A few days passed.
I was awoken by the sound of a notification on my phone.
It was only a few minutes before my usual wake-up time, so I decided to sit up and see what it was about.
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From: TAG Administration
As the special exam comes to a close, we will be introducing a new condition to the school. From now on, at the end of every week, all students from the lowest caste will be expelled.
In order to avoid expulsion, you must pay 10,000,000 Points. As such, it is highly advised that you attempt to get into a higher caste before then.
The first caste to be expelled at the end of this week is Caste 76-J.
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Ah, that was the one I was in right now.
At this school, there were several ways to raise your caste rankings. The first and easiest way was to simply challenge someone through a {Rank Challenge} and steal their position.
The next way was to request a {Rank Reallocation} for a cost of 10,000 Points until you were first in your caste. At that point, the school had another mechanism to automatically promote you to the next caste. It wasn’t specifically displayed in their message to us, but it was easy to notice that you would get promoted if you had significantly more points than the lowest-ranked in the caste above.
The third condition was that if your caste had less than 10 people, you would all be automatically promoted to the next.
POINTS
Your current points: 114,471
Current Rank: #43,144
It was easy to assume that I had significantly more than those above me, just considering the fact that I was ranked around 43,000th in a school that should have around 76,000 people according to the number of castes remaining.
Opening my door, I began making my way toward the elevator. The brown-haired girl never showed up to the classes on the 125th floor after that day, so I was basically alone every single time.
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I was going to go to the 25th floor for a change since there were probably going to be more students there. There were a few other people in the elevator with me, but they were all minding their own business, leaving dead silence.
On my way up, I simply requested a {Rank Reallocation} through the app.
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From: TAG Automated
Your RANK REALLOCATION request was successful.
You have been promoted to #1 of caste 76-A.
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Only a few seconds later, the second message I expected came through.
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From: TAG Automated
You have fulfilled the criteria for an AUTOMATED PROMOTION.
You have been promoted to caste 75-J.
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That was enough to keep me comfortable for a week. I could probably requisition another {Rank Reallocation} but there wasn’t a need for it at the moment.
Walking through the large hallway, I saw quite a number of other students. With the sound of chatter filling the halls, it was pretty clear that maths was a significantly more popular subject than the one on the 125th floor.
!#$(%*$#&%$#
I felt a tug on my arm.
I had a quick look around but no one was there.
Looking down at my arm, I noticed that there was a black mark that circled my wrist. It was thick and uniform like a tattoo, however, I could feel pressure from it.
This must be someone’s ability.
Letting my wrist get pulled, I followed the momentum of it. Someone definitely wanted to either talk to me or attack me. It’d just become a bigger hassle if I tried to avoid it now.
Dragging me around the corner beside the storage room, I saw a boy with long wavy hair. His face was long and stern, with acne across his cheeks. Leaning against the wall, he loosened his arms and looked down at me.
“You’re in big trouble, Akira.”
Am I a celebrity? A lot of people I’ve never met before seem to suddenly know my name.
“What do you mean.”
“I know it was you that messed up Kai’s plan.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He laughed a little, then his expression grew more stern.
“You’re the one who’s seen both of his [Scanners]. Don’t try to play dumb.”
Ah, but I really like playing dumb.
“What scanners? I have no idea what you’re referring to.”
The boy kicked the wall, slamming his shoe against the plaster. A dense thump echoed through the hall. Surprisingly, the wall didn’t suffer any damage—I guess that was due to the school’s expensive infrastructure, or maybe he just wasn’t very strong.
He sighed.
“You’re a bit smarter than the others aren’t you? I guess that’s why you weren’t on Kai’s list of targets. Still, now that you’ve seen his ability, I can’t let you go.”
At this point, he was just doxxing himself. I didn’t even know the name of who made the abilities or even what it was called. It was like he was trying to expose all of his secrets to me.
“You didn’t have to namedrop your boss like that.”
“What?”
“I don’t even know who this ‘Kai’ person is.”
He looked confused for a moment.
Taking out a piece of paper, he handed it to me.
“Written contracts are enforced by the school. If you sign this, we’ll leave you alone.”
Sigh, I guess we’re skipping a few steps with this one. The contract seemed pretty similar to the one that Jaerin’s boyfriend was talking about. But this guy never challenged me to a duel which he would’ve used to force me to sign the contract.
“I have no obligation to do that.”
I could feel the mark beginning to burn my wrist. It was a weird tingling feeling which imitated being burnt. Still, I didn’t notice any physical damage on my arm.
“I’ll cut your hand off if you don’t.”
“No, you won’t.”
He seemed surprised.
Unless he was going to pull a knife out of his pocket and literally cut my hand off, nothing was going to happen.