Running away from the fight scene, we searched for an empty room. Most doors were locked, so I attempted to kick them open to no avail. The more time we took being out in the open, the more likely it was we would get caught.

Mitsugi kept turning his head back, paranoid about them. Choosing a random room, I tried opening only for the doorknob to rattle. I kicked the door yet nothing happened.

The option of utilizing mana wasn’t a good idea as they could detect the use of mana. It would leave a trail of crumbs which they would use to follow to find us.

“Put him down,” I said, placing the student I was carrying to the floor.

“Oh.” As if realizing something, Mitsugi did the same.

“We’re going to kick the door in the count of three, okay?” I said, stretching my limbs.

He nodded. “All right, one, two, three!” I uttered, charging at the door with my body.

Using my momentum, I thrusted my leg forward. Around the same time of the impact of my foot, Mitsuki's foot also connected, effectively breaking the door.

The door flung open, creaking at the sudden force. Quickly the both of us dragged the students inside the room, and closed the door. Due to the window, the room was decently lit.

Hm. Now that I think about it, what is a window doing in this room? When I looked around, all I could see was an empty area with two windows on opposite sides of each other. I shrugged, dismissing the weirdly designed room.

Sitting down on the floor, the solidness gave us no cushions of any sort. Normally that would be no problem, but I did get into a fight not too long ago. I yawned, raising my arm to cover my mouth.

My opponent was awake as he awkwardly stared at us, sitting upwards, legs crossed. Soon the other woke up. He groggily blinked, moving his head around. Finally realizing the change of location, he shot up, standing up with a panicked look on his face. Once he saw us, he calmed down, sitting down.

“Are you sure they won’t find us here?” Mitsugi asked, wiping the sweat on his forehead.

“Honestly, I have no idea,” I replied, unsure.

“We’ll be fine.”

Both of our heads turned to the student who said this. He was the one I had fought. He ran his hand through his messy brown hair, dark brown eyes gazed at the two of us.

“How are you so sure?” Mitsugi questioned, barely refraining from shouting.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

“Trust me, if we weren’t sure we could get away from the disciplinary committee then we wouldn’t have gotten in a fight in the first place,” replied the other student, placing his hand on his neck.

He massaged his neck, moving his dark purple hair out of the way. His dark brown eyes had a certain unreadable emotion. I’ll be calling the former student one and the latter student two until I get their names.

“So, this isn’t the first time you two have gotten in a fight? Do you love harassing first years?” Mitsugi inquired, shaking his head in disappointment.

“It’s not that…” he muttered, looking away.

“Right, I tend to forget school has barely started for you guys…” Student one sighed.

So, there’s a hidden agenda behind them attacking us? Like I thought this academy is a meritocracy, with all these benefits the teacher was saying, one might be inclined to believe that teamwork is important.

While that’s true, that’s just a piece of the puzzle. Truthfully, I don’t have enough information to determine whether I’m correct on anything. Most of these thoughts are mere theories. Nothing more, nothing less.

Anyways, it looks like purely fighting isn’t as common as people would think. Well, it’s been like this all along. After all, the second year girl said something along the lines of “It’s just the second day and you first-years are already fighting…”

Which indicates that scuffles like this are more common than one would expect. The disciplinary committee must be busy with these students fighting each other all the time. No wonder the girl seemed irritated by me taunting the already unconscious opponent. She’s probably tired of dealing with all the fighting.

“When you’re trying to appeal to someone—no, not even that. When you’re trying to get by with no problems you will be bound in one way or another to submit to someone. Or a group of people,” he continued, looking on the ground as if tired of something.

I see. That’s to be expected. No one likes doing the dirty work themselves, instead sending your minions to do such things. Considering the expressions of their faces, the roles weren’t determined fairly.

“Our leader wanted to gauge the ability of the new batch of first years. We don't know her intentions yet it’s fairly certain, at least from our perspective, she has plans to recruit a first year to her faction.”

That makes sense, getting a first year, second year, or third year on your side is tremendous help. Perhaps she also wanted to see who to look out for. This is good and all.

However…

I don’t agree with her methods.

“That must suck. Following orders unwillingly, I’m grateful I have the opportunity to defend myself to a certain degree…” I said, casting a sympathetic look at them.

“Yeah, I don’t think I would be able to deal with it. One way or another, I will attempt to rebel against them at the very first chance I get. It’s just the type of person I am,” Mitsugi said.

Student two smiled. “If only we had enough strength to do so. Unfortunately, that time has been over for far too long,” he whispered, making a fist.

Seeing this student one, placed his hand on his fellow classmate’s shoulder. He shook his head before turning back to us.

“This academy is a meritocracy like many of you already know. For us lower class students, we have no future if we get unlucky.”

“That’s just how things are…”