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I’ll ignore the drunk groaning on the floor. She might revive like some zombie if we carelessly nudge her, after all. I need to prevent her from joining in our conversation for as long as I can.

“What are your plans from here on?”
“I’m naturally going to university to learn administration and gain other necessary knowledge.”
“I’ll be going to university too. What’s after that will depend on Aya’s efforts.”
“I’ll be training while attending university. I intend to debut whenever I win Mama’s approval.”

All of them going for higher education was pretty much as expected. However, I noticed something weird with Kishita’s answer. Why is she leaving her post-university future dependent on Aya’s efforts? I’m sure Kishita can find good employment after university.

“Kishita, what’s Aya’s relation to your plans?”
“I’m considering the option of becoming Aya’s manager. She already scouted me for it a long while ago.”
“Fufufu, best to secure excellent people as soon as you can, you see.”
“I was planning on recruiting Kaoru as well. I didn’t expect someone else to beat me to the punch.”

To be headhunted by the twelve families, Kishita really is talented. If my path towards being a singer had been paved earlier on, I might have asked for her to be my manager as well. Do I have any dissatisfaction with my current manager? Well, somewhat.

“However, if Aya doesn’t make her debut before we graduate, I intend to find other options.”
“If that happens, why not go to me?”
“It’ll depend on the circumstances. There’s no guarantee that you won’t be as unreasonable as you were in our student council days.”
“How harsh~”

I think that’s a fair answer. If you work directly under the twelve families, your salary and employment are practically secure. However, there’s no telling how demanding that will be. Stress from busy work is understandable, but you might get stress from things completely unrelated to work.

“What I’m mostly worried about is the managerial profession itself. I did some research regarding the job, but I still don’t understand the general gist of it.”
“It’s work that demands adaptability and efficiency, I think. Other than schedule management, physical and mental health care management is probably necessary, too. Also, the ability to take measures to prevent issues.”

Since I think that’s what Ran does. In her case, she lives with Ayaka to monitor her as well. Probably because Ayaka is impossible to manage otherwise. There’s no telling what a rogue will do if you don’t have your eyes on them. EXIST makes for a good example.

“Kotone, do you have an acquaintance who is a manager?”
“Actually, she even has a manager assigned to her. Also, you’re scheduled to debut soon, right?”
“Why do you know?”
“There’s no way that Mama would be that enthusiastic for only this event. I could tell.”

It’s something anyone can guess, huh. If advertising was the goal, then since it was basically a guerrilla live broadcast by radio, you can call it a success. Which I’m personally not happy about. After all, I was being used.

“Regarding the debut, I won’t answer. As for the other one, I have two acquaintances who are managers.”
“Is it someone among the people in the New Year incident?”
“Again, why do you know?”
“Well, since actress Ayaka was there, it’s safe to assume that her manager would have been around.”

I don’t remember ever introducing Ran to Hadzuki. Still, it’s true that she was there, and we even bumped into her. I didn’t tell him who was playing what role either. Because if I ever give Hadzuki that kind of information, he might try to gain their cooperation for stuff.

“Still, I can introduce you to them. Both of them are relatively decent people.”

I don’t know Yui that much, but I know that she’s capable because she can manage the EXIST members to some extent. I do feel like she’s been influenced by the idiots’ actions recently, though. The problem here is Ran. It’s possible that she has a weird interpretation of what management entails. It’s the rogue’s den’s fault.

“Correction. One of them might be a bit dangerous.”
“Dangerous in what way?”
“In how she isn’t picky with her methods. There were times when she utilized every situation and manpower available to suppress the chaos, you see.”
“So a person like Kotone.”
“Wait a minute…”

No, I don’t remember doing anything like that in front of Kishita, but it’s true that the actions Ran took mostly imitated how I act. Know who’d be most useful in a certain situation and what the opposition’s goal is, then make the goal impossible to achieve. That was my main strategy back when I was with the rogue’s den.

“Hadzuki, don’t tell me…”
“Information dissemination is important. I’ve shown both Aya and Kaoru the New Year uproar, and I’ve talked about it too.”
“To think that you were doing something that fun after splitting up with us. I should’ve tagged along for a bit longer.”
“It was very interesting as pure entertainment. But only because I’m not personally involved in it, that is.”

That was completely unnecessary. He should know that it’d be dangerous for the twelve families to know about the rogue’s den. If the two ever join forces, it’ll lead to a catastrophe. And I absolutely want no part in that.

“Back to the topic; one is the manager of EXIST, while the other is the manager of the actress Ayaka.”
“You really have an abundance of friends, Kotone.”
“They all have some eccentricities, though.”
“The same goes with these two. Since it’s a good opportunity, could you please introduce me to them? I want to learn how they keep eccentric individuals on a tight leash.”

Hadzuki and Aya’s faces freeze. They’re probably thinking that they’re sure to be on the receiving end of it. And they’d be right. Still, I wonder how Kishita will change under the tutorship of individuals capable of quelling such a big incident. Scary to think about.

“That would be good medicine for these two, huh.”
“Nono, Kotone. It’ll be dangerous if Kaoru becomes like them.”
“I agree. Besides, I’m the one who’s going to be with Kaoru more. I’m definitely going to be affected the most.”
“By the way, the two managers are similar in that regard.”

Ran can go overboard sometimes, but Yui has also started to specialize in reeling in idiots. While she insists that she hates the stress, her steady growth is clear to see. After all, the idiots haven’t been barging into my place.

“You can’t be as reckless as you were until now.”
“That’s true. As an adult, you’ll be amenable to more restrictions. Still, there might be a few opportunities to pull something at the university, won’t there?”

Oi, you two. Don’t you dare look away. I can still understand Hadzuki, but Aya, what do you plan on doing when you have an image to maintain? You should know that simply controlling the whole class isn’t a viable tactic in university.

“I just thought that there shouldn’t be any harm in having fun when alcohol’s involved.”
“People will see you differently afterwards, so don’t.”

To begin with, what do you mean “have fun”? You don’t even know how alcohol might affect you. You might end up humiliating yourself without even realizing it. In the case of the rogue’s den, they get smashed before that happens. Just like those three over there.

“Like I thought, this is probably the best place to drink for the first time. Kotone would probably stop us in case anything happens.”
“And we’ll have someone who can objectively observe our change in behavior. Even if we get a hangover the next day, Kotone will probably do something about it, too.”
“That’s true. I’d greatly appreciate having Kotone’s help to deal with all that.”
“Don’t just casually involve me. Doesn’t sound like I can refuse, though.”

It’s not as if I’ll never be able to meet with these three again. As long as their schedules line up, I feel like they’ll be using this place as a hangout spot. I have no idea why I have to offer my apartment. Still, that might not be too bad either.

“Misaki. Sorry to disturb your eating, but bring those to me.”
“Understood.”

Misaki left for a moment before returning with certain items at hand. It would be improper if I didn’t have anything to give to the graduates. While I couldn’t prepare anything expensive, I at least bought each of them flowers.

“Hadzuki, Aya, Kishita; congratulations on your graduation. I look forward to being with you all in the future.”

This would be a pretty emotional moment if we were teary-eyed or something, but I’m not expecting any of that. Aya is even inspecting to see if there’s any traps in it. What kind of trap are you expecting from common dry flowers?

After that, we spent time chatting and reminiscing on past events, and it was about time to go home. Yes, everyone was about to leave, if not for a certain idiot who managed to restart.

“Kotone, water~”
“Shirose, isn’t the water right in front of you?”
“Give me~”
“There’s no helping it then.”

In a smooth motion, my hairband was removed, causing Kotone’s ponytail to flow straight down. This wasn’t by choice. The daily habits developed ever since Shirose came over resulted in a careless mistake. At this point, there’s nothing I can do.

“Drink slowly, alright?”
“You’re so kind~ Really different from a certain someone.”

Well, sorry for being such a certain someone. If it were me, I would have either ignored her or given her water until she choked. Shirose knows that, which is probably why she turned to Kotone. I seriously don’t know why she’s careless when it comes to this stuff.

“Also, I’m not going to let you feel lonely. You’re going down with us.”
“What are you talking about?”

You seriously don’t realize it? That you’ve just voluntarily stepped inside a minefield? It’ll be easy for me to call Kotone’s attention. But since it’s already too late, it would be better to have her realize what she just did. After all, the hunters won’t let this opportunity slip anyway.

“Kotone.”
“Kotone.”
“Kotone.”
“Fue?”

To the voices of hunters seizing their prey, Kotone turns around while uttering a weird sound, finally realizing what she has done. Her brain froze for a few seconds, and as she turned her gaze back to Shirose, she had a wide cat-like grin.

‘Good luck.’
“You tricked me!”

No, I’d put the blame on you for falling for something that simple. All I can say are these two words.

‘You fool.’