Shocking Twist

What?”

“Well, I got dragged here with no real explanation,” I replied.

Instead of clicking her tongue at me, she showed her ill humor by

vigorously snapping her paperback shut. She glared at me as if she were

looking at an insect, gave a sigh of resignation, and spoke.

“Okay. Then let’s play a game.”

“A game?”

“Yes. A game to guess what club this is. Okay, so what club is this?”

Playing a game alone with a girl…

Now this was coming off as some kind of kinky setup, but Yukinoshita

radiated no aura of temptation. She was more like a honed knife, sharp

enough that if you lost, it might cost you your life. Where did that rom-com

atmosphere go? This is a gambling apocalypse!

The force emanating from her bested me, and I broke into a cold sweat,

casting my eyes around the classroom for clues. “There’re no other club

members?”

“No.”

Could you still have a club without any members? I had serious doubts

about that.

Honestly, there were no hints. No, wait. If you were to look at it from

another angle, there were only hints. I’m not bragging or anything, but having

been almost entirely devoid of friends since I was little, I’m pretty damn

good at games you can play on your own.

I’ve got a fair amount of confidence in my skill with puzzle books,

riddles, and things of that nature. I think I could win the All-Japan High

School Quiz Championship. Well, okay—I couldn’t gather enough members

for a team, so I couldn’t go to the event…but still.

There were a number of clues I’d managed to discern already. Assembling

my hypothesis based on that, the answer should have presented itself.

“A literature club?”

“Hmm? How did you come to that?” Yukinoshita replied with mild

interest

“It wouldn’t need a specialized room or any kind of equipment, and even

with only a few members, the club wouldn’t be disbanded. In other words,

it’s a club that doesn’t need financial support. Furthermore, you were reading

a book. You were showing me the answer all along.”

Perfect deduction, if I do say so myself. Even without some bespectacled

elementary school student to tell me, “Huh? Something’s not right!” I could

figure out this sort of thing before breakfast.

Even Princess Yukino seemed impressed as she made a quiet mm-hmm

noise. “Wrong.” Her laughter was brief and derisive. Ooh, that kind of got on

my nerves!

Who’d called her a paragon of good conduct, a flawless

Superhuman? More like Demon Superhuman.

“Then what is it?” I asked, my voice tinged with irritation.

But Yukinoshita, seemingly unperturbed, announced that the game would

continue.

“I’ll give you the biggest hint. Me being here, doing this, is a club

activity.”

So she’d finally given me a hint. But that didn’t give me any answers. In

the end, it only led me to back to my same conclusion—that this was an arts

and literature club.

No, wait. Wait, wait, calm down. Stay cool. Stay cool, Hachiman

Hikigaya.

She’d said, There are no club members aside from myself.

But the club still existed.

In other words, that had to mean that there were ghost members, right?

And so the punch line was that the ghost members were actual ghosts. And in

the end, it would be a setup for a rom-com between me and a beautiful ghost

girl.

“An occult research society!”

“I said it was a club.”

“A-an occult research club!”

“Wrong. Haaa…ghosts? What nonsense. There’s no such thing.” The way

she said it wasn’t even slightly cute. Not like Th-there’s really no such thing

as ghosts! I-I’m not saying that just because I’m scared, okay! She

considered me with eyes that held me in the deepest and most sincere

contempt. Eyes that said, Go to hell, moron.

“I give in. I have no idea.” How could I figure out something like this?

Give me something easier! “Why’s a raven screwing around with a writing

desk?” Anyway, that’s not trivia; that’s a riddle.

“Hikigaya. How many years has it been since you last talked to a girl?”

The question came completely out of the blue, destroying my train of

thought.

She’s so rude.

I’m pretty confident in my memory. I remember the minute details of

conversations that anyone would forget. So much so that girls in my class

have treated me like a stalker. According to my superior hippocampus, the

last time I’d talked to a girl had been in June, two years earlier.

Girl: It’s seriously hot right now, huh?

Me: More like humid, eh?

Girl: Huh? Oh…yeah, sure, I guess

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