An hour later.
Inside the library, Ishigami Yu glanced at the Nakano sisters sitting opposite him. Four of them. Identical in every way except for their hairstyles.
He had heard about this before, but seeing it with his own eyes was still shocking.
Though… what shocked him more was something else entirely.
Ishigami lowered his head, staring at the test paper he had just completed. Today's review was mathematics.
The paper had been prepared by Sakurai Saki, and most of the questions fell within his range of knowledge. He hadn't been able to answer all of them, but even so, his score turned out decently high.
"…" Ishigami bit back a sigh. Can someone really be this stupid?
Even after confirming it several times, he still found it hard to believe.
He discreetly peeked at the test papers of the four girls across from him.
Not a single one of them had passed.
At Shuchiin, the "red line" was set at half the average—usually around 35 points. Anything below that was failing.
And every single one of them had failed.
"Itsuki, what I told you yesterday, you still haven't remembered it? You're too slow at solving problems," Sakurai Saki sighed.
He had deliberately raised the difficulty of today's test, hoping to find out the sisters' upper limits. Instead, he hadn't even managed to find their lower limit.
Yes, their scores were that bad.
Ichika had survived purely thanks to lucky guesses on the multiple-choice section.
Yotsuba, on the other hand, was even worse—she had literally pulled out an eraser, using it like a divination tool to choose her answers. Ishigami was fairly certain she had entrusted her academic fate to the gods.
Multiple-choice luck was one thing, but when she almost started writing "A, B, C, D" in the fill-in-the-blank section, even Sakurai had to intervene. Without him, she might actually have gone through with it.
"If you gave me just a little more time, I could do them all!" Nakano Itsuki declared proudly.
She could do it! She swore she could! Passing was within her grasp—no, exceeding expectations was!
Ishigami scoffed. "Itsuki-senpai, I really hope you get that kind of extra time during the actual exam. You know, the one that only lasts two hours? Pop quizzes are even shorter—just one class period."
For once, Ishigami felt like a king. His confidence had never been this inflated. Truly, the phrase 'there's always someone worse off than you' was gospel.
With over a hundred million people in this country, of course there would be people more hopeless than him. Today, he had found them.
Sakurai knew exactly why he had brought Ishigami along today—to give the boy a badly needed ego boost. So he let him bask in it.
"Ishigami-kun, aren't you also at the bottom of the class?" Itsuki shot back, unwilling to accept defeat.
Without a word, Ishigami lifted his own test paper. The score shone like the midday sun.
Itsuki flinched, unable to look at it directly. The gap between them was blinding.
Terrifying! The unbridgeable chasm between passing and failing!
"Damn it!" she grit her teeth. He was younger than her, and yet his score far outstripped hers.
"Ishigami is the Student Council's accountant, so it's only natural he's good at math," Sakurai consoled her. Then, turning his gaze, "Miku did fairly well too—just shy of 30 points."
He had set today's red line at 30. Technically, she had almost passed.
"You'll get it next time," he encouraged.
Miku only shrugged. She had never cared much for grades to begin with. She wasn't stupid—just unmotivated. Last year she had coasted along, and since none of her sisters liked studying, she hadn't felt the need to work hard either.
"What about me! What about me!" Yotsuba waved her hand eagerly.
"…There's a lot of room for improvement," Sakurai said carefully.
"Yay!" Yotsuba beamed as though it were praise.
Ishigami stared blankly. Did she really not understand what that meant?
"Itsuki, the questions you did answer were highly accurate. That's impressive—it shows you have a decent grasp of last year's material," Sakurai added.
Indeed, her fundamentals were solid. Memorization by rote worked well enough for her. But when it came to adapting or problem-solving? Well, considering her habit of tediously verifying each multiple-choice option one by one, perhaps not so much.
Finally, Sakurai turned his eyes to the eldest. "Ichika."
"Hm? Teacher-chan~ What is it?" Ichika asked lightly.
"You did well."
"Thank you." She smiled faintly, touching the corner of her eye.
He had told them yesterday there would be a math test today. She had stayed up late reviewing.
"That other matter—you should work hard on that too."
"…Mm." Ichika nodded, her smile carrying a trace of relief.
This weekend, she had finally switched agencies. Ueno Yoko—the one Sakurai had met before—had taken her in. The breach of contract fee had been covered by the new agency.
Since Ichika was still a newcomer, the penalty hadn't been too steep.
Sakurai knew all this because Ueno Yoko had called him personally to inform him.
Now that he thought about it, perhaps Ueno Yoko had set her sights on Nakano Ichika for a long time—or maybe she was even a secret informant for the Nakano family's father.
But that was just speculation on Sakurai Saki's part. The probability wasn't high. After all, Ueno Yoko had always had a sharp eye for talent, and scouting new faces was her specialty.
"What, what? What are you two talking about?" Yotsuba tilted her head curiously.
This atmosphere…! Something was definitely off!
Although Ichika had admitted to her sisters that she worked a part-time job, she had never revealed the details.
"What are we having for dinner later?" Ichika asked casually, steering the conversation away before Yotsuba could pry further.
Food immediately caught Itsuki's attention. "I want soy sauce ramen!"
Seeing Ichika dodge the topic, Yotsuba didn't press the issue. Instead, she raised her hand energetically. "I want cola!"
That's not even dinner… Ishigami grumbled internally.
Before the debate could spiral further, Sakurai Saki cut in. "We're not finished yet. There's still another hour left. Today we'll be covering sets."
"Ehh!" Yotsuba's expression collapsed like a deflated balloon.
Time always passed suspiciously quickly during study sessions. And yet, when the four sisters finally walked out of the library, they looked exactly like prisoners walking free after years behind bars.
Ah, studying is the best! It's so wonderful! We absolutely must work hard again tomorrow!
At least, that was the kind of optimism Sakurai imagined they were projecting as they escaped.
"Ishigami, how do you feel about today?" he asked once the sisters were gone.
He wasn't expecting miracles. Improvement never came in a single day—or even a single week. Tomorrow's pop quiz wouldn't determine Ishigami Yu's future, but the midterm exam in a month's time was an entirely different matter.
If Ishigami continued his daily routine of gaming and slacking off in the Student Council room, failure in the midterms was a certainty.
So, adopting the mindset of "once you're already itchy, one more flea doesn't matter," Sakurai decided to add Ishigami to the tutoring group as well.
"I feel great!" Ishigami declared, flashing an uncharacteristically bright smile. "It feels amazing knowing there are people worse than me!"
He clenched his fist, energized. "Just thinking about how some people can't even pass such a simple math test… it makes me feel like I can eat three more bowls of rice tonight!"
Sakurai Saki: "…"
Your thoughts are way too dark, Ishigami-kun.
Terrifying. Truly terrifying.
Sakurai felt that before improving Ishigami's grades, he would first need to work on improving his morals.
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