No Hiding; No Holding Back [ON HIATUS]

Chap 10: Test

I went to school as usual today, after jogging in the park for some quick exercise. I could feel more people than usual having their eyes drilled on the back of my head.

I should really complain about that post on the school forum. Even after 3 days, the attention directed at me had not wavered in the slightest.

I walked into class, and after greeting a few of my classmates, headed to my seat.

"Looks like you're getting pretty popular nowadays." I heard Horikita say.

I turned my head to see the Ice Queen reading a book by Agatha Christie, 'And Then There Were None'. It was a good book I had read a few years back. A true masterpiece. She sat on her chair elegantly, with a stern look on her face.

I sighed. "I didn't ask to be. It is troublesome."

I sighed yet again as I thought of all the Karaoke parties and shopping trips I had to attend in the coming days. 2 days ago, I had also gone out with several Class B students to expand my social network.

"How 'bout you? How're you doing with Kushida?"

She replied, "fine. She's not as annoying as I thought her to be. But let me warn you. Be careful around her."

I raised my eyebrows slightly. Had she noticed that Kushida was hiding her true self to everyone? Or... Could it be...

"Sure. Thanks for the warning. But why did you say that?"

She looked at me and said curtly, "intuition," before returning to her book.

~~~

Class continued as usual. Majority of the students listened attentively, or at least tried to pretend they did. However, a few students, such as Yamauchi, Ike, Sudo and Shinohara still secretly used their phones. I sighed. I had addressed that problem just last week, and they did stop for a few days, before continuing again.

Looks like I'll have to confront them about it soon.

For third period, we had history class with Chiyabashira-sensei. When the bell rang, Chiyabashira-sensei walked into the classroom.

"Today's lesson will be a bit more serious, students."

"What do you mean, Chabashira-sensei?" Ike asked.

“It’s the end of the month, so we’re going to have a short test. Please pass these to the back.”

She handed out the papers to the students in the front row. Eventually, the single-sheet test reached my desk. It contained questions in the five main subjects. With only a few questions per subject, it really was short.

“This test is just for future reference. It won’t be reflected in your report cards. There is no risk involved, so don’t worry. Of course, cheating is prohibited.”

"Won't be reflected in your report cards." Did that mean that it would affect our class points?

As soon as the pop quiz began, I scanned the questions. There were four questions per subject, for a total of twenty. Each question was worth five points, for a total of one hundred points. Most of the questions were extraordinarily easy. In fact, the questions seemed to be about two levels less difficult than the ones on the entrance examination. It appeared far too easy.

However, just as I thought that, I reached the end of the test. The final three questions were an order of magnitude higher in terms of difficulty. The final math problem couldn’t be solved without complex formulae.

“No way. These questions are seriously way too hard…” I heard someone mutter.

These questions couldn’t be geared toward a first-year high school student. The final three questions were clearly of a different quality than the others, so it was possible they’d been put on the test by mistake.