Classroom of the Elite: World Domination

Ch-9: Meta Masterclass

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--> Time = Mid of Term 2, Yr 1 <--

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Ayanokoji Kiyotaka's POV:

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A certain student shifted around the classroom, his voice drifting between light banter and focused intensity. Oddly, I found myself listening more closely than I expected.

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'His words weren't particularly groundbreaking, but there was a certain logic to them that resonated with me. Or perhaps, more accurately, with the experiences I've had before arriving here-experiences in a place that wasn't exactly conducive to traditional studies.'

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"... so learning is all about organizing information."

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'That was true enough. I'd been taught that long before I ever set foot in this school. In the White Room, the process of "learning" had been entirely different. It was more like survival. Information was drilled into us in ways that forced us to remember, to categorize, to adapt. You either knew something or you didn't. And if you didn't... well, you paid dearly for it.'

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"There is a concept called the Pareto principle, and it 'must' be applied in all your study sessions, so take note of it. It involves prioritizing most of your efforts on the least amount of information or work that gets you to your study goals, and cutting out everything else. It goes hand in hand with a certain matrix called do, delegate, delay and delete."

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'Pareto principle, huh? Hearing someone casually throw out the idea like it was common knowledge made me realize how differently the world outside of that room functioned. People had the luxury of choosing what to focus on. We didn't. For us, it was all or nothing.'

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"Don't just randomly study pointless information that you already know, even if the teachers tell you to. You must be goal-oriented every micro-step of the way and do targeted research."

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'I'd already adopted that mindset before coming here. I never wasted time on things that didn't matter. I'd watched the others in this class struggle through unnecessary work, pushing themselves to learn everything they were told to, regardless of its relevance. It was inefficient. And that's why most of them would never reach the top. They were trapped in the system, while people like 'him'-and, to a degree, myself-found ways to work around it. To manipulate it.'

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He kept talking, and the class remained surprisingly quiet.

I glanced around at the others. Mii-chan took notes, Matsushita looked intrigued, Yukimura seemed thoughtful, and even Horikita-always so determined to do everything by the book-was biting her lip, a clear sign that she was considering his words. Kushida was smiling, though it was hard to tell how much of that was genuine.

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"...your job is to systematically bridge these gaps of confusion using targeted research. Forget other unrelated data that do not directly answer these questions."

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'Systematic. That was a word that had been hammered into us since childhood. We bridged gaps through repetition, through endless drills, through sheer willpower. We didn't get to choose which gaps we wanted to fill-we had to cover everything.'