Chapter 3: Is it possible to study with a genius?

*bling* *bling*

“Yeeeeesssssssss…?” I slowly drag myself towards the door. I had just woken up not long ago and was currently snacking on an apple that was in the fridge last night. My hair resembles the balls of tumbleweed that roll around in the desert, but it’ll settle down when I feel more awake.

*bling* *bling*

“I said… I’m come…-ing!?” I opened the door to a surprised Akio, who was already properly dressed for school with his bag.

“Oh! Sorry! I just thought we could head over to school together, I didn’t realize you were still eating, I’ll come back later.”

“Dooon’t you worry. You’re so early… come inside and take a seat!” I’m not a morning person.

“A-are you okay? Your words are slurred- no…” Akio gasped. “Did you drink last night?”

“NO! What do you think I drank? Water beer?” I snapped, stomping my foot as I released some early morning anxiety.

“Ha…? O-okay then, I’ll come inside.”

“Just… make yourself… comfortable.” Leaving those words behind, I slogged back to the washroom to splash some more water on my face, and dried it with one of the many white towels stored in the closet. Refreshed, I came back out to the kitchen to get a glass of water before sitting down on the comfy couch adjacent to Akio and taking another bite out of my apple.

“Please, make yourself at home.”

“H-home?! Oh! Y-yes.”

“Hahaha with that flushed face you might as well be a girl Akio,” I teased.

“...”

“Sorry! That was mean, I know, I know. Anyways, did you see the message from yesterday?” *chomp* This apple is really good.

“I-I did, and I-I was wondering if you had any idea how we could prepare for it?”

“Nothing that you can’t think of yourself Akio, you’re overestimating me way too much.”

“Hm…”

“Just relax, I’m not going to hurt you or anything. If you do that we can actually make some progress here.”

Akio listened and took a few deep breaths. His speech smoothed out instantly afterwards.

“The first thought I had after seeing the title of the test was investigating the labyrinth itself. In other words, what type of labyrinth is it? If we can narrow that down, it might make it easier for us to find a way out. Furthermore, since it’s a diagnostic exam, I’m sure we’ll be tested on junior high material, or more likely what we covered in our last year at junior high.”

That’s too formal, but we’re making progress so I’ll let it slide. If it was just a normal labyrinth, I’d just stick myself to the left wall and keep walking alongside it until I make it out. That’s simple enough.

“Just keep one hand on the left wall and walk. You’ll make it out eventually.”

“Katsu-kun, you do realize making it out of the labyrinth is nowhere near good enough right?”

“Huh?” No, I definitely have not. When were labyrinths any more use than escaping from?

Akio shook his head in disappointment. “We explained this Katsu-kun, we’re going to be ranked on a leaderboard remember? That implies that we’re going to be timed on this exam, and our score will be relative to everyone else. Not only do you have to find your way out of the labyrinth, but you have to do it faster than everyone else. Does that make sense?”

Sort of. I had such a simple plan too…

“Oh! The time. We have to go Katsu-kun!”

“One day you’re going to have to drop those honorifics, Akio…”

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Entering the classroom, I noticed Shimada from the sushi stall yesterday. So she’s in our class. It might just be my imagination, but Akio doesn’t look pleased. It doesn’t take us very long at all to find our friends huddled together in a large circle in the back of the room.

“Good morning everyone!”

“Hey, it’s Katsu and Akio, quick, quick, come here.” Jisen urged.

“What is it?” I whispered.

“You’ll never guess.”

“We’re going to discuss the labyrinth now.”

“Whaaaaat? How’d you know?”

“Jisen!” Tomoko hushed. What other topic was interesting enough to gather this particularly diverse group of people into a circle? Even Maya and Toshiro were huddled and listening.

“Alright so Tomoko and I have thought of a few strategies to tackle this test. We can discuss them on the second floor of the department after school. Let’s all aim to do well on this.”

“Right, and just to be clear Tomoki, we’re going to exclude everyone else from our class.” I sarcastically remarked.

“Shhhhhhhhhh.” Tomoki pressed her finger to her lips. “We don’t have to help everyone, I just wanted all my friends to do well.”

“Awnnnn, you consider me a friend?”

“You don’t have to be one if you don’t want to Jisen.”

“Jeez your attitude changes fast.”

That was about as productive as it was going to get, and it was going to be a waste of time if I stuck around any further. Right when I took a seat in an empty chair beside Akio, who chose to sit in the back left of the class, Hachiroka-sensei entered the classroom with a bottle of soda.

“Ah~ everyone’s here! Fantastic~~”

“How’s everyone today?~~ Not worried about the email sent out last night, are we?”

“We’re doing our best to tackle it sensei!” Chikako exclaimed at the front of the class.

“Great!~~ Now, are you ready to begin your first homeroom period of high school???”

That sounds like a cue for us to cheer-

“YEAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH”

Yeah. What can I say? We’re still children at heart.

“Woohoo~~! Let’s start with the important news, shall we? The details you’ve all been waiting for.”

Akio and I may have discussed some plans of action, but without further details they would’ve been impossible to carry out. The class fell silent as we perked our ears.

“I’m sure you’re all wondering how we will be testing your knowledge while you’re escaping a labyrinth, and don’t worry, we’ll touch on that later. First thing’s first. The labyrinth that you will all be taking on will be a variant of the paper and pencil game of labyrinth invented by the Soviet Union in the 1970s, a game popular with its high school and college students.”

I have no idea what she’s talking about.

“In this game, when a gamemaster designs a labyrinth, each cell can be one of the following: empty, wormhole, river, or treasure. These will be the only tiles that you will face in the labyrinth as well.”

Only four types? That might simplify things a bit.

“However, since we want to grasp your academic skills to the best we can, you will be taking this test on your own, and there will be no weapons, unlike the original.”

What if there were weapons? Do we resort to brutality? Even if it’s just a virtual world… that’s hard to imagine.

“You will be searching for a number of treasure tiles, and the amount of gold coins you extract from them will be proportional to the number of questions you get right in the corresponding set of problems. Your objective is to escape the labyrinth with as many gold coins as you can as fast as you can. Your total score will be the average of your rankings for gold coins and speed within the entire school.”

“The entire school??? Won’t our seniors have a great advantage then?” Jisen interrupted.

“Not exactly, they’ll be given questions taken from the material they covered last year. It is important at this school that you’re able to not only learn but also retain information for as long as possible. You won’t be very successful if you keep forgetting everything you learn after a few months would you?”

We have to spend time reviewing material even after our tests…? My free time… I clenched my chest as my heart ached from the thought. I didn’t come here to waste my time studying…

“Oh! One last thing. You will be given a map of the labyrinth tomorrow after your last class. These details that I have just discussed with you will all be sent to you in a few hours.”

A map??? But if we’re given that, then that means…

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Finally, after Hachiroka-sensei finished up a personal story of hers, the last class of the day was over. Our classes were more like introductions than lectures today, with Hachiroka-sensei just running over some introductory details on each of the subjects. I wouldn’t mind classes like these that I can practically sleep through, but since it’s just the first day, I’m not going to get my hopes up. When I checked through the news, I saw that a group of speleologists were saved from the depths of a cavern after two weeks. From the calm smiles on their faces, I’m not sure if they were scared that they were going to die or if they just had fun as the cave enthusiasts they were.

I’m not particularly scared of the dark, but I’d rather avoid being stuck in a dark space for extended periods of time.

“Guys, since we’re going to see the actual labyrinth tomorrow, I thought it would be a better use of our time if we did some reviewing tonight,” Tomoko suggested to the group.

“Sounds fun! Do we have the materials from junior high to study from though?” Tomoki asked

“Don’t worry, Toshiro has all sorts of books packed in his bags, he agreed to let us use them too.”

“Awesomeeeeeeeeeee can I see them? This is so interesting! I wonder what the books look like!” Maya chirped from behind me, startling me.

“Great. We can use my room for tonight, I bought some snacks yesterday so you guys can have some if you want.”

“Katsu-kun?” Akio noticed my silence, and poked me from my left.

“Oh, sorry but I’ll pass on that.”

“Why?”

“I just don’t particularly feel like studying, that’s all.”

“But we can make it fun, right Tomoko?”

“I did say you can have some of my snacks didn’t I?”

“It’s okay, I’ll just head back myself today.” I stood up to leave, and glared at Akio to not follow me after he got up from his seat too. It’s nothing personal to them, I just don’t like study groups. If they’re not playing games tonight then I’ll be doing that alone in my room. I have nothing against studying either, but it’s just a waste of my time to study with others. If I don’t have to, I won’t work with others either. I always finished all my group projects alone as quickly as I could just to avoid wasting any more time than I needed to on them.

“What happened to him? Did I say something?” I heard them whisper when I reached the door.

“No!” I yelled, before walking back towards the dorms.

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I actually used to enjoy learning and studying. My parents would often read me books and play all sorts of fun games with me. They were educational, but they were fun. I got pretty good at shogi, go, and chess when I was little, and I would always run around, badgering my parents to play a game with me. I often lost, but I never gave up.

One day, they told me they had some work to do, and told me to play on the computer while they were busy. Not soon after, they stopped telling me stories, and asked me to read books myself. They told me I was growing up, and that I had to do these things myself.

I’ve already learnt enough to skip two or three grades of school back then, but it was useless. I did not need to know more than what I needed to know. My friends were all focused on displaying their pokemon figurines and pencil cases, but what have I been spending my time on all these years? I wanted to play with them too. I wanted to have fun. I’ve always wanted to have fun.

I have an overly competitive nature. If I care enough for the game, I will try my hardest to win. This is true for everyone; who wants to lose? However, I quickly noticed that if I had too much fun in one go, others suffered. They want to win too, and if they don’t, they’d stop playing. It’s a shame, I valued the fun of playing with friends over the fun you get from winning. I stopped caring about whether or not won as long as everyone was happy enough to play again next time.

Occupied by friends and games, I stopped studying. I started reading up the popular topics on my phone, and was able to get along with my classmates. As a result, I never interacted with the smart kids. They were boring and only ever cared about studying after school alone. They were not there for me when I needed friends the most. The self-proclaimed model students shut others out, and focused on their own studying. Not only is there no fun in that, they only end up hurting those that try to befriend them.

Like how my sister hurt me.

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“Another new song, huh.” I looked up at the ceiling. Sometimes, the internet feeds me too much information too fast. I barely remember any of it, but at least I can recall that I looked at it. Small talk was an important skill to develop.

There were fancy artifacts on the bookcase with some classic English books. The twin bed doesn’t squeak when I get on or off. The blue desk was built into the wall and the comfy pink chair had wheels. Just yesterday I discovered the joys of spinning around a chair for minutes on end. Not sure why, but I felt so dizzy afterwards I couldn’t even unlock my phone. It’s an exhilarating sensation.

The room was way too colorful. I mentioned the pink chair already, a curious color for a boy’s room, but the bookcase itself was brown, which is normal, and the walls were green. Add to that a red lamp and a yellow bed frame. Now I’m just missing an orange beanbag and a purple plushie before my room would be complete.

I furrowed my eyebrows as I released the anger that had built up over the past two days. “WHO IS DESIGNING THIS???” At least this is more productive than boring studying the night before an exam, I thought as I took another spin on the pink chair.

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*bling* *bling* Who’s coming to see me this late into the night?

“Hi- Tomoko?”

“Just came to check to see if you’re alright. You ran away today right after class, could it have been something I said?” He showed up in his uniform with glasses on and a bag of chips. From his serious personality, I’d never have thought he was the type of guy to enjoy snacks.

“No! Not at all! I said that when I left didn’t I?”

“I couldn’t think of what else it could’ve been, so I came all the way here to see what happened to you.”

“I’m so sorry for making you come all this way, but it’s nothing special: I just didn’t want to study with you guys tonight.”

“But it’s so we can all do better on the test-”

“That’s enough. I’ll manage somehow.”

“I see. Well if you ever change your mind, we’ll be in my room for another hour tonight. Room 510. If not, see you tomorrow Katsu.”

“Thanks for coming, but I’ll pass on that. See you tomorrow, I’m looking forward to it.” I punched the door after he left. I don’t belong in their group. They’ve all been top students for their entire lives, while I just worked really hard on one test. They wouldn’t understand how I feel, they’ve always been perfect students. Perfect students don’t understand the normal ones.

But selfishly, I want to keep having fun with them. If they were playing cards tonight, I would’ve gone along. I won’t distance myself permanently from them. Maybe I’ll show up to their next study session. There, I’ll just do what I did tonight.

Study sessions have left a scar on me, the ones I had in the past where nobody would answer my questions. Not even the private ones at home with my sister, who never once looked up from her books to answer my questions.

My heart just wasn’t ready for it today.