Chapter 134: The Disappearance of the Panties!
"Thank you."
"You're welcome!"
Ibuki Mio put down the water bottle, her gaze scanning the camp. The students were all packing their things, as a portion of them would soon be heading to the next designated spot to acquire points. Everything seemed normal.
But Ibuki knew that very soon, it wouldn't be.
Before everyone else had woken up this morning, she had gone to another location. It was the spot where Karuizawa Kei kept her clothes. Last night, she had taken something from there, and right now, that item was tucked against her chest. She felt the small object hidden in her inner pocket, her fingers brushing against the soft fabric.
She took a deep breath and stood up. "I'm going to the restroom," she said to Elsie.
"Okay! Make it quick! We're about to head out!"
Ibuki nodded and walked quickly toward the edge of the jungle. She crouched down and stuffed the item from her coat into a nearby thicket. Her movements were fast and light, ensuring no one saw; then she stood up, brushed the dust off her clothes, and walked back to camp.
"Back already?" Elsie asked.
"Mhm."
"Then let's get ready to go!"
Ibuki nodded, but in her mind, she was counting down. Three, two, one...
"Ah——!!"
A scream pierced the tranquility of the camp. Everyone looked toward the source of the sound simultaneously. Karuizawa Kei stood at the entrance of her tent, her face deathly pale, frozen in place as if struck by lightning.
"What's wrong?" Sato Maya hurried over to ask.
"My... my..." Karuizawa's voice was trembling, her face turning from pale to a deep crimson. "My underwear is gone!"
Karuizawa's voice was loud, causing the entire camp to fall instantly silent. Everyone was stunned.
"What?" Sato Maya's eyes widened. "What did you say is missing?"
"Underwear! My underwear!" Karuizawa's voice was sharp and ear-piercing, her face flushed with rage. "I clearly packed them away last night! Today they're gone!"
Sakura Airi's face turned red as well, and she shrank behind Kushida Kikyo. Kushida maintained her smile, but it was visibly stiff.
"Could you have remembered wrong?" Sato Maya asked tentatively.
"No, impossible, I remember very clearly!" Karuizawa's tone was incredibly firm.
"Then that means..." Sato Maya's voice changed, "Someone took them?"
This sentence was like a bomb dropped into the camp, causing an immediate uproar.
"What? Someone's stealing?"
"Who did it?"
"But..."
Who was the most likely candidate for such a thing? Everyone immediately thought of the two people with the worst reputations in the class—Ike Kanji and Sudo Ken. The color drained from their faces instantly. They glanced at each other, both seeing panic in the other's eyes.
"It wasn't me!" Ike was the first to jump out. "I've been washing my face all morning!!"
"It wasn't me either!" Sudo shouted along. "I just got up not long ago!"
Normally, there would be a third person to help draw the fire. However, Yamauchi Haruki was no longer in the class.
Hirata Yousuke didn't speak, but his expression was grim. Karuizawa's gaze swept over the boys, her eyes growing colder. She walked toward Ike and Sudo step by step, each footfall like treading on ice.
"..." Her voice was shaking, not with fear, but with fury.
"It really wasn't us!" Ike took a step back. "We swear to heaven!"
"Then who else could it be?" Karuizawa's voice grew louder, her face full of wrath. "There are only so many people in this camp! Did the underwear grow legs and run away on its own?"
Sakura Airi, hiding behind Kushida, whispered: "Could it be... someone from outside..."
"Someone from outside?" Karuizawa turned her head. "Who? Class A? Class B? Or Class C? They ran into our camp just to steal underwear?"
Sakura Airi didn't dare speak further. The atmosphere in the camp grew increasingly tense. The girls' gazes were like knives scraping across the boys' faces. After all, the "credit score" of the boys in this class was far too low; during previous swimming classes, several of them had cast lecherous gazes without any attempt at concealment.
Ike and Sudo were flushed with embarrassment and anger, unable to defend themselves. Hirata Yousuke kept his head down, silent. Previously, Hirata would have definitely stepped in
to mediate, but now, he just watched. The other boys looked at each other, unsure of what to say.
Ibuki Mio stood on the edge of the crowd, watching coldly. Her expression remained aloof, but her heart was racing. The chaos had begun. Next, as long as she made the chaos a little bigger and caused everyone to suspect one another, she would have the chance to find the keycard.
All of this was Ibuki Mio's doing. Although she felt a slight pang of guilt, she knew she was ultimately a Class C student; the interests of Class C had to be her priority. Therefore, she had no choice but to do this. Next, the situation would likely become even harder to manage.
Ibuki looked up at the sky; it was overcast and looked like it might rain soon.
"Let's stop there for now."
A calm voice rang out—not loud, yet it silenced everyone. Ibuki's heart skipped a beat.
Katsuragi Keima stood up from under the large tree, still holding his handheld console. He walked over with unhurried steps, his expression exactly the same as usual—completely unreadable. He walked up to Karuizawa Kei.
"Keima-kun..." Karuizawa's voice changed from anger to grievance, her eyes even reddening slightly. "My underwear... it's gone..."
"Mhm." Katsuragi Keima nodded.
"Someone must have taken it! It has to be a boy—of course, definitely not Keima-kun!" she added quickly, her face turning bright red.
Ike and Sudo nodded frantically beside her, their eyes full of a desperate "please keep talking" hope.
Katsuragi Keima didn't respond to her. He simply looked at the spot Karuizawa had just searched—the small bundle of clothes had been turned into a mess, with several items scattered on the ground.
"Look again carefully," Katsuragi Keima spoke slowly. "Maybe you really just missed it."
"But I already looked—"
"Look again."
His tone was still flat, but it possessed a weight that made it impossible to refuse. Karuizawa opened her mouth to say something but ultimately crouched down; she unconditionally trusted Katsuragi Keima. She began going through the small bundle again, taking out items one by one—folded T-shirts, shorts, socks...
"I really did look, it's not..." Her voice carried a hint of a sob.
"Maybe it's at the very bottom," Keima said.
Karuizawa froze for a second, then reached her hand to the bottom layer of the bundle. Her fingers brushed against a piece of soft fabric. Her expression shifted from grievance to confusion, then from confusion to disbelief. She slowly pulled the item out—
A pair of underwear. Precisely the pair she thought was missing.
"..." Her eyes widened. "How is this possible? I clearly looked just now..."
"You probably missed it while you were rummaging," Katsuragi Keima said. "The light is poor in the morning, making it hard to see clearly. It's normal."
Karuizawa stared at the underwear in her hand, her expression shifting from anger to bewilderment, and then to embarrassment. She clutched the underwear, her face turning redder and redder.
"..." She turned around and bowed deeply to her classmates. "I'm sorry! I made a mistake! The underwear wasn't lost; I just didn't find it myself!"
The camp was silent for a second. Then Ike and Sudo both collapsed onto the ground, gasping for air.
"That scared me to death..."
"I told you it wasn't us..."
The other boys let out long sighs of relief, their expressions changing from terror to the luck of a narrow escape. Sato Maya patted her chest: "As long as it's found, as long as it's found." Sakura Airi peeked out from behind Kushida and whispered something. Kushida nodded with a smile.
Horikita Suzune stood outside the crowd, watching this scene with a slight frown. She glanced at Katsuragi Keima, then at the underwear in Karuizawa's hand, seemingly lost in thought. Something felt off, but she said nothing.
"Alright," Katsuragi Keima said. "It's time to set off. Shall we prepare to occupy the spot?"
"Right, right, right!" Sato Maya was the first to react. "Time to go! Pack your things quickly!"
The crowd began to disperse. Ike and Sudo helped each other up, their legs still shaking. Sato Maya pulled Sakura Airi to get the water bottles, and Kushida helped Karuizawa re-fold the scattered clothes. Karuizawa stood there, clutching her recovered underwear, her face still red. She stole a glance at Katsuragi Keima and whispered, "Keima-kun, thank you..."
"I didn't do anything; there's no need to thank me."
"..."
"Just look more carefully next time."
Katsuragi Keima flashed a smile at Karuizawa, then walked back to the large tree, sat down again, and picked up his console. The screen lit up, his fingers settled on the buttons, as if
nothing had happened. With ten minutes left before departure, he didn't want to waste a single opportunity to play.
Karuizawa watched his back, her lips moving as if she wanted to say something, but in the end, she just lowered her head and stuffed the underwear back into the bundle. A small smile appeared on her lips as she muttered something under her breath and ran toward her tent.
Ibuki Mio stood on the edge of the crowd, witnessing it all. Her expression remained cold, but her hands were trembling slightly.
'Impossible. Utterly impossible.'
She had personally taken that underwear. This morning before dawn, while everyone was still asleep, she had quietly walked to the place where Karuizawa kept her clothes. She had observed for days and knew Karuizawa habitually kept her laundry in a small bundle outside the tent. The underwear she stole was definitely hers, and just minutes ago, she had hidden it in the nearby bushes.
She had confirmed no one was around. She had confirmed the hiding spot was concealed enough. She had confirmed—
But those panties were now back in Karuizawa's hands.
Ibuki stared at Katsuragi Keima's back, countless thoughts flashing through her mind. Did he take it before she could put it back? Impossible; she had been watching that direction the whole time, and no one had approached the bushes. Then when? How did he do it?
She forced herself to calm down. Maybe... maybe she misremembered the location? Maybe the underwear wasn't found, and the one in Karuizawa's hand was a different pair? She immediately dismissed that thought—impossible, she had taken them with her own hands and hidden them with her own hands; there was no mistake.
She needed to confirm.
Ibuki took a deep breath and slowly walked toward the edge of the camp. Everyone was busy packing, and no one noticed her. She skirted around a tent and stepped behind the bushes. She crouched down. She reached inside. Twigs scratched the back of her hand, but she didn't care. Her hand searched through the thicket, brushing away dead branches, fallen leaves, and gravel.
There was nothing. It was empty. The spot where she had hidden the underwear was completely vacant.
Ibuki's hand froze. She searched deeper, but still found nothing. She turned over the surrounding bushes, cleared the leaves, and moved the stones—nothing, absolutely nothing.
The underwear was gone. She had personally stuffed it in there, and now it was gone.
She crouched behind the bushes, staring at the foliage she had messily turned over, her mind a total blank. Someone had taken it after she hid it and put it back in Karuizawa's bundle. Who?
She tried to recall every second between hiding the underwear and Karuizawa's scream.
After hiding it, she walked back to camp and spoke a few words to Elsie. Then Karuizawa screamed. Only a few minutes had passed in between. During those minutes, everyone was in the camp. Ike was washing his face, Sudo was tying his laces, Sato Maya was combing her hair, Sakura Airi was organizing things, Kushida was talking to Horikita, and Hirata was spacing out in the corner. No one had left the camp; no one had walked toward the bushes.
Then how did the underwear get back?
Crouching behind the bushes, Ibuki felt a chill run down her spine. Something had happened beyond her perception. Something she couldn't see, couldn't imagine, and couldn't understand. She remembered what Katsuragi Keima had just said.
"Maybe it's at the very bottom."
His tone had been so calm, so certain. It wasn't a guess or a consolation, but—he knew. He knew the underwear was there. He knew Karuizawa would find it. He knew everything!
Ibuki stood up, her legs feeling a bit weak. She leaned against a tree trunk and took a deep breath, trying to calm herself.
'Calm down, Ibuki Mio, calm down! There must be a rational explanation. Maybe the underwear accidentally fell out when she hid it, and someone passing by picked it up and put it back. Maybe she misremembered the spot and never hid it there. Maybe...'
She couldn't convince herself. It was pure self-deception.
Katsuragi Keima definitely did something, didn't he? But how on earth did he do it? Wasn't he playing games the entire time?
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