Meeting - The Roles

Horikita now stood on the podium with the microphone in her right hand. Everyone was looking at her, as she had gotten the attention of the entire class, excluding Koenji, who was looking in his mirror.

"So let's get started with today's meeting. I assume all of you have read the information about the special exam thoroughly."

Everyone slightly nodded their head except for Ike and Koenji. Ike was looking confused around the class to see if everyone nodded to her assumption. He likely hadn't read the special exam information yet. Koenji was still just looking in his mirror.

"Ike, did you perhaps not read it?"

"No, no, of course, I read it."

"Can you then tell everyone, how this exam works?"

"I didn't it read it", Ike muttered followed by a deep sigh.

Sudo, who was sitting next to Ike, put him in a headlock.

"Ow.. ow.. ow... S-stop."

"If you say anything else, I am going to strangle you."

"But you are already strangling me, jeez. I give up."

Horikita, who was watching the scene occur, let out a deep sigh. Her eyes seemed to want to ask, 'is this male bonding?'.

"Can you two stop already, so we can start the meeting, time is ticking. We will get nowhere with this."

Sudo let go of Ike, who had just head locked him before, and Ike started breathing heavily and let out a deep sigh in relief for being unstrangled.

"We won't be able to all stay together during this exam, so I think we should split up into three different eleven-twelve students in each group. The groups will find a designated area together and camp together. The groups should further split into smaller groups when they are looking for tasks, so they can be most efficient as possible."

To get the most points possible, then you would have to split up into different groups. If half the class came to one task, then it would not at all be efficient. It would be better to go into three-four-person groups to tasks and compete in them. Four-person was likely best if there were group tasks. Compared to the former example, then we could go to considerably more tasks and maybe even win a few of them.

We don't know yet if it is only the winner, that gets points or the other places also gets points. The tasker would only earn 2x points if he won the task, so if there were point rewards for second and third place and he got that placement, then he would not get 2x the points.

The tasker role would have to be given to a person who would win with no doubt in academic or physical activities. Sudo was the first person who came to mind, but most of the tasks would be academics, so he would have to walk to find physical activity tasks. Yukimara was undoubtedly the best in our class at academics, but many students rivaled his abilities in other classes, while Sudo had A+ in physical abilities, which only 2 persons had. That was Sudo and Kiryuin.

Sudo would nearly be invincible in tasks with physical activities as the theme.

The free-to-camp role was the only role that could be given to four separate people, so they would likely camp together themselves or search for other students with the free-to-camp role. We had an alliance with Class-A, so we could put our free-to-camp students in the same group.

"But Suzune, we are 39 students. If we have three groups comprising twelve students, then that would only be 36 students?"

"It's simple. Our four students with the free-to-camp role will camp alone together. We also have established an alliance with Class-A, so our four students will camp with their four students with the same role."

Many students in the class looked confused when she mentioned the alliance with Class A. It had only been a few moments ago since we had established the alliance, so nobody had known about it yet. Most students were likely thinking something like 'we can't trust Class A, they are our enemies.' Horikita would have to do some smooth talking to get people to agree with this.

"Why do you think we should trust Class-A, they are our enemies? We are competing with them and you are saying, that you already established an alliance with them without our consent as a class?"

The first person to speak up was Matsushita, normally the quiet type. That would not say much. She did not look concerned at all like the others in the class did.

"We made this alliance with the term, that we still can go for a high ranking even though it could likely close the gap with Class A. The only thing in this," alliance" is that we help them, they help us if it is needed. If your group is in trouble, then you can search for a Class A student and get help. The," alliance" will also only last for this exam. After the exam, we are enemies again. Does that satisfy you?"

Matsushita slightly nodded with a smug smile. The others in the class seemed to have gotten the answer to their questions because they looked quite satisfied with the answer that Horikita had given.

"Then let's continue. The way we will split up into different groups is by measuring three things, which is Academics, Physical abilities and the last thing, we will base groups on, is compatibility."

"Compatibility?"

"In short, we will base the groups on who you work together with well since you will camp together and doing tasks together. We just cannot afford to have silly arguments between people during this exam."

Having good bonds with your group mates was important, because if you just put eleven-twelve people in a group together, who not talked a lot to each other, then the motivation could plummet for some students. During the uninhabited island exam, Sudo, Ike, and Hondou had teamed up together, and they were best friends and that was why their group worked well. Those three were compatible. They did not have problems when working together.

The same thing applied to this exam, but since there were more conditions like high altitude, then you would have to give more of a thought to the groups, because if Sudo, Ike, and Hondou were to team up again as a small group. Then you could say that Sudo would end up waiting too much on the other two if he wanted to go do tasks or survive in the higher altitude.

Walking up and down on the mountain would drain more of your energy than mostly flat terrain like the uninhabited island, so Hondo, that had gotten extremely tired after that exam, likely could not survive that. So in this exam, they were not a good pick to put together. I did not know about Ike yet; he had a lot of camping experience, but it depended, where he had gone camping before. If he had camped at higher altitude levels before, then he could be a massive help for us, but if he had not done that before, then he would not be much of help with earning points. Though he would likely still be able to help with setting campsites up, even if that was the case.

"So I have rented a time for us to use the gym tomorrow, so we can do some stamina and endurance tests, so tomorrow's meeting will take place in the gym. When looking at academics, we will use the last couple of academic tests."

There were no objections to it from anybody, but Ike looked like he wanted to say something after a short time. He put his hand up in the air and spoke up.

"I have quite the experience with camping and I have camped on mountains before. So I think I can help a bit during this exam."

"I see. I will consider that. If you have camped on mountains before, then I will assume you could survive at a higher altitude, experiencing nothing major, like altitude sickness. I am correct?"

Ike nodded while looking happy.

"Then you can be quite the help because just with that, you can earn forty individual points daily just with that method. That will be quite helpful, Ike."

Horikita had just praised Ike for something that he he was good at. Horikita had seen how people matured. Sudo had gotten better at controlling his temper and Ike started helping the class by doing what he was good at. Horikita had also matured. She had moved away from her brother's shadow and could now reach new heights, even higher than her brother.

"So, what I wanted to discuss for this meeting was the roles, so we can assign them now."

"Ike, since you can camp at a higher altitude with no problems, would it be okay with you to camp over 3000 meters in height for the entire exam?"

"I mean, I could do that, but wouldn't it be fine for me to just get the forty points and then head down?"

"I was thinking of giving you 'The Climber' role, since you have camped at that height before, so is it possible?"

"Yeah, but just make sure I won't be camping on my own."

"Then I will assign 'The Climber' role to you. You will camp in a smaller group than the initially intended eleven-twelve people since 3000 meters above the sea level can be described as very high altitude level and people, who cannot adapt to that will probably get sick."

3000 meters is a very high altitude, so only the physically adapted students in our class could camp up there, while we could get a group of eleven-twelve people up at that height. We would most likely increase the risks of a student facing altitude sickness and retiring from the exam. That would mean that we would lose fifty class points, so it would undoubtedly be better to not run the risk. If a student got the daily forty points for being in high altitude and earned lets sat fifty points from tasks daily, then the student would earn 630 individual points in total and if we divided that by ten to get the number of points, that would be added to the class' score, then it would be sixty-three points. It would likely not be great to run the risks for the weaker physical students at least, but for the more physically adapted students, then it would be fine to do it.

It would be best to have as many students in the higher altitude, but you risked students retiring from an illness. The temperature would also be an enormous problem since it was October. On Mount Fuji, that is similar in height to this mountain, has a temperature as low as -5.8°C (21.6°F) and an average high of -0.1°C (31.8°F) in October. So many students might catch a cold in weather like that.

"Each group will have their separate leader. That makes the decisions. I have already thought about the three leaders for the three sizeable groups, which are Me, Hirata, and Ayanokoji. The group with the free-to-camp roles will decide for themselves and Ike, you can decide for yourself."

'I have not agreed to this. I wanted to say these words, but they just could not come out of my mouth, so I ended up being the leader of a group. It would be harder to swing around since people would usually depend on their leader to decide instead of making their own decisions. Though this could mean I would have more pawns to play with.

"I don't think you should pick me as a group leader since I won't be able to focus on earning points. If I am the leader I will just try to come through it all safely."

Yosuke had spoken up and given his concerns about him being chosen as a leader, but there was a reason for that pick.

"That's why I picked you as a leader. The students in the class with low physical ability will have to come through the exam safely. I hope you understand this."

"Yes, I fully understand."

Yosuke said that in a tone of excitement while wearing his optimistic smile. He could focus on helping his group with coming through the exam safely.

"Now, for the next roles, we should assign. There is the commander, the imposter, free-to-camp, the tasker, and the spy. I have already decided on who the free-to-camp roles should be assigned to. I have picked Hasebe, Sakura, Miyake, and Yukimara for those roles, since Hasebe, Sakura and Miyake placed the worst on the uninhabited island exam in this class, so I think it will be best for them to get those roles."

I was the one who had given that recommendation to Horikita earlier, and she had no problem with it. They were all good friends, so they could get through it together pretty well. Keisei and Airi had respectively gotten D and -D in the OOA app in physical ability, which was the lowest in the class. Keisei could also earn points through academic tasks, so they would likely be safe for food and water.

"For the commander and the imposter, I will take the commander role, since other classes will probably not suspect me of being the commander and might fear, that I have been assigned the impostor's role. For the impostor..."

"Why should you be the commander, is it just because you want to earn more individual points for yourself and win private points for yourself?"

Shinohara interrupted Horikita in mid-speech, objecting to her being assigned the commander role. The commander could earn more points since the points that the commander earned would be multiplied by 1.5. But there was the risk of losing 200 individual points, if your identity was guessed, which could even mean you would drop to be the lowest contributor in the class and would then face expulsion if the class placed in 7th or 8th. There was an enormous risk to taking the commander role.

"No, while it is true, that I will earn more points. There is a tremendous risk to being the commander. If another class guesses you are the commander, then you'll lose 200 individual points, which could mean your expulsion if the class ranks in 7th or 8th."

Shinohara did not look satisfied with the answer but did not continue objecting, since there was no point in doing that.

"For the tasker, I was thinking of giving that role to Sudo, since the tasker will need to win an event before the points, he earns, gets doubled. Sudo will probably be able to win the physical ability tests since he is one out of two, that has an A+ in physical ability."

Sudo had likely hoped to get that role, so he could help the class more and show off his skills.

"Sudo will join Ike's group as they will camp in the higher altitude and the tasks reward more in that area. Another reason is that you two are good friends."

"For the spy, that role will be assigned to Karuizawa. I will assign the impostor role to Hirata and that should be all the roles. Does anybody have any objections to this?"

Nobody seemed to have any objections regarding the roles other than Shinohara, but she kept silent instead of speaking up. The first meeting would seem to come to a close soon.

Koenji was still sitting on his chair, but it did not seem like he was listening to what Horikita said. If he was going to help with this exam, then he would undoubtedly be a tremendous help to the class. It was probably too wishful to think like that, but you could always hope for it.

"Each group will lie out their strategy since each leader will have a different way of doing his/her thing. I will see you tomorrow at the gym at 1:00 PM. We will test your stamina and endurance there. After that, we will make the groups and then we should be ready for the exam. That was all for this meeting. You are free to leave now."

Thus, the first meeting had ended.