Entering the School

At 7:10 on a quiet morning, Tokyo had yet to fully awaken. The damp chill left behind by the night rain mingled with the city's familiar mix of exhaust fumes and dust. Kazama In stood beneath a slightly weathered bus stop sign, wearing the deep-blue uniform of Advanced Nurturing High School, which fit his tall, straight frame neatly. A simple black backpack hung from his shoulder. A few other boys and girls in equally new uniforms stood nearby, their faces showing the awkwardness and excitement of entering an unfamiliar place, or the lingering traces of sleepiness. They chatted quietly, their eyes drifting now and then toward the end of the road.

Kazama In's gaze, however, was calm as a windless lake. He watched the traffic at the far end of the road, though his eyes seemed to see through the passing metal shells and settle somewhere farther away, somewhere unknown. Advanced Nurturing High School... A completely unfamiliar world. His fingers unconsciously brushed the backpack strap, and the rough texture of the fabric gave him a fleeting sense of reality.

An old bus, belching a faint trail of diesel fumes, lumbered up to the stop and came to a hissing halt. Its doors struggled open.

The crowd began to surge toward the entrance. Kazama In boarded with the flow, moving smoothly and naturally, without a hint of awkward jostling. He paid, turned, and quickly scanned the interior. Most of the seats had already been taken by early-rising students and office workers. Only a few scattered seats remained in the rear half of the bus, along with a window seat near the rear door.

Without the slightest hesitation, he walked straight to the empty window seat. He sat down and placed his backpack on his lap in one efficient motion. A thin layer of morning mist and rain streaks clouded the window, blurring and distorting the streets as they slipped past. He turned his head slightly and let his gaze rest on the shifting light outside, shutting out the faint bustle of the bus. The crisp, new collar of his uniform brushed against his neck, bringing with it a subtle, unfamiliar sense of restraint.

The bus engine roared as it carried its passengers along the city's arteries. The cabin rocked gently with the road. Some passengers rested with their eyes closed, others stared down at their phone screens, and a few gazed blankly out the window. The air held a faint smell of leather, the morning chill, and the warmth of people's bodies.

Two stops later, the doors opened again. A cold morning breeze swept into the bus, and a figure climbed aboard, trembling with every step.

She was an extremely elderly woman. Sparse silver hair was barely held in place by an old black hairnet. She wore a dark, slightly bulky cotton coat, faded from many washes, and her back was so severely hunched that she was almost bent at a right angle.

The veins stood out across the back of her thin hand, mottled with age spots. She clung desperately to the metal handrail by the door, her knuckles whitening with the effort, like a few withered twigs struggling in the cold wind. Her breathing was labored. She raised her cloudy eyes with difficulty, searching the crowded bus for any possible space.

The old woman had stopped not far from Kazama In. Her hunched body looked especially unsteady on the moving bus, swaying slightly with every turn and bump.

Almost at the same time, two voices rang out in the cabin.

One was a clear, pleasant female voice, sweet and concerned without a hint of pretense. It came from a seat in the aisle just ahead of Kazama In. A girl with soft chestnut hair cut in a bob and an exceptionally cute face—Kushida Kikyo—was quickly unfastening her seat belt and leaning forward, a warm, approachable smile blossoming across her face. Her lips parted, and the first few syllables of "Grandma, please take my seat!" came out clearly.

But before her voice had even faded, before her body had moved more than a few centimeters away from the seat—

Kazama In moved.

There was no warning, no hesitation. His movement was as fast as a preset program triggering in an instant. As Kushida Kikyo's offer was still traveling through the air and she had only just begun to rise, Kazama In sprang up from the window seat like a silent shadow!

He stood with utmost efficiency, making no unnecessary movement, not even stirring the hem of his uniform. One moment he had been sitting still, like a statue frozen in place. The next, he was standing steadily in the aisle, directly in front of the elderly woman, who had stumbled as the bus lurched. He formed a silent barrier between her and the crowd.

"Please, take my seat." Kazama In's voice was quiet, almost low, yet it carried with an uncanny clarity, cutting through the bus's noise and the abrupt, interrupted tail end of Kushida Kikyo's offer. His tone was perfectly even, without any deliberate warmth or humility, as though he were simply stating a fact. He looked at no one else, his gaze resting on the old woman's wrinkled face, bewildered and touched with gratitude. He stepped aside slightly, clearing the shortest path to the window seat.

The entire cabin seemed to fall silent for an instant at the sudden change. The air itself seemed to freeze.

Kushida Kikyo's hand stopped midway through unfastening her seat belt. The flawless sweetness of her smile faltered ever so slightly. Her round, kind eyes flashed with surprise, then quickly filled with even brighter, more sincere admiration. Looking at Kazama In's tall, silent profile, she let out a heartfelt exclamation. "Oh! You were so fast! That was amazing!"

The old woman's cloudy eyes were initially bewildered, but she soon understood. Her wrinkled face crumpled into a grateful smile, and she thanked him again and again. "Thank you... Thank you, young man... What a good boy..." She steadied herself against Kazama In's arm, which he had promptly extended to support her, and slowly made her way to the window seat. At last, her hunched body found support. She let out a long sigh of relief.

Kazama In merely gave a slight nod in acknowledgment of her thanks. He glanced at the blond young man seated beside her. The two said little to each other. Kazama In simply watched him, patted his shoulder, then quietly said, "I hope you can use your beauty in places like this, too."

He then turned toward the front of the bus and easily gripped the overhead handrail with one hand, keeping perfectly steady as the vehicle swayed. His gaze returned to the blurred streets outside, as though his swift, windlike gesture had never happened. His expression remained as calm as ever, almost indifferent.

Yet at the edge of his peripheral vision, beyond the swaying passengers, he caught someone watching him.

The gaze came from farther back in the bus. A boy wearing the same Advanced Nurturing High School uniform sat there. He had slightly messy hair, delicate features, and eyes as calm as two unfathomably deep wells, without the slightest ripple or trace of emotion. He sat quietly, as if none of the commotion around him had anything to do with him.

—Ayanokoji Kiyotaka.

Kazama In had no recollection of the name. But just moments ago, when Kazama In had risen to offer his seat as if by reflex, that calm gaze had briefly swept over his extraordinarily fast movement, like a precision probe, then examined his steady stance as he gripped the rail. There was none of Kushida Kikyo's surprise or admiration in that gaze, nor the indifference or approval of the other passengers. It was pure, almost mechanical observation and record-keeping.

The look had lasted only an instant, then vanished. So brief that it could have been mistaken for an illusion.

Kazama In's gaze lingered on the shifting light outside for a moment, then unobtrusively withdrew. He remained silent, like a pillar in the bus. Only the fingers gripping the cold metal rail, the faint tingling from the vehicle's vibrations against his fingertips, reminded him of his present situation. This tiny act of kindness in an ordinary bus seemed to make him feel more inexplicably... uncomfortable than last night's "judgment" in the neon-lit downpour.

The bus pulled up at the stop marked "Advanced Nurturing High School."

Kazama In got off with the crowd. His feet landed on the solid sidewalk, and the cool morning air filled his lungs, dispelling the bus's slightly stuffy atmosphere. Before him stood a massive, imposing metal gate, its heavy bars stretching away in both directions like a cold wall separating the world outside from the world within. Above the gate hung a huge metal sign, its hard surface reflecting the weak morning sunlight.

Advanced Nurturing High School.

The seven characters were bold and powerful, radiating an unquestionable authority and weight. Beyond the gate lay an astonishingly broad, tree-lined avenue. On either side stood towering old trees, pruned to immaculate perfection, like soldiers standing at attention. At the far end of the avenue, modern school buildings with uniform designs and severe lines loomed in the distance, like silent steel beasts occupying the vast campus. An invisible air of strict order pressed down on him.

This was the "battlefield" he would face for the next three years.

Kazama In's gaze remained on the cold sign for a few seconds. There was not a trace of emotion in his ink-black eyes, only an almost instinctive scrutiny. Then he looked away. Unlike the other new students, who stopped to take pictures or gawk excitedly, he simply set off, following the signs and joining the stream of people heading toward the dormitory area.

The dormitories stood deep within the campus, at a suitable distance from the academic buildings. Rows of modern apartment blocks, simply designed and uniformly colored, stood in neat formation. Kazama In quickly found his building and the room assigned to him.

The key slid into the lock with a crisp click. The door opened.

The room was so simple it was almost bare. It had the standard furnishings of a single room: a single bed with a fresh white sheet, a desk, a chair, a built-in wardrobe, and a private bathroom. Nothing else. The walls were clean, off-white, and the floor was pale laminate. The room smelled of new furniture, slightly sharp and artificial.

Kazama In closed the door behind him, shutting out the clamor of the new students in the hallway. He casually placed his black backpack on the desk and quickly scanned the room. Like a hawk sweeping over its territory, he took in every corner and every inch of space, scanning, analyzing, and categorizing it in an instant.

Secure. No blind spots for surveillance. Vent opening was a normal size. The window used a common inward-opening lock, of adequate strength. Escape routes were clear.

The initial assessment was complete in an instant. It was instinct, etched into his bones.

His gaze finally settled on the spotless desktop. A brand-new, unopened cardboard box lay there.

He opened it. Inside was a new smartphone, sleek and simple, its screen black as ink. Beside it lay a thin instruction manual and a card printed with the dormitory's wireless network username and password.

Kazama In picked up the phone. The cold metal edge felt smooth beneath his fingers. He pressed the power button on the side. The screen lit up, its bluish glow illuminating his calm face. After the startup screen, it opened to an extremely simple, heavily customized operating system. Only a handful of apps had been preinstalled: basic contacts, a calendar, a memo app, and a prominent app bearing the Advanced Nurturing school emblem—the student handbook.

He swiped across the screen and opened his contacts. The list was empty. He opened the dial pad and tried entering an extremely familiar encrypted number for an external security contact of the Kazama Family.

A notification appeared on the screen:

[Warning: This device is currently operating on the campus intranet. Access to external public communication networks is prohibited. To request special communication privileges, please contact the Student Guidance Office.]

A line of cold red text, like an invisible chain.

Kazama In's lips pressed together almost imperceptibly, forming the faintest, coldest curve. No external communications? A gilded cage. It seemed this school, which claimed to cultivate elites, wanted far more control over its students than he had expected.

He set the phone on the desk and walked to the door. A medium-sized black hard-shell suitcase stood against the wall. The Kazama Family's driver had delivered it directly that morning. Kazama In pulled it over, laid it flat on the floor, deftly entered the combination, and lifted the lid.

Everything inside had been arranged with meticulous, almost military precision. Several changes of clothes were folded neatly, taking up most of the space. Beneath them, near the edge of the case, lay an inconspicuous, flat black waterproof case.

Kazama In took it out and opened it. There were no weapons or contraband inside, only a few ordinary-looking electronic devices: a tiny multiprotocol wireless network card, about the size of a USB drive; an equally small Bluetooth transceiver; and a custom data cable.

He carried the small devices back to the desk. He connected one end of the custom cable to the charging port of the school-issued phone and plugged the other into the miniature wireless network card. Then he picked up the Bluetooth transceiver and lightly pressed an almost invisible indentation on its side.

A faint hum sounded, and a dim blue light came on at the top of the transceiver.

Kazama In picked up the school phone and swiped and tapped rapidly across the screen. Its glow reflected in his intent eyes like streams of data. He bypassed the usual settings menu, using a complex series of concealed key combinations and gestures to enter the phone's low-level engineering debug mode.

The screen was instantly filled with dense command-line code, scrolling at high speed. Green characters poured down like a waterfall.

His fingers flew across the virtual keyboard, moving so fast they nearly blurred. Each keystroke was precise, imbued with a cold rhythm. He rewrote the low-level communication protocols, bypassed the campus intranet's physical restrictions, used the custom wireless network card as a stepping stone, and employed the Bluetooth transceiver to capture available external public Wi-Fi signals nearby, however weak. Then he simulated and constructed a virtual gateway channel.

Commands appeared one after another, slicing through the system's preset firewall like a scalpel. A virtual route was forcibly carved open in the sea of code.

Time passed in the silent room, accompanied only by the faint tapping of his fingers against the screen.

About three minutes later.

Kazama In entered the final command and lightly swiped the edge of the screen.

The waterfall of green code disappeared at once, and the display returned to the simple, customized home screen.

He opened the dial pad again and entered the encrypted number.

This time, no red warning appeared. A steady "beep... beep..." sounded in the earpiece as the call waited to connect.

The walls of the cage crumbled in silence.

Kazama In hung up before the call connected, his expression unchanged. He unplugged the cable and the small devices, put them back in the black case, and returned it to its hidden place in the suitcase. The whole process flowed smoothly, as though he had merely performed routine maintenance.

He casually placed the now "liberated" phone on the desk. Its screen was still lit, displaying a clear system notification on the home screen:

Class assignment: Class 1-D. Classroom: Main Building A, 3rd Floor, D-301.

Class D.

Kazama In's gaze paused on the letter for a moment. According to Advanced Nurturing High School's public claims, classes ranked from A to D, apparently forming some kind of evaluation system. Class D hardly sounded like a gathering place for top students. He did not care about the supposed rankings, but the result carried a subtle hint of irony. The Arbiter, assigned to the "bottom"?

Just as his finger was about to touch the screen to check the student handbook in more detail—

A new message notification appeared at the top of the phone screen without warning.

Sender: [Unknown Number]

Message: [The Ladder must be climbed in person.]

Only seven characters. As concise as possible, with no form of address or unnecessary punctuation.

Kazama In froze. He stared at the message, his ink-black pupils contracting as a pebble fell into a cold, deep pool. His fingertip hovered a few millimeters above the screen.

An unknown number. Yet whoever it was had sent the message at the precise moment he had finished breaking into the phone and seen his class assignment, and the words were so... suggestive.

Kazama Ryunosuke.

It could only be him.

A complicated emotion swept through Kazama In's chest like a current flowing beneath the surface of a cold pool, rippled by a pebble. There was the discomfort of knowing his father was watching him at all times, the understanding that came with the cryptic reminder, and a subtle sting at being seen through so clearly in his uncertainty.

"The Ladder must be climbed in person..."

He repeated the seven words in a low voice, almost too softly to hear himself. His father knew he had been assigned to Class D. The message was both tacit permission—to set aside the identity of the Arbiter for a while and experience all of this—and an unquestionable declaration. He would have to face, understand, and conquer the school's rules himself. Like climbing a ladder, there would be no shortcuts.

There was no anger or resentment. The momentary stir in Kazama In's eyes quickly subsided, returning to the stillness of a deep pool. Yet beneath that calm, something seemed to have been kindled: a restrained but unmistakable sharpness.

He looked away from the message without deleting it. His finger fell, and the phone screen went dark. The bluish glow vanished, leaving only the cool morning light filtering in through the window.

It was time to go to class.

Kazama In turned and left without another glance at the room. His black suitcase stood silently by the door, like a quiet full stop marking the beginning of a new life.

The new students' noisy voices still echoed through the hallway, filled with youthful restlessness and anticipation of the unknown. Kazama In's steps were steady and silent. His deep-blue uniform disappeared into the light and shadows of the corridor as he headed toward Main Building A. The path ahead was a new ladder. And the Arbiter's gaze had already turned toward his first "battlefield"—Class 1-D.