✭〈𝔻𝕒𝕟𝕘𝕒𝕟𝕣𝕠𝕟𝕡𝕒𝕍𝟜 - 𝕊𝕙𝕒𝕥𝕥𝕖𝕣𝕖𝕕 𝔹𝕝𝕚𝕤𝕤〉 ✭

✭Guess we're doing this again..✭

Everyone had left the gym. There was a tension in the air, the fear that at any moment, any of us could be killed. Despite Akamatsu's speech, I could tell everyone was still distrusting. Having to review the rules made me disgusted by the whole situation even more. This had to be classified as some form of psychological torture.

But besides all of that, everyone has gathered at a manhole Gokuhara had found.

And so,

a few simple hours after the announcement of the killing game, here I am again.

This was the only exit at the moment.

After Gokuhara had found the manhole, and we of course climbed in, everyone was shocked to see a sign, labeled exit, pointing down a long tunnel that I knew was dangerous. But I'll spare you the details of finding it because that's a long boring story that no one wants to hear.

I mean anyone would be shocked, but of course I wasn't. This was one of monokuma's many traps in this killing game, and it worked the first time.

I know it's impossible to make it to the end of this tunnel, and with every failed attempt, Monokuma aims to lower morale, making us more vulnerable to lashing out at each other, splitting up, and, well, more willing to kill.

I was dreading this tunnel, because I knew whether I said something or someone else did, it would end in an argument like last time. It was truly pointless to try to stop it, but I could still attempt to.

"Well, this seems like an obvious trap, no?" I looked around at everyone, who seemed so caught up in Akamatsu's shenanigans that they forgot what common sense was. I mean, there was a sign which could've only been put there by Monokuma (or Shirogane), who were the ones trapping us in the first place.

Maybe it was more obvious to me because it's my second go-around, but it was also kinda their faults for being so mindless. For all they knew, Akamatsu could be the mastermind trying to sabotage everyone by pretending to be their friend. Of course that wasn't the case.

Akamatsu directed her attention to me. "Well even if it does seem like a trap, isn't it still worth a try?" She looked at me hopefully, as if she wasn't gonna go ahead and do it even if I said no.

"Not really, but I could also be lying. In fact, maybe I totally agree that we should go ahead with it, but maybe I don't. Who knows? I know I don't !"

Akamatsu looked as if she had not followed anything I said at all. With a bewildered look on her face, she answered with a simple; "Ok."

I know this isn't exactly the time to be messing with other people, (especially when I'm trying to stop them from wasting their time and potentially hurting themselves) but I just wanted to heighten my own mood. It didn't work, but her bewilderment was somewhat funny I guess.

"I'm not going to pretend I understood what Ouma-kun said, but I do think some of what he said was important. Akamatsu-san, don't you think it's more likely this is some sort of trap than an actual way out?"

I raised an eyebrow.

During my brief period between the first and this game, I had tried to push away everything that had happened the first time. The memories of the deaths, the guilt that came along with them, the pain in my final moments, all of that had been pushed as far away as possible. But with the announcement of the 54th season, all of that has sort of resurfaced.

The point of saying this is to point out that most memories have been pushed down, down, down faaar away from my mind, meaning I don't remember most of the tiny details. So maybe me saying this is wrong, but I don't remember Saihara saying anything about the exit. I know I'm not the most reliable source of information, but I'm almost 90% certain that Saihara had never said anything.