Chapter 263: The Murderer Is Among Us!
Translator: imperfectluck Editor: vb24
Seiji entered the Genhana High School library for the first time today. He was accompanied by Chiaki, Mika, and Kaho. They were there for the drama club’s study group.
When he arrived, he saw that several drama club members had already arrived.
Chiaki greeted them and helped make the introductions.
Seiji noticed a handsome boy in drama club with a head of curly light blue hair, a pale face, and a haggard expression.
Seiji took a closer look and confirmed that this boy was the person who was playing the part of the "Ice Prince" during the drama club’s performance for the school festival.
At that time, this person had been quite spirited, and he acted quite convincingly. While he wasn’t at Chiaki’s level, he was pretty good for a high school student.
But now he was like this... what could be the matter?
Just as he was thinking this, Chiaki introduced him as "Hiroshi Fuuma."
"Fuuma-san, you don’t seem so well—are you feeling ill?" Chiaki also noticed his strange condition; she seemed slightly worried about him.
"I’m fine... I just didn’t sleep well last night; there's no need to worry," Hiroshi Fuuma replied with a weak smile.
Was it just "not sleeping well?" Seiji couldn’t believe this.
Chiaki didn’t believe it either, but seeing as he obviously didn’t want to talk about it, she didn’t pry.
After the introductions, everyone exchanged greetings and sat down.
After a while, all the drama club members arrived, including the vice club president Shiina Shiho.
Under "Demon Face" Shiina’s constant pressure, all the club members studied obediently and asked each other questions that they couldn’t understand.
The only person who wasn’t studying was Seiji.
He was continuing to write his novel. In order to not affect the atmosphere of serious studying, he arranged several textbooks around himself and pretended to learn.
Half an hour passed.
While Seiji was engrossed in the middle of his storyline, he suddenly heard a *thud.*
"Fuuma-san!" someone shouted out in surprise.
When Seiji went to go take a look at the commotion, he saw Hiroshi Fuuma collapsed on the ground.
Shiina walked next to Hiroshi and crouched next to him to check his condition. Everyone else watched with worried expressions.
"Fuuma-san has fainted... someone needs to take him to the infirmary." Shiina looked concerned.
"Allow me," Seiji offered.
As the tallest and strongest boy present, it was only natural for him to take this task.
With Shiina and Chiaki’s assistance, he carried Hiroshi on his back and hurriedly walked towards the infirmary, followed by the two girls.
...
"He’s probably overly fatigued," Kaede said after assessing Hiroshi
"Overly fatigued?"
"Yep, his body was tired and he pushed himself to his limit, which led to him fainting," Kaede explained. "It isn't too serious; he’ll wake up naturally after resting for a while."
Vice club president Shiina heaved a sigh of relief upon hearing her club member would be alright.
Chiaki also relaxed slightly.
"Why was Fuuma-san overly fatigued?" Seiji was rather curious.
"I don’t know... When I saw him yesterday, he seemed unwell, but he was fine last week," Chiaki murmured. She then looked at Shiina to see if she had any clue. "Vice president, any ideas?"
Shiina shook her head. "I’ll stay here and watch over Fuuma-san. You guys should go back and keep studying."
She glanced at her club member resting on the bed before turning to Seiji. "Harano-san, thanks for carrying him here."
"No problem, Shiho-senpai."
Seiji and Chiaki left the infirmary, returned to the library, and told the other people about Hiroshi Fuuma’s condition.
Everyone relaxed after hearing it was only fatigue.
And of course, everyone was just as curious as Seiji as to why Hiroshi would suddenly collapse from fatigue.
"Did Fuuma-san go out and secretly get a very difficult part-time job?"
"If so, what job would be so tiring? And why would he need to go work?"
"Did something happen in his family?"
"It doesn’t seem like it."
The club members were all gossiping.
If "Demon Face" Shiina was still here, then she would definitely suppress all this idle chatter, but she was still in the infirmary accompanying Hiroshi.
"Hmph... It would appear that I’m the only one who knows the truth," said a short, red-haired boy assuming a pretentious pose.
Everyone looked in his direction.
Seiji recognized his voice as the actor who was doing the narration for the drama club’s school festival play.
"Nakajima-san, what do you know?" a person asked.
"Yep, I’ve already seen the mysterious death of Fuuma-san," Nakajima said smugly.
"Don’t just go off killing people; he’s not dead yet!" another person exclaimed.
"Now," Nakajima announced with a flourish, "allow me to unveil the mystery of the locked-room puzzle."
"What locked room?"
"The murderer who killed Fuuma-san is actually among us!"
"The hell with murderer! Stop pretending to be some famous detective!!"
Yep, the drama club members really knew how to have fun.
Seiji chuckled at this scene. After playacting for a bit and getting everyone’s attention, Nakajima finally told the study group the "truth."
"Last week, Fuuma-san got a girlfriend from another school."
"A girlfriend?"
"From another school?"
"Yep, I found out by eavesdropping on his conversation with Zawai-san."
"You were eavesdropping!?"
"And last weekend, I coincidentally spotted Fuuma-san behaving intimately together with a beautiful girl on the street, so I followed them for a bit."
"You even stalked them!?"
"That girl was incredibly proactive, and Fuuma-san was the one on the receiving end. I only followed them for a little while before I saw them kissing. Unfortunately, I didn’t have my cell phone at the time, so I was unable to get a picture."
"You even wanted to secretly take their picture!? You’re too much!"
"With how proactive that girl was being in the relationship, Fuuma-san would definitely fall for her, so that’s why... he was overly fatigued!" the red-haired boy named Nakajima said with adamant conviction.
Everyone was rendered speechless.
"So after all this time you were just telling a raunchy joke on us!!" several male members commented in unison.
"No, this is the truth! The dark, cruel truth." Nakajima had a serious expression and even acted as if he were pained. "For me, who’s still single, it’s... unbearably heavy."
Everyone was rendered speechless again.
"Cough cough." Chiaki interrupted the boys. "Everyone, let’s stop here, and continue learning," she said calmly.
Everyone silently obeyed and went back to studying seriously, without continuing that topic.
...
Seiji received a call from Editor Yoshizawa.
"Your short story received excellent feedback, and in the readers’ votes of the most popular stories, you’re ranked number six!"
"Number six..."
"For a brand-new author’s short story to rank so high is already astonishing," the editor said solemnly. "Such a high ranking is sufficient enough for it to be modified into a full-length series and be published by itself."
Published by itself! Seiji raised his brows at this.
"Are you interested in this? Writing I’ll Die if I Don’t Become Handsome as a full-length story and publishing it?"
"This is an attractive proposal." Seiji mulled it over as he spoke. "But there’s another book I want to publish more: the one I’m currently writing. I believe that it’s even better than Become Handsome ! Although I’m not finished yet, I’m almost there. Why don't I show you what I have written already, for you to review? I believe that you’ll share my opinion about it after you've read it!"
Saki Yoshizawa remained quiet for a few moments. "If that’s what you say, then I’ll take a look... What’s the name of your next novel?"