The rich aroma of roasted coffee beans mingled with the sweetness of vanilla, filling the air inside Pallet Café that afternoon. Following the storm of emotions, cheers, and brutal physical exhaustion from the Sports Festival that had shaken the foundation of the school's hierarchy, the atmosphere of the café within the Keyaki Mall facility felt like a soothing oasis. Classic jazz melodies drifted softly from hidden speakers, muffling the chatter of the few groups of students relaxing there.
In the quietest corner, far from the main windows and the crowd of other students, Seiji Koroizumi sat in a relaxed posture. A cup of chamomile tea, still wafting hot steam, rested before him. He observed his own reflection in the glass window, which was darkening as night began to fall. The sports festival had concluded, and he had planted the seeds of growth in the hearts of all his students. Ichinose Honami had found her fangs again, Horikita Suzune had learned the meaning of absolute victory, and Class B now occupied the throne of Class A.
However, Seiji knew perfectly well that this peace was merely an illusion. If his students weren't given a greater enemy, those newly grown fangs would dull. They needed a new wall of despair. They needed a monster.
Not long after, a highly distinctive rhythmic sound approached.
Tap... tap... tap...
The tip of a cane striking against the marble floor. The rhythm was slow and steady, yet it radiated an authority that forced anyone who heard it to turn their heads.
Sakayanagi Arisu emerged from behind a decorative partition. The silver-haired girl wore her school uniform impeccably. An elegant smile, one that never seemed to fade, was etched onto her pale face. She took the seat directly across from Seiji, resting her cane against the edge of the table with a graceful motion.
"It is quite rare for me to receive such an intriguing invitation," Sakayanagi began. Her voice flowed as softly as silk, yet her violet eyes glinted with a razor-sharp analytical light, dissecting every inch of Seiji's body language. "The Koroizumi Seiji, who just led a defective class to seize the throne, personally inviting me to tea. Should I feel flattered, or should I be preparing to face execution?"
Seiji smiled warmly—the signature smile of an educator looking at one of the most gifted students in the school. He poured a little tea from the porcelain teapot into the empty cup in front of Sakayanagi.
"Of course you should feel flattered, Sakayanagi," Seiji replied casually, leaning back in his chair. "You are one of the few people in this school who can see through the chessboard without having to move the pieces directly yourself. While the other classes were bleeding on the track, you managed your class points with absolute efficiency using nothing but verbal instructions. But... that is precisely where the main problem lies."
Sakayanagi paused her hand just as she was about to reach for the teacup's handle. Her eyebrows rose slightly, intrigued by the premise the young man before her had thrown out.
"A problem? I successfully led my class up to Class B with minimal physical risk. If you call that a problem, then your standard of evaluation is truly beyond human logic, Koroizumi-kun."
Seiji leaned forward, folding his arms on the table. His aura shifted instantly. The facade of a laid-back high school student evaporated completely, replaced by an absolute pressure that made the air around their table feel denser and suffocating.
"Let's make a transaction, Sakayanagi," Seiji said, his voice heavy, deep, and commanding. "I want you to get serious for the upcoming school exams. I want you to unleash your full potential, without holding back in the slightest, and fight my class—the new Class A—with all the strength and ruthlessness you possess."
Sakayanagi chuckled softly, covering her lips with one hand. "Fight your own class? You are intentionally nurturing an enemy to threaten your throne? You truly have a dark sense of humor, Koroizumi. Besides, what makes you think I haven't been serious all this time? I always give my best for my class."
"You've never been serious because your body limits you," Seiji interrupted without the slightest hesitation. His words sliced coldly through the air. "Your mind is a strategic engine that surpasses anyone in this cohort, but your physique forces you to remain chained to the earth. That makes you bored. It makes you view everything merely as a passive board game. You have never exerted one hundred percent of your effort because you know that, in the end, you will never be able to stand on the front lines to celebrate that victory on your own two feet."
Sakayanagi's eyes narrowed slightly. Her smile thinned until it practically vanished. Tension radiated from her posture. "And then? What could a first-year student possibly offer to alter that reality? Who do you think you are talking to?"
"A cure," Seiji answered straightforwardly.
Silence instantly fell between them. The sound of the background jazz music seemed to simply evaporate. The clinking of spoons and the laughter from other tables felt as if they existed in a completely different dimension.
For the first time since she set foot in this school, Sakayanagi Arisu drew a blank.
Her brain, accustomed to processing thousands of scenarios and probabilities in mere seconds, suddenly froze. The genius girl who always maintained absolute control over her emotions sat stiffly in silence, her eyes widening as she stared at the young man before her as if she had just heard the most absurd joke imaginable.
Seiji didn't allow that pause to linger. He looked straight into Sakayanagi's violet eyes, dissecting the girl's greatest weakness with the precision of a surgeon.
"Congenital Heart Disease, or CHD in medical terms," Seiji stated calmly, reciting the diagnosis that had long been the Chess Queen's greatest secret and most fatal weakness. "An abnormality from birth. This disease is a defect in the structure of your heart that you've had since you were in your mother's womb. Imperfect valves, leaky heart chambers, and suboptimal blood flow force your heart muscle to work many times harder just to perform normal human activities. Walking a mere hundred meters feels like running a marathon to you. That is what makes your body so fragile, pale, and dependent on that cane."
Sakayanagi didn't flinch. She made not a single impulsive movement. However, her fingers resting in her lap visibly tensed slightly. It was the only sign that her mask of composure had just been cracked by the facts Seiji laid bare with such naked accuracy. She didn't feel angry; rather, she felt—for the very first time—as if she were under the microscope of someone who understood her better than she understood herself.
"If your illness is cured, I want you to get serious in the upcoming school exams," Seiji continued, emphasizing every syllable. He paused for a moment, letting the sentence sink into Sakayanagi's mind, then repeated it with even greater weight. "If your illness is cured... I want you to mobilize all your cunning, ambition, and intellect to crush my students. Test them. Shatter their egos. Become an absolute wall they cannot surpass until we graduate in our third year. That is the price."
After a dozen or so seconds that felt like an eternity, Sakayanagi's awareness finally returned. Her calm facade crawled back up to mask her shock, though her breathing was slightly more erratic than usual. She laughed, but this time her laugh sounded skeptical, trembling, and remarkably cold.
"You have crossed the line of jokes I can tolerate, Koroizumi-kun," Sakayanagi hissed, her gaze sharpening. "Modern science and medicine currently lack the technology to instantly cure congenital structural heart defects. Even surgeries with the most fatal risks can only patch the damage, not restore function to that of a normal human. My family employs the best specialists in all of Japan, and they all say the same thing. So, what makes you think you can offer a miracle that all my father's financial wealth cannot buy?"
Instead of arguing or responding to the girl's anger, Seiji merely offered an understanding smile. He slowly reached into the inner pocket of his maroon blazer.
On the table, Seiji placed a small glass vial the size of a thumb. Inside, there was a thick, silvery liquid that emitted a faint, microscopic blue luminescence when caught in the café's lighting. The liquid moved inside the vial in a bizarre manner, as if it possessed its own density and pulse of life.
"I am not asking for your blind trust," Seiji said, pushing the vial closer to Sakayanagi. "Take this. Drink it before you sleep tonight. Wait until the medicine takes effect on your cellular structure. Once you realize that the world no longer limits you... let us discuss our transaction in earnest."
Sakayanagi looked down, staring at the small vial with disbelief. Her rationality screamed that this was sheer nonsense, sugar water mixed with dye, or perhaps a psychological poison. However, her primal instincts—the instincts that had always been spot-on in reading the anomalous existence of Koroizumi Seiji—whispered strongly that the young man before her was not bluffing.
In his mind, Seiji gazed at the vial with a flicker of nostalgia that warmed his chest.
This formula was initially pioneered by my students... Okuda Manami and Takebayashi, Seiji thought, remembering two of his beloved students from Class 3-E. Okuda, the innocent yet lethal chemistry genius, and Takebayashi, the microscopic data analysis expert. They worked day and night, trying to create a cell regeneration serum to save me from the antimatter explosion counting down my life.
Although the formula was imperfect in the past, the memories of its molecular chains and chemical composition were eternally embedded in Seiji's computational mind. After crossing over to this world, utilizing the school's adequate science facilities, the internet black market, and the limitless computational capacity of the AI Ritsu in his dorm, Seiji had spent his free time perfecting that masterpiece.
This liquid isn't magic or a miracle, Seiji continued in his thoughts, watching Sakayanagi's face, which was now clouded with deep doubt. It is an extreme-level acceleration of cellular biology, a scientific legacy from a world where a tentacled monster once existed. This liquid works by triggering rapid division of healthy myocardial cells. The biological nanotechnology within it will reconstruct defective valves, seal the leaking heart chambers, and optimize blood flow. Based on my mathematical calculations, Sakayanagi's human body will need around 24 to 72 hours to perfectly respond to this total regeneration drug without the slightest side effect.
"Don't worry about the taste. It won't make you nauseous," Seiji added, his voice breaking Sakayanagi's reverie. "Just think of it like drinking a slightly thick mint syrup."
Sakayanagi Arisu slowly extended her hand, her slender fingers grasping the glass vial. The glass surface felt cold, yet its contents promised the warmth of the freedom she had always dreamed of since childhood. The walls of logic she had built her entire life were trembling violently, on the verge of collapsing.
If this young man is right... if this liquid can truly free me from this torturous physical cage... then the world will never be the same again for me.
"You truly are an absurd anomaly, Koroizumi Seiji," Sakayanagi whispered. She clutched the vial tightly against her chest. Her eyes flashed with ambition, confusion, and something far darker—a fang that had finally found its reason to grow. "Very well. I will play this crazy game of yours. If this truly is a miracle, then prepare yourself. I will give you and your students the nightmare you asked for."
Seiji smiled in satisfaction. His task here was complete. He turned around casually; there were no stiff formalities, only steady, calm footsteps. He left behind Sakayanagi, who now gripped her new future tightly beneath the café's dim lighting.
Two Days Later. Class 1-B Dormitory Room.
Six in the morning.
The autumn sunlight pierced through the window curtains, casting natural lighting onto a room that resembled an intelligence command center more than a teenager's bedroom. Three large monitors glowed on Seiji's desk, displaying streams of matrix code, probability statistics, and psychological development graphs for every student in Class 1-A (formerly 1-B).
Seiji sat in his ergonomic chair, his eyes darting rapidly as he read the report compiled by the AI Ritsu.
"Based on the surveillance camera scans in the first-year girls' dormitory corridor, target Sakayanagi Arisu has not left her room for the past 48 hours," Ritsu's voice chimed cheerfully from the speakers. "Kamuro Masumi was seen pacing in front of her door seven times yesterday, bringing food, but was denied entry."
"Cellular adaptation phase," Seiji murmured as he sipped his black coffee. "Rebuilding the heart's structure from the inside without medical anesthesia would undoubtedly induce a high fever and excruciating pain in the chest cavity. Her body is forcing millions of dead cells to be replaced by new ones. Sakayanagi is a girl who fiercely guards her pride; she wouldn't let anyone see her in a weakened state, groaning in pain."
"Are you not worried, Master, that she might pass out and fail to survive the regeneration phase?" Ritsu asked, displaying her 2D girl avatar on the main screen with a concerned expression.
Seiji smiled faintly. "Not at all. Her fighting spirit is far stronger than steel. That girl would rather die than fail to prove that she is an unrivaled genius."
Suddenly, one of the monitors let out a soft beep. Ritsu swiftly enlarged the screen from the third-floor corridor surveillance camera in the girls' dormitory.
Real-time footage. The door to room 302 slowly opened.
Seiji leaned forward, staring at the screen with intense focus.
On the screen, Sakayanagi Arisu stepped out. She wore her school uniform flawlessly. Her silver hair was neatly combed. However, there was one thing missing from the girl's silhouette.
Her cane was not in her hand.
Kamuro Masumi, who had been leaning against the corridor wall playing on her phone, looked up. In the silent camera footage, Seiji could see the phone slip from Kamuro's hand and crash to the floor. The dark-purple-haired girl's mouth gaped wide open, her eyes widening as if she had just seen a ghost.
Sakayanagi did not walk dragging her feet. She took steps. First step, second step, third step. Her posture was perfectly upright. There were no pauses to catch her breath. There were no wrinkles of pain on her forehead. Her usually pale face now held a healthy, rosy flush, a sign that highly oxygenated blood was now pumping flawlessly through all her tissues.
Sakayanagi stopped in front of Kamuro. She offered a sweet smile, saying something that made Kamuro merely nod stiffly in utter shock. Then, Sakayanagi walked past Kamuro, strolling down the corridor with light, graceful footsteps.
Even through the silent monitor screen, Seiji could feel the terrifying surge of dominant aura radiating from the girl. The Chess Queen had descended from her throne. She could now walk, run, and personally execute her enemies directly on the battlefield.
"Transmutation complete," Seiji whispered with a tone full of admiration.
"Target's heart rate monitored at a stable 75 BPM. Optimal lung capacity. Perfect blood circulation. Remaining structural abnormalities: 0%," Ritsu reported the remote biometric analysis with an enthusiastic tone. "Your scientific miracle was a success, Master! But... is this a wise move? You've just unleashed the most dangerous predator in this school's ecosystem in one hundred percent physical condition."
Seiji laughed. That "Nurufufufu" laugh echoing in his dorm room sounded pure, wild, and filled with the joy of a teacher who had just designed the most lethal exam for his students.
"On the contrary, this is the most brilliant move, Ritsu," Seiji replied as he swiveled his chair, staring at the giant whiteboard on his wall filled with charts of the first-year students' names. "A sharp sword cannot be forged with a wooden hammer. Class A (Horikita) and Class C (Ichinose) are currently intoxicated by the euphoria and sorrow of the Sports Festival. If I don't give them an enemy capable of killing them psychologically, their growth will stagnate."
Seiji stood up, grabbed a red marker, and circled Sakayanagi Arisu's name with a thick line.
"She won't target me directly at first," Seiji analyzed sharply. "She is a smart girl. She knows she can't fully comprehend me yet. So, she'll aim for the people around me first to gauge my reactions. She'll target Suzune, Ichinose, Ryuen, and most certainly... she will target Ayanokouji Kiyotaka."
Seiji tossed his marker onto the desk. "Prepare a full hack into the faculty room server, Ritsu. The Paper Shuffle Exam at the end of November will be the first massacre led frontally by Sakayanagi. We must ensure Horikita Suzune and the others possess sufficient logical weaponry to survive the storm I've just unleashed."
"Executing orders, Master!" Ritsu replied. The monitor screens were immediately flooded with lines of hacking code moving at the speed of light.
Outside the window, the drying autumn leaves began to fall, blown by an increasingly cold wind. The Sports Festival showcasing muscular strength might be over, but a far more brutal and bloodless intellectual warfare was now ready to tear apart the peace of Advanced Nurturing High School.
The monster from Class B had gained her wings, and the Shadow Teacher of Class A was ready to witness just how far his students could survive in the impending academic hell.
End Of Arc 4 : Sport Festival Special Exam
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