Brief summary of Vol 10

Massive spoilers ahead needless to say. I’m gonna keep this brief but I’ll do my best to answer additional questions in the comment.

After the reveal that Hinami was teaching Fumiya those life lessons just to prove to herself that her way of thinking was correct, Hinami hasn’t been coming to the before school meetings anymore and doesn’t reply to Tomozaki’s messages. When they talk in the classroom they interact normally, but that’s pretty clearly Hinami just keeping up appearances. Also Valentine’s Day happens and while the girls from the main group (Tama, Mimimi, Izumi, Hinami) each give chocolates to all the guys from the group (Tomozaki, Nakamura, Mizusawa, Takei), Kikuchi gives Tomozaki chocolates after school and gets slightly sad upon seeing the chocolates from all the other girls, though they talk this out quickly.

It’s revealed Hinami’s birthday is in March, and the above group minus Hinami decide to take her out for an overnight trip for the express purpose of making her happy. They get her OK on the date and plan the rest as a surprise to her. They break into three groups to prepare presents: Mimimi/Tama, Takei/Izumi/Nakamura, and Mizusawa/Tomozaki/Kikuchi (who is also invited).

Mizusawa brings his group to the karaoke place him and Tomozaki work, where Kikuchi is interrogated by Gumi. At this point Mizusawa reveals to Kikuchi that he likes Hinami and asks for their cooperation. Fumiya decides to reveal to Mizusawa how Hinami was coaching him through life since earlier in the school year, plus all the details about her being the number 2 attafam player in Japan. They decide to make their gift to her an original game.

Everyone throwing the party meets at Tomozaki’s house to discuss stuff. Tomozaki’s sister seems to have really looked up to Izumi since they were on the badminton team together. Tomozaki’s mother and sister are in disbelief that he has a girlfriend. In the discussion, Tomozaki suggests they go to Yontendo world (Nintendo world knock off) playing it off as Hinami recently being interested in gaming.

Tomozaki asks Ashigaru to introduce him to a game creator. There’s negotiation between Tomozaki’s group and the game creator, but eventually through Mizusawa’s negotiation skills there’s an agreement that Tomozaki will advertise some of the guy’s mobile games in exchange for a 2-D shooter (just like the one Hinami got the catchphrase ‘Hexactly!’ from) that’s reskinned with the attafam character Found. Ashigaru is impressed with Mizusawa and gives him his business card. Mizusawa meets with Tomozaki later and says he intends to confess to Hinami again on the trip, which leaves Tomozaki feeling conflicted in a way he doesn’t really understand. Fumiya sets an assignment for himself to have a serious discussion with Hinami about their true goals.

Day of the trip comes and Mizusawa makes an early play by pairing up to sit next to Hinami on the bullet train, cluing in some of the other members of the group, particularly Izumi, to his feelings. Tomozaki sits with Nakamura who talks about how Mizusawa usually doesn’t seem to care that much about people and how it’s nice he’s finding something to actively work for (Hinami). Tomozaki realizes that since both him and Mizusawa are trying to find time to talk with Hinami alone, Mizusawa is sort of his rival. When they arrive at Univerisal Studios Japan (or some knockoff of it for copyright purposes), Mimimi decks Hinami out in an embarrassing amount of birthday pins, and from then on the staff frequently makes big embarrassing displays celebrating her birthday. This includes a prime seat for a haunted mansion ride (combined haunted house and roller coaster type thing), which it turns out Hinami is not great at dealing with. Tomozaki and Hinami start interacting like before when they’re teasing eachother over it.

The group enters Yontendo world and things hit their stride. Hinami and Tomozaki geek out together and the group seems to start to realize that they are way closer than anyone thought. Following this the group takes a small break, when suddenly Tomozaki sees a staff person dressed as Found, at which point he immediately calls for Hinami (in front of Kikuchi). She is clearly excited, but tries to play it cool, and also reveals she’s still a bit salty that Tomozaki changed his main. They all get pictures with Found, Hinami and Fumiya in particular making a pose from the game.

This culminates when everyone goes on a tour type ride in two seater carts. The initial plan is to have couples ride together plus the pairings Tama/Mimimi, Takei/Nobody, and Mizusawa/Hinami thanks to some consideration by Izumi. Kikuchi and Mizusawa, however, decide to get Hinami and Tomozaki into the same boat. This at last gives Hinami and Tomozaki time to talk, and Tomozaki gets Hinami to open up a bit by essentially saying that she’s not that different from everyone else and that everyone is struggling with how to reconcile their internal selves vs external image.

Hinami reveals she had two little sisters. One of them, named Nagisa, had a strong sense of justice and as a result got bullied in her class. This is explicitly pointed out as the reason Hinami took so many pains to get revenge on Erika Turing Tama’s situation, as the circumstances were similar. Nagisa died in a traffic accident, and it haunts Aoi to this day that she doesn’t know if it was an accident or if Nagisa couldn’t take the pressure and committed suicide. Specifically, she says something along the lines of “never knowing the process and only the results” which is a clear contradiction to her philosophy of getting results through her hard work. After this she puts the mask back on and interacts with Tomozaki like she normally does in front of others. When shopping for souvenirs for herself and, according to her “her little sister,” she buys 3 mugs (keep in mind Japanese doesn’t always use a plural form when referring to plural things).

The group goes back to where they’re staying, and Mimimi/Tama reveal their gift is a bunch of the food that they ate with Hinami, remade with Tama’s cooking experience, plus an original cheesecake of Tama’s creation as thanks for advice on the sweets shop matter. Hinami ends up going 15-1 in the game gift from Tomozaki/Mizusawa/Kikuchi, only losing once to Tomozaki. Izumi/Nakamura/Takei’s gift is a video of various people giving their thanks and saying happy birthday, from classmates to club mates to teachers. During this Tomozaki gives a bit of a speech such that only Hinami can hear, essentially saying that even if what she was doing was done with a mask just for her own benefit, for proving her own life philosophy, that it still had a positive impact on those around her. This is similar to something Mizusawa mentioned earlier about how starting with just ‘form’ can still reach someone provided there’s some emotion. The book ends with Minami’s mother and little sister (the alive one) appearing in the video and saying happy birthday. The video itself isn’t over in the book yet though, so it’s sort of a cliffhanger.

I left out some minor moments that didn’t really effect the main plot, such as Tomozaki’s constant thoughts of “We have to protect Tama from Takei,” which he and Mimimi seem to have come to an unspoken agreement about. It’s honestly hilarious. Feel free to ask any questions and I’ll do my best to answer if they’re in the book.