“Logically speaking, there are only so many places you can hide this amount of porn magazines.”
Hariu began explaining after drawing a simple map of the school on the blackboard.
“First of all, the classroom is a no-go.”
“What about inside the lockers? We could limit the access to after school hours.”
“No way, you can’t use the classroom like that. Seriously, Suzumoto?”
Wait, are we really considering places to use them!? If we start thinking like that, then the entire school is off-limits!
“Given the amount collected, it’s not like they were just bringing them to school to lend and borrow, right? We have to assume they were actually using them.”
Wow, that’s a pretty disturbing deduction! I hate this!
“…Well, considering the size of our lockers, unless there were multiple accomplices, thereโs no way all this would fit inside. Not with this volume.”
President made a valid point. But I have to disagree.
“No, President! Objection! This has to involve accomplices! I mean, the genres of these books are completely different!”
Yeah, I think so too.
I mean, really, is there anyone who likes both ‘big sister’ and ‘little sister’ genres equally? Usually, people have a preference for one or the other, right? Hmm?
Okay, maybe, just maybe, there’s someone who likes both. But even then, isn’t it weird to have both lolicon and mature woman genres together? And this box contains some really niche stuff too. If thereโs someone who likes all of these, Iโd be kind of freaked out.
“Yeah, right? We have to consider the possibility of multiple culprits; otherwise, this doesnโt make sense.”
Hariu seemed satisfied. Way to go, detective!
“But this is porn we’re talking about. People want to read this stuff in secret.”
“Maybe there’s a pervert who likes to be watched while reading.”
“Come on, can you not consider every rare case?”
If there were someone who liked being watched, we might know about them already. Iโve never heard any rumors like that.
“Well, well. Anyway, I’ve already figured out where the ‘original hiding place’ of the porn was. You know what I mean? A place where a few people could hide, and that could also have a legitimate reason for being there.”
“…Ah.”
Suzumoto clapped his hands in realization!
“The clubroom, huh?”
“Exactly! In the clubroom, you could hide all sorts of things! We’ve all used the clubroom shelves to store our stuff during class changes or cleaning days. That’s exactly our situation right now! Haha!”
“Uh, well… when you put it that way, I can’t argue, but I really don’t want to be lumped in with this…”
But the fact that weโre having a meeting around a box full of porn canโt be changed.
“So, if we’re talking about the clubroom, you mean the clubroom building?”
“Well, let’s think about it one by one.”
Kadomi began counting the number of clubs on his fingers, but I think weโll crack this pretty easily.
“First of all, there aren’t any clubs without a clubroom, right?”
“Yeah, our school is pretty spacious.”
Our school is quite old, so itโs actually pretty big with a lot of buildings.
“And we can rule out ‘girls’ sports clubs as suspects, right?”
“Women might enjoy this kind of thing too.”
“So, can you not consider every rare case!?”
“Wouldn’t Maito read it…?”
“Stop saying that!”
Actually, Maito-san can handle male-oriented porn pretty well, but let’s set that aside for now. Moving on.
“For the same reason, we can exclude the brass band, right?”
“…Yeah, the gender ratio there is weird…”
“Itโs practically an all-girls club…”
Yeah, the brass band. There are way more girls there. And with so many members, it doesnโt seem like a good place for hiding things.
“Also, even though it’s not a girls’ club, we can probably exclude the home economics club. Itโs practically an all-girls club too.”
“It seems like we can exclude the choir club as well. They only have the second music room as their clubroom, and the number of girls and boys is about equal, right?”
“The newspaper club and drama club also have an even gender ratio. We can exclude them too.”
“What about the literature club and the manga club…? The girls in those clubs might actually read porn, but can we exclude them?”
“Oh, no way they drew all of these, right? These arenโt doujinshi, and some of these are regular 3D stuff… yeah.”
“And then there’s the broadcasting club! They donโt need porn! They just donโt need it!”
“Ah… weren’t they a couple in that club…?”
…And so, we were able to eliminate quite a few possibilities pretty quickly.
Wow, it’s surprising how well we can deduce things even about clubs we don’t know much about. I’m impressed.
“Plus, quite a few of us are in multiple clubs, right? Iโm pretty sure there isnโt a culture of hiding porn in the astronomy club! Or Iโve been left out! Haha!”
“There’s probably nothing in the biology club either. I might not know for sure, but there isn’t really any space to hide porn in there.”
“The IT club probably doesnโt have any either… I mean, the IT club wouldnโt use analog books like these…”
“And the chemistry club, which would be the most likely to do something like this, has a complete alibi! Us!”
“If it werenโt us who discovered this box, we wouldโve been the first ones suspected, right?”
…And thanks to us being members of multiple clubs, even those that wouldโve been highly suspicious were safely excluded! I’m so glad weโre in the chemistry club. I mean, seriously, thank goodness it was us who found this box. Really.
“…But, narrowing it down from here might be tough, right? The remaining suspects are mostly sports clubs, but we donโt know much about their internal workings.”
Suzumoto was deep in thought, but Hariu patted Suzumoto’s shoulder with a grin.
“Nah, this is enough! Just narrowing it down to the sports clubs means we can already guess their motive.”
Grinning, he circled the “Clubhouse” area on the blackboard.
“The sports clubsโ clubrooms are all in this building.”
Yeah, yeah.
“And didnโt they have to move out of the clubhouse?”
…Huh?
Oh. Oh, I see. Now I get it. I completely understand.
“Because there was renovation work!”
“…Come to think of it, they did mention that this morning…”
“That’s what kicked off the big cleanup, and thatโs why those science magazines came from the library through me!”
I remember, I remember. Yes, we were the ones doing the big cleanup before the entrance exams! And they said there would be renovation work in the clubhouse, fumigating the extracurricular activity building, fixing the leaks in the gymnasium roofโyeah, yeah, they said all that during the morning SHR.
“So, they had to evacuate their stuff from the clubhouse because of the renovation work, huh?”
“Well, if the workers were going into the clubrooms, it would be bad if they found porn lying around.”
“Teachers might go in too.”
…Oh. I just had a eureka moment. Got it.
“But leaving that much porn at the dump is nonsense. Itโs a great hiding place! …Which means the culprit was in a hurry to hide the porn?”
“Exactly!”
“But it doesn’t make sense that they didn’t know about the need to move their stuff until the day before, right? So, in other words, the culprits who had to hurriedly hide the porn yesterday hadnโt been informed about the renovation work beforehand. Is that correct?”
“Correct!”
With Hariu’s OK sign, I gave a triumphant fist pump. Columbia.
“…Ah, right, the activity days…”
When Kadomi started nodding, everyone fully grasped the situation!
So, this crime!
It was definitely committed by a club with ‘few activity days’!
Then we opened this year’s club introduction booklet (published by the student council) and pinpointed the culprits.
“…No doubt about it. The club has a room in the clubhouse, is probably all-male, and has very few members.”
“And their activity days are irregular. It’s not strange they didn’t get the notice beforehand.”
…Itโs the ‘mountaineering club’!
“Didn’t even know this club existed…”
We had almost forgotten about this minor sports club!
“…So, what do we do now?”
“We’ve got a suspect, but no concrete evidence. Still, we might have to confront them.”
“What if itโs not the mountaineering club?”
“Like in a werewolf game, Iโm the type to make decisions based on probability.”
“So, what? Youโre just going to march up to the mountaineering club and say, ‘Excuse me, are these porn magazines yours?'”
“I can do that.”
“I have nothing more to say to you. Do whatever you want.”
President’s boldness is nothing new, but Iโd prefer to handle this a bit more smoothly.
“Actually, I think it’s fine if we just go to the mountaineering club.”
But then Hariu gave the go-ahead! Whatโs going on here!? Oh, I get itโheโs fine with letting President take the heat alone. Makes sense.
“Because if the mountaineering club is in their room today, thatโs proof right there.”
……
“If a club that usually isnโt active is in their room today, thatโs proof enough.”
…… Hariu is smarter than he looks, huh?
“Alright then. Case closed. Letโs go.”
“Wait a second! Donโt all go together!”
“Should I go?”
“Yeah, do that…”
And so, well, it looks like itโs probably solved, solved, and done. All’s well that ends well.
๏ผToday’s Record๏ผ
Ah… I’ll just record what happened exactly as it occurred!
“I thought I had retrieved a science magazine I accidentally threw away from the trash, but somehow I ended up picking up a box of porn.”
You might not understand what I’m saying, but I didnโt understand what happened either…
My head felt like it was going to explode…
This wasnโt some cheap trick like hypnosis or super speed.
I got a glimpse of how terrifying the mountaineering club can be…
Ah, in short, the ones who swapped the magazines were the mountaineering club members! But we got the science magazines back, so itโs all good!
Apparently, they were planning to switch them back before tomorrowโs recycling collection, but since we picked up the porn, they were in a bind. So, in the end, itโs a WIN-WIN situation.
By the way, the negotiation was handled by President alone! Thanks, President! We wonโt forget your bravery!
๏ผPostscript (by Maito)๏ผ
Why didnโt you tell me something this fun was happening!? I wanted to see Presidentโs bravery too!
๏ผPostscript 2 (by Toriumi)๏ผ
Oops, I forgot Maito-san reads this notebook too. My bad.
Honestly, for our peace of mind, it was just a bit difficult with Maito-san there. Sorry about that.
Even though we know Maito-san can handle this kind of stuff, itโs still kind of… hard to explain.
We didn’t mean to exclude you, so I hope you understand.
๏ผPostscript 3 (by Maito again!)๏ผ
I totally understand. I was being selfish. Sorry. Thanks as always.
So I wonโt say anything about you guys suddenly being so friendly with the mountaineering club or visiting their clubroom now and then. Iโm not that nosy.
๏ผPostscript 4 (by T.)๏ผ
How did you find out…?