Classroom of the Elite: Free Will

Ayanokouji Kiyotaka POV

March 31 was quite a special day. It was the day Horikita Manabu left. Our agreed meeting time was exactly noon. As usual, I did things early and arrived at the front gate. There wasn't no one else around except for me.

From time to time, while I waited for the others to arrive, I looked at the students headed toward Keyaki Mall in the distance. Come to think of it, I had come to this school through this very gate a year ago, hadn't I? The location was one I often came close to, but never really walked right up to. There were times when we might head through the gate on a bus for things like special activities and exams, but other than that, the only way you'd walk through this gate would be if you graduated or got expelled. And since there was no system in place for students to repeat a year, we would inevitably see those things happen within our three years here.

"I feel like I've been thinking about that all the time lately," I muttered to myself.

Now that we were about to enter our second year, I'd been reflecting back on my current state of mind more and more.

Just then, close to twenty minutes before we were scheduled to meet, Horikita Manabu arrived. After confirming that it was me, he briefly glanced around at his surroundings. I didn't even need to bother asking what he was looking for.

"Unfortunately, your sister still isn't here yet," I told him.

"Looks that way," he replied.

Right now, it was around 11:40 a.m. She certainly wasn't too late, not by any stretch. However, considering how little time there was left, it would have been better if she had arrived earlier. I thought back to how Nao forced her to talk to her brother the other day.

"I think I should try giving her a quick call," I suggested.

I figured that if I were to make the call, then Suzune' brother would agree to the proposal quite easily. That's what I had thought, anyway, but...

"No, there's no need."

He refused my offer, gently stopping me with his hand.

"If she fell or something, she would've let us know ahead of time," he reasoned.

"It's possible she might just be sleeping in." It was highly unlikely, but I thought I'd mention the possibility.

"If that is the case, then there's no need to wake her up," he answered.

He was saying that if she were to oversleep on such an important day, that meant she wasn't worth his time anymore, huh? Even though this was the last chance they had to meet, his attitude was the same as ever.

"Well, there's nothing to worry about. There's still plenty of time until we're supposed to meet."

I could also imagine pretty easily that she was sitting around nervously in her room until the last possible minute, since she was meeting with her older brother.

"Suzune aside, though, I didn't expect you to have gotten here so soon," said Horikita.

"Somehow, I had a feeling that you'd be getting here early, too," I replied.

We had agreed to meet at noon. Of course, we still had plenty of time until the bus departed. But this would be a final goodbye. I'm sure that both Horikita siblings must have anticipated that there would be a lot to talk about. And sure enough, Manabu had arrived twenty minutes early. The only thing that both Manabu and I didn't expect was Suzune's absence, as she was supposed to be the central person in this gathering.

Anyway, since she wasn't here, that meant that we could only talk about things with just the two of us. It would be a complete waste to just spend our time in silence. After thinking for a little while, I opened my mouth to speak, telling him about something that had been on my mind lately.