Chapter 54 New School New Life - Part 1

'Power is in tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of your own choosing.'

It was an ordinary morning—as ordinary as a morning could get. It was neither too cold nor too hot, it was neither too wet nor too dry, and it was neither too windy nor too still. However, for if you know what today represented, you would believe it to be anything but ordinary.

It was January 1st; why is this day special, you may ask?

It was the official beginning of the new school year, but it was also the official beginning of the biggest experiment to ever be conducted on a group of children. It was an experiment on a scale much larger than the Ideal Human Project. It was an experiment which would push the minds of hundreds of adolescents into agony—well, it's not exactly as treacherous as that.

Calling it an experiment isn't exactly right, either.

Formulated after years of running the Ideal Human Project, Tachibana Kohei created his masterpiece, the true cumulation of all his knowledge. He called it the Tachibana System. It was, in theory, the greatest education system on the planet.

However, the definition of greatest is up to the interpretation of the individual.

I slowly began making my way toward the front gates.

Originally, I lived on the school grounds in the dormitory. However, as of today, the room I resided in for the entirety of last year would cease to be mine. Because today, every single student of National High School is allocated a dorm room.

A few moments later, I joined a big group of students at a booth which was set up just beside the main gate.

There were a large number of staff members, and from what I could see, they seemed to be handing out phones to all of the students. There were also other staff members carefully examining every student, searching their bodies from top to bottom. I decided to stand in line and wait for my turn to receive a phone.

"Next."

I was greeted by a man who was behind a laptop.

"What's your name?" He asked.

"Mizuhara Ayato."

"Alright, the password to your phone is one, two, three, four. Once you get in, tell me what your phone number is."

I unlocked the phone and opened the contacts app.

After informing him of the phone number on the phone, he typed some more things into the computer before handing me a charger.

"You're all good. Make sure to change your password... next."

With that, my school-issued phone was set up.

Under the new system, you weren't allowed to bring any personal possessions. This meant that everything you owned would be issued or acquired from the school.

I changed the password and had a quick look at the apps which were available.

On the main screen, I was greeted with a few apps: Personal Information, Preseqta—which was greyed out, Bank, Weather, Contacts, Mail and Map. They were all pretty self-explanatory except for the app called Preseqta.

I checked out the Personal Information app.

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Personal Information

Name: Mizuhara Ayato

Age: 17

Date of Birth: 10/10/2018

Student Number: 192202

Class: Not Assigned

Housing: #142 - Boys

The source of this content is nov/el/bin[./]net'

Entry Type: Recommendation

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It was some pretty basic information.

As the time got closer to 9 am, more and more students were arriving at the school. They were all saying goodbye to their families and friends or whatnot. I guess the fact that they can't communicate with people outside the school is a pretty big deal.

I assumed that there was going to be a bit of time before there was an organised assembly of sorts since most students were still arriving. During that time, I decided to make my way around the school and have a look at the renovations which took place.

The school seemed to have been split into two areas. Looking at the map, there was the original school zone which hadn't been changed all that much, but there was another area, in the old middle school and junior school area, where a huge number of stores were built. I decided to make my way over and explore the commercial zone.

After walking through the schoolyard, I looked at the commercial area, which had been swiftly constructed in the past several months. You could still see the foundations of the old middle school and junior school classrooms. However, they had been redesigned into a variety of shops with realistic storefronts. It was like a small shopping village; I noticed that most of the stores were empty, most likely because the school year was just beginning.

From what I could see, there seemed to be a little clothing store, a miniature supermarket, a cafe, a big canteen, a medical centre, a retail store with furniture and games and various other buildings which were still being finished. It seemed that the short time frame meant that they weren't able to complete everything before the school year began.

It was all the bare necessities, per se. The shopping district would be one you'd expect from a small rural village. It was nothing impressive, but it was certainly novel in a school setting.

After having a little look around, I decided to make my way back towards the front gate.

Apparently, everything we needed would be provided by the school. I guess this shopping district was what they meant by that. I assumed that this meant the school would be providing some sort of currency.

A few minutes later, I received a notification on my phone.

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NATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL

Welcome to National High School.

Please make your way to your allocated dorm room. Your designated room is written in the Personal Information app on your phone. Use the Map app to find it within the main dormitory building.

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Well, it seemed that we had officially begun.

I walked back over to the dormitory building alongside hundreds of other students. The dormitory building had been significantly renovated, with a huge number of rooms being built and making the entire building several stories higher.

I made my way inside and into one of the newly-built elevators. A very large number of students were trying to squeeze in, forcing students to have to line up just to wait for the elevator to return with more space.

I was one of the first to enter my new room.