Three hours.
That was all the time given.
The large digital map of the simulated city glowed on the table in front of them.
Emergency alerts blinked across different districts.
Power grid failure.
Transport collapse.
Civil unrest.
The scenario was simple on paper.
But the deeper they looked, the more complicated it became.
Mei studied the screen intensely.
"If we restore transportation first," she said, "we can move emergency resources faster."
Kaito leaned back slightly in his chair.
"Wrong priority."
Mei frowned.
"Excuse me?"
He tapped the screen casually.
"If transportation restarts before stabilizing communication networks, misinformation spreads faster."
Ren watched them quietly.
Neither of them noticed that he hadn't touched the interface yet.
Mei crossed her arms.
"So what do you suggest?"
Kaito smiled faintly.
"Control the narrative first."
Ren finally spoke.
"Both of you are missing something."
They looked at him.
Ren's finger moved across the digital map.
He zoomed into a small section of the city.
A power station.
"If this station fails," he said calmly, "half the districts collapse simultaneously."
Kaito leaned forward.
Mei's eyes widened slightly.
Ren continued,
"The scenario isn't asking how to fix the crisis."
A pause.
"It's asking how to prevent it from spreading."
For the first time, the three of them looked at the map the same way.
Not as a disaster.
But as a chain reaction.
Kaito chuckled quietly.
"Well," he said, "looks like our quiet observer finally decided to play."
Mei didn't respond.
But she adjusted the simulation controls immediately.
They began building the strategy together.
Not smoothly.
Not comfortably.
Arguments happened.
Ideas clashed.
But strangely—
Their plans kept improving.
At the front of the room, Professor Aika watched the students.
Her eyes moved across the teams.
Some were arguing.
Some were panicking.
Some were working efficiently.
Then her gaze paused.
On Ren's team.
Interesting.
They weren't cooperating naturally.
But they were adapting quickly.
As if each of them forced the others to think harder.
Aika's tablet vibrated softly.
A new message appeared.
She opened it.
Her expression changed very slightly.
The simulation system had detected something unusual.
One of the teams had already accessed a hidden layer of the scenario.
A layer that was not supposed to appear until later.
Aika's eyes moved back across the room.
The screen updated again.
A red notification appeared on the simulation map.
New Crisis Detected
Mei frowned.
"That wasn't in the original briefing."
Kaito looked amused.
"Looks like the game just changed."
Ren stared at the screen silently.
The map zoomed out automatically.
New red zones began appearing across the city.
Not random.
Organized.
Intentional.
Someone had triggered a secondary collapse scenario.
Mei's voice dropped slightly.
"This… wasn't part of the test."
Ren finally spoke.
"No."
His eyes moved slowly across the other teams in the room.
"Someone in this room triggered it."
The timer continued counting down.
2:14:33
At the front of the room, Aika watched quietly.
The first evaluation had just become much more interesting.
And somewhere in the room—
A student smiled.