010 Entrance Exam - Part 4 - Mark’s POV

Mom’s friend Reina finally showed her true colors.

And they were bullshit.

“Of course, crazy attracts crazy!” I screamed.

I was dying.

Literally flying through the air.

Wind roared past my ears, my body spinning uncontrollably as I plummeted through the sky. I had no idea how high she threw me, but it was high enough that I could see half the damn campus.

The worst part?

I couldn’t even use my ESP to hide. The sheer absurdity of my situation made sure everyone watching would absolutely remember me.Hopefully, they didn’t have vision-related ESP and they would see me as just some strange bird.

Mom, I hope you’re happy.

Just as I was bracing myself for an extremely painful landing, something yanked me back—

“Oooof—!”

The collar of my uniform snapped tight around my neck as I was abruptly caught midair. I choked at the sudden stop, my limbs still flailing for a second before I realized I wasn’t falling anymore.

I missed my hoodie.

My arms and neck stung from the friction of being grabbed mid-flight.

A deep, booming laugh echoed beside me.

“This ought to be a milestone!”

I turned my head and—oh. Oh no.

A bald professor with a flight-based ESP hovered beside me, grinning ear to ear like this was the funniest thing he’d seen all year.

“To think Reina-chan would do something this exaggerated!” He howled with laughter, still holding me one-handed like a stray cat. “Threw you quite far, eh?”

I just stared at him.

Then I slowly closed my eyes.

“…I hate this school.”

The bald professor was Brady Collins.

According to my notes, he used to be in the military, part of some classified special ops unit. He had an ESP that let him manipulate air currents, which—combined with his combat experience—made him an absolute nightmare in aerial combat.

I knew all of this because Mom wrote it down in my journal.

Brady grinned as he held me midair like a prize fish.

“Now, don’t fight back,” he said casually. “We’re quite high up.”

As if to drive home the point, he let go of my collar for a split second—just enough for my stomach to plunge before he caught me again.

I glared at him.

He just chuckled.

Then, without any real ceremony, he cuffed me.

I froze.

Anti-ESP cuffs.

They were standard-issue at ESPer Academy, designed to neutralize a student’s ability by scrambling the ESP signature in their brain. Each pair was customized to block specific ESP types. Meaning the school already had a countermeasure for mine.

Which meant they were expecting me.

Which meant—

Mom… was a snitch.

And here I thought I’d get to enjoy the privilege of being immune to cuffs.

I sighed through my nose.

“Really?” I muttered.

Brady shrugged. “Really.”

I was brought back to the auditorium and dumped into one of the frontmost seats.

To my left was Mirai, who looked equally exhausted. To my right—unfortunately—was someone I recognized from my notes. A red-haired guy with an unmistakable scowl, sitting across the aisle, separated from me by a pathway of empty seats.

Karl Brandt.

One of the love interests.

And he had anger issues.

Karl turned his sharp gaze toward me. "What are you looking at, chump?"

I wasn’t even looking at him. He just had that kind of personality—loud, confrontational, and always looking for a fight.

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I gave him the barest glance before returning my focus to the stage.

Karl wasn’t done. "Hey, hey, I’m gonna be number one, do you hear me?!"

What did I do to deserve this?

According to Mom’s notes, the best strategy here was to ignore him. That suited me just fine.

Besides Mirai sat the blonde kid.

Ronald Ardent. Or Ron, as he liked to be called.

According to Mom, he was the canon male lead. The imperial prince. The golden-haired, blue-eyed noble. My so-called archnemesis.

What was I doing with my life?

I watched Mirai and Ron chat like they had been friends for years. The topic? Puppies.

Mirai’s eyes sparkled. "Oh! You have a Corgi? That’s adorable!"

Ron beamed. "Yeah, her name’s Butter. She’s super energetic, though. She always tries to escape the palace grounds."

"Butter? That’s so cute! I bet she has little stubby legs and a fluffy butt!"

"She does! And she loves belly rubs."

Mirai gasped. "No way, I love giving belly rubs!"

I frowned.

Mom told me never to let Ronald get Mirai’s attention too much.

Mom also told me to be bold, but with so many people around, I couldn’t bring myself to do something embarrassing… again. So what was the best strategy?

Clearly, Ronald talking to Mirai was the problem.

I see. So that was the solution.

I just had to come up with a topic Mirai found more interesting.

What did I know about Mirai?

…Apparently, nothing.

Mom had no idea what the heroine’s personality was either since the otome game was fashioned after the player’s choices.

I thought back to the rooftop.

Cu for Copper.

Te for Tellurium.

Be for Beryllium.

Au for Gold.

…Okay, I got it.

She must have liked chemistry. She responded to those pickup lines too well for it to be a coincidence.

I inserted myself into their conversation. "Hey, Mirai, have you memorized the periodic table?"

Silence.

Mirai went awfully quiet.

I thought back to my short stint in high school. Memorizing the periodic table was something students were forced to do. So obviously, Mirai—who worked multiple jobs—must have had it memorized, right?

I turned to her. "You do know it, right?"

Mirai glared at me.

…Huh?

What did I do wrong?

She stopped talking to Ronald entirely and just stared ahead, arms crossed.

Ron looked confused. I looked confused.

But Mirai wasn’t talking to him anymore.

So I guessed… this was my victory.

I think?

It was just periodic table though…

Reina strolled up to the podium with that usual cocky grin of hers, completely unfazed by the collective exhaustion of the freshman class.

"Okay, kids, a short announcement before I let you go and dismiss class for real," she said, her voice echoing through the auditorium.

The room fell into silence, save for a few muttered complaints.

"Between eight o’clock and nine o’clock tonight, you should receive your class designations via email, so look forward to it. Your class schedules will also be sent via email."

Murmurs spread through the room. Some students sounded excited. Others sounded like they were already dreading it.

I just wanted to get these cuffs off.

Reina clapped her hands together. "Last but not least, bring a dictionary tomorrow for your classes, okay? You’ll suffer demerits at the hands of your Masters if you fail to bring something as simple as a dictionary."

A few students groaned. I didn’t blame them.

Then Reina smirked, and I immediately knew she had something worse planned.

"Also," she continued, dragging out the word, "a bit of a take-home assignment. You’ll be bringing those cuffs with you home."

A heavy silence fell over the room.

"If you manage to break them or get out of them, you will receive merits from your Masters. Feel free to use any method at your disposal."

For a moment, no one reacted.

Then the freshmen erupted into protests.

"You can’t be serious!"

"This is cruel!"

"How are we supposed to sleep like this?!"

"My ESP is totally useless in this state!"

I wasn’t any different.

I flexed my wrists, testing the cuffs for the hundredth time. Solid. No visible locks. No seams. No screws.

Ugh.

Reina ignored the protests and simply shrugged. "That’s all. Class dismissed."

The groaning only got louder.

The freshmen left the auditorium in an orderly manner, though the air was thick with grumbles and complaints about the cuffs.

I wasn’t complaining. I was already working on mine.

Anti-ESP cuffs were tricky. I’d spent the last few minutes analyzing how mine worked. Popping a thumb out wouldn’t do anything—these things weren’t just locked around the wrists. They were stitched into the ESP of the ESPer itself. The only way to break free was to reverse-engineer the suppression and undo it from within.

It was weird tech. Even Mom had trouble explaining it to me, and she was the one who had trained me to deal with them.

I flexed my fingers, feeling for the internal signal feedback. It was a subtle thing, like searching for an invisible thread running through my nerves. I pulled at it, just the way Mom had drilled into me.

Click.

The cuff unlinked from my wrist. I pocketed it to submit for tomorrow.

Next to me, Mirai let out a dramatic gasp. “You little cheater.”

I turned to see her watching me with sharp, amused eyes. Then, without hesitation, she did the exact same thing to her cuffs, and they popped open like she had done it a thousand times before.

“…Are you serious?” I said flatly.

She grinned. “What? You showed me how. I just did the same thing.”

“That’s not how that works.”

“For you, maybe.” She twirled the cuffs in her hands before slipping them into her pocket.

“That’s top-tier cheating,” I muttered. “Your ability’s busted.”

Mirai tossed her hair dramatically. “I prefer the term ‘highly adaptive.’”

I rolled my eyes. “And by that, you mean you can just steal anything you see.”

She gasped in mock offense. “I don’t steal! I just… borrow knowledge permanently.”

I shot her a look.

“Fine,” she admitted, smirking. “I cheat. But I cheat fairly.”

“That doesn’t even make sense.”

Mirai stretched her arms, looking far too pleased with herself. “Well, sense or not, I’m free. So what now, Whitey?”

I sighed. “First, stop calling me Whitey.”

“Then stop calling me a cheater.”

I crossed my arms. “Fine. Mirai the ‘legally questionable individual.’”

She laughed. “I’ll take it.”

We reached the park just by Mirai’s bicycle, which, surprisingly, was still intact after everything that had happened today.

I stopped beside it and glanced at her. “Hey, Mirai, you owe me one, right?”

Mirai tensed up. “Y-yeah…”

She was nervous. Good. That meant she’d actually take this seriously.

This wasn’t written in the journal. Mom never mentioned anything about the cuffs staying on, and asking for this might ruin the strategy. But I wasn’t going to get a better chance.

I crossed my arms. “How about we settle that debt you owe me?”

Mirai narrowed her eyes. “What do you want?”

“Your bicycle.”

Her jaw dropped. “I can’t give it to you!”

“Fine,” I shrugged, playing it down. “Just give me a ride then.”

Mirai relaxed, but only slightly. “…A ride?”

“Yeah,” I said. “I’ll even pedal. I could use the exercise, and—”

“No.”

I blinked. “No?”

“I’ll give you a ride,” she said, crossing her arms. “But I will be pedaling.”

“…Can I at least try?”

Mirai frowned. “Try what?”

I hesitated. Ugh, this was embarrassing. I could feel my ears burning. “I want to learn how to ride a bike.”

Mirai stared at me like I’d just told her I wanted to learn how to fly.

“…Are you serious?”

“Pretty much,” I said.

She kept staring. I refused to make eye contact.

For as long as I could remember, I’d always thought kids riding bikes looked cool. But I never got the chance to learn. No time. No stable environment. And whenever I did try, I’d always end up falling on my knees for some reason.

Mirai tilted her head. “Wait… You don’t know how to ride a bike?”

“Obviously,” I muttered.

A slow grin spread across her face.

“…Don’t.”

She ignored me and grinned harder.

“Mirai. Don’t—”

“Oh this is going to be fun.”