♛

"THE PLEASURE IS DEFINITELY mine," Uchdryd says with a grin, making Keigo gulp in terror.

     "We thank you for your time. I didn't know you'd visit so soon," Max then says, and Uchdryd took a seat on the sofa, gesturing for Max and Keigo to sit with him. The two declined the offer, so Uchdryd just quietly laughs, resting his arm on the head of the sofa, and says, "It's been a while since I've been here. After all, I was a student in J.S High once, so I can't help but feel nostalgic about it."

     "I'm glad you feel that way," Max says, making the lord smile.

     "I was surprised to receive the letter of request from the Counts. It's such a rare occurrence, but who am I to decline them? After all, I am a mere lord in the House of Bishops."

     Max doesn't say anything, so Uchdryd adjusts himself in his seat before adding, "But I didn't know that the person who would request for me would actually be you. I'm amazed by the power you hold against the brotherhoods here."

     "I have no power against them as I am not their master. They offer me their assistance because of the strong foundation we have in each other. That is all," Max explains this time, and Uchdryd couldn't help but look at Max in disbelief. He couldn't believe that a mere white uniform like him had such a strong presence.

     Usually, a white uniform, despite how powerful they are outside their school, would cower in front of a brotherhood. But Max was different. He didn't show any ounce of fear as he stood in front of the lord with his head held high. You could see the experience and the hardships that Max went through just by looking at the way he presents himself. It was definitely a sight to behold.

     "Your presence frightens me, and I can tell that you have a clear understanding of your worth," Uchdryd tells him. "But it's also fascinating that out of all the brotherhoods you have conquered, you chose Cigarettes to request for my visit."

     When Max heard what Uchdryd said, he couldn't help but show a smirk. "You catch on fast," he says. "Cigarettes are just outside this room. They're a brotherhood that holds no principles, and their base is the most secluded. If you're planning on doing anything troublesome, your safety will not be promised here in the Smoking Room."

     Uchdryd stares at Max, grinning at him as he licks his lower lip. "How fascinating," he whispers. 

     "I don't want to waste any more of your time. I know you already helped me before, but I'm hoping you give me your assistance once again," Max says, and Uchdryd couldn't help but chuckle at the request.

     "And why on earth would I do that for a white uniform? Unlike the brotherhoods here, the both of us don't have a strong foundation," Uchdryd tells him, and the response was already something that Max had expected.

     "Uchdryd Rease, though you are now in the House of Bishops, you are still subjected to the universal rule of the Brotherhoods. This means the sins of your past members, will also be transferred to you for subjection," Max finally says, and Uchdryd was left dumbfounded.

     "I have strong evidence that your brotherhood has held an illegal auction in J.S High, as well as CCTV footage of your former members that shows them bullying a white uniform to acquire their points," Max confidently says, surprising Keigo because contrary to what Max said, they don't, in fact, have any strong evidence.

     "I may or may not share this information to the council and to the association, but my final decision will be based on your cooperation today," Max then reveals, his face serious and certain.

     Uchdryd was quiet for a while, but after a couple of seconds, he started laughing.

     "How wonderful!" Uchdryd shouts, his excitement rising like a rocket. "I see now...you are what they described. You did not disappoint me whatsoever."

     Max and Keigo don't say anything as they watched Uchdryd continue laughing. When he finally calmed down, Uchdryd wipes the tears from his eyes and looks back at Max with a calmer expression.

     "My apologies, it's just that the last time I encountered a white uniform like you was when president Grey was still alive. It's a surprise that there's someone out there who can still leave me speechless," Uchdryd says as he adjusts the brooch on his chest.

     "You've cornered me. It seems you have given me a checkmate. It might not be much, but I value the position that I am in, and it would be very troublesome if our previous mistakes would come back to haunt us," Uchdryd says with no hint of malice. "Then you have my full cooperation, Sinclaire. How may I assist you?"

     Max takes a deep breath and looks at Keigo before saying anything. Keigo looks at him too and nods his head towards Max, telling him to continue.

     "Uchdryd Rease, as the leader of Checkmate, please tell us everything you know about the auction that was held here in J.S High," Max finally says, and Uchdryd adjusts in his seat again before giving Max a serious look.

     "During the old times, brotherhood funds were almost impossible to acquire. The brotherhood battles weren't enough to fund their resources, so Checkmate thought of a way to milk the other white uniforms instead. Though it was illegal, they held secret auctions at the school's auditorium," Uchdryd explains, and Keigo mentally started remembering every single detail down so it could help them in the future.

     "When the leader and the other original members of Checkmate graduated, I became the leader and decided to reform the group. A lot of things changed, and one of those changes is the case you've mentioned. You might not believe it, but we don't do the auctions anymore, and I believe that the illegal transaction was discontinued in the House of Kings as well when we left," Uchdryd explains further.

     "So you think it's not happening anymore?" Max asks, and this time, Uchdryd smirked.

     "No, but I think a brotherhood isn't holding it anymore," Uchdryd corrects, surprising Max and Keigo.

     "What do you mean?"

     "It's obviously not us because we're not in J.S High anymore. And knowing the brotherhoods in your house, I think it's unlikely that any of them would bully white uniforms just for money; it's just impossible. So I think someone took the concept and continued it themselves," Uchdryd explains, and Max and Keigo instantly looked at each other again.

     That made perfect sense. Why weren't they able to think of that?

     "That auction, the auction that sells illegal points, I think it's being organized by a powerful white uniform. Maybe someone from J.S High's...10 highest-ranked students."

...

Max and Keigo were back at their small 'office,' organizing all the information they gathered from the leader of Checkmate, Uchdryd Rease. Thanks to him, the two were getting closer to solving their 2nd task.

     "A white uniform who is powerful enough to hold an auction of illegal merit points? Do you have any idea who that might be? Especially when you're already in the top 10," Keigo states, turning his chair to Max who was writing notes down on the whiteboard.

     "I'm still trying to guess who it could be too, but I don't want to just assume anyone," Max says as he looks at the board where all the names and information of the top 10 students of J.S High were written.

     Max and Keigo already ruled out Thomas Anderson Woods because they strongly believe PHD won't give them two different tasks that involve one student. And Max just thinks that even though Thomas kept his brother's illegal points, he believes that Thomas isn't the type of person who would organize an auction.

Now that leads to the other top 10.

RANK 01: Ian Rothman (President) - 4th year, Broadcasting Club leader

RANK 02: Gavriil Ivanovich Alexeev (Vice President) - 2nd year, Newspaper Club leader

RANK 03: Richard Young (Secretary) - 4th year, Business Leaders Club leader

RANK 04: Dustin Griffiths (Treasurer) - 3rd year, Debate Club leader

RANK 05: Heaven J. Carter (School Representative) - 3rd year, former Bassist of the band, The Monarchs' Bassist

-

RANK 06: Thomas Anderson Woods - 4th year, Alpha Society leader ❌

RANK 07: Kenzo Furukawa - 4th year, Beta Society leader

RANK 08: Antonio Fernández de la Paz - 4th year, Theater Guild leader

RANK 09: Justin Griffiths - 3rd year, Cooking Club leader

RANK 10: Maximilian Leigh Sinclaire - 2nd year, Omega Society leader

"You think it's someone from the Elites?" Keigo asks, and Max stares at the names of the Elites with his arms crossed.

     "If it's the Elites, the first suspect I have would be Heaven. He's a very suspicious white uniform, but at the same time, I have this gut feeling that he's not the person we're looking for. He's not the type to organize anything big. He's a secretive person, so he won't risk organizing something like an auction," Max explains, and Keigo nods his head, taking Max's word for it.

     Keigo then stands from his seat and stood beside Max so he could stand in front of the whiteboard too. "But look at this list. You guys are literally all achievers. And all the society leaders are on this list too. That's just crazy."

     "Gavriil told me that Thomas was stripped of his title as the leader," Max suddenly shares, surprising Keigo. "Since he knew that his brother used the funds of the club to buy points, president Janus deemed that it would be ridiculous to still make him their leader. Though he's still a member, the Alpha Society probably has a new leader now," Max explains.

     "Then how about his rank? I'm pretty sure the council would have taken the illegal points away from his total merit points," Keigo then says, and Max takes a deep breath and nodded his head.

     "That's right. He hasn't been officially stripped of his title as rank 6 yet, but the council is already working on it. It's just a shame because Thomas is a hard-working white uniform. He just made a stupid mistake, and I somehow still feel guilty about what we did to him," Max explains, and Keigo looks at him with a sad smile.

     "You know, it might not be much since it's coming from someone like me, but you did the right thing, Max. Thomas would have lived his entire life being proud of his fake achievements. You freed him from that regret, and now he has a clean slate. He has the chance to prove to everyone that he's more than what happened to him," Keigo tells Max as his words of comfort, and Max smiles at him and nods his head at Keigo as a form of thank you.

     "You're right. We're doing this for a reason," Max says with conviction before looking back at the board.

     "But among all of them, who has the power to secretly hold something like this? They have to be someone who's at least a fourth-year student since it means they were able to witness what Checkmate did," Max then explains, taking a marker and putting an x on Justin and Dustin Griffith's names, Gavriil's name, as well as Heaven's name.

     "We have five suspects left," Max says, and Keigo stares at the board again. He looks at the name one by one, but he stops at a particular student.

     "Theater Guild," Keigo says, making max look at the name too.

     "That's Antonio, an amazing actor who achieved awards even outside the country," Max explains, wondering why Keigo would mention it.

     "He's from the theater guild, so doesn't that mean that they do their club activities at the auditorium?" Keigo asks, and the moment Max realized it too, he quickly covered his mouth in shock.

     Uchdryd said earlier, that they held the secret auction at the auditorium. One of the students who have full access to the auditorium is none other than the Theater Guild, the club Antonio Fernández de la Paz is the leader of.

     "It could be him!" Keigo excitedly says.

     "W-Wait, let's not assume that just yet, we don't have enough evidence to prove that it's really him. But even though there's a chance that it's not him, he might know something, considering how they're always at the auditorium. He must have noticed something strange about the place," Max explains, and Keigo ran back to his computer and started typing something.

     "If that's the case then we can easily find evidence. If this guy is really the one who's organizing these auctions, then I believe we'll find something in his profile," Keigo explains.

     It took him about a couple of minutes to hack into J.S High's system, and as soon as he got in, Antonio's picture and profile appeared on his screen. Max quickly stood behind Keigo and looked at the screen together. The two scanned the profile, trying to find a speck of single dirt that would be useful to them, but after checking each piece of information, they found nothing.

     "He doesn't have any records or even family members that attended J.S High. He doesn't have any suspicious activities either. His profile's too clean. Maybe we got it wrong after all," Max says, but Keigo wasn't giving up.

     Keigo continued to read through the profile, but after a while, he suddenly points at something on his screen and shouted, "This! This is our proof!"

     Max quickly looked at what Keigo was pointing at with an excited expression, but as soon as he saw what it was, his smile turned into a frown.

     "Look, he wrote here that one of the plays that he enjoys acting in the most is The Phantom of the Opera. I haven't really watched the actual play, but I have seen the movie and if I remember correctly, the scene starts with an auction that was held at the opera house's vaults. Don't you think this is way too much of a coincidence?" Keigo asks, looking at Max with a proud smile like he just discovered the secrets to the universe.

     "Keigo, I don't know if you're a genius or if you're stretching this way too much," Max honestly says, and Keigo finally gave up and slumped himself in his seat.

     "I don't know anymore. This Antonio guy looks way too clean. He might really not be the person we're looking for, but if he was, we still won't have any evidence," Keigo says, massaging his temple in frustration.

     Max walks back to the whiteboard and stared at Antonio's name again. With the short time he's been with Antonio, Max could only think of positive things about him. He's fun to be around, and he's helpful to everyone in the office. It could be that Antonio's just the type of person who everyone gets along with, or he's just a really good...

     "Actor," Max says underneath his breath before looking back at Keigo. "I have an idea."

     "You do?" Keigo asks, and Max nods and walks back to him.

     "If we don't have any evidence, then we'll make one," Max says, making Keigo look back at him with furrowed brows.

     "Max, as much as I want to hear more about your plan, just a friendly reminder but...we only have tomorrow to finish all the tasks. I know you already told me that it doesn't matter to you anymore, but let's at least still try to achieve that target. Don't you want to attend the banquet?" Keigo asks him since he doesn't know how long it would take for them to make fake evidence.

     "Well of course I'd still want to go, but these tasks are more important than that," Max casually explains, making Keigo give up.

     "Alright, so what's your master plan then? How are we going to make the evidence?" Keigo asks him, and Max walks back to the whiteboard and encircled Antonio's name.

     "Antonio's a great actor, right? Then let's give him a performance that he wouldn't be able to forget."

- END -