I have a life simulator.

"Actually, this special test was just a very simple math problem, especially for the student who wanted to win the first place award in the grade."

"After excluding the possibility that someone might actually be willing to pay a ridiculously high price of one million personal points to exchange for extra votes with the school, the number of praise votes and criticism votes for each class is a fixed value. Therefore, in this zero-sum game, all you have to do is increase your own score and weaken your opponent's score."

Ayanokouji Kiyotaka nodded in agreement, looking directly into Kitagawa Ryo's eyes and readily admitting it:

"That's true, but in the early stages of preparation for this special exam, Kitagawa, you really created an atmosphere that I had a chance, and at one point I almost believed it myself."

From the moment the rules for this special exam were revealed, Kiyotaka Ayanokouji had already been rapidly calculating the maximum score Kitagawa Ryo might receive. Assuming that all the internal praise votes from the students in Class 1-A were given to him, and all the external praise votes from Class 1-B were also given to him, then without counting criticism votes, Kitagawa Ryo could get a total of 34 plus 39, for a total of 73 praise votes.

Since Class 1B outwardly displayed a completely closed-off attitude and refused to cooperate with any other class in this special exam, Kiyotaka Ayanokouji could only start from within Class A. What the small group in Maezono was trying to do was to use the guise of self-preservation to cast praise votes for each other. This would naturally reduce Kitagawa Ryo's praise vote. If they could also fill in a few more criticism votes for Kitagawa Ryo, his score would drop even further.

In addition, Nan Yunya also holds all thirty-nine criticism votes from Class 1-C. In fact, Ayanokouji Kiyotaka has already prepared to contact the other party privately after everything is ready and ask him to fill in all the criticism votes with Kitagawa Ryo's name. In this way, Kitagawa Ryo's score will drop to the level of twenty-something.

Next, we will deal with all other possible variables one by one.

All the praise and criticism votes from Class D were bought with personal points. This served two purposes: firstly, it made Katsuragi Kohei owe him a favor, and secondly, it indirectly prevented Kitagawa Ryo from buying votes from Class D to boost his own score.

In truth, Kiyotaka Ayanokouji never imagined he could become the top student in his grade, even though he really needed those protection points.

This is still a simple math problem.

Just as Kitagawa Ryo might be burdened with criticism votes from an entire class of Nagumo Masaru, Ayanokouji Kiyotaka, after reading the page about Karuizawa Megumi in Kitagawa Ryo's "Encyclopedia of Love," was very clear about one fact: all the external criticism votes from Class 1-B were very likely to be directed by Karuizawa Megumi to be cast on him.

Increase your own score and weaken your opponent's score.

Both he and Kitagawa Ryo were actually using this simplest yet most direct method.

But as time went on, Kiyotaka Ayanokoji gradually realized that even this most ideal scenario was absolutely impossible to achieve.

The biggest problem first arose with Nanono Masayuki. By the time Ayanokoji Kiyotaka was about to go and make a deal with her, Amasawa Ichika from Class 1-A had already beaten him to it. Before he could even figure out what was going on, he had already learned from her impatient reply that she was prepared to cast all the criticism votes for Maezono from Class 1-A.

In fact, this can be considered a strange twist of fate.

Because he was so focused on avoiding a direct confrontation with Ayanokouji Atsuomi during the cultural festival, using Kitagawa Ryo and Yuki as cover, and only managed a brief meeting with him at the very end, he missed the most direct way to discover Nagumo Masaru's current psychological state. Furthermore, because Ayanokouji Atsuomi casually lied about his identity, Nagumo did not discover Ayanokouji Kiyotaka's possible identity in the same way she did when she discovered that Amasawa Ichika was the biological daughter of some important person.

Then, the problem arose with the contract signed between Katsuragi Kohei and Ryuen Sho of Class 1-D. That simple yet effective word trap directly revitalized the transaction between Class 1-A and Class 1-D, causing the praise votes for Class 1-D that Ayanokoji Kiyotaka thought would never come to Kitagawa Ryotaka to still end up in Class 1-A.

Finally, there's Kitagawa Ryo's counter-strategy against his moves, namely the incident involving Chabashira Sae.

From Ayanokoji Kiyotaka's perspective, in fact, by the last few days before the end of the semester, the ticket types for each first-year class had already been decided.

In Class 1-A, the praise vote goes to Yahiko Totsuka, and the criticism vote goes to Shiho Manabe; in Class 1-B, the praise vote goes to Ryo Kitagawa, and the criticism vote goes to himself; in Class 1-C, the criticism vote goes to Maezono; and in Class 1-D, the praise vote goes to Ryo Kitagawa, and the criticism vote goes to Yahiko Totsuka.

Among all the neat and orderly votes, only the votes praising their class, Class C of the first year, were in complete disarray.

Katsuragi Kohei and his clique voted for Ryuen because of their contract with Ryuen. However, there were still nearly thirty students left, and Katsuragi Kohei couldn't expose his deal with Ryuen Sho regarding Totsuka Yahiko. Therefore, he could only let the students of Class C vote for themselves, and all these votes became scattered votes controlled by the students of Class C.

Kitagawa Ryo collected these loose tickets in just two moves.

Firstly, it was Chabashira Sae's assistance that confirmed that the one-on-one conversations with Class C students that Ayanokoji Kiyotaka had previously suspected were indeed instigated by Kitagawa Ryo.

In conversations with some of the girls in Class C, Chabashira Sae once again plays the victim, falsely claiming that Kitagawa Ryo threatened her to collude during the investigation. That is, if Chabashira Sae does not accept his deal, he will take the opportunity to tell the school that Chabashira Sae, as the class teacher, has indeed engaged in inappropriate and misleading behavior towards him that is not in line with the role of a teacher.

As we all know, when it comes to serious social issues like teacher-student relationships, the public will definitely hold the teacher accountable more severely. After all, it can all boil down to saying, "It's one thing for the child to be immature, but you, an adult, are also immature?" In the case of the whistleblower who is also from Class C and has a bad relationship with the person involved, Kitagawa Ryo, and there is no evidence of collusion to slander the teacher, Chabashira Sae will naturally find herself in a situation where she cannot defend herself, and she may even be dismissed directly.

It was precisely because of this that Chabashira Sae had no choice but to accept Kitagawa Ryo's request again. He would stand up and prove his innocence in their relationship, but the price was that Chabashira Sae needed to get at least ten praise votes for him in the class.

Aside from Kitagawa Ryo's reputation in Class C being negatively impacted once again, this rhetoric was undoubtedly quite successful. Just like during the cultural festival, students tend to subconsciously trust what their homeroom teacher says, especially since the logic behind it was quite sound.

After tricking the girls out of their praise votes through Chabashira Sae, Kitagawa Ryo once again set his sights on the boys in Class C.

"By the way, in that investment and financial management class this morning, someone suddenly placed a bet of three million personal points under your name, betting that you would definitely fall to the bottom three in the grade. Was that something you placed yourself, Kitagawa?"

In response to Ayanokoji Kiyotaka's question, Kitagawa Ryo simply smiled and nodded slightly.

"It's just a transfer from one hand to the other, but I should be able to get a few praise votes from your Class C. After all, after I placed my bet, quite a few people immediately followed my lead and placed the opposite bet. I bet some of them are from Class C."

"Perhaps. Just like you said, it's a scheme where you pass money from one hand to the other. If you can get one card, it's a sure thing. After all, if you buy it from the school, it's worth a million personal points."

Kiyotaka Ayanokouji simply nodded in agreement. He had initially considered using this betting game to target Ryo Kitagawa, but he immediately abandoned the idea. Even if he were to throw in personal points to manipulate public opinion, the funds he had would not be as substantial as those of Ryo Kitagawa.

"I have to say, you really won this time. By the time the results are announced tomorrow, you should have almost a hundred points."

"……No."

Kitagawa Ryo simply shook his head, then turned to Ayanokoji Kiyotaka, smiling as he pointed out his biggest mistake in this special exam:

"You're always too rational, so after deducing all my plans and calculating that you can't surpass me in scores no matter what, you naturally and quickly gave up, right?"

"But actually, the praise votes from Class B and Class D were never all for me, as you might think. I had them fill in the names of every student in Class A."

After hearing Kitagawa Ryo's statement, Ayanokoji Kiyotaka's pupils subconsciously contracted slightly in surprise:

"what?"

As for Kiyotaka Ayanokoji, he still finds it hard to understand Kitagawa Ryo's seemingly unnecessary behavior. After all, rationally speaking, it's like giving up dozens of praise votes that were within easy reach, and it's not impossible that they might even lose first place because of these differences.

"Don't be so surprised. This can be considered a kind of feigned indifference to people's hearts. However, it was Fanbo who took the initiative instead of me."

In his and Ichinose Honami's plan, it would be Honami's turn to appear and reveal his "good intentions" at this point, so that most of the students in the class would be willing to vote for him.

As he spoke, Kitagawa Ryo leaned back comfortably against the back of the bench, gazing absently at the setting sun gradually sinking on the horizon. Ayanokoji Kiyotaka also appeared to be deep in thought.

After today's debriefing with Kitagawa Ryo, he gradually realized a crucial problem he lacked in order to defeat his opponent: interpersonal relationships.

Karuizawa Kei would make Class 1-B a potential vote bank for Kitagawa Ryo, Ryuen Sho from Class 1-D would be willing to join forces with him to set up such a scheme against Class C, and Ichinose Honami from Class 1-A would run around for the other party's plan, acting out this perfect victim drama with Kitagawa Ryo. All of this is because of their relationship with Kitagawa Ryo.

This was undoubtedly a contest of communication and intelligence, but apart from Class A, Kiyotaka Ayanokouji had no chance to extend his reach into other classes, and even his control over his own class was a mess. Even with the personal points he got from the third-year students, the effect was still somewhat mediocre.

But that doesn't matter. In the white room, he was never the one who could pick up new things and knowledge the fastest, but rather the one who learned the fastest.

There was a long silence between them before Ayanokouji Kiyotaka finally spoke first:

“If we transfer to Class B, we will become direct competitors. In fact, from the perspective of talent alone, I don’t think Class B can compare to Class A. In fact, it is far more mediocre.”

"Indeed, but I might not be able to go if I do."

At this point, Kitagawa Ryo put his arms behind his head, turned his head, and gave Ayanokoji Kiyotaka a wry smile:

"But that's not why I went to Class B."

"Then why?"

"...Are you Kanzaki or Ayanokouji?"

“I did read his notebook.”

"Then you still ask."

"I just wanted to confirm, just like at the end of a chapter, I can only turn the page with satisfaction after I've read it all."

"What kind of ridiculous metaphor is this?"

Kiyotaka Ayanokouji simply smiled but did not reply. Through his conversation with Ryo Kitagawa, he had already found a second target to observe in the other party's list.

Ichinose Honoki.

The fact that the other party was willing to help Kitagawa Ryo implement this class transfer plan suggests that, aside from the extremely slim possibility that she was also kept in the dark by Kitagawa Ryo, it is more likely that Ichinose Honami had already made the corresponding preparations.

She and Kitagawa Ryo will be parachuted into Class 1-B.

how to say.

Thinking of this, even the legendary observer Ayanokouji, who had seen many storms, was unusually eager to get started.

-------------------------------------

The results of the special exam for this class vote were announced as scheduled the following day.

The highest scorer in the grade: Kitagawa Ryo.

Last place: Maezono Chiyo.

Second to last place: Shiho Manabe.

Third from last: Totsuka Yahiko.

According to the rules, all three students were expelled from school.

But compared to another major piece of news, their dropping out of school seemed to go unnoticed.

On the last day of the second semester of the first year, after all the first-year students had finished their final exams, the first instance of using 20 million personal points to transfer students in the history of Tokyo Advanced Educational High School was finally born.

Karuizawa Megumi from Class 1-B spent 20 million personal points.

Kitagawa Ryo, from Class 1A, has officially transferred to Class 1B.

Chapter 375: Did you miss me?

In fact, for the school administration of Tokyo Advanced Educational High School, this was the first time they had seen a student achieve this rule that had never been achieved by a student since the school was founded. They had originally expected that second-year student Nagumo Masayuki would be the first to try this, but they did not expect that a first-year student would be able to accumulate a full 20 million personal points by the end of the second semester of the first year, and not only did he not use them on himself, but he also asked to transfer students from other classes to his class.

Faced with this new situation, which had never been seen before and for which there was no relevant experience, the teacher in charge of the Academic Affairs Office immediately reported the matter to the acting chairman, Tsukishiro Tsuneaki. After all, the school's rule was that "a class transfer could be achieved with 20 million personal points," but whether students from other classes could be transferred was indeed a somewhat ambiguous derivative issue, belonging to the category that could be both justified and rejected.

However, Tsukishiro Tsunehiro himself did not show any negative attitude towards this matter. After inventing the new concept of protection points, the acting chairman was currently researching a new reward item called 'transfer ticket'. Therefore, he readily gave Karuizawa Megumi's proposal the green light, believing that her behavior was in accordance with school rules and approved it.

And so, following a pinned announcement from the school on the forum, after the second semester's final exams, Kitagawa Ryo's name appeared on the roster of Class 1-B, officially leaving Class 1-A and becoming a member of Class 1-B.

Then, more details and inside stories about this class transfer and special exam were revealed and dug up one by one on the forum. The first thing that was successfully proven was Ichinose Honami's statement. Karuizawa Megumi from Class 1-B and Ryuen Sho from Class 1-D publicly revealed the contents of their contracts with Kitagawa Ryo, which proved that Kitagawa Ryo himself did indeed use his own money and his maneuvering to get praise votes from Class 1-B and Class 1-D for all the students in Class 1-A.

It was precisely because of this that Class A of the entire year became the class with the most students who scored positive (i.e., received more praise votes than criticism votes) in this special class voting exam. Most of the students received a reward of 10,000 personal points from the school. However, in the current situation, the sound of these personal points arriving seemed somewhat jarring and ironic.

The script that Honami Ichinose crafted for Ryo Kitagawa was quite perfect. From the perspective of most of the students in Class 1-A, Ryo Kitagawa's action logic in this special exam was to first make normal arrangements and negotiate with other classes, just like in previous special exams. Then, because he noticed the dissatisfaction and activities of Maezono and others in his class, he did not ignore their opinions or simply expose them as the class leader. Instead, he seriously considered the opinions of these marginal students in his class. After understanding their concerns about being mistakenly harmed, he chose to change his initial plan. He used his personal points and the possibility of missing out on the first place award in the grade to make a deal with Classes B and D. He didn't even plan to make this public, letting the students in Class 1-A vote for praise and criticism according to their own ideas.

Sudo Ken and his group are the second-hand insurance prepared by Kitagawa Ryo and Ichinose Honami. His task in this play is to bring up the midterm exam incident from last semester, to make the whole class believe that Kitagawa Ryo is indeed the kind of person who does good deeds anonymously, and to further increase the credibility of this rhetoric.

Finally, it was a natural ending with Class B of the first year.

Just as Karuizawa Kei said, she and Kanzaki Ryuji had been preparing for Kitagawa Ryo's transfer for a long time. Karuizawa Kei was even a little concerned that others might think things were too coincidental. How could Class 1-B just happen to have exactly 20 million yen after receiving Kitagawa Ryo's ticket money? Therefore, she arranged for Hoshinomiya Chie to come forward.

Although it seems like she didn't need to make any arrangements, the moment Kitagawa Ryo transferred to the class, the homeroom teacher of Class 1-B couldn't wait to share the message she had been editing for a long time on the forum. She enthusiastically welcomed Kitagawa Ryo to the warm family of Class 1-B, and her smug attitude easily made people think that this guy must have sponsored a lot of personal points in this matter.

Of course, although most students were fooled by the transfer strategy wrapped in this special exam, the students of Class A, who could not accept the fact that Kitagawa Ryo had left, still flocked to try to salvage something, and all kinds of phone calls and text messages flooded Kitagawa Ryo's phone almost immediately.

Fortunately, on the first day after the class transfer, which was the second day after the start of winter break, Kitagawa Ryo successfully left Tokyo Advanced Educational High School under the pretext of the drama club going out to participate in a competition, thus avoiding the first wave of the storm.

But even so, there are always some people who can't escape it.

-------------------------------------

As usual, boys and girls left the school in separate cars. Unlike Kitagawa Ryo, who had become close friends with supervising teacher Simakendo on one car, the atmosphere on the other girls' car was tense and subtle.

Amazusa Ichika is currently staring intently at Karuizawa Kei, who is in turn exchanging glances with Ichinose Honami without giving an inch. Fortunately, Sakura Airi, who is caught in the middle and has a good relationship with all of them, is trying her best to use her skills as a former idol to keep the atmosphere lively and smooth things over. Otherwise, it feels like the three of them might start pulling each other's hair in the car at any moment.

Still seemingly resentful and annoyed that she was distracted by Sakayanagi Arisu and Kitagawa Ryo during the special exam and failed to notice the class transfer in time, Amasawa Ichika clearly showed her dissatisfaction with Karuizawa Megumi and Ichinose Honami after leaving school. She wasn't stupid; after reviewing the events briefly, she quickly realized that the latter, and even Sakayanagi Arisu, had also played a role in pushing things along.

"It's just a class transfer, is there any need to get so worked up?"

Perhaps feeling a little bothered by Amazawa Ichika's direct gaze, even Karuizawa Megumi, who was still wondering when Ichinose Honami would also parachute into their class, had no choice but to turn her head and say something to Amazawa Ichika with a hint of helplessness.

"If you think it's unnecessary, then Karuizawa-san doesn't need to transfer Ryo over there, does she?"

"Hmm, that makes sense. But since Amasawa isn't satisfied with my answer, why not try turning Ryo back? Or ask Ichinose next to you; she just happens to have 20 million points."

After easily drawing Amazusa Ichika's attention back to Ichinose Honami, Karuizawa Megumi leaned over and whispered a few words to Sakura Airi, who was sitting next to her.

Because she already knew from Karuizawa Kei about Kitagawa Ryo's desire to transfer to her class during the sports festival, Sakura Airi wasn't surprised when it actually happened. After all, Karuizawa Kei's relationship with her was even better than Shiina Hiyori's. Although she was indeed a little disappointed that her friend's wish had come true, she was mostly happy for Karuizawa Kei.

Seeing that Amasawa Ichika's anger had been ignited by Karuizawa Megumi and was now spreading to her side, Ichinose Honami decided not to hide anything any longer and simply stated her intentions:

"I will also be transferring to Class B later."

Although she really wanted to join in with "Me too," Tianze Yixia definitely couldn't come up with 20 million personal points right now. Kitagawa Ryo's transfer was already decided, so she could only lean back somewhat aggrievedly, looking quite miserable.

As the school vehicle left the artificial island where the Tokyo Advanced Educational Junior High School campus is located and entered downtown Tokyo, the lively festive atmosphere of the streets quickly seeped in through the transparent car windows.

Today is Christmas Eve, December 24th, and tomorrow is Christmas Day, December 25th.

This year's snow season has also coincided perfectly with the timing. Starting last night, Tokyo welcomed its first snowfall of the winter. Although the amount of snowfall was not enough to accumulate significantly overnight, the clearly visible snowflakes falling from the sky still added a more dreamy atmosphere to the upcoming holidays and the end of the year.

The windows of various shops along the street displayed the words "Merry Christmas" in English. Shop assistants dressed in Christmas costumes greeted customers at the door. Kitagawa Ryo, who was somewhat engrossed in watching, subconsciously reached out and rolled down the car window a few times. A few snowflakes and a gust of cold wind hit him, making him feel refreshed and unconsciously raise the corners of his mouth.

For him now, everything at Tokyo Advanced Educational High School, including the class transfer, is irrelevant.

Thinking about it carefully, it seems that he hasn't seen his sister for quite a long time. After all, she has been receiving treatment abroad for several years, and he himself has enrolled in Tokyo Advanced Educational High School, making it quite inconvenient to make video calls on weekdays.

Actually, after realizing that the white cat that had been by his side for a very long time was also Hotaru, Kitagawa Ryo went through a period of confusion, but he quickly recovered.

In his view, both the cat and the person were his sisters. The former was his sister who died in his previous life, while the latter was his sister whose fate he changed, who regained her health, and started a new future. There was no difference between them, and he had no preference for either of them. They were both his most important family members.

Speaking of which, before leaving school today, Kitagawa Ryo celebrated his cat's birthday in advance and also asked him with great curiosity about his cat's opinion on the other Hotaru who exists in reality.

The answer he received was quite subtle, because the last words his cat typed on the computer keyboard were a rather inexplicable line: "The self with a greater chance of fulfilling its wish." After typing this line, the cat quickly slipped back to its little nest, only to emerge again and wave its cat fists at him as Kitagawa Ryo packed his bags and left the room.

As they leisurely reminisced about Ying and her, about half an hour later, the car finally arrived at the hotel where they were going to stay. The supervising teacher, Sima Kedian, got out of the car first and prepared to help the drama club students carry their luggage upstairs.

But in the blink of an eye, Kitagawa Ryo, who had just been standing next to him, had vanished. Sima Kedian frowned and quickly scanned his surroundings. Soon, he spotted Kitagawa Ryo at the hotel reception desk. The man seemed to be communicating with the staff there, and then took the phone that was handed to him, as if he was making a call to someone.

This is absolutely forbidden under the rules of Tokyo Advanced Educational High School. Even students who go out to compete must minimize or avoid all contact with the outside world under the supervision of accompanying teachers.