I hate Mondays.
Actually, scratch that. I hate every day that involves stepping foot in this educational prison, but Mondays? Mondays are special. They're the universe's way of saying, "Hey Kaito, remember how you had two glorious days of freedom? Well, screw you."
I slumped into my usual seat by the window—third row from the back, perfect for looking engaged while mentally checking out—and immediately regretted my life choices. All of them. Starting with the decision to be born in a world where calculus exists.
"Alright everyone, phones away. You know the drill."
Mrs. Tanaka stood at the front of the classroom with the smug expression of someone who genuinely enjoys watching teenagers suffer. With her tight ponytail, thin figure and round owl glasses, I swear she did. She was holding a stack of papers that might as well have been execution warrants.
The maths test. Right. Because apparently, the universe hadn't punished me enough.
"You have ninety minutes," she announced, her voice dripping with false cheer. "Show your working, and remember—"
Yeah, yeah. I know. No calculators, no notes, no hope.
I watched with mounting dread as she distributed the papers, that familiar rustle of doom making its way down each row. When mine finally landed on my desk with a soft thwap, I stared at it like it had personally insulted my mother.
Question 1: Solve for x in the following quadratic equation...
Already? We're starting with already?
I picked up my pen with all the enthusiasm of someone picking up a shovel at their own grave. Around me, the sound of scribbling had already begun. Overachievers. Every single one of them.
Well, except for Tanaka in the back row—no relation to the teacher, unfortunately for him—who was already half-asleep. At least someone had the right idea.
I squinted at the first question. Okay. Quadratic equations. I knew this. Probably. Maybe. There was a formula, right? Something about b squared and... other letters doing things?
I wrote down some numbers. Moved them around a bit. Added an x for good measure.
There. That looked mathematical enough.
Question 2 stared back at me with even more hostility. Something about derivatives and tangent lines and—nope. Absolutely not. I didn't know derivatives yesterday, I don't know them today, and I suspect I won't know them tomorrow either.
I chewed on the end of my pen, a habit Mrs. Tanaka absolutely despised, which honestly made it more satisfying.
Fifteen minutes in, and I'd answered maybe two questions with any degree of confidence. And by confidence, I mean I'd written something rather than leaving it blank. The something in question could very well be complete nonsense, but at least it showed effort.
That's what teachers cared about, right? Effort?
Who am I kidding. They care about correct answers, and I have approximately zero of those.
My gaze drifted upward from the paper, seeking any distraction from this mathematical hellscape. The window was too far to my left to be interesting—just the usual view of the courtyard and some pigeons having a better morning than me.
Then my eyes found something infinitely more distracting.
Yuki Nakamura.
She sat directly across from me, two rows ahead, her dark hair pulled back in a ponytail that somehow made even fluorescent classroom lighting look romantic.
My dick twitched as I stared at her. After all, I had beaten my meat to the mental picture of her more times than I can remember. I could just imagine her high-pitched voice moan in pleasure as I fondled those perky boobs of hers.
She was bent over her test, actually solving the problems, her pencil moving across the page with confident strokes. Her top two buttons were undone. I wished that I was sitting in front of her so I had a good view of those melons as she was hunched over her desk.
I tried shaking the thought off. My classmates were all solving problems all round me. Meanwhile, I was over here thinking dirty thoughts.
I've had a crush on Yuki since... honestly, I'm not sure when it started. She had held the undisputed hottest girl in every class for several years now. Sometime between freshman year and now, she'd gone from "girl in my class" to "girl who makes me forget how to form complete sentences." Not that I'd ever actually tried talking to her about anything beyond borrowing a pen.
Which I'd never returned. Sorry, Yuki.
She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, and I felt my heart do that stupid flutter thing it does. Completely involuntary. Completely embarrassing.
This is pathetic, Kaito. You're eighteen years old. Just talk to her.
Right. Talk to her. Say what, exactly? "Hey Yuki, I know I'm failing this test we're currently taking, but would you like to hang out sometime and watch me fail at other things?"
Smooth. Real smooth.
I dragged my attention back to the test paper, guilt gnawing at me. I should at least try. That's what adults were always saying, right? "Just try your best, Kaito." As if my best wasn't a solid D-minus on a good day.
Question 8 looked at me with judgment. I looked back with equal disdain.
We were at an impasse.
My pen hovered over the page. I could probably bullshit my way through this one. Write down some equations, throw in a few graphs, maybe draw a smiley face in the margin to appeal to Mrs. Tanaka's nonexistent sense of humor.
The clock on the wall ticked forward. Sixty-three minutes remaining.
This was going to be a long—
Wait.
I blinked, suddenly aware of something... off. The air in front of me shimmered, like heat waves rising from summer pavement, except we were indoors and it was October.
What the hell?
Letters began forming in the space between me and Yuki's head. Glowing, floating letters that definitely weren't part of the standard classroom experience.
[SUMMONING PROTOCOL INITIATED]
[SELECTING CHAMPIONS FOR WORLD: FERELDEN]
[CANDIDATES REQUIRED: 5]
I rubbed my eyes. Definitely hallucinating. I'd finally lost it. The stress of the test had broken my brain, and now I was seeing things.
But the words remained, hanging in the air like some kind of holographic display from a sci-fi movie.
[CANDIDATES SELECTED]
[INITIATING TRANSFER IN 3... 2…]
The text flickered.
[SYSTEM ERROR]
Oh, that's not ominous at all.
[ERROR: SUMMONING PARAMETERS EXCEEDED]
[CANDIDATES DETECTED: 20]
[RECALIBRATING…]
Twenty? There were twenty students in this classroom.
No. No way. This wasn't—
[TRANSFER INITIATED]
The world lurched sideways.
Someone screamed—might have been me, honestly—and then the classroom dissolved into light, Mrs. Tanaka's shocked face the last thing I saw before everything went white.
My final thought, as reality unraveled around me: I'm never going to finish that test.
Honestly? Best case scenario.