Class Points

A month passed in the blink of an eye, and before long, it was time for the points to be distributed again.

There'd probably be quite a bit of new information this time! Hoshino had started to understand how this school worked: students only learned the details of the rules when they triggered them. So today, they should announce how the class points had changed.

Looking at the unchanged number on his phone, Hoshino began to form a suspicion.

He made his way to the classroom at an unhurried pace. Most of the class had already arrived. Hoshino returned to his seat, straightened out his schoolbag, and took out the books he needed for class.

The first period was homeroom. Chabashira-sensei strode briskly to the podium. Her quick footsteps sounded especially hurried, and she held a rolled-up sheet of paper in her hand.

"Chabashira-sensei, this month's points haven't been deposited! Weren't they supposed to be deposited on the first of every month?..." Hoshino vaguely recognized the flippant voice. It seemed to belong to one of Sudo's friends, a boy named Yamauchi. At that moment, he raised his hand to ask the question, looking thoroughly displeased.

"No. Your points were deposited a long time ago!" Chabashira-sensei folded her arms, her face dark and gloomy.

"Huh? But..." Yamauchi tried to hold back his displeasure and looked around at everyone. Quite a few of them looked confused, too, as they pulled out their phones and checked again.

Sitting quietly at his desk, Hoshino refreshed his phone again and again. The result finally became clear. How should he put it? It was both within his expectations and beyond them.

On one hand, Class D had racked up a truly excessive number of violations. Only a few students generally paid attention in class, and being late was commonplace. It would've been strange if they hadn't lost all their points.

On the other hand, people tended to think this way: no matter how badly they did on an exam, few would readily believe they'd get a zero. Before the results came out, Hoshino had expected they'd have at least some points left. Still, this outcome had gone his way.

"Your points were deposited a long time ago! There's no doubt about that, and the school didn't accidentally leave your class out!" Chabashira-sensei's voice dropped. The restrained tone revealed her anger and disdain.

"But they haven't been deposited at all!"

The last of Sudo's three friends challenged her with righteous indignation. His voice set the class murmuring. Hoshino simply stared at his phone in silence, feeling a little helpless. This class really did seem to have little hope.

"Heh. You really are a bunch of fools!" Chabashira-sensei's face was full of mockery and disdain, and her voice was just as scornful.

An uproar broke out beneath the podium.

But Chabashira-sensei ignored it and continued to taunt them. "Between tardiness and absences, you were late or absent 101 times. You chatted during class and secretly played on your phones 441 times. And that's not counting other things, like sleeping in class. You've been incredibly lax, all in a single month! At this school, the entire class's grades and conduct are reflected in the points deposited each month. The result of the review is that you've lost all the 100,000 points you should have received! The points deposited into your accounts this month... are zero!"

As soon as she finished speaking, many students began to look uneasy. "Does that mean we're going to be broke from now on?"

"W-What kind of nonsense is this? I never heard anything about this!"...

"Did you really think that ordinary high school students could spend 100,000 points every month without any restrictions? Anyone with common sense would know that's impossible! Why didn't you look into it? Didn't we tell you on the first day of school? This school judges students by their abilities. In other words, you've been judged to be worthless trash with a score of zero!"

At Chabashira-sensei's words, the entire classroom fell silent. Many students looked utterly shocked, but hardly any seemed to feel remorse.

Hoshino didn't feel anything in particular, but he did find Chabashira-sensei's approach puzzling. It was one thing for her not to give the students any hints beforehand, but these harsh, demoralizing words weren't something one would expect from an ordinary teacher!

The homeroom teacher was supposed to stay with the class for all three years. Normally, a homeroom teacher would be biased toward their class. They would feel disappointed and criticize them.

But Chabashira-sensei acted as though none of it had anything to do with her. She even seemed to deliberately do things to demoralize the students. That really didn't fit with Hoshino's idea of a homeroom teacher who would stay with a class for three years.

Looks like Chabashira-sensei isn't exactly an ally, Hoshino concluded.

He looked back at the podium. Chabashira-sensei unrolled the paper she'd brought and stuck it to the blackboard. It only had a few lines of information on it:

Class Points for the First Year

Class A: 940 points

Class B: 650 points

Class C: 490 points

Class D: 0 points

That zero was hard to miss! Hoshino couldn't help grumbling to himself. It was one thing to hear about it, but seeing it written down beside the other classes made the impact much worse!

"That's right. This is the S System! It reviews students in real time and calculates their scores. Look at that—you've perfectly proven that you're the worst kind of trash!"

Chabashira-sensei pressed a hand against the chart on the blackboard as she revealed information no one had known, and couldn't resist ending with a few more words of mockery.

"But I have to hand it to you. You managed to lose every last point in a single month. This is the first time it's happened in the history of Class D!" Chabashira-sensei clapped, her face full of disdain as she turned up the "heat."

"Sensei, please at least tell us exactly how points are added or deducted!" The most popular boy in the class stood up. He seemed a little hesitant, but his tone was firm.

"Once you enter society, the personnel department won't tell you the details of its evaluations!..."

That was a fair point, and the boy was left speechless.

"These are the points each class currently has! One class point is worth 100 personal points for every student! At the start of the school year, every class was given 1,000 class points. But you've lost every last one..." Chabashira-sensei's expression darkened.

"Um, do we still have a chance to earn more points?" Kushida raised her hand and asked.

"Of course! If your class point total exceeds Class C's by the end, you'll be promoted to Class C, and Class C will be demoted to Class D. Your next opportunity is the midterm exam. You can earn up to 100 class points, depending on your results!" Chabashira-sensei's expression softened a little at the question, but the scorn at the corners of her mouth remained!

"Only 100 points!" "That's so little!"...

Hoshino felt like laughing. Since they'd been placed in Class D, there were bound to be quite a few students with poor academic skills, yet they took it for granted that they'd already won!

Sure enough, Chabashira-sensei unrolled another sheet of paper. This one showed the results of their placement test from last time.

A few students at the very top had excellent scores, but just a little farther down, the results were absolutely awful.

Hoshino's results were generally a little above average, but that still put him in thirteenth place in the class. There really were a few students with exceptionally high academic ability!

After scanning the results, Hoshino noticed something odd: Ayanokoji had scored exactly fifty in every subject!

The proof was in: he was a master at controlling his scores!

Still, Hoshino couldn't quite understand it. Why get exactly fifty in every subject? Was he mocking everyone else, or challenging the limits of their intelligence?

Either way, Hoshino could no longer ignore Ayanokoji's existence.

"Take a look at your test results! They're all garbage. Starting next time, anyone who fails a midterm or final exam will be expelled immediately!"

Chabashira-sensei's blunt words stunned the entire class, though there were a few exceptions.

Hoshino understood now. So that was how they achieved a 100 percent employment rate! This school was kind of messed up!