The Optimal Solutio.

It was another grey morning overlooking the office of the Headmaster of Auroralis Academy.

Gerhardt Eisenhardt sat behind his cluttered wooden desk, sipping cold black coffee, his dark green eyes scanning the computer screen with routine boredom.

Click.

The red alert window that had been blinking since yesterday vanished.

[Status Update: Student. Status: Discharged. Health Condition: Stable.]

"He's out, then..." Gerhardt muttered softly, brushing a strand of pale golden hair from his forehead. "I expected him to stay a week. It seems his endurance is higher than his IQ."

He didn't write a report. He didn't call a parent. Just another click, and he sent the file to the forgotten archives. To Gerhardt, a student returning from the hospital didn't need care; they needed to get back to class.

Click.

A new message appeared. This one was "official," adorned with a shiny gold emblem.

[Open Invitation: Annual Innovation Exhibition.] [Location: University Island.] [Participants: Two University Students + Open Invitations to Educational Institutions.]

Gerhardt read the invitation, the corner of his mouth lifting slightly in mockery.

"Innovation..." He said the word like it was a bad joke. "Everyone knows the result."

He looked out at the academy courtyard through the window. Students walked lazily; some fought in the corner, others escaped over the fences. It was chaos, but it was "living chaos."

"They need a reason..." Gerhardt thought. "Micro-crises create progress."

He reached for the microphone console on his desk. He pressed the button.

A faint whistle echoed throughout the academy; in the classrooms, the hallways, the cafeteria, and even the backyards.

"Good morning, or whatever time you woke up," Gerhardt’s calm, composed voice resonated through the speakers.

In one of the classrooms, a "student violating the uniform code" lifted his head from the desk where he was pretending to sleep (or actually sleeping) and opened one dark blue eye lazily.

"The same boring announcement every year," Gerhardt continued. "In two days, the Innovation Exhibition will be held on University Island. They expect us to send a delegation of student inventors to clap for their inventions."

Gerhardt paused for a moment, heightening the focus of the students who had started to grumble.

"I don't care if you go or not. And I don't care if you clap," Gerhardt's tone shifted to become more serious. "But let's be realistic. Boredom is killing you, and the rules are suffocating you."

In the cafeteria, Kai stopped throwing an empty juice carton at a student and lifted his head with interest.

"So, I will set a simple incentive," the Headmaster said. "Any student from this academy who participates in the exhibition... and wins a place, or leaves a strong enough impression to force 'everyone' to acknowledge them..."

He paused again for effect.

"...I will allow them to add a new rule to the academy's regulations for this year."

Dead silence fell over the school.

"Provided there is no exaggeration, of course. No requests to expel teachers, no requests to blow up the building, and definitely no requests for eternal holidays or optional classes, or... you know? You get the idea."

Gerhardt turned off the microphone with a final click and went back to sipping his coffee, watching from the window as the "laziness" in the courtyard suddenly transformed into "excited whispers."

In the classroom, a boy in a red hoodie sat up straight.

"A new rule?" he muttered, his eyes gleaming with a rare spark. "Can I make gaming in class allowed?... I do that already... If it's time to graduate."

He pulled out his phone and started typing a message rapidly. (The Exhibition. I need an invention. Now.)

Elsewhere, Kai was smiling that arrogant smile.

"A rule allowing fighting in the hallways?" Kai thought aloud. "No... that doesn't solve the property damage problem. Or maybe... abolishing the boring uniform? That sounds fun."

Back in the Headmaster's office, Gerhardt opened an old book and began to read, completely ignoring the creative chaos he had just unleashed.

"Let's see who floats to the surface," he whispered to himself. "I bet 90% of those who participate will cheat, 9% will understand the spice is in destroying the exhibition or threatening a student or bribing them to register with them... and 1% are those who invent something in one day, ending up either destroyed with the rest or the sole survivor."

Somewhere on the "Central Island," inside a towering, nameless administrative tower.

The meeting hall was vast, cold, and completely dark. No chairs, no wooden conference table, not even a bottle of water.

Just the void, and the faint hum of projectors.

Suddenly, light tore through the darkness.

Six giant screens suspended in the air flickered on, forming a circle of light around the empty center.

The screen at the front displayed the "Annual Innovation Exhibition" logo rotating slowly. The screen at the back displayed a constant stream of data and timestamps.

As for the four side screens... they displayed the "Members."

On the right screen (the first one), a man appeared sitting at a golden desk, his face partially shadowed, but his luxurious uniform and the "Lion" emblem (Leontolyx University) were clear.

And on the left screen (the first one), a woman appeared with features sharp as a sword, a pure white and blue background behind her, and the "Moon" emblem (Lunognosta University) shining coldly.

"I see you accepted the open invitation," the woman's voice came from the left screen, smooth but carrying the edge of a blade. "I thought 'Leontolyx' preferred to keep the purity of its... actions... away from everyone."

"It is city protocol, Madam President," the man from the right screen replied in a deep, bored voice. "The instructions are clear: 'We do not want a repeat of what happened in the recent exhibitions.' It seems the Council doesn't want the start of a new era of arms and drug trade."

"Trade..." The woman chuckled lightly. "Those were good days."

"You only say that because she was the only prominent inventor you had, unlike us," the Leontolyx President said, adjusting the collar of his golden jacket. "Leontolyx University's history is more distinguished."

"Really? Are you sure?" the President asked, her eyes glinting in the screen light. "Does your university possess any of the Ranked?"

"You only have two attending; one because of her family and the second because you bribed her," the man retorted with excessive confidence. "If I recall, because of that, you had to repair the training arena more than five times in one month."

"One month?" The President raised an eyebrow. "Rumors spread, but it's not like you're wrong. In the end, we are talking about Rank Seven."

"Are they going to keep talking like this?"

An older man's voice came from a screen far from the speaking man's screen.

"Both inherited the position; the boasting between them will never end," came a woman's voice from a screen further from the main one.

"It was supposed to be Victor who took the university," the older man sighed.

"That's according to you, whereas I see Verina as fitting to take Lunognosta," the woman replied, looking at a screen in the back. "Everything is ready in terms of preparation, but... regarding the attendance of those three."

"Unknown," the older man replied. "It's better they don't appear. The goal of the exhibition is not to boast about who is already an inventor, but to support new inventors or idea holders in the Atlas Plan."

"Well, they haven't attended in the last three years," the woman answered. "Each of them was busy. This year, we can only hope for the same."

The two fell silent, thinking of that possibility.

But silence was impossible.

"You only have lunatics in that university of yours," the President's voice appeared, breaking their silence.

"Those you call lunatics are the ones who graduated and control most sectors," the President retorted.

"Shall we end the meeting?" the woman asked.

"I will send the rest to you," the man replied.

After that, the screens shut off.

In the heart of the "University Island," inside the "Leontolyx University" student dorms, which resembled a seven-star hotel.

The room was spacious, its floor polished black marble, and the walls covered with display screens showing random clips.

In the center, a "boy" sat in front of a metal workbench clean to the point of obsession.

He wore a luxurious grey shirt, having taken off his golden jacket and hung it carefully on the back of the chair so it wouldn't wrinkle. His messy black hair (calculatedly so) was fixed, and his pale grey eyes stared with intense focus at the object placed before him.

It was a complex wristwatch, a "Star-X" type, expensive and known to be impossible to repair if opened.

"With reverse disassembly..." the boy whispered.

He touched the watch glass with the tip of his finger.

It didn't break. It didn't shatter.

Instead, it disassembled.

The parts separated from each other as if gravity had ceased. The tiny gears, the hairsprings, the screws, and the crystal cover... they all floated slowly in the air, maintaining their relative spatial arrangement, but separated into their primary components.

The boy's eyes scanned the components. His mind didn't see "spare parts"; he saw "information." Structure, link, strength, and weakness.

"Good design... but still improvable," he muttered, moving his index finger to turn a small gear in the air without touching it. "Why use titanium here when compressed carbon is lighter and more efficient? A waste of resources."

He closed his eyes for a moment.

(I just have to reassemble... with a modification here.)

The pieces began to move.

They didn't return to their original places. They changed. The heavy metal gears eroded and their molecular structure shifted to become lighter and harder. The springs were reshaped to store more energy. The outer casing melted and reformed itself into a sharper, more aerodynamic design.

Within ten seconds, the watch was back in one piece.

The boy held it. It was no longer a "Star-X." It was something new. Something "better."

"This is the difference between me and them," the boy said to himself, placing the modified watch aside to join a collection of "improved" devices on his table. "They make... and I make things work."

He rose from his chair and walked towards the giant window overlooking the university campus.

He was thinking about the "order" that would arrive tomorrow.

"Abir Enigmon..." He said the name with a mix of respect and disdain. "Genius inventor, yes. But chaotic. He is like a child drawing with chalk on the walls of a palace. He needs... a business manager. He needs someone to take his scribbles and turn them into art sold for millions."

The boy looked at his reflection in the glass. He smiled that smile that didn't reach his eyes.

"I am not a thief," he convinced himself with stunning sincerity. "I am an 'editor.' I take the ugly first draft and make it the novel everyone reads."

He returned to his table and opened a blank holographic blueprint.

He began writing a list, his fingers moving with nervous speed on the digital surface:

[Shipment Receipt Plan - Tomorrow 08:00 AM]

Plan A (Success): The device arrives. I disassemble it, understand its mechanism, reassemble it with a nicer design, and present it at the exhibition as a "prototype" of my own design.

Plan B (Complication): The device is too complex or protected against disassembly. (Solution: Use external generators to boost my energy and bypass the protection).

Plan C (Trap): Abir sent a bomb or a prank. (Solution: Open the package in the isolation room in the basement; I prepared a remote opening robot).

Plan D (Total Failure): The device doesn't work. (Solution: Steal the project of the "student in room 402" that he has been working on for two months, and modify it tonight).

The boy sighed in relief after writing the plans.

"The pessimist survives," he said, closing the screen. "And the dreamer... is the one who takes the prize."

He looked at the empty space in the center of the table, where he would place the "Skull Gun" tomorrow.

"I just hope it's not something too 'biological'," he rubbed his fingers nervously. "I hate dealing with wet things. He won't put a real skull... right?"

He opened the screen again and wrote.

Plan Z (Madness): Return to Plan D immediately and destroy the weapon right before inspection.

He closed the screen again, stood up, and lay down on the bed.

"Everything is prepared like this."

He closed his eyes.