Team Ebisu

The sun had long set by the time I arrived to the school gate. As the instructions stated, I checked my surroundings and made sure I was the only person around. With the coast clear, I made my way inside and to classroom 3-B. As I reached my hand to knock on the door, it was opened from the inside. Standing there was Ms. Kurokawa, she must have been the faculty representative for my group. Just my luck.

“You just can’t seem to get away from me, can you Nakamura?”

“I guess not,” I replied, unsure of what else to say.

“Well come on in, meet the rest of your team.”

I entered the classroom, there were only four other students in the room. Another student quickly came forward to introduce himself.

“Hi there, I’m Ichiro Ishikawa, from Class B, nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you. Arata Nakamura, Class A.”

“So you’re the infamous Arata Nakamura?” another one of the students chimed in. I don’t know if I would consider myself famous or infamous for anything, but I guess the rumors still stuck around. At least, she seemed to know me in some capacity. “Good to know we got stuck with the lowest ranking member of Class A.” Her tone was harsh, but I could understand her frustrations to some level.

“Take it easy Akane, shouldn’t we be focusing on getting along with our teammates?” Ishikawa quickly jumped back in. Given how he addressed her, she must have been one his class teammates. “She’s one of my teammates from Class B, Akane Akabane, she can be a bit snappy but trust me she’s nicer than she comes off.”

“Oh shut up, Ichiro.”

“I’m from Class C,” another guy chimed in. “Jiro Fujimaki. My teammates aren’t here yet.”

All that left was one girl sitting quietly in the back of the classroom. She was likely one of the Class D members, since Ichiro failed to introduce her and Fujimaki stated none of his classmates were present. She didn’t seem intent on introducing herself to everyone. Maybe it was nerves?

“I’m not supposed to tell you all what to do, but maybe you can wait to do introductions until after everyone from your team has arrived,” said Ms. Kurokawa. “Would be better than introducing yourselves every time someone arrives. Plus the rest should be arriving momentarily.”

Heeding her advice, we all waited around for the rest of our team to arrive. One by one, the final ten students arrived. Eventually, the remaining students from classes B, C, and D arrived. That meant, the final student to arrive would be the final member of class A, my partner, the teammate that selected me. Who would walk through the door?

With thirteen of us in the room, the classroom door slid open one more time. Standing there was none other than Sakura Sato. It was nice to have a familiar face around, but that also meant I was not selected at all during the draft process. Sakura, as the 15th ranked member of our 16 person class, was left stuck with me. Neither of us had any choice in the matter.

“Now that you’re all here, I’ll get started with some further explanation. You eight are now known as Team Ebisu, but of course don’t let anyone else know that. Sato, as the highest ranking member of the team, I am giving you the Ebisu figure.” Ms. Kurokawa handed Sato a carving of Ebisu, standing about a foot tall.

Sato immediately turned the figure over to me. That level of responsibility was not something she was comfortable with, and as the other Class A representative, she probably trusted me over the others. I wasn’t really comfortable with the responsibility either, but I had to try and save face for Class A. If both of us tried to hand off the figure, we would definitely lose whatever respect afforded to us as Class A students.

“Before we continue, let me introduce all of you,” Ms. Kurokawa said. She wasn’t one for wasting time. “Sakura Sato and Arata Nakamura, Class A. Ichiro Ishikawa, Akane Akabane, Shou Saiki, and Ayame Asai, Class B. Hideyoshi Takagi, Jiro Fujimaki, Gorou Goto, and Kenshin Kurata, Class C. Touko Sasaki, Tsukasa Tachibana, Eiko Eki, and Megumi Mazaki, Class D. There, now you know each other.”

That wasn’t much of an introduction, but they were swift at least. We’d have to truly get to know each other on our own time. I think I had everyone’s name memorized, even as they were recited so quickly. It did help that everyone was standing alongside their classmates.

Ms. Kurokawa cleared her throat. “Okay, well you have until midnight to hide your figure. You all read the rule sheet, so good luck.”

Before anyone could ask her any questions, she was out the door. Now, all that was left was the awkward air hanging between the hodgepodge group of students from every class. Who would step up and try to lead the team? Sakura was the de facto team captain, as the highest ranking member of the group, but acting as a vocal leader wasn’t in her wheelhouse. If someone from a lower class tried to step up, would the students of the higher ranked classes respect them?

“Hi everyone,” one of the boys from Class C spoke up. I believe his name was Jiro Fujimaki. “Even though we don’t seem to interact much between classes at this school, it’s important we all work together for this exam. We all have a lot to gain if we do well.”

“Obviously,” one of the Class B girls remarked under her breath. Akane Akabane, was it? Maybe I hadn’t remembered their names as well as I thought.

“You’re right, Fujimaki,” a boy from Class B said in agreement. “If we all work together we can all move up our respective class rankings. It’s in our best interest to cooperate. Does anyone have a plan to tackle this exam?”

Silence filled the room. Like me, I guess the others struggled to think of a plan, if they were even trying.

“Sorry, what was your name again?” a girl from the Class C faction asked sheepishly.

The boy let out a charming chuckle. “No worries, the teacher really rushed our introductions. I’m Ichiro Ishikawa. It’s a pleasure to meet all of you.”

Silence again.

“Nakamura, you have the figure right now, do you have any ideas where we should hide it?” Ichiro directed his question straight at me. Honestly, I was amazed he even remembered my name. But here he was, putting me on the spot.

“I don’t have a clue, sorry. Maybe someone on our team knows magic that might be useful for this exam? An object invisibility spell or something?”

“I know light magic,” Touko Sasaki said quietly. I remembered her name since she was the girl who didn’t introduce herself before, sitting alone in the back of the room. “I can bend waves of light around objects, creating visual distortions.”

I didn’t even know such magic was possible. It was the perfect form of magic for an exam like this. It was almost too convenient.

“Is it an active use magic? Or is it an enchantment?” I asked.

If Touko’s magic was active use, she would run herself into the ground trying to keep the statue hidden all week. Enchantment magic, on the other hand, could be applied to an object and maintained independently until the enchantment was broken.

“Object enchantment. If I enchant the figure, light will bend around it until I release the enchantment.”

Touko Sasaki from Class D was our savior. With her magic, we could hide our figure in plain sight.

“She’s in Class D,” the girl I recalled as Akane interjected. “How can we trust her to enchant it properly? She is in Class D for a reason after all. If it’s a weak enchantment someone else could break it easily.”

Akane certainly wasn’t helping group morale. We all needed to be on the same page or we were doomed to fail. People skills weren’t my strong suit, especially with strangers, so I stayed off on the sidelines hoping someone else would step in.

“You have serious attitude for someone who isn’t even in Class A,” Hideyoshi Takagi, one of the Class C students, snapped back at Akane. Even though he was in Class C he readily jumped to the defense of a Class D student. Maybe there was some respect between the classes after all. “You haven’t even provided anything for the group,” he continued. “So why run your mouth?”

“I may not be in Class A but I’m still sitting pretty above you,” Akane retorted. “This exam is stupid anyway, forcing us to cooperate with inferior students, so I have nothing to share.”

“Probably scared of being exposed for being a fraud. You probably had to use that body of yours to reach Class B, but the teachers didn’t like it enough to put you in Class A.”

“You want to take this outside?” Sparks flew off Akane’s fingertips. Things were starting to get out of hand now. Akane’s initial comments were out of line, but Hideyoshi was taking things too far.

“Let’s all calm down,” Ichiro said, coming to the rescue again. He gently grabbed Akane’s hand and lowered it, the sparks dissipating. “Class differences aside, for the next week we are a team. Let’s try to get along, okay?”

This was going nowhere fast. Ichiro could say all the right things but that couldn’t force people into getting along and cooperating. The stark contrast in personality even between members of the same class was very apparent. Sakura and I got along well enough, and Class D was yet to be a factor besides Touko offering her light magic. Classes B and C, however, seemed to be struggling with their own internal turmoils. I’d have to be cautious of all three other classes, one wrong step could derail our entire group.

“We only have a few hours to hid this figure,” I said bluntly. “If we don’t hide it by the deadline we are automatically disqualified. So let’s start there.”

It was a rare moment of assertiveness for me, but no one else was focusing on the actual objective at hand. I had to reel the group back in, along with Ichiro’s help.

“He’s right. We need to do this.” Sakura finally chimed in, and she backed me up. It was beneficial to show a unified front, at least for Class A, even if individually we were both at the bottom of the Class A totem pole.

“Alright, fine,” Akane scoffed.

“The rules are quiet lenient,” I continued. “Anything not expressly against the rules is permitted, so we should set up some kind of protection system for our figure. Magical traps so to speak.”

“If one area is rigged up with more traps than others, won’t other groups realize a figure is nearby? After all, why protect an area if there’s nothing there?” Jiro asked.

He brought up a good point. Thankfully, during all the bickering, I already came up with a potential solution for that problem.

“You’re right. That’s why I propose only two people in our group go out to hide the figure. One will be Sasaki, since she knows the light enchantment magic, and we can nominate someone else to accompany her. The rest of the team can disperse across the island and set up traps. That way, our trap locations will truly be random. If we have no pattern to our traps, there is no patter for other teams to discover.

My idea was to help the team in part, but also to cover myself and Sakura. I couldn’t trust anyone in our group yet, especially with a traitor among us. This method of randomization would prevent almost all the risk.

Some of the groups discussed within themselves. Sakura and I watched on in silence. Ichiro was the first to address the group as a whole.

“Great thinking, Nakamura. You know your stuff. I like it. Class B approves of the plan.”

The three other Class B students didn’t look nearly as thrilled, but it was approval nonetheless. It appeared that Ichiro had taken over as the leader of his Class B faction. Given his natural charm, the decision made sense.

“How are we deciding who goes with Sasaki to hide the figure?” Jiro asked. That was one question I didn’t have a good answer to. The safest bet was Sakura, since she couldn’t be the traitor as the team captain. But would me suggesting my own Class A teammate lead to others falsely concluding I was biased?

“Anyone except a Class D student should be fine,” Hideyoshi chimed in. “Sasaki is a Class D student, we don’t want both people hiding the figure to be from the same class.”

That was a good point as well. Perhaps picking another student would be harder than I initially thought.

“Maybe we should draw straws,” Jiro said. “That would go along with keeping it truly random. Excluding the other Class D students, of course.”

Everyone exchanged glances. I guess no one was going to step up to challenge Jiro. He reached into his bag and pulled out a bunch of straws.

“Here, Sasaki, hold these.”

Touko took the straws and presented them to the group, concealing their length. One by one, we drew straws. I pulled immediately after Sakura. My straw was shorter than hers, so I was already out of the running.

“Looks like I’ve won the honors,” Jiro said, holding out a straw that was considerably longer than anyone elses. “Alright Sasaki, let’s talk.”

Jiro motioned towards the back of the room as he got up. Sasaki followed.

“I guess that leaves the rest of us to place traps,” Ichiro said. “We should get started on that, we don’t want to get caught out setting traps after the test has started. Can everyone here use at least some kind of enchantment magic?”

Everyone nodded along, except for me. The look of disgust on Akane’s face couldn’t be more obvious. As one of the two members of Class A, I couldn’t use any enchantment magic. But my value to the team lay somewhere else, in observation.

“Allow me to scope out the city,” I said. “I can pick up a lot of information on the other teams, information that will prove valuable when it comes down to guessing who belongs to what team.”

There was no immediate response. No one was a big fan of my idea.

“Yeah that sounds stupid,” Akane laughed. “You can’t enchant anything so you’re just going to watch? That sounds lazy.”

“Now Akabane-”

“Don’t interrupt me Ishikawa,” she snapped back quickly. “When it comes down to scoring points, we need to get the figures first, solve the rest later. Using our strength to take figures by force is our best bet.”

“I agree,” Hideyoshi said. “Jiro and I are two of the top ranked students in Class C. We can overpower the other teams if it comes down to it.”

Ichiro gave me a look of disappointment, but he didn’t seem disappointed in me.

“Sorry Nakamura. If you want to scout out, go ahead, but I don’t think you’ll have much support on that front.”

I figured as much, but that wasn’t going to deter my plans. For once, I was confident I was taking the right approach.

“Alright everyone,” Ichiro continued. “Let’s get a move on! Fujimaki, Sasaki, good luck out there!”

And with those words of encouragement from Ichiro, everyone departed the classroom. 10:07 PM. In just under two hours, The Hunt began.