Sora was lying on his bed thinking about all the information he had recently obtained, he was also mentally revisiting the plan or rather the plans he was going to put in place afterwards. It was slightly hot in their small student room so the air conditioning was on. Shiro was sitting on the floor playing the console, while reading some of the information they had learned in class in a few seconds. For someone like her, it was as simple as glancing at each page to have every word and comma memorized.

"The S-system huh..."

Sora knew what was coming. He understood that classes weren't made up randomly and if it continued like this his own class was going to finish last. He tried his best to think about the situation. Class A and class B were two classes made up of serious and involved students, class C's profile was still hard to determine, and class D was considered the class of the worst students.

"Why?"

He asked the question to himself, in a voice low enough to not break Shiro's concentration. He knew that there was a system of exams in this school that would allow his class to move up in the rankings if they won the exams in question. But there was one major problem with this system: inequality.

The school had distributed the students unequally, so in theory it was impossible for a class like class D to move up to class A, therefore why did this system exist? Why was there a system of competition when there was an inequality between the distribution of students in the classes ?

Thinking about it further, he didn't even understand why class D was the class of the worst students, sure there were some troublemakers but generally the class had some good profiles as well. Kushida and Hirata were extremely popular and seemed to be academically involved. Horikita, despite her isolation, was still heavily involved in reading so she certainly had the academic abilities of a Class A student as well. He still didn't quite know all of his classmates, but he was certain of one thing: he was missing a crucial piece of information.

Information that would allow him to understand why such a system existed despite the inequality that was in place. To get such information, he needed to know more about his class, and to do that he needed to enable Class D to unite.

He also needed to understand why people like him and Shiro, despite their clean record on the exam, were placed in class D. At first he thought it was a random assignment but since each class was defined for a specific purpose, their presence in this class also had a purpose.

Class D was a class with various profiles, many of these profiles were incompatible with each other, Sora knew that if he wanted to unite the class then he had to somehow make these profiles find a point of compatibility.

He then also thought about the email he had received, a person who had invited them to this school had demanded Sora and Shiro to "win the game". If that was the case, then that would explain why they were in class D. If class A was the class that was entitled to all the merits and rewards, then winning the game meant moving up to class A.

The competitiveness between classes was a team game, the kind of game Sora and Shiro hated, but if Sora didn't want to lose his sister then he had to take whatever means necessary to succeed.

On May 1, rankings were going to be established, based on the performance of each class, they would be assigned their true rankings based on class points. This was what Yoshino had explained. The class points were assigned according to different criteria. The system in this school was based on collective responsibility, one student's punishment is the punishment of the whole class.

"In other words..."

If Sora didn't deal with the disruptive people in her class quickly, they would lose all their class points and end up at the bottom of the class. Horikita, Sudou, Kouenji, Ike, Yamauchi, and a few other names came to mind, all of these people in one way or another could pose a risk to the class. Horikita's lack of cooperation could be a reason for negative points as could Sudou's aggressive behavior.

Within a group, if one did not want a disruptive element to spoil the group's performance, there were two ways to do so: to get rid of the person or make him understand the importance of his actions. Getting rid of a student seemed like a complicated task, so Sora had to get the students in class D to care about each other to limit their problematic behavior in class.

In order to unite them, conveying the truth was an important first step, if they could convince the class of the reality of this school's system then the students would be more likely to try to improve their behavior, but that wasn't likely to be enough, especially since before May 1 no one would have any proof that this system really existed. So extra precautions had to be taken.

" It' s tomorrow then?"

Shiro, who until now had been focused on her game and her books, spoke in a soft voice.

"Yeah."

He replied simply. Today at 7pm Kushida and Hirata had discussed with Sora and Shiro how they would present this story to the class, they had decided not to talk about Sora and Shiro because their story was hard to believe. Instead, Hirata and Kushida were going to explain to the class that some of their friends had told them the reality about this school. Since they were popular, it was not inconceivable for these people to have informants among their friends.

And the revelation of this reality was going to take place tomorrow, during the lunch break.

"We have three weeks until the rankings are decided."

"Which means we've already lost a lot of points with all the little incidents that have happened so far."

Whether it was aggressive behavior, students who ignored class, students who chattered, or students who slept, if class points were a reflection of class performance then all of these things would undeniably bring that score down.

"Yosh. It's time to act my little sister!"

"Will the seeds start growing?"

"Of course, simply for them to grow, we also have to feed them. But before we feed them we need information."

"What information?"

"We're going to... take a little stroll through the entire campus."

"A stroll?"

.

.

.

Meanwhile, a few hours earlier, a young student with long black hair was in Professor Sae Chabashira's office. She stood with a determined and slightly irritated look, ready to defend her reputation.

"Suzune Horikita. It's rare for a student to request a meeting with the teacher after such a short time. That's not usually a good sign you know?"

"I know about everything. The way this school operates, I know the S-system."

Ignoring her words and not wanting to beat around the bush, Horikita got straight to the point. Her eyes were piercing and her words filled with a certain conviction, she showed no signs of instability.

"Ho? I have no idea what you're talking about."

"I know very well that this system exists, it explains a lot."

"What do you mean?"

"These differences between classes, these private points that the school gives, the free items. The real system in this school is a meritocracy."

The teacher had a small smile on her face, she turned her chair so that her whole body was facing Horikita, adjusting herself in her chair, she crossed her legs and continued.

"A meritocracy? All the schools in this country are meritocracies lady, what you're telling me isn't very useful information."

"But this school is really implementing the consequences of a meritocracy. It decides everyone's position in the school based on their performance, that's why the worst students end up in class D."

"What is the purpose of this meeting Horikita? You didn't just come to tell me your vision of this school and society I suppose."

Chabashira-sensei was once again using a diversionary technique to dodge the main point of the discussion.

"I am convinced of the existence of this system and therefore I am also convinced of the existence of a mistake. I am not supposed to be a class D student, I would like my place to be corrected."

The teacher looked at her for the space of a few seconds as she tapped the desk with her finger in a slow and steady rhythm, she took a deep breath and decided to get into her game.

" Assuming that such a system exists, what makes you say that you are placed in class D by mistake?"

"It's obvious isn't it?"

"Not really, explain it to me."

"Whether it's my physical or academic abilities, I have a pretty solid profile, I'm even sure I'm worth a lot more than many of the class A students."

" Admittedly, what makes you say that it is your academic and athletic skills that decide your place in this school?"

"Your question is ridiculous ma'am, within a school it is always the academic and athletic skills that have taken precedence over everything else."

"Except that, according to your logic, we are in a real meritocracy system within this school and you know what happens in a real meritocracy system?"

"Enlighten me."

"Your results are just a preliminary. Do you think that in adult life, when a company hires you, it's your academic results that they'll bother to look at? No. It's the quality of your profile that will interest them."

"Meaning?"

"It's up to you to find the answer to that question, have you ever had a company tell you why they aren't hiring you? Or tell you how they evaluated your performance? These are confidential things, if the candidate knew what they were being evaluated on then they could easily manipulate their results and that's not what they want."

"No matter what you tell me, I refuse to believe that there is anything in my profile that would justify my position in the worst class. I will make an appeal."

" Do so, simply I know in advance what the outcome will be."

Horikita gritted her teeth and turned around with a heavily frustrated look on her face, leaving the room with a head full of negative thoughts. Chabashira returned to her documents, her chin resting on her hand, she chewed on her pen as she thought about what had just happened.

"Looks like these two have already learned the reality about this school."

She laughed silently, an excited look drawn on her face.

.

.

.

On her way home, while she was deep in thought walking through the empty school corridors, Horikita came across someone she didn't particularly want to see.

"What do you want from me?"

"Hi Horikita-san, I was wondering if you wanted..."

"No."

"But I didn't even tell you what I wanted..."

"What do you want?"

"Well, to go to a cafe and-"

"No."

Horikita started to move forward at once. But the young blonde with short hair followed her.

"Why won't you talk to me? Don't you like me?"

"I have no reason to like or dislike you and I consider these outings a waste of time, what is the purpose of us going out together?"

"Well so we can become friends..."

"That's not something I'm interested in Kushida-san."

Horikita turned to her, giving her an icy look that lasted a few seconds before continuing on her way.

" Why are you being like this?!"

Kushida raised her voice and asked her in a loud voice, something that didn't faze Horikita.

"Why do you want to be my friend so much?"

Horikita answered her with a new question.

"Because I don't like to see you alone, I don't understand how you can like living alone!"

Kushida continued, in a slightly desperate voice.

"Huh?! Isn't it selfish what you're saying to me now? You want to impose your way of life on me just because you can't understand mine? Stop thinking only about yourself!"

Horikita raised her voice slightly, wanting to be as sharp and direct as possible.

"Selfish? How can you say I'm selfish when I just want to make sure you're not alone..."

Kushida's voice weakened, as if she was about to cry.

"You assume that my way of life is not good, you simply don't know anything about me, you don't know me, therefore the only reason why my life saddens you is because you wouldn't stand it. In other words, you only deal with people's situations from your perspective, isn't that selfish?"

"Does your way of life really suit you?"

"I don't need others, I don't need friends. I can take care of myself and I would like you to leave me alone.

Horikita finished with these words, without a single ounce of hesitation in her voice, before continuing on her way. A distance was created in the corridor between Kushida and Horikita before she disappeared completely.

.

.

The next day, Sora and Shiro headed to their classroom, within a few hours Kushida and Hirata would reveal the reality to everyone.

"Do you think this will be enough to make things change Nii?"

"I'm not sure sis, that's the reason we went on that whole ride last night, we're going to take some extra steps."

"What will this map be used for?

"Hehehe, I will explain it to you soon."

Sora looked at a certain map that he had taken a picture of on his cell phone. Last night he and Shiro had walked around all the roads on campus, Sora had asked Shiro to use her computational skills to draw an accurate angle of all the cameras on campus and highlight the blind spots. As a result, they had drawn a map on paper with all the blind spots on campus, the map being hidden in their room.

"In this world, rules are made to discourage people from certain behaviors, simply there is no rule that completely prohibits a person from doing something. A person will always be free to do whatever they want, but if they get caught, they will face a heavy punishment. In America, there is the death penalty for the most serious crimes, yet the number of murders, kidnappings, rapes and other crimes do not completely decrease because there is a simple idea to escape the punishment."

"Not getting caught."

"Absolutely. The world continues to know evil because there is no omniscient authority that can immediately punish anyone who commits a crime."

"Why are you telling me this bro?"

"People in this school are no different, as soon as they find a way to break the rules without getting caught, they will."

"If people were to find out about the existence of our map, it would become problematic."

"We're not going to broadcast the existence of this map, at least not right away. But we will use it.

"You want to break the rules, bro?"

"Let's just say that, in order to get the best possible results in such a short time for our class, we're going to have to use some crude methods."

What did Sora have in mind?

A/N : Hope you enjoyed this one, to be honest I'm excited to be able to write about the real deal, the special exams. However as you know the first volume is mostly about introducing the system and the characters, hence I have to get around that aswell before really starting to deal with the exams. I have to write about some characters interactions that I'm excited with and other stuff. In that sense this story will take quite a few chapters in order to properly move towards the key elements of this story. I'd like to chronologically treat about all the volumes through Sora and Shiro's eyes but that will be a long task. I don't know how long this fanfiction will last but what I can say is that I'll do my best to write about it continually.