Author's Note: Two chapters in two days. Well, not really. I wrote this one about six weeks ago but needed to write the previous chapter before I got to this point. I hope you guys like this one. Naoto fans rejoice! She's finally doing something in my story!

Moonlight sporadically pierced the clouds that blanketed the sky, the brief moments of illumination disrupting an otherwise black night. Such moments would allow a traveller to navigate the shadows.

While the light and darkness fought in the sky, Naoto paced in her room. For more than an hour she'd been walking back and forth, and was beginning to wear a crease into the floor

She was tense with worry. In keeping her promise to Yosuke to look out for 'suspicious behavior,' at school, she'd uncovered something that was eating away at her.

After much contemplation, she had resolved to share the information with Narukami. She had attempted to discuss the issue with him afterschool, but the setting was inappropriate. She spent the last few hours reviewing the information over and over in her head. She wanted to make sure she could explain in logically so it would make sense. At last, she picked up her phone, located Narukami in her contacts and hit dial, hoping he wasn't already in bed.

Naoto was relieved when he answered after only two rings.

"Hey Naoto, what's up?" he greeted, sounding fully alert despite the late hour.

"Narukami, are you able to talk?" she answered.

"Um, yeah….oh that's right, you wanted to talk about something after school. What is it?" he recalled.

"Something important," Naoto confirmed, and then went silent.

"Is something wrong?" Yuu questioned.

"You could say that," Naoto began. "I'm fine, don't misunderstand me, but something strange is happening at school."

"Strange? What do you mean?"

"Narukami, do yourself a favour and sit down. I've got a lot to say, and it might be overwhelming and somewhat muddled."

"If you say so," he responded obediently.

"Are you alone?" she asked.

"Um, yeah. I'm by myself in my room," he confirmed.

"Good. Make sure the door is shut and locked."

'Okay," Yuu replied.

"Alright, I'm going to start from the very beginning. A few days ago, Yosuke asked me to watch out for suspicious activity at school. More specifically, he wanted me to keep an eye on that student representative that you had an encounter with last week."

"Yeah, we figured there was something strange going on at student council. All of the clubs keeping getting cancelled for no good reason, even though the student council is pretty well funded," Yuu elaborated.

"That hunch was accurate, to say the least. I told Yosuke I would talk to the representative. I did so the next day, and I was immediately struck by his rudeness. I inquired about the reasons behind the cancellation of student clubs and the spending of student funds, but he was uncooperative. He only offered snide remarks. He wouldn't even tell me his name," Naoto recounted.

"Come to think of it, we don't know his name either," noted Yuu.

"That is not surprising. My conversation with him left me very suspicious that he was hiding something. Naturally, I wanted to investigate further. My first objective was to figure out his identity, so I approached students from different classes with the hopes that someone knew his name. Over and over, I ran into the same dead end. Nobody could confirm that he was in their class, and nobody seemed to know his name. In fact, most students had no idea who I was even talking about."

Naoto paused and drew a deep breath.

"By the end of the day, I had visited every single class, and spoken with dozens of students. As far as I could determine, he isn't actually part of any class at Yasogami High."

"Does that mean he is he skipping class?"

"No. What I mean is that he quite literally doesn't belong to any class. Essentially, he isn't really a student," Naoto clarified. "When this became hard to deny, I decided to see if he had student file, or records of registration. I was able to find a file with his photo attached in the student databank. It seems that he is registered as a student, but he has no homeroom assigned and the school has no records of a birth date, home address or phone number. And of course, there was no name on his file. I only recognized him from his photo."

"How did you get into the school registration databank? Shouldn't that be, you know, under lock and key?" Yuu questioned.

Naoto drew another breath. "Don't worry about that right now. The details are not important. Just know that I have my ways."

Yuu decided not to question the issue any further.

"Anyway, all of this raised alarm bells in my mind. When I looked further into his file, I was astounded to see that his grades are flawless. He has straight A's in everything. And I mean everything, even classes that haven't even been offered over the last few years. I had to ask myself, how does a person who doesn't appear to be part of any class earn the highest grades, by far, in the school?"

Yuu was dumfounded. "I dunno," he replied.

"Well, it all started to come together when I noticed that his file recommended him for a number of scholarships. I investigated these scholarships online, and luckily the websites maintain pictures of the past winners. I scanned through the list of previous winners diligently, and eventually I came across a picture of our mystery representative, holding a gigantic novelty check for $25,000."

"Does that mean we know who he is?" Yuu exclaimed happily.

"Unfortunately, no," Naoto replied. "The photo in question was dated from two year ago, but he is identified as a 3rd year high school student."

"What? Shouldn't that mean he graduated two years ago?" Yuu blasted.

"Exactly," she confirmed. "At that point, I knew his activity was fraudulent, so I thoroughly investigated other scholarships that offer unconditional cash awards and the schools they were awarded to. Within our region, I learned that seventeen schools received a disproportionate amount of scholarship money over the last three years, about seven times more money than the average school. When I examined the registration photos at these schools I found he was registered at them all, but always under a different name. He's registered at multiple schools at once, and at every school his grades are, without exception, flawless."

"So he's stealing scholarship money?" Yuu inquired.

"That's right. My theory is that the schools falsify his registration, inflate his grades to impossibly high standards and then submit his name for giant scholarships. Perhaps the schools are even taking a cut," Naoto explained calmly.

"So, shouldn't you be calling the police, and not me?" Yuu suggested.

"Not yet, Narukami. I'm afraid this conspiracy may go far deeper yet. I'm not ready to expose what I know until I understand the threat more fully."

"What else is there to know?" Yuu pondered.

"Somebody inside the school administration must be aware of this. Someone must be helping falsify his grades, and must have helped him forge his registration documents. The vague way that the records are kept also suggests that they are attempting to shroud their misdoings."

"Who do you think might be helping him?" Yuu asked.

"It's too early to say. It could be teacher. It could be anyone working as part of the administration, such as the principal."

"Well at least we know to keep our guard up," Yuu commented.

"That's the least worrisome part, however. Yosuke also told me that that he and Chie observed the rep meeting with a board member of the Kirijo Group, which owns Junes."

"Yeah, he mentioned that to me too. Do you think Junes has something to do with this?"

"I'm not sure if it's in an official capacity, but I think someone at either Junes or Kirijo is involved. Why else would he meet with some of the higher-ups of a multinational company and be afforded such niceties?"

"I sense you have a hypothesis?"

"Yes, although it is incomplete, and still circumstantial. Whatever their connection, it surely involves the money."

"Would Junes or Kirijo really care about scholarship money? It seems like a lot to us, but they make billions, don't they?"

"Yes. However, if the amount of money he has conned in Inaba is reflective of an average, he has made 1.36 million in the seventeen schools I've linked him to thus far. Given the breadth of the conspiracy, it's reasonable to suspect he is embezzling money from other schools around the country."

"How many schools?"

Naoto paused for a moment to reflect.

"Theoretically? Dozens…hundreds…who knows." she replied.

Yuu nearly gasped as he tried computing the money potentially involved in such an enterprise. Without a calculator, it was pointless.

"It could be tens of millions, hundreds of millions, or more," Naoto replied firmly. "Keep in mind that those numbers are speculative at this point. But for Kirijo to have any use for him, it would need to be a significant figure.

Yuu paused. "There is one thing that doesn't make sense to me. If he is able to receive all of this money because he is the top student on paper, then why is he actually here? Why can't he just exist on paper? Isn't it riskier to have someone acting the part?"

"I considered that as well. My working theory is that he is a 'handler,' making sure the other players involved, like the ones we believe are present in Yasogami High, don't act out of line. I suspect whoever is truly in charge trusts him more than they trust their assets in the school system."

"If he has so much money, why the hell does he draw attention to himself by cancelling all of the student clubs?" Yuu asked with confusion.

"Maybe he's an egomaniacal sociopath. I don't truly have an answer for that part. Maybe he's just sloppy in some respects."

"Do you think he is dangerous?" Yuu asked cautiously.

"Yes, I think he is extremely dangerous. And for that reason, I want you to promise me you will not confront him or tell anyone else what I just told you; especially Yosuke. His family is too involved in Junes. One slip of the tongue could expose us. This information needs to stay between us."

Yuu was silent for a few seconds.

"Yuu, please, promise me," Naoto repeated.

"I promise. I won't do anything drastic and I'll keep my mouth shut," Yuu said resolutely.

"Thank you," Naoto said softly. She then said goodbye and ended the call, tossing her phone onto her desk. She turned to face a dark corner of her room, where the moonlight did not penetrate.

"Why didn't you let him know that you told all this to me already?" a voice called from the dark corner.

"Compartmentalization," Naoto responded.

"Huh?" the voice questioned from the shadows.

"It's a tactic used to prevent compromise of information. The less Narukami knows the better. That way, you won't be at risk if the conspirators realize that Narukami is aware of them. It's for protection. That's why I didn't tell him Kanji," she responded.

"So why did you tell me?" Kanji asked, now emerging from the dark corner.

"Because I need someone nearby that I can trust," she answered.

Well, it looks like the student council is more corrupt than anyone thought. I've been waiting a long time to release this chapter, as it's probably the more important one in terms of plot. I hope my little conspiracy makes sense. As Naoto was saying, it might sound a bit muddled. What do you guys think? Is this just getting silly or is it somewhat believable? Or perhaps I shouldn't be worried about silliness in a fanfiction based on a series about jumping into TV's? Lol, in any case, thanks for reading. It might be a while before the next installment unfortunately. The ideas for future chapters are still pretty rudimentary.