50.1 Easy Mode?

The concept that life was going to be easy was something that I admittedly had back when I was a kid. Being supposedly gifted by acing tests and not needing to study did that to most people, I suppose. Even up until high school, I didn't really put much effort into my studies, mostly just skating by the barest minimum in order to pass through the curriculum.

Then college came and promptly kicked my ass into submission.

Understandably, it got whittled down the older I got. There was only so much that raw talent could do for you. In the end, hard work will always pay off even against the laziest geniuses in the bunch. Still, a niggling thought of it still persists inside me even today. I could still see ways in which some tasks would only need the barest minimum to succeed, and I could even tell whether or not an exam was easy even if I didn't study for it all and flunked it hard. Well, at least I thought I did. Then again, why was I even talking about this again?