Supermarket, Chance Encounters, and Surveillance Blind Spots

The school supermarket after classes was livelier than expected.

Orikasa Yuu pushed a small shopping cart through the aisles. There were only three things in it: the cheapest toothbrush, the cheapest towel, and two bags of sliced bread marked "Today's Special." No drinks, no snacks, and no nonessential items.

An Energy-Saving Ideologist's shopping principle: only buy what was needed to maintain the minimum standard of living, and never trigger extra spending impulses.

He stopped in front of the household goods shelf and swept his gaze across the price tags. A faint sound came from behind him—at the other end of the shelf, a girl with long chestnut hair stood with her back to him, her fingers swiftly skimming over the products. Her movements were quick, like some practiced instinct.

Out of the corner of his eye, Orikasa Yuu caught sight of her profile. A Class A student—he had seen her at yesterday's entrance ceremony. Her name was... Kamuro Masumi, perhaps?

He did not turn around and continued selecting a toothbrush. The first rule of the Energy-Saving Ideology: do not actively create social energy expenditure. Other people's secrets were other people's energy expenditure. They had nothing to do with him.

A long line stood before the registers. Orikasa Yuu chose the shortest line on the far left, took his place at the end, stared straight ahead, and entered energy-saving standby mode.

"...You came to buy things too?"

A calm voice came from the aisle of shelves to his right. Orikasa Yuu did not turn his head, but he caught two familiar figures from the corner of his eye.

Beside the household goods shelves, Ayanokoji Kiyotaka held a convenience-store bag as he looked at the black-haired girl before him. Horikita Suzune's basket was neatly arranged with several boxes of salad, whole-wheat bread, and a bottle of mineral water, like a nutritional balance calculated with precision.

"Is there a problem?" Horikita Suzune did not even raise her head.

"No." Ayanokoji's gaze seemed to drift briefly toward the chestnut-haired girl before casually moving away. "I was just surprised that you came to the supermarket too."

"The school cafeteria's calories are too high. The ratio of fat to carbohydrates does not meet my standards."

Ayanokoji gave an "Oh," his eyes seeming to sweep briefly toward Orikasa Yuu before casually shifting away.

Orikasa Yuu did not join the conversation.

The first rule of the Energy-Saving Ideology: do not actively create social energy expenditure.

He moved forward one step, ready to pay.

Directly above the register, a hemispherical surveillance camera was embedded in the ceiling grid, its red indicator flashing at regular intervals. Another stood diagonally across from it. Complete coverage.

Orikasa Yuu placed his items on the counter and paid by scanning his phone.

"That'll be 820 points."

He took out his phone and completed the payment, picked up his shopping bag, and turned to leave.

The instant the automatic doors opened, the spring evening breeze swept in with the noise from outside.

In the open space outside the supermarket, three students in second-year uniforms stood in a semicircle. The light-brown-haired boy at their head had his hands in his pockets as he looked down at the red-haired boy trapped in the middle.

Sudou Ken.

His shopping bag had overturned on the ground, canned drinks rolling everywhere. Several cans had already been crushed. Sudou Ken's fists were clenched tight, veins bulging across the backs of his hands. He was like a fully drawn bow, even his breathing trembling with rage.

"...A defective product from Class D, and you can't even watch where you're walking?" The light-brown-haired upperclassman grinned and turned to his companions. "I heard this year's Class D is another garbage dump, stuffed with every kind of trash. Look at this guy. Doesn't he look like a stray dog?"

"Haha, it's Class D. That's normal." Another upperclassman kicked the drink can by his feet.

"You bastard—" Sudou Ken suddenly stepped forward, his fist rising to his waist.

Orikasa Yuu stood motionless on the supermarket steps.

His gaze passed over Sudou Ken's trembling shoulders, past the arrogant expressions of the three upperclassmen, and fixed itself on the southwest corner of the supermarket ceiling.

There, a black hemispherical surveillance camera was embedded in the ceiling grid, its red indicator flashing at a fixed rhythm.

There were cameras.

Orikasa Yuu's gaze swept toward another camera diagonally across, then the third directly above the register.

Complete coverage. No blind spots.

His eyes swept over the supermarket interior again. Beside the innermost shelf near the back door was an inconspicuous notice:

[Free Goods Area]

Several bags of bread and bottled water sat on the shelf, their labels printed with:

[Relief Use · 0 Points]

They were for students who had spent all their points.

Orikasa Yuu withdrew his gaze, tightened his grip on the shopping bag, and headed toward the dormitories along the stone path.

Behind him came Sudou Ken's angry panting and the light-brown-haired upperclassman's increasingly vicious taunts. The energy of the conflict was rising sharply, like a bomb that could explode at any moment.

But he did not look back.

An Energy-Saving Ideologist's criterion for judgment was simple: was the energy cost of intervening lower than the price of not intervening?

With cameras present, any physical conflict would be recorded. That meant subsequent investigations, questioning, class point deductions, and the risk of attracting the attention of Ayanokoji or Chabashira-sensei.

Energy expenditure level: extremely high.

Benefit: zero.

"Hey! You're just going to stand there and watch?!"

Sudou Ken's furious roar came from behind him, though Orikasa Yuu did not know who he was yelling at.

Orikasa Yuu did not slow down in the slightest.

Orikasa Yuu walked slowly along the stone path lined with cherry blossoms. As he passed the supermarket's side window, he glimpsed the chestnut-haired girl leaving through the back door, an unnatural shape bulging from her uniform pocket.

He withdrew his gaze and kept walking.

An Energy-Saving Ideologist never wasted energy on irrelevant expenditure.

The student dormitories were private single rooms, fully equipped and more comfortable than expected. Orikasa Yuu opened his door with his key card, set the shopping bag on the table, then sat on the edge of the bed and casually picked up the student handbook issued by the school.

When he turned to the [Living Services] section, his fingertips stopped.

The list on that page was astonishingly long:

[Room Cleaning Service · 500 Points/Time]

[Laundry Service · 300 Points/Time]

[Wake-Up Service · 100 Points/Time]

And there was a line of small print at the very bottom:

[Spare Room Key Application · 200 Points/Card (A reasonable reason must be provided)]

Orikasa Yuu stared at that line for two seconds.

Two hundred points. Less than the cost of one lunch, and one could obtain a spare key to someone else's room. The school could not even be bothered to verify whether the "reasonable reason" was genuine—or rather, in this school where "ability comes first," privacy itself was not worth more than a few points.

He closed the handbook, his gaze falling upon the phone screen on the table.

[Balance: 99180 PPt]

Outside the window, cherry blossoms continued to fall. Noisy sounds drifted from some distant dormitory—someone was probably throwing a party, and the music made the glass tremble faintly.

Orikasa Yuu set his phone aside, lay flat, and stared at the ceiling.

One hundred thousand points. A dormitory system full of loopholes. Upperclassmen watching like hawks. And that Class A girl who had casually pocketed something at the supermarket.

This school was more interesting than he had expected.

But it was also more troublesome.

The Energy-Saving Ideologist's response strategy remained unchanged: lower his presence, reduce interaction, and live quietly at the edge of the storm.

He closed his eyes.