Chapter 61 Utopia-Like Dystopia - Part 3

I decided to break away from the group so I could observe the Preseqta System.

I wanted to have some alone time anyways.

As I took a seat on my bed, I opened my phone and looked at the now-available app.

When I opened the app, I was greeted by two tabs.

Special Exams.

Aptitudes.

I tried pressing on the Special Exams tab first, but I was met with nothing but a blank screen.

The Aptitudes tab, however, provided me with more options.

Sort: Class/Name/Rank

I decided to sort by name and searched for myself.

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Mizuhara Ayato - Second-Year Student

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Overall Intelligence: **Unreleased**

Athletic Ability: **Unreleased**

Interpersonal Skills: **Unreleased**

Spatial Awareness: **Unreleased**

Lateral Thinking Capacity: **Unreleased**

_

Appearance: **Unreleased**

Cooperative Reliability: D- (Rank #299 out of 480 in school)

Creative Ability: **Unreleased**

~~~

Overall Score: A+ (Rank #1 out of 180 in the year level)

Consistency: **Unreleased**

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Ah.

It was concerning how much the school seemed to know about me.

Only one aptitude appeared to be released aside from the overall score. All of the aptitudes seemed to be pretty self-explanatory aside from Spatial Awareness and Lateral Thinking Capacity. The one aptitude that was released was Cooperative Reliability which I assume roughly translates to how trustworthy they are.

Also, for some reason, the overall score ranked you among the people in your year level, but the other aptitude ranked you in terms of the entire school. The system was still quite mysterious, from what I could tell.

I decided to scroll through some of the other people I knew.

I started with my roommate.

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Kimura Haruto - Second Year Student

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Overall Intelligence: **Unreleased**

Athletic Ability: **Unreleased**

Interpersonal Skills: **Unreleased**

Spatial Awareness: **Unreleased**

Lateral Thinking Capacity: **Unreleased**

_

Appearance: **Unreleased**

Cooperative Reliability: C (Ranked #213 out of 480 in school)

Creative Ability: **Unreleased**

~~~

Overall Score: A

Consistency: **Unreleased**

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I guess only the student is able to see their own overall rank. Based on my deductions, it seemed that the letter grades were somewhat misleading. One would believe that 'C' would be the average but judging by the linear calculation method for the letter grades. The median is closer to 'C-' or 'D+'.

The thing I wanted to know was how the school had this information.

I guess I won't be able to know for the time being.

Suddenly, my phone beeped again as a notification popped up at the top of the screen. I pressed on it, revealing an email—this time, it wasn't from the school.

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To: 2-E

From: Kai Furukawa

We are having a birthday party at my dorm tonight for Akane at 6:00 pm.

My room is on floor 3. It's room #32. There will be snacks and drinks. Remember to bring a gift! Points are fine if you can't think of anything.

See you there!

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I guess Furukawa decided to follow through on the birthday party idea. Not sure why they made it today, though. Something felt suspicious. It seemed a little awkward that he would make the party tonight. It didn't really give people a lot of time to prepare a gift. The fact that he included 'Points are fine if you can't think of anything' also felt weird.

It was as if he was hoping that people didn't have time to buy a present...

There were still around thirty minutes before the party so I decided to make my way over to the commercial area and look for a gift.

I left the dormitory, and after a short walk, I found myself in the small grocery store.

I had no idea what she'd want, so I had no idea what to get. In the end, I decided to just get a large bar of dark chocolate and some wrapping paper. Hopefully, she wouldn't open it until she went home so she wouldn't judge my gift-giving ability.

The total came to 360 points for the chocolate and the wrapping paper—I was still trying to be conscious of my point expenditure.

After making the purchase, I decided to make my way over to the library and wrapped up my gift. They had scissors and tape, along with some stiff paper that I made into a makeshift birthday card. After a little while, my gift was complete.

There were still a few minutes before the start of the party, so I decided to begin making my way back into the dormitory building. I noticed that there were also a few small groups of students who seemed to be going to Furukawa's floor.

Eventually, I got to his front door and saw him standing outside, greeting everyone.

I waited as he talked to the people in front of me.

"Hey, do you guys have a gift?" he asked.

"Ah, sorry, I didn't have time to get one," they replied.

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"That's fine. You can transfer some points into her account instead."

"Uh, um, okay then..."

A few moments later, there was a beep from his phone before Furukawa let him inside. He did this to several more students before I finally got to say hi to him.

"Hey, you're here, Mizuhara!"

"Yep."

I handed him my gift.

"Alright, come in!"

I made my way inside as he continued to greet the students who were arriving.

Once I went inside his dorm, I saw that he had a large number of snacks and drinks strewn across his table. Other students were helping themselves, and some were just standing around having a chat.

I guess this is the party.

Now that I was here, I didn't really have a great deal to do.

The school didn't sell any alcohol, so it was all pretty laid back.

As more students made their way inside, I noticed that the room was also starting to get quite cramped. Eventually, Furukawa also came inside and started talking with the guests. I decided to stand back and see what everyone else was doing.

I noticed that Hamasaki was quite sociable. She was quite similar to Fujiharu in that way. Talking was like second nature to her, even with people she wasn't too familiar with. It also seemed Takeuchi wasn't here for whatever reason.

"Mizuhara," Furukawa called out.

"Yeah?"

"Do you have any song recommendations?" he asked.

"I thought our phones couldn't play music."

"You can buy the music playing app from the school through the department store."

It seemed that the department also sold apps on the phone. I guess they'd install it on your device after you bought it or something. I wasn't exactly sure how it worked.

Well, I didn't really have any song recommendations.

A notification appeared on my phone all of a sudden.

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National High School

All students, you will be receiving your first special exam tomorrow.

Check your phones in the morning.

You do not want to miss this.

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