The First Probe of Karuizawa Kei

"Sakura, do you have anything else to do next?" Shangguan Che closed the club brochure and turned his head to ask.

"No, I don't." Sakura Airi shook her head gently, her hair tips swaying slightly with the movement.

"Then come with me to fill out the application for the Soccer Club. I'll treat you to dinner once we're done."

Shangguan Che spoke with ease, but in his heart, he could hear his "personal points" wailing silently inside his phone.

"Okay, but there's no need for you to go to such trouble, Shangguan-san." Sakura waved her hands quickly, her eyes filled with a hint of embarrassment.

"It's fine, it's just a small amount of money." Shangguan Che said it as if it were nothing, but the "points" in his mind were already ranting wildly: "Kid! Look at how much you've spent today! If you keep spending like this, you'll be drinking the northwest wind by the end of the month!"

Just as he was speaking, Shangguan Che caught a glimpse of a familiar figure out of the corner of his eye.

It was Hirata Yosuke, surrounded by a group of girls and shining like a little sun.

His eyes lit up, and he calculated in his heart: "This is a great opportunity to close the distance. Best friend, I'm coming to 'save' you!"

"Sakura, I'm going to go grab someone, wait for me a second." He dropped this sentence and, shouting "Friendship! Bonds!" in his heart, charged toward that "sun."

Shangguan Che grabbed Hirata's arm and, before the other could react, yanked him out of the crowd of girls and dragged him all the way toward the Soccer Club's recruitment booth.

After running only a few steps, he began to pant: "Strange, how long has it been since I last ran? Why am I so weak? Didn't I donate money to improve my physical fitness?"

He subconsciously tapped his phone and saw a system email marked in red, understanding instantly: "Oh~ so the attribute points don't take effect until night, and I can even choose the direction of the increase. This latency is way too high!"

"Shangguan-san? Shangguan-san?" Hirata's voice pulled him back to reality.

"Ah, oh, what's wrong, Hirata?" Shangguan Che stopped in his tracks and scratched his head, feeling a bit awkward.

"Nothing, just saw you spacing out for a moment there." Hirata smiled gently. "By the way, you suddenly dragged me over, is there something you need?"

"Nothing major, I just wanted to fill out the Soccer Club application with you." Shangguan Che said smoothly. "In case there's anything I don't know how to fill out, I can ask you. You don't mind, right?"

"Of course I don't mind, feel free to ask. I'll tell you everything I know!" Hirata's smile remained as warm as the sun.

"Then thank you so much!" Shangguan Che rejoiced inwardly. Plan successful.

"No need to be so polite," Hirata said with a smile. "I didn't expect Shangguan-san to like soccer as well."

"I wouldn't go so far as to say I like it," Shangguan Che waved his hand dismissively, thinking to himself, The main thing is to earn personal points through honors, while saying aloud: "I'm just decent at playing, that's all."

In fact, the application form was very simple; Shangguan Che could have finished it on his own.

But he felt that "since I said I wanted to ask questions, I can't just lie," so he deliberately found a few trivial questions to ask Hirata.

After fussing for a few minutes, the form was finally completed.

He turned his head and saw that Sakura was standing with a few girls led by Karuizawa Kei, clearly waiting for them.

"Shangguan, why did you suddenly drag Hirata away just now?" Karuizawa Kei walked over and glared at him with annoyance.

Shangguan Che was stunned: "Hm? Was the character profile I analyzed earlier wrong? That's impossible, I wrote that setting myself."

He suppressed his doubts and probed: "Um, you're Karuizawa Kei-san, right?"

"Who else would I be?" Karuizawa Kei frowned, her tone carrying a hint of impatience.

"Nothing, I just thought you looked a bit familiar," Shangguan Che said deliberately. "I keep feeling like I've seen you somewhere before. You wouldn't happen to have a twin sister, would you?"

He questioned frantically in his heart: Does she? Does she? If she does, it means my analysis was correct; if she doesn't, then there's something wrong with Karuizawa herself. It can't be that there's something wrong with me, I have to believe in myself!

"No." Karuizawa Kei's tone suddenly weakened, her eyes darting away, not daring to look at Shangguan Che. After saying that, she walked quickly to Hirata's side.

Shangguan Che was dumbfounded: "No way, is there actually something wrong with you? It's only the second day of school, how did the plot get this twisted?"

He took a deep look at the backs of Hirata and Karuizawa, then shook his head: "Forget it, it is what it is. Let's eat first."

He turned around and smiled at Sakura: "Let's go, Sakura, let's go get dinner. I promised I'd treat you!"

That night, Shangguan Che used his "Clairvoyance" function to check the dormitory addresses of the four students he intended to help.

He comforted himself in his heart: "This is a necessary precaution to prevent accidents; it's definitely not because I want to peep at the girls' dormitory! Besides, the boys' and girls' dorms are in the same building, and the system automatically censors areas I'm not allowed to see, so I can't see anything anyway."

The next morning, when the first ray of sunlight shone through the gap in the curtains onto his desk, Shangguan Che sprang up from his bed.

He stretched his arms wide, feeling an unprecedented lightness in his muscles—there was a faint soreness when he flexed his arms, but it wasn't fatigue; it was a sign of being filled with strength.

"It wasn't all for nothing!"

Shangguan Che couldn't help but clench his fist and wave it, remembering the "attribute-point-boosting meal" he had specially made for himself last night.

"Looks like I should make this meal a daily routine. If I keep at it, I'll be able to get rid of this 'weak' constitution sooner or later!"

After washing up, Shangguan Che habitually tapped the system panel and clicked the "Daily Draw" button.

As the wheel on the screen spun rapidly, it finally settled steadily in the "Common Item" area.

The prize was a jet-black retractable gel pen with a smooth body and no extra patterns.

"That's more like it. A plain, ordinary daily life should come with down-to-earth prizes like this."

Shangguan Che smiled as he gripped the pen. The moment his fingertips touched the barrel, the system popped up a notification: "Special item detected. Store in system inventory?"

He was taken aback. The system had never allowed him to store ordinary items like the notebooks or erasers he had encountered before.

"It seems this black pen isn't simple. It's different from all the other items that didn't come from the system."

Shangguan Che decisively chose "Yes." Watching the pen vanish from his palm, he felt a surge of anticipation: "Maybe it will come in handy later on."

After finishing breakfast, Shangguan Che shouldered his backpack and walked into the classroom.

The bell for class had already rung, and the teacher at the podium was explaining mathematical formulas, yet the classroom was not as quiet as one might expect.

A few boys in the back row were whispering with their heads down, and someone was secretly spinning a pen under their desk. Looking around, there were very few people diligently taking notes.

Shangguan Che frowned and silently pulled his notebook and pen out of his backpack.

He had begun his "Respecting the Teacher and Valuing the Way" routine again; even in this unfamiliar school, he couldn't shake his habit of listening attentively in class.

The pen tip glided rapidly across the paper, though he ignored the key points and formula derivations the teacher was reciting.

It's a pity that Chinese and History just refuse to join my "Respecting the Teacher and Valuing the Way" family.

He couldn't help but mutter to himself.

During Chinese class yesterday, the classical literature the teacher discussed was obscure and difficult to understand, causing his mind to wander; History class was even more tedious, with pages full of dates and events that made him dizzy, leaving him with no choice but to rote-learn it in the end.

"If you won't join, then don't." Shangguan Che shrugged, secretly making a resolution:

Wait until the next exam results come out and see if you two still try to isolate me! Once my Math and English grades are out, I'll show you just how serious the consequences of not listening in class can be!

Thinking of this, he straightened his back and became even more diligent in his "Respecting the Teacher and Valuing the Way."