Chapter 4: Fighting Against Solitude

Chapter 4: Fighting Against Solitude

Chapter 4:

Fighting Against Solitude

I BRUSHED THE SPIDERWEBS off my clothes, slowly took my backpack off, and set it down. The ninth day of the uninhabited island exam was as hot and humid a day as ever. Having safely arrived at my fourth designated area, I let out a deep sigh. I had reached my destination on time, just as I planned. The sweat beading on my forehead slowly trickled down to the bridge of my nose, and I wiped it off with my arm.

My fourth designated area for the day, which was announced at three in the afternoon, had been quite the trek. It took me from area H9 all the way to D5. Making it there in time had been a rather arduous journey. One Task that I could have snatched up had appeared while I was on the move, but I decided to forego it to reduce my risk of getting hit with a penalty.

Despite it taking nearly two hours for me to get to where I needed to go, few other groups had come to this area, including students from other Tables. I successfully managed to arrive early enough to get the third place Early Bird Bonus. Though I was, by and large, not dissatisfied by the results, I wasn’t able to meet up with Sakayanagi because I wasn’t near the starting point. I’d used up lot of my energy to push on ahead already, and I didn’t want to overdo it.

I passed by several groups of Class 2-A students and reached out to talk to them, but unfortunately, none of those groups had walkie-talkies. Should I push my luck tomorrow morning? No… That’d be dicey. I set the matter of contacting Sakayanagi on hold for the time being and proceeded to summarize the day’s events.

“So, after adding up all of the points I got today, that brings me to a total of a 112… Huh,” I muttered to myself.

Kuronaga’s group had maintained their position at tenth place in the rankings, with a total of 123 points. I had moved up to thirteenth place—and there was now only an eleven-point difference between my score and Kuronaga’s group’s. Considering that it would soon be five o’clock, there was a good chance that the day would end with this gap as it was. My goal had been to get to eleventh place, but I supposed that an eleven-point difference in scores was more or less acceptable.

Although I had gotten here later than I planned due to the whole incident with Nanase and the severe weather, I had reached the perfect position: the spot I had been aiming for since the beginning. That’s right: I had been aiming for eleventh place since the start of the uninhabited island special exam. I was in thirteenth place today, a little below where I wanted, but the important thing wasn’t necessarily getting to exactly eleventh place. What was important to me was making sure I got to just barely below tenth place and that I stayed there.

I needed to work hard to accumulate points so that I ended up on the winning side. That was unavoidable. But whether I was working alone or whether I was in a large group that had seven people in it thanks to having the One More card, if I broke into the top ten, I’d stand out even if I didn’t want to. That was because the top ten groups were announced publicly. If I were to stand out, then my rivals would become wary of me, and the risk of sabotage in the near future would surely increase.

To avoid those risks while still giving me a chance to shoot for the top ten later, the ideal ranking for me to reach was eleventh place. However, this strategy did have several drawbacks. Because of the nature of this plan, I needed to be extremely careful in managing my score. Any failure in that department could result in me popping into the top ten too soon, even if just for a moment. If that happened, then my strategy would fail.

An even bigger drawback was that this plan was highly dependent on the group in tenth place. The closer that the tenth-place group got to the first-place group, the easier it would be for there to be a shakeup. But on the flipside, the more points they needed to catch up to first place, the more difficult it would be to pull off a surprise victory later. This was precisely why it was so important to have those groups at the top drag each other down for me.

Well, that hadn’t been happening as overtly as I’d hypothesized, and now, some groups had basically pulled far, far ahead of everyone else. I wouldn’t call it compensation or anything, but the second-years as a whole had been able to fight this battle from a relatively advantageous position. That is to say, we weren’t feeling much pressure pushing up against us from below or pressing down on us from above. Trying to sabotage another group more or less amounted to an act of self-sacrifice, which meant that it was difficult for anyone to actually pull some kind of stunt unless they had the luxury of extra points to spare.

What concerned me most was whatever Nagumo was up to. I anticipated that he might have tried to do something to Kouenji since he was competing with him for first place, but from what I could tell by checking their movements via the GPS, there was no sign of Nagumo interfering with him in any way. I supposed that could have been because Nagumo was focusing his efforts more on building up his own group’s score rather than kicking opponents off the board, but…

“Well, even if I don’t win, if Kouenji takes first and I get second, I wouldn’t really have anything to say to that,” I muttered. “That’d be fine.”

If I maintained my place in the rankings, staying somewhere close to eleventh, then I wouldn’t stand out. And even if I did lose time due to sabotage by Amasawa and the first-year students, I wouldn’t drop down into the lower ranks either. What I needed to do was to keep hiding in plain sight among the higher ranks until the end of the twelfth day.

I took it easy for a bit, resting in the shade of a big tree and wiping off my sweat. Then I slung my backpack over my shoulders once again and headed toward the neighboring area, which was only a short distance away. I decided that I wanted to find a clearing that was a little further out of the way from the boundary line.

The sun was starting to set, and I needed to decide where to set up camp for the night. Just then, I noticed a lone single-person tent had appeared in my field of view. Someone else must have gotten here already. Since the tent’s entrance was shut while it was so hot outside, I wondered if the tent’s owner, whoever it was, was away at the moment. They could be conducting reconnaissance of the surrounding area, or perhaps they were using the bathroom.

“It’s a nice spot,” I remarked out loud, to no one in particular.

There didn’t seem to be that many places in the nearby vicinity that were reasonably open and flat. For my part, anyway, it would be quite easy for me to set up camp in this area. However, now that I no longer had Nanase accompanying me, I was a single guy traveling alone. If the owner of this other tent happened to be a girl, then carelessly approaching them could lead to trouble.

More importantly though, I had to wonder—what did it mean that there was a sole single-person tent here? Was this person acting separately from their group? Or had they been going it alone from the start? If it was the latter, then whoever this person was, it was almost certainly someone that I knew. Regardless of whether I ended up setting up camp here myself, I wanted to identify this other tent’s owner.

I decided to stand around for a while to see what was going on. If they were out walking around, they’d be back before the sun went down completely. And if I heard any noises coming from inside the tent, then I could just call out to them without delay. I knew that it would be more efficient for me to just try calling out to them right away, but… Well, you get the idea.

I proceeded to wait for about ten minutes or so. But even after waiting that long, I didn’t see or hear any sign that they were coming back. I wondered about the possibility that maybe they had gone to bed early, by some chance. Since there was no sign of any of their comrades coming this way to join up with them, I decided to steel myself and just say something.

“Is anybody there?” I called out from beside the tent.

I held my breath and quietly waited a few seconds to see if I could hear any kind of reaction, but I didn’t hear a single thing.

“Sorry for the bother, but I was thinking of setting up my tent near here. If that’s an inconvenience, let me know,” I added.

After assuming that the other camper wasn’t around, at least for the time being, I lowered my backpack to the ground. Of course, I made sure to set up at an appropriate distance from the other tent. Although I was a little curious about who this other person was, I finished setting up camp in short order. I was once again impressed by just how much easier it was for me to set up a tent this year compared to when I was on the island last year.

I also rather liked single-person tents because I didn’t need to worry about anyone else. Well, I suppose thinking that way might have been the reason I didn’t really have many friends. A cheerful person, I figured, would find a tent that couldn’t accommodate that many people to be rather boring. I wondered if a day would come when I felt that same way.

“…I can’t really imagine that happening,” I muttered to myself.

That was a future that was never going to come to be.

Just as I was getting ready to get changed and stuff, though, I heard someone call out to me from behind.

“I thought I saw something strange. Turns out it’s just you.”

Apparently, the owner of the solitary tent nearby was none other than Ibuki.

“Was I being loud?” I asked.

“Not really.”

She only said a few words, and she glared at me right after answering. I thought she was going to say something else, but then she quickly ducked back inside her tent. There was something about the way she looked that made me uncomfortable, so I decided to go over to her tent to check on her.

“Hey, do you have a minute?” I called out to her.

I didn’t get a response. However, I could hear a faint sound coming from within her tent.

“I just wanted to ask you something,” I said, trying a different approach.

I didn’t get any response that time either. I thought that maybe she was just ignoring me, plain and simple, but it felt like she was up to something sneaky instead.

“Hey, I’m going to open your tent and come in,” I said. “Okay?”

I waited about thirty seconds, just to be on the safe side, and then I proceeded to open the entrance to her tent.

“…What?” she huffed.

When I peeked inside, I saw Ibuki sitting down with something in her mouth.

“You’re really— Wait, what are you eating?” I asked.

“Jerky,” she replied.

“Jerky? That wasn’t in the uninhabited island manual they handed out to us.”

That meant she must’ve gotten her hands on some fresh meat by purchasing it or some other means and prepared it herself. However, it would take a considerable amount of time and effort to make jerky all by yourself. What’s more was that Ibuki had issued a challenge to Horikita right at the start of the exam, and then had immediately set out for her designated area. It was obvious that if she had been walking around with fresh meat on her, it would’ve spoiled in less than a few hours during the summer season.

In that case, could I assume that all of Class 2-B knew how to make their own jerky? Maybe some groups had taken it upon themselves to make it for everyone.

That way, it could be done readily and at a considerably lower price. Dried foods were quite effective options for quick, portable meals. However, pre-prepared foods like jerky that could be stored for an extended period of time didn’t have a great cost-to-performance ratio, considering the high number of points needed to buy them outright. That was why even if you were preparing the same amount of food, it would be more cost-effective to make the jerky yourself from fresh beef since it was cheaper to produce in large quantities.

Although I hadn’t seen any of Ryuuen and Katsuragi’s food, I felt it was safe to assume that they were operating in much the same way, carrying around emergency rations, namely jerky. Even if they could only scrimp on just a few meals by doing so, that still meant they’d be able to pass up a hotly contested Task that offered food without worry.

“What does it matter anyway? It’s none of your business,” snapped Ibuki.

Although I had taken the liberty of imagining what could be going on with the jerky situation, it didn’t sound like I was going to be able to hear the truth from Ibuki. At any rate, even though Ibuki had been tackling this exam all on her own, her name hadn’t appeared in the bottom ten up until this point, at least as far as I knew. She must have been pushing ahead as hard as she could, collecting point after point. In her case, it was hopeless to try and get high scores in any Tasks that involved academic ability, so her main sources of points must have been Arrival Bonuses for reaching her designated areas and Early Bird Bonuses.

I supposed that with her skills, that narrowed down the Tasks she could take on to ones that primarily focused on physical ability. That meant, of course, that she would inevitably become more fatigued than the other students. And because of that, she probably sustained quite a lot of psychological suffering as well. It was plain for anyone to see that, and it wasn’t an exaggeration to say that she’d already pushed herself past her limits.

“How many people have you talked to since the exam started?” I asked.

“Huh…?” she huffed. She must not have slept very much either, as she had dark circles under her eyes. “Horikita. I told her I wasn’t going to lose to her,” she said. “You heard it too, didn’t you?”

“In other words, you haven’t had an actual conversation with anyone since the exam started,” I concluded.

I figured that, at most, she had probably only opened her mouth to say yes or no to staff members at Tasks sites when she was trying to register.

“You should probably talk to someone, even if it’s just a little,” I told her.

“I don’t talk to enemies,” she replied.

“Then you should talk to your classmates. If you wander around a bit, you might run into one of them,” I suggested.

“I don’t consider anyone in my class my friend.”

So, she had been hiding within her shell, and that was how she was continuing to act, even today. I was impressed that she had lasted for nine days in this state, but there were still five days left in the exam. If she were to let it all out, even just for a second, she’d most likely immediately fall apart. Of course, if Ibuki got eliminated, then it was inevitable that she’d get expelled, since she was on her own.

The collective understanding that we all shared for this special exam was to avoid letting groups from our same grade level get expelled as much as possible. The best thing for her to do would be to spend an entire day resting. I didn’t count the seventh day as rest, even though it had been cancelled anyway. But if she could spend a full day peacefully doing nothing at all, then that alone would restore a great deal of her strength. It wouldn’t be impossible for Ibuki to survive the other remaining four days with the strength she had recovered from that day of rest.

But reality wasn’t that kind. It might sound simple on paper, but it was exceedingly difficult to actually spend an entire day just resting. Even if Ibuki forced herself to take a physical break, whether she could revitalize her spirits was another matter. While she was taking it easy, her rivals would be scoring more points. She’d be pressured by the threat of being overtaken and sinking down to the bottom of the rankings.

Under those circumstances, any ordinary person would find it impossible to spend time recuperating and clearing their mind. Besides, simply failing to reach your designated areas would lead to a loss in points too. If she racked up more penalties, then she would suffer even more in the days to come.

“Get out,” said Ibuki.

“…I’m going.”

Even though this was Ibuki I was talking to, she was still a girl. Peeking into the tent of someone of the opposite sex at a time like this when it was getting dark out was absolutely not the right thing for me to be doing. Even if Ryuuen had been here right now, I was skeptical that we could’ve fundamentally solved this issue anyway.

After leaving Ibuki’s tent, I got back to checking out my clothing situation which I had been in the middle of doing. The wind blew calmly outside now, so it seemed like I’d be able to stay at least somewhat cool tonight.

“Hey.”

Ibuki must have settled down more now that she had finished whatever she needed to do. She got out of her tent with a wobbling, dazed gait, but she walked straight ahead. She then stuffed her hands in her pockets and approached me.

“How many points do you have now?” she asked. Just when I was thinking about how surprised I was that she had finally emerged from her tent, she came out and asked me something so audacious.

“We’re enemies, you know,” I reminded her.

“So, you can’t tell me, huh,” she said in a low mutter. It sounded like she was implying I was stingy and tight-fisted.

There wasn’t a single person on this entire island who would benefit from knowing I was in thirteenth place.

“Yep, that’s how it is,” I answered.

“Okay then, in that case, just tell me if your score is higher or lower than mine. Mine is—”

I cut Ibuki off with a wave of my hand just as she was about to go ahead and divulge her own score to me.

“Sorry, but I can’t answer that question in any way, shape, or form,” I said, interrupting her.

Even if I were only telling her that my score was above or below hers, I’d still be giving her a clue. That’d be true even if I lied about my score. It might have seemed like a safe bet if I told her that I was ranked lower than she was, but if she thought that I was struggling to get points, then she might come after me aggressively and try and force me into a corner. I had to avoid letting information carelessly slip and allowing it to take on a life of its own.

Ibuki, hands still in her pockets, clicked her tongue at me. “Oh well… Fine. Whatever,” she snapped. “Dealing with you is a waste of time anyway.”

“There you have it. Besides, your real favorite is Horikita, isn’t it?”

The second I uttered Horikita’s name, Ibuki’s attitude immediately changed. She had been looking worn-out, but she made the effort to yank her hands out of her pockets and glare at me with her middle finger raised.

“If you see her, tell her that I am never, ever going to lose to her.”

“That’s all well and good, but I’m not the one you should be giving the finger to, am I?” I replied.

“You’re the same as her. Since you two are such good pals,” she said.

Well, no, we weren’t, actually. I wasn’t close with Horikita, but I guessed it was all the same to Ibuki. She must have only come out of her tent to ask me about my score because she soon turned to go back inside.

“Wait a second,” I said.

Ibuki stopped and turned back toward me, and I took a few steps closer to her. She was clearly wary of me. When I reached my hand out to her, she grew even more suspicious and moved out of the way.

“Huh? You wanna go?” she said defiantly.

She must have determined that I was arbitrarily fixing for a fight with her. She balled a hand into a fist.

“That is absolutely not my intention in the slightest,” I protested, quickly reaching my hand out toward her once again. I didn’t give her the opportunity to escape and grabbed onto her wrist.

“The hell are you doing?!” she shouted.

Flustered, she lashed out with a kick, but I blocked it with my other hand. I thought she was going to try again, but she just let out a deep sigh and turned to look the other way. It was like all the venom drained out of her.

“I admit that I can’t beat you. But someday I’m definitely going to land a good kick on you.”

I didn’t want her to go ahead and set such a troubling goal like that.

“So, what now? Did Horikita tell you to sabotage me?” said Ibuki.

Not only had she failed to understand my true intentions, she had also even started to raise some strange suspicions about me. Well, I was one of Horikita’s classmates, so I supposed nothing I said would get through to her. If I thought about it, there was no way that Ibuki would accept the idea of taking a break that easily, so there was little hope for her.

“Your pulse is elevated,” I told her.

“So what?!” she snapped.

“And the area around your mouth looks dry. Your lips, especially, are really cracked. You’re obviously dehydrated,” I explained.

At this rate, it wouldn’t be long before her watch emitted a Warning Alert. It might have already sounded once already. The reason she had been sitting so quietly in her tent was most likely due to fatigue…but it might’ve also been because she was trying to get her pulse down so that she could suppress the alert.

“I’m not really all that thirsty… I mean, I’m not thirsty anymore,” she said.

“Not ‘anymore’? Does that mean that you were dehydrated before?”

When I let go of her wrist, Ibuki made a face like she wanted to bark back at me again, putting some distance between us.

“I don’t need your help,” she said. “I’m not in any real trouble.”

When she turned back around, I quickly ran past her, overtaking her.

“Hey, what the— What are you doing?!” she yelled.

She wasn’t the sort of person who would listen even if I tried, so I walked ahead of her, crawled into her tent, and pulled out her backpack.

“Show me what’s in here,” I told her.

“Huh?” she said. “There’s no way I’m showing my bag to a guy. Actually, I wouldn’t even show my bag to a girl.”

“I figured,” I replied.

Since there was no way that she was going to give me permission to do so, I went ahead and opened her backpack anyway.

“What the hell?!” she snapped.

Inside her backpack, I found clothes, toiletries, and a small amount of food, like jerky. I spotted just one single 500-milliliter water bottle, which was empty. Garbage bins were offered at various locations, such as Task sites, so I guessed that she had tossed out anything she didn’t need a long time ago. There wasn’t even a single drop of water in the plastic bottle, so she must have finished it quite some time ago. I also didn’t see anything she could use to communicate with others, like a walkie-talkie.

“When did you last have a drink?” I asked.

“I don’t have to answer y—”

“I said, when did you last have a drink?” I repeated, cutting her off, speaking in a forceful tone and looking at her with a stern stare.

“About…one day ago. And then some,” said Ibuki.

“Have you been walking around in this condition?” I asked.

“I haven’t,” she replied. “I’ve been resting here this whole time today.”

“That’s a blatant lie,” I said. “There wasn’t any GPS signal in this area this morning.”

“What, did you do a search?” she asked.

I hadn’t, of course. It was a bluff, but the most important thing was that she seemed to have bought it. I lied simply because I couldn’t imagine that Ibuki would actually choose to rest when she so desperately wanted to beat Horikita.

“Did your Warning Alert go off?” I asked.

“It did… About an hour ago,” Ibuki admitted. “That’s why I didn’t have any choice but to go to sleep early.”

The Warning Alert on our watches was designed to stop sounding after a while unless there was some kind of continuous anomaly detected. If time continued to pass and the warning system hadn’t escalated to an Emergency Alert, the watch would sound the Warning Alert again.

“At the rate things are going, if you can’t rehydrate, the alert is just going to keep going off even if you do rest,” I warned her.

Ibuki’s pulse was elevated. She wasn’t going to be able to get it back down, and eventually the alert system would move up to an Emergency Alert. By that time, she would be fully dehydrated, and the inevitable medical check-up would result in the teachers declaring her elimination from the exam.

“I’ll do something about it tomorrow,” she replied. “If push comes to shove, I’ll just head back to the starting area. So just leave me alone.”

“The starting point is over two kilometers away from here. If you collapse on the way there, that’ll be it for you,” I reminded her.

“Then I’ll just do a Task or something,” she said.

“You obviously can’t do that,” I argued. “That’s why you’re struggling so much right now.”

I shot down her irrational protests with sound arguments. I had to calm her down. I went into my tent and got my backpack. Then, I took out two 500-milliliter bottles that I had gotten earlier today from completing a Task.

“Let’s trade,” I told her.

“Huh?” She blinked.

“This is perfect. I’m in trouble right now because I’m running low on food,” I said, matter-of-factly. “On the flipside, I just so happen to have a surplus of water, which means I have more than I need. I think that I can make a fair trade with you here, Ibuki, so I hope we can negotiate.”

Ibuki audibly cleared her throat at the sight of the plastic bottle full of water, even though it wasn’t cold anymore.

“So, what do you say? Let me just say, once again, that this will be a fair trade,” I reminded her. “I’ll be expecting a reasonable share of food in return.”

“Who in the hell would trade with—” she protested. I cut her off again.

“You can turn me down if you want,” I interjected, “but I’m not going to offer a second time.”

As long as I kept command of the conversation with an aggressive attitude, I could get Ibuki to stop talking.

“With how dehydrated you are, you’ll get eliminated at this rate,” I told her. “Then your loss to Horikita will be set in stone. You know, I ran into her a little while ago. She looked good. And she didn’t seem to be having trouble with food or water either.”

There was an essential key word here to get Ibuki moving—or rather, a name. Instead of bringing up the threat of expulsion, I simply had to mention Horikita.

“Fine, fine, I get it…” grumbled Ibuki. “I’ll accept your trade or whatever. But how much should I give you?”

With the way things were going, Ibuki’s food supply would be exhausted in less than two days. But if I only took a small amount from her, then you could hardly call that a fair trade.

“Half your remaining supply. That’d be good,” I said.

“And you’re sure you’re okay with that?” she asked.

“It’s a heck of lot better than having to eat weeds because I’m struggling to find food.”

And so, Ibuki and I each traded what we had: my water for her food. As soon as we finished making our exchange, Ibuki slammed down about half of the water in the plastic bottle, gulping it in one go. Normally, I would have told her to be careful, but considering that she was beginning to show signs of dehydration, she needed to have something to drink as soon as possible.

She must not have liked the fact that I was looking at her because she shot me a sharp glare. Even though the issue of her dehydration had been improved somewhat, her mental state was clearly not normal. Ibuki had to continue to challenge herself while under intense stress, and she had absolutely no room to breathe and relax. How much more was her mind and body going to be able to endure?

Would she last a few hours? A few days? Hopefully she’d be able to hold it together until the end of the final day of the exam. We were in different Tables, though, so if I parted ways with her right now, I probably wouldn’t see her again during the exam. Should I at least try to say something else to her now?

“I’m not going to say thank you,” she snapped. “It was a fair trade, wasn’t it?”

“I’m not really asking for you to thank me,” I answered.

“Then what is it?”

She was probably extra sensitive to having someone try and talk to her right now because her nerves had been sharpened throughout the day. That ability would be useful in short intervals, but right now, she was basically torturing herself with it.

“If you’re not falling into the bottom of the rankings at this point, don’t you think it would be a good idea for you to spend tomorrow resting to recover your strength? Or you could switch things up and focus on getting food and water,” I suggested.

“What, you’re telling me to give up on scoring points? Hah! Quit joking,” sneered Ibuki. My proposal had only stoked the flames. “I’m not trying so hard to avoid expulsion. My only goal is to beat Horikita.”

I understood that, I really did. I was simply offering advice to help her to increase her chances of winning, and yet… Well, ever since Ibuki found out that I was X, she started to hate me as much as you could possibly hate someone. Everything she said or heard was filtered through those extreme feelings, so not even the truth behind my words could get through to her.

“I’m not talking to you anymore,” she said.

And with that, she went back into her tent. I knew that it would be pointless to try and persuade her, but I supposed that at best, my message might have at least come off to her as a warning. At any rate, there wouldn’t be any problems with Ibuki’s physical condition today or tomorrow. Now she just had to get back on her own two feet and get more food and water on her own.

Since she was going it alone, I was somewhat concerned about how many points she was getting. But since she was such a strong-willed contender, I couldn’t imagine that she’d fall to the bottom of the rankings.

There was still plenty of time left today, but I already used up a lot of my energy, so I figured I’d take a rest myself. It was still sweltering and humid outside, so I decided to wind down and spend the night here.

4.1

I T WAS FIRST THING in the morning. I was returning to my tent after going outside to use the bathroom, a trash bag in hand, when I saw Ibuki moving suspiciously near my tent.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“Ah!”

She seemed to have been completely absorbed in rifling through my backpack, because she couldn’t hide her surprise when I called out to her.

“Were you trying to look at my tablet without my permission? Or was there something else you wanted?”

Unfortunately for her, our tablets were set up with a lock screen that made it impossible for a third party to access their contents.

“I wasn’t doing anything like that! I was just… I was just checking to see if it was really a fair trade, that’s all,” replied Ibuki, slinking away from my backpack. “There was only one bottle of drinking water in your backpack. How exactly is that supposed to be a ‘surplus’ or whatever you said?”

I had only been away from my backpack for less than a minute, but I supposed I had been a little careless. That had been enough time for her to check its contents. That being said, I had no right to criticize her. After all, I had gone and rifled through her backpack without permission yesterday. Even if I tried to fool her into thinking that I had just drank my extra water last night, she would simply have asked me where the empty plastic bottles were. It was against the rules to just toss our garbage around on the island.

“So, what? Were you thinking that you’d help me so that I’d owe you a debt?” she demanded.

“How exactly? You wouldn’t have even found out unless you looked in my backpack,” I said. “I don’t think that would mean I was trying to make you owe me.”

“Ugh.” After I shot her down, Ibuki puffed out her cheeks angrily.

“Whatever the truth is, the point is that it was still a fair trade,” I told her.

“I’m not entirely convinced, but… Fine, whatever, I get it. In that case though, I’m not giving you anything back,” said Ibuki.

“Would you have given the water back to me if I had been trying to make you owe me?” I asked.

“No,” she replied flatly.

“I see…”

So, she checked out my backpack because she simply wasn’t convinced that it was a fair trade. Since our conversation stopped there, I briefly went back inside my tent. It was only just after six-thirty in the morning, but I could already hear Ibuki moving about. I opened the entrance to my tent again and peered out. It seemed like she was already starting to put her tent away.

If this were the second or third day of the special exam, I probably would have thought, Wow, she’s really motivated. I once again had the feeling that she wouldn’t speak to me anymore, so I went back into my tent. Eventually, seven o’clock rolled around and the first designated area of the day was announced. Mine was in E4. I didn’t hesitate to spend a point to use the GPS search to see the locations of all students.

The search was well worth the one point spent.

The gap between me and tenth place was slight, so it was possible I could unexpectedly overtake them. By using that one point on a search, the gap between me and Kuronaga’s group increased to twelve points. Even if I arrived first at the designated area and won the eleven-point first place Early Bird Bonus, I still wouldn’t overtake them in the rankings.

There were about three rival groups on the map right now who could be competing with me for this Early Bird Bonus. Among those three groups, one of them included a certain someone who was quite a formidable enemy. And that group was in a perfect position too.

Depending on how the situation developed, I was considering ignoring the Basic Movement system for now and making replenishing my supplies my top priority instead. It was a good thing I had done this search before making a decision. It allowed me to check how many students were in the vicinity of the Task that I was after as well, which made it possible for me to predict the degree of competitiveness there would be from an early stage.

When I got back out of my tent after I had finished getting ready, Ibuki was already nowhere to be found. There wasn’t much benefit in heading out before the day’s exam period started, but I figured she might have simply wanted to get as far away from me as quickly as she possibly could.

4.2

M Y DESIGNATED AREA was located close to the starting point, but it took me nearly an hour and a half to get there. I looked down to check my watch just as I got a notification and saw that I had not gotten any Early Bird Bonus points. I had only received one point for the Arrival Bonus. I wasn’t dissatisfied with that, of course, because I had picked up a Task along the way. From where I was standing, a point at a high elevation, I could practically survey the entire uninhabited island, if just barely.

“You were quite late getting here, Ayanokouji,” said Kiryuuin, standing just barely within sight. She was looking down the cliff face, not turning to look at me as she spoke.

“From the looks of it, apparently so,” I replied.

When I had done the search earlier today, I considered her to be the most troublesome person out of the students in my same Table.

“I thought that there was a formidable opponent racing me for the Early Bird Bonus,” she said. “So, it was you, huh?”

“I’m not so sure about that,” I replied. “Besides, it’s not uncommon for people in different Tables to be in the same area. More importantly, I didn’t think that you were interested in breaking into the top ten, Kiryuuin-senpai.”

Kiryuuin had been sitting somewhere around eleventh place or lower, but this morning, she had suddenly shot right up to ninth place.

“This uninhabited island exam has been surprisingly interesting,” she admitted. “I guess I just got a little too excited. Rather unbecoming for someone as old as I am.”

Someone as old as you are? But you’re only a year older than me, I thought in response.

“I’m only planning on keeping up my current pace for a little bit longer,” said Kiryuuin.

“You’re not aiming for first place?”

“Everyone competing for the top spots will be gunning for one another,” she said. “I’m not interested in getting involved in that mess. Although, if Nagumo or Kouenji happened to crash and burn, then I suppose that might be a different story.”

“Crash?” I repeated. “It doesn’t really look like things will go that way now, though.”

“Do you really think that Nagumo is just going to let Kouenji run around freely?” Kiryuuin asked.

It sounded as though Kiryuuin had some idea of what was to come as well.

“With both sides so evenly matched, it’s hard to say that Nagumo will win this thing,” she added. “So far, he’s probably just been sitting back and watching how things go. But this is about the time for him to start making his move, so it’s quite likely that we’ll see a showdown between him and Kouenji. Depending on how the situation plays out, they could each make it difficult for the other to rack up more points.”

Alternatively, it was possible that one of them would make a misstep and fall in the rankings instead.

“Defeating your opponent head-on is another crucial element of battle,” said Kiryuuin.

I couldn’t make any guesses about when exactly Nagumo was going to declare war, but if things continued as they’d been going so far, Nagumo and Kouenji would surely clash. I had no doubt that at the very least, Nagumo’s side would stop Kouenji.

“Are you not going for the top ranks yourself?” she asked me.

“Unfortunately, I can’t really envision myself making it into the top ten,” I replied.

“I see. I thought for sure you’d get a score close to mine.”

She seemed to be extremely interested in me. Well, to be precise, I didn’t think that I was the only one she was interested in though. Kiryuuin was, in her own way, looking at and analyzing the strategies being used by students throughout our entire school across every grade level.

“This is probably when most groups will start seeing a drop in their efficiency,” she said. “Don’t give up and keep giving it your best.”

Kiryuuin was someone I hadn’t known at all until just recently, but I gathered that she was an exceptionally capable person. She was a third-year student with excellent intuition and perception, which you wouldn’t glean just from looking at OAA alone.

“That being said… From what we can see on our tablets so far, how do you feel about the fact that no groups have been completely eliminated yet?” she asked.

“All I can say is that in this situation, we can’t let our guards down. Not even for a moment,” I answered.

“I stopped by the starting point yesterday and picked up a little information,” she said. “Apparently, some groups suffering from a lack of food and water are trying to avoid collapsing altogether by having individual members spread out in an effort to endure the situation.”

“That’s a wise decision on their part,” I remarked.

No matter how many points a group collected, if every member of the group was eliminated, they’d be disqualified and expelled immediately. In that case, it was much safer to send one or two people back to the starting area even if it meant a drop in efficiency. Water was readily available there, and you could more easily avoid getting sick if you could maintain proper hygiene.

“I’m sure that the groups in the bottom ten are wishing to themselves, ‘I don’t care what group it is, I just hope some other group gets eliminated,’” I said.

“People who have no regard for appearances will use any means necessary,” said Kiryuuin. “Just be careful, okay?”

“Shouldn’t you be worrying about yourself in that regard, Kiryuuin-senpai? As a girl?”

“Hmm. Well, I suppose that, yes, as a fair maiden, I should be aware of the dangers,” she replied.

Though I had asked her that only as a joke, she was surprisingly serious about it. “If it comes to that, then… I suppose I’ll just push through by force.” Kiryuuin then tightly clenched her hand into a fist.

Her answer was completely unlike what you’d expect from a “fair maiden.”

“I can’t tell how serious you’re being about this,” I told her.

“Fu fu,” she laughed. “Sorry for taking up so much of your time. After all, you and I both need every moment we can get. We can’t spare a single second of a single minute.”

With that, she gently waved goodbye and started to walk away. Judging from the direction she was headed in, I guessed she must have been aiming for a Task.

Before she was out of sight, though, she paused. “You’re not coming? There might still be room for you to register for the Task too, if you leave right now.”

“Thanks, but I’ll pass,” I replied. “I don’t think that I can compete with you, Kiryuuin-senpai.”

At this point in time, it looked like there were only enough openings for up to two groups to register for this Task. In addition to the fact that there were three or more rival groups headed that way, Kiryuuin was also headed to that Task, so my chances of being able to register weren’t very high at all.

As I watched her go, even though she should have been in a hurry, she stopped again and looked back at me.

“Hm, so that’s how it is… Well, I guess I’ll just go and see for myself in person,” she said, speaking as though she had deduced my strategy. Kiryuuin finally left and headed toward the Task.

4.3

T HE SUN HAD SET on the tenth day of the exam, and it was now after nine o’clock at night. It was time for me to check the GPS information for the top and bottom ten groups. Suddenly, a bright light flickered from outside my tent.

“Is someone out and about at this hour…?” I muttered.

It was risky, but I supposed it was conceivable that someone could have been trying to reach their final designated area for the day if they hadn’t been able to until now. I couldn’t help but follow the light with my eyes as I sat inside my tent. It wasn’t as though the light was being shined in my direction though. Rather, whoever it was seemed to be sweeping the light to and fro as they walked.

The movements of their flashlight seemed unstable, as if they were desperately searching for something. I got curious, so I decided to pop out of my tent. Actually, it looked as though they were desperately searching for someone . Was Amasawa looking for me because she wanted to get close and try something? No, I couldn’t imagine that she would have been using her flashlight so haphazardly if that was the case. After closing the distance between our positions by using GPS, she should have been able to take advantage of the darkness and gotten closer to me.

“Yume-chaaaan!”

I heard a faint voice, and it sounded like it was coming from the same direction as the the flashlight. I didn’t know who the owner of the voice was, but nicknames aside, I knew that there was only one person in our school named Yume. I was certain that they were calling for Kobashi Yume from Class 2-C. In that case, it was probably correct for me to assume that whoever was speaking was either someone from that class, or who had a connection to it. If I remembered correctly, there was a girl named Shiranami Chihiro in Kobashi’s same group.

At any rate, it sounded like whoever was calling was about to burst into tears at any moment. I could have ignored her and let things be, but since this was a student from Class 2-C, she should be able to get in touch with Sakayanagi from Class 2-A since those classes were cooperating on some level. Our tablets had a flashlight function, so I took mine out and turned the flashlight on. It wasn’t as dependable a light source as a regular flashlight, but it was more than enough for someone to see in the dark. Shortly thereafter, the girl noticed me and pointed her flashlight in my direction.

“Yume-chan?!” the girl said, sounding panicked, her voice getting more audible as she drew closer.

After getting flashed by the dazzling beam from her flashlight, I could slowly start to see the flashlight’s owner come into view.

“Yume-chan!” she shouted once again.

“Hey, sorry, but I’m not Yume,” I replied.

“Oh…”

The person that had emerged from amidst the trees was none other than Shiranami, after all.

“Oh, um, Ayanokouji-kun… G-good evening,” she stammered.

Although we were hardly close, she seemed somewhat relieved. Had her situation really been so upsetting that she was happy to see even me?

“It’s pretty dangerous to be out at night all alone,” I said. “Where are Kobashi and Takemoto?”

“Oh, um, well… I actually don’t know where they are… I was walking along in a hurry, and I lost track of where I was going, and…”

I wasn’t going to ask her such an uncouth question like, “Why are you all alone in the woods in the middle of the night?” This was an expansive forest; everywhere you looked, it was an ocean of trees. If you pressed on into the woods without being totally prepared, thinking to yourself, “Oh, they probably went this way,” you’d end up losing your sense of direction in the blink of an eye. As a result of her getting lost, Shiranami had probably wandered far, far from the rest of her group.

“About how long has it been since you lost track of them?” I asked.

“I’m not sure… I think maybe fifteen…or, like, twenty minutes, maybe?”

Even if she had traveled in the opposite direction from her teammates, they shouldn’t have wandered so far apart that it was worth getting depressed over. But, at the very least, she had gotten far enough away from her teammates that they were no longer able to hear each other.

“At any rate, walking around aimlessly is just going to make this situation even worse,” I told her.

“O-okay,” she replied.

I figured that for the time being, I’d take the lead and give her instructions to follow me while using my tablet to light the way ahead. It’d be a hassle if I ended up getting lost too, after all. Still, I couldn’t just leave my tent and stuff here while I went out to look for Shiranami’s group with her. I was sure that some students must have had similar troubles and got lost in the same way.

Some might have managed to find their way back through pure chance, but for others, it might have taken a long time. If students couldn’t find their way back, though… Well, making it through the woods in the middle of the night wasn’t exactly an easy thing to do. Even if they didn’t have any major physical problems in doing so, it was still difficult emotionally. Shortly after, we reached my campsite, and I talked to the anxious Shiranami there.

“There are lots of bugs out,” I told her. “For the time being, you can stay in my tent.”

“Huh?!” Her shout sounded more afraid than surprised.

“I’m not going to go inside, so you can relax,” I added.

I had some problems trying to explain the situation to her, but in the end, I basically forced Shiranami into the tent as she was still unable to wrap her head around what was happening. After that, I closed the entrance behind her.

“I-I’m sorry… I was just resting, and…” she wailed.

“It’s all right,” I assured her. “More importantly, were Kobashi and Takemoto both looking healthy? Normal?”

“Yeah,” she replied.

In that case, they must have been panicking as well since Shiranami hadn’t returned. I assumed that they must have been discussing whether to go out and search or to stay where they were.

“Did your group make a plan for what to do if you got split up?” I asked.

I thought I’d ask and see, but Shiranami simply shook her head.

“It’s possible that Takemoto, the guy from your group, might go out to look for you by himself, Shiranami,” I said. “But if he did, there’d be a risk of someone else getting lost and being in distress. They’d be taking quite a big risk if both your teammates left their tents and stuff behind to go out looking for you.”

Additionally, packing up their tents and backpacks before setting out to search for Shiranami wouldn’t exactly be an effective option either, since Shiranami could very well return all by herself in that time and find herself all alone at a deserted campsite. For them to do things as safely as possible, it was preferable to not walk far enough away as to lose sight of their own tents, but to stay in the nearby vicinity and rely on using lights and loud shouts to find Shiranami, hoping that she would notice them.

But if Shiranami’s group hadn’t made any detailed plans ahead of time, and since one of the girls had gotten separated from the group, I wasn’t sure if her teammates would be able to keep level heads. It was entirely possible that they might panic and go out searching for her.

“What do I do…?” wailed Shiranami.

She was talking to herself, not asking me for my opinion on anything. I supposed you could say that this was trivial, but on the other hand, you could consider what she was doing to be a major mistake. It was understandable why she was doing it, since she was overwhelmed with anxiety. The problem was the other two people in her group. Well, actually, it was possible that there were even more people.

“Do you still just have the same small group of three people? Or have you increased your group to four or more people?” I asked her.

“That’s…” she started, but then trailed off.

So far, Shiranami had openly explained everything that had happened in detail, but now she suddenly stopped talking. Since she should’ve known the size of her own group well enough, she must’ve hesitated to tell me for a different reason.

Right now, Ichinose’s class was working together with Sakayanagi’s class in a cooperative partnership. I was sure that there were also friend groups that further transcended those boundaries, of course, but the majority of the groups were originally created via that arrangement. Obviously, to tell me the details about the inner workings of these groups would be considered an information leak. In that sense, it was appropriate on Shiranami’s part not to casually mention whether there had been any additions to her group since the start of the exam. There was value in that.

“I understand, and you don’t have to tell me the exact details of your situation. But, for the time being, just hear me out,” I told her.

With that out of the way, I went on to elaborate.

“If I were a member of your group, Shiranami, then I would first look at the situation at hand. I would determine that a girl was wandering alone in the dark forest, having lost her way back.”

Shiranami nodded meekly.

“I wouldn’t just leave things be then, of course. First, I would raise my voice and shout her name loudly, to see if she answered back. But, like I said before, if I didn’t get a response by doing that, then I’d have to try something else. Now, let’s assume for example that it was Kobashi who had gotten separated from the group. What would you and Takemoto do in that case?”

“I think that we would probably…go out looking for Yume-chan, together…”

“Even if you ran the risk of running into trouble yourselves? You could end up getting hurt and eliminated from the exam,” I replied.

“She’s my friend. I couldn’t just leave her,” said Shiranami, resolutely.

That was definitely an answer I’d expect from someone from Ichinose’s class. Whether that was an advantage or disadvantage was a separate issue entirely. Takemoto, being from Class A, might initially try and stop Shiranami from going, but he would probably end up going along to help her. The best approach for me to take here would probably be to let her use my tent to wait things out while her teammates came to meet up with her.

Besides, I was sure that if the situation called for it, her teammates would use the GPS search and come looking for her. Still, with this thick cover of darkness, I didn’t know how well a search would help, even if you came into our vicinity once or twice.

“Do you have points to spare? Would you worry about your spot in the rankings if you used the search two or three times?” I asked.

“Well, I…I don’t know, actually,” she replied. “I don’t think it would be a particularly good idea for us to use it.”

From the sound of it, her group certainly wasn’t maintaining an outstanding position in the rankings. Before the exam concluded, there would be no way of knowing if using the search would have any impact on their position, or if the points used to search spelled the difference between victory or defeat. As for Shiranami, I was sure that she’d feel guilty and upset at herself if her teammates used points to come searching for her in the same way.

In that case, I supposed the best course of action would be to just wait and see. But we couldn’t necessarily rule out the possibility that her teammates would be coming to look for her, or that they simply wouldn’t be able to find her. Besides, in this case, since I couldn’t use the tent myself, that meant I’d be spending the night outside. That would certainly disrupt my pace, which I had been able to keep at a steady rhythm up until now. If I was going to take action, then…I supposed now was the time to do it.

“Got any energy?” I asked.

“Huh?” she stammered.

“I mean, do you have enough energy left to walk?” I clarified.

“Y-yes. I think I should be okay to do that…”

I urged her to come out of the tent.

“Let’s get moving now, so that you can join up with your group,” I told her.

“But…how?” she asked.

“This isn’t a problem that we’ll be able to solve by just stumbling around in the dark. We’re going to use this,” I explained, showing her the tablet in my hand. “If we use the GPS search, then we’ll know which direction they’re in, and we can find out approximately how far away they are.”

Still, it wasn’t going to be easy for Shiranami to meet up with her teammates. Making our way through the woods under the cover of darkness like this was going to be an extremely arduous task. And for average students like Shiranami, it was going to be impossible without repeatedly using the GPS search.

“Why are you helping me…?” she asked meekly.

“Why? Well, I guess that one reason for it is that this exam is a battle between grade levels, more or less,” I replied.

“But still, going so far as using your GPS search for me is…” she protested.

Using one or two points wasn’t that big of a burden, at least from my perspective. I could always collect more points again and catch up, as long as it wasn’t going to put me any higher than eleventh place. Since there was no point in talking about this any further, I figured I’d just try and say something that sounded reasonable.

“Well, I guess if I had to say why… It might be because it’s Ichinose’s class,” I replied.

The instant I said those words, I turned to look back at her and saw Shiranami’s face stiffen.

“Wait, could you…?” she said quietly.

Did I say something awkward?

“Hm?” I replied.

“Wait, Ayanokouji-kun, could you and Honami-chan…?” She trailed off again.

Even though Shiranami had gotten far enough to mention both my and Ichinose’s names, she suddenly stopped, closing her mouth. I was able to more or less understand what she was trying to say, though it took me a minute. I thought back to what Ichinose’s other classmates said to me the other day, when I ran into them.

“There’s nothing,” I said, trying to answer her preemptively.

But Shiranami’s expression remained visibly stiffened with surprise. At any rate, for the time being, I put the subject on hold and went ahead with using the search. Kobashi and Takemoto’s GPS signals were displayed on top of one another, which meant that they were most definitely still together.

We walked on ahead in search of Shiranami’s group. For about ten minutes, we headed in the direction of their GPS signals.

“Chihiro-chan!!!”

As we weaved through the trees in the dark forest, Kobashi, wearing her backpack, spotted us. Her teammate Takemoto was with her too, with a backpack over his shoulders as well. They seemed to have come looking for Shiranami while carrying all their group’s belongings, since he was also carrying another backpack in his hands.

Since they were heading straight for us, I guessed they had probably used the GPS search too. In the end, after meeting up, we all headed back over to the location where I had set up my tent.

“Thank you so much for helping Chihiro-chan, Ayanokouji-kun,” said Kobashi.

“Nah. I’m sure that you guys would have found each other eventually,” I replied. “I just hope I wasn’t overstepping or anything.”

“Overstepping? Come on, no way,” said Takemoto. “If we had kept going, we would’ve risked getting injured. And more importantly, we would’ve had a harder time finding her.”

Even though Takemoto was in a different class than his teammates, he was sincerely relieved that he and Kobashi had been able to find Shiranami so quickly. If Takemoto and Kobashi had to go chasing after Shiranami themselves, it was possible that it would’ve taken them more than one or two GPS searches before they found her.

I figured that I’d go ahead and broach a certain subject with Takemoto now, while I had the chance. “Hey, I wanted to ask you something. Do you have a walkie-talkie?” I asked.

“Huh? A walkie-talkie? Yeah, I do, but…” he replied, but he didn’t finish his thought.

I figured that if he was somewhat grateful to me, then I might be able to borrow it from him rather easily.

“If you don’t mind, I was hoping to see if I could talk to Sakayanagi for a minute,” I told him. “I wanted to ask her if a Class D student that I’ve been worried about has gotten back to the starting point.”

“Oh yeah, if that’s all, then I’d be happy to. Hold on just a minute,” he said.

Takemoto wasn’t hesitant at all about sharing. Figuring it was a way he could show his thanks, he quickly took out the device. The walkie-talkies provided to us by the school were digital, of course, and they came equipped with a function called secret conversation mode. It was, essentially, a function that allowed you to talk only with specific people one-on-one without allowing your communication to be intercepted by others. The groups that had gotten walkie-talkies for this exam had probably prepared codes so they could prevent information leaks from happening.

Takemoto used the walkie-talkie to call Sakayanagi to see if she was available. Shortly after he reached out to her, he got a response, and then he handed me the walkie-talkie.

“I’d like to talk with Sakayanagi in private for a few minutes,” I said.

Kobashi, Shiranami, and Takemoto all nodded happily, agreeing to my request. They graciously gave me some space. I still made sure that they could see the walkie-talkie, of course, to show them that I wasn’t trying to pull any cheap tricks. I talked with Sakayanagi for a while, and then I handed the device back to Takemoto.

“That’s all then, Sakayanagi. Sorry for bothering you this late at night,” said Takemoto, saying a few words to her himself.

My communication with Sakayanagi had ended with that exchange between Takemoto and her, which served as proof that the conversation had been concluded without any problems.

“You really helped me out,” I told Takemoto. “I was able to get the information I needed from Sakayanagi, thank goodness.”

“That’s great! Oh, also, Sakayanagi asked me to give this to you, Ayanokouji,” he replied, handing me a walkie-talkie.

“Okay, thanks,” I replied.

“We really need to say thank you too. Isn’t that right?” said Kobashi, gesturing to Shiranami.

“Thank you so much for all of your help, Ayanokouji-kun,” said Shiranami.

The three of them thanked me once again, and it was decided that the four of us would spend the night here together. I fell asleep listening to stories of Class A and Class C, which I normally didn’t get a chance to hear about.