#34 First month

May 1 quickly arrived and Yuichi currently arrived at the classroom where everyone was sitting in a quiet manner. Yuichi was a bit surprised by this since it was still a few minutes before the class but not even Ike or Yamauchi talked to each other.

When he arrived, a lot of people turned his direction and most of them had relieved expressions when they saw him. Yuichi already checked his account this morning when he woke up and he saw that his points went up by 19.700 which was a very particular number and he couldn't exactly believe that his entire class lost the remaining 80.300 points. At that time, he was a bit suspicious if it's really all about behavior and grades, he was thinking whether his assumptions were wrong.

[Private Points: 116.200 points]

Yuichi sank down into his seat, loosing up his tie a bit while looking out of the window with a thoughtful expression on his face.

He felt someone staring at him and he was pretty sure it was either Ayanokoji or Horikita but he decided to ignore it unless they call out to him.

The bell rang for the first class which woke Yuichi up from his thoughts. After a few seconds, Chabashira-sensei slid doors open and walked in with a rolled-up poster in her hand. The entire manner she carried herself, her expression, all indicated that she was much more serious than previously when she was even ignoring students calling her Sae-chan-sensei.

"..." She was a bit surprised at how quiet the classroom was.

"Alright, the morning homeroom is about to begin. Before we get started, does anyone have any questions?" Chabashira finally said while glancing at Yuichi who tilted his head at her with a confused expression.

"Sensei, may I?" Hirata raised his hand.

"Go for it..." Chabashira nodded her head.

"The points we were supposed to given this morning...Why did we get just 19.700 points out of all 100.000?" Hirata asked, wanting her to explain properly.

Hearing his question, Chabashira faintly smiled before opening her mouth.

"To be honest, I am quite surprised you were able to get that many to begin with. You should really thank the one who warned you all." She said before narrowing her eyes at Yuichi, observing everyone's reaction.

Hearing her words, everyone widened their eyes as the front seats turned behind to glance at Horikita with grateful expressions despite not truly understanding Chabashira's words.

'?!' Horikita immediately frowned when almost everyone looked at her before she sharply glared at Yuichi.

Seeing this chain of reactions, Chabashira released a faint smile once again while looking at Yuichi who just closed his eyes. To him, it didn't matter if the teacher realized that he was the one who gave the idea away. As long as he would force Horikta into more social interactions it would serve its purpose. Plus if he were to take credit for it, he wouldn't gain anything, he has the trust of a lot of classmates, he is already quite popular, there was no reason for him to take that credit so he gave it to Horikita who seemed to have some kind of problem with being near people and forming a friendship. Yuichi thought that she was either too proud or she might have been betrayed by someone dear to her, however, he didn't want to jump to a conclusion.

Still, he opened his eyes and smiled at Chabashira as if to say "You caught me red-handed".

"But didn't sensei say that we will receive 100.000 points each month? Was that a lie?" Someone asked.

"Did I? I don't really remember saying "You will receive 100.000 points each month", I said that this month's points were already allocated which was 100.000 points. You were the only one who perceived my words wrongly. Did you truly think that you would be given so much money for not doing anything? Not to mention your absences, bad grades, and your behavior on campus." She said with crossed arms and stern expression.

"Basically, it is similar to scholarship...?" Yuichi asked with closed eyes and crossed arms.

"Basically, yes. That's the most ridiculous thing. Most of you weren't even suspicious of such sum of money given to you for nothing...Some of you might have been a bit suspicious but you haven't done anything about it until the said person stepped out and took action. All those points are practically that person's points and not yours. You might think that you have all helped out but you were only the herd of sheep led by one shepherd." Chabashira said while resting her hands on her desk in front of the board with a faint ridiculing smile.

"W-wait, wait, wait! Sensei never explained that even absences are reflected in our monthly points. I can accept our grades but behavior and absences?" Although most of the students were behaving as good as they could, without any motivation or clear reason why to behave, it was impossible to make everyone behave.

"For crying out loud...Did they not teach you at elementary school not to be late? Just because you are at higher education, do you think you can skip classes however you want? You are trying to blame me for not explaining to you that you can't be late and can't talk during classes? If you have behaved like any regular student, your points wouldn't be so low. Unfortunately, one shepherd isn't enough to watch over the entire herd when there are some skittish sheep in the herd." Chabashira said, visibly irritated by a few students.

From her expression, it even seemed like she would be happier if they lost all of their points to reform themselves.

"...Sensei, can you explain to us in detail how are points deduced and added?" After a long silence, Hirata once again asked.

"I cannot tell you. We cannot disclose the methods behind our student evaluation. When you enter a company, it is the company's choice whether to tell you how employees are evaluated or not." Chabashira said with a calm expression.

'So I was right, comparing this school with the real-world outside was the right choice.' Yuichi thought and was glad that he didn't view this school as any regular Senior High school. The most suspicious thing that told him that this wasn't just normal school was how Chabashira-sensei told him that she can't explain everything in detail regarding those points. Not to mention, why use points instead of money if everyone was to receive the same amount and there was nothing else behind it. With that being said...Yuichi stared at the rolled-up poster still on Chabashira's desk, expecting something big.

'There must be some kind of system to those points...that S-system...what is it? Why was it never mentioned during the whole month?'

Chabashira continued explaining how even if they regulate the absences to zero, it won't get their lost points back, however, they can still lose those they saved, giving them a lot of pressure this way.

And before anyone knew, the bell rang, signaling the end of homeroom.

Chabashira was a bit surprised by how fast time flew so she quickly spread the rolled-up poster and pin it to the board with a few magnets.

"These are the results of each class...?" Horikita muttered with an uncertain tone.

Class A...940

Class B...650

Class C...490

Class D...197

The moment Yuichi saw number 197 next to his class he immediately understood why they got such obscure sum of points...19.700.

'Which means, 1000 equals 100.000 points.' Yuichi thought before glancing outside of the window.

"But why is there such a difference in our point values from other classes?" Hirata asked even though he already heard a few theories from Yuichi, well, "from Horikita".

Chabashira began explaining how students are sorted into classes and that Class D is most defective.

'That actually wasn't so hard to figure out with all that discrimination and students from class D buying free meals...'

"Still, I have to say that I am impressed by how much you indulged yourselves. I must applause the person who was able to save so many points despite you morons doing whatever you wanted." Chabashira said with an amused smile while fake applause resounded in the entire classroom.

Sudo began gritting his teeth when he heard all those words since it was apparent that they might start looking down on him in the basketball club.

"Anyway, I should also mention that your class's points aren't just linked to the money you receive each month. They are also indicative of your class rank." Chabashira said, meaning that if Class D were to get 500 points, they would become Class C.

"Now then, I have one more a bit of bad news to tell you" Chabashira said and pinned another sheet of paper onto the board. Everyone's name was there with a number next to it.

"Judging from theses, I can tell that we have quite a few idiots in this class. These are results of the short test you took some while ago. Can you explain to me what in the world did you study when you were in junior high?" Chabashira continued humiliating others with a ridiculing smile.

"If this were an actual test, the seven of you would have had to drop out." She added with a fake relieved expression while placing her hand on her heart.

Even Yuichi was surprised how many people had so low scores. There were a few indeed very hard questions but most of them were completely easy, even for someone like Yuichi who skipped a lot of classes due to his club activities and tournaments during his junior high.