The first rays of dawn, timid and pale, struggled to pierce through Kai Suzuki's room. At precisely 8:00 AM, his jade-black hair, usually a messy testament to his late-night endeavors, barely stirred as he blinked his calm, innocent-looking eyes open. Lazy, one might think, but Kai's mind was anything but that. While the world slept, he was wide awake, studying until 1 AM.
He rolled out of bed, the cool air of his room doing little to disturb his rhythm. In the bathroom, he splashed cold water on his face and looked up. The reflection staring back was an asset: eighteen years old, jade-black hair falling in a messy, approachable fringe, and eyes that looked perpetually calm.
He practiced a smile. Too wide. He reduced the curvature of his lips by a fraction. Perfect. Non-threatening. Bland. The kind of face people trusted because they didn't think it was capable of hiding anything.
Back in his room, he packed his bag. Physics, Chemistry, Literature—props for the stage. Underneath them, he slid two worn paperbacks. One on behavioral psychology, the other on unarmed combat. He preferred PDFs, but strict school rules meant he had to go analog. These were his real curriculum.
He ate quickly, grabbed his bicycle, and merged into the morning flow.
"Morning, Kai!"
Kai slowed his pedaling. Haruto, loud and grinning, pulled up beside him with Renar trailing behind.
"Morning, Haruto. Renar," Kai said. He injected just enough warmth into his voice to register as friendly, but kept his body language closed enough to discourage a long conversation.
"Did you finish the math sets?" Renar asked, pushing up his glasses. "The calculus was brutal."
"It was manageable," Kai lied. He had finished it three days ago in ten minutes. "I struggled with the last one a bit."
"Right? Me too," Renar sighed, visibly relieved.
Social transaction complete.
Kai parked his bicycle and entered the school.
As he walked towards the classroom, his gaze seemed distant, unfocused, deliberately so. It was a subtle art, one he had mastered—projecting an aura of mysteriousness that invited curiosity without demanding engagement.
When he entered the classroom, he registered each flicker, each averted gaze, filing them away. Any other boy might interpret it as budding affection or admiration. Kai, however, knew what it was.
He didn't look, but he cataloged them. Aoi near the window, Rina in the center.
"Kai, good morning," Yui said, turning from the seat in front of him.
"Morning, Yui." He noted the new bracelet on her wrist and the lack of bags under her eyes. "You look energetic. finally finish that English essay?"
She beamed, clearly flattered he remembered. "I did! It took forever."
"Kai implies you have a secret coffee stash," Mika chimed in from the next desk, her eyes sharp. She was the difficult one—observant, cynical. "You're always too calm for a Monday."
Kai met her gaze. He held it for exactly three seconds—the limit between polite attention and awkward staring—then shrugged. "I just like the quiet before the storm, Mika."
He turned away before she could retort, effectively ending the power struggle before it began.
Classes blurred, Kai absorbed in his own study.
It was chemistry now. While Mr. Tanaka droned on about coordination compounds, Kai read his combat manual under the desk.
Mr. Tanaka, accustomed to Kai's peculiar study habits, barely spared him a glance. There was a time when teachers had been furious, their lectures interrupted by Kai's blatant disregard for their authority. But then came the grades—consistently excellent. He wasn't a topper, but always managed to come in the top 10 without even studying, at least not in class. And when questions were posed, Kai's answers were almost always correct.
Eventually, they had stopped caring, understanding that Kai, despite his unconventional methods, simply got it.
He was used to it.
Teachers not doing anything despite his unattentiveness during the classes was a feat of his manipulation.
The bell shrieked, a jarring interruption to the intricate dance of chemical bonds Kai was diligently ignoring. Mr. Koyama, visibly deflated, snapped his textbook shut, and the classroom exploded. A symphony of scraping chairs, slamming locker doors, and a cacophony of adolescent chatter filled the air. Kai, however, remained a still point in the swirling chaos, his eyes, like twin obsidian chips, scanning the room with a practiced subtlety that belied his age.
The bell rang for lunch, dissolving the room into chaos.
Kai moved toward the door, timing his exit. As he reached the threshold, Cecilia, a popular girl with a clumsy streak, tripped over a chair leg. Her romance novel sent skating across the floor.
"You dropped this, Cecilia," he said, his voice a soft murmur. It was an act of kindness, Though he knew, deep down, it would change nothing.
Cecilia looked up, a faint blush blooming on her cheeks. "Oh, Kai! Thank you so much! I'm always such a klutz." Her friends, Saki and Rin, who had been hovering nearby, exchanged glances, a flicker of interest – and perhaps a touch of suspicion – in their eyes. They knew Kai's reputation. Was this a genuine act of kindness, or another calculated move?
"It's no problem," Kai replied, his smile deepening fractionally, a subtle shift that hinted at something more. "Just glad I could help.... That looks like a fun read."
Cecilia giggled, taking the book back. "It is! A bit cheesy, maybe, but I love a good love story."
"Everyone deserves a good story," He gave her the 'innocent smile'—Number 4 in his arsenal. "Have a good lunch."
He hadn't even cleared the doorway when their voices, slightly muffled, reached his ears.
"Looks like Kai's got his sights set on you, Cece," Saki chirped, a hint of playful mischief in her tone.
"Yeah, probably interested in making me his next pawn," Cecilia scoffed, though a lingering blush on her cheeks betrayed a hint of internal conflict. "No one would believe how he truly is if they hadn't known his past."
"You can't expect anything genuine from that guy," Rin added, her voice laced with conviction.
Kai gives his everything, But the past, like a persistent shadow, still clung to him. The main rule of manipulation: never let them know you're manipulating them.
'But I made a great mistake by letting them know from the start.' Kai thought
Later, in the library, he was 'Browse' near the history section when he 'noticed' Miko, a popular and outspoken girl known for her sharp wit, frowning over a particularly dense historical text. He subtly positioned himself, then sighed just loud enough for her to hear, a sound of shared frustration.
"History can be brutal sometimes, can't it?" he commented, not directly to her, but seemingly to himself. When she glanced up, startled, he offered a small, understanding smile. "Especially the Meiji Restoration. All those factions are confusing."
Miko, initially wary, narrowed her eyes. "You're telling me! I can't keep track of who's who."
"It helps if you visualize it as a series of chess moves," Kai offered, leaning against a bookshelf, his posture relaxed and non-threatening. "Each faction making their play, trying to checkmate the others. Think of the Satsuma and Chōshū as the initial rooks, consolidating power..." He continued, weaving a simplified, yet insightful, narrative that made the complex events suddenly click for her. Miko, initially guarded, found herself listening intently, a flicker of genuine appreciation in her eyes.
"Don't act like you're actually interested in what I'm saying," he told her, his expression flattening into boredom. "Or, if you are going to pretend, at least do a better job of it."
"Why would you think I'm pretending?"
"After hearing about my past, I doubt anyone would want to get close to me," he said, his voice dropping slightly. "Unless, of course, that person needed me to exact revenge on someone." Based on his study of body language, he's sure that she's genuinely interested, but saying that had a different motive.
"Don't worry," she shot back. "I'm not like you—someone who gets their bullies expelled from school while managing to keep their own hands clean."
"They were lying. I had no hand in getting them expelled," Kai said. "I've said this a thousand times, but it's up to you all whether you trust me or not. Frankly, I don't care whether you believe me or not."
It was a lie that danced dangerously close to the truth. Without hard evidence, anyone would view him simply as a victim. If the bullying hadn't flipped a dark switch inside him back then, perhaps no one would have ever discovered Kai's manipulative side.
Kai closed the history book with a soft thud, signaling the end of the conversation. He turned away, his movements slow and deliberate.
Walk away, he commanded himself.
He took one step. Then another. He knew human nature better than he knew the history curriculum.
"Wait."
The word hung in the quiet library air. Kai paused, He turned back halfway, raising an eyebrow.
"What is it?" he asked, keeping his tone cool.
Miko chewed on her lower lip, glancing from her confusing textbook to Kai. The suspicion in her eyes was still there, warring with desperation. "You said... the Satsuma and Chōshū were like rooks. What about the Shogunate? In this chess game of yours?"
Kai fully turned to face her, his face softening into 'The Reluctant Tutor'—Expression Number 7. It was gentle, non-threatening, but carried a hint of weariness.
"The Shogunate is the King," Kai explained, stepping back toward the table but maintaining a respectful distance. "But a King trapped in the center of the board, surrounded by his own pawns who are slowly turning against him. If you look at the timeline, you can see the checkmate coming ten years before it happened."
Miko blinked, looking down at her notes. "That... actually makes sense." She looked up at him, the harshness in her gaze receding slightly. "You're good at this. Explaining things, I mean."
"I just spend a lot of time alone," Kai replied softly, casting his eyes downward. "You observe a lot when you're not part of the group."
"Well," Miko muttered, shifting awkwardly in her seat. "If you're not busy... maybe you could sit? Just for a few minutes. I really need to understand the Charter Oath."
"I have to go now, i apologise." Kai started going.
"All right. By the way, I'm sure you'll regret not helping me." She said, albeit in a cute but angry tone.
As the final bell rang, signaling the end of the school day.
He retrieved his bicycle from the racks, The path home was uneventful, a mundane backdrop to his internal machinations.
Suddenly, a piercing scream tore through the evening air, followed by the frantic bleating of a car horn. Ahead, at the intersection, a girl from his year was staring at her phone, stepping blindly onto the crosswalk. A delivery truck was barreling down the road, the driver slamming on the horn, brakes screeching uselessly
Almost all the guys would risk their life for a girl like that. sadly, kai wasn't one of them.
Suddenly a thought surged through Kai. For a split second, he was able to 'see' the situation clearly, as if the time stopped. It doesn't matter if truck kun hit her or not, if he jumped for her without thinking about his own life... then...
One more thing was that there are several people in the road, many would see his selfless act.
Without a thought, he dropped his bike and sprinted. "GET BACK!" he bellowed, a primal roar ripping from his throat. He lunged, a desperate, last-ditch effort. He shoved the girl forward, sending her sprawling onto the safety of the pavement.
Then, the world erupted in a blinding flash of white. The deafening screech of tires became a sickening crunch of metal and bone. A searing pain ripped through his body, stealing his breath, his thoughts, everything. The world dissolved into a blinding white, then absolute black.
Darkness.
Void.
...Light?
Kai gasped, his lungs burning with sudden, sharp oxygen. He sat up, clutching his chest.
He wasn't in a hospital. He wasn't on the asphalt.
He was in a bed with blue sheets. The posters on the wall were of cartoon characters he hadn't thought about in years. He looked at his hands. They were small. Soft. Unscarred.
He scrambled out of the bed, his coordination clumsy, his center of gravity all wrong. He ran to the full-length mirror in the corner.
Staring back at him was a child. Ten years old. Jade-black hair, wide eyes, and a face of pure, disarmingly innocence.
Kai touched his cheek. The shock faded, replaced by a slow, terrifying realization.
He had died. And he had reloaded the save file.
A slow, chilling smile spread across Kai's face. The game had just been reset.
He knew the future. He knew the stock market. He knew who would become powerful and who would fall. And most importantly, he hadn't made any mistakes yet.
The game was on.