Class Trial - IN SESSION

...

Once again we filed out of the elevator and made our way to our podiums. I looked around the mockery of a courtroom and saw two more memorials of the fallen.

Tokuko was alone now, flanked on both sides with faces of the deceased. Those of one of her closest friends in the academy, and the other of one of past blackened. The 'X' over Shuichi's face was in a more cursive looking style. I couldn't imagine how hard it must be for her to only have her crush Kaito and best friend Miyuji being the only ones out of her friends to still be here.

Ryoma's wasn't much different, aside from technically not being held at his true height. Much like during the actual trials it was made at the level he participated at, minus the box he'd have to stand on for it. And seeing that cross over his monochrome face stung me all the more with how impersonal his was compared to the others. Just a harsh blocky 'X', not a trace of his talent or personality to it.

It's almost like his death was meant to happen from the start. I thought to myself.

After the basic explanation, Kaede decided to begin our debate. "First, we need to clarify if Zellium not seeing anything suspicous while, Gonta, Tenko, Kiyo, and Angie were in the Virtual World is related or not."

"T-The killer must've s-snuck past him somehow in the V-Virtual World if that's the c-case." Kokichi theorized.

I listened to the non-stop debate soon after and heard Keebo say the contradiction I was looking for.

"If it wasn't Zellium who noticed anything who else could have noticed?!"

That's a good question. But at the same time there was evidence it might not be his original avatar, wasn't there? I thought.

It's one of the few pieces of evidence for this case that we do have. Could it be a hint that what we found in the Virtual World is all we need?

That would explain why Ryoma's cause of death is unknown, if we don't really need a murder weapon.

But we need to take this one step at a time. If we rush ahead we could slip up.

And if we do that'll be the end of us.

"Why are you asking that, Keebo? Didn't you make it possible for us to change between avatars? How exactly does that work?" I asked him, as I hadn't been able to before.

"Oh. I mean, it's pretty simple. You enter the wardrobe, it brings up the list of all of the avatars I've made, and among those not currently being used you can select one." The robot explained. "Obviously, trading avatars will add your previous one to the list of options, I just wanted to avoid a case like two of us having identical forms. It'd just make things really confusing."

Kokichi was quick to see where I was going with this. "A-And how many avatars d-don't we use anymore? D-Do you have an accurate option?"

"Well, let's see… there's no other version of me, I didn't see any reason to." Keebo started and counted along with his fingers as he went on. "Kiyo has two variants, his original and the 'gender flip'. Angie also has two, the latter with adjustments to how it senses the cold since I had troubles with just updating her original. And Tenko has two as well, she asked me to make a duplicate of hers so she and Ryoma could test the wardrobe while I was still tweaking it. So that's three unused sprites in addition to the 11 of us and Zellium."

"Yup! I actually got Ryoma to play twinsies with me!" Tenko said with a smile before her face fell. "It was nice of him... Zellium was willing to do it too of course! Gonta just thought it'd be a bit too risky so that was a no-go. So Ryoma offered since Angie said she was too busy trying to cheer up the weirdo."

"I didn't do that! I just thought it was a bad idea!" Angie objected. "So what if I was having fun?"

"You were also buried under several supplies at the time." Kiyo snarked.

"I could have gotten her out!" Keebo exclaimed.

"I doubt it. Unless you were willing to work with me to get her out, you wouldn't do much better than I did." The faux anthropologist responded.

"Stuck? I wasn't! There's a lot of fun things to do once the boxes were tipped over." The faux artist insisted.

"You weren't supposed to do that!" The robotic student complained. "I set them up like that for your own safety."

"We're getting sidetracked!" Miyuji interrupted. "Was Angie playing in the decorations before or after the walk along the river?"

That's still losing the point of Kokichi's question though! I thought.

"Before, getting her out of that mess so Keebo wouldn't get stressed out by the bloody havoc she had wrought was one of Ryoma's stated objectives." Tokuko answered.

"Yeah! And the fact that he left Kiyo alone to try and mess up what I was working on was very weird!" Angie agreed.

"That… is not the way I'd describe it." Tenko stated with a wary look on her face as she poked her fingers together.

"It's OK. We all have our own opinions." The dancer responded.

"OK, well, at least that helps give us some sort of timeline. But we're losing the point of Kokichi's question!" I yelled. "And we do have evidence that Zellium did notice suspicious activity."

"What?! But there was nothing else there could be-" Keebo tried to argue.

"Kokichi saw Kiyo's 'gender bend' avatar near the river! Unless the mask and gloves he found in the avatar's pockets was part of how it was designed, Keebo, I think that counts." I argued back.

"I-It was also flat as a board." Kokichi nervously added.

"I can't tell if you're a brave man or a dead man for saying that in front of Kiyo right now." Miyuji joked.

"We're good friends so it's fine." The calligrapher replied.

"So, Keebo? Is that proof enough for you?" Kaede asked.

"I… Yes. But when could he have gotten access to the wardrobe?!"

"It's OK, Keebo, let's just take things one step at a time. Hell, maybe it wasn't even Zellium." Kaito offered.

"If it isn't Zellium then who else could it be? Can avatars just be left lying around, like clothes?" Gonta wondered.

"Well, I didn't think that they could." Keebo said with a troubled expression. "They always disappear when a person logs out. But with how he was still around I don't see how else to explain it."

"Then maybe we should focus on something else for now." I suggested.

I wasn't sure where things went from there with arguments flying back and forth. But eventually, a horrifying truth was revealed once Tokuko confirmed that Gonta seemed to be waiting for her in the salon while she was in the Virtual World.

Gonta was going to try to kill her and use the 'first come, first serve' rule to get away with her death.

Most of us were in shock when this was revealed.

"Look, I'm the Ultimate Disciple. The most powerful of all of Zanza's Disciples. So you guys should've fuckin' expected this to happen at some point. I figured Tokuko was the perfect target for my plan to work since I felt like Miyuji didn't deserve to be her best friend." Gonta explained.

Miyuji now had tears running down her face. "Y-You were willing to kill her so we could stay together?"

The faux entomologist also had tears running down his face as well. "I'm sorry. I thought she was in the way of our love like Murasaki was when she killed Bea in cold blood. I'm sorry to both of you for my murder attempt. The pain of the Killing Titan War still lingers with me, that's all."

Tokuko was also crying just as hard. "If what we know of the war is true. T-Then it's OK if you thought our friendship was in the way of your love."

Needless to say that several of us were crying now. I couldn't help but think to myself as this went on.

I think I know who killed Ryoma now.

Gonta made it clear that he isn't the culprit we're looking for.

The pain of the Killing Titan War still lingers with me too.

So I can understand his motive.

But now I must confront his Disciple friend who's responsible for our suffering here and now.

I wish I didn't have to do this, but they left me with no other choice!

...

Class Trial - INTERMISSION