The second day of school arrived with a precision that mirrored Class A's growing reputation.
Morning sunlight poured through the pristine windows, casting long, sharp shadows across the desks. Compared to the previous day's frantic uncertainty, the atmosphere in the room had shifted toward a restrained, lethal order. After the revelation of "Class Points," the students sat with a new kind of intensity. They were no longer merely students; they were investors in a collective future.
The window seat remained conspicuously empty.
As the seconds ticked toward the official start of class, many eyes drifted toward the vacancy. There was no mockery today—only a quiet, electric expectation. How would the man who had deconstructed the school's economy on day one make his entrance today?
Katsuragi Kohei sat like a gargoyle in the front row, his gaze alternating between the door and the clock. Near the wall, Arisu Sakayanagi leaned her chin on her hand, her silver hair catching the light. She drummed a silent, playful rhythm on the head of her cane, her eyes shimmering with a secret mirth.
Just as the preparatory bell was about to tear through the silence—
The door glided open.
Sakamoto stepped into the room, silhouetted by the brilliant morning light of the corridor. There were faint beads of sweat on his brow, as if he had just completed a long-distance run, yet his breathing was as rhythmic and calm as a deep-sea tide. He didn't rush. He didn't apologize. He simply walked.
His stride was a masterpiece of measurement. He navigated the rows of desks with a pine-straight back, oblivious to the forty pairs of eyes tracking his every move. He reached his seat. His left hand brushed the air above the chair back, his body pivoted with the grace of a matador, and the exact millisecond his weight met the seat—
"DING—!"
The bell erupted.
A collective, silent gasp rippled through the room. If yesterday had been a shock, today was a confirmation. Sakamoto didn't just follow time; he seemed to dictate it. The students felt a phantom thud in their chests—the sheer, absurd contrast between the absolute silence of his seating and the violent roar of the bell.
Again... exactly to the second.Is he even human?
Sakamoto merely adjusted his posture, fixing his gaze on the podium with a serene focus, as if the bell were a personal salute.
Mashima Tomoya entered the room a moment later. He scanned his classroom, expecting to find the usual morning restlessness. Instead, he found forty statues. The silence was absolute. Even Sakamoto, the "special attention" case, was a paragon of student decorum.
A flicker of genuine surprise crossed Mashima's hawk-like eyes. In twenty-four hours, this class had transformed. He suppressed his reaction and opened his materials.
"Class is now in session."
The period was English. Mashima's lecture was a barrage of rigorous, high-level instruction. Below him, pens flew across notebooks in a frantic, disciplined scratch. Sakamoto sat perfectly upright, his pen moving in occasional, lightning-fast bursts of notation, his expression as unreadable as a still pond.
The moment the final bell rang and Mashima exited the room—
"Whoosh!"
The silence vanished. Sakamoto's desk was instantly engulfed. It was an eruption of suppressed fervor that Class A's discipline could no longer contain.
"Sakamoto-kun! That was unbelievable!" Hashimoto Masayoshi was the first to the front, his face split by a manic, eager grin. "The paper airplane! The hint about the points! It worked perfectly! We found out everything from the seniors. If you hadn't pointed the way, we'd still be in the dark!"
Other voices joined the fray, a chorus of admiration and rapid-fire questions.
Suddenly, a figure pushed through the crowd with an undeniable, sharp energy. Morishita Ai, her purple hair tied into two playful pigtails, stared at Sakamoto with eyes that sparkled with a strange, piercing light.
"Hey, Sakamoto-kun!" she said, her voice cutting through the noise. "What's your full name? I mean, your real name?"
Sakamoto looked up, his gaze meeting hers through his black-rimmed glasses. He offered a polite nod, his voice as smooth as velvet. "I am Sakamoto—"
CRASH!
At that exact moment, a stack of heavy textbooks was knocked over in the back of the room. The thunderous sound drowned out the end of his sentence, drawing every head in the room toward the mess.
When the dust settled, Morishita Ai's smile had turned into a dark, frustrated scowl. She leaned in closer, her light purple eyes narrowed. She hadn't heard it. The crucial detail—the one thing that might humanize the mystery—had been lost to the noise.
Sakamoto, however, remained unfazed. He adjusted his cuff, the movement as elegant as a ritual. He raised a single hand, and the crowd fell into an immediate, expectant hush.
"Fellow classmates," he began, his voice possessing a peculiar, penetrative power. "Yesterday was merely a reaction to the circumstances. The glory of Class A lies in your own collective wisdom and initiative. It does not rest upon the guidance of a single individual."
He offered a shallow, respectful bow. "I am merely a stepping stone. The road ahead is long, and it is a path you must walk hand-in-hand."
The circle of students, including the scowling Morishita, went silent. They were struck not just by his words, but by the sheer breadth of his vision. He wasn't claiming leadership; he was demanding excellence from them all.
From the sidelines, Sakayanagi watched the scene with a deepening, cryptic smile. Katsuragi remained at his desk, his brow furrowed in a mix of respect and unease. And in the corner, Yahiko Totsuka muttered under his breath about "show-offs," though his eyes never left the tall boy by the window.
Sakamoto, the elegant anomaly of Class A, had once again turned a moment of chaos into a masterclass in style.