Chapter 7: Classroom of the Elite

On May 1, the morning bell rang for our very first day of class. Soon afterward, Chiyabashira-sensei strode into the room, holding a rolled-up poster. Her expression today was even more stern than usual. Had she started menopause, I wondered? If I made that joke out loud, I think she would have swung an iron bat at my face with full force.

“Hey, sensei, did you start menopause or something?”

Unbelievably, Ike actually let that joke fly. Honestly, it was more shocking that I’d thought the same thing as Ike.

“All right, your morning homeroom is about to begin. Before we get started, does anyone have any questions? If so, now is the time to speak.”

Chiyabashira-sensei completely ignored Ike’s sexual harassment. She appeared totally convinced that the students had questions they wanted answered. Immediately, several students raised their hands.

“Um, I checked my point balance this morning, but I didn’t see any deposits. Points are given on the first day of every month, aren’t they? I couldn’t buy juice this morning.”

“Hondou, I already explained this before, didn’t I? Points are deposited on the first day of the month. I’ve confirmed that points were wired this month without any issues.”

“Um, but…nothing was deposited into my account, though.” Hondou and Yamauchi exchanged glances. Ike appeared too shocked to notice them looking at each other. I’d checked my point balance that morning as well, but saw that it had remained unchanged from the day before. No more points had been deposited into my account. I’d simply thought that the points would be wired later.

“Are you kids really that dumb?”

Was she angry or delighted? I was getting an ominous vibe from Chiyabashira-sensei.

“Dumb? What?”

As Hondou stupidly repeated her words, Chiyabashira-sensei looked at him sharply.

“Sit down, Hondou. I’ll explain once more,” she said.

“S-Sae-chan-sensei?”

Hondou, taken aback by her unusually strict tone, slumped in his seat.

“Points were deposited. That much I know for certain. There is absolutely no chance that we forgot about anyone in this class. To think so is ludicrous. Understood?”

“Well, even if I tell you that we understand, we haven’t received any points…”

Hondou, still perplexed, began to look dissatisfied. Supposing that what Chiyabashira-sensei said was true and that points had been wired to us, then that meant…

Had there been a discrepancy, then? Did that mean that zero points had been deposited into our accounts? My vague doubts quickly grew.

“Ha ha ha! I see. So, it’s like that then, teacher? I think I’ve solved the mystery,” Kouenji boomed, laughing.

He propped his feet up on his desk and smugly pointed toward Hondou.

“It’s simple. We’re in Class D, so we didn’t receive a single point.”

“Huh? What are you talking about? They said that we’d get 100,000 points every month—”

“I don’t remember hearing that, though. Do you?” Chuckling, Kouenji boldly pointed at Chiyabashira-sensei.

“While he certainly has an attitude problem, Kouenji is exactly right. For crying out loud, barely anyone seems to have noticed the hint I gave you. How deplorable.”

In response to this sudden turn of events, the classroom exploded in an uproar.

“Sensei, may I please ask you a question? I’m afraid I still don’t understand.” Hirata raised his hand. He appeared to ask on behalf of his classmates rather than out of selfish concern. Just as I’d expect of the de facto class leader. Even now, he took the initiative.

“Can you please tell us why we didn’t receive any points? We won’t completely understand otherwise.”

That was certainly true.

“A total of ninety-eight absences and late arrivals. Three hundred ninety-one incidences of talking or using a cell phone in class. That is quite a few infractions over one month. In this school, your class’s results are reflected in the points that you receive. As a result, you wasted all of the 100,000 points that you should have received. That’s what happened.”

“I should have explained this all to you on the day of the entrance ceremony. This school measures its students’ true abilities. This time, you were evaluated as being worth nothing. That’s all.”

Chiyabashira-sensei spoke in a robotic fashion, devoid of any emotion. The doubts I’d had since coming to this school were finally confirmed, though, in the worst way possible. Even though we’d started with the huge advantage of 100,000 points, Class D had lost it in just a single month.

I heard a pencil moving against paper. Horikita seemed to be tallying the number of absences, tardy arrivals, and instances of talking in class down in her notebook, perhaps trying to make sense of the situation.

“Chiyabashira-sensei. I do not recall hearing you explain that to us before—”

“What? Are you incapable of understanding something unless it’s explained in detail?”

“Of course. There was never any talk about reducing our points. Had that been explained beforehand, I’m sure we would have avoided being late or talking during class.”

“That is a rather bizarre argument, Hirata. It is certainly true that I don’t recall explaining the rules of point distribution. However, didn’t you all learn in elementary school not to be late or talk in class? Was that not taught throughout your elementary and junior high schools?”

“Well, that’s—”

“I’m sure that in nine years of compulsory education, you learned that being late and talking in class are bad things. And now you say that you can’t understand this because I haven’t explained it to you? I’m afraid your reasoning is flimsy. If you had simply acted properly, then your points would not have dropped all the way to zero. This comes down to you taking personal responsibility.”

There was no way for anyone to refute her perfectly sound argument. Everyone knew that bad behavior didn’t pay.

“Having just entered your first year of high school, did you honestly think you’d receive 100,000 points every month with no strings attached? At a school established by the Japanese government for the express purposes of training gifted people? That’s unthinkable. Try using some common sense. Why would you leave it to chance?”

Although Hirata appeared to be frustrated, he looked the teacher straight in the eye. “Well then, could you at least explain in detail how points are added or deducted? We can keep that in mind for future reference.”

“I cannot tell you. We cannot disclose the methods behind our student evaluation. It’s the same as any other organization. When you enter a company, it is the company’s choice whether or not to tell you how it evaluates its employees. However, I’m not cruel, and I’m not trying to be cold. In fact, this situation is so pathetic that I will give you one bit of guidance.”

For the first time, I saw a faint sliver of a smile on Chiyabashira- sensei’s lips.

“Let’s say that you stop being late to class and have no more absences… Even though zero points will be deducted from you this month, that doesn’t mean that your points will increase, either. That means next month you will still receive zero points. From another perspective, you could say no matter how times you’re late or absent to class, it doesn’t matter. So, you’re not really at a loss, are you?”

“Tch…” Hirata’s expression darkened. Her explanation was so counterproductive that it had the opposite effect; some students seemed incapable of understanding what she meant. The students who thought they could improve their situation by remedying bad behavior had their hopes dashed. That was probably Chiyabashira-sensei’s, or rather, this school’s, intention.

The bell rang, signaling the end of homeroom.

“It looks like we spent too much time yammering. I hope that you understood the gist of it. Well, it’s about time that we switch to our main topic.”

From the tube she carried, she removed a white rolled-up poster and spread it out. She stuck the poster to the blackboard with some magnets. The still-confused students stared blankly at the poster.

“Are these…the results for each class?” Horikita tentatively took a guess. She was probably right. Class A through Class D were listed. To the side was a row of numbers that went up to a maximum of four digits. Class D had zero. Class C had 490. Class B had 650. And at the top was Class A, with a total of 940. In this case, 1000 points would mean 100,000 yen, wouldn’t it? Every class had apparently lost points.

“Isn’t something about this odd?”

“Yeah. The numbers look too even.”

Horikita and I had both noticed something strange.

“You’ve all been doing whatever you pleased this past month. The school has no intention of preventing you from doing what you want. Your actions, such as being late or talking during class, only affect the points you receive. The same goes for how you use your points. How you choose to spend is entirely up to you. We have not put any restrictions on point usage.”

“This isn’t fair, though! We can’t enjoy our student lives like this!” shouted Ike, who’d stayed quiet until now. Yamauchi wailed in incredible agony. He’d already used up all of his points…

“Look here, morons. Every other class got points. The amount of points we gave you for the first month should be plenty for you to live on.”

“B-but, how do the other classes still have points left? That’s weird…”

“I’ve already told you, there’s nothing unfair about it. All of the classes were scored using the same rules. Despite that, they didn’t lose as many as you. That’s the truth.”

“But…why is there such a difference in our point values?” Hirata also seemed to have noticed that the numbers were too tidy.

“Do you finally understand now? Do you see why you were placed in Class D?”

“The reason why we were placed in Class D? Weren’t we simply accepted into this school?”

“Huh? But classes are normally divided up like this, right?”

Students exchanged glances.

“In this school, students are sorted by their level of excellence. The superior students are sorted into Class A, the least capable in Class D. It’s the same system you’d find in the major cram schools. In other words, Class D is akin to the last bastion for failures. You are the worst of the worst. You’re defective. This is just the result of you being defective.”

Horikita’s face stiffened. She appeared shocked by this line of reasoning. It certainly made sense to sort the superior students with the other superior students and the failures with the failures. If you mixed rotten oranges with good ones, the rotten would quickly spoil the good. Inevitably, the superior Horikita would find this revolting.

I, on the other hand, was glad. This meant I couldn’t go any lower.

“However, I have to say, this year’s Class D was the first to ever spend all of their points in a single month. I am impressed by how much you indulged yourselves. Wonderful, just wonderful.”

Chiyabashira-sensei’s false applause echoed throughout the classroom.

“So, does that mean that once we reach zero points, we’ll always stay there?”

“Yes. You will remain at zero until you graduate. But don’t worry, you can still have a room in the dorms and free meals. You won’t die.”

Although we knew that it was possible to get by with the bare minimum, a lot of students weren’t comforted by that fact. After all, we’d lived a life of luxury this past month. To suddenly restrain yourself after that would prove seriously difficult.

“Won’t the other classes make fun of us?”

Sudou kicked the legs of his desk with a loud thwack. After hearing that the classes were divided based on merit, everyone else would probably believe that Class D was full of morons. Despair wasn’t unreasonable.

“What? You’re still worried about your dignity, Sudou? Well then, work to make your class into the best one.”

“Huh?”

“Your class’s points aren’t just linked to the amount of money that you receive each month. They’re also indicative of your class rank.”

In other words…should we get to 500 points, then Class D would be promoted to Class C. This really did sound like a company performance review.

“Now then, I have one more bit of bad news to share with you all.”

She stuck another sheet of paper up on the board. It listed the names of everyone in class. A number stood next to everyone’s name.

“Judging from these, I can see that we’ve quite a few idiots in this class.” As her heels clacked against the floor, she glanced at us. “These are the results of the short test you took a while ago. Your sensei was so happy after your excellent performance. Come on, what in the world did you all study when you were in junior high?”

With the exception of a few high scores, almost everyone tested below a sixty. Even if you ignored Sudou’s wonderful score of fourteen points, there was Ike, scoring a little above him at twenty-four points. The average score was sixty-five.

“I’m so glad. If this were an actual test, then seven of you would’ve had to drop out.”

“D-drop out? What do you mean?”

“Oh, what, did I not explain this to you? If you fail on a midterm or final exam in this school, then you have to drop out. If we applied that rule to this test, anyone who scored below thirty-two points would be out. You guys really are stupid, aren’t you?”

“Wh-what?!” wailed Ike and the other failures.

There was a red line drawn on the paper, separating the seven people in question from the rest of the class. Among those seven people, Kikuchi had scored highest, with thirty-one points. Anyone with a score equal to or lower than Kikuchi’s had failed.

“Hey, don’t jerk us around, Sae-chan-sensei! Don’t joke about kicking us out!”

“Frankly, I’m also at a loss,” the teacher said. “These are the school rules. You should prepare for the worst.”

“The teacher’s right. There do seem to be a lot of morons here.” Kouenji wore a smug grin while he polished his nails, his legs propped on the desk.

“What the hell, Kouenji? You scored below the red line, too!”

“Pah. Where exactly are you looking, boy? Look again.”

“Huh? Kouenji is…huh?”

Starting from the bottom of the page, Sudou scanned upward, and there he found Kouenji Rokosuke’s name. Unbelievably, Kouenji had tied for the top spot, scoring ninety points. That meant he’d been able to solve one of those super difficult problems.

“I never thought that Sudou was an idiot like me!” cried Ike, a mixture of wonder and sarcasm in his voice.

“Oh, one more thing. This school, which operates under government supervision, boasts a high rate of advancement into elite education and workforce placement. That is a well-known fact. It’s very likely that most of you have chosen a college or future workplace.”

Well, naturally. This school boasted the highest rates of advancement in the whole country. There were rumors that it was possible to get into a highly competitive school or company just by graduating. Rumors even suggested that graduation from this school was like receiving a recommendation to Tokyo University, the most prestigious of Japan’s institutes of higher learning.

“However, nothing comes easy in this world. Mediocre people such as yourselves would have to be naive to think that you could easily get into the college or workplace of your choice.”

Chiyabashira-sensei’s words carried throughout the room.

“In other words, you’re saying that if we want to get into the company or college of our choice, we must, at minimum, surpass Class C?” Hirata asked.

“You’re wrong. To make your dreams of a bright future come true, your only option is to overtake Class A. This school guarantees nothing for any other students.”

“Th-that’s…absurd! We didn’t hear anything about that!”

A bespectacled student named Yukimura stood up. He’d tied with Kouenji for the top score, indicating that there were no issues with his academic abilities.

“How disgraceful. There’s nothing more pitiful than men losing their cool.” As if prompted by Yukimura’s words, Kouenji let out a sigh.

“Don’t you feel dissatisfied being in Class D, Kouenji?” Yukimura asked.

“Dissatisfied? Why would I feel dissatisfied? I don’t understand.”

“Because the school says we’re so low that we’re basically delinquents and failures. We’ve been told that there’s no guarantee whatsoever that we’ll advance into higher education or get a job!”

“Pah. Utter nonsense. That’s so marvelously stupid that I can’t even find the words.” Kouenji didn’t even stop polishing his nails or turn to face Yukimura as he spoke. “The school simply hasn’t seen my potential yet. I pride myself on being great, and I value, respect, and regard myself more highly than anyone. So, the school arbitrarily placing me into Class D means nothing. Say, for instance, that I dropped out of school—I would be perfectly fine. After all, I am 100 percent positive that the school would come crying to take me back.”

That certainly sounded like something Kouenji would say. Was it being macho? Or narcissism? It’s true that if you didn’t care about the school’s classification of students, then it really wasn’t a big deal. If you considered Kouenji’s impressive intellect and physical ability, it was difficult to imagine that all of the students in Class A could be better than him. Perhaps he’d been assigned to Class D because of his personality rather than his ability.

“Besides, I don’t care in the slightest if the school does or doesn’t assist me to higher education or the workforce. It’s been decided that I will lead the Kouenji conglomerate group. Whether I’m in Class D or Class A is a trivial matter.”

It was true that for a man whose future was already decided, getting into Class A was far from a necessity. Yukimura, at a loss for words, simply sat back down.

“It looks like your bubbles have been burst. If you had simply understood the harsh reality of the situation from the start, then this long homeroom period might have meant something. Your midterm exams are in three weeks. Please think things over, and be careful not to drop out. I have confidence that you can find a way to avoid getting red marks on your report cards. If at all possible, challenge yourself to act in a way befitting a skilled individual.”

Chiyabashira-sensei exited the room, closing the door with some force for added emphasis. The students marked in red were left dejected. Even the normally proud Sudou clicked his tongue and hung his head in shame.

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