Some time later...
"Students from each class, please line up in two columns in your designated area. First-year students, please line up according to where your homeroom teachers are standing."
A male voice rang out over the auditorium's speakers. At the sound, most students began lining up of their own accord. The first to move were the students at the far eastern end of the auditorium. Judging by their height and weathered looks, they were probably third-years.
Naturally, the first-years were the slowest. Even with their homeroom teachers giving instructions, they still dragged their feet.
Once the lines had formed, Kamio Tatsuya found himself at the very back for personal reasons. A girl from his class stood to his right. To his left...
There was no one.
What was going on?
That was supposed to be the second-years' line.
There were forty students in Kamio Tatsuya's first-year Class D, twenty boys and twenty girls. Split into two columns, that made twenty rows.
Kamio Tatsuya was at the back, the twentieth person in his column. The number on his right was fine—there were twenty students in all—but the second-year class on his left had only eighteen boys and nineteen girls.
Were three people late? Or had they all come down with food poisoning?
No, that didn't seem likely.
From where Kamio Tatsuya stood, it wasn't just the class next to first-year Class D. Even the classes farther away, all the way to the end of the third-year lines, were short of their full numbers.
A rough count put the missing students at nearly twenty.
There was no way all of them had food poisoning or were late, right?
Something was wrong...
Taking Action
Even after the entrance ceremony ended, Kamio Tatsuya never saw the missing upperclassmen show up.
"If I'd known I could skip the entrance ceremony, I would've gone straight back to the dorm."
"Yeah, lots of the upperclassmen didn't show up."
Hearing the people nearby talking, Kamio Tatsuya was left speechless.
What the hell?
So they hadn't failed to notice that the upperclassmen were missing. They just assumed the absent students hadn't wanted to attend the entrance ceremony?
Looking around, the first-years seemed to accept the upperclassmen's absence without question. No one seemed puzzled by it.
Was I overthinking it?
Kamio Tatsuya felt a little out of step with his first-year classmates.
After the long entrance ceremony, the school announced that students were free to go wherever they wanted. Kamio Tatsuya finally had his chance to act.
To settle the question that had been nagging at him, he chose the simplest, most direct approach: ask an upperclassman. Surely someone from one of those classes would know something.
So, he'd find someone who looked easy to talk to.
Just then, a girl in an unusual uniform happened to pass by him.
She had long orange hair, an orange top, and a sunflower hairpin clipped into her bangs.
All right, you'll do. She seemed approachable, and most importantly, she was pretty.
"Um, excuse me, senpai. Sorry to bother you."
The girl turned toward Kamio Tatsuya in surprise, then pointed at herself in confusion.
"Are you talking to me?"
"Yes, you, pretty senpai." Kamio Tatsuya nodded firmly. "Could I ask you something?"
The girl didn't agree right away. She looked him over first, then spoke.
"You're a first-year, right?"
"That's right. I'm Kamio Tatsuya, from first-year Class D."
"Class D?" The girl sounded a little surprised, but quickly hid it. "I'm Asahina Nazuna from second-year Class A. What did you want to ask, Kamio-kun?"
I can't believe the first person I approached was willing to answer. I'm really lucky.
After a silent moment of gratitude, Kamio Tatsuya asked, "During the entrance ceremony, I noticed that none of the second-year or third-year classes had a full forty students. Do you know why?
"Did they all get food poisoning or something?"
Kamio Tatsuya laughed at his own joke.
Asahina Nazuna laughed when she heard the question.
"Kamio-kun, your powers of observation and your ability to take action are both excellent. Especially your ability to take action."
Kamio Tatsuya wasn't the only one who had noticed the upperclassmen's classes were short on students. But he was the only one who'd gone straight to an upperclassman to ask about it.
That was why Asahina Nazuna praised his initiative.
"The answer's simple. They didn't get food poisoning, and it wasn't some sudden emergency. They left the school. In other words, they dropped out."
"Dropped out?" For the first time, Kamio Tatsuya looked genuinely surprised. "This school has such great facilities. They were willing to leave?"
Asahina Nazuna smiled without answering, as though she didn't want to discuss it any further.
Noticing her expression, Kamio Tatsuya realized something. Perhaps they hadn't dropped out of their own free will.
Then they'd been expelled. Had they broken the school rules?
But could it really be a coincidence that every class had lost students?
"Um, can you tell me why they dropped out?" As he spoke, Kamio Tatsuya checked the time. "It's almost noon, so I could treat you to lunch as thanks for answering my questions."
Kamio Tatsuya had made a good impression on Asahina Nazuna. He was tall and handsome.
Although he was from Class D, the aura around him was nothing like that of the idiots in her own class.
If his approach hadn't been so clumsy, she might have thought he was older than he was.
"Sorry, junior, but Nazuna probably can't have lunch with you."
A male student's voice cut in just as Kamio Tatsuya made his offer.
The student had blond hair and a fairly handsome face, but for some reason, Kamio Tatsuya found him irritating.
Still, he knew his place. He didn't like the guy, but he was new here, so it was better not to make enemies if he could help it.
"Miyabi, have you finished taking care of things with President Horikita?"
Asahina Nazuna turned to greet the boy named Miyabi.
"It was just some routine Student Council reports." The boy named Miyabi smiled, then looked at Kamio Tatsuya. "You've already dug this far into things, even though you only just arrived. You're pretty capable."
"Uh, thank you, senpai."
"You're Kamio Tatsuya, right? I'm Miyabi Nagumo, also from second-year Class A, like Nazuna. As for your question, Nazuna already answered it. We can't tell you anything more for now."
Kamio Tatsuya looked helpless.
"But, Kamio-kun, if you can uncover the truth about this school within a month, I can recommend you for the Student Council."
Miyabi Nagumo smiled.
That left Kamio Tatsuya at a loss.
Uh, what's the benefit of joining the Student Council?
I just want to be a Water-Paddling Fish, quietly slacking off. I don't want to join some organization and start working like a wage slave ahead of schedule!
And that statement was basically telling Kamio Tatsuya straight out: there's something unusual about this school.
In fact, Kamio Tatsuya had already realized there was something unusual about the school, so Nagumo wasn't exactly letting him in on a secret.
"Um, what's the benefit of joining the Student Council?"
"Heh. You'll find out once you join." Miyabi Nagumo smiled mysteriously, then took out his phone. "Let's exchange contact information. I'll be waiting for the day you uncover the truth."
[Quest Accepted: Investigate the truth about the school and report it to Miyabi Nagumo or Asahina Nazuna.] [Quest Reward: System Space extraction +1] [Quest Penalty: None]
Kamio Tatsuya wasn't particularly interested in joining the Student Council, but Miyabi Nagumo clearly wasn't an ordinary person. Getting to know him didn't seem like a bad idea.
As for disliking him—well, there were no eternal enemies, only eternal interests.
And even if they did end up clashing one day, it was better to learn more about him now than to know nothing when that day came.
Think of it as infiltrating the enemy's ranks in advance.
Most importantly, the system had issued a quest!
It was the first quest the system had ever given him. Of course he had to complete it.
So, Kamio Tatsuya took out his phone and exchanged contact information with Miyabi Nagumo.
Then Asahina Nazuna came over and exchanged contact information with Kamio Tatsuya as well. As she put it, how could she not get involved in something so interesting?
Free Food Wasn't So Bad Either
The problem of the missing upperclassmen had been more or less resolved, but it had raised a new question: the truth about this school.
Though, rather than raising a new question, it was more like it had triggered a Side Quest.
Quest: Uncover the truth about this school within one month and report it to Miyabi Nagumo.
Quest Reward: The chance to join the Student Council through Miyabi Nagumo's recommendation.
Kamio Tatsuya's instincts told him that the upperclassmen's Student Council was the key to uncovering the truth. But judging by Nagumo and Asahina's reactions, they'd probably been sworn to secrecy or something.
After thinking it through, he also ruled out the possibility that the two of them were lying to him or messing with him.
As Kamio Tatsuya pondered the problem, he followed the new students to the first-year dormitory.
From the outside, the dormitory looked like a standard apartment building. It was more than ten stories tall, with over a dozen doors on each floor.
There was more than enough room for all 160 students in a year.
The girls entered the building along with the boys, so it was a co-ed dormitory.
But while lining up to complete the check-in process, Kamio Tatsuya noticed that the girls lived on the upper floors, while the boys stayed below.
When it was his turn, Kamio Tatsuya took out his phone, opened his student ID, and followed the dorm supervisor's instructions to place it on the reader on the counter.
"Kamio Tatsuya, first-year Class D, correct?"
The dorm supervisor read out Kamio Tatsuya's name.
"That's right."
After a quick identity check, she took a card from a drawer, tapped away at the reader, and placed it on the counter between them.
"Your dorm room number is 404. The door uses a card lock, so please keep your key card safe. If you lose it or it gets damaged, you can report it to me and get a replacement."
Kamio Tatsuya took the card and inspected it. It was a standard card, the same size as a bank card—a size that seemed to be universal across the world.
From the way she'd just handled it, she'd probably entered the room's information onto the card, turning it into the key to Room 404.
If the information for all the other rooms were entered onto the card, wouldn't it become a master key?
Just to be safe, Kamio Tatsuya asked one more question.
"Um, the spare keys aren't given to anyone besides the room's occupant, right?"
"Under normal circumstances, no. Spare keys are only made when needed."
"When needed—can anyone make one? You don't just hand a spare key to some random stranger, do you?"
This was Japan, after all, and there were plenty of perverts around. Even a school wasn't necessarily safe. A young man had to protect himself when he went out!
"Only the room's occupant or an official school employee can be present when one is made. For example, your homeroom teacher."
I see. That made it quite a bit safer.
After getting that information, Kamio Tatsuya spotted an elevator coming down from upstairs. He took his key card and the dormitory rules booklet from the supervisor and hurried to catch it.
Outside Room 404, he held the key card up to the reader on the doorknob. There was a faint beep, and the door unlocked.
Before you continue