First of all, thanks for clicking on this book. This is my first time writing one, and I'm doing it purely for fun, so I hope you'll be patient with me.
Please treat anything in this story that doesn't match the original as the author's own interpretation.
If you think what I've written is a pile of junk, I'd like to apologize in advance. I'm sorry for wasting your precious time.
If you think there's something worthwhile here, please keep reading. It'll definitely get more interesting later.
As long as someone's willing to keep reading, I'll keep writing. If nobody does, I'll just entertain myself. ٩(๑•̀ω•́๑)۶
And now, the story:
In a white room, a five-year-old boy jolted awake, clutching his chest and gasping for breath.
"WTF, how can I have heart disease?" the boy asked in astonishment. Then he froze.
"Huh?"
He looked down at his small body and suddenly realized there was a serious problem.
"Holy crap, did I get turned into a kid by some black-clad organization's poison!? Does that mean I'll have to join a detective agency next? Wait, didn't I die? So I've been reincarnated!?"
The boy felt as if he'd touched the truth of the world, but then he grew nervous again. He swallowed, checked between his legs, and let out a relieved breath.
"Good thing I'm still a man."
Sitting on the bed, the boy looked around and realized he was in a completely white room. The bed was white, the walls were white, the alarm clock was white... The longer he stared, the more unsettling it became.
Once he'd calmed down, he grew melancholy. "Sigh... My whole life has been like walking on thin ice..."
He remembered how, as a child, he'd begged his parents to buy him a Kamen Rider toy, only for it to get stolen after just one day. Then, despite having the grades to get into a top medical school, he'd entered the wrong code on his exam application and ended up studying civil engineering. After two and a half years of struggling following graduation, he finally found a job. On his very first day, he'd happily headed to work, dodging a speeding truck, a billboard blown over by the wind, a flowerpot falling from above, and a lunatic swinging a knife at people by the roadside... After surviving eighty-one tribulations and making it to the company entrance, he'd suffered a sudden heart attack and died.
At the thought, two streams of tears rolled down his cheeks. Hadn't he just died from bad luck?
The boy cried harder and harder, rolling around on the bed until he accidentally fell off, which only made him more upset.
"I suffered my whole last life. Can't I enjoy myself in this one?"
Only then did the boy notice a character carved into the side of the bed: "Ying."
The moment he saw it, five years' worth of memories that didn't belong to him came flooding in. He realized he'd been reincarnated in the world of Classroom of the Elite, and that he was a White Room student!
But that left Ying with a dilemma. The White Room's curriculum was pretty harsh. Should he deliberately fail and get sent out, or keep going until he reached his limit? Either choice sounded miserable. If he chose the first, he might have a good life if a nice family took him in. But if no one did, wouldn't he have to enter society at just five years old? If he chose the second, he'd have to get up at six thirty every morning, take a lunch break from one to two, and finish his lessons at ten at night... Actually, that didn't sound so bad?
Comparing it to his high school schedule in his previous life, he decided the White Room's curriculum wasn't as difficult as his original self had thought.
All right, then. He'd stay in the White Room. But there were still plenty of things to think about. For example: should he use his college education to crush the elementary school exams, or just scrape by? Should he be friendly with the others, or remain as cold as his original self?
After careful consideration, Ying came up with his own set of White Room principles. First, he couldn't reveal his true abilities. He'd have to improve gradually until he could no longer hold back, since he didn't want the instructors paying him too much attention. Second, he couldn't show too much emotion in front of others. Finally, he had to give his all during practice. One had to suffer through the worst to become the best.
A blazing fire seemed to ignite in Ying's eyes. This time, he was determined to live a thrilling life!
One day later...
"Sigh... Maybe I should just deliberately fail and struggle to get by out in society." Ying's eyes were dull. The fire had already burned out.
Holding back was easy enough, but living like an emotionless machine all the time was genuinely exhausting. Especially when everyone around him acted the same way. With the pure white room all around them, it was suffocating.
"It's not that I couldn't keep going, but when I think about living like this for ten years, I just lose all motivation." Though Ying was now lying on the bed, utterly dejected, he'd had a rule for living ever since his previous life: once he made a plan, he had to give it his all. That was why his grades had been good enough to get him into a top medical school. He complained, but he was extremely disciplined.
"Why do other reincarnators get ridiculously powerful abilities and overpowered cheat skills? Why don't I have anything after a whole day? If only I had King Crimson and could erase these ten years. Sigh..." After complaining, Ying resigned himself to facing the next day's lessons.
"That's enough for today. Time to sleep!"
The next morning, Ying felt something was wrong. His body didn't seem to be under his control. Half-asleep, he got out of bed, but after taking only a couple of steps, he fell over.
"Ow!"
???
Why did his voice sound so mature? That was when Ying realized he'd grown up overnight. No wonder his body felt out of control—his brain hadn't caught up yet.
He slowly adjusted to his grown-up body, then gradually climbed to his feet. His eyes were level with the alarm clock on the table.
It was six thirty. Normal. But wasn't the year wrong? King Crimson, time erase. Holy crap!!!
Ying really hadn't expected it. His casual complaint yesterday—or what felt like yesterday—had actually come true. So he really did have a special ability, and it was time erasure? But what good was that!? Ten years! He'd erased ten years. Didn't that mean he'd lived ten years less!? Now he really wanted to cry. Where had all that time gone...
"Damn it, give me back my ten years of youth! What a joke! Give them back!" Ying fell to his knees, crying as he pounded the floor. Every so often, he cursed his ability. Even now, he still didn't understand how the time had been erased.
"Knock, knock, knock."
Someone knocked on Ying's door. He hurriedly composed himself, and the door opened. A man in a suit walked in, standing ramrod straight. He wore a smile, but there was no warmth in his eyes.
"Ying, from now on, you'll be Baiye Ying. You can call me Tsukishiro." Tsukishiro's voice was rich and warm, making him seem approachable, but Ying, who knew the original story well, knew this man was a viper adept at disguising himself. Tsukishiro shook Ying's hand and continued, "As one of the few White Room students who managed to endure until now, you've earned our recognition. So you've now been given an opportunity that others dream of: the chance to leave."
Ying pretended to be shocked and showed a hint of anticipation.
Tsukishiro seemed very pleased with Ying's reaction. He raised one finger. "However, there's one task you must complete."
Ying put on a serious expression and stared into Tsukishiro's eyes, waiting for him to continue.
"Next, you'll attend Tokyo Metropolitan Advanced Nurturing High School as an ordinary student. Find a student named Ayanokoji Kiyotaka and get him expelled. In short, you'll be a White Room assassin."
Ying sneered inwardly. They actually wanted him to get Ayanokoji expelled? Hah. He'd never taken a mission of this caliber seriously. Get the protagonist expelled? In their dreams. No way!
Before you continue