Classroom of the Elite, Oh No, I've Become a Stand-in

[Violence Rules Everything:@I really am not anonymous 6457, I have remembered you. I will dig you out and make you taste what it's like to wish you were dead.]

[I really am not anonymous 6457:@Horikita Manabu, he is threatening to kill me, I'm so scared...]

The beautiful weekend morning at Advanced Nurturing was shattered by a post published on the forum in the middle of the night.

Numerous students accustomed to surfing the web were successfully broken by this earth-shattering and heaven-defying video.

While enjoying the spectacle, they exclaimed that such a genius had emerged at Advanced Nurturing, one who would likely leave a heavy, colorful stroke in the school's history for years to come.

The heated atmosphere of the forum discussion lasted until the afternoon.

The school authorities, who had remained silent from the beginning, suddenly released a new notice on the forum.

[Effective immediately, two new school rules have been added to Advanced Nurturing:

One, it is prohibited to use excrement in any form to attack other students. (This also applies to oneself.)

Two, students are prohibited from playing or causing trouble in the restrooms, and any form of attack against students using the restroom is prohibited.]

[Additionally, regarding the fight between Ryuen Kakeru of Class C and Yamada Albert in the restroom, Ryuen Kakeru, who initiated the conflict, is sentenced to a one-week suspension. Meanwhile, given that Yamada Albert was merely defending himself and, to a certain extent, alerted the school to the deficiencies in the school rules, a verbal warning is issued to student Yamada Albert.]

Ryuen Kakeru had been enrolled for less than a week, yet he had achieved a feat that countless graduates of Class A could not: successfully forcing the school to add new rules—two of them, no less!

Decades from now, people will still remember the Restroom War God and King of Red History who sat at the pinnacle of Advanced Nurturing...

"Hahaha..."

In the cafe, Mikage Touji looked at the school's official announcement, clapping his hands against the table until tears of laughter rolled down his face.

"Laughing so happily..."

Morishita Ran puffed out her cheeks, glanced suspiciously at Mikage Touji's phone, and unable to suppress her curiosity, took out her own phone and clicked on the video.

"Ha... haha..."

Mikage Touji was laughing so hard his head felt like it might fall off, and he hurriedly reached out to cover Morishita Ran's large eyes.

"Children... haha... shouldn't watch this kind of thing, haha... it will dirty your eyes."

He turned his head to look at Yamamura Miki, who was also opening the forum, and added, "The same goes for girls."

"..."

"Mikage Touji, do you like me?" Morishita Ran's flat voice came through.

"Haha—gah!" Mikage Touji was so startled his laughter stopped, and he replied in a split second, "The probability of that is lower than the probability of Shinjō and Daigo never crashing their planes again."

"Then you really are a super pervert, keeping your hand over Morishita-sama's eyes like that." Morishita Ran's voice turned cold, and a biting wind like small knives scraped across his face.

"Cough, cough," realizing the situation, Mikage Touji hurriedly let go of Morishita Ran, whose anger was steadily rising, and said sternly, "In short, this isn't something for you girls to watch, trust me."

"Mm." Yamamura Miki nodded like a chick pecking at rice.

"It's not like you were the one who did it, yet you're laughing so happily..." Morishita Ran put her phone back in her pocket and muttered softly.

The smile on Mikage Touji's face froze for a tenth of a second, and his gaze drifted toward Morishita Ran, who was poking at her parfait with a spoon.

All of this stemmed from a certain person's can of coffee...

Chapter 19: The Popular Swimming Class

The average temperature in Tokyo in early April was around ten degrees Celsius, feeling slightly cold, yet Advanced Nurturing had already begun its swimming curriculum.

Mikage Touji sat by the poolside, leaning back with his hands supporting his weight on the ground, his eyes darting around as he watched the girls of his class. Their bodies, overflowing with the vitality of youth, swam through the pool like fish, and the occasional silvery laughter caused Mikage Touji to let out a blissful sigh.

"That incident with Ryuen, it was you, wasn't it, Mikage-kun?"

While Mikage Touji was wantonly enjoying his youth, Katsuragi Kōhei had silently arrived at his side, arms crossed, staring straight ahead, interrupting his beautiful moment.

"You found out..."

Mikage Touji parried Katsuragi's words, though his gaze remained locked on the small group of girls playing and splashing water at each other in the pool.

"It wasn't hard to guess. The time and location you leaked to me when you called were highly consistent with that video, and since Class C's integration failed, we in Class A were the biggest beneficiaries," Katsuragi Kōhei paused, his voice dropping lower. "If you had explained this to me at the time, I definitely would have rushed over."

"How was it?" Mikage Touji gave Katsuragi Kōhei a thumbs up, showing his porcelain-white teeth with quite a bit of pride. "My masterpiece..."

"It was a bit... well... but I have to admit, it was extremely effective." Even the consistently composed Katsuragi Kōhei couldn't help but crack.

"That's all that matters. Speaking of which..."

Mikage Touji brushed off the restroom incident easily, pinched his chin, and carefully looked Katsuragi Kōhei up and down, who was only wearing swimming trunks.

"I originally thought you just liked shaving your head, but I didn't expect it to be true that you're completely smooth everywhere?"

Katsuragi Kōhei looked down at his own body, not feeling inferior, and said frankly, "You mean this? It's alopecia; my body doesn't grow hair."

"Is that so..." Mikage Touji fell into deep thought.

The students of Class A who had finished changing entered the water one after another, and the water at the edge of the pool spilled over like waves, lapping against Mikage Touji's feet.

"Katsuragi, let me ask you a question."

"Mm... go ahead."

"Do you dry off really quickly when you take a shower?"

"..."

"I, I suppose that's fast..." Katsuragi Kōhei couldn't quite keep up with the way Mikage Touji's mind worked.

"You're bald, so do you wash your head normally?"

"That is necessary."

Katsuragi Kōhei nodded solemnly and earnestly explained to Mikage Touji that a bald head not only needs washing, but also care with facial cleanser and body wash, and one must be mindful of applying sunscreen to their scalp in daily life.

Mikage Touji nodded repeatedly, indicating he had learned something new.

After finishing with a sense of lingering interest, a classmate in the distance waved and called out, so Katsuragi Kōhei said goodbye to Mikage Touji and headed that way.

"Remember to call me for things like this next time; I'll help out," Katsuragi emphasized once more.

"Got it."

After Katsuragi walked away, Mikage Touji silently poked his head out from the edge of the pool and slapped the water.

"I won, Morishita. Remember to treat me later!"

A figure suddenly burst out from the calm water, splashing water all over Mikage Touji's face.

"Hah... hah... hah..."

Morishita Ran gasped for air, her small face flushed red.

"How many minutes?"

"Two minutes and twenty-three seconds."

"Morishita Ran has broken the record!" Morishita Ran raised her hand and cheered loudly.

"Remember to treat me," Mikage Touji emphasized again.

Five minutes ago, Morishita Ran and Mikage Touji had argued about whether Katsuragi actually washed his head on a daily basis.

Morishita Ran believed that since Katsuragi's bald head looked so smooth and didn't get dirty easily, washing it whenever he had time was enough.

Mikage Touji, however, believed that the shorter the hair, the more frequently one had to wash their head, and since he was completely bald, he felt Katsuragi must wash his head every single day.

The final result was self-evident...

"Morishita Ran is a good sport!"

Having completed this challenge, she swam off toward the other side of the pool on her own.

Is getting excited the moment you touch water truly an inherent trait of children? Watching Morishita Ran's retreating figure, Mikage Touji sighed with emotion.

After sitting by the pool for a while longer, a long whistle blew, and Mikage Touji withdrew his gaze.

The physical education teacher in the distance shouted, "Everyone, please come over and assemble."

Following Mashima Tomoya, the second teacher to shatter Mikage Touji's preconceived notions had appeared!

In the assembly line, Mikage Touji looked at those exaggerated, bursting arm muscles and thought with a toothache of the PE teachers from his past life who were always getting sick, and the math teachers who never got sick regardless of the weather and often forcibly elbowed the PE teachers into the hospital.

"Three people in the internship group..." The PE teacher's words seemed to carry a hint of satisfaction.

"Then I will get straight to the point. I will conduct a baseline test on you all in a moment. The fastest student will receive a reward of 5,000 points, while the slowest will stay behind for remedial lessons..."

The PE teacher, who was giving his routine lecture, entered a rambling state, which could be summarized as—

I will put you through rigorous training to ensure you absolutely learn how to swim, so please prepare yourself for a life-or-death struggle.

Mikage Touji broke out in a cold sweat. He did know how to swim...

Just a little bit...

Therefore, once in the water, Mikage Touji, who was in the first group, decisively asked the person in the adjacent lane for help.

"Kito, is there any evil cultivation technique for rapid success that can increase speed by thirty percent in under a minute?"

Kito Hayato in the second lane seemed choked by Mikage Touji's question, and it took a long while before he spat out, "No."

"That's troublesome."

Mikage Touji shrank half his face under the water, staring at the shimmering, fish-scale-like surface as bubbles gurgled up before his eyes.

Could it be that he would have to face his first remedial lesson right here?

"Mikage, isn't there still me to bring up the rear?" A gentle male voice came from the lane on the other side.

The speaker was a rather thin boy named Sanada Kosei, who was polite to others and one of the top students in the class.

"Sanada, do you know how to swim?" Mikage Touji's eyes lit up instantly.

Sanada Kosei: "..."

Your silence is deafening!

The final result was as expected: Mikage Touji took last place in the boys' group with a "great" time of 48 seconds.

In contrast, Kito Hayato next to him showed no mercy; as soon as the whistle blew, he pulled a significant distance away from Mikage Touji, successfully taking first place in the boys' group.

As an aside, the first place in the girls' group was a girl with purple hair. Her long, toned legs slapped the water rhythmically, and her pinkish-white soles rose and fell with the splashing water, a sight that made Mikage Touji feel refreshed and delighted.

After being dismissed, Mikage Touji swam toward the PE teacher's poolside with a dark expression.

Along the way, Morishita Ran glided silkily past his right side using the freestyle, breaststroke, and backstroke respectively.

Mikage Touji felt he had been subjected to silent mockery and decided that from now on, he would rise at the first light of dawn for physical education, vowing to stand tall and strike down the arrogant Morishita Ran!

Upon reaching the poolside, Mikage Touji realized that the girl staying behind to make up the lesson with him was none other than his desk mate.

"Shiraishi, are you not good at swimming either?" Mikage Touji felt a bit more at ease; this was the camaraderie of being in the same trench.

"Because I haven't swum in a long time, I'm not quite used to being in the water suddenly, but," Shiraishi Asuka suddenly exerted force, drifting alongside Mikage Touji with the ripples, "I didn't expect it to be with Mikage-kun. Hehe~ this isn't bad either."

Her pale golden hair brushed against the tip of Mikage Touji's nose, and a faint scent of hair mixed with the unique dampness of the pool permeated his lungs.

"Even though your physical ability isn't exactly poor, it's definitely not great either, to think you'd be in last place..."

As Shiraishi Asuka spoke, she reached out a slender finger and curiously poked the muscles on his body, a strange glint flashing in her eyes.

"Ahem," Mikage Touji couldn't quite keep his composure and shrank back, "It's a technical issue, nothing I can do about it."

"It's alright, I'll be with you." Shiraishi Asuka comforted him softly.

"Shiraishi..."

"But 48 seconds is still a bit too slow, you'll have to work hard." Shiraishi Asuka delivered a fatal blow with a smile.

Mikage Touji, who had just been feeling a bit touched, was instantly drenched in cold water.

"Are you two the ones?" The burly, gorilla-like PE teacher came up behind them, picked up the clipboard, and looked at it, "Mikage Touji and Shiraishi Asuka, one at 48 seconds and one at 58 seconds. Although the speed is a bit slow, it's within the normal range; if you put in the effort, you'll catch up soon."

After speaking, the PE teacher had them swim another lap, began pointing out the errors in their form, and explained small techniques for their respective swimming processes.

It had to be said that the gorilla teacher's teaching level was truly on point. Combined with the impressive senses bolstered by his mental ability, Mikage Touji was swimming quite decently before long, and he could even find time to chat with Shiraishi Asuka in the next lane while swimming.

"To think that even though Shiraishi also clocked in at 58 seconds, you'd mock me for my 48 seconds."

"Is that so?" Shiraishi Asuka said, "Boys and girls are different, you know. Girls can be delicate, but if a boy is too weak, he'll be laughed at."

"Now that you mention it, that—"

Mikage Touji suddenly stopped, re-examining Shiraishi Asuka, who was also chatting with him while swimming.