Quiz results, three perfect scores

Another week had begun. On Monday morning, sunlight spilled into the Class D classroom, bringing a drowsy air with it.

Late spring was still as mischievous as ever, showing no sign of leaving. The students were listless too, comfortably narrowing their eyes in the warm sunlight.

The bell rang on time, and the classroom's sliding door opened from outside. Sae Chabashira stepped onto the podium in her red-soled heels.

She was once again wearing a fitted black business suit today, though the style seemed to have changed a little.

Sae Chabashira held a roll of white paper in her hand as her gaze swept over the languid students below. When her eyes passed over the back of the classroom, they inevitably met Ken Kaneki's.

Her heart gave a sudden jolt. Images flooded her mind, making her fingers tighten slightly.

Chabashira-sensei quickly looked away, firmly suppressing the strange feeling inside her as her expression returned to its icy state.

She walked to the blackboard, picked up a small yellow magnet, and secured the white paper in the center of the board.

"These are the results of last Friday's surprise Social Studies quiz."

Sae Chabashira's voice was not loud, but the speaker at the front of the classroom carried it clearly to everyone's ears.

The students were all a little curious to see how the first quiz since school began had gone. Kanji Ike and old man Yamauchi even craned their necks, looking just like a pair of turtles.

"Holy shit!" Kanji Ike suddenly swore, his eyes widening in disbelief.

"What? What happened?" The students farther back began stirring, asking curiously.

"Perfect scores! There are three perfect scores!" Someone pointed at the blackboard and supplied the answer.

The whole class erupted. Every student focused on the very top of the list, where three names sat quietly, each followed by glaring proof of a perfect score.

Ken Kaneki, Rokusuke Koenji, Kiyotaka Ayanokoji.

"Seriously? Those last few questions on that paper were insanely hard!"

"Are those three monsters...?"

Kikyo Kushida covered her small mouth, surprise and admiration appearing on her face.

"Kaneki, Ayanokoji, and Koenji, you're all amazing. I only got eighty-two."

The male simps nearby immediately came over to shower Kikyo Kushida with praise.

"Don't worry, you did great too. Eighty-two is super high, okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, Kikyo, there's no need to put yourself down."

Although the praise came from a bunch of poor students, it still made Kikyo Kushida feel wonderful and thoroughly satisfied her vanity. Her deliberate compliment had not been wasted.

As for Horikita Suzune, her result was much the same as in the original story: eighty-nine points, placing her below Ayanokoji in the class rankings. But looking at the hundred-point scores above and then at hers was honestly rather awkward.

She turned her head and glanced at Kiyotaka Ayanokoji, who looked completely indifferent.

"I didn't expect you to be quite so capable."

"Just a coincidence. You did well too." Ayanokoji looked at her expressionlessly and offered a compliment in return.

At the podium, Sae Chabashira picked up a piece of red chalk and walked to the blackboard.

She drew a heavy red line between the ninth- and tenth-lowest names on the list.

The chalk scraped against the blackboard with a piercing sound. The students who had been discussing their results instantly fell silent, and everyone's eyes gathered on that red line.

Below the red line were the names of Ken Sudō, Kanji Ike, Haruki Yamauchi, and others. Without exception, their scores were all below forty.

"Do you see this red line?" Sae Chabashira turned around, sweeping the class with an icy gaze.

"If this were an actual midterm or final exam, everyone below the red line could start packing their bags right now."

"Packing our bags? What's that supposed to mean?" Ken Sudō frowned, somewhat confused.

"Exactly what it sounds like. You would be expelled outright."

"Expelled?!"

That word landed like a bomb, sending a considerable wave of turmoil through the classroom.

Haruki Yamauchi shot to his feet, his face deathly pale. He knew his own grades well enough; he was definitely among those who had failed.

"You've got to be kidding! What kind of school expels people just for failing an exam? I've never heard of a rule like that!"

"Advanced Nurturing High School has no need for worthless defective products."

Sae Chabashira's tone did not fluctuate in the slightest. Since these were the final two days, it was not as though she could not even say something like this anymore.

"Did you think this was an ordinary school? The rules are everything here. If you fail to meet the standards, you can only be eliminated. You would all do well to look out for yourselves."

With that, she tossed the red chalk into the chalk box, opened her lesson plan, and began teaching.

"Turn to page thirty-two of your textbooks..."

Sae Chabashira had no intention of calming the students. She went on writing on the blackboard, and an atmosphere of panic immediately settled over the classroom.

The students below had no mind to listen. The class group chat instantly exploded, its message count shooting up to 99+ in a short time.

Kanji Ike: "Is the expulsion thing real? I don't want to get expelled! I still need to find a cute girlfriend!"

Haruki Yamauchi: "She's definitely just trying to scare us! There's no way the school can expel students so casually!"

Sotomura: "But Chabashira-sensei's expression didn't look like she was joking..."

Ken Sudō: "Damn it, why didn't they tell us about this stupid rule sooner?!"

Messages raced up the chat. Even Ken Kaneki and his two companions, who were lurking, could feel the intense resentment.

Kanji Ike sent a motivational sticker: "No, for the sake of my youth, I have to start staying up late to study tonight! Nobody try to stop me!"

Haruki Yamauchi followed right after him: "Count me in! Starting today, I'll do whatever it takes to keep myself awake and studying!"

Before long, under Ken Kaneki's gaze, Kanji Ike and Haruki Yamauchi in the front rows promptly gave up trying.

These two, who had just solemnly sworn in the group chat to study hard, were now hiding their terminals beneath their textbooks, frantically tapping their screens as they played the school's most popular single-player mobile game.

The bell rang for the end of class. Sae Chabashira closed her lesson plan and quickly left the classroom.

As she passed Ken Kaneki's desk, her steps faltered slightly, but she did not stop and walked straight out the door.

Much of the tense atmosphere dissipated with the teacher's departure, and the classroom grew noisy again.

Haruki Yamauchi put away his phone, leaned over to Sudo and Kanji Ike, and said secretively, "Hey, have you checked the school forum? Several new shops suddenly popped up over the weekend."

"Yeah, I saw them." Kanji Ike nodded repeatedly. "There's a secondhand trading platform called Campus Life. The game consoles on there are way cheaper than outside! There's also something called Micro Bank. Weird name."

The platform had officially launched a few days earlier.

Using their ample points, the three had directly recruited five upperclassmen in urgent need of points to form their initial operations team.

Customer service, reviewing listings, and in-person errands were all handled by these employees.

Ken Kaneki and his two companions only needed to manage the overall operation behind the scenes and pay a portion of their private points as wages.

"But what's with that Micro Bank offering loans? The school gives us a hundred thousand points every month. We can't even spend it all, so who would borrow that stuff? Isn't that completely pointless?" Haruki Yamauchi scratched his head, looking baffled.

"Who cares? Probably some gimmick an upperclassman came up with because they had more money than they knew what to do with." Ken Sudō curled his lip disdainfully.

Sitting not far away, Yosuke Hirata heard their conversation and frowned slightly.

He took out his terminal, opened the school forum, and found Micro Bank's promotional post.

The terms were formal, the interest rates clearly stated, and there were even penalties for overdue payments.

This was definitely no game of make-believe, but a commercial institution built on meticulous calculations.

Yet, just as Yamauchi had said, with a hundred thousand points coming in every month, students had more spending power than they needed. There was simply no market demand for loans.

Unless...

A frightening thought flashed through Yosuke Hirata's mind.

Unless something was going to happen to next month's points.

He keenly detected something unusual. Thinking back to the expulsion cutoff Chabashira-sensei had just announced, this school seemed nowhere near as good as it appeared on the surface.