“Akira, you were the one who revealed Fern’s feelings, am I right?”
“Yeah.”
“Was that really the right thing to do?”
“I don’t know.”
She sighed a little.
I wasn’t exactly trained on how to give love advice. It was more than likely that my decisions wouldn’t always be the most conventional, or even morally right—that didn’t matter though, especially not to me. I simply looked to solve problems as quickly and effectively as possible. Feelings were secondary.
Erika was clearly distressed about the whole situation. It would probably take her some time to get used to the new dynamic of their relationship.
I looked down at the notification from the school.
-
From: TAG Administration
From now on, all students must pay rent for their rooms. In return, you will receive free cleaning services and room upgrades. Caste one students must also pay rent for their executive rooms.
Rent is as follows.
5,000 points per day for standard rooms.
100,000 points per day for executive rooms.
Rent will automatically be deducted from your account every day. If at any point, you are unable to pay rent, excess rent will be accumulated as debt. You will be given THREE days to pay off ALL debt, if you do not manage to do so, you will be immediately expelled.
-
The school was starting to increase the pressure on the students, especially ones who were already struggling with keeping up their ranks. It all fit with their goal in the end.
“Isn’t it a bit of a waste, paying all this rent and not even staying in your room, Sumire?”
She laughed.
“Don’t worry, I’m making sure you get plenty of value from your room.”
Sigh.
Erika was still not in the best headspace, so there wasn’t much we could do.
I looked at my minions.
[Battery Minion]
Fuel: 76%
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
Inventory: 11x Batteries
Recharge Minions: 650
[Base]: 1% Charge per Hour
The minion will recharge at a rate of 1% per hour. You may purchase [Recharge Minions] for 150 Points each in order to increase the speed of recharge. Once the {Fuel} gauge reaches 100%, you may convert it to 100 Points, 1 [Recharge Minion] or receive 1x Battery.
Batteries can be given to other minions to increase their production rate.
I’d been transferring batteries over as much as possible, so my [Affinity Minion] should be providing me with a token soon enough.
[Affinity Minion]
Inventory: 0x Affinity Tokens, 157x Battery (Accessory)
[Base]: 1x Affinity Token per month
Upon using an [Affinity Token], there is a very small chance that your {Personal Ability} will evolve. Every student can only use the Affinity Tokens they produce, no one else’s.
(Max 1 per person)
After a while, Erika got up from the ground.
“Hey, sorry for bothering you guys.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
Sumire was already bothering me plenty. It hardly made a difference.
“Thanks for talking about this with me. I was thinking of going on a walk to clear my mind. Do you guys want to join me?”
“I don’t mind.”
Sumire hopped down from the table.
“You know, I need to get some new clothes. It’s a pretty convenient time for that now anyway.”
She walked over to the tap in the little corner kitchen and splashed water into her bowl.
“Why’s now a convenient time?”
“I just happened to get quite a few points, that’s all.”
I guess she was still trying to raise herself in the ranking. She didn’t seem to be getting involved with the whole situation with Kai, which was probably due to the fact that Kai didn’t take an interest in her even though he should have.
“How many do you have now, Sumire?” I asked.
She squeezed some of my dishwashing detergent on her cutlery and scrubbed it with my cloth.
“A few thousand.”
I guess she didn’t want to say the exact amount with Erika in the room. My guess was that she had at least a few hundred thousand, if not much more. She wasn’t the type of person to spend money on accessories and clothing unless she had plenty of points stocked up.
Before long, she turned off the tap and put her bowl and utensils on my drying rack.
I couldn’t tell if she was just trying to be economical by using my things, or just because she was weird and liked to hang out in my room.
Suddenly, Erika spoke up.
“So, you two are childhood friends as well, right? Have you guys fought like this before?”
Well, that was a bit of a difficult question.
I looked over at Sumire. Hopefully, she could answer this question with something useful.
“Nope, Akira and I have never had a fight before.”
“Really? How do you guys keep such a friendly relationship after all these years?”
“I guess it’s because we’re not that close.”
“What do you mean? You hang around in his room all day, even Fern doesn’t do that with me.”
“We’re physically close a lot of the time, but emotionally, we’re not that close. Anyways, enough questions, time to go.”
Sumire began to put on her shoes, however, Erika was still interested.
“Wait! Can you explain what you—”
“Nope. Now come on, do you want to walk with us or not?”
She also glanced at me.
I guess I better get up.
We made our way through the hallway and waited for the elevator as we always did. Erika was being fidgety all of a sudden. It was somewhat surprising how much she changed after the situation with Fern—it’s like her entire personality has been flipped upside down.
Sumire raised her arm and quickly showed me her phone.
—1,392,563 points
She really did have a lot.
“Do you still want me to pay you back?” I asked.
She laughed a little.
“Of course, it’s a matter of formality after all.”
Well, I guess our relationship was mostly transactional.
After a short ring, the elevator door opened.
“Which floor?”
“The 500th floor,” Sumire replied.