Seen Through the Eyes of Goodwill

Chapter- 14 Shifting Gears 1

Chapter- 14 (Shifting gears -1) Miscalculations

Ayanokouji's POV:

Class D made Ichinose Honami as their traitor, till now I have only read about mob mentality. Now that I witness it, I feel fascinated.

Once Ichinose left Hirata took a seat and questioned his life choices, Horikita who stood at a distance seemed to be doing the same. Leaving her for later I went to Hirata.

"It is time for the 200m dash, you should get going."

Hirata didn't answer me, he got up and left. Once I was done with the 200m dash I returned back and approached Horikita.

"There's a little over an hour left until Sudou's turn, huh?"

The dash continued for the second- and third-year students, followed by a fifty-minute break. If Sudou didn't return before the break ended, it'd be checkmate.

Ichinose was also gone but I didn't have any plans of rescuing her right now. With our ace in the hole gone, we'd never win that is why Sudou takes the priority. Only one person in our class could get to him. I wondered if Horikita understood just how vital her role was.

"Horikita, do you know what happened with Sudou?"

"I saw it. He realized what a disappointment he was, then ran away. What bothers me is that the traitor has roped Ichinose into a trap."

"Well...yeah, I guess that's true."

"Why are you here? You're not going to request that I bring Sudou or Ichinose back, are you?"

"If you already know, then don't ask. Do you understand you're the only one who can help?" I inquired.

"I don't think so. There are other people who can do something. There's no way I possibly could," she said.

Was she serious? Yeah, she probably was. She had no idea that Sudou had a crush on her.

"Besides, I'm not exactly in a position to worry about other people right now," Horikita added.

She was indeed suffering. She had a lot to deal with on her own. I understood her feelings. Besides, pretty much no one wanted to go find Sudou. They'd abandoned him, although they knew that he could save us in the sports festival. Everyone's trust in him had evaporated.

Unlike Sudou there was a minority of girls who were ready to defy the judgement of class against Ichinose and went on her rescue without thinking twice. For Sudou, Horikita needed to grow up to bring out his full potential.

"Here's how I see it," I said. "It was the three idiots who approached you when the sports festival began, they were ready to follow you but look at where they are now. You weren't able to handle them and neither yourself, not only are you a useless leader but a burden of an individual."

"That's an awful thing to say. I'm sorry I got hurt, but I had bad luck. Some things you can't control, right? As for Sudou, he must mature himself."

"Wrong. It is your job to help him mature as a leader. You blame your injury on bad luck and such delusional factors, but in reality you don't realize a thing."

"Don't make fun of me. I understand the seriousness of the situation. Clearly, we have a traitor who leaked our participation table to Ryuuen. The traitor in the class has successfully played Ichinose into submission." Horikita said, but those were obvious points that even Ike could notice.

"What else have you noticed?"

"What else? I know that Ryuuen-kun provoked Sudou-kun."

"That's right. Even with all the information in the world on Ryuuen's side, Sudou—our class's MVP—was still nearly undefeatable. So, Ryuuen needled and provoked him on purpose, until he got Sudou to drop out."