I walked to the cafeteria hoping to buy lunch. As I walked, I looked through the menu, and decided I'd buy the curry today.

Annoyingly, there was a group of three girls standing in the middle of the hallway, blocking me off. They all seemed to be in my year, and wore blue ties. They were C Class students from Megiddo Blue. They clicked away at their phones and were talking to each other.

Using my ability in becoming a background nobody, I tried to squeeze past them. But to my surprise, I recognised one of them.

It was my childhood friend, Suzune.

She still has that same hair style. Long, brown hair tied up into a bun. Her face didn't change at all.

The last time we saw each other, we were both 8 years old, and now 8 years later, this is our grand reuniting? I suppose my luck was turning around. Another good thing came from going to GEN Academy after all.

"Suzune-chan?" I blurted by accident, stopping as I looked at all the girls. Suzune was in the middle of the three. One of her friends had bright orange hair, while the other had her hair tied up into Chinese buns.

The other two girls glanced at me with confusion, but Suzune gave a glare like I was trash. I get that a lot for some reason.

"Kinoshita-chan, you know this guy?"

"Is he your boyfriend?~"

Her friends began teasing her. I could see the anger boiling inside her, ready to spill at any given moment. Even so, I couldn't help but find that expression a little cute.

"Huh? No. I've never seen this guy in my life."

"So why'd he use your given name?"

"How am I supposed to know? He's being stupid probably." Suzune pointed at me and narrowed her eyes. "Hey, you."

I remember Suzune being more nicer than this. I wonder what happened to her. She's so much different than I last remembered.

"Me? Don't you remember me, Suzune—"

"Don't use my name so freely. You have no right to call me that, let alone attach "chan" to the end of it."

I guess she doesn't remember me after all.

"Sorry, my bad. I just thought you recognised me."

"I've never seen you in my life, nor would I ever want to associate with someone like you. I mean, look at the state of you." She pinched her nose and turned away. "You're not just stupid, you're also smelly. I can't believe a sick pervert like you would act like that towards me. Drop out of GEN already, you loser."

Okay... what?

I think my heart was torn to shreds by those cold words. Why was she being so cruel? I don't understand what I did wrong. The girls began to break into laughter and walked away.

I wasn't ready to give up. This was Suzune, my childhood friend. Before I met Yukina, she was my best friend. No way would she forget about me that easily... right?

I decided to try one last ditch attempt.

"Kinoshita-san! If I tell you my name, do you think you'll remember who I am?"

"Does it look like I care for who you are? What difference does it make if I know your name? Will you be happy if I say your name? You virgin."

Ouch... that was really harsh...

"Yeah, you tell him Kinoshita-chan!"

"He deserves that after calling you Suzune so freely."

Her friends cheered her on with large grins. Suzune was enjoying this a bit too much, as a sadistic smile went across her face.

I'm glad not many people are here. Otherwise, this would be an even more brutal public shaming.

I'm not giving up still. I'll make her remember. Even if Suzune forgot who I am, I didn't forget who she was.

Her and the promise we made.

"Kinoshita-san. I'm Takanori Yuuto. Does that sound familiar?"

I tried to reach out to her. Instead, her face turned from condescending to furious.

Mission failed, abort plan.

"Okay then. Fine. If you want me to know who you are so badly, then I'll gladly remember you. I'll remember the disgusting virgin that had the audacity to call me by my first name."

It was what I called you though...

Ah, her insults were really painful. I think I was ready to break into tears.

"How did he even know your first name, Kinoshita-chan?"

Her friend posed a good question (in Suzune's eyes at least).

"Ewww, stalker~"

I'm not a stalker...

"Gross..." Suzune covered her mouth and her face turned sour.

Great, she's even more disgusted with me now. Good going Yuuto, you blew it.

"That's a good point... how do you know my name...?!" She backed off, and her friends stood in front of her like bodyguards.

"Su- Kinoshita-san, we're childhood friends. That's how I know."

"This guy's delusional, Kinoshita-san!" Her friend with bright orange hair pointed at me.

"Is he going to say you guys kissed under the moonlight during middle school too?" Her other friend with the Chinese buns laughed at me.

Suzune just continued to glare at me. I really did feel like trash.

Deep down, I thought she might murder me any second now.

"I've never had a childhood friend named Takanori."

"Figures. C'mon, let's get to class!"

"Yeah, talking to this guy is just a waste of time. I'm sure you have better things to do, Kinoshita-chan~"

Her friends pushed her to leave.

"Sure. I don't see a problem in that."

I was paralysed, unable to know what to do. From the shock of seeing Suzune, to the shock of her drastic personality change, to all the insults thrown at me in the span of five minutes, my brain was a complete jumble. I'm going to lose my chance.

As they began walking away, I could hear some whispers.

"That guy was so gross!"

"Poor Kinoshita-chan."

Even so, Suzune didn't comment on it further. I watched her and her friends disappear, and I stood in the middle of the hall like an idiot.

"Ugh!"

I made a small noise and face-palmed, letting everything sink in. As I trudged to the cafeteria, I began mulling over any possibilities.

I'm still confused. Why did she hate me so much suddenly? When we were childhood friends, she was so kind and accepting. We were so close that whenever we played "House" with our other friends, we were the only girl and boy okay with playing the mother and father roles. I don't understand at all.

Though, I'm glad to see her again... at the very least, we went to the same school now. I'll have plenty more chances to reunite with her.

Scratching the back of my head, I sighed. All this hardship, just because I wanted to eat lunch. I concluded lunchtime was a utter failure.

Buying the curry and sitting down with Mitsuba, I began to eat. Surprisingly, today with Mitsuba was Yukimura, who was all sweaty. It seemed he had stopped playing football to buy some food to eat.

Mitsuba looked at me like with an awkward laugh. "What's with the sad face for?"

I was about to say I got called a virgin loser, but decided that I shouldn't spread my public humiliation around so easily.

"The test." I lied with something that might relate to my depressed behaviour.

"The test was dumb. Sensei's such a foxy woman though." Yukimura said, shovelling curry into his mouth.

"Dude, I know right? I want her to bury my head into her boobs!" Mitsuba exclaimed.

Hey, I thought we were talking about my feelings, not your delusional perverted thoughts...

"I would screw her, doggy-style." Yukimura laughed. "Does she have a boyfriend?"

"I don't know. Should we ask her?"

"You guys shouldn't be talking about our teacher that way..."

Approaching us and joining the conversation was Nora, who had traded in his usual novels for revision guides.

Thank you for being a reasonable, upstanding young man Nora.

"Who cares, it's not like she tells us off. I bet she secretly enjoys it." Yukimura laughed.

"Shizuka-chan-sensei is the best sensei ever!" Mitsuba laughed.

Nora looked uncomfortable as he took a seat next to me. "I was wondering where you were. I finished what I was doing in the library and came to find you."

"Ah... something happened." I replied.

"But back to the test." Mitsuba said. "I'm pretty sure I flunked it. I could only do the Japanese questions with ease."

"I didn't even attempt the English or math sections. I don't know anything about those two subjects." Yukimura said.

"You guys... that's... really bad." Nora said.

"I tried on the science questions. You'd be surprised how much physics links with sports." Yukimura said.

"At least you attempted it..."

"That last question on the maths test. What the hell was even all those letters and numbers? My head was spinning." Mitsuba said.

"That was triple algebraic functions."

"Triple what?"

"Functions. You know, like..."

"I can't even solve simultaneous equations. Miss me with this function stuff."

"That's..."

"To be fair, I didn't understand those questions either. And I completely forgot the quadratic formula." I said.

"I thought the quadratic formula was the number four with a bunch of Xs." Yukimura said.

"No, the quadratic formula is X equals minus B, plus or minus the square root of-"

"Nora, we don't care!"

"S-Sorry..."

"It's good that he's interested in academics, though. Smarty pants can tutor us." Mitsuba said.

"Well... tutor...? I don't think I'm qualified for that..."

"Just tutor us the day before the midterms. It'd be like last-minute cramming but with a genius."

Last-minute cramming is also a terrible idea.

"Guys, I'm not that smart, really..."

"You're clearly the best out of us four." I said.

"I feel embarrassed..."

Mitsuba and Yukimura laughed together. As we enjoyed ourselves, some commotion was going on.

"Oi, why's everyone going outside suddenly?" Yukimura asked.

Mitsuba shrugged. "No clue. What's going on?"

"There seems to be something happening outside." Nora said.

"Want to check it out?" Yukimura said.

"Sure. You two coming as well?" Mitsuba said.

I looked at Nora, and we both nodded. The four of us followed the crowd that flooded outside.

On the field, there was a mass of students surrounding two people. The crowd was chanting "fight!" and phones were out recording them. Yukimura waved his phone around quite recklessly.

The two boys in the middle had green ties on, meaning they were D Class students from Zoa Green. The two boys were definitely first years, but due to their size and build they could have easily passed as 2nd Years.

The two boys were unique individuals. One of them was a foreigner that looked like he was from America. Even under his thick blazer you could tell he had an athletic body.

His opponent, the delinquent, looked tough, even more so than Yukimura. His body was beefy, like Yamaguchi, but his expression was scary, like Akihiro.

"Who's fighting?" Mitsuba began asking around, getting answers from the other students watching.

"Zyriot-san and Takemoto-san."

The foreigner was Zyriot, and the delinquent was Takemoto. An interesting brawl was about to take place.

"I've had enough of your shit, Feirbuster. Let's settle this like real men!" Takemoto exclaimed, throwing the first punch.

Zyriot caught Takemoto's fist, and Takemoto swung with his other arm. Zyriot dodged, and pulled Takemoto in towards him. Despite Takemoto having the superior stature, Zyriot had a calculated defence that was enough to counter Takemoto's brute force.

Zyriot had began closing the distance between them by grabbing a tight hold of his arm. But Takemoto, who was losing his ground, decided to go with surprise a kick to Zyriot's stomach. A dry slap made the crowd shiver and cheer simultaneously.

Takemoto managed to free himself from Zyriot's grip, and performed a round-house kick consecutively. Zyriot clutched his stomach and dodged the kick, before curling his hand into a fist. Zyriot shot a punch at Takemoto's face, which made him flinch.

However, Zyriot's fist never connected. It was a fake-out sucker punch to give him a split second opening to grab Takemoto's arm with both his hands and reign him in. Getting a solid grip on his arm, Zyriot dragged Takemoto over his shoulder and—

Flipped Takemoto to the floor.

The impact was loud. Even louder than the kick to the stomach. The dry thunk that came from Takemoto's body slamming against the floor looked and sounded painful. The crowd began cringing at what happened, shuffling away from the scene.

Takemoto yelled in pain, curling up into a ball and holding his back with his hands. Gasping and struggling, Takemoto rolled on the floor in agony, back and legs shaking from Zyriot's fierce toss.

"Haa... haa..." Zyriot huffed, breathing in and out slowly.

Hiden-sensei of A Class was coming over, and the crowd of students began dispersing. Mitsuba and Yukimura fled, while me and Nora stayed to watch what would happen next.

Zyriot stared down at the beaten Takemoto, and extended a hand. "I'm sorry."

His Japanese accent was really bad. Takemoto hissed, grabbing Zyriot's hand. Zyriot helped him up to his feet, and slung an arm around him to help him walk.

Takemoto groaned, shaking his head. Hiden-sensei looked at both boys and raised his eyebrows.

"What happened here?" He asked.

Zyriot looked at Takemoto. Takemoto nodded.

"Forgive me, Hiden-sensei. I started a fight with Takemoto-san."

Takemoto's eyes widened slightly. He shook his head, and was about to speak, but Zyriot nudged his back to make him groan in pain.

"I flipped him and really injured his back. Can you take him to the nurse's office?"

"I see. Both of you can come with me. You will be facing repercussions later, Zyriot-san." Hiden-sensei said, taking Takemoto out of Zyriot's hands.

"That's fine by me, sensei." Zyriot watched his classmate walk off with sensei. He then shot a quick glance at the bystanders who were still around.

He said in English: "You all disgust me." Zyriot followed them, and everyone seemed confused on his parting words. But I understood it fully.

As everyone began to return inside, Nora exhaled a deep breath.

"That was intense, wasn't it?" I said.

"Yeah. Who would've thought D Class had an internal fight." Nora said.

"They seem more dysfunctional than we are."

"I don't know. I heard that D Class is a pretty friendly class. Zyriot-san actually leads them I believe."

"Really? How did you find out?"

"I check the forums sometimes."

It seems the school forums are a popular way to gather information. I'll keep that in mind.

Me and Nora returned to class. The day went on as usual, and the final period came. It was the last home-stretch until we could leave school, so everyone was overjoyed.

Chabashira-sensei entered the class with her usual stern expression. Sitting at her desk, she greeted us coldly then put up the exam results on the smart board.

My eyes widened at the results.

Japanese
Sakigamiya Alice - 19
Kazuraba Yukina - 19
Nora Takayuki - 18
Ayano Kanzaki - 18
Matsushita Isogai - 17
Takanori Yuuto - 16
Kawaguchi Masaru - 15
Suzuki Mayuri - 15
Ishima Akihiro - 13
Misogi Kikyou - 13
Hono Ria - 13
Demiza Taiga - 13
Kiba Ichika - 12
Rinbayashi Amou - 12
Jomko Akari - 12
Tanaka Houji - 11
Mitsuba Jun - 10
Ikesugi Kaoru - 10
Yamaguchi Teruhiko - 9
Fujimura Shouko - 7
Tadokoro Yumiko - 7
Katsumi Kou - 6
Kita Hana - 3
Yukimura Fudou - 2
Kouji Tenma - 1

English
Takanori Yuuto - 20
Sakigamiya Alice - 19
Nora Takayuki - 18
Ayano Kanzaki - 16
Kazuraba Yukina - 15
Matsushita Isogai - 13
Tanaka Houji - 13
Demiza Taiga - 12
Jomko Akari - 12
Hono Ria - 12
Kiba Ichika - 10
Misogi Kikyou - 10
Rinbayashi Amou - 9
Kawaguchi Masaru - 8
Ishima Akihiro - 7
Kita Hana - 5
Ikesugi Kaoru - 3
Suzuki Mayuri - 3
Tadokoro Yumiko - 2
Yamaguchi Teruhiko - 2
Mitsuba Jun - 2
Fujimura Shouko - 2
Katsumi Kou - 1
Yukimura Fudou - 1
Kouji Tenma - 1

Maths
Nora Takayuki - 18
Sakigamiya Alice - 17
Ayano Kanzaki - 17
Tadokoro Yumiko - 15
Matsushita Isogai - 14
Takanori Yuuto - 14
Kawaguchi Masaru - 13
Hono Ria - 13
Kazuraba Yukina - 13
Ishima Akihiro - 11
Demiza Taiga - 10
Tanaka Houji - 9
Fujimura Shouko - 9
Rinbayashi Amou - 8
Jomko Akari - 7
Kiba Ichika - 6
Misogi Kikyou - 6
Suzuki Mayuri - 3
Katsumi Kou - 3
Ikesugi Kaoru - 2
Kita Hana - 2
Yamaguchi Teruhiko - 1
Mitsuba Jun - 1
Kouji Tenma - 1
Yukimura Fudou - 1

Science
Ayano Kanzaki - 20
Sakigamiya Alice - 19
Jomko Akari - 18
Matsushita Isogai - 18
Kazuraba Yukina - 16
Nora Takayuki - 15
Takanori Yuuto - 15
Ishima Akihiro - 14
Tanaka Houji - 11
Kawaguchi Masaru - 10
Kiba Ichika - 10
Hono Ria - 9
Rinbayashi Amou - 9
Misogi Kikyou - 9
Yukimura Fudou - 7
Yamaguchi Teruhiko - 6
Tadokoro Yumiko - 6
Ikesugi Kaoru - 5
Demiza Taiga - 5
Fujimura Shouko - 4
Katsumi Kou - 4
Suzuki Mayuri - 3
Kita Hana - 3
Mitsuba Jun - 2
Kouji Tenma - 1

History
Sakigamiya Alice - 19
Nora Takayuki - 19
Demiza Taiga - 17
Ayano Kanzaki - 17
Kazuraba Yukina - 17
Tanaka Houji - 16
Matsushita Isogai - 15
Kawaguchi Masaru - 13
Kiba Ichika - 12
Jomko Akari - 11
Ikesugi Kaoru - 11
Takanori Yuuto - 11
Misogi Kikyou - 10
Rinbayashi Amou - 10
Tadokoro Yumiko - 10
Ishima Akihiro - 9
Hono Ria - 7
Katsumi Kou - 4
Kita Hana - 4
Yamaguchi Teruhiko - 3
Mitsuba Jun - 2
Fujimura Shouko - 2
Suzuki Mayuri - 1
Yukimura Fudou - 1
Kouji Tenma - 1

Total Marks (out of 100)
Sakigamiya Alice - 93
Nora Takayuki - 88
Ayano Kanzaki - 88
Kazuraba Yukina - 80
Matsushita Isogai - 77
Takanori Yuuto - 76
Jomko Akari - 60
Tanaka Houji - 60
Kawaguchi Masaru - 59
Demiza Taiga - 57
Ishima Akihiro - 54
Hono Ria - 54
Ikesugi Kaoru - 51
Kiba Ichika - 50
Misogi Kikyou - 48
Rinbayashi Amou - 48
Tadokoro Yumiko - 40
Suzuki Mayuri - 25
Fujimura Shouko - 24
Yamaguchi Teruhiko - 21
Katsumi Kou - 18
Mitsuba Jun - 17
Kita Hana - 17
Yukimura Fudou - 12
Kouji Tenma - 5

While 76 isn't a bad score, I felt like I could've done much better. But... the more shocking thing to me is how low so many of my classmates scored. That Kouji guy only got 5 marks! He's somehow worse than Yukimura.

I glanced at Kouji, who sat at the back-row like me. He looked like he didn't care, as his earphones were plugged in his ears and his eyes were closed. What a relaxed guy.

"I got seventeen! I got seventeen!" Mitsuba cheered, jumping up and down happily.

"That's a terrible score and you know it." Yukimura said.

"At least I didn't get twelve!"

"Nice work on getting 93, Alice-san!" Matsushita congratulated her.

"Heh, thanks. I could've gotten better though. You didn't do too bad yourself, Isogai-san." Sakigamiya said with a satisfied smile.

Nora sighed and scratched the back of his head. "Better luck next time..." He mumbled.

I looked at Tadokoro who was exasperated. From her results, it was clear her strong point was maths. She did badly on just about everything else though.

"You happy with your score, Yuu-kun?" Yukina asked.

"I'm pleasantly surprised. I thought I'd be at the bottom for sure."

"Damn, only 54? I need to seriously work on my history and maths." Akihiro said, before glancing at Jomko, who sat next to him.

Jomko looked really happy with herself. 60 was one of the better scores in our class after all.

"Chabashira-sensei, how did we do compared to the other classes?" Matsushita asked.

"Would you like to see the results of the other classes?" She asked bluntly.

"Yes please."

Chabashira-sensei then clicked away at her tablet, which changed the screen on the board. Displayed was a graph comparing E Class to the other four classes.

The whole class fell into a state of shock.

Our class did the worst on this exam than any other class. A quarter of the A Class students managed to get full marks. In fact, every class except E Class had at least one person to get full marks.

For D Class, it was a boy named Shirogane. For C Class, there two people, a boy named Murakawa and a girl named Houki. B Class had five students that got full marks.

Sakigamiya clicked her tongue and gritted her teeth. Her friend, Hono, consoled her.

Nora slumped in his seat, burying his face into his hands. He looked stressed.

Matsushita stood up and faced the class that was in disarray. Despite most of us not caring, seeing how poorly we did compared to the other classes stung a little.

"Don't worry about it, guys. After all, it's only been two weeks since we've enrolled here. Like Chabashira-sensei said, the school doesn't expect us to get full marks since there were questions we haven't covered yet." Matsushita said. "If we study hard, we'll beat the other classes in the midterms and raise our own personal scores!"

Matsushita gave encouraging words to the class, basically telling us it was okay that we were the worst. The class's depressed mood was lightened up by him, and we were back in high spirits once more.

I felt both impressed and jealous by his ability in communication. Matsushita really cared a lot about his class, even if we could be a handful sometimes.

I, however, didn't really care about stuff like exams. 76 is a satisfactory score, and I was glad to pass. Placing too much importance in academics leads to unnecessary stress anyways, and that's troublesome.

After the class had reviewed their test scores, Chabashira-sensei begun her history lesson. I listened along, occasionally glancing outside. The sky was clear, and the ocean was still. A yacht went round and round, and the city was at peace.

This idyllic school life wouldn't last long, I thought. I somehow felt a storm was approaching.