Danganronpa: Hope for the Hopeless/Chapter 4 - Lodge Life

## Story

Ding dong, bing bong.

Once again, Monokuma’s announcement played on the school speakers. “Rise and shine everyone. It is now 7 A.M. It is officially morning. It’s time to enjoy another beautiful day here at Newpoint Lodge!”

As the announcement, my eyes opened. At first, I tried rolling over and closing my eyes with a groan, but it was too late. The light poured into my eye receptors and invaded my sleep. For all intents and purposes, I was awake to another day here at Newpoint Lodge.

I briefly stretched my arms up over my head and sat up. At the time, the thought occurred to me that I should have been grateful to be alive. But if I were to be honest, the memories of Eto’s murder, the attempt on my own life, the execution, and the fact that our escape seemed less likely than before didn't help my mood. With a sigh, I slid my legs over the side of the bed and stood up.

As soon as I did, I felt weak and nearly buckled forward. But I reached out my hands and steadied myself all the same. I felt nausea in the back of my throat and the throbbing in my head, while less than before, was still there. Yet, I suppressed any notion of feeling sorry for myself. Things wouldn’t be easy and I knew that much, but I told myself that things would work out eventually somehow.

*(You need to get a hold of yourself Nishi. You need to focus on making sure that the group works together to find a way out of here.)*

And so, I began my routine. I took off my current clothes, changed, and grabbed my new knife as well as my ElectroID, my watch, and my pill bottle. For a brief moment, my right hand hovered over the two recorders as well. But I drew it back and shook my head. The truth was that the last attack on my life came out of nowhere and that those recorders were of very little actual use in the heat of the moment. In the end, it was Koike and Senji that saved me. So, I turned around and continued my morning stuff without setting up either recorder.

Ordinarily, I would have left for breakfast. But this morning, I decided to do one extra task. Namely, I opened my bathroom door, stepped inside, closed it behind me, and headed right up to the mirror. Although what I saw put a frown on my face.

When I examined my reflection, I noticed two things. The first was that parts of my skin around the injury that weren’t covered up were somewhat bruised. It was unfortunate, but it was to be expected. The second problem however, was not expected. As I looked in the mirror, I noticed that a strand of my hair stuck up in the front and pointed upwards instead.

Naturally, I attempted to brush the strand of hair back down like it was supposed to be. However, each time I tried, the stubborn strand raised right back up to where it wasn’t supposed to be. For a moment, I considered getting my hair wet, but I shook my head and dismissed the idea when I remembered the bandages wrapped around my forehead. So in the end, there was nothing for me to do but hang my head in resignation and look away.

*(I suppose a bad hair day was bound to happen eventually.)*

So, in my defeat, I opened the door, walked into my room once more, opened the door to the hallway, stepped outside, and closed the hallway door behind myself. Once that was done and the door shut and audibly locked with a faint click behind me, I looked around the hallway for other students.

Sure enough, Saeki Masu and Machi Satu strode towards me as a somewhat casual pace side by side. Neither of them seemed to be smiling. Yet oddly enough, neither of them appeared to be frowning either. Overall, they both appeared to exude some degree of confidence as they headed towards me. And the moment they noticed me, Saeki waived her right hand at me.

*(Those two seemed to be in a surprisingly good mood.)*

As soon as I finished the thought, both of them made their way over to me and Saeki finally spoke up to me.

“Hey Nishi, have you heard the news?” Saeki asked with the usual hum in her tone. “We’ve told everyone else but I do not believe anyone has had the chance to tell you yet. Please let me know if I am wrong.”

“You’re not wrong,” I replied with just a hint of exhaustion in my tone that surprised even myself. “I- uh- I’ve been in my room since last night and I’ve been pretty tired too. Yesterday was a fairly exhausting in general.”

“I agree. Yesterday was an awful day,” Saeki concurred with a single nod in a brief tone of solace. “We all suffered yesterday. You and Eto, who I will never forget, probably suffered the most of all. I hope at the very least you got decent rest after it all. Eto is dead and there is nothing I can do to change that, but I can at least make sure that you are recovering well.”

If I were to tell the truth, I didn’t get a good night’s sleep. For the first night since coming here, I had my first nightmare. Surprisingly enough, it involved Machi stabbing Saeki in the heart in the latter’s own room, Machi winning the class trial, and everyone being dragged off to their executions. To make matters worse, my subconscious was all too willing to provide me a hypothetical scenario for my own. Once I was dragged away from the group, I was simultaneously torn limb from limb and hung by brass colored chains slowly to the rhythmic tick and turn of gears that surrounded me in a chamber that looked like the inner workings of a clock. All the while, various bloodied pieces of other humans hung from chains in the chamber. But worst of all, it was all vivid and realistic.

“I had my first nightmare here, but I refuse to talk about it,” I said as soon as I realized that I was failing to suppress a cold and violent shiver. “Anyways, you had something that you wanted to talk to me about?”

“Not necessarily that we wanted to, but since you’re here we might as well.” Machi cut in flatly. “It turns out that forcing open locked doors is against the rules, but altering other people’s ElectroIDs is perfectly allowed. Suffice to say that I made Sasori’s ElectroID recognize me as its new owner and used it to gain access to his room.” At that, she gave a warm but tired smile. “It turns out that there is hope for us after all. What Sasori didn’t tell us is that there are twelve instances of killing games excluding the ones going on right now where more than one student lacks a red X over their face.”

“Wait,” I said as I visibly looked up and stirred. At the same time, I felt as though a weight had been lifted from my shoulders. “If that’s the case, then that means that there had to be other instances of groups escaping.”

“You really do catch on quickly Nishi,” Saeki complimented as a smile crept across her face as well. “Unfortunately, these instances have mostly only happened during the earlier killing games. Since Monokuma confirmed that ten killing games happen simultaneously, I hypothesize that we are being tormented by the same masterminds as the earlier classes and that earlier escapes can be attributed to beginning errors on the part of the masterminds. I hope I am wrong however because escape will be much more difficult if I am not.”

“Eh, don’t worry about it Saeki, I’ve got my drones scouring the mountain from top to bottom,” Machi said in a reassuring tone. “Anyways, let's hurry up and get to breakfast already. I’m starting to get hungry.”

I opened my mouth to make some sort of remark, but before I could say anything, I noticed Saeki comply with her request. And so, I simply closed my mouth and began to follow the two of them. Granted, as I did, I unconsciously strayed behind them. If I were being honest with myself, seeing Machi nice to anyone felt surreal. Even if it was to Saeki.

We made our way around the two left corners towards the stairs and made our way up them without any incident. But then, Machi more or less brought me right back to reality once we made our way to the cross section where all the staircases were when she turned around and took a brief glimpse of me.

“Oh, Nishi. I hope you realize you have a thing on you hair by the way,” Machi explained as she pointed towards it with her right hand haphazardly. “You should do something about it. It doesn’t look good on you.”

“Gee Thanks,” I said as I grit my teeth and practically dripped sarcasm.

But in spite of what I said and a quick disapproving glance from Saeki, Machi turned around and led the way once more as if nothing happened. And so, we made our way to the front room, past the AV as well as the first aid rooms, into the hallway that led to the cafeteria, and all the way to the doors that led to the cafeteria.

After that, we each pushed the door aside and stepped inside. When we did, I quickly looked around and noticed two things. First, everyone was more or less sitting together among two tables and nobody looked particularly upset thankfully except for Sama who just stared down at her plate. And second, I noticed both from the aroma that permeated the cafeteria and the food on everyone’s plates that we were still eating leftovers.

And so, I proceeded to the kitchen, opened the right door with my right palm, headed inside, and grabbed some of the salad which was conveniently out for anyone who wanted to gather some for breakfast along with peaches, bananas, and oranges for those who wanted to have fruit with it. I myself grabbed a peach along with a banana and two scoops of salad and put it on my plate.

And then, I headed out of the kitchen about the same time that Machi and Saeki headed inside, made my way over to an empty spot on the edge of the group across from Sama and next to both Wakuni as well as Yakawa, and sat down. As soon as I did, Yakawa must have picked up on my presence because he looked up, smiled at me, and spoke up.

“Hey Nishi, did you hear about what Machi found in Sasori’s room?” Yakawa asked. “She thinks that it may be possible for us to escape after all. Not that I was going to give up but I’m glad you turned out to be right.”

“Ah,” I said with a single quick nod. “Yeah, Machi filled me in on the situation. And I’m probably just as pleased as you are. Of course, that doesn’t necessarily mean it’ll be easy. We’ll have to do everything we can to prevent more murders from happening before we find a way out.”

“Believe me Nishi, we’re well aware of that,” Wakuni grumbled.

At that, I took another glance around the cafeteria to see one more time how everyone was doing. Overall, everyone seemed to be doing well. Everyone except for Machi and Saeki were eating and they were just starting to sit down. However, Sama still seemed to droop her head a little.

So, I leaned forward and asked the obvious question. “Are you alright Sama? I know that yesterday was rough for all of us.”

“Heh, tell me about it,” Sama said with more than a hint of exasperation in her tone as she looked up at me. At that, she calmed down somewhat. “The truth is, I’m not the happiest at having validated Sasori’s false alibi or having argued against you in the elevator. I’m not super upset about it but I’m not in the best of moods at the moment you know?”

Before I could reply, Monokuma seemingly jumped onto the table from nowhere once again. This time, there weren’t any special backflips, front flips, or theatrics. Instead, he just belly-flopped onto the table as if he fell from the roof. That wasn’t to say that it didn’t grab our attention however, because the loud thud of Monokuma hitting the table echoed throughout the room. In fact, the noise was surprisingly loud.

*(It's probably because of the machine inside the plushy that is being used to move it. It’s quite durable though all things considered.)*

At that, Monokuma got up, brushed himself off with both paws, and spoke. “Darn, I had a really cool ceiling drop entry but it botched it up. Oh well, at least I seem to have all of your attention. Which is probably saying a lot considering-”

“Yes, yes, we were expecting you,” Sama retorted flatly. All the while, she clenched both of her fists. “So what did we unlock this time?”

“I was getting to that,” Monokuma explained as gleefully as ever. “I actually have two things to say. First, I wanted to say that just like every other time, I cleaned up the crime scene. Yessir, I fixed the door to the passage that leads to the summit. And while we’re on the topic, could you possibly be less destructive with your murders? This is getting old fast.”

Rather than dignifying Monokuma’s request with a response, Sama just continued to undermine him. “Is the other thing you wanted to tell us that you finally fixed the door to the library?”

“Nope! Not at all! That room is still locked down tighter than ever,” Monokuma said with a dismissive wave of his right hand. “What I was going to say was that up until now, you haven’t had any means of transportation. Well I’m telling you that that’s about to change! Or rather, it changed at 2:32 am. As a reward for surviving three class trials, I’ve unlocked the mobile shed. Inside are two high powered mobiles that will greatly expand your range of exploration around the mountain.”

I glared at him, but what he said actually made me bite my lip and consider the consequences of there being two mobiles. One of them of course was that they could potentially be used to try to escape though it likely went without saying that we were still too high up to escape without freezing to death. Another consequence was that only two to four people could benefit from the new form of exploration at a time. Furthermore, the prospect of four people using the mobiles assumed that they were big enough to ride two people per snowmobile.

Senji seemed to pick up on the fact because as soon as I finished my train of thought, he said as much. “Monokuma, only a few of us can actually utilize your reward at any given time. Is there any particular reason why there are only two snowmobiles?”

“Oh, there’s a reason alright,” Monokuma retorted as he placed both of his hands on his hips and looked down on Senji. “You all having to share is so much more interesting than that alternative!”

“And how are we supposed to determine who gets to use them,” Saeki asked in a polite enough tone although hints of irritation were evident and she tapped the table in front of her irritatedly with her right pointer finger.

“That’s for you chumps to decide,” Monokuma replied. And at that, he gave a quick mocking wave with his right hand. “Because I ain’t sticking around to help you! Motives to kill and people to plan! Ciaio.”

I frowned as he jumped off the table and seemingly disappeared into the floor again. But I didn't try to stop him nor did I bother to react to his antics. His behavior was designed to elicit a reaction so I wasn’t about to dignify him with one. Instead, I simply sat and waited for someone to speak up about the subject as soon as he left.

“So,” Sanda said from the other table after about a minute of silence. “Is it okay if I take the mobile for a spin? I totally promise it’ll be in mint condition when I get back. I’ve never taken one for a spin before and I really want to try.”

“Ah, yes. I imagine that you would be interested,” Saeki chimed in as she drew a smile once more. “Some of them can be deceptively fast however so do be careful if you go out. We wouldn’t want any accidents.”

“I would like to go as well if nobody minds,” Tanabe butted in from the other table behind me as well. “If- well if that’s okay with everyone else. I promise I'll tell you everything I find if I end up taking one of them.”

“Assuming nobody else speaks up, you can have the second one,” Saeki replied calmly. “I’ve used snowmobiles before and I like to pride myself in my patience. Besides that, Machi already mapped the surrounding area so we don’t exactly need to worry about anyone keeping secrets.”

At that, everyone more or less gave their consent to Tanabe and Sanda being the first two to take the mobiles for a test drive. And although I had to admit that curiosity burned in the back of my mind, I gave them a thumbs up with my right thumb anyways.

After that, breakfast more or less returned to normal. People began to eat and talk among themselves about the new developments. Throughout breakfast, I picked up on a few people asking Machi to provide them a map of the mountain and made a mental note to do the same later, but I mostly concentrated on eating my food. And luckily, we all seemed to finish within a decent amount of time without any more major incidents.

From there, we all disbanded one by one. When I did, I did the same thing I always did, I grabbed my plates and other trash, stood up, made my way through the double doors to the kitchen, put the food scraps in the trash, put everything else in the sink, and stopped to think about what I was going to do next.

Ideally I would be able to explore the area that opened up thanks to the snowmobile shed being unlocked. Unfortunately, Tanabe and Sanda both got first dibs on the the two snowmobiles out there. However, two other options immediately came to mind. First, I could probably find Machi and ask her to show me a map of the area. It wasn’t my first choice, but I figured that it would be useful to eventually talk to her. And second, the promise to search the storage room came to mind.

*(What to do-)*

It took me a second, but in the end, I decided to go with the storage room and proceeded out the back door into the hallway next to the greenhouse. When I did, I noticed a particularly high amount of condensation and stopped briefly, but I pride my eyes away from the window and continued down the hallway quickly enough past the entrance to the greenhouse and the supply closet. From there, I passed the crossway, turned right to head down the stairs, and proceeded down the steps calmly but briskly.

As soon as my left foot reached the bottom of the stairs, I heard Senji’s voice come from behind me. “Ah, Ms. Toshiro. There you are. There are a few things that we need to discuss.”

At that, I turned around to find that it Senji indeed was walking down the stairs towards me. In response, I stepped backwards and to my right so that I would be out of his way when he made it down the steps. And soon enough he did.

“What is it?” I asked in a pleasant enough tone.

“I have a few things to tell you. First, Monokuma told me to tell you that you have trash duty because- well I can’t think of a reason why he didn’t tell you himself,” Senji said with a slight frown. “Regardless, It isn’t anything bad, but it may be a mild inconvenience for you. And fortunately enough, I just recently had trash duty so I can show you how the machine operates.”

“Right,” I trailed off with a quick glance over at the control panel just down the hall. If I were being entirely honest, it was going to be an inconvenience. It felt like I always had something that I had to do and this was just something else that I had to do on top of that. Nonetheless, I mentally shrugged the notion off and refused to complain. “In that case, what exactly am I going to be doing?”

“Nothing strenuous I assure you,” Senji said as he followed my gaze at the control panel. “All you will need to do is come here after each night time announcement, see if the incinerator is burning properly, and initiate the sequence in the event that it is not running properly. Perhaps I could show you how the controls work?”

I nodded. And as soon as I did, Senji led the way to the control panel and opened the thing up for me to see. And of course, I thoroughly familiarized myself with the layout of the controls as soon as he did. At the top, there was a red light on the left and a green light on the right, below that was a screen, below that on the left were four black square buttons marked ‘time’, ‘interval’, ‘temperature’, and ‘display’, below the screen on the right side were two red buttons with the top one having the word ‘on’ and the bottom one having the word ‘off’ on it, and below all of that was the card reader. Suffice to say, I blinked a couple of times as I tried to wrap my head around everything that wasn’t labelled before he explained it to me.

“It's fairly simple once you get the hang of it,” Senji said as he turned to face me and pointed to each item with his right pointer finger. “The top left light informs the user that there is a living organic life form. Now, I have been informed that there is a safety mechanism in place that prevents the incinerator from working if a student is inside, but I would refrain from activating the incinerator if the light is flashing. You understand that right?”

He seemed to place a heavy degree of emphasis in his tone towards the end of his explanation, but luckily enough, it was easy to follow. And so, I nodded and he continued.

“Moving on,” Senji said with a faint smile. “The right light flashing indicates that the incinerator is active. You can use the top round button to turn the machine on and the bottom round button to turn the device off. Although I suspect that you’ve already determined that much. Now as for the other buttons, presumably time, interval, and temperature allows the user to change their respective settings though all of my past attempts have only been met with a notice citing that I do not have the authority to alter those settings. The only black button that actually works is the display button which brings up a record of each time the control panel was used, what time it was used, and who used it. And finally, and this is the reason why you have to manage the incinerator, none of the buttons on the terminal will produce a response unless the user’s ElectroID is in the slot at the bottom of the terminal.”

I just bit my lip and let him finish. It was obvious that the mastermind was the only person with the authority to make important changes because he or she wouldn’t want us to mess up their operation somehow, but I kept silent about it for the moment. Instead, after about ten seconds of silence, I gave a reassuring smile.

“Alright, I can take it from here Senji,” I finally replied. “So, what was the other thing that you wanted to talk to me about?”

“I wanted to discuss something that I found in the storage room,” Senji explained offhandedly as he gently closed the terminal cover and turned to face me. “It could potentially be more problematic than this though Ideally everything will be fine. Follow me.”

As soon as he finished, he took off towards the storage room and I followed like he commanded. Granted, I wasn’t the most keen on being ordered to do something, but he sounded as though it were important and I had every reason to follow him. So, without thinking, I rounded the two corners, approached the door to the storage room just as Senji reached out his right hand and opened it for me, and stepped inside.

As he followed and the door shut audibly behind us, I looked at the new area that had been opened to us as a result of winning the third class trial. Like before, the new area in the storage room had the same walls and lighting as earlier. However, this one gave me a headache when I glanced at it.

On the far wall, there was a silver rimmed portrait the size of a person that contained a grey maze entrance that was comprised of single polished slabs of rock walls and black rocky ground that stretched into the darkness inside. The foreground and background weren’t much better because the entire picture portrayed the maze enveloped in mist, the sky was cloudy albeit during daytime, and the ground before the maze was brown and lifeless.

But that wasn’t the only thing that was in the new area. On the left wall, there was a three layered rack that bore yellow bins with black and yellow caution stripes on the rims. I took a few steps closer and once I did, I realized that they contained assorted electrical equipment. Namely, batteries, jumper cables, and a black portable electrical charge box with a handle on the end were all neatly sorted into separate bins and placed at different levels. Furthermore, on the right wall was an open brown wooden crate that contained black ball weights with corresponding numbers on them and a giant blue bin that went up to my waist and was filled to the brim with standard thick brown rope and thin black cords.

As I walked inside and glanced again at the rack, I looked with genuine curiosity. After all, Monokuma told me that the room had a secret that a potential culprit could use but nothing really gave off any more alarms than anything in the other rooms. In fact, this room seemed less troublesome than the last two save for the conspicuously large quantity of rope that was provided.

“So which of these things are you concerned about?” I said as I raised my right hand to rub my head.

“None of them actually,” Senji surmised as he calmly stepped past me and proceeded to the far end of the room. Namely, before stopping in front of the portrait. “Believe it or not Nishi, this particular painting is masking a secret passage. Or an alternative method of accessing the hallway behind the class trial elevator room and near where the mirror is located.”

At that, I looked over to where Senji was standing and eyed the portrait more closely. If I were being honest with myself, I was honestly expecting the secret to be a weapon or a clue of some sort. However, I doubted that Senji was lying. First off, he could have simply withheld the information from me if he wanted to keep the trick of this room a secret. And second, the lodge seemed to be full of them or at least that was my explanation as to how Monokuma could disappear as quickly as he did so it wasn’t much of a stretch to believe that there would be a human sized secret tunnel around here somewhere.

Furthermore, Senji more or less confirmed it. He raised his right hand, knocked on a few sections of the portrait and pushed on the area where the entrance of the labyrinth was. As soon as he did, the portrait swung back without so much as a sound to reveal an unlit dark grey concrete passage that curved off smoothly but quickly to the left.

“Right,” I trailed off as I looked at what was beyond the picture. “So, how did you actually manage to find this thing?”

“Mostly luck Nishi. That is all there is to it really. I usually conduct as thorough searches as possible but I stumbled upon this,” Senji replied as he pulled out his ElectroID, tapped it, and turned it so that the screen would illuminate the darkness. After that, he turned to me. “It may be best if I go first Nishi.”

If I were being honest, I felt a mild wave of apprehension and my footsteps felt sluggish as I walked over to the entrance. It wasn’t that I was particularly afraid of Senji, but something about walking into an unknown and unlit area put me on guard. So, as I stepped through the threshold, I put my hands in my pockets so that I could grab my ElectoID and my knife if I needed them.

But nothing became of it. Senji led the way down the tunnel without any incident. When I rounded the first corner, I took note of both the door closing behind us and concrete stairs that undoubtedly ran parallel to the stairs outside that led to the incinerator room. Naturally, none of those were anything special although I did internally sigh when the door closed and the last bit of light other than Senji’s ElectroID vanished.

But we proceeded down the hall, up the stairs, and continued towards our destination without any incidents. And as we approached the final stretch, I looked around. The light that Senji’s ElectroID provided was minimal of course, but it was enough for me to observe my surroundings and determine that I didn't miss anything. It really was just one cold dark concrete metal passage.

And so, we reached another left turn that led us to a grey metal door with a single door handle on it. I didn’t need Senji to figure out that it was the exit to this area, but he reached out with his right hand, grabbed the handle, pulled, and let the light shine in regardless. I reached up with my left hand to shield my eyes from the light about the same time that he did, but from what I saw, Senji’s assessment was correct because we were in fact, right next to the mirror in the hall behind the class trial elevator room.

Slowly but surely, my eyes adjusted to the light and I was able to stumble forward. Surprisingly though, I managed to do so before Senji who took a few extra seconds before collecting himself and walking into the relative brightness that was the hallway. And of course, it was then that Senji turned to face me.

“Curious,” Senji began as he folded his arms and the door, which blended in perfectly with the wall save for a new small black rimmed portrait of a purple opera feather mask that hung on the front, started to close. “What are your thoughts on the passage?”

The answer was obvious enough. I frowned and glanced at the door as it closed silently and seamlessly into the wall. Truthfully, Monokuma could have given us something much worse, but this only served to make our investigation harder.

“Truthfully,” I said as I looked back at Senji and looked him in the eyes. “I prefer this to the various poisons that Monokuma gave us access to last time. And I’m not just saying that because two of them were used to try and kill me. However, I don’t like this in the slightest. It only gives potential culprits an opportunity to avoid detection if they wish to kill someone or hide evidence near the storage room. Have you told anyone else about this?”

“Aside from you, I have only told Koike about it. To the best of my knowledge, we are the only people who are aware of the secret though I would not be surprised if someone else made the discovery without my knowledge,” Senji remarked. After that, he put his right hand to his chin in thought. “I also agree that this development could be harmful and I am glad that you understand that. To that extent, we need to remain vigilant.”

I nodded somberly. Luckily though, at least three of us knew about the secret route but it still posed the problem of allowing anyone who knew of it to sneak into the storage room without being spotted. Additionally, there was the matter of figuring out who could or could not be trusted with the information.

*(Perhaps I should just leave Senji to figure that last problem out.)*

“Oh, there you two are.” Came a voice from the direction of where the lounge was. Both Senji and I looked in the direction of the voice and when we did, I saw Yakawa nonchalantly approaching us.

“I am sorry Yakawa, but we are in the middle of something,” Senji explained in a calm enough tone though I did pick up on him putting his ElectroID faster than usual. “I trust, or at least I hope, that you can understand that.”

“Yeah yeah. I get it. But Machi has something to show us that she insists is important,” Yakawa replied. “Everyone is in her room and we’re both waiting for you two so I’m afraid you’re going to have to come.”

At that, I looked at Senji who in turn took a brief glance back at me. I knew that Machi was serious about escaping the lodge so whatever she had to show us probably would be useful. And apparently Senji was aware of that fact as well because he just smiled, nodded, and looked back at Yakawa.

“Lead the way then,” I replied with a smile of my own.

And so, we made our way down the hallway, past the route that led to the class trial elevator, past the hall to the lounge, past the AV room, through the room, where all the stairs were, down the stairs to the dorm area, and finally, past a few turns to where the entrance to Machi’s dorm was. All without incident though that was mostly to be expected for a routine trip down a straight path with three people.

The door was closed and undoubtedly locked but the solution to that was simple enough. Yakawa reached out his right hand, poked the doorbell with his pointer finger, retracted his hand, and waited for someone to open the door.

Sure enough, and quite unsurprisingly, someone obliged. After about five seconds of silence, the door handle turned, the door swung open, and Machi Satu stood to greet us with a neutral expression on her face. Behind her, of course, were the others. Wakuni, Koike, Saeki, and Sama were all there with varying degrees of impatience evident from their mannerisms. In fact, the only people who weren’t there were Tanabe and Sanda who were likely out exploring like they said they would be.

“It took you two long enough,” Machi remarked as she pointed to myself as well as Senji. “I had to fetch someone to get you two. Where were you two anyways?” At that, she shook her head. “You know what? I don’t care. Come inside. I have a few things to show you.”

*(It's nice to see that you haven’t changed Machi.)* I thought to myself sarcastically.

For an ever brief moment, I almost frowned at her. But I refrained from it. Instead, I did what was expected of me and followed both Senji and Yakawa through the threshold and into Machi’s room. It was then, and only then, that Machi slammed the door shut behind us.

“Alright, it looks like everyone is here,” Sama remarked as she uncrossed her arms and stepped towards us. “So, what did you call us all over here for Machi?”

“Patience, Sama,” Saeki chimed in as she calmly got up from the chair in front of the work bench. “Neither Tanabe nor Sanda have arrived yet and I assume that she doesn’t wish to start without them.”

“Actually, I think it's best if I went ahead and told everyone what I found Saeki,” Machi replied before taking a brief glance at the camera in her room. “I don’t want to have to repeat myself but it will be too conspicuous if we stay here for too long. So, will everyone follow me to the bathroom?”

She spoke as though she were giving a command rather than a request and she turned around and headed to the bathroom door as if everyone was expected to follow her. So, I assumed that I didn’t have a choice and complied with the request along with everyone else.

Machi opened the door and we all filed inside into a room that was identical to my own bathroom. Machi was the first of course, then came myself, Senji, Koike, Yakawa, Saeki, Sama, and finally Wakuni. It was rather crowded when we all fit in the room, but when all was set and done, we did fit into it.

And that’s when I noticed two things. First, the shower door was open. And second, Machi reached into the stall to turn the water on hot. She retracted her hand as soon as the water came on, but her right sleeve clearly got drenched before she could finish.

“What the heck is going on here?!” Wakuni said as his right eye twitched. “We didn’t come here to watch you mess around in the shower.”

“Tsk, do you really think I called you here to fool around Wakuni?” Machi sharply retorted as she balled both of her hands into fists. “The steam is going to fog the lens of the camera that Monokuma is using to watch us.”

“This is going to use up all the hot water isn’t it?” Koike muttered as she pressed her pointer finger together and frowned at the revelation.

“I fear that is in fact the case,” Senji agreed with a nod. “However, any development towards determine ingur situation here is well worth the inconvenience. This is a matter of life and death after all.”

I bit my lip. *(I guess I’d better expect to take a cold shower if I end up taking one today.)*

“Oh, I definitely agree with you Senji. It’s just, you know, something that I wanted to avoid if possible,” Koike reassured. “I suppose it doesn’t matter in the long run though while this discovery or whatever might matter.”

As much as Koike didn’t like it, she appeared to at least understand Machi’s reasoning. And as I looked around, everyone else appeared to understand her reasoning as well. So, we waited for steam to more or less fill the room as what was probably the only hot water cascaded and audibly dripped in the shower. We waited for about five minutes or so before Machi looked up at the camera, looked down, and spoke up.

“Okay, I think that’s enough,” Machi explained as she pushed past Wakuni, grabbed what looked like a dark grey iPad from the sink and tapped on the screen. “Monokuma’s camera comes with audio. Tanabe should be distracting Monokuma right now but try not to talk too loudly about what I show you. He may be recording what we say.”

“What exactly did you find Machi?” Sama asked as she tapped her foot a few times on the ground.

“One of my drones found something and I’ve datamined it. It contained several things including a conversation that the mastermind had at some point,” Machi cooly said as she flicked her right pointer finger across the screen and turned the device in her hand around for us to see. “That’s all I’m going to say out loud, it's best that you take a look.”

I didn’t know what Sama did after, but I for one looked intently at what Machi showed us and I suspected that everyone else did as well. Sure enough, like Machi said, I noticed a white notepad of sorts on the screen and with speech bubbles originating from both sides of the screen. The names and dates were both absent but the content in the speech bubbles were visible to us luckily enough.

‘Have you fixed the safety protocol in the simulation yet? We have a tight schedule to maintain here and we can’t proceed until we have that fixed.’ Began the person on the left side of the speech bubbles.

‘you're trying to kill the others but you can’t take the risk yourself eh?’

‘This isn’t funny.’

‘I get it. You know you don’t have to be so serious all the time. It is ready though so you and the others can proceed as usual.’

After that, there was a repeat and the text bubble on the right side initiated a question. I wasn’t completely sure what it meant, but I could only assume that the other person was beginning an entirely new conversation. Likely at a different time than when the previous conversation ended. Regardless, I continued to look through the text that Machi provided for us.

‘So, shall we run the simulation like normal? The log says you broke the standard procedure last time-’

‘It's complicated but the last time was an exception. We’re going to do what we always do. We will send fifteen students to the scenario. Then I will borrow the sixteenth student’s avatar and impersonate them just like we planned.’

‘In that case, you should probably know that there are still a few kinks in the system from your exception as you call it. Everything is running normally, but there is residual data floating in the background.’

‘Just do your best to patch it up. I’ll deal with the aftermath. As long as all the systems are working normally, we can proceed.’

‘Everything is working. Luckily the system has that working for it. Just don’t do any unmarked scenarios again.’

‘I will definitely do my best. Oh, and thank you for staying overtime to get this working.’

‘You are welcome! :)’

‘Don’t make this awkward.’

That was it. The text ended there but to be honest, that was that I needed in order to feel ever so slightly dizzy. From the text alone, it wasn’t too difficult to piece together that the mastermind was talking about us, that Machi was right and that the person was very likely the mastermind, that he or she was impersonating one of us by stealing one of our avatars, and perhaps the most dizzying revelation of all, that this was simulation. The last of which made me paler and my vision more blurry the more I thought about it.

I wasn’t the only one either. Most people in the room showed symptoms and Koike even started to stagger somewhat. Furthermore, Machi predicted as much because by the time I shook my head enough to clear my vision, Machi was already holding up another line of text. This time, notes marked in bold red for us on lines rather than in a text bubble.

‘Yes, in case any of you are dumb enough to not understand what this means, it means that the mastermind is one of us and that we are currently in a virtual world. By the way, the sickness you are probably experiencing will likely go away in a few minutes. It did for me and it probably will for you.’

I simply nodded and successfully fought back the urge to vomit as my vision and the color of my skin came back to me. And one by one, everyone else gradually began to stave off the symptoms of what must have been knowing the world was fake as well. Nonetheless, it didn’t remove the shock of the whole situation. I pinched my right arm and all the cues to determine that I was pinched were there including the minor bit of pain, yet it was fake. I was just an avatar in a fake world but it all felt so real. And furthermore, the mastermind, was impersonating one of us through the use of our avatars. One of us was fake.

“I have to admit that this is a shocking development,” Senji admitted with a hint of surprise in his voice as he rubbed his chin with his right hand. “However, it does explain a lot. For starters, the changes in the class trial room each time we visit it.”

“Hmm, yes,” Saeki hummed with a weary smile on her face. “Eto and I had our suspicions before she died. She was smart like that. We had no way of knowing for sure but this confirms it. So, Machi, thank you for this. It really is going to help.”

“I agree. This was well worth the trip here,” Yakawa agreed with a brief nod at the same time that machi beamed with what must have been pride. “Now do you have anything else that you wish to show us?”

At that, Machi’s smile dropped somewhat. And instead of an audible response, she turned the iPad around, tapped it, and flipped it back over for us to see. Like before, she left notes for us. And although she didn’t want to say anything, the message was clear.

‘The only other thing that I found and decoded so far a video of an execution that is potentially related to the exception the mastermind was talking about earlier. Some Super High School Level Reporter was Asato Tara was executed right before Yasui according to the notes. Aside from that, unless you want to watch a video of a girl being shot to death by a firing squad while repeatedly claiming that they are innocent, I don’t really have anything to show you.’

*(Ah.)*

I just gave a somber nod and looked across the room as silence followed. Nobody spoke up, but everyone seemed to react to the claim. Of course, I didn’t know the details of any such scenario but if I had to guess, her class guessed incorrectly and she served as a reminder as to why we wanted to avoid voting for the wrong person. Regardless, the silence went on for some time before someone spoke up.

“I do not believe that we need to see that Machi. We will just take your word for it,” Saeki replied with more than a hint of tact in her tone. I for one nodded at that. If I didn’t have to watch an execution, then there was no reason for me to Regardless, Saeki continued. “So, now what are we going to do?”

“Assuming we want to prevent Monokuma from knowing about this meeting, I believe it would be best if we found a cover for ourselves that we could pretend the meeting was about.” Senji remarked without so much as missing a beat. In fact, if I had to guess, he planned to say that from the start.

“That sounds about right,” Machi conceded without so much as looking at Senji as she turned around and turned off the shower. “I don’t want to waste my time but I suppose it's inevitable. What are we going to do?”

Of course, there was silence after the question was imposed. And for good reason. As far as I remember, it was fairly difficult thinking of a group activity that everyone would agree to. Furthermore, the few times we did stuff as a group, I couldn’t remember a single time where it went well. At the same time, the realization came to me that all of Machi’s efforts to prevent Monokuma from figuring everything out were pointless if the Mastermind were with us. So, I opened my mouth to point this fact out. But before I could, someone else made a suggestion.

“Uh,” Koike quietly began while she looked down at the floor. “I normally, wouldn’t suggest this, but we could have a get together at the pool. You know, as something that we can say we organized this meeting for.”

“You know that Nishi isn’t supposed to swim with those bandages right?” Yakawa argued politely but assertively nonetheless with a quick glance over at where I was.

“It's alright. I’ll just lounge in one of the pool side chairs if they those,” I offered almost immediately along with a reassuring smile.

It was true that all of these efforts to stop Monokuma from figuring out the real purpose of our meeting were useless, but I wasn’t about to crush an opportunity for the group to relax and spend more time together. It would have been if I did.

Still, Yakawa appeared to have some degree of doubt based on his posture so I insisted and motioned for the door with my right hand. “Let's get going. The sooner we get there, the better it will be.”

That seemed to be enough. I opened the door to Machi’s bed room and one by one, we all filed out of the cramped area into the relatively much more open bed room area. Of course, we didn’t stop there, as soon as we all exited, Machi shut the door to her restroom once more, headed to the door that led out of her room, and opened it. Suffice to say, we all headed out quickly and soon enough, we were standing out in the hallway with the door to Machi’s room close behind us.

After that, we headed to the pool. Koike led the way as we made our way through the dorm area, climbed the stairs to the central room, turned left and climbed the two flights of stairs that led to the second floor, turned left, headed down the hall past the art room to where the greenhouse was, turned left again, and made our way to the two electronically protected changing rooms. Astonishingly enough, the entire trip was relatively quiet save for the echo of footsteps without so much as a peep of protest from anyone. I wasn’t sure why everyone else so readily agreed because of Koike or because they needed a coverup, but I was sure that they all agreed for one of those reasons.

Regardless, people began speaking among themselves when we reached the doors and a few people hesitated as some frowned and other glanced briefly at the metal pads on the floor which we all knew would probably kill us if we swiped our ElectroID on the wrong card reader. But we nobody outright stopped. I wasn’t paying attention to the guys, but out of the girls, Koike was the first to head up to the door, swipe her ElectroID through the red card reader, and step inside. And of course, I didn’t hesitate to follow her through.

When I did, I looked around at my environment. And surprisingly enough, it looked fairly similar to the coat changing room. At least in terms of color scheme. The walls were pink like before, the floor had tan tiles, and the ceiling was white. As for the furniture, I noted that the room had three changing booths on both sides that each had white doors for privacy but otherwise blended in as extensions of the walls. Furthermore, there was a white door on the far end with a pink fish logo on it pointed left. And finally, I took notice of six grey lockers to my immediate left. Each with a red card reader.

Naturally, I pulled out my ElectroID, went up to the locker that had the same number as the one to my room imprinted on it, swiped the card through one of the red readers, and opened the thing up to see what was inside about the same time that Koike did. And when I did, I saw a short sleeved one piece white swimsuit inside. It wasn’t anything special really, it as just the standard swimsuit only with two pockets. Yet, it was better than nothing. About that time, I thought occured to me.

“I didn’t notice any towels in here,” I thought aloud. Mostly to myself but with some hope in the back of my mind that someone could answer.

Koike did about the time I pulled out my stuff and slammed the locker shut in a tone that sounded as if she could barely contain her excitement. “This isn’t quite like the coat room. They keep one white towel in each changing room. Anyways, I will see you in the pool.”

“See you,” I said as I looked in her direction only to see that she was no longer there and a door to one of the stations close in her absence.

*(Wow, she is faster than I would have expected.)*

Regardless, I shrugged and headed to the right changing room, opened the door, went in, closed it, and locked it behind me. As soon as I did, looked around and noticed that Koike was right. The room looked the same on the inside as it did on the outside but it had a dark brown wooden overhanging bench and a silver towel rack with a single large towel hanging over it.

After that, I started to change when I thought occured to me.

*(Maybe I shouldn’t change. I won’t be getting in the water and I don’t want Yakawa to think that I will.)*

And so, I stopped, grabbed my stuff, unlocked and opened the door, headed out of the changing station, and did everything that I needed to put my swimsuit back where it belonged. It was then, and only then, that I finally, headed to the door that led to the pool, pushed on it, and stepped through the threshold to see what was on the other side.

As soon as I did, the warm temperature and chlorine hit me. But otherwise, it appeared to be a calming environment. The area around the pool was made of smooth white stone, the walls were a dark blue, and the roof was black although fluorescent light lamps hung from the ceiling. As for the extra details, the was a metal double doored shed barely large enough to walk into in the far right side of the pool, there was the standard silver lifeguard chair on the right with a white plastic seat, and a silver colored metal diving board in front of me with a white plank, and white poolside chairs on both the right and left side of the pool.

And of course, there was the pool itself. Or in this case, the pools themselves. The main pool in the middle of the room was the standard rectangular shaped pool. It had light blue tiles for its floors and walls save for the Hope’s Peak crest in the center of it and it seemed to slant downwards with the deep end closest to me and the shallow end farthest away from me. And finally, the other pool was a round circular jacuzzi pool at the far left end behind the pool with the same tile scheme but with three steps into it.

Unsurprisingly, almost everyone already appeared to be situated. Saeki and Machi appeared to be in the jacuzzi with swimsuits that looked exactly like mine save for the fact that they had color schemes similar to their coat color schemes, Koike and Sama were both swimming alone by themselves, and Yakawa was perched in the lifeguard chair wearing swim trunks that matched his coat’s color scheme, a white shirt with the word lifeguard written in red on it, and one of those red floatation devices.

*(Huh, where are all the other guys?)*

Before I could think too much about it, Wakuni spoke up from behind me in what sounded like surprise. “Nishi, why aren’t you wearing a swimsuit?”

I nearly jumped, but I stopped myself, took a deep breath, and turned around to face him. Like his brother, he also wore swim trunks that matched his color scheme. Though he wore a plain white swim shirt. Furthermore, he wasn’t frowning so if I had to guess he was more surprised than anything else.

“Remember what Yakawa said? I shouldn’t go swimming and I know it’s because I don’t want to get these bandages wet,” I said as I pointed to them with my right pointer finger and gave a wry smile. “I appreciate the thought but I have no reason to wear my swimsuit right now.”

“Ah,” Wakuni said with a hint of disappointment in his tone as he glanced at the bandages. “I know. I suppose I just thought it would be nice for you to get into the spirit of this whole event. Besides, I think you would look nice in one of those swimsuits.”

“I- well-” I began as I looked away. “I didn’t want Yakawa to get the wrong impression. By the way, where is Senji?”

“Senji opted to stay behind and wait for Tanabe and Sanda to come back. He figured that someone needed to tell them where we were though if you aren’t participating, you probably would have been better for the role,” Wakuni nonchalantly explained about the time I finally looked back at him. Though when I did, he looked as though he were repressing a smile. “Anyways, I think I’ll get to swimming if that’s okay with you.”

“Have fun Wakuni,” I conceded.

That seemed to be all the invitation he needed. As soon as I finished speaking, he ran onto the diving board, jumped on to the end, and sprung off as the end bent for maximum moment. And of course, the result was a few seconds of suspension in the air that he used to adopt a cannonball position before he crashed down.

I smiled at the splash down but as soon as the water finished crashing down, I sighed. Watching people dive was fun and all but I wished I could have participated. Nevertheless, I kept my composure and looked around for something to do. Sure enough, my eyes fell on Yakawa who appeared to be looking in Wakuni’s direction.

*(I suppose talking to him would be better than nothing. Unless I distract him in which case I'll back off. But I might as well give it a try.)*

So, about the time that Wakuni resurfaced, I casually made my way over to the lifeguard’s chair and by extension, I caught the notice of both Yakawa, Koike, and Machi. All of which appeared to have different levels of indifference or a lack thereof. Of course, as soon as I reached the chair, Yakawa glanced down at me and spoke.

“Is there something you need of Nishi? I’m afraid I’m a bit busy at the moment,” Yakawa apologized in a serious tone as he looked back up and scanned the environment around him. “I’ve been volunteered to be acting lifeguard here.”

“I actually just wanted to say hi,” I replied before I looked at the crest in the center of the pool. “You know, since I can’t go into pool right now, I thought I might as well try to talk to someone. And if it isn’t too distracting, you seem like just as good of a person to talk to as anyone else.”

There was a brief pause as Yakawa opened his mouth to reply. But after about a second or two, he softened up and responded. “I’m sorry Nishi. I’m sorry about what happened to you. I wish I could help you heal faster but I can't, I'm afraid. That said, I’m glad you’re following my advice and if you need someone to talk to, I’ll be here until I switch shifts with Koike.”

“Than-” I began to reply. But as soon as I did, I caught myself and looked back up at him with a raised right eyebrow. “With Koike?”

“Yeah,” Yakawa said as he failed to fight back a smirk. “I wouldn’t underestimate her. She’s the best swimmer out of all of us, she is surprisingly strong, and as far as I know, she's one of the four people here who know cardiopulmonary resuscitation. I suppose there may be more, but Senji, Koike, Wakuni, and myself are the only people that I know for sure know.”

*(Well of course you know.)*

I opened my mouth to convey my thoughts on the subject. But before I could, I heard a large crash to my left and looked at the source just in time to see Tanabe storm into the room with Sanda and Senji close behind. Senji had a disappointed expression and both of his arms crossed, Sanda was smiling and walking in with what I could only assume was pride as well as amusement, and Tanabe had narrowed eyes and seethed with grit teeth as he stretched his right hand out of his swim shirt and glared at Sanda.

“You have a really unhealthy self image Tanabe,” Sanda nonchalantly remarked with a tone of suppressed laughter loud enough for the whole pool congregation to see. “You need to lighten up. Nobody cares about-”

Sanda caught himself but it was too late. The visceral anger was practically palpable and the entire pool went silent. Tanabe clenched both of his fists, and glared harder than I had seen him glare up until that point. If looks could kill, Sanda would be dead. But after a few seconds of silence, he just snorted, turned around, and stormed away twice as fast as before to the pool.

At that, Sanda frowned at looked at Senji. The look on his face told me that he thought he was helping, but Senji just frowned, said something to him that I didn’t quite catch, and walked calmly away from him to presumably join up with Koike. And as for Sanda, he sulked and looked down at the ground.

“Why- wow,” Yakawa muttered after a brief period of silence. “Nishi, why don’t you check to see if Tanabe is alright? And then if Sanda is alright? You don’t have to obviously but they look like they could use you’re guidance.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” I replied in a tone of an equal amount of shock. “I’ll go check on them now.”

And that was what I did. About the same time that I noticed Koike and Senji head over to the jacuzzi, I made my way to where Tanabe was headed, namely, I turned to my right, passed the lifeguard chair, and prepared to intercept Tanabe at the shallow end of the pool. However, when I rounded the corner, he stopped and looked to his left where one of the walls with the pool chairs were.

Undeterred, I rounded the corner and continued to head towards him casually enough. However, as I headed over to him, I heard something from my immediate right that caught my attention.

“So,” Saeki chimed in from the Jacuzzi which was now within earshot of me. “What brings you here Koike? I for one would have thought you would be playing in the deep end of the big pool if I may say so.”

“Well- you’re right about that,” Koike conceded as she and Senji eased into the water. “But- well there something important that I wanted to tell Machi.”

“Should Saeki and I give you a moment?” Senji suggested in a surprisingly calm tone given the events that he witnessed first hand earlier.

“Saeki and I are talking to each other,” Machi retorted as she folded her arms. “You can stay if you want but you can’t force her to leave.”

“Guys, you all can stay. What I have to say is meant for Machi but you can listen if you want,” Koike responded. After that, there was a pause and she swallowed. But sure enough, she responded. “Machi- uhm, I know that wasn’t going to be killed in any of those plans you made a while back, but they still would have affected me. They would have affected all of us. I’m not saying this to guilt trip you or anything. Quite the opposite. I wanted to say that I waited to forgive to Seno for what he did to me and by the time I came around to it, it was too late. And well- we never know how this killing game is going to go. You clearly regret making those plans and you’re clearly trying to change and I should have said this a long time ago, but I forgive you.”

At that, Machi looked down at the water and failed to repress a smile. She opened her mouth once, but nothing came out. If I had to guess, she was trying to find some way to respond to Koike but couldn’t. Regardless, she visibly relaxed and uncrossed her arms.

That was when I looked back in Tanabe’s direction.

Ding dong, bing bong.

“Well He-llo everyone! Enjoying your poolside get-together? Well you’re going to have to cut it short because I have a surprise waiting for you at the lounge!” Monokuma blissfully and eerily declared over the speaker. “I expect you all to head there effectively immediately. And by expect, I mean demand! Over and out.”

We all glanced over in the direction of the nearest monitor, but Sama was the first to speak up about the new development. More precisely, in her typical deadpan manner. “Of course he does. I don’t know why I expected him to choose any other moment to harass us with what is probably another motive.”

I kept silent, but at the same time, I bit my lip. Immediately, my mind raced with thoughts on what the motive might be. And to make matters even worse, I knew very well that forced motives were not off the table either. Not that it mattered because Monokuma seemed to be able to get people to murder each other on short order regardless, but the memory of the second motive he gave us still stung in the back of my mind. And as I glanced around the room, I could tell that I wasn’t the only person to experience a wave of mild apprehension.

“Alright, I know nobody wants to go but we are all required to,” Senji said in the resulting silence with more than a hint of irritation in his voice. “I am afraid that we do not have a choice. We should just prepare ourselves for whatever is to come and remember that we are all on the same side here.”

“I agree,” I said half heartedly though as loudly and convincingly as I could. “We are all in this together. And if we all work together, then just maybe we can get through this motive without anyone dying.”

“I somehow doubt that Nishi,” Machi said from behind me. “However, we don’t have much of a choice. If we refuse, we die. So, let's just get this over with.”

And so, we did, with enough muttering amongst the group, we all began to make our way out of the pool area and towards the lounge. Starting with leaving the way we came. At that time, I noticed blue card readers on the doors that connected the pools to the changing room. But it scarcely invoked anything from me other than a mild surprise given that all the other card readers in the area were red.

Regardless, I never entered the pool so I was the first of the girls to make my way over to the card reader, pull my ElectroID out, slide it through the reader, open the door, and put my ElectroID back in my pocket. At about that time, I reached for my knife with my left hand and grabbed it. I couldn’t explain it, but I felt more relaxed, or more in control when I did.

For me, the next steps were simple. Unlike the others, I was wearing my normal clothes so I simply proceeded out the door on the far end of the changing room instead of drying off and changing back into my normal clothes.

After that, it was the same as before. I turned right, walked down the hall next to the greenhouse, turned right again, walked past the art room as well as the sports room, turned right again, and marched down the stair well. However, when I made it to the bottom, I took the opportunity to take a deep breath and tried to stop thinking about what was likely another motive. If it was going to happen, it was inevitable. But fretting over it wasn’t going to help anyone.

*(Come on Nishi, we are all counting on each other to get through this.)*

So, I took a few more deep breaths and proceeded directly towards the lounge. And of course, it wasn’t too difficult to get there without incident. All I did was head forward, turned left, went down the hall to where the door to the lounge room was, and opened it up. However, what I saw when I did genuinely came as a shock to me.

Once more, there was a grey foldout table with black metal legs on the other end of the room. However, unlike the last time, it was much larger,and bore ten golden trophies on them in two neat rows with guys in the back and girls in the front. They were all different in shapes and sizes. However, they all had Monokuma figures on them doing various poses.

I paused for a few seconds, but after that, I decided to walk right up to the trophy case and examine the trophies. After all, I was the first to arrive at the lounge so I had time to kill and I figured that I might as well spend it by examining what I had to work with. But as I did, I noticed nothing off about the trophies. There was one addressed to each survivor but they looked, smelled, and sounded like perfectly normal trophies. The only thing off about them was that they looked like mockeries of real trophies.

Their achievements were mockeries as well. I had ‘most likely to wind up dead’, Koike had ‘most in distress’, Sama had ‘most useless’, Machi had ‘least number of friends’, Saeki had ‘most number of projects’, Wakuni had ‘most redundant’, Yakawa had ‘most likely to fail’, Senji had ‘most likely to graduate’, Tanabe had ‘most abnormal’, and Sanda had ‘most likely to provoke a murder.’ Suffice to say, they were all achievements intended to hit a nerve on some level or to harbor distrust.

At about that time, I heard the door open behind me. As I turned around, I saw the others enter the room. Wakuni and Yakawa were first, then came Senji and Koike although the latter did so hesitantly, then came Sanda with an equal degree of hesitation, then Sama who looked around the place before she entered, then Saeki and Machi who just marched through the door, and finally, Tanabe walked through the threshold. He didn’t appear to be nearly as angry as before, but he had a frown on his face nonetheless.

“So-” Machi trailed off as her gaze shifted to the stand and the trophies on them. “What’s with the trophies?”

“I’m glad you asked!” Monokuma shouted from seemingly out of nowhere. However, we all knew what was to come. So, Machi gave an exasperated sigh and the entire group gazed at the podium just as the half-white and half-black teddy bear jumped up from behind the podium and landed on top of it. As soon as he did, he dramatically motioned towards the trophy stand with his left arm. “You guys have worked so hard over the last couple of days, so I decided to give you awards.”

“Right-” Sama remarked as she walked over to where the trophies were and gazed at them. However, she did so, her eyes went wide with shock and then narrowed into a glare of what must have been outrage. “What the heck is this? Most likely to graduate? Most useless? Are these somehow dangerous or is this just you being petty again?”

“Again?!” Monokuma shouted in what must have been mock outrage as he raised his hands to cover his mouth. “Why I’d never- well- actually yeah. The trophies are for my amusement. As to whether or not they’re safe or not, you’ll never know until you check!”

“And I assume that these trophies are the reason why summoned us?” Senji remarked with a hint of disdain in his voice as he crossed his arms. Then, without waiting for an answer, Senji gave a stern warning to Sama and I. “Both of you, get away from the trophies. They could be laced with poison or contain something equally dangerous!”

Sama and I just took one quick glance at each other and then stepped back towards where the other members of the group. I didn’t know what Sama was thinking as we did. But my pulse picked up a bit when I considered the possibility and took one more glance at them. Furthermore, if I had to guess, I would imagine that Sama was similarly concerned.

Luckily for both of us though, Monokuma lowered his paws and shook his head. “No, no. The trophies are safe. Geeze you all are such killjoys. Though in your defense- you kill each other just as fast-”

“Can we please just jump to the conclusion,” Sanda cut in with an evident frown on his face.

“Fine!” Monokuma shouted before crossing his arms. “There are actually two reasons why I invited you here. First and foremost, to give you the trophies. You don’t have to take them but none of you are allowed to leave until you a least see yours. Second, I wanted to give you a friendly warning that I have already given this round’s motive to its intended recipient?”

“Wait, you’ve already passed it out?” Wakuni grumbled. “What is it?”

“Who knows?” Monokuma said with a shrug. “Oh wait a second, Senji knows! Why don’t you ask him? He’s the one who received the motive and he has every right to tell you what it is if he so chooses to.”

*(Senji?!)*

“Hmm, well if Senji tells us it shouldn’t be a problem,” Machi asked flatly as she crossed her arms and looked at Senji. “So, what was the motive Senji?”

“Uhm- well,” Senji began as he rubbed the back of his neck with his right hand and lost composure. “I would like to say that Monokuma is lying but I can’t very well deny it, so all I am going to say is that it is a video designed to trick us into killing someone by making us believe that she or he is the mastermind.”

“Hey, it ain't necessarily a trick! I said that it may or may not contain a clue to the mastermind’s identity,” Monokuma pouted. “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. I never lie about my motives. Bear’s honor.”

“Didn’t you just say that you wanted us to ask Senji about the motive instead of going to you?” I retorted.

“Hey! I-” Monokuma began. However, he stopped and put his right paw to his chin in what must have been thought before continuing. “Well darn! I guess I’d better leave before I spoil the rest of the fun. See you. And don’t forget to look at the trophies before you leave the lounge.”

At that, Monokuma jumped back to whatever was behind the podium and disappeared into what seemed like thin air. All the while, he seemed to take some of the tension with him but the rest of it lingered in the room as the group gradually shifted their gazes towards Senji one by one.

“Good thinking Nishi,” Senji began only to be interrupted.

“Why didn’t you tell us that Monokuma gave you a motive earlier?” Koike muttered as she looked up at him. She didn’t sound angry, but she did have some degree of disappointment in her tone. “You know you can trust me- I mean us.”

“It isn’t that I didn’t want to tell anyone,” Senji admitted calmly enough. “It is just that this is a murder motive, the intended victim is likely not the mastermind, and they would likely become a target if the full motive were revealed to you.”

“So you’re just going to determine what is and isn’t best for us?” Sama retorted with a glare of his own. “Really Senji, it would be best if you showed us so that we can decide the facts for ourselves.”

“If I were to show you, then there would be no going back-” Senji said as he raised his voice. However, as he began, he was cut off.

“You can’t sincerely believe that we’re just going to form a mob and hurt the suspect,” Saeki argued with what sounded like a disappointed tone as well. “It’s as if you don’t know us at all Senji.”

“You aren’t going to convince me to divulge the information Saeki. This is a murder motive which means that Monokuma knows that someone will react to the video and kill the suspect.” Senji argued. “Besides, even if I was wrong and nobody killed the suspect, could you all say that watching the motive won’t change the way you think of him or her? Maybe you can Saeki but I am not willing to risk their safety or stand by while they’re ostracized.”

“You know that you’re going to be the prime suspect if a murder happens,” Sama warned in a fairly cold tone.

At that moment, it became clear to me that a wedge was forming between Senji and the rest of the group. Whether that was the intent of the motive or not wasn’t entirely clear. But it became fairly obvious that the best thing to do would be to try and intervene before it got out of hand like so many other things. So, that is exactly what I did.

“Guys, can we calm down for a second?” I suggested as I stepped between Senji and Sama. “I want- no I expect answers from Senji, but a fight like this is probably exactly what Monokuma wanted.”

“Hmm, well it is dinner time,” Sanda muttered as he looked away in what must have been contempt. “I suppose I’m willing to wait until we’re finished with that fiasco to find out what Senji knows.”

“Tsk, I guess,” Machi said with a quick nod before glaring at and pointing towards Senji with her right pointer finger. “But you better explain yourself when we’re finished. This is a murder motive and I don’t like you keeping it to yourself.”

At that, most of the group more or less agreed though Senji vividly disented and Koike just looked up to him with concern etched all over her face. As for the others, none of them seemed pleased with the suggestion either. But at least all of them headed over to the table to look at their trophies so that they could leave. Everyone except for Sama and myself that is because we simply headed to the lounge door.

I passed one final glance over my right shoulder to Senji. To be honest, I knew that it would have been better to press Senji for the information but I knew in the back of my mind that trying would only lead to the same argument that we just stopping. So, I looked forward and pushed the door open. Then, I stepped outside, waited for Sama to do the same, and let go of the door so that it could close behind us as soon as she did. After that, we headed towards the cafeteria though as soon as we did, I could tell that the trip wasn’t going to be uneventful.

“I can’t believe we finally have a chance to do something about the motive, that we finally have a chance to stop someone from killing someone else-” Sama began to rant as she picked up speed to a brisk walk. “And yet, Senji plans to keep it to himself! How do you think it is that Sasori wound up killing someone?”

“I’m not a hundred percent sure that Senji intends to go through with anything-” I began about the time we past the class trial elevator room doors and reached the front room area. However, Sama cut me off as soon as I did.

“I get that much, but that doesn’t change the fact that he kept this hidden from us,” Sama remarked as we bounded past the First Aid station. “Besides, he might very well be planning to do something. All that I know is that on top of all of this crap that I have to deal with, I have to wonder whether or not Senji is going to kill an innocent person or if he is withholding vital information about getting out of this hellhole.”

At that, my right eyebrow raised. If anyone asked, I would have had no trouble admitting that Sama’s rant caught more than a smidge of my interest. She never seemed to be particularly happy when she was around but as she spoke, I considered the possibility that she was taking the killing game harder than I initially considered.

“Sama,” I said without any attempt to hide my concern as we approached our destination. “Are you okay? Like, what crap are you specifically referring to?”

“Well there’s-,” Sama began as she reached out her right hand to grab the door handle that led to the cafeteria. However, the question sunk in, she visibly exhaled and relaxed, and she spoke in a much less harsh tone than before. “Actually, I’m not sure if I feel up to telling you right now. I’m sure you remember the bad things that have happened to me by this point. I appreciate the thought but right now all I feel comfortable saying is it's been a rough killing game for me.”

At that, I considered what she was talking about. And to my surprise, it didn’t take long for memories of unpleasant things that have happened to Sama to come to mind. I recalled that she enjoyed the library before being locked out of it, that she didn’t take the first class trial well, that she actually discovered Seno’s severed head, that she was accused of killing him, and that she felt guilty of being tricked into helping Sasori. Suffice to say, I went wide eyed as it hit just how rough things were going for her.

“I’m sorry Sama,” was about all I could think of to say as I reached for and grabbed the door handle. “If you ever want to talk about it, you know where to find me. Though for now, I promise that we’re going to figure Senji’s situation out. We’re all working together to convince Senji. I promise that between most of the group, we can figure this out. So try not to let this get to you okay?”

“I’ll-” Sama started as she looked towards the door. “I’ll do my best. And- well I haven’t forgotten your other promises Nishi. I’ll let you know if I need you. I promise.”

At that, I nodded and pushed the door open and led the way into the cafeteria with Sama close behind me. Naturally, I looked around at my environment and the usually full cafeteria felt empty in everyone’s absence. But otherwise, we proceeded to the kitchen doors, pushed them open, and proceeded inside without any incidents.

From there, the two of us went to grab leftovers from the previous night. I reached for Tonjiru soup and Sama more or less did the same. After that, it was just a matter of placing them into a microwave, turning the thing on, and waiting for it to heat up. And when it inevitably did, I headed out the double doors into the cafeteria and called it a day because to be frank, I had more important thoughts going through my mind than dinner.

Sama must have been doing almost everything automatically because when I sat down closest to the kitchen, she joined me and sat across from me. I suppose that made sense given how upset she was with the new motive though.

Regardless, I wasn’t alone to consider it for long. Because after about a few seconds of awkward silence, the door to the hallway opened and almost all of the rest of the group came pouring in. Koike, Saeki, Machi, Tanabe, Wakuni, Yakawa, and Sanda all joined the two of us in the kitchen. However, one person was notably absent.

*(Senji.)*

Understandably, Sama looked over her left shoulder and gave Koike what must have been a confused glance and asked the obvious question. “So, is Senji going to be joining us this evening or is he too good to be bothered?”

“Senji said he wouldn’t be joining us,” Sanda remarked with a shrug but a smidge of disappointment in his tone. Both of us looked in his direction as soon as he replied but when I did, I noticed that he was sitting down cross legged next to Sama and with a steak on his plate though he seemed to be busy looking up at us. “Confused?”

“How?” I replied as I stared down at the thing.

“It’s a simple substitution trick really,” Sanda remarked with what must have been a smug smile as he rested his head on his hands. “I’ve been getting a little rusty so I thought I could practice on you two. I’ve actually been planning this all day and I’m glad to see that it paid off!”

“Were you also planning to antagonize Tanabe?” Sama remarked in her usual dry tone. “Not that I care, but it's probably a bad idea to make enemies with someone while a murder motive is in play.”

“Well,” Sanda trailed off as his smile dropped a bit. “Truth be told, I thought he’d have the same reaction that you do. You know, when you get all flustered and then dismiss it. And I was trying to prove an important point, but I suppose I hit a nerve. I suppose I’ll just have to patch things up with him or wait for it to die down. But don’t worry, I’ll be fine.”

Truthfully, I wasn’t entirely sure what to think about Sanda’s attitude or whether or not he should downplay what he did. True, it was likely to blow over, but similar past actions that he did to people came to mind. And from what I remembered, he seemed to rub people off the wrong way as well starting with Sama and Machi.

Regardless, I excused the thought and dinner went on like it usually did after that. Everyone else came in with food, Koike took the final seat close to me, and I ate the soup one spoonful at a time. And it’s flavor was surprisingly poignant but otherwise, it was fairly well done and had a sensation taste to it.

And when all was said and done, I got up, drabbed my stuff, made my way through the double doors like before, and placed my stuff back where it belonged. After all, the notion that Senji was distancing himself came to me. Additionally, the fact that Senji didn’t even show up to dinner didn’t help matters at all. Of course, I considered that he just wanted time to calm down. But at the same time, things were only going to get worse the longer Senji kept quiet about what he knew and I hoped in the back of my mind that we could have resolved the issue over dinner. I was about to sigh when an all too familiar ring echoed throughout the school.

Ding dong, bing bong.

Once more, Monokuma gave his usual annoying speech night time speech. “Attention everyone. The time is now 10:00 P.M. It is now officially night time. Goodnight everyone and rest well. You never know what tomorrow will bring.”

*(Hopefully, common sense for Senji and Sanda. But I somehow doubt it.)*

With a sigh I headed out of the kitchen and into the back hallway. Though fortunately, I happened to have a clear idea of what I needed to do this time around. Not what I wanted to do, but what I needed to do at least.

Without hesitation, I turned left and headed towards the incinerator room. Like Senji told me, I had been assigned to deal with the incinerator and it wasn’t exactly a responsibility that I wanted other people to know that I neglected. Fortunately enough though, Senji mentioned that it should work normally on its own and it tended to do so about this time, I figured that it shouldn’t be any worse than a standard stroll though I did look over my shoulder a few times to make sure that I wasn’t being followed.

However, nobody followed me and I made my way there without any incidents. It was a brisk walk past the greenhouse entrance and janitor closet, past the cross section, and down the stairs like usual so it would more or less have been completely mundane if it weren’t for the group’s concern about Senji.

Regardless, I made it, opened the lid to the terminal, and checked the thing. The right incinerator light was flashing bright red like one might expect and warm air seemed to come from the direction of the incinerator. So, I smiled, closed the terminal and began towards my room.

*(At least I don’t have to deal with that today.)*

After that, I made my way up the stairs, took the back hallway past the new picture hung on the wall beside the mirror, past the hallway that led to the lounge where I stopped and glared at the place for a second, past the area with all the stairs, down the stairs to the dorm around, around one right corner and to my room.

And then, I did what I always did before. I pulled out my ElectroID, swiped it through the card reader, opened the door, stepped into my room, and closed it behind me. All without any trouble of course. However, when the door closed behind me and the lock on it clicked faintly, I slid down into a sitting position on the floor and sighed.

*(Sama. Sanda. Senji. Tanabe. I- I have my work cut out for me.)*

A short amount of time passed as I just stayed there and processed the situation. After all, I had quite a bit of information to process. And of course, I wracked my brain to try and think of any time where Senji had shown suspicion towards any of us but drew nothing but blank thoughts. The end result was that I knew it was a problem that was exhausting to even think about so I came to the conclusion that I might as well get up go to sleep, and figure it out tomorrow.

And that is exactly what I did. I got up, put away my knife, painkillers, and ElectroID, changed my clothes, cleaned up, slide into my bed, and turned out the lights. All like I usually did albeit with the enigma of what to do in the back of my head the entire time.

Nonetheless, I closed my eyes and did everything I could to drone out the thoughts. After all, there really was no reason to worry about the situation. It was bad, but worrying wasn’t going to help anything. And so, I slowly repeated this fact in my head until I was convinced of it. And as a result, exhaustion slowly but surely crept over me until I eventually gave myself over to lull of blissful rest.

…

Ding dong, bing bong.

Monokuma spoke his morning announcement just a cheerfully as before. “Rise and shine everyone. It is now 7 A.M. It is officially morning. It’s time to enjoy another beautiful day here at Newpoint Lodge!”

For me, it was one of those mornings wear I wanted to go back to sleep. I woke up and sat up with a groan as well as a pulsating pain in my forehead. Furthermore, the world was blurry albeit everything was slowly piecing itself together to form a clear picture in my vision and my body ached with the same exhaustion as before. For all intents and purposes, I felt like going back to sleep even though I knew I couldn’t afford to.

*(I must have had a rough night.)*

Truthfully, I wasn’t sure why. I didn’t have any recollection of any nightmares from the night before. Just an idea that I wanted to share with the others as soon as I got the chance. If I had to guess, I would just say that I slept in an uncomfortable position or something along those lines. Regardless, I yawned stepped out of bed right foot first, and caught myself with my left foot when I stumbled forward.

After that, it was mostly the usual deal. I grabbed my knife, ElectroID, watch, and a bottle of painkillers. However, when I got a new set of clothes to change, I noticed something fall out of them and leave make a clattering sound as it hit the ground.

Naturally, I knelt down, reached out with my right hand, and picked the thing up with my right pointer finger and thumb, and held it up for closer inspection. Furthermore, what I saw brought me a hint of a smile. What I found wasn’t the best but it wasn’t the worst thing to find either. Overall, it was a little convenience.

*(At least I've found a monocoin.)*

After that, I pocketed the monocoin and proceeded about my daily routine. I changed, during which I felt the same strand of hair on my head from yesterday still sticking up and frowned about it, put my night clothes away, and proceeded to the door. From there, I opened the thing, stepped outside, and waited for it to close behind me. Everything went normally of course, but the fact that a piece of my hair was standing up in the front bugged me longer than I cared to admit.

Nonetheless, I shrugged it off and headed to the cafeteria like I normally did. After all, I needed to check up on the rest of the group so it wasn’t like I could afford to waste time thinking about my hair. And at worst, I could always ask Saeki for help if this problem persisted.

And so, I walked out of the dorm area, up the stairs, through the room where all the stairs were, through the front room past the AV room and first aid station, down the hallway, and to the door that led to the cafeteria room. From there, I opened the thing and calmly but briskly stepped inside. It all went without incident of course, but nothing prepared me for what I found as soon as I made my way into the cafeteria.

The food was out like it was the previous morning, but what really caught my attention was the behavior of the class. Senji was pacing up and down between two tables, one where nobody sat, and one that was filled with the other members of my class. Both parties had their eyes locked on each other and both were quite animated. Luckily, neither Tanabe, Sanda, or Sama showed any immediate signs of their situations worsening, but what I did see was still enough to make me cringe.

“I have said this before and I will say it again,” Senji began in a clearly exasperated tone with what was clearly a scowl. “We can not afford to go on a witch hunt. This is exactly what Monokuma intends for us.”

“How can you claim to know what Monokuma wants?” Yakawa immediately rebutted as he crossed his arms. “Because while I can’t say what the reaction will be, I know for sure that it's far more dangerous to let this slide and leave you running around with some unknown motive.”

“This is really for the best Senji,” Saeki replied in a relatively placative tone and with a single nod. “I do not personally believe that you’ll do anything but none of us are willing to take the risk. You can trust us Senji.”

“I’m sure all the previous killers would have said that if they were in this situation as well,” Senji argued back. “In fact, I know that two of them didn’t even intend to kill anyone until after they’ve received their corresponding motive.”

“And you seriously think that we’re just going to let this go?” Sama retorted with biting sarcasm in her tone before rolling her eyes. “You know Senji, you don’t have the right to pretend you’re better than the rest of us. For all we know, you fully intend to kill someone because of the motive and you’re just not telling us. And by the way, I don’t appreciate your comparing us to the past three killers.”

At that point, a fuming Senji turned around from his pacing and shifted his glance just in time to see me. At that, he started taking deep enough breaths and he seemed to calm down a little, though not by much.

I just sighed and explained myself. “You don’t have to explain this to me. It's easy enough to decode already. Someone, who I’m guessing is Machi because if anyone would be confrontational about it it would be her, asked you to explain what the motive was. And then you argued with her and it snowballed into what it is now.”

“That is actually- surprisingly accurate,” Machi confirmed my suspicions with some degree of hesitance and her eyes wide with shock before she narrowed them at me. “You didn’t have to sound so sure of yourself about it though.”

There was a pause after that as most of the group either awkwardly looked at me, glared at Senji, or eyed Machi with what looked like ‘I told you so’ written all over their faces. A pause that I used to bring my right hand up to my forehead, but it, and continue.

“So anyways, I had an idea that might be able to make it harder for people to murder each other. It can probably wait but I wanted to tell you guys while everyone was here,” I announced clearly but succinctly before anyone could continue. “So, can you withhold your argument until I’m finished or should I wait?”

Senji unsurprisingly leapt at the chance. “Go ahead Nishi. I think it would be best if we all got back on the same page.”

*(You’re the reason we aren’t.)*

“Well, it's nothing groundbreaking and it definitely isn’t a catch all solution,” I began in a surprisingly calm tone. I didn't know why I didn’t hesitate, but if I had to guess, it was because I was annoyed with the situation. “It's simple really. The first two murders happened because of secret meetings that we didn’t know about. So, all people need to do to prevent those types of murders is to inform a third party whenever they intend to meet someone alone some place. All they have to do is explain who they’re meeting with and where. That way, everyone will understand that they can’t arrange any meetings to kill someone and they’ll be easier to catch if they do.”

As soon as I finished, there was a pause as some of the people in the group looked at each other and appeared to consider it. And of course, it wasn’t until then that the doubt of how effective the idea would be crept into my mind and I bit my lip as I waited for a response. Seconds passed, but it felt longer until at last, someone replied.

“I mean, You’re right about it not being the solution to all of our problems, but it's worth a shot,” Wakuni said with a shrug. “Besides, we could always drop it if it turns into an inconvenience for everyone.”

Luckily enough, nobody seemed to argue with him after that. And so, it seemed as though the entire matter was settled in my favor. Something that almost made me smile as I headed over to the food, grabbed a plate, and started loading fruit like yesterday. However, whatever stir of pride I felt was overshadowed by the reality of the situation when Machi spoke up.

“You know Senji, I know what you did,” Machi cut in with more than a hint of irritation in her tone. “You took advantage of Nishi’s idea to change the topic. This really is important. We need to know what we’re dealing with.”

“I’m not sure why we’re having this conversation,” Senji growled as he clenched his teeth and as I picked up the remainder of my breakfast. “I have already explained that I wasn’t willing to compromise on this matter and my reasons for it. If you don’t believe that I’m trying to prevent murder, than I’m afraid there isn’t anything left for me to say.”

“We do question your intentions, but that isn’t why we’re having this conversation Senji,” Yakawa spoke up in a warning tone. “The problem here is that you think it would be better for you to deal with the motive by yourself then let us help you prevent its fulfillment.”

Senji’s eye twitched and his fists clenched. But somehow, he kept most of his composure. “As I said before, this conversation is going in circles so I do not see any point of continuing it. And regardless, I am afraid that I am losing my temper. I believe I shall be leaving before this gets out of hand.”

“Senji-,” Saeki began only to be interrupted.

“I’m afraid that wasn’t a request Saeki,” Senji replied through clenched teeth. “If any of you need my services, I will be in my room. Otherwise, you all would do well not to bring this subject up to me again.”

At that, Senji stormed off to the door at a surprisingly brisk pace, pushed the open, and marched out. All the while, his tone and posture were calm, but his irritation was almost palpable in the room and remained so even after he left. Naturally enough, I sighed at this as I made a mental note to myself to make this issue the highest priority one to resolve.

*(I hope Senji doesn’t try anything before we figure out a way to fix this.)*

As soon as I finished the thought, I headed over to the table. And unsurprisingly, Koike herself got up from the table and followed the steps that Senji took towards the door. Her arms were folded, she looked down, and if I had to guess, she was nervous about the whole ordeal. Yet, she persisted until someone called her out by name.

“Hey Koike, where are you going?” Machi of all people called out.

That made Koike turn around and give a weak smile along with an obviously strained voice. “I agree with you guys. I really don’t want anything bad to happen to Senji and it would be best for him if he didn’t have to go through this alone. But at the same time, I need to go check on him to make sure he is alright. This has to be hard on him. If- if you need me, I’ll be in the dorm area. Probably talking to him in his room.”

And so, Koike turned around once more, followed in Senji’s footsteps, and headed out the door much like the guy before him. Of course, it didn’t take me so much as a split second to figure out why she was nervous and why she was checking up on Senji. She was obviously loyal to what was clearly her closest friend here. Nonetheless, I did frown at the implications when she did.

*(Isolating Senji is bad enough, but the way things are playing out, we might drive Koike away from us as well.)*

However, despite my concern, there wasn’t really anything that I could do about the situation at the moment unless I wanted to run off after Koike. For a moment, I looked at the door and considered the idea, but ultimately, I shook my head and took a seat where Koike previously sat. It was selfish, but I wanted to finish my breakfast and talk with the other students about how to proceed before I did anything.

I grabbed the banana on my plate and began to peel it when Saeki and Machi both got up in quick succession of each other. Both politely but both succinctly as well which drew my attention to them before Machi spoke up.

“I actually have to go now. Drone to calibrate,” Machi explained herself in a rather curt tone. “In the meantime, you don’t need to worry about me bothering Senji. Believe me, I would. But this is really important.”

*(So is figuring out how to resolve this situation.)*

“I am afraid that I have to go as well. I have an important matter of my own to attend to,” Saeki stated before taking a deep sigh and turning toward me. “Speaking of which, may I borrow that watch of yours? I know that it’s really important to you but there is someone that I want to talk with and I do not want to be late. I promise I’ll get it back to you in one piece. Oh, and I also promise to comply with your guideline once I have it scheduled.”

I bit my lip and wracked my brain to consider why she thought the watch was important to me. But almost as soon as I did, the answer came to me. Senji lied about the thing being some priceless sentimental gift from a relative and I went along with it. Fortunately though, I supposed that everyone took my hesitance for considering whether or not to give her the thing.

“Be careful with it,” I said with a degree of fake hesitance as I slowly pried it off of myself and handed it over to Saeki. After that, I simply lied. “It's the only connection that I have right now to the outside world. What am I kidding? Of course you’ll keep it safe. I trust you Saeki.”

At that, Machi head towards the door to the hallway while Saeki took the watch from me and brandished it in her right hand. All the while, she gave a faint smile of what I could only guess was amusement as she examined the thing.

“Thank you for trusting me with this Nishi,” Saeki replied in a rather somber tone. If I had to guess, she took borrowing my stuff really seriously which I supposed would make sense given her usual personality.

And with that, the Saeki and Machi left. Machi did so by headed towards the front door, pushing off of it and stepped outside, and Saeki did so by heading through the double doors to the kitchen and presumably through it to the hallway behind the kitchen. And like that, the six of us were left alone in silence to eat our food and discuss our situation.

I began to eat my breakfast, but I also spoke up after chewing and swallowing my first piece of banana. “Alright so, aside from the whole breakfast incident, how is everyone holding up today? And do we have any ideas about how to fix this?”

“Well-” Wakuni began with a grumble. “I think the best way to resolve the issue with Senji would be to get him to tell Koike so that she can tell the rest of us. However, that would destroy whatever trust Senji had in Koike.”

“Unless he never found out that Koike ratted out on him,” Yakawa chimed in. “Anyways, that’s our current goal. We just need to get both Koike and Senji on board with their respective parts of the plan which is easier said than done.”

“I suppose I can try to talk to them separately later,” I offered with a slow understanding nod. To be honest, I felt some relief at hearing that. The plan bore its fair share of risks but hearing it was like having some weight lifted from my shoulders. However, that didn’t stop my from motioning towards Tanabe and Sanda with my right hand. “By the way, Tanabe, Sanda, how are you two doing?”

There was what felt to me like an awkward silence as both people just stared at me with blank unamused faces. And the reason why was obvious of course. It wasn’t hard to deduce what I was concerned about or why I wanted to bring it up. They had an issue that needed to be resolved. So, while calling them out definitely wasn’t ideal, it was necessary.

“I think I get what you’re asking me about. I’m still upset about what Sanda did. It was just wrong,” Tanabe replied in a stern and surprisingly normal volume tone as he crossed his arms. After that, he sighed. “Nonetheless, I don’t hate him, I’m not going to do anything drastic over that little incident yesterday, and I’m not going to hold a grudge forever.”

“Thanks Tanabe-” Sanda began only to be prodded by Wakuni’s left elbow and subsequently stopped.

“The only thing we’re genuinely worried about is the motive,” Yakawa cut in with a frown visible on his face.

“And you must understand that we don’t hate him either,” Sama concurred. She still had some irritation in her tone, but it seemed to be quickly dying down. “We’re worried about his own safety just as much as we are concerned about the safety of everyone else. I’m not happy about him thinking he’s better than us of course, but Koike isn’t the only person who would be upset if something bad happened to him.”

“Yeah, I believe that.” I agreed as everything that Senji did came to mind. He made food for us, he saved my life along with Koike and Yakawa, he regularly provided physical and emotional support to whoever needed it, and he was instrumental in finding all three previous culprits. Moreover, he was one of my friends. The thought of having to continue without him gave me a cold empty feeling of dread that stirred in me before I recollected myself and spoke solemnly. “I just hope we don’t cause trouble.”

“Yeah, I hope we’re not making any mistakes either,” Sanda chimed in as he looked down at his plate. “So, now that we have a plan, how about we get back to eating breakfast. It’s getting cold.”

And so, we did. I looked down at my plate and noted that I had already eaten half of it while we were talking but that didn’t stop me from eating the other half. All the while, I looked around at the group and thought about the situation. Tanabe could easily be more hurt than he was letting on, Sama was still fairly distressed, and Senji of all people was causing a major issue for the group. But, none of those problems were ones that I could deal with in public. So, I ate my food in peace.

After that, I got up with my plate and headed for the kitchen to put my stuff away. But before I made it to the double doors, I thought about what I wanted to do, turned around, and spoke up to let everyone know.

“So, if you want, I could try talking to them now,” I explained. “I was going to head to the prize room and try to win something that might help us escape, but this is clearly more urgent and that can always wait.”

Surprisingly enough, nobody agreed with that reaction. Most of the group shook their heads at the suggestion despite the obvious fact that we needed to deal with the situation as soon as possible. As a result, I frowned before Yakawa spoke up.

“That would be ideal but Koike is with Senji right now so you won’t be able to do anything other than make them both angry with you. It would probably be best if you did what you were going to do first and get back with them later after Senji has calmed down and you can talk to them individually,” Yakawa suggested before taking a short pause and continuing with what must have been an afterthought. “And don’t hypnotize Senji either. The whole point of this is not to provoke him.”

*(Well I know that much.)*

“Alright then,” I replied without any attempt to hide the mild irritation in my tone. “I don’t like it, but you have a good point. I’m heading to the prize room if you need me because I found a Monocoin. But after that, I’m going to see if koike is still with Senji or not. If she isn’t, I’m going to talk to at least one of them.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Wakuni muttered with a right thumbs up and a brief smile. “See you around Nishi. And stay safe.”

With that, I turned around, headed for the double doors, pushed them with my right hand, and headed inside. Then, I walked over to the sink, put everything down where it belonged, stepped back, and sighed.

*(Alright Nishi. It's time to head to the prize room and try your luck.)*

And so, I walked back through the double doors to the cafeteria, headed through the cafeteria and out the front door to the hallway, made my way through the hallway past the first aid station, past the AV room, headed towards the stairwell to the second floor and made my way up the stairs without any trouble.

From there, getting to the prize room was fairly trivial. I simply turned right, went up a flight of stairs, proceeded forward until I reached the intersection, turned right towards the Monokuma fountain statue hanging from the wall, turned right once more to grab onto the door to the prize room, pulled it open, stepped inside, and waited for it to audibly shut behind me.

I gazed around the room and to nobody’s surprise, it was pretty much exactly the same. The wheel, bubblegum machine, and kiosk were all still there. The only thing absent surprisingly enough was Monokuma. As I stepped closer, I expected him to spring up from behind the kiosk, but the silence of the room persisted with ever increasing conspicuousness until finally, I stepped forward, placed my hands on the rim of the kiosk, leaned forward, and peered down to see if I could find a trap door or something.

That was when the silence broke. I saw part of the floor open for a micro instant. And furthermore, I saw a half-black and half-white blur spring up at a frankly astonishing speed. I tried to react, but before I could, the thing collided with my face with a velocity that knocked me off my feet.

Monokuma somehow recovered the landing and landed on both his feet. I however, wasn’t so lucky. After the initial blow, I fell backwards and stopped myself from hitting the ground only because I reached both my hands out to catch myself. Luckily, it didn’t hurt because Monokuma had a literal plushy exterior to insulate whatever mechanisms were in him, but the end result was me on the ground looking up at him nonetheless.

“What was that for?” I growled as soon as I came to my senses.

“What do you mean what was that for? I was just coming here as fast as I could from setting up a punishment and this is the thanks I get?” Monokuma exclaimed as he folded his arms and stared down at me with a narrowed right eye. “I assume you’re here to spend that monocoin of yours on whatever?”

I just glared up at him as I reached into my pocket with my right hand, pulled out the monocoin, and handed it over to the bear before speaking. “I guess I’ll try the wheel again. If I win it's more beneficial in the long run.”

“Say please!” Monokuma taunted.

“Please,” I deadpanned as I pushed off the ground and pried myself back up onto my feet. To be frank, it felt humiliating to play along with him, but the last time I won, I got an improved coat so it was well worth it to get something from the room next door.

I took a step forward. But before I could, Monokuma jumped onto one for the higher rungs of the wheel, grabbed it, let his weight pull on the thing, and let go at the bottom once the thing went into full spin. After that, it quickly picked up into a full spin but unlike the time I spun it, friction picked up much more quickly and it only lasted about forty seconds before it landed on one of its red sections.

“Upupu, it isn’t your day Nishi,” Monokuma declared in his usual gleeful tone. “That means you get nothing. You lose.”

“Hey, I thought I got to spin the wheel,” I countered as soon as the argument came to mind. It wasn’t so much that I cared as much as the fact that Monokuma irritated me at the moment and that he deserved for me to be difficult, but I pressed the matter anyways. “Last time, you let me try the wheel. For all I know, you rigged your attempt.”

“Oh, I suppose I should have clarified that. It doesn’t matter who spins it as long as its spun.” Monokuma defended as he rubbed the back of his head with his right paw. “But I’m not changing the results. If you wanted to spin the wheel yourself, you should have been faster. Now you’re not going in there and you’re not going to find the missing blow dart in there either.”

At that, I scowled at the bear and then glanced at the door all while I considered leaving. After all, there was no reason to stay if Monokuma was just going to gloat about the situation. But soon after I did, Monokuma’s final words rang in the back of my mind and made me slowly turn to face the bear once more.

“Wait, did you say missing blow dart? As in, someone came here and took one from the shelves?” I asked in a much more serious tone. Irritatingly enough, Monokuma didn’t respond. But the answer wasn’t that difficult to deduce without his input. “Was it before or after you showed us the motive?”

“What does it matter? I’m not going to tell you!” Monokuma shouted back at me as he began waving his arms frantically. “I already told you too much already.”

I sighed and stared down the bear. Once again, Monokuma decided to be as unhelpful as possible and he forced me to work out the answer myself. Something that made my head throb briefly. But eventually, I figured out my answer without his help once again.

*(Monokuma wouldn’t have subconsciously slipped that information if it weren’t on his mind which either means it was recent or that it is going to be used for something noteworthy- like a murder!)*

As soon as it hit me, my pulse picked up, my breathing shallowed, and I went wide-eyed. Regardless of which of those reasons were true, the facts only presented three possibilities. First, Senji might be getting ready to murder someone. Second, someone might be getting ready to murder Senji. And third, someone is going to use the situation as a coverup to murder another random student. Regardless, all three scenarios involved a murder.

“See you,” I said as I turned around and made a brisk march for the exit without so much as looking over my shoulder at the bear.

After that, I shoved the door open and sprinted out of the room and towards my new destination. From there, I turned left to go back the way I came to the prize room. All the while, seconds seemed to pass by like forever and my lungs began to burn. But I persisted nonetheless. And as made my way down the flight of stairs to the rest of the second floor and reached the stairwell that led to the first floor, a plan formulated in my mind.

*(Calm down Nishi, you probably have plenty of time. All you have to do is tell Senji what you know, tell him that either he or Koike will die if he commits a murder if he turns out to have the blowdart, or warn him about the situation and use it as leverage to get him to tell Koike what he knows if he doesn’t have the blowdart. Then, we can warn everyone else and stop this from happening!)*

I practically flew down the stairs as my plan came together. I nearly tripped towards the bottom of the first flight, but I caught myself and made the U-turn before I proceeded down the other flight of stairs. I was short of breath when I reached the bottom, but other than that, there were no incidents.

Not until I hit the bottom that was. As soon as I did, all I could do was gaze at the scene that I rushed upon abject horror rushed over me. I knew the situation was dire, but nothing prepared me for the notion that I might have been too late and that someone might have died because I was too slow to react for the second time in my life. Yet, it came suddenly, so I was not prepared for what I saw.

Yet, whatever it was just started, Senji Kenazane lay on the ground in the middle of the cross section. Furthermore, he was on his left side, posed towards the hallway that led to the lounge among the other areas. His legs were sprawled out, his left arm reached out across the floor towards the storage area, his right one stretch out towards his back, his teeth were clenched and his eyes were shut tightly. Furthermore, and perhaps most importantly, a kitchen knife dug into the back of his right upper torso very close to his shoulder, blood soaked all the way through the back of his shirt, there was the occasional twitch in his hands.

I stepped closer as my head began to feel light. But what I saw next brought at least some degree of relief. Senji’s chest rose and fell with what looked like pained, sharp breaths. Senji Kenazane wasn’t dead, but I had no idea how to save him. And so, I cried out for help as a surge of both desperation and adrenaline coursed through me and my cries for help pierced the halls.

I didn’t hear anyone come, but they came like a blur. First, I felt Wakuni and Machi brush past me. Both of whom were wearing their coats albeit with their hoods down and their goggles on their foreheads. After that came Sama, then Tanabe, then Sanda and finally, I noticed Yakawa stumble in to the scene. And when they did, they all had equally horrified reactions save for Yakawa who shook his head and knelt down to examine Senji.

“He’s still alive but I think the assailant nicked an artery,” I explained without any attempt to hide the desperation in my tone. “I- can you save him?”

“Oh, the assailant did a lot more than just nick an artery,” Yakawa said before shaking his head as if he were trying to stir himself. It was then that I noticed a small puncture mark on the right side of his neck. Regardless, he continued. “I should be able to save him.”

“Good,” Replied Sama in an equally concerned tone before she took a quick glance around at her surroundings and continued. “Say, where are Koike and Saeki?”

For whatever reason, that question was enough to make Senji stir ever slightly and even open one of his eyes for a moment though not without stifled cry of pain in his voice or the act of reflexively moving back into his previous position.

“Ko- koike, he took her to,” Senji strained to say with increasing effort. “Down hallway- past- mirror- Save-”

“We’re going to handle it Senji,” Yakawa stated fairly assertively. “The more the struggle, the closer you’ll be to bleeding death. As it is, the only reason you’re even still alive is because the knife was left in you.”

At that, I stepped away from the group and motioned for them to do the same so that Yakawa could have some space to work with and save Senji without interruption. Luckily enough, everyone complied. It took them varying times to peel their eyes away from Senji, but they all did and looked up towards me.

“We probably should find Koike and Saeki as soon as we can,” I chimed in to the rest of the group as I put my right hand to my chin in thought. “Senji said the hallway past the mirror, that means whoever tried to kill him took her down the hallway behind the class trial elevator room.”

“I was in the greenhouse and I didn’t see anyone go anywhere near where I was,” Tanabe said quietly but in a much more desperate tone than usual. “Which means that they must have gone down towards the storage area.”

“Great, you know where she is,” Yakawa shouted with a tone of impatience in his voice. At that, I looked over just in time to see him apply pressure to Senji’s injury with some blue cloth. Furthermore, he wasn’t even looking at us. “Now could you hurry up and find her? I need to stay and stabilize Senji, but Koike needs you to find her.”

“Got it,” Wakuni said solemnly with a quick nod before turning to address the rest of us. “You heard the man, this is an emergency. Let's find Koike before it's too late.”

I didn’t protest. In fact, Wakuni didn’t even have to say it. But as soon as he did, I led the charge towards where we expected Koike to be and I heard the footsteps of what I could guess was everyone else behind me.

And so, I did another sprint much like the one to the cross section where I found Senji. I headed into the back hallway, and past the AV room and hall to the lounge at which point Wakuni took the lead and passed me. Yet, the pursuit remained the same regardless of who was in the lead and we turned left, turned right, and bounded down the stairs without incident all the same.

It was then that something caught my eye. The panel door on the incinerator was swung open, the bottom half of the controls appeared to be torn out of the incinerator, and there were scrape marks all around the frame. Furthermore, I noticed a dozen different wires, all of which followed a multicolor spiral pattern of white and some other color, hung out of the hole in the wall. Some were frayed and some weren’t but they all caught my attention. What caught my attention most of all though, were the lights. The right light was shattered with glass strewn along the floor, but the left one was lit brilliantly and illuminated a small area around it in a vivid red glow.

“Wait!” I shouted as I stopped and reached both my hands out to stop anything from passing me. To be honest, I wasn’t sure how, but Senji’s lesson on the incinerator controls flashed vividly in my mind. “Koike is in the incinerator.”

Wakuni just nodded ahead of me, resumed his pace, and bounded around the corner. We followed of course and when we did, we saw a sight that halted us in our tracks for just a brief moment.

The door to the incinerator was ajar and I felt a surge of relief when I saw Koike inside. However, she didn’t appear to be in the most pleasant of situations. Koike was lying down belly first in the center of the incinerator. Luckily enough, the room appeared to have very little trash in it and a circular area seemed to have been cleared for Koike. But unluckily for her, both her arms and legs were restrained behind her with what looked like a soft black cord in a hog tie knot with while her mouth and eyes were both wrapped in white cloth meant to gag and blindfold her respectively. Finally, Koike’s head was turned to the right and bore what looked like one of the stickers that were used to drug people unconscious during the last murder.

Luckily for her though, nothing else seemed to be too off. Her chest was rising and falling normally but she didn’t stir when we saw her. So if I had to guess, she was unconscious. Furthermore, none of her extremities were red or blue so it didn’t seem as though the rope was tight enough to cut off circulation. For all intents and purposes, Koike was safe.

“Alright,” Sama said with clear relief in her tone. “So, we should probably free her. That position doesn’t look comfortable and she might know what’s going on.”

“She’d better know where Saeki is,” Machi remarked. “I don’t know what we’re going to do if she doesn’t know.”

At that, Wakuni bit his lip and looked over at Machi before looking back and speaking up. For once, without making any retorts against her. “Regardless of whether she knows or not, we’d better get to freeing her. I’ll stay here until she wakes up, someone needs to inform Senji and Yakawa about the situation, and the rest of you should probably search for Saeki.”

“I’ll tell Yakawa the good news,” Sanda volunteered.

And with that, almost everyone went their separate ways. In the blink of an eye, Sanda left to do what he said and most of the others left to do what I could only assume was continue the search for Saeki. But Wakuni, Machi, and I all stayed behind and went inside to figure out what Koike knew about the situation, and in my case, make sure she was alright.

Freeing her was a fairly simple process, I pulled the knife out of my pocket and began cutting at the rope while Wakuni removed the sticker on her neck and Machi removed the gag and blindfold on her. Overall, the process was fairly streamlined. I took the longest on account of being careful not to cut her, but otherwise, we had Koike free within minutes.

From there, we propped her up against the wall and waited. After all, just because Wakuni removed the sicker didn’t mean that the symptoms of the drug were gone. As much as I hated it, Koike would take time to wake up. And so, waiting was exactly what we did. I just put my knife back where it belonged and stood by her to her left, Wakuni did more or less the same except on her right, and Machi paced back and forth with increasingly frequency as time passed. I hanoow idea how long the process went on for, but at the end of it all, Machi spoke up.

“How long is she going to take?” Machi asked without so much as making an effort to look at either of us. Instead, she glanced over at Koike.

“When Nishi was drugged, she took ten minutes to wake up,” Wakuni stated factually before coughing into his right fist and continuing. “Contrary to what you might believe Machi, I’m not an idiot. I know you care about Saeki so if you want to leave and search for her like the others, Nishi and I can handle it.”

Machi opened her mouth, likely to make some sort of retort about how Koike might have been the best bet of finding Saeki, but before she could, something caught all of our attention. Namely, Koike stirred, groaned, and started rubbing her hands. At first, the actions were all negligible, but they stood out in the otherwise quiet atmosphere nonetheless. And by the time she opened her eyes, all of ours were on her.

“Ugh,” Koike groaned as her head bobbed around before shaking her head and looking up at us and speaking with a mild sense foreboding in her tone. “Hey- hey. What are you all doing here? What happened?”

“You were kidnapped Koike, but you’re safe now,” I said in the calmest tone I could muster. “We were actually wondering if you could tell us what happened. We don’t want to strain you but we’re still searching for Saeki so if you could tell us anything that might lead us to her, we would greatly appreciate it.”

“S-Saeki? Wait,” Koike said as her tone dropped to a much more solemn one and she curled up into a ball. “I- I remembered being attacked in the coat room. Someone walked out of the men’s coat room and knocked me out. I thought it was a dream when I first woke up but if it isn’t- I was only in the coat room because I was going to meet with Saeki at the snowmobile shed to talk about Senji. If I was kidnapped and Saeki is still missing-”

At that, Koike closed her eyes, took three deep breaths, opened them, and slowly but surely pushed off the ground as she dropped her hands to her side. Her legs buckled as she did, but she quickly got her bearings. All the while, Wakuni reached out his right hand to stop her, but she just her head.

“I appreciate the thought Wakuni, but if Saeki is missing, then she’s probably at the meeting point.” Koike explained with evident concern in her tone. “Oh, this is all my fault. If I hadn’t agreed to meet her, I don’t think any of this could have happened.”

“It's not your fault Koike,” Machi rebutted. “But you can help us save her. Did you tell anyone about the meeting who can take us there?”

“Well, I told Senji that I was talking to her and where we were headed but that’s about it and I don’t know if Saeki told anyone or not,” Koike muttered miserably as she looked away from Machi. “I uh- wait, where is Senji?”

“He’s safe with Yakawa,” I answered quickly before either Machi or Wakuni could botch the explanation because that was not a risk I felt like taking. “He was- injured but I suspect that Yakawa stabilized him by now.”

“St- Stabilized!?” Koike shouted. All the while, she went wide-eyed and an entire shade paler while I winced the moment I realized that I let that piece of information slip. “I want to check up on him so badly,” She whined. “But- but you say he’s safe and we don’t know about Saeki yet. I’d- I'd better take you to the meeting point first since it seems like I’m the only one who can.”

At that, we all looked around at each other and frowned. The truth was that Koike was in no condition to lead the search for Saeki and that she deserved to rendezvous with Senji and Yakawa so that the latter can treat them both. But at the same time, Koike was the only person who could potentially save Saeki if she was at the meeting point. Sure Saeki might have told someone, but nobody knew who it was if she did. And if she did, it was possible that the person could have been the assailant. So, whether we liked it or not, letting Koike lead the search was out best choice.

“Alright,” Wakuni said with a sigh. “Lead the way.”

And she did, our march out the incinerator and to the coat room was somewhat slowed by the fact that Koike was getting her bearings which made Machi scowl. But otherwise, it went without incident for most of the journey. We stumbled out of the room, turned left, headed down the hall and up the stairs, turned right and headed past the back hall, passed the trial elevator room, and past the Lounge as well as the AV room. But after that, we stopped.

Koike took note of a small pool of blood on the floor, grit her teeth, and put her right hand over her mouth. And as for the rest of us, we just followed her gaze and looked down at the blood. After all, that was all that we could do.

“This is where it happened wasn’t it?” Koike asked in a solemn tone. Though to be honest, she sounded as though she already knew the answer to that question.

“Well yes-” Wakuni began as he scratched the back of his head with his right hand. “But Senji isn’t here which means Yakawa must have gotten him to the first aid station. If it’ll help, you can check up on him.”

“No she can’t,” Machi cut in dryly as she crossed her arms and pried her gaze away from the blood. “You realize that if Saeki is at the meeting point and she’s still alive, then Koike is the only person who can save her?”

“Koike isn’t just some tool Machi,” Wakuni replied with a glare. “I know she volunteered to help, but this is clearly distressing her. You at least need to acknowledge her.”

“Machi’s right,” Koike cut in. At that, we all looked over at her as she continued. “I- I’m really worried about Senji but Yakawa is the finest at stabilizing people. I- I trust him. And me being there isn’t going to help Senji but I can help Saeki if she’s still alive.” Koike motioned for us to follow her with her right hand. “Come on. The sooner we find her, the sooner I can pay Senji a visit, the sooner we can stop whoever did this, and the sooner we can put all this past us.”

And so, Koike turned around and began to leave for the coat room like we had been before. At first, we all hesitated but Koike looked over her right shoulder impatiently and we followed in tow. And at that, we continued our journey without incident. We headed down the stairs to the dorm area, turned left, rounded two right corners, and approached the coat room. It was then, and only then, that we stopped once more. This time, because of Machi.

“Since Wakuni and I already have our coats, I’m going to go and get a few things that might help us find her just in case she isn’t there,” Machi claimed succinctly and assertively. “I’ll meet you all at the shed.”

After that, we went our separate ways. Machi speed walked down the hall towards what I could only assume was her room while I opened the door to the coat room for Wakuni and Koike to head inside. Both did of course and as soon as they did, I followed them through and let the door close behind me.

“Now, Koike,” Wakuni began as he scanned the area. And for good reason. Despite Koike claiming to have been assaulted here, everything seemed to be in place save for one locker that happened to have a coat arm that I recognized to be Koike’s hanging out of it. “Are you able to change?”

“Yeah,” Koike nodded as she looked at her locker and then looked away. “My memory is all starting to come back to me. This- situation has a way of waking someone up pretty quickly.”

And so, Koike went directly for her coat and I pulled out my ElectroID. Mostly to swipe it through the scanner but on my way, I also raised it and took a picture of Koike’s open locker complete with a coat arm hanging from it. And luckily enough, Koike didn’t block the camera. However, I still frowned when I observed the picture.

*(Poor Koike. There’s no sign of a struggle here so she must not have even had a chance to defend herself.)*

Regardless, I sighed about the time that Koike did and pulled out my coat. From there, we both closed out locker doors, Koike pulled out her ElectroID, and we both swiped our way into the changing room. Koike was first, but I followed closely behind. And once that was done, all we had to do was get to changing.

That’s exactly what we did. Koike chose the closest stall but I quickly opened the door to the second closest one, entered it, and closed it behind me. And as soon as it did, I immediately started removing my current clothes and replacing them with the coat clothes. After all, we had found two people safely, but the atmosphere was frantic, my pulse was still elevated, and I knew that we needed to find Saeki as soon as possible. For a brief moment, somewhere in the back of my mind, a thought came to me about how likely it was that Saeki was dead since everyone else was at the lodge and so, whoever ambushed Koike finished their task. But I pushed the thought aside.

*(I just hope she’s still alive.)*

Regardless, I finished relatively quickly, opened the door, stepped out, and closed it behind me. From there, I headed to the door that led to the coat room, pushed it, and stepped outside to greet both Koike and Wakuni once more. Both crossed their arms and stared at me as I put everything else away in my locker, but nobody said anything.

From there, we just simply opened the door, stepped out and retraced our steps. We rounded the now left corners, turned right, and went up the stairs. But when we did this time, we made our way to the right and headed to the front room area instead of the back hallway. It all happened quietly and methodically but anyone could tell that an aura of dread loomed over us as we prepared for what was to come. But in spite of that, we only stopped for a moment to raise our hoods and put on our goggles before heading outside.

When we did, we were greeted by a chill that sank to our bones as well as the whistling wind and the light but fast falling snow. I slowed down and covered my arms reflexively, but like the others, I continued the march towards where we thought Saeki was nonetheless. If anything, Koike’s pace even picked up as she marched on through the snow.

Fortunately enough, it was a fairly simple route to get to where Koike wanted to go because there were two tracks in the snow headed towards what Koike seemed to believe was the destination. However, I didn’t bother to take a picture of the snow. After all, Saeki obviously left of the footprints and since Machi probably went ahead of us, then it stood to reason that she left the other ones.

Regardless, the trip was short and quiet, but felt like forever as each passing second went by until finally, we came u on our destination. Like the shed that Naya, Eto, and I once explored, this one had a grey brick exterior along with a traditional black hip roof and a faded red door on the front. Yet like Saeki claimed when she first explored the area, the shed lacked any windows whatsoever and bore a grey metal segmented garage door that covered what seemed like the majority of the wall on the right side. And finally, numerous treds seemed to go from it and head down the mountain.

I reached out and grabbed the handle on the door. And to my surprise, it opened without fuss and swung inwards to reveal what was inside. Inside was what appeared to be a dimly lit garage complete with a dark grey metal floor that was peppered in snow and contained two yellow lines that marked off two rectangular areas, slightly lighter grey metal walls that offered little to no insulation from the cold, and a black roof that contained two dim LED lights that hung down, swung back and forth ever so slightly, and gave the ever so faint hum.

Aside from there, the left wall contained a light grey four legged workbench, a light grey four-legged chair, a closed yellow book with a black trim, and a giant faded red metal toolbox with a black handle on it. It was closed, but It looked large enough to contain anything necessary to fix the mobiles in the shed. Furthermore, on the far wall was a door close to the wall on the left though it contained a half-white and half-black card reader on it, a red switch near the garage door on the right side, and two mountain snowmobiles in the center. One had a vivid red hull, and the other had a dark blue hull. But they both had black seats with just enough room for two people to squeeze on and black handlebars with what looked like switches on them.

We wasted no time stepping into the garage. And when we did, we saw Machi Satu waited for us by the switch with her arms crossed and a black backpack strapped to her back that looked overstuffed judging by its size.

“Well, it took you all long enough,” Machi commented before uncrossing her arms. “I don’t know what situation Saeki is in but I didn’t find Saeki anywhere around here so I assume this place was only the point where you two were going to meet each other.”

My heart only sunk when Koike nodded and spoke up. “Saeki said she went out this morning and found a really neat place that she wanted to show me. She told me the directions. Uh, are you sure she isn’t here? Like maybe behind the door over there?”

“That door is locked Koike,” Machi said as she shook her head and practically slammed the switch that opened the garage door with her left hand and caused the garage door motor to roar to life. “No matter though. Koike, if you want to ride with me, I think I figured out how to work the mobile. Wakuni, Nishi, there’s an instruction manual on the desk. I suggest one of you skim through it.”

As soon as she finished speaking, she climbed onto the front of the red snowmobile, revved the engine, and beckoned for Koike to comply. When she did and followed her, I winced. Though to Machi’s credit, she looked over her right shoulder to make sure that Koike had a firm grip on her. And luckily, she did.

Wakuni wasted no time following in her footsteps. Though instead of heading over to the book on the workbench, he simply swung his left leg over the seat and immediately started to rev the engine as well. As a result, the hum of both machined echoed through the garage.

“Hold on,” I shouted over the roar of the engines as I took a nervous glance over to the manual. “Wakuni, aren’t you going to read the manual?”

“No Nishi, I already know how to use this thing. See, occasionally my father would take my brother and I on hunting trips. I’ve just so happened to have used a few snowmobiles very similar to this one on a few of them.” Wakuni shouted back. “Rest assured Nishi, you can trust me to drive this thing.”

To be honest, in spite of everything, including the tension that mounted in the air and the thoughts of Saeki’s probable death, I hesitated. But, I knew that I needed to for Saeki. So, I hopped on the back of the surprisingly warm seat, wrapped my arms tightly around Wakuni’s waist, and sighed.

*(You’d better be alive Saeki.)*

After that, took off into the snow. Machi must have had a garage switch on her snowmobile, because when she hit something, I heard the garage door begin to close behind us. Yet, I didn’t look back. Instead, I only looked forward as our two mobiles picked up to what felt like breakneck pace against the oncoming wind.

I had what would have been a white knuckled grip had I had something to grab onto and occasionally, Wakuni shifted his position with what I could only guess was discomfort. But otherwise, the trip was largely uneventful. For what I could only guess was ten minutes, we both followed the trends in the snow under Koike’s guidance. The entire time, we saw nothing but the smooth snow stretched across the horizon as we made our way down the mountain. But after a while, two things came into view.

First, I saw a patch of rocks much like the ones at the summit of the mountain. However, these were much larger, much smoother, and connected in some areas to create walls of light grey rock and snow. However, the rocks didn’t completely block my view and when I looked beyond them, I noticed that the ground more or less dropped off. And second, I noticed that the treds that once went in the same direction began to split off like a fork in the road and I made a mental note to myself when I did.

*(Once we find Saeki, I need to ask Wakuni to take me down the other path.)*

Regardless, we followed the path to the right and made our way through a pass between two rocks. From there, I saw a place that I immediately assumed was the point where Koike and Saeki were going to meet. Our path curved around the rock to our right and went along a ridge that curved left around an ice covered lake below and slowly declined to the area of the lake. A few things seemed out of place. For example, there were two holes in the ice that covered the lake with one near the middle of the ridge and the other on the opposite side of the lake. But otherwise, there didn’t seem to be too much out of place. In fact, the view even put a smile on my face.

That smile dropped however when we took the bend, followed it down to the bottom, and began to slow. Among other things, I noticed a rock sticking out on the other side of the lake stuck out like a tooth that went up to my head. That wasn’t a problem in of itself of course, but there were other things that made my pulse pick up. First, the trail ended here at the lake and there were blood splattered patches on the ground. Second, I noticed the same type of string used to bind Koike only it was blood stained, an electrical box, a serrated knife that was thickly coated in blood, jumper cables, and Saeki’s coat, which notably did not have blood on it, on the ground near the rock. Third, the rock had light grey rings around it near where my ankles and waist were as well as more blood splatters. And finally, there seemed to be two footsteps that headed for the whole next to the shore in the lake.

Suffice to say, we wasted no time stopping our vehicles just short of where the site was. Furthermore, as soon as the noise of the engines died we all hopped off and sprinted in the direction of the evidence. Namely, we rushed towards the edge of the lake where the tracks stopped. And while I could not speak for the others, I knew that my heart was pounding like an anvil in anticipation for what was to come. I didn;t want to believe it of course, but in the back of my mind, I knew it.

Unfortunately, my prediction did not prove to be wrong. As the four of us gazed down into the icy waters and what was beneath the surface, I felt a cold and empty sickness that pieced me to the core. Once more, the world felt surreal as I fixed my gaze on the entrancing scene. I was right, but what I saw far exceeded my expectations. In fact, it exceeded my expectations to a nauseating degree.

Senji was still alive when I found him, and we managed to save Koike before she got hurt, but our luck ran out with Saeki Masu. Because we found her underneath the water. Her mouth was agape and she stared up back at me directly in the eyes, or at least she did with her left eye. Her right eyelid was wide open as well but nothing was behind it but a bloodied socket. Furthermore, her coat was missing and her top appeared to be stripped down to her shirt save for her scarf which seemed to be wrapped somewhat too tight around her neck for comfort and my silver watch which hung around her neck and floated towards the surface but bore a web of cracks on it and had its hands stuck at the hour of 1:00pm. And overall, it looked like Saeki died screaming.

But that wasn’t the worst of it. Both of Saeki’s hands appeared to be missing their fingers with nothing but frozen over stubs in their place. Judging by her clothes and the blood on them, various lacerations were inflicted all over her front torso, her arms, and her legs. In fact, I winced when I noticed two particularly bloody spots over both of her sciatic nerves. Her entire body was starting to ice. The right side of her face appeared to be bruised all the wall from her check to her forehead. And finally, I noticed that her sleeves were rolled up and there were burns on her wrists. Probably electrical burns based on the jumper cables I found earlier.

And to top it all off, both of her hands were bound behind her back, her legs were bound tightly together, and they were both tied down to a series of ball weights like the ones that I saw in the storage room yesterday by a thin black wire that I could only assume cut badly into Saeki’s wrists.

Of course, we all reacted when we saw her. Wakuni clenched both of his fists and began to shake with what I could only guess was anger, Koike fell to her knees and buried her face in both of her hands, Machi crossed her arms and closed her eyes, and I just looked away from the ghastly sight. I’m not sure how long that went on for, but it must not have been long. Because soon after, an all too familiar announcement rang.

Ding dong, bing bong.

“Attention everyone, a body has been discovered!” Monokuma rang out without pity or remorse. “Since most of you won’t be able to get to the scene of the crime and since I’m such a nice guy, I’m going to go ahead and explain it to ya! Saeki Masu was found dead as a doornail at the lake! Anyways, I’ll be sending you all Monokuma files shortly! So keep your wits about you! You’ve got a class trial to prepare for! Monokuma out!”

I pried my eyes away from Saeki’s corpse and in the direction of where I heard the announcement. I had so many questions to ask like who would want to kill Saeki Masu? Who would torture her, stab Senji, and abduct Koike? And was this related to the motive? As all those questions swam in my mind, I knew that there was only one thing that I truly could be sure of. One inevitable but unpleasant truth.

*(It's time to begin another fight for our lives. It's time to begin another investigation)*

## Trivia

* The culprit to this case follows two patterns that the previous ones did. If you know what they are, the case should be easy. If not, then it’s meant to be the hardest standard case.
* Quite a few things changed in the creation of this chapter. The events that happened were all the same but the sequence of events were completely different.
* For example, Nishi was supposed to find Koike first but wound up finding Senji first instead.
* Originally, this chapter’s murder case was going to involve the culprit having amnesia and not realizing that he was the killer. But the idea was dismissed as too far fetched. Whether or not the culprit is still male or not is anyone’s guess though.

**Oops! I almost read a spoiler!   *Plot and/or ending details follow.***

* Coincidentally, the creator came up with the idea and dropped it before V3 came out.

 ***Spoilers end here.***