C42

Chapter 42: Questionnaire Results

Outside the window, low-hanging clouds stretched across the sky from early morning, their color growing steadily darker as time passed, creating an atmosphere that looked as though it could start raining at any moment.

Inside the classroom, several students were still working on their questionnaires.

Amidst the quiet rhythm of pencils scratching across paper, some students would occasionally stop to think deeply. A few reviewed what they had written and added several more lines.

Before long, the number of students finishing gradually increased, and turned-over sheets began to pile up on tobacco-stained desks—or rather, neatly across the tops of their desks.

Noticing this, Yamaoka quietly stood up, glanced across the entire classroom, and slowly made his way between the desks. Stopping whenever he spotted an inverted paper to collect it one by one, he continued walking through the room for a while.

The sound of pencils being put down grew more frequent, and in sync with it, the turned-over papers vanished from the tops of the desks.

Soon, picking up the very last sheet, Yamaoka squared the collected papers and returned to the teacher's podium.

"All right, that's it. Thank you everyone for your cooperation."

Right after that, the chime signaling the end of the first period echoed through the classroom, but the students remained seated, moving not an inch as they waited for the fading reverberation to quiet away.

Holding the collected questionnaires, Yamaoka left the classroom alongside the grade head.

◇

Yamaoka and the grade head walked side by side down the corridor. Having reached recess, the school building was filled with the overlap of voices and laughter leaking from classrooms and footsteps crossing the hallway, carrying a gentle air quite unlike that of class time.

The two advanced down the hall without exchanging words, the presence of people gradually fading as they passed several classrooms. Coming right up to the student guidance room at the far end of the corridor, Yamaoka gave a light knock.

"Come in."

A voice replied from within.

When Yamaoka opened the door, Hirano-sensei, the student guidance director overseeing this incident, was waiting for them.

◇

Yamaoka placed the questionnaires he had been holding onto the desk.

Next to them lay the materials the three of them had organized the previous day—compiled extracts from the video reviewed yesterday, capturing the students' appearances in the classroom and overheard voices, summarized as necessary.

As Hirano flipped through the materials, Yamaoka reached for the stack of questionnaires on the desk.

Picking up a single sheet, Yamaoka first dropped his gaze to the name, then smoothly slid his eyes down the responses lined up along the questions.

Matching Yamaoka's movement, Nishikawa picked up a different questionnaire and quietly began reading its contents.

For a while, there were no words between the three of them.

Only the sound of turning paper could be heard.

Reading the students' writings one by one, they cross-referenced them with their hand materials and the facts being verified by the school, jotting down necessary points on the paper in front of them.

After a short while, Yamaoka's hand stopped. His gaze lingered on one particular spot in a response written about last Monday's after-school hours, remaining frozen there for a moment.

What was recorded there was not just the events of that day, but also what had been communicated within the class afterward.

Yamaoka looked away from it, turned his gaze to Hirano, and placed the paper in the center of the desk.

"……This."

Hirano leaned in to check the written contents, and Nishikawa also raised his head from the paper in his hands.

Written there was the instruction that they had been told not to talk about the events of that day outside.

Hirano shifted his gaze to the materials at hand. The documents compiled based on the video verified yesterday organized the scene where the false confession took place, but they did not record what kind of exchange occurred in the classroom afterward.

Because of that, this was a fact the three of them were confirming for the very first time.

"……A gag order, huh."

Hirano muttered quietly.

After that, the three continued to check the questionnaires one by one. In other questionnaires as well, several similar descriptions were found; though the wording differed slightly, the contents described were all consistent.

Regarding the events of that day, they had been told not to talk about it outside the class.

With a frown etched between his brows, Yamaoka lined up several responses on the desk and compared their contents.

It wasn't just how a single student perceived it; multiple students remembered the exact same event.

After reading through the responses to confirm that fact, Yamaoka let out a small breath and looked over the questionnaires lined up on the desk with a gaze slightly different from before.

The three turned their eyes back to the materials at hand.

Combining the events confirmable in the video with what the students wrote by tracing their memories, the three verified what had happened in the classroom that day and began adding newly discovered facts to the documents one by one.

As the verification work proceeded steadily, new facts gradually piled up in the materials.

When Hirano looked through a newly picked-up questionnaire, he stopped his hand once midway. Written there was a response to the effect that the writer had done nothing in particular in the classroom that day.

Finishing that response, Hirano shifted his gaze to the materials on hand.

Confirming the name written on the questionnaire, he traced back over the summary compiled regarding that student.

In the footage confirmed yesterday, that student's figure remained captured as well.

Moreover, at the scene where Tachibana was being showered with words from Kujo and the others, that student was clearly confirmed laughing along with those around them.

Hirano returned his eyes to the questionnaire once more.

The written content versus the video record left in the materials.

That discrepancy was not something that could be brushed off as a mere misperception.

"……This student."

As Hirano pressed his fingertip against the paper and turned his gaze to Yamaoka, Yamaoka dropped his eyes to the response column as well, then checked the corresponding section in the materials.

A silence of about several seconds followed.

In the video, that student could be seen laughing alongside those around them. Furthermore, while uttering some words, they directed a mocking look at Tachibana. Despite all that, the person's own response wrote nothing of the sort; rather, it read as though they had done nothing at all.

Deep wrinkles carved into Yamaoka's brow, and slight tension gripped the fingers holding the paper.

Keeping his eyes lowered to the materials for a while, Yamaoka exhaled without a word. Quiet anger seeped into his expression.

The facts confirmed by the school did not match the answers written by the individual.

Was this just one person, or were there others—the three returned their eyes to the questionnaires in their respective hands and resumed reading.

Yamaoka picked one sheet from the stack piled on the desk.

Dropping his gaze to the name with his usual demeanor, he smoothly slid his eyes down the response column.

However, as he read further, wrinkles gradually gathered between his brows.

His eyes paused once midway, and the speed at which he followed the page slowed slightly from that point on.

Even after finishing reading to the end, Yamaoka did not immediately reach for the next paper.

Staring at the single sheet in his hand, he remained motionless for a while.

Eventually, letting out a small breath and narrowing his eyes as if in disbelief, he still couldn't accept it and returned his gaze to the response once more.

As he reread it, the disbelief faded, replaced by creeping anger.

Noticing this, the other two turned their gazes to Yamaoka's hand, whereupon Yamaoka, without a word, placed the questionnaire he was holding in a position where both could see it.

The two first looked at the name, and then ran their eyes over the contents... After a short while, Hirano let out a small breath, and Nishikawa similarly leaked a sigh, furrowing his brow.

A heavy silence fell among the three.

With his gaze directed at the questionnaire, Yamaoka said nothing for a while. Keeping his eyes fixed on the paper surface without moving them, he stared intently at what was written. Clear anger surfaced on his face.

After that, the three continued reading the questionnaires, checking the remaining responses one by one.

Once they finished looking through the very last sheet, they lined up the respective papers on the desk and cross-referenced the written contents.

As Hirano compared several responses side by side, Yamaoka also lowered his eyes to the papers.

"……It seems everyone remained in the class."

When Yamaoka spoke, Hirano moved his eyes to confirm the responses at hand.

"That's right. It turns out everyone was present at that scene."

Silence fell between the two for a while.

Nishikawa didn't interject either, keeping his eyes dropped on the questionnaires lined up on the desk.

Yamaoka picked up a few of the responses and began looking over sections different from before.

"……There are quite a few students who hesitated about whether to consult someone, it seems."

Hirano nodded.

"It's written here. Thinking it would be better to talk to a teacher, and so on."

Yamaoka did not reply, looking over several responses in order.

Thought about consulting.

Yet, in the end, no one made a move.

Even though there were students who considered talking, nothing was ever communicated to the school.

For a while, there were no words between the three. Silence persisted as each absorbed the contents recorded in the questionnaires, until Hirano finally broke the heavy silence toward the other two.

"……Regardless of the reason, they were right there and must have directly witnessed Tachibana-kun being hurt in that manner in front of everyone. Even so, faced with the fact that he has been absent until Friday, the fact that no one consulted the school is a very grave issue."

Yamaoka nodded silently.

Nishikawa quietly exhaled as he squared the questionnaires in his hands.

Keeping his eyes dropped on the questionnaires lined up on the desk, Hirano thought for a moment.

"……First, this afternoon, let's call in the directly involved students one by one and listen to what they have to say."

Yamaoka nodded quietly.

Hirano nodded as well, continuing to speak.

"After that, once the interviews are finished, we'll report it to the vice principal as well."

Yamaoka dropped his gaze back to the questionnaires.

"As for the class, are we organizing things based on these responses?"

"Right. There's no need to treat everyone the same way."

Answering thus while glancing over several responses, Hirano added, "We'll look at the contents, and if there are students who need verification, we'll talk to them individually at that point."

While Nishikawa squared the papers in his hand, Yamaoka also gathered the remaining materials, reconfirming the workflow: conducting interviews with the directly involved students starting from the afternoon, cross-referencing those contents with the questionnaires, and then reporting to the vice principal.

Hirano picked up the bundle of materials and stood up quietly.

At that moment, a single small raindrop fell against the window glass, followed by a second and a third, and as they increased, rain began to patter down from the clouds that had hung heavily since morning, the sound of it striking the window of the student guidance room growing slightly louder.