May 1

"Did you want an answer?"

"Huh? What do you mean, an answer?"

"Usually, when you confess to someone, you want to hear their answer, don't you? Whether they accept or reject you."

"Th-then I don't want to hear your answer, Yuto."

"Why?"

"I have a feeling that if you say something like that, it means you're about to reject me. I don't want to hear something that would make me sad."

Amasawa Yuto fell silent.

"If a story ends happily, do you think the journey there matters, Yuto?" Yuki suddenly asked.

"If you could be certain from the start that the journey would end in happiness, I think you could endure whatever happened along the way. But most people either give up early because they can't be sure of the future, or lose to their own inertia on the long road."

"I see." Yuki held her spoon in her mouth as she thought. "Then tell me, could someone know their story was destined to end in sadness and still move forward without hesitation?"

"They'd have to believe in something deeply, like the countless failed rebellions throughout history, whose members sacrificed themselves to bring peace to future generations. Or perhaps they enjoyed the journey itself, like audiences who watched Titanic even though they knew it was a tragedy."

"I see." Yuki nodded thoughtfully, then returned to her usual smile, as if the somber mood had never existed. "About what you said earlier, Yuto, could you hold off on giving me an answer for now?"

"What do you mean, hold off?"

"I want a little time to prepare myself, and I hope you'll think it over before answering, too. If you feel you've made up your mind, you can tell me anytime."

"I promise."

"Thank you, Yuto."

In class on May 1, Class A's homeroom teacher, Mashima Tomoya, stepped up to the podium.

Everyone in Class A had received only 94,000 points that day, and they were all waiting for the teacher to explain why.

"I'm sure you've noticed that the points you received have decreased compared to last month. That's what Katsuragi meant when he talked about our 'lower evaluation.' Now I'll explain the real rules of this school."

He projected a sheet of paper onto the screen. It showed how many points each class had left after one month.

Class A: 940 points

Class B: 920 points

Class C: 460 points

Class D: 0 points

"We're only 20 points away from Class A!"

Everyone in Class B erupted in cheers, and Hoshinomiya-sensei watched them with a smile.

For Hoshinomiya, it was a double blessing. Even better than her own Class B achieving its best result ever was Chabashira Sae's Class D getting a big fat zero.

After work tonight, she'd have to go to a bar and celebrate with a good drink!

Ichinose looked at the gap of just 20 points between her Class B and Class A, and the corners of her mouth lifted without her realizing it. It was everyone's hard work that had kept Class B's results so strong in its second month.

Now Class B was only 20 points away from Class A. That was hardly an insurmountable gulf.

She also had Amasawa to thank. Whatever his original intentions had been, Class B had undeniably benefited.

Should she send him a message to thank him?

Ichinose hesitated. With the gap between Class B and Class A so small, would he mistake it for Class B trying to provoke him?

No, Amasawa wouldn't think that way.

Truthfully, from Ichinose's perspective, she wanted to give Amasawa something tangible in return, such as the 500,000 points he'd helped Class B save.

But her classmates might not agree. They were probably eager to seize Class A's throne while their morale was high.

"For Class C, your first month was quite good. Better than in previous years."

Class C's homeroom teacher, Sakagami Kazuma, smiled. He was slim, with rather gloomy features, so his smiles always seemed a little sinister. But there was no doubt that the expression on his face now was one of relief.

"What's with Class D, anyway? How could they blow through all one thousand points in their very first month? They're such losers!" A few of the girls in the class mercilessly mocked Class D's results.

At their head were Manabe Shiho and Yabu Nanami. Since Shiina Hiyori, the most academically capable girl in the class, kept to herself, Manabe Shiho was currently the leader of the girls in Class C.

It suited her imposing name, too: the nation's treasure.

"Quit laughing, Manabe. If I hadn't kept you in line, would you have skipped class any less than that trash in Class D?"

Ryuen suddenly stood up from his seat. The classroom fell silent, including Manabe Shiho, who had been laughing moments earlier. The moment Ryuen called her by name, she fell quiet, intimidated.

Everyone's eyes turned to the Tyrant.

With his hands in his pockets, Ryuen strolled up to the podium without a care that their homeroom teacher, Sakagami Kazuma, was still there, then plopped himself down on the desk.

He slowly surveyed Class C, like a king looking down on his subjects.

Strangely, despite his blatant disrespect, Sakagami Kazuma didn't say a word. There was even a hint of approval in his eyes.

As long as the class was under control, Sakagami Kazuma didn't care what methods were used. He'd turned a blind eye to Ryuen's violent behavior in class before, too.

He knew that this class, full of bottom-of-the-barrel students, could only stand up to Classes A and B with a ruthless tyrant like Ryuen.

"Sakagami, aren't you going to tell us the breakdown of the deductions?" Ryuen addressed their homeroom teacher by his first name.

"School policy requires that this information remain confidential, Ryuen."

"Hmph. So we're supposed to guess? I was wondering why we hadn't been punished for all the violence and property damage lately. Turns out it was all deducted from our Class Points. How interesting. So as long as you pay with Class Points, you can do things that skirt the rules?"

Ryuen muttered to himself from atop the podium desk. Naturally, no one below dared to speak up.

He was thinking.

So it was the right call to notice how unusually similar the behavior of Classes A and B was, then force this bunch of deadbeats in Class C to behave.

Two weeks after the start of school, Ryuen had noticed that the students in Classes A and B were unusually well-behaved. He'd finally understood what it meant that points represented an evaluation, and had ordered the students in Class C to stay in line.

Otherwise, their points would look even worse now.

But now that he knew the classes had started out with different scores, why were Classes A and B so close? Didn't that mean the school had made a mistake when assigning students to classes?

No, it wasn't that Classes A and B were close. It was that Class B had an unusually high score.

It seemed there might be someone interesting in this year's Class B.

Ryuen flashed a sinister smile. "You all know our goal is Class A. Only by graduating from Class A can you enjoy the privileges that come with it. If you don't want to waste your time here, then climb your way up, one step at a time, you ants."