Now when Ranran was groomed as 'The Fox', since the age of 3, one of the rules when it comes to consoling their clients was 'no coddle'.

So the one thing to console a depressed person is 'talk'.

However, based on experience, Shinichi ain't the kind to open up. This was evident since, in a future biography interview from the projector, he rarely does. Even as he was 17 and was poisoned to be shrunk into a 7-year-old little boy with this fake name Edogawa Conan thanks to two shady men in black, he never told Ran for 5 months plus or so and continued to live quietly under Ran's dad's place.

Yes, Ranran was stumped when she was listening to this interview, who knew medical science must have reached new heights 11 years into the future? To shrink a 17-year-old teenage boy into a kid...man, it takes a psycho to do this sort of thing. Then again, when she was 3, 'The Boy' taught her how to mix poisons and was able to get away with all sorts of shenanigans that baffled doctors in real life, so it's probably not surprising now she thinks of it.

Anyway, when Ranran was listening to the details, she learned that Shinichi who was shrunken as Conan pretended to masquerade as Ran's little adopted brother under the Kogoro detective agency. There, he remains very tightlipped about his secret identity to prevent anyone from knowing about this while bringing the organisation down.

Even though Ran admitted to him as 'Conan' that she had a crush on Shinichi, he never revealed it right until he got his body back. Whatever he was dealing with emotion-wise, he always kept it with him. In a way, similar to Ranran, it's rare for him to ever open up until he felt like it. And she can't blame him, given that 1st birthday party incident he had, it would be very difficult to trust anyone, especially with famous parents where every single opportunistic bastard is out to befriend him for that.

Now she could've used the method Ran used in the future, forcing him to open up by being annoying, which usually works for Shinichi because he had no other choice but to confront it. But Ranran never believed those methods are the way to heal the heart of an emotionally wounded person.

Cause in real life, it gave the opposite effect, at one point, almost push children like Shinichi to suicide in her old school while the annoying bugger gets to live another day without consequences, being surrounded by other children sympathizing for being 'nice' to the depressed person, while the depressor is labelled 'evil'.

So her job as his mentor isn't to force him to open up, it's something else entirely. Her job is to guide him to the answers he knew deep down all along, but dreads to face it. Don't get her wrong, she isn't doing this out of sympathy, but to keep his mental state back to manageable for the stakeout tonight.

After that stakeout ended in failure, and him having realized that his own past being the real reason for the failure, it was evident Shinichi was feeling guilty and sad now. Not because he failed due to inexperience, but rather, he couldn't manage Ran and Sonoko who is standing in the way of his dream. But above all, failed to notice Mamiko had been eyeing on him all this time, and that she framed his mentor because of her obsession looming over him. In a way, he felt like he deserve whatever punishment he deems fit for calling Ranran a 'bastard'.

Heading to the recently newly installed mini-fridge in their 2nd association, Shinichi could hear Ranran doing something to the fridge. Before he knew it, he felt a cold sensation freezing his face, resulting in him lifting his head as he backed out to see what was the source.

To his surprise, he sees his mentor shaking a can of Ice Lemon tea.

His will broke when he look her in the eyes. "Drink this, that is how I deal with such feelings."

Placing the can before him on the table, he quietly flip the latch before drinking the tea as Ranran took a seat next to him. And he gulps it as if a man would drink his sorrows away with a bottle of alcohol. Ranran meanwhile just observed him from a distance.

Future 21st-century Sherlock Holmes of Japan...I wonder if he had known of this in the future, but kept brushing it off and remain ignorant, lying to himself that everything was fine? Since they are after all...his friends?

At some point, he drank so fast that he started to choke on the drink, so Ranran pats his back to clear up whatever was blocking his windpipe while he wipes whatever he splutters around his mouth with his sleeve, while she told him to drink carefully.

As soon as he cleared his throat, he continued to drink but with caution.

Leaning against the chair while tilting, Ranran began to talk about her past, "You know...my mentor...he used to do that."

"Hmph?" He gave her a side glance while drinking it.

"Hand me a cold sweet drink by chilling it on my face, when I can't handle the emotional burdens of the cases I worked on," Ranran thinks of this in solitude, watching the rain together with Shinichi as she went on, "I never knew...why the drink tasted good when it was with 'him'. He got it from a vending machine, you know? I only know it as cold and sweet."

Now that Ranran thought about it, staring at Shinichi reminded her of her old self back then.

"Until he passed away...when I bought it myself, it still feels sweet, but colder. It was winter after all when it happened." Her eyes hardened as she thought of it, "Even after becoming The Fox here, I cannot understand how he knows this soothes me one way or another."

That's right, even when Ranran went through the video content, there was no reveal that said the future Ranran needed a cold drink to calm down her unsettled thoughts.

"Another funny thing was...'he' never forced me to open up, you know? 'He' always waited till I said it. I wish back then I had that amount of patience like he did, cause back then...being 3 or 4 and all so temperamental, there was no way I can ever reach that level of tolerance like 'he' did."Ranran had a deep air of regret. "I felt very lacking whenever I compared myself to him in this aspect, felt like I dragged him down."

The storm flash back and forth, clapping loudly outside the skies, but the two had no fear when it came to that.

"A year into becoming 'The Fox'...I bought a drink because it was summer, but the drinks in the fridge sold out completely in this convenience store, so the ones that remained on the shelves were all I had. As soon as I drank it, it felt bland...then I knew why." Without looking at her apprentice who recently finished the drink, she chuckled bitterly, "My mentor is at times a philosophical kid, what he was trying to tell me this whole time was: When it comes to canned drinks, not putting it in the fridge would make you miss out the sweetness. Similar to real life..."

Looking up to the clouds, she ended it with, "In life, sometimes the way to obtain sweetness is to confront the coldest and the cruelness of situations head on, otherwise like this lemon tea...it would be nothing but bland."

Shinichi's eyes grew big at his mentor's choice of words, amazed at that observation of hers.

At the same time, however, it dawned on him that this story wasn't just solely about her and 'The Boy', but it was also about...what happened earlier.

Ranran is right, what happened to him was by far the cruellest in any shape or form. Even so, the one good thing that came out of this was Tantei Association and someone of the same age as him to talk about detective stuff and do proper case-solving. In a way, this was bittersweet, he lost friends he thought he could count on, and he still has to deal with Mouri Ran, but he is living the dream now with a better friend so to speak.

Finally having got through his senses, she stood up before announcing to him, "Remember the case we are going to handle soon. It's ok to be sad and angry about it, but don't let it overpower you. If you can balance that out...at least it makes you decent than those blithering idiots."

Again her British accent let slipped when she mentioned the word 'blithering' in English.

"You...are not going to tell me to forget it? Or that this is childish? Or man up? Or even put aside any of this while working?" Shinichi found himself saying.

"No," Ranran shook her head at him, "You had every right to feel that way. Also, who told you such nonsense? All of those things are bloody abnormal."

"A-abnormal?!" He stuttered. Shinichi didn't have the heart to tell her it came from their Ran and Sonoko since her hatred for them was obvious, but what if he bring up their grandparents? They did say something like this before, "It was from our grandparents, they say this is normal."

"Hah!" Ranran mocked rolling her eyes at that thought, "That is pure nonsense! It's like telling one to remain silent for all the wrongdoings inflicted on us in life! Idiots relish on our silence to control the other." Ranran huffed before wondering, "Are they punching bags in a past life?"

"EH!?" Shinichi almost jerked out of his seat, "Punching bags?!"

"Just accept all of the beatings like a fool." Then Ranran gave a deep thought about it before shaking her head, "No, more like an Inflatable Tumbler Doll."

"An Inflatable Tumbler Doll?!"

"Just google it. Picture those dolls as our grandparents, while the people who punch them represent 'normal'."

In a way, he didn't know what to think of this.

But then gradually after googling on his smartphone and viewing results of people punching such dolls, to remain defiant and bounce back, he burst out laughing at Ranran's words. He was laughing so hard that tears were forming in his eyes and he was clutching his stomach in a desperate attempt to stop laughing.

When he finally managed to calm himself down, he looked up to see a beaming Ranran.

And as if the sad atmosphere finally ended, the rain finally stopped outside. Suddenly, he felt much better while grateful for Ranran's words. Shinichi is glad that he had listened to his dad, otherwise, he could foresee himself acting pretty arrogant that he would be the only successful youngest detective in the history of Japan. Before, he was unfair to Ranran in many ways.

Looking back, all of the false things that were spoken about Ranran were due to Mamiko's delusional love for him. Now that he thought about it, why did she scheme this far to go after Ranran?

Mamiko's main motive was to woo Shinichi as her romantic interest, so why did she feel the need to go after the granddaughter of the Kudo family? Ranran and Shinichi are in some ways related, so if he were Mamiko, would it not be a no-brainer to try and woo him through Ranran?

At the same time, however, Ranran's relationship with Shinichi is ambiguous to everyone outside the family, so perhaps Mamiko could've mistaken that she was someone the family brought over to marry him, thus, assuming Ranran as a love rival, which is why she was later subjected to all of Mamiko's nonsense. After all, Ranran did frame Shinichi for pushing her down and breaking her leg, so it was obvious Mamiko would be pissed. Adding salt she also framed Amaya, her half-brother.

But the more he thought about it, the more perplexing it was for him.

The first time he came in contact with Mamiko was at the parkour event, and they were more of strangers than remotely close to acquaintance at that time. As they were not that close,  it wouldn't had made sense of her to just go after Ranran for a stranger, would it?

However....the killing spree onto the cats she had been doing behind everyone's back left a bad taste in his mouth. He had watched many murder documentaries about killers, and the dangerous kinds like serial killers show early signs around their age when they started going after weaker animals before transitioning to humans. Whenever one questions their motives, it was often ridiculous.

"I killed her because that person is nice."

"I did it for fun. It really was fun."

"Weak, that idiot is weaker than me. I want them to be reminded of that."

That's right, it is plausible now he think it through. Mamiko had delusional beliefs that Shinichi and her are official, so even if they were strangers, it would make sense for her to do it despite from a logical stand point, it doesn't. The worst part is some of these killers, the smarter ones, had a talent for destroying lives in the worst way possible besides being murdered, and that thought sank deep in Shinichi's head when he realised why Mouri Ran and Suzuki Sonoko were no longer the friends he once knew since kindergarten.

"Perhaps the reason why she did all of this was to isolate me so I would go to her and no one else."

The more he thinks of this, the more he began to clench his fists as suddenly it made sense now. Killers like them do isolate their victims from their love ones to increase dependency, the manipulative ones however would cut everyone he knows around him. The detective dream, now Shinichi believes Mamiko was misusing Ranran's name to strip any form of independence.

As to why Mamiko specifically use Ran and Sonoko...the purpose is to establish a common hate group against the red lip girl so Mamiko would be introduced as his friend, someone he could trust. She already in some way is trustworthy among Ran and Sonoko, so she must be thinking this would lower his guard.

In more ways than one, that makes Mamiko a twisted deceitful sociopath.

Gathering his thoughts, he decided something needed to be done to settle the score once and for all. Shinichi takes a few deep breaths. Ranran half-expected him to be a little nervous, but he does not let even the barest hint of emotion flit across his face. He was tired of returning to see his past haunting him. Time to stop pretending to be one.

"Tonight's stakeout at the gallery, if that bicycle is still there with a new camera, text me under our private messaging channel and I will do something about it," Shinichi instructed Ranran before he placed the empty can beneath his feet.

"What about the feud?" Ranran's red lips pressed into a smirk, as she finally got her partner back.

Crushing it into a pulp as if the can was Mamiko, he lowered himself to pick up the can.

"Continue to act as if there is still some distance between us, phase 2 of my plan hasn't turned to fruition yet. Right now, let's focus on catching Snake's daughter, as well as those morons who have been scamming the insurance company. As for those kids who have been messing with me...especially where they act like trash...I will empty them out of the association, where trash belonged," Ranran observed him aiming the crushed can be placed at the corner, "Into the bin it goes."

Tossing with accuracy as it land into the bin, Ranran and Shinichi then bumped fists.

......

"Did you hear what happened earlier?"

"Yeah, I heard that Suzuki girl had framed an innocent girl, that Kudo Ranran, to make Shinichi quit pursuing his detective dream so that the idiot marries her off to her best friend!"

"Woah, is this a romantic soap opera in the making like my mother watches all the time!?"

"I kid you not! That did happen when Ranran exposed her. And it was funny, 'cause this morning Ranran was arguing with Shinichi earlier about Ran's nonsense with Sonoko till the video surfaced!"

"I wonder who is the one who sent Ranran the video?"

"Good question, but it must be someone who hates Sonoko perhaps? I mean it did more damage to her."

"Not really, maybe someone knew Sonoko was a vicious little tramp."

"Hey, you think now that everyone knows Mamiko told Sonoko to do it, I wonder if Ran is also behind it?"

"Hah?"

"Think about it, Ran has more to gain if the plan succeeded, right?"

"Oh yeah, now that made sense."

"Now I am thinking about this, I wonder what is Amaya's relations to Mamiko."

"Eh?"

"I mean the bicycle everyone was talking about earlier, how come Mamiko had access to it to plant a camera and record their stakeout? Also, how did she know about the stakeout when Ranran and Shinichi specifically told everyone to keep quiet? I can only assume the answer was simple: Ran was the one behind it. Or maybe Mamiko and Amaya are secretly boyfriend girlfriends."

Damn those idiots, Suzuki couldn't help but mutter to herself as she head to the classroom to collect her rondesu bag, with almost every single child pointing fingers at her ruined reputation while whispering among themselves, she has become the poster child of a real 'minion of a villainess' in those romantic dramas. Supposedly Sonoko should've headed home after finishing drama club, but after hearing how Shinichi made her cry when she spotted her alone in their classroom, she left her bag and hurried over to confront them, without the foresight that Ranran had basically UNO reverse everything.

Don't they have a life of their own instead of gossiping about me and Ran!?

Sonoko had the urge to yell at them, even slap them if that was even an option. But she knew better that as a gossip queen, violence only will incite their beliefs that whatever Ranran and Shinichi said was the truth.

Then again, it wasn't a lie either-way. The video was not staged or edited, she knew this better than anyone because Sonoko herself was there. She didn't know she was being recorded back then, at that time, with all of the etiquette class going on because of a grave mistake her parents allegedly claimed that Sonoko was truly at fault, and with the girls in those classes calling her out as 'a peasant', she felt very much alone and only Mamiko was willing to lend her ear.

Ran is even to this day, her best friend, but as a daughter of a rich family, she felt like she didn't want to burden her feelings onto Ran, who was at that time having a tough time with her parents' separation, which is why she shared it with Mamiko. Oh yes, the friendship lasted till now. And never once Sonoko doubted Mamiko, her friend, would be secretly recording her when she made this suggestion. Mamiko was the only one who defended her from those idiot girls after all.

That was until today.

For friendship's sake, Sonoko thought of keeping things quiet to confront Mamiko later on. Surely Mamiko was innocent in all of this, and she never had any malicious intentions when she suggested to Sonoko she should do this to Shinichi. But with Shinichi's outrage over the fact that Sonoko allegedly 'framed' Ranran, it was times like this that Sonoko needed to confront the truth.

But Mamiko isn't around at that moment, since her class is on a school exchange trip for over a week, so even that wasn't an option. She couldn't even contact her over the smartphone for some reason, as Sonoko recalled the trip was in a rural area where the phone signal is rather weak.

The further she walked to the hallway aimlessly, the more she began to question about the video. Why did it exist in the first place? What was Mamiko's intention when she recorded this without telling her? Suddenly, it felt like the Mamiko she assumed to be kind, gentle, who had a sisterly figure image who looks out for the younger ones...that image collapse overnight to the video.

But that was nothing, compared to Ranran's reaction during the argument.

Her eyes... every time it lay on Sonoko, it was intense hatred, resentment and disgust.

Initially, Suzuki assumed that she saw Mouri Ran as a threat to the association, a rival that will steal Shinichi back away from Ranran. It was jealousy, Sonoko reasoned this to herself. But now...she isn't that sure anymore.

When Ranran made Sonoko sign the contract where her inheritance would be the penalty fee for the misdeeds Ran had allegedly caused to the association, she thought it was very evil and clearly directed at Ran. Especially the feud this morning when she got word from Ran that Ranran and Shinichi argued over who would be in charge of the stakeout that her best friend's name was brought up, Sonoko was very certain jealousy was the motive.

But then when Ranran confronted her about how meddlesome she was that she prevented Sonoko from explaining herself to her angry and sad apprentice, Sonoko felt the old feelings of suppression, guilt, even the look where she was seen as a 'bad child'...she had not felt this feeling in a long time. Not since she was around 4.

With whispering among everyone, not to mention, a headache from that feeling, she continued to push her way to 1-A.

..............

The first ugly thing she sees was her desk with Japanese writings.

Frowning, getting closer to view the damage, the words became clearer.

She stopped, the rondesu bag that she earlier hung at the hook attached to the desk was on the cold hard ground, her heart seemingly joining it by her feet.

The lettering was an aggressive, carved with blade, yet, the message was clear for all to see.

Go away, you evil minion of Mouri Ran!

Die, you Suzuki witch!

Leave Ranran and Shinichi alone, your murderer!

Get the hell out of our school and don't ever come back!

The longer she stands there, the more uncomfortable she gets. Even her rondesu bag hooked to the table was dumped with mud all over by someone. It was clear everyone thinks that Sonoko is evil, one without redemption all means. With that video going viral, they even think that Ran is behind this besides Mamiko. It was one thing when every learn that she went after Ranran who was innocent.

But to go after Kudo Shinichi, that was another story.

Kudo Shinichi himself is very influential without him realizing in school. Although obnoxious, arrogant and cocky at times, he was likable in his own way. Where his morals about justice, including how devoted he was to locating those missing wallet and bentos is what made children of Teitan Elementary like him as if he was a beloved ideal Hero. In a way, for someone who is born into a wealthy yet famous family, he never once turned down a single of those requests, so that gave everyone the impression he was someone who put other people before him regardless of his background.

When he started becoming Ranran's apprentice, there was initially a mix reaction that Ranran could've manipulated him into this. But then, as days dragged on, they start to realize that Shinichi has...humbled in a good way. Or matured, which is why his popularity soared and they think Ranran is very good influence despite her shady reputation. After all, Ranran's shady reputation only began because of the name calling.

So as soon as all of this blew up in Sonoko's face, it was a no-brainer to decide who the majority was going to the side. There are still kids who admire Shinichi from afar, even as a romantic interest, so for this to blow out of proportion was evident just how influential Shinichi is.

And Sonoko may not be smart, but she could tell the writing on the table wasn't just solely done by one person, but by multiple.

Everything ached in her head but more than that, her heart hurts.

It feels like Sonoko's reputation is being ripped apart by those judgmental eyes. Why is it that the things Ranran did is considered 'justifiable' but what Sonoko did wasn't?

Rather than feeling mad, she thought about who would be so cruel to do all those things on her desk. And how do they know this is her desk?

The more Sonoko thought about it, the more it didn't make sense. She was popular among her grade, but not to a point where kids above her grade would know where she sits.

Could it be...with her eyebrows shot up, she had a clear indication of who did it.

Perhaps...Ranran's friends did it? Reina and Takuma are in the same class as them after all, and they knew where she sits. Maybe they did it as a warning, like in that drama 'Boys over Flower', where they are warning her that Kudo Shinichi will never belong to Mouri Ran. He'll always be Kudo Ranran's.

With that set determination, Sonoko rushed over to confront them in the only place she knew where they would gather.

........

"I'm going to kill those two girls, and neither of you can't stop me," Moriko urged as Reina fixed some tea for both her boyfriend and herself, it was around 5:30pm by this point on and everyone is relaxing to talk what had transpired at the association earlier.

Words travel fast, so Moriko had simply arrived at the office after hearing the commotion the one brain cell heiress had caused to Ranran. She didn't ask questions, but she knew instantly that the only person responsible for Ranran and Shinichi's state was those two idiots.

"You're going to break the tea cup if you keep moving the spoon like that," Takuma uttered from the couch.

"What Sonoko did can't be forgiven, but above all, the damn Mamiko or even Mouri Ran for that matter!" Moriko stated.

"I'm sure there's a logical explan—-" Reina's words cut off as her cousin abruptly turned to face her and shook her head.

"No, don't justify," Takuma growled "Ranran and Shinichi did not deserve this, we know better," the rage in his words was evident.

"With the audacity to even...I have no words." Moriko chugged on the tea as if it could wash out every single misdeed those two girls had done to her saviour, but it just kept on plaguing her head.

"But I think out of all of this, I sympathize with Ranran and Shinichi, especially him, since he must be having the worst day of his life. To think that his own friend would do such heinous things! And poor Ranran...how dare they misuse her name like that! I know she is The Fox, but even so!"

Before her boyfriend could reply, the three could hear the door rapidly being knocked violently, "Reina and Takuma! You both better get out of the damn office and confront me face to face! Unless you both are all cowards!"

"The hell!?" Reina's cousin spluttered her drink a little before peering at the window to see who was the idiot causing the ruckus outside the student council office's door, "What is that idiot girl doing here?"  Moriko asked, pointing at the hazel-haired girl standing outside the office.

Before anyone could respond in puzzled expressions, Sonoko yelled, "I know the both of you trashed my backpack with mud and wrote horrible things on my desk with a knife under Ranran's orders! If you are not a coward, both of you show yourselves!"

"The hell bruh!?" Takuma slams his own drink on the table in anger, "What the hell is she talking about desks and mud?"

"And taking orders!? Who the hell did she think we both are!? Minions of Ranran!?" Even Reina was very pissed off. This idiot is just slinging all sorts of slander onto their friend.

But by far, no one is much more livid than Moriko, who is quietly listening to all of the nonsense Sonoko was brazenly accusing her saviour of. With simmering anger, Takuma sighs, "If I was still a disgraced athlete, the first thing I would do is tackle her head to the ground, cause that is what footballers do. And believe me, she will wish never to do this to us."

"I wish I could do worst to her, unfortunate," Reina's hands curled into a fist, "But I am the head of the student council now. Violence is no longer an option, and usually, Ranran is in charge of that behind the scenes."

"I think I better call her," Takuma brings out his phone before searching for her contact, "This lunatic is already here blaming us for no reason. Ranran will never make us do such things 'cause it felt degrading, and yet, here is that idiot talking crap as if Ranran ordered us around to ruin her life when she ruined it with her own hands."

But then a smile formed on Moriko as an idea lit up in her head, "But I can, right?"

"Hah!?" Heads turned to the actress.

"I don't hold any powerful position in this school besides being an actress, so even if I hurt someone, I will get away with it because everyone in the school is aware that I am a no-nonsense actress." Having stood with her two feet in confidence, she glanced at the two people she held dear, "Wait here, I will take care of their problem. And don't call Ranran, she is already having her hands full with that poor boy."

Before anyone could stop, she slides the door open and before Sonoko could even respond, struck Sonoko in the face, making everyone startled at the actress's calm demeanour.

The slap to the cheek was sudden, but it made Sonoko stop speaking.

With an evident red mark on her face, Moriko questions the embarrassed heiress, "Are you done slinging mud on my cousin and my soon-to-be cousin-in-law?!"

Rubbing her sore face, she cowered a little at Moriko folding her arms.

In drama club, it was evident to everyone that the main leading actress Moriko and the script writer Sonoko has never gotten along. When Moriko joined the club shortly after Ranran removed any shred of possibility that Mamiko can ever hurt her, she and Sonoko often butt heads over the contents of the characters Sonoko write in the plays she produced. She accused Sonoko of romanticizing too many toxic female leads and male leads, while Sonoko casually brush it off as 'just a story', nothing more.

Initially, Sonoko used to say she can never make it with her 'idiotic ideas', but then her acting talent won over the leader of the drama club, and as Moriko flourish further in acting and attracted more fans within their school, it became all too evident that Moriko's influence had surpassed Suzuki, even more so after Ranran exposed Sonoko's role in the house break-in and was stripped out most of her writing abilities in the club.

So her slapping Sonoko made it all too evident to everyone, as painful as it was in many ways...she was truly at the losing end in going after the cunning devious Tantei association's founder.

"You are not satisfied in justifying your actions when it comes to ruining the dream of a person to marry someone off like a housewife, you even went as far as to go after us? All because you naturally assumed Ranran hired us to write names on your table and threw mud on your bag!? When you were the one at fault, to begin with!?"

The non-guilty look in Sonoko's tone really made Moriko more pissed off than ever. "It's not what you think."

"Not what I think? You were the one who went after Shinichi after he cut all ties when you both refuse to believe him." She seethe in anger as Sonoko backed away from her till her back hit the shut window, "Your selfish motive is the reason why you pushed him to Ranran. And if that wasn't bad enough, when you couldn't live with the fact that Shinichi was living a happier life with her, you went on to harass her and him nonstop after opening the damn association! Hell! You even put Ran in there just to endanger the two! Every single day!"

Moriko even went as far as to jab her in the chest, any ounce of confidence in Sonoko deflated like a balloon. "You even went as far as to accuse Ranran of being a thief! That she stole Ran's boyfriend when there was not even an official relationship!" Moriko's words were sharp and direct, Sonoko couldn't tiptoe around the subject.

"I didn't do this to marry him off to Ran, alright?! It ain't that cruel!"Sonoko almost shouted, and took a step forward, wanting to breach the distance between Moriko and herself.

"Oh, so now you are going to brazenly lie now!? Just like what you did to her during the funeral incident!?" Moriko backed off, disgust on her face, and the hazel-haired girl could tell she wasn't believing a word she said.

"Funeral? What is she talking about?" One girl suddenly became curious.

"Oh, so all of you didn't know, huh?" Moriko thought about it before announcing to everyone who was watching this charade, "Listen up people, I have tea to spill!"

"It ain't-"

"It is, and it was something Sonoko didn't want anyone to know," With her firm stance, she informed everyone before pointing a finger at the horrified Suzuki, "During a funeral memorial event that took place at a hotel, the very venue was supposedly booked by the Suzuki family for this girl's birthday." Pacing elegantly in front of everyone, she muses, "Interesting note: The father cancelled the party because the hotel charged them unreasonably due to an increase in price."

As everyone murmured among themselves, the elegant hair girl continued.

"Around the same time, however, Ranran needed a venue for someone dear to her. A deceased child who was around our age was," Satisfied that all attention turned to her, as Ranran's story needed to be told in a dramatic fashion, "Needless to say, her family booked the venue through legal means. But someone like this idiot, who didn't understand this, made a huge scene at that event memorial by accusing her of stealing her birthday party venue out of nothing! Made it all about her, the birthday girl instead of the unfortunate boy who died an untimely death! Do you know how I know? Because I was attending Takuma's dad's birthday party, which was based next door to the memorial event! And you know how sad all of this was?"

With her head held high, she gave a bitter look to everyone, "Ranran never said any of this to anyone, because it was no matter what: 'His day'. She didn't want anyone to know that as soon as it reaches one's ear, it would be all about her. But I am tired...I am tired that my friend's name is being talked crapped about over and over in the name of idiot jealousy!"

The more stares filled with disgust and anger contributed to the suffocating atmosphere Sonoko was feeling, the more she tried to argue, "It's not like that, I'm telling you-"

"So tell me what it is? Tell me! At first, I thought Ranran had it sad, but who knew...even your own friend Kudo Shinichi! You didn't even hesitate to suffocate him! Who do you think you are!? A spoilt little Suzuki princess who can rule over everyone because one is born into a wealthy family!? A princess who can't accept a no...never deserves to be one in the first place!"

"Moriko-"

"No, don't call me that!" Moriko barked at Sonoko, resulting in her close to bursting into tears at her outrage, "I once assumed girls like you who were born with everything were the worst kind but meeting Ranran who was born from such a family changed all of that! I realize after getting to know her that money was never the root of the problem, it's how irresponsible you are that made her so different from you!"

For the first time, Sonoko's knees gave way as her knees met the floor.

With Moriko looking down at her as if she was a pest, she ended her last words while Reina and Takuma were giving a horrifying look Moriko, wondering where did she get all of that bravery, "About the mud on your bag and whatever writings that were on the table, Ranran isn't capable of that."

"E-eh?" Sonoko felt her face wet again in the midst of all the confusion.

"Takuma...when he fell for grace at that time during the scandal, he was bullied through such means that it was traumatizing. So the one thing he made her promise was to not carve writings on desks or muddy anything. And she always keeps her promises when it came to such matters," Looking at her as if she was a vermin, she spat, " I don't expect your friend Ran to ever leave the association because of how stubborn you are, but I don't ever want to see you harass Ranran once more, or else I will do something far worst than slapping! Don't think just because you are the gossip queen of this school, you can overturn the words the way you want them. You are not the only one who had influence."

Not a hint of emotion in her words as she spoke calmly and with a resigned air, she flipped her hair before stating, "I going to drink more tea after all of the telling off, Ranran is going to be all so fussy if she finds out I overused my throat over a vermin."

Heading back into the office, she shut the door and once more, Sonoko was left on her own in the hallway, sobbing over how cruel school is for the first time.