked at the members of the big five.

"Beat it scrubs. Those are our seats. Move your butts," Seo ordered, waving the others off.

"H-Hey! Don't interrupt our studying," Kayano shouted, holding up her book that suspiciously hid a book on puddings.

"Kayano... Your book," Nagisa whispered in despair.

"These seats are ours," Isoagi claimed confidently. "We reserved them and everything!"

"Yeah! And being able to study with air conditioning like this is simply heavenly," Nakamura said as she rested her head against her arms.

"Have you forgotten? You E-Class underachievers can't defy a class with much better grades than you- not at this school," Koyama hissed while pushing glasses back onto his nose.

"W-We can too," Okuda shouted as she stood up for herself.

"What?"

"We're aiming for the top scores in every subject at finals! Let's see you try to boss us around then!"

"D-Don't talk back to me, you cheeky bitch! And what's with those glasses? You look like a hick! Right, Araki?"

"Oh, yeah." Araki clearly didn't actually as Koyama laughed to himself.

"In all your criticism, you've overlooked something," Sakakibara claimed, playing with Kanzaki's hair. "See? Here we have a pearl among the swine. What a pity. You and I make a magnificent pair, if only you had the academic chops for it. Perhaps you could be our servant."

Kanzaki looked away as Sakakibara got too close to her. "Um, no."

"Hang on, aren't these the same ones from midterms? Kanzaki Yukiko, ranked twenty-third in Japanese. Nakamura Rio, ranked eleventh in English. Isogai Yuma ranked fourteen in social studies. Okuda Manami, ranked seventeenth in science. And Nagisa Shiota, second in everything if only because the principal refused to give him first place. I get it. So you're not entirely without academic skill, in one subject, anyway," Koyama shouted while hitting Okuda's forehead. "All but you that is."

Nagisa sighed as he looked away. "I would appreciate it if you stopped harassing my friends. It's not like that going to stop me from getting full marks in the tests anyway. You're just making a fool of yourselves."

"Is that so, then how about this?" Araki walked forward with a calm expression. "Whichever of our two classes snags the most top-ranking over the five key subjects gets to make the losing class do whatever they want.

"What's wrong? Chicken? All bark and no bite? We're perfectly willing to put our lives on the line," Seo teased darkly. What a poor choice of words.

Kanzaki swiftly picked up her pencil, holding just in front of Sakakibara's eye. Nakamura was by Okuda's side in a second, hitting away Koyama while Isogai pointed his finger at Akira's neck. Nagisa took his pencil, holding it dangerously close to Seo's neck. "You probably shouldn't be so quick to bet your lives."

"A-All right, then," Seo shouted, jumping away from Nagisa. "We have ourselves a deal!"

"We'll show you something worse than death," Koyama claimed while pushing his glasses on his nose.

"There's no running now," Sakakibara tried to say with any confidence but he was clearly scared.

"You'll regret this," Arika concluded as they all ran away like cowards.

Nagisa sighed as he placed his head on his hand. "I take back everything I ever said."

It wasn't long before the incident had spread around the whole school. Everyone knew that Class E and Class A were going to have a fight for the top. Honestly, why were they surprised? Nagisa, Karma and Okabe all claimed top places in the school the first time around, naturally, they are going to help the others be like that as well.

Karma yawned from under his book.

"Come on, Karma-kun! Shape up and study right!" Koro-sensei was not pleased as his skin turned red and he shouted at Karma. "You know you have a fighting chance of getting the overall best score! And Okabe! Are you even trying to stay awake?!"

Okabe yelped as he slid off the desk he was sleeping on. "Sorry teach, Zenny and Bones keep me working up all night, I'm so sleepy." Okabe yawned as he stretched out on the desk.

"Don't worry, teach," Karma ordered, lifting the book off his face. "Your teaching methods are top-notch. But you know Koro-sensei, with the way you've been going on about top this, top that, you've been sounding like a regular teacher: crappy and boring. Anyway, what's the plan? You know those A Class goons have something up their sleeves."

"Don't worry so much, Karma," Okajima said, turning around in his seat. "What more does the E Class even have to lose?"

"If we win, we can make them do anything! I'd like them to let us use the cafeteria," Kurahashi shouted, clapping her hands together.

"I have an idea regarding that," Koro-sensei claimed, a tentacle still resting on Karma's shoulder. "What if we make them hand this over?" Koro-sensei moved to the front of the classroom, holding up the school pamphlet. "You've already been at the bottom of the heap. That's why I'd like you to experience a lively battle for the top. An assassin must aim for the top-and bring it down."

Nagisa sighed as he stood above Karma and Okabe who were tangled up on the bed. Taking in a deep breath, he screamed at the top of his lungs. "Wake up! It's exam day!"

Karma and Okabe screamed awake as Nagisa dragged them to the bathroom, throwing them inside.

"And get that blood off you!"

Nakamura walked beside Nagisa as they headed towards the classroom. "Well, Nagisa? You ready for this?"

"I hope so. Digit got in the way of some of my studying but at least this time I get my supplies hidden so I didn't get poisoned halfway through," Nagisa laughed as he recalled all the times he fainted because of some neurotoxin on his pencils.

"You know, I've always wondered, how come you hang around those assassins so much?"

Nagisa froze slightly as he tried to recover. "Well, I knew Zen from before he came Zen. I was the one who started calling him that just like he was the first one to start calling me Viper. When Zen joined the Kuro ōkami, I just got to know his new friends." Nagisa scratched the back of his neck as he spoke with decreasing confidence.

"This will be rich," Tanaka said while leaning on the door frame. "So you made a foolish bet with A-Class, eh?"

"Wonder what they'll make you do," Takada teased as Nakamura attacked Tanaka.

"Well, looks like we're the first ones here," Nakamura announced as she opened the door to the classroom. She was wrong.

Sitting in the far corner was a girl with light purple hair.

"Who's that?!"

"Ritsu's proxy," Karasuma explained as he leaned against the wall. "We couldn't get the principal to allow an AI to take part, so we settled on a stand-in whom Ritsu personally instructed. Do you have any idea what it feels like to have the principal give you a pity-filled 'you've sure got it rough' look during those negotiations?"

"We're not worthy," both Nakamura and Nagisa shouted as they bowed.

"Ritsu has a message for you, and so do I: 'Good luck.'"

"Yes, sir!"

Nagisa took a deep breath as he handed out the papers.

Now, it begins.