On a cloudy, oppressive day, our university held its first major exam of the new semester—and honestly, the students waiting in the classroom looked about as gloomy as the weather outside.
"Everyone, please answer the questions carefully and be vigilant against any behavior that could be construed as cheating!" our homeroom teacher announced with military precision. "Also, please pay attention to the time constraints. The examination begins... now!"
The sound of test papers being shuffled and distributed filled the room like rustling leaves, followed by the collective intake of breath that signaled the beginning of academic warfare.
Most of my classmates immediately adopted expressions of intense concentration, their pens moving frantically across their answer sheets as if their lives depended on it.
In stark contrast to the prevailing atmosphere of dread and tension, I found myself working through the questions at a surprisingly relaxed pace.
There was something almost pure about academic challenges—everyone had different learning speeds and performance ceilings, but the fundamental rule remained constant: the more effort you invested, the better your results would be.
At least here, if you put in 100% of your accumulated hard work, you'll see corresponding improvements. No office politics, no nepotism, no arbitrary decision-making from incompetent managers.
While most of the student body was drowning in stress and anxiety, I was probably the only one in the room who looked genuinely comfortable.
Maybe too comfortable. I should probably look more concerned so I don't stand out.
A few days later,
Lunchtime arrived, and our usual group had gathered on the rooftop with our bento boxes, the familiar routine providing a welcome break from academic pressures.
"Ahhhh, my entire body feels rejuvenated! I feel so refreshed now that the exam is over!" Okamoto declared with the kind of enthusiasm usually reserved for religious experiences.
This guy's emotional range is absolutely incredible.
"Hey, are you actually okay?" I asked, genuinely puzzled by his reaction. "Didn't the exam end three days ago?"
Why is he acting like it just finished five minutes ago?
"Ahahaha! So what if it did? I can't help but keep thinking about it! Only now that the exam is completely behind me can I fully dedicate myself to my beloved otaku lifestyle!"
Of course. I should have known this was about anime and manga priorities.
That's right—the midterm examination period had concluded three days prior without any major incidents or disasters. The students, finally liberated from the crushing weight of academic pressure, had been radiating an almost manic joy ever since.
"Judging by how excited you are, your test scores must have been pretty good, right?" I asked, observing his practically manic energy levels.
"Hehehe, Ginjo-san, didn't I tell you not to underestimate me?" he replied with a smugness that was both endearing and slightly concerning. "Even though I usually keep a low profile, I'm actually quite intelligent."
Low profile? This guy? We're definitely not thinking of the same person.
When our group heard this bold declaration, the collective look of skeptical contempt was immediate and unanimous.
"I think your brain is completely filled with garbage at this point," I offered helpfully. "It's starting to affect your grasp on reality."
Someone needs to keep his ego in check before it achieves orbital velocity.
"Whatever! The exam is over, so I don't care about any of that anymore. I'm just going to enjoy myself for as long as humanly possible," Okamoto replied with the kind of devil-may-care attitude that was both admirable and terrifying.
The man has his priorities straight, I'll give him that.
"But Okamoto," one of the other guys interjected with perfect timing, "today's the day they post the test results in the corridor."
Oh no. Here it comes.
"WHAT?!!"
Okamoto's voice cracked like a thirteen-year-old boy hitting puberty, his expression shifting from confident swagger to absolute horror in record time.
"Why would you say something so cruel?! I had just managed to forget about it and successfully hypnotize myself into peace of mind!"
"Don't make such pitiful, anguished sounds," the other boy replied with brutal honesty. "Even if I hadn't mentioned it now, reality would still shove those results in front of you like a guillotine blade."
"What... what guillotine?! Don't make it sound like I'm heading for execution! Maybe a miracle will happen!" Okamoto protested, but his voice had lost all its earlier confidence.
Our friend's overly cruel but entirely accurate words had instantly deflated Okamoto's high spirits like a punctured balloon.
"What about you, Ginjo-san? You seem remarkably confident," Okamoto asked, apparently seeking some solidarity in shared anxiety.
I couldn't help but smile at the question.
"Why are you still showing off?!" Okamoto shouted with renewed indignation.
Showing off? I'm literally just sitting here eating lunch.
"I'm not showing off," I explained patiently. "I just have a realistic understanding of my own abilities. At least I'm not living in a fantasy world like someone I could mention."
Unlike certain people who think they're secret geniuses while spending their study time watching questionable video content.
Okamoto visibly deflated at this observation.
"Well, it's mainly because of my English grades!" he admitted with the tone of someone confessing to a serious crime.
English. Of course it's English. The universal nemesis of Japanese students everywhere.
"Why do we even have to learn English anyway? There are translation apps for everything now! And I don't even want to go abroad!"
The other guys nodded in agreement, apparently united in their belief that knowing enough English to understand idol group song lyrics was sufficient for modern life.
"I've told you before—watch some American TV series. English isn't as difficult as you think," I suggested, repeating advice I'd given him multiple times.
Though knowing Okamoto, he'll probably find a way to mess this up too.
"I did watch some!" he protested. "But they just kept repeating 'oh yes, come on baby' back and forth. I learned those phrases a long time ago."
Wait… What?!
"Hold on," I said slowly, a terrible suspicion forming in my mind. "What American TV series are you watching exactly?"
Please don't let this be what I think it is.
"I think it was called something like 'Woodpecker,'" he replied with complete innocence. "Anyway, I forgot the exact plot..."
OH MY GOD! He's been watching porn and thinking it was educational television.
This guy didn't just miss the point—he launched the point into orbit and then nuked the launch site.
Good lord, I suspected this moron hadn't even watched the "plot" and had just fast-forwarded through the entire thing looking for English dialogue.
No wonder his English hasn't improved. He's been using adult videos as language learning material.
"Ahem..." I cleared my throat, desperately trying to change the subject before this conversation went any further into territory that would scar me for life. "Anyway, how do you think you did on the exam? What did you mean by 'clear self-awareness'?"
"As for me, who knows until the results are actually posted?" I replied with genuine calm.
"Excellent! Then you're one of us now! Join us in facing reality together!"
Oh no.
"YEAH!"
The other guys started cheering as if I'd just enlisted in their army of academic failures.
I really cannot deal with these male college students and their terminal cases of chunibyo syndrome.
"By the way, Okamoto, what's going on with Mizutani lately?" I asked, remembering something I'd observed earlier.
Just before we'd left the classroom at noon, I'd passed by Mizutani Yuki's desk and witnessed the short-haired, glasses-wearing class representative with her hands clasped together in prayer position, trembling like she was experiencing some kind of religious crisis.
She looked like she was either praying for divine intervention or having a nervous breakdown. Possibly both.
"You mean Mizutani-san? She's always like that before exam results are announced," Okamoto explained with the casual tone of someone discussing the weather.
"Even though she always gets first place, she still gets incredibly nervous. It's really hard to understand."
Our group seemed completely accustomed to Mizutani-san's pre-results ritual, treating it as just another quirk of university life.
"That's because she still has genuine ambition and cares about her achievements," I pointed out. "Unlike certain people who've completely given up on themselves."
Looking directly at you, Okamoto.
Every university seemed to have students like Mizutani-san—the type who frantically sought out classmates to compare answers with the moment an exam ended, then spent days calculating and recalculating their potential scores with mathematical precision.
But what's the point? The exam is over. All that anxiety isn't going to change anything.
I genuinely couldn't understand the mindset. At least I had a realistic grasp of both my abilities and my level of concern about grades.
Either you know the material or you don't. Worrying about it after the fact is just self-torture.
Just as the afternoon school period was ending, someone's shouting suddenly echoed from outside our classroom, and the corridor erupted into chaos.
"Everyone! The midterm exam results are posted in the hallway!"
And here we go. The moment of truth.
The corridor instantly filled with students pouring out of various classrooms, creating a human traffic jam of pushing, shoving, and increasingly loud discussions.
It's like watching a stampede of academically anxious cattle.
"Well, it's time for the guillotine, Ginjo-san. Shall we march to the execution grounds together?" Okamoto asked with the dramatic flair of someone facing actual mortal peril.
"Let's wait for the initial crowd to thin out," I suggested calmly. "It's impossible to get close to anything in that mob anyway."
"Come on, Ginjo-san! We'll have to look eventually anyway. Let's go—consider it moral support for your brothers in academic struggle!"
"Alright, alright, stop pulling! I can walk by myself," I protested, allowing myself to be convinced.
I felt neither excitement nor nervousness as we headed toward the corridor where our academic fate awaited
If Okamoto's "Woodpecker" study method somehow resulted in better grades than mine, I might need to seriously reconsider my approach to education.
Actually, no. Some things are more important than grades. Like maintaining my sanity and not accidentally stumbling into adult entertainment while trying to learn English.
The crowd ahead of us buzzed with the kind of nervous energy that could power a small city, and somewhere in that chaos were the numbers that would determine whether this semester had been a success or a learning experience.