Chapter 118: Study Plans

“At least one of you has finished…” She said, checking back at her phone. “And it’s Koya-kun too, what are the rest of you even doing? It’s not like the questions are even that hard.”

Everyone in the class visibly flinched.

“I just looked at the way they set past mid-terms and then made my changes according to that.” Misora said like she was explaining something that was very obvious. “Now hurry up… the period will soon be over and we haven’t even decided the tutors and who you’ll be grouped under.”

After that, Misora decided to look at Koya’s answers even though the app was automatically marking all of them.

She still wanted to know what he wrote specifically while Mio on the other hand sat in her seat looking at her phone with her chin resting in one hand.

’Pale, what do you think?’ She thought.

She didn’t want to get into the middle of teaching students at all.

Similarly to Misora, she had memorized the whole curriculum at once before ever stepping foot on the Academy grounds, and besides, the Order Academy had taught her to see past all the nonsensical complications in question phrasing.

She also visited the Academy Library regularly enough that most of the librarians knew her face.

“Well Koya-kun did say he wanted to teach someone moderate.” Pale said from mid-air with her legs crossed, chilling in her astral form since nobody except Mio could see or hear her. “So I think we should get half of them… right at the cut-off mark and fail the rest so we won’t be turned into a Professor for some kids who need their hands held through basic questions. Besides… I need to kiss him this time. That’s the priority.”

Misora blushed while looking at her phone, the color rising before she could stop it.

She hadn’t forgotten about the kiss from yesterday and had been touching her lips constantly throughout the morning, trying to hold onto the exact feeling of it. It was irritating how clearly she could still remember it.

’N-no… I will.’

Pale blinked at her slowly.

“No way… you actually claimed him?” She said and threw both hands in the air. “You’re finally growing, Mio! We need to hold a full celebration for this moment.”

’Shut up… let me get to answering these questions.’ She thought and her fingers blurred across the screen… answering some of them wrong on purpose, selecting and filling every theory text box with sentences that made no grammatical sense while cycling through the rest with speed.

She finished in a fraction of the time it would have taken if she were actually trying. ’Phew, done.’

“Are you sure you were supposed to finish that quickly?” Pale asked, looking at Mio’s screen.

’It’s not like she’ll think otherwise.’ Mio thought. She locked the screen and set the phone face-down on the desk.

About thirty-five minutes later, most of the students had submitted and slumped over their desks, waiting for the final verdict.

“Alright, forty minutes have passed.” Misora said.

The screens of anyone still answering went blank as the site closed them out. “Now your test is over. It’s not the official Mid-terms so you shouldn’t be too worried about it. Let’s see the scores.”

A student raised his hand.

“Class Rep… are you going to be scoring those yourself?” Someone asked, to which Misora smiled.

“Not exactly. You see, I bought the platform we used directly from Tech Tube some days ago… it automatically tallies all of your scores and outputs the results in real time.” She said and tapped her ALI phone against the Holo-board at the front of the room.

A scoreboard appeared on the board in clean white text

…

[CLASS 5 TEST SCORES]

[1. MISORA TACHIBANA — 160 POINTS]

[2. AMAGI KOYA — 160 POINTS]

[3. KAMEMORI MIO — 160 POINTS]

[4. RENZAN KOICHI — 100 POINTS]

[5. YUU ICHINOSE — 87 POINTS]

.

.

.

[27. RIKA TODA — 0 POINTS]

The room went quiet for a moment.

Koya looked around the room to make sure he was reading it right, then turned to Renji since he wouldn’t get answers from just watching faces.

“Yo, what happened?” Koya asked while keeping his voice low.

“You didn’t hear?” Renji whispered back. “Class Rep killed one of our classmates on Familiar Isle.”

’Huh?’ Koya blinked. Misora… or rather Hakua had killed someone? What happened to keeping a low profile?

The whole point of the Misora identity was to do the things she couldn’t do in Hakua’s body… make friends, find her Knight Candidate, live as a commoner. So why did…

“Ah, there seems to be a bit of a technical error.” Misora said calmly from the front, tapping at her phone. “I’ll erase her name quickly.”

“So let me catch you up real quick since we’re bros… though you don’t act like it anymore.” Renji said with a roll of his eyes. “We were in the middle of a fight that had broken out. Almost everyone had gone to the Base of the Tower to get supplies and then the mana deactivated… leading to one noble insulting a commoner, then back-and-forth, then a full-scale brawl where everyone was forced to get involved whether they wanted to or not. With or without their Familiars. The C-class and Class 5 were the only commoners in the group so it was easy pickings for the nobles early on. But then Misora entered the Base of the Tower.”

Renji paused. “And I swear she didn’t even use any kind of mana… It was just her palm. She went through several high-tier nobles like that.”

’Disguise Master mentioned this when I asked her after the anime session with Mio.’ Koya thought.

Misora had killed several high-class nobles and the Tachibana clan had gotten off with a light warning surprisingly which was alarming to the other nobles.

“We were grateful but one of our classmates… I think you’ll remember her, you helped her with mana control once, Rika Toda… she and her new Familiar tried to keep fighting even after Misora had already gotten the rest of us clear. When Class Rep tried to stop her, she told Misora she wouldn’t understand the situation since she was a noble.” Renji whispered. “So Class Rep slashed her legs and hands off with her bare hand then crushed her head and killed the Familiar too, In that order.”

“…”

“Nobody tried to continue fighting after that.” Renji added.

“Aha! I’ve removed it.” Misora said from the front, tapping her phone with a cheerful expression. “I miscalculated… we have 26 students, my apologies. It looks like Koya, Mio, Koichi and Ichinose all placed very high. Well done to those four.”

Mio raised her hand, she couldn’t understand and Pale was confused too. Mio had deliberately scored an 80 since she had put rubbish in the theory boxes herself and watched the wrong answers submit.

So how was she sitting at full marks?

“Yes, Mio.”

“I-I… I don’t think I got everything on that test correct.” She said. “What happened?”

“Well, Tech Tube installed a verification feature into the platform.” Misora said pleasantly. “It cross-references each student’s academic records and submission pattern in real time. If it detects that the person’s answers are inconsistent with their established performance level… if they’re deliberately scoring below what their history says they’re capable of, it corrects the score to what they should have received based on their full academic record. It flags intentional underperformance and removes it.”

She paused.

“It’s quite a thorough system.”

Mio sat down, completely deflated. She didn’t even know what she wanted to say anymore.

’Ugh… I’ll be teaching I guess.’

She looked up and Misora was grinning at her from the front of the room like she had done this on purpose.

’Like I’d let you spend time with Koya-kun.’ Misora thought, pressing her lips together to hold the laugh in.

“So I’ve decided, since the Top 5 barely got above the cut-off, Number 1-4 on the test will take 6, 6, 6 and 5 students.” Misora said and stepped away from the Holo-board just as the bell rang for the period’s end. “Thank you for your time… Study sessions will begin promptly after school today and please try to purchase as many question bundles as you can before then. No excuses.”

“Yes, Class Rep!”

Koya looked back at Renji while the class was packing up around them.

“So why is she still in position after all that?” He decided to whisper though he was fairly sure Misora could hear every word if she chose to pay attention.

“Well, she was right in what she did. The Rika girl was a saboteur… she was paid by someone in Class 2 to let us get caught in their crossfire trap. That came out when the Class 2 student confessed. He wanted to eliminate the competition before Mid-terms so he paid her to make sure Class 5 took damage in the fight so she was working against us the whole time.”

Renji looked at the ground. “So Class Rep was right but I can’t help thinking that she could do the same to any of us for no reason if she decided to.”

’So that’s it…’ Koya thought.

It was better than mindless killing but the end result was the same… Class 5 was afraid of her now but honestly maybe that was good… They weren’t going to act up, they weren’t going to cause problems, and they were going to do exactly what she said at study sessions.

Honestly from a purely practical standpoint that wasn’t the worst outcome. ’Welp, that doesn’t concern me much.’

The door opened and in walked the blond haired history professor from before with her hips swinging as she adjusted the glasses on her face.

“Ah, Morning Class 5… I heard your first Professor wasn’t around for your first period and I’m glad you all maintained yourselves.” She said, dropping her textbook on the table and glancing at Koya. “For today, I’ll be teaching another topic of what happened in the beginning of the Apocalypse.”

Sakura glanced at Koya again as she set up her notes at the front table.

’Master said that my succubus inheritance will attract him… so why isn’t it working?’ Sakura thought as she opened the textbook and turned to the right Chapter.

She had made sure her hair was right this morning and picked this blouse specifically. He hadn’t even looked up from his table once since she walked in. ’Do I need to use my Pheromones… or is he just not attracted to me? I don’t understand… This has never failed before.’

She cleared her throat and started the lesson.

…

“Than- Ump.” Koya grunted as Disguise Master fed him some ramen, making sure he swallowed all of it before he could continue.

“Master, I really think you should stop trying to talk while you’re eating.” Disguise Master said. “Less you choke on your food.”

“I still can’t believe you got a personal maid, huh?” Renji chimed in, looking between the two of them with an impressed look on his face.

Disguise Master gave him a look.

’I wonder why Master is still socializing with someone like this… but I guess he is Master’s first friend or something like that.’ Disguise Master thought.

The Order had a file on Koya after all… he had a streaming platform and was a homebody before ALI, made his first real friends with Mio and Renji when he enrolled so it was a small circle united by history of conflict.

Besides it was obvious that he was using a disguise but she couldn’t wrap her finger around what was wrong with it.

There was something hollow about the whole thing… it was not like a normal disguise skill where the mana underneath it was readable if you looked closely.

This was different and she kept coming back to it… It got on her nerves every time she looked at him directly.

Koya swallowed.

“I think you should let Koya-kun eat in peace.” Mio said with a sigh. “You’re being annoying as usual.”

“Ouch… the original gang finally got back together and you’re already being harsh with me, Mio-chan? Come on, I’m not that bad.” Renji said with a laugh as he took a bite of his Fruit biscuit which was 30 IP.

Koya swallowed.

“I guess if you shut up a bit more then this get-together would be nicer.” Koya said and Disguise Master fed him a cup of juice, everyone around their table was casting envious looks in his direction.

Getting hand-fed lunch by a personal maid at the commoner cafeteria was apparently enough to ruin someone’s day just by existing near it.

“Tch… anyway, I have a new plan which I want to fill you guys in.” He said then chewed his full biscuit before slamming his fist into an open palm. “So as you guys know, I’m single right now… It’s been a while and I’m suffering.”

“Didn’t you have a big chested girlfriend before?” Mio asked while rolling her eyes.

“Of course and I miss her… unfortunately she was a part of the Order, no actually, in this situation… It’s fortunately.” He said. “So Koya-kun, why don’t you request a mission from the Order?”

“Huh?” Koya raised an eyebrow.

“So I was thinking… why don’t you request an assassination from the Order and have another Order agent come to the Academy undercover so I can date again, huh? Peak plan right?”

All three of them looked at him for a full two seconds without saying anything.

’I think after today, I really need to stop interacting with this guy.’ Koya thought.

This was a speed-run to getting himself killed… The man had genuinely just suggested using the Order as a dating service.

The Order.

The same organization that had assassins, spy networks, and a Boss who was currently married to Koya… That same Order.

“Come on, you guys aren’t saying anything.” Renji said and the other two just continued eating. “How mean…”

Koya swallowed another round of food and water then sighed.

“Dude, you’re horny… go get a prostitute or something.” Koya said. He had never in his life thought he would be the one saying this to someone but here they were.

“Prostitute?” He raised an eyebrow with genuine curiosity. “You use those?”

Koya was about to answer, however Disguise Master stabbed another bit of food into his mouth and smiled at Renji directly.

“Master never needs to.” She said and then glanced at Mio from the corner of her eye. The look on Mio’s face was exactly what she had been hoping for so it was completely worth it.

“Oho~ So you and Koya-kun get busy at night, huh? Doing ten rounds or something…?” He asked cheekily and Disguise Master looked down at the table with pink cheeks.

’If watching him sleep counts for something…’ She thought though she already knew it didn’t.

“Wait you guys do? Fuck.” He gripped his head with both hands. “Koya-kun got laid before me… after everything I’ve been through…”

Koya wanted to talk however he noticed something land on the table.

It looked like a fly at first but it was completely white… Maybe it was some sort of variation for this world but it wasn’t moving the way a fly moved either.

There was no wing noise as it just sat there on the table surface and his Danger Sense didn’t ping at all.

’Is it like some kind of variatio-’

“Target Acquired.” It spoke quickly and the whole table morphed into a spear, tearing through Renji’s chest and coming out the other way.

Koya blinked.

It all happened in an instant but that wasn’t the most surprising thing… it was the fact that Renji was… hollow.

There was no blood coming out of the wound with no organs visible in the gap where the spear had gone through. It was just empty space inside the body, with white sparks flickering at the edges of the hole where a person’s insides should have been.

“Bzzt…” His whole body sparked up as the voice changed turning completely mechanical which was nothing like Renji’s actual voice and the eyes that had turned completely red died down slowly. “Fuck… it.”

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