Marriage Contract

"Hello, Liang."

Just then, a man's voice came from behind.

Turning around instantly, I saw a middle-aged man who looked to be in his forties. He wasn't tall, nor was he particularly burly, and his appearance wasn't the type to easily leave a lasting impression.

But Kitagawa Ryo's pupils still contracted for a moment; he had seen the other person's photo at Chairman Sakayanagi's place.

Ayanokoji Atsuomi, the mastermind behind the White Room, is also Ayanokoji Kiyotaka's biological father.

You can call me teacher.

Seemingly noticing Kitagawa Ryo's momentary confusion, Ayanokoji Atsuomi spoke up with his hands behind his back.

"After all, to all the children here, I am the teacher who Salvation them and educated them, right?"

Despite his turbulent thoughts, Kitagawa Ryo hadn't expected Ayanokoji Atsuomi to make direct contact with him so early, but he still quickly acted in accordance with his current persona.

"... Could you ask them to stop doing this, teacher?"

Pointing at the Fifth Generation still fighting amongst themselves in the room, Kitagawa Ryo naturally revealed a worried and sorrowful expression, enhanced by his talents as a [Thespian] and [Fraudster].

"Hehe."

With a light laugh as if amused, Ayanokoji Atsuomi crouched down and put his hand on Kitagawa Ryo's shoulder, responding to Kitagawa Ryo's words while casting his gaze into the room.

Only two wounded children remained, locked in a fierce standoff.

It happened to be one boy and one girl.

"Actually, the focus of their struggle is you, you know?"

He whispered in Kitagawa Ryo's ear, Ayanokoji Atsuomi observed the situation inside with amusement:

"If we compare the data directly, over 70% of the dozens of rounds of competition we just had were upsets by the underdogs. Human potential is indeed enormous."

"That..."

Just as Kitagawa Ryo was about to speak, Ayanokoji Atsuomi reached out and covered his mouth, coldly reprimanding him as if his expression had suddenly changed:

"Shut up."

"That's what a good child is like."

"You're a lucky one, you know?"

"Judging from the current situation, about thirty test subjects are obsessed with you personally, but this might actually be a bad thing as they grow older."

The fight in the room had come to a conclusion. Under the joint gaze of Kitagawa Ryo and Ayanokoji Atsuomi, the red-haired girl knocked her opponent to the ground with an elbow strike. She searched for a long time on the ground for the hair ties that had come off during the fight, and then picked them up and put them in her pocket.

"Another comeback."

Kitagawa Ryo heard Ayanokoji Atsuomi whistle excitedly, and then a guard who walked in from the side blindfolded him and plugged his ears with a black cloth.

"It's time to wean."

Ayanokoji Atsuomi made this declaration.

"What about the other side? How's the test subject?"

After wiping his hands with a tissue from his assistant, Ayanokoji Atsuomi looked up and asked.

"It has some effect, but not as significant as here."

Knowing that Ayanokoji Atsuomi was asking about the Fourth Generation control group, where Yuki was, the assistant quickly replied.

What is the overall situation of the Fourth Generation?

"The rate at which members of Kiyotaka's team are being eliminated is accelerating year by year. At this rate, he will probably be the only one left in about two years."

"While the control group, including Xue, did show some improvement in terms of overall quality and elimination rate, it did not achieve the outstanding result of zero eliminations like the Fifth Generation."

The assistant shook his head and said:

"Take this fighting competition for example. We only hinted to the Fifth Generation that their individual results would affect Ryo's fate, but in the end, more than 70% of the Fifth Generation achieved upsets against their opponents. Even the one who stood in the end was Ichika, whose physical abilities were not as good as Takuya's."

"However, in the control group of Fourth Generation, only about 30% of the subjects showed strong concern."

"Then let's accelerate the second phase of the plan with the Fourth Generation; it'll also be a good opportunity to test it out for the Fifth Generation."

After listening to the report, Ayanokoji Atsuomi casually waved his hand.

In the Harlow's Monkey Experiment, the baby monkeys consistently showed strong dependence and love for their mothers, even when they might harm them. The White Room was then used to conduct a second variation of this experiment.

[Testing whether the children's potential can be further forced out through actual acts of harm to the 'Cloth' mother]

All it takes is to set up a simple logical trick.

Make them believe that if they fail to achieve a certain goal, they will hurt their mother.

"Actually, we can do one more variation."

Ayanokoji Atsuomi said casually:

"Just let the other party enjoy the same treatment, and make good use of the information gap."

"Yes."

The assistant's heart skipped a beat, and he immediately nodded in agreement.

"Ugh... Ugh..."

The intense nausea and dizziness made it almost impossible for Kitagawa Ryo to stand upright. He leaned against the wall like a drunkard, vomiting repeatedly into the trash can in the corner of the room.

Overwhelmed by sleepiness and the fatigue previously suppressed by medication, Kitagawa Ryo bit his lip hard, hoping to use the pain to stay awake for the time being.

My throat was parched. I wiped my mouth with a tissue, desperately trying to endure the strong effects of the medicine while rinsing my mouth with the remaining half-glass of water in the room.

He tasted the metallic, bloody flavor in his mouth, and the cool night breeze blowing into the room through the window felt sticky on his face. Kitagawa Ryo looked up, and the hanging light bulb cast a large swath of bluish-white light.

The White Room, at this moment, finally revealed its deepest Malice to him.

Although he didn't know what kind of drug he had been injected with, Kitagawa Ryo could clearly feel a strong sense of drug dependence and addiction over the past few days.

Even with his golden talent of perseverance supporting him, Kitagawa Ryo knew that he would eventually succumb to the effects of the drugs.

Not only that, Kitagawa Ryo, who possesses the talent of a [Physician], also clearly understands how much irreversible damage these highly addictive drugs can cause to children. Perhaps in this simulation, he won't even survive as long as the vice-chancellor who was afflicted by [Heavenly Jealousy].

Feeling exhausted and powerless, Kitagawa Ryo swayed and collapsed onto the bed. The quickest thing for him to do now was to end this simulation immediately, since each chapter of the simulation offered five chances, and this was only the second one.

However... we might also be able to use this opportunity to uncover more information.

Kitagawa Ryo gritted his teeth and began to think. Since the White Room had already drugged him, they should feel more at ease with him in the future, and perhaps there would be a chance to get in touch with the more core parts of this place.

If we can find valuable intelligence, it will be absolutely beneficial for both the next simulation and the real world.

After all, even Kitagawa Ryo couldn't guarantee that he would draw the [White Room] talent again.

Just as Kitagawa Ryo was beginning to decide to stay, he heard the door open.

The girl who ran in from outside was Xue, his roommate who had been living with him for more than two years.

Kitagawa Ryo's condition was visibly poor. He had intended to greet him as usual, but soon realized that the other person had already pounced on him first.

This action reminded Kitagawa Ryo of the first time he met the other person, but this time there was no blanket between them, and the temperature of their skin was transmitted almost instantly.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry..."

Xue's face showed a mixture of fear and relief as she apologized profusely.

"I will never do that again, I will never make that mistake again, please forgive me."

She kept apologizing, seemingly to no one in particular.

"Hey, Xue!"

Kitagawa Ryo couldn't help but shout her name loudly.

"I'm fine."

She struggled to break free from the other person's arm and made a sound.

"Cool... cool?"

Her hopeless, deep purple eyes spotted Kitagawa Ryo's presence, and Yuki hugged him, suddenly bursting into tears.

"It's all my fault... I'm so sorry!"

I feel like I've fallen into an information asymmetry trap, but I can still roughly deduce some things.

Like the Fifth Generation, Yuki is also being exploited by the White Room.

She was probably threatened in kind that she would be punished if she did something wrong.

Two years of living together allowed Kitagawa Ryo to understand the other person's personality very well. She was almost an anomaly in the White Room; in a way, she was the one closest to a normal child there.

If the violence had happened to her, the other person wouldn't have even fallen into such self-reproach, which is somewhat similar to Ichinose Honami. But for a child in a White Room, kindness is a quality that has never been possessed or has long since faded, which is why Yuki seems so special.

After finally calming Xue down, Kitagawa Ryo couldn't utter a word to explain. He knew very well that someone was watching him through security cameras, and any unnecessary words could end the simulation.

"It was my own mistake."

"It's not that the cold is the problem; rather, it's fortunate that the cold is here. If I were alone, I definitely wouldn't have been able to make it."

Kitagawa Ryo's heart sank deeper and deeper. Only then did he realize with some horror that the girl he was watching, who was a year older than him but treated like a younger sister, seemed to be drifting further and further away from the way she was at the beginning.

Yuki hugged Kitagawa Ryo tightly, her eyes filled with dependence, like a little animal hiding alone in its den seeing its mother return.

I like it cold the most.

The lines flowed smoothly, as if they had been meticulously crafted.

Kitagawa Ryo, pale-faced, accepted this most unusual Confessions he had ever heard.

Chapter 87: The Marriage Contract

What doesn't last long often ends in tragedy. -- Golding, Lord of the Flies

Sakayanagi Arisu should be arriving soon.

Kitagawa Ryo took a deep breath and tried to calm himself down. Sakayanagi Arisu was a year older than him in this simulation because she was the same age as Ayanokoji Kiyotaka, who was in the Fourth Generation, while he was a member of the Fifth Generation.

Whether in reality or in the previous simulation by Sakayanagi Arisu, Arisu would come to the White Room for the first time with her father when she was seven years old, and see Ayanokoji Kiyotaka through the glass. This was a very important turning point.

Therefore, after celebrating his sixth birthday, Kitagawa Ryo began to pay attention to this matter intentionally.

But the whole process was more difficult than he had imagined. As one of the lowest-ranking test subjects in the entire White Room, even though Kitagawa Ryo occupied an important position in the White Room's current plan, it did not actually improve his treatment.

That's true, at least in the short term.

The only good news now is that through the last simulation, Kitagawa Ryo knows the approximate departure time of Sakayanagi Arisu. However, the accuracy of this time is not very high because Sakayanagi Arisu's own experiences have changed considerably between the two simulations. Her current timeline should be closer to reality than it was in the first simulation.

Besides not being able to determine when Sakayanagi Arisu, Kitagawa Ryo also faced the problem of not being able to contact her.

The test subjects in the White Room are strictly confined to the classroom for training every day, with no free time. Ubiquitous surveillance tracks everyone's whereabouts from all directions, and it is conceivable that the level of vigilance in the White Room will increase on the day the Sakayanagi Family arrives.

Slowly closing his eyes, Kitagawa Ryo did not choose to contact Sakayanagi Arisu in the hope of clearing the game. In fact, what he needed more was someone to break the current predicament and Salvation this cycle that was destined to fall into tragedy.

Without external intervention, this simulation would have ended in far more disastrous consequences than any previous one.

Kitagawa Ryo, who initially hoped to use this opportunity to gather information about the White Room, quickly realized his naiveté. It seemed that the White Room never intended to make much contact with him from the beginning; rather, they hoped that Kitagawa Ryo was a piece of Cloth that could not move or laugh and could only be manipulated by others.

[Harlow's Monkey Experiment] and [Cloth] mother, Kitagawa Ryo finally understood the White Room's role in his life after being forcibly injected with drugs and brainwashed several times.

This can be considered a butterfly effect.

Kitagawa Ryo stared at the [Leader], [Affinity], and [Peerless] talents shining brightly on his personal panel. It was the passive attraction brought by these talents that had inadvertently drawn all the Fifth Generation to the closed environment of the White Room. The White Room, noticing this, reacted quickly and, for the next two years, adopted a method of not stopping him and even subtly encouraging him, which ultimately made him a rather special and rather abnormal existence there.

Deformity.

Unable to help but sigh, Kitagawa Ryo rolled over and stared directly at the dark ceiling.

This is something only White Room can achieve. Kitagawa Ryo never believed that true talent could be cultivated in such an extremely closed environment. Such an environment either completely erases a person's emotions or drives them to the other extreme, making them live with some kind of biased emotion, whether it be hatred or love.

Ayanokoji Kiyotaka's Fourth Generation of students belonged to the former category, while his current Fifth Generation belongs to the latter.

Neither being driven by so-called pure rationality nor by artificially created extreme emotions is normal.

So.

[Marriage Contract: A one-time use item that allows you to enter into Marriage Contract with any character].

Open the item's description again from your personal inventory.