After breaking up, my ex asked me to win her back

What happened next was as expected.

The 'anonymous' exposé on the News Department forum instantly shifted the public pressure onto Ayakoji Chiyoko and Kagura Hikaru, painting them as the villains and Kiryu Hina as the victim, naturally making the so-called bullying rumors unbelievable to anyone.

The Society Discussion Meeting's credibility plummeted, but that did not prevent everyone from reading its daily newspaper. After all, aside from the distorted school news, there were still many trendy topics worth reading about.

It was like when pork with swine fever appeared in the market; it wouldn't be possible to ban everyone from buying beef.

Some sticklers believed that reading the Society Discussion Meeting's daily release was equivalent to supporting Ayakoji Chiyoko, so they resolutely boycotted it and even persuaded those around them not to read it.

But the vast majority of students simply didn't care about these stance issues; they were more interested in having fun.

At the same time, the News Department quietly began its campaign to promote its own online forum.

Using the gossip news about Ayakoji Chiyoko and Kiryu Hina as a stepping stone, they launched many community events, continually posting interesting new threads, with some people writing stories and even creating sections reminiscent of confession walls, attracting a large number of Uka High students.

Ayakoji Chiyoko had been busy investigating the previous 'surprise inspection' by Kiryu Hina and was brooding over it without paying any attention to these developments. By the time she realized it, the News Department forum had already become the second center of opinion within the school.

Kagura Hikaru was surprised by Hina's ruthlessness when he found out about this.

No wonder she released the most crucial exposé on the school forum; it was all part of this scheme.

Attacking the Society Discussion Meeting and Ayakoji Chiyoko, suppressing rumors, and revitalizing the News Department's influence in public opinion—it was killing three birds with one stone.

Clearly, she had premeditated all of it.

With this, the Society Discussion Meeting could no longer hold ground in Yuqiu High School's public opinion battlefield. In places like online forums, the efficiency of setting the tone far exceeds that of newspapers.

In her irritation, Ayakoji Chiyoko ordered the Society Discussion Meeting to continue competing with the News Department for readers, but the issue was they focused on the daily paper and forums respectively, and simply couldn't clash head-on.

The Society Discussion Meeting tried to set up its own forum, but it went unnoticed, and even after a week the visit count hadn't broken a hundred.

The Society Discussion Meeting failed to achieve its initial target and instead, the News Department managed to make a fortune out of someone else's misfortune, gaining influence comparable to the Society Discussion Meeting, and declaring a complete defeat in the battle for public opinion.

Ayakoji Chiyoko's personal authority suffered a severe blow.

Although she was prepared, no one could produce direct evidence to prove her involvement in the actions against Kiryu Hina, and she hadn't actively slandered the latter even in interviews for her own daily news.

But public opinion is such a thing; it can sentence someone to death without evidence.

If it incites widespread resentment, one can become guilty even without guilt.

In order not to affect the Disciplinary Committee, Ayakoji Chiyoko announced her resignation the day after the post appeared, ostensibly stepping down from the Disciplinary Committee, with the former vice-chair taking over as Chairman of the Disciplinary Committee, but in reality, she shifted to controlling things behind the scenes, and from top to bottom, the Disciplinary Committee was still her people.

But from the perspective of ordinary students, Ayakoji Chiyoko had suffered a crushing defeat this time.

Her attempt to smear the Student Council President was unsuccessful, and instead, she was 'expelled' by the Discipline Committee, stripped of her rank, it was a total loss.

Out of respect for the attitude of the Discipline Committee, nobody dared to ridicule her openly, but behind closed doors, Chiyoko didn't know how many cold stares she received.

It was said that a few hot-headed youths who had previous grudges with the Discipline Committee blocked Ayakoji Chiyoko's classroom door to give her trouble; she beat them single-handedly, and then dragged their 'corpses' herself to surrender to the Discipline Committee.

Whether those spirited lads were okay or not, nobody knew, but when Ayakoji Chiyoko walked out of the Discipline Committee, not even the wrinkles on her clothes had changed.

Having had a rough time herself, Kagura Hikaru's situation was naturally worse.

For a whole week, every day, his locker was crammed with stuff.

Of course, they weren't pink love letters, but rather razor blades, threatening letters, insect carcasses, weird photos, and the like.

His indoor shoes would disappear daily only to show up torn and tattered in the trash can, forcing Kagura to take his shoes home.

On his way to and from school, he'd be picked on—nothing would happen on campus though, as there were always some Discipline Committee members watching over him. If someone caused trouble, within three seconds, a student wearing a red armband would show up for 'justice execution,' which was blatant protection.

But no one could really say they were in the wrong, as preventing disputes within the school was indeed the job of the Discipline Committee members.

Those annoyed with Kagura thought that once off school grounds, where the Discipline Committee couldn't intervene, they could teach him a lesson, only to learn what is meant by 'being skilled in many things.'

Over the years, the Golden Finger had copied many martial arts skills for him, which normally weren't of much use, but came in especially handy at times like this.

Strangely, even though Kagura encountered malice everywhere in the school, such things never happened in his own classroom, where, despite some awkwardness, everyone still interacted with him as before.

This silent support touched him deeply.

Kagura had always been the least talkative and most aloof in his class, yet somehow he had been accepted into the group, which was both surprising and moving.

After about a week like this, the bullying began to subside.

There were factors causing the enthusiasm of the bullies to decline, as well as reasons related to Kagura Hikaru being too impeccable, giving them no opportunity to start any trouble; in any case, life had returned to the usual school days.

During these days, Ayakoji Chiyoko, who hadn't been in touch for a while, sought him out again.

Lunchtime, on a bench in the corner of the courtyard.

It was the same place where they had first talked about collaborating.

Ayakoji Chiyoko and Kagura Hikaru sat on either side of the bench, each eating their own bento.

"The next plan against the Student Council is in preparation," Ayakoji Chiyoko suddenly said out of the blue, "For myself, I'm very keen to discuss the topic of Kiryu Hina's love life. Do you have anything to add?"

Kagura Hikaru put down his chopsticks, frowning deeply, "I've said long ago that I don't want to talk more about this matter."

"Is that so? That's really a pity."

Perhaps because she was bothered by this for a while, Ayakoji Chiyoko started asking around again about the love history between Kagura Hikaru and Kiryu Hina, especially about the reasons behind their breakup.

Seemingly out of a woman's intuition, Ayakoji Chiyoko believed there should be big news buried within this matter.

—That's why he disliked these sharp-witted brats.

Kagura Hikaru's expression darkened for a moment.

Once close enough to be considered a model couple, now estranged, Kagura Hikaru was hated by Kiryu Hina, labeled a traitor, and of course, there were convoluted and difficult internal details involved.

It was Kagura Hikaru's deepest secret, one he didn't wish to share with anyone, let alone have it exposed as a piece of dark news.

To ensure that Ayakoji Chiyoko wouldn't continue to delve into the matter, he even resorted to using mind-reading.

[Looking at it this way, there's definitely something hidden.]

[But continuing to pressure him might drive him away... Let it be, let's see how it goes.]

[You gained through the vision of the mind: guitar +2]

[Guitar lv5 (not upgradable)]

[Congratulations on obtaining your first maximum level skill, your Mind Reading Technique has been enhanced]

Hmm?

Kagura Hikaru, who had let his guard down upon realizing that Ayakoji Chiyoko had no intention of probing further, was startled once again.

He was aware that his guitar skill was about to reach maximum level since it was already sufficient for his needs, so he hadn't deliberately sought to increase experience points.

Unexpectedly, a maximum level skill could upgrade mind-reading abilities.

He wondered what the effects of the enhancement were.

Out of curiosity, Kagura Hikaru used mind-reading again on Ayakoji Chiyoko sitting next to him.

[Today's bento has foie gras again; I've said several times not to put such expensive ingredients, that disobedient French chef, I'll fire him sooner or later!]

[You gained through the vision of the mind: Tea Ceremony +1]

[Tea Ceremony lv4 (51/100)]

In the sunlight, Ayakoji Chiyoko elegantly picked up a piece of foie gras and put it into her mouth, calm and composed without showing any expression, completely unaware that her thoughts were now crystal clear to the person beside her.

However, unlike before, this time, Kagura Hikaru not only read her thoughts but also saw an image of a white-haired old man in a chef's uniform flash by—a blurry image seemingly extracted from Ayakoji Chiyoko's memory.

So that's it, this new ability allowed him to see the images the other person was thinking about during mind-reading.

Now, his mind-reading wasn't limited to text; it could even display images, which was a major leap forward like evolving from a feature phone to a smartphone.

Kagura Hikaru couldn't help but wonder, with more maximum level skills, what would his mind-reading ability eventually become?

Well, there would always be a chance to find out in the future.

Kagura Hikaru ate a meatball, chewing while pondering these thoughts.

So, that day, he and Ayakoji Chiyoko simply had lunch together and then went their separate ways.

Neither of them realized that such behavior could easily lead to misunderstandings.