Chapter 6

"Yayy Father is here!" Monotaro yelled happily.

"Daddy is so cool!" said the pink bear named Monophanie.

Monokuma looked at Monokubs while trembling, "My cute little cubs, you are so cute. The only reason I can tolerate your antics is that you are too cute! Even if the prologue is dragging way too long, I'll let it go because you are cute."

"Pops, are you mad at us?" asked the yellow bear, Monosuke, while he sweated profusely.

"Don't be stupid! There is no way I'm mad at you guys!" shouted Monokuma angrily.

"Gah, he is mad!" Monokid exclaimed in horror.

"I said I am not MAD!" said Monokuma, while shooting a beam out of his hands and beating the hell out of Monokubs.

Well, so much for not being angry. His words and his actions didn't match. However, I was too tired and don't have the energy to be surprised anymore.

"Another Teddy bear? It doesn't look like an ordinary one though," said Kiyo.

"Hey! Show some respect to your headmaster! I am not a Teddy bear, I am Monokuma!"

"They look like autonomous robots built with AI, like me," said Keebo.

"The Exisals are different from us, though. They are mindless killing machines that can only be controlled by us, Monokubs!" said Monophanie.

"Autonomous robots with intelligence controlling mindless killing machines, now this turns out to be quite a story," said Ryoma while sighing loudly.

"What I am worried about is the killing game you just mentioned. What does that mean?" asked Rantaro, as if unperturbed by the chaotic situation.

"Puhuhuhuhu…" Monokuma let out a weird laugh.

"What is so amusing?" asked Kirumi.

"It's amusing because I want you Ultimates to participate in a killing game!"

"Huh? Wh-what? You can't be serious!" exclaimed Kaede in panic.

"Huh? You guys don't wanna do it?" asked Monokuma while tilting his head.

"O-of course not! A gentleman never hurt people!" said Gonta.

"You guys must have explored the school ground already, so you should know that you are surrounded by a wall, right? You can't escape. And as long as we have Exisals, you can't defy us. In short, your life and death are within my hands." Monokuma explained to us in a high-pitched voice. However, the voice sends chills down my spine.

He was right. We had seen the courtyard and that tall, tall wall called End Wall. In this situation where we had no way to communicate with the outside world, we couldn't defy them, or the consequences will be big.

"So you are saying we should do as you say if we don't want to die," said Rantaro while folding his hands.

"Y-you gotta be kidding me! Why should friends kill each other?" asked Tenko as she pointed her finger at Monokuma.

"What friends? You guys aren't friends at all. You are enemies meant to kill each other."

"E-enemies?" muttered Shuuichi who is beside me.

Are we.. really enemies? Do we, truly don't know each other before? But then, what is this deja-vu feeling I'd been experiencing since the beginning? I feel like I'm forgetting something important.

I glanced at Rantaro, who is currently observing the situation carefully. Was it just like he said, do we, somehow have our memories erased by someone? If it's not amnesia, then, is it Monokuma's doing? Did he manipulate our memories?

"I have a question," Ryoma's deep voice sounded so loud in this quiet room, "How are we going to kill each other? Are you going to give us weapons?"

"What the hell are you asking, man?" said Kaito as he looked at Ryoma in disbelief.

"We need to get information as much as possible for now. We can't do anything if we don't know anything," answered Ryoma. While he was on to something there, I was dumbfounded by how cold and decisive he is.

"Weapons, huh? What kind of barbaric game are you thinking?" asked Monokuma, feeling amused. "Well, you got it wrong! Since the killing game of this Academy is a refined and sophisticated experience."

"What do you mean?" asked Maki.

"Yeah. The killing game here is punctuated by class trials."

"The class.. trials?"

After that, the Monokubs proceeded to explain how the class trial works. Basically, the class trial was an open debate that was held after a person murder another. In this trial, the killer was called the 'blackened', while the others were called the 'spotless'. During the class trial, the spotless will faced off and debated on who was the blackened among them. After that, the participants will be needed to vote on who the blackened was. If the majority of voters got the correct person, only the blackened will be punished. However, if the majority of voters got it wrong, then only the blackened will be free from punishment, while the remaining spotless will be punished.

From that explanation, it means that it's not enough to only kill someone, you need to make sure you got through the class trial as well.

I started sweating profusely right now. My palms felt clammy with sweat. I didn't even want to think what they mean by 'punishment'.

"Kill without being caught, and then survive the class trial. Sounds eerily similar to the real world to me," said Rantaro after the end of the explanation.

"One already can guess by this point... but I guess I'll ask just in case," Kiyo raises his hand and looks at Monokuma, "What... do you mean by 'punishment' before?"

"Well, it's simple. It's an execution!"

Just like I thought. An eye for an eye. A death for a death. If you were ready to kill someone, then you must be prepared to be killed for that. It was almost impossible for the punishment to be any less than the death itself.

"E-execution?!" exclaimed Gonta.

"If you do a crime, then you will be punished. That's the basic rule of society. But this is a killing game, so the punishment will need to be more… permanent." I can almost see Monokuma's red-eye sparkling eerily. He seems like enjoying this to the fullest. This feeling of dread, and despair. "Well then, let's get this heart-pounding killing game started already! You are free to choose the method, too. Bludgeoning, stabbing, burning, poisoning, drowning, strangling, slashing, shooting, crushing, electrocuting, feel free to pour your heart on this killing game!"

"Killing school semester. It's like a game," said Rantaro with a dark face.

"Kehehe. Do you want us to risk our lives for a silly game? Absolutely absurd," said Kiyo.

"It doesn't seem like it will be boring, though." Kokichi still has that mischievous smile on his face. I wonder if he realized the severity of this situation.

"Hey! How can you degenerate males react so calmly to this?!" asked Tenko in annoyance.

"Th-this has to be a lie, right? It's a lie right?" asked Tsumugi with a trembling voice. Her face is pale.

"I-I never want to kill people. I-I definitely won't participate in this game," said Shuuichi.

"Puhuhuhu. But the killing game is the only reason for you to be here."

"No matter what you said, we will never participate in the killing game! We won't do it! Whatever you planned, I will not let you get away with it!" declared Kaede. She stood tall and faced Monokuma heads on.

"K-Kaede, I understand your feeling, but maybe you shouldn't defy him for now--" I tried to reason with Kaede before she got hurt.

"No, I commend her resistance! That kind of spirit is important in the killing game!" said Monokuma while snickering, "It's always fun when the most defiant one eventually snaps and gets their hands dirty…"

"Wh-what?"

"That betrayal! That brutality! That despair! Those are the things that make the killing game so exciting! Everyone loves that, especially me!"

Monokuma lets out a creepy laugh, while the Monokubs laugh along with him. We just stood there, staring at them as the realization hits us once again. In this game, we are the players, and they are the spectators. This heavy and bad feeling I kept getting since earlier, to think it warned me about this outcome... I still can't believe it. And this is how our high school life began.