After all, there was a Special Exam every month, but the students in the four classes were completely different from one another.
There was a difference in rank between the classes from the very beginning.
For example, most of the students in Class A were elites, while Class B was made up of outstanding ordinary students. Class C was more like a gathering place for delinquents and troublemakers. As for Class D, it was probably the dumping ground for everyone left over after the others had been picked.
Although Class D was one of the protagonist's classes in the original story, it was bound to have plenty of capable people and oddballs among its students. But there were also some genuinely ridiculous people.
So getting a group like that to work together would take far too much effort.
Still, there were other ways to get points.
He said this because Nakano Yuu's gaze had settled on the black-haired girl ahead of him.
She had ordered just one rice ball, which cost 100 points, and a carton of milk for 140. She'd spent only 240 points on breakfast.
She seemed quite frugal. And she was a brand-new student who had just enrolled.
Nakano Yuu wanted to get his hands on some living expenses.
The school gave students their living expenses, so he could only start with the students themselves.
There was no need to mention the older students. They already knew the rules of the school, so getting points from them would be difficult. The new students, on the other hand, were still green.
And for new students, everyone started with the same 100,000 points for living expenses when they enrolled. Only a month had passed, so there had to be some who hadn't spent all of theirs.
The black-haired girl up ahead, however, was one of the few new students who had plenty of money.
He could tell from the memories he'd read that his five adoptive older sisters were all very beautiful, but even they couldn't quite compare to the black-haired girl in front of him.
She was striking.
Her long black hair fell to her waist, spilling over her back and shoulders. On the right side, she wore a small white ribbon tied into a bow, along with a long, thin braid.
Her waterfall of black hair carried the faint fragrance of lilies—probably the scent of her shampoo.
Long eyelashes, orange eyes as alluring as a fox's, and delicate features.
Yet the cool expression on the girl's face seemed to radiate an air of rejection at all times.
Oh.
That was Horikita Suzune.
The heroine of the world of Classroom of the Elite.
In the original story, this heroine could cook for herself and often picked up free ingredients, so she managed to get by on just over 10,000 points a month.
It was only the 26th, so Horikita should still have over 80,000 points left.
Of course, Nakano Yuu wasn't some awful person who wanted to trick her out of the points she'd saved up. Rather, in the original story, Horikita's points would be wasted on buying Sudo a passing grade after he failed an exam.
In the original story, everyone got the answers to the written exam, but Sudo still failed. He was one point short of passing, so Horikita and the male protagonist spent 100,000 points to buy that point and save him.
You were given the answers and still failed, then made your classmates pay to save you and take responsibility for your mistake. It was downright shameful.
Besides.
It hadn't happened yet, had it? If he made sure Sudo passed, they could save the money.
So he wouldn't feel guilty about taking those points.
P.S.: I've started a new book. Here's the update schedule: 7 a.m. and 11 a.m. (If there are two updates, sometimes a chapter won't be split into parts, so it'll be posted at 11.)
Chapter 3: Horikita, I Want to Sell You Some Soon-to-Expire... Uh, Important Information!
After spotting a rich girl, Nakano finished his breakfast quickly and waited for Horikita to finish hers.
At last.
As Horikita Suzune got up to leave, Nakano Yuu immediately followed her.
"Horikita! Wait a moment."
"I have nothing to wait for, and you're in my way." Horikita Suzune turned around.
She was certainly beautiful, but her attitude was as cold as it had been in the original story.
"I need to talk to you about something," Nakano Yuu said.
"?"
Horikita Suzune paused, then turned all the way around.
"Do you really have to say it? I'm not interested in romance. I only want to study," she said expressionlessly.
So she'd mistaken him stopping her for an attempt to ask her out?
"No." Nakano Yuu immediately denied it. "I'm not pursuing you. Please don't misunderstand."
"Then what is it?" Horikita asked in surprise.
She'd been pestered and confessed to back in middle school, and thought that sort of thing was incredibly stupid. So she'd nearly assumed Nakano Yuu was about to do the same.
"How many points do you have left?" Nakano Yuu asked.
"..." Horikita might not have expected the conversation to change direction so abruptly, but she still answered. "82,400 points."
Hmm.
Nakano-kun nodded.
"I'm out of points. There are only 156 points left in the private account on my Student ID Card," Nakano Yuu said. "That'll probably only buy me a cup of instant noodles."
"..." Horikita.
At that, Horikita Suzune furrowed her brow slightly. "I won't lend you any."
"I'm not asking to borrow money," Nakano Yuu said. "I want to sell you the truth about this school, but you'll have to pay for it."
Nakano Yuu continued, "You have 82,400 points. I won't ask for too much. 80,000 will do."
"..."
She had 82,400 points, and he wanted to take 80,000 of them!
So he wasn't trying to ask her out, but he was trying to scam her out of her money?
Horikita Suzune wasn't pleased.
Considering Horikita Suzune's reputation as an honest person in the original story, Nakano-kun decided to offer some information for free first.
"This school believes in the principle of meritocracy. You heard the Student Council President say that at the opening ceremony when you enrolled, didn't you? The class divisions, A through D, represent the students' ability levels. Most of the students in Class A are elites, while Class B is made up of outstanding ordinary students. Class C is more like a gathering place for delinquents and troublemakers, and Class D is probably the dumping ground for everyone left over after the others had been picked. And you were probably judged to be trash and placed in Class D."
Watching Horikita's expression change, Nakano Yuu continued.
"The rankings of Classes A, B, C, and D can change, too. They fluctuate according to each class's evaluation score. The school assigns every class a score after enrollment. They all start with 1,000 points, and if a class's score rises, its ranking rises as well."
"Now, is this enough to shock you?" Nakano Yuu asked.
How could it not be shocking?
Over the past month, she'd noticed a lot of strange things.
For example, although the school waived tuition and gave every student 100,000 points for living expenses, it also provided free meals and ingredients as a form of humanitarian aid.
Students could take as much as they wanted, as long as they could stand the looks from the people around them.
The school also seemed to leave the students entirely to their own devices. They could daydream in class, play on their phones, and chat without getting scolded. The teachers didn't even assign homework.
Chabashira-sensei, their homeroom teacher, didn't interfere when students were late or skipped class.
The school spoiled its students without restraint. But she'd also noticed that something seemed off about her classmates. A school with such a good environment should have students who matched it. But the students behaved so poorly, and even some of her classmates acted ridiculously and seemed awful, yet the school did nothing to intervene.
That clearly didn't make sense.
So she'd been puzzled about it all month.
And now.
She finally understood. The school wasn't treating its students well; it had already ranked them. Her classmates were so awful because she was in a terrible class. And even if that were all there was to it...
She'd always been an honors student, striving to follow in her excellent older brother's footsteps. Being judged as a poor performer was simply unacceptable.
And now she'd learned that being placed in Class D meant the school had outright judged her to be trash!
Why?
"And with 20 million points, you can transfer to any class you want, including Class A," Nakano Yuu added.
"Then... my athletic ability is good, and my academic performance isn't bad either. I got 94 on the entrance exam, out of a possible 100. Why was I assigned to Class D? Or are the others all that good?" Horikita Suzune asked, her face pale.
"No, no," Nakano Yuu said. "Some students really are very capable, like me, but others are exactly as you've seen—like Ike or Yamauchi. They're ridiculous. The rest aren't very strong either, and some even failed. Your assessment of yourself is off, too. Your academics are good, but you can't get a perfect score. You're athletic, but only compared to ordinary girls. And that's not even considering things like teamwork. Since you don't get along with others, you're basically a zero in that regard."
"The school ranked its students from top to bottom, and you have a major flaw in the school's overall system. So while you think some of your strengths should earn you points, it means your weaknesses are even more serious and have been heavily penalized," Nakano Yuu said. "That's why you got the overall evaluation of 'trash.'"
"???"
"..."
"..." Horikita Suzune.
Horikita Suzune's face grew even paler.
"So, are you shocked enough? If you are, transfer the points to me. That was just the basic information. I'll give you another piece of soon-to-expire... ahem, important information in a bit."
Nakano Yuu took out his phone terminal.
This was the deal he'd made with Horikita Suzune.
She was smart enough to suspect that Nakano Yuu wanted to scam her, so she'd told him to sell her the information first and she'd pay if it was valuable enough.
If it was shocking enough, she'd even pay the full amount.
After all, on the first day of school, their homeroom teacher had told them they could use the points on their Student ID Cards to buy supplies—and, in fact, buy anything at all, as long as they had enough points.
So it was allowed to buy information from Nakano Yuu at the agreed price.
But heaven knew, this was Horikita Suzune's idea. At first, Nakano Yuu had only wanted to scam her out of 80,000 points. But Horikita Suzune seemed ready to hand over everything.
"..." Horikita Suzune pressed her lips together.
"..."
Horikita Suzune bit her lip.
She realized how foolish she'd been. Was this what a meritocratic classroom was like?
"How do I transfer the points?" she asked after two minutes of silence.
"Like this. Scan my QR code," Nakano Yuu said, opening a screen. "Or you can enter my student number."
Beep!
Following Horikita's instructions, Nakano Yuu's balance of Private Points updated at once.
It went from a pitiful 156 points to 82,556.
Meanwhile, Horikita had gone from 82,400 points to zero.
What a well-behaved girl.
Horikita was known in the original story for being extremely unsociable, like a high mountain or a block of ice. It took the male protagonist's constant efforts to soften her up. But now, Nakano Yuu had unexpectedly gained one point of affection from her.
"Even if you're out of money, don't panic," Nakano Yuu said, giving her another piece of information for free. "The school knows this is a meritocratic classroom, and that some students will spend all their points. So they've set out some free daily necessities at the large supermarket. You can go and get them."
"I knew about that at the beginning of the month, but was the school actually taking all this into account?" Horikita Suzune rested her chin on one hand.
Back then, she'd thought the school was spoiling its students too much. Even if they ran out of points, it still offered humanitarian aid.
It was like raising a bunch of freeloaders.
But now, she understood that it really was raising failures—students from classes that had lost the competition between classes.
Only now did she realize how little she knew about the school.
"This school has been around for more than a decade. What hasn't it seen?" Nakano Yuu said.
No, no. You'd only spoken to her for the first time today, then swindled her out of all her money in five minutes. The school had never seen that before.
Horikita felt she'd come across an exception.
Before you continue