I sneak down the creaky, rusty stairs, trying not to make too much noise, as I survey my surroundings. The walls seem covered with stains from some form of moisture, with bacteria and rust forming on the handrails. I carefully step on each platform of the staircase, trying to see which spot would make the least amount of noise.

As I approach the bottom of the stairwell, I see a hallway with two doors to the right. I peek into the first room and see a table with a video camera. After that room, I go to the next one over. As I peek into the room, I see a table with two holes in it, a flat screen TV, some chairs, and a handwritten note. I take a look at the note. It reads "Hello, Akari," and I discover, to my horror, that this whole place is a trap.

"Hello, Akari." A voice says behind me and I turn around. It's none other than Ikishima Midari, head of the Beautification Council. "It's great to see you." For some reason, it takes me a while to notice the muzzle of a revolver being pointed right at my head. I gasp as I stumble backwards. "I know you want to gamble with me. Everyone in the Student Council knows. I have the lowest amount of money, is that it? Well," she chuckles, "that's going to be a big mistake for you."

My former curiosity and determination is replaced with dread. "You wanna gamble, huh?" Ikishima says loudly, "Let's gamble!"

She directs me with the gun to sit at one of the chair at the end of the table. "This is called the ESP Game. You load in a gun with some bullets, however many you want. Then, you drop the gun into the hole on the table and guess the order of the cards will be as displayed on that flat screen TV. If you get more cards than your opponent, you get to grab a random gun from the hole in the table and pull the trigger at the loser, and don't miss! If you miss, then the loser gets to pull the trigger at you!"

I'm not all that surprised, really. Yumeko was talking about this game before, and how she hated Ikishima's guts afterwards. Ikishima really does want to die from gambling.

"How will I not know you're not cheating?" I yell at Ikishima. "You can easily get signals from the flatscreen TV if your cronies are the ones laying the cards! I bet you already have an agreed upon order."

Ikishima laughs evilly. "Look. If you really want to make sure I'm not cheating, you can call up one of your friends and tell them where this place is. Then, she can place the cards for us. Got it?"

I take my phone out of my pocket and call Mary.

"What do you want," Mary asks with a yawn.

"No time to explain. Turn left of the library and go down the doors into the basement area."

"Hyakkaou doesn't have a base-"

"Just do it! Hurry up!"

"Fine, fine." After a few minutes, Mary comes running into the room with Ikishima pointing a gun at my head. "Ikishima! How come I didn't predict something like this. What game are you going to force us to play?"

"ESP. You deal the cards."

Mary sighs at this, almost as if she's been through something like this with her before.

"Now that we have our impartial dealer," Ikishima says with her signature nasally tone, "let this ESP game begin!"