The next day, Kei was walking to school trying to completely forget about the incident that happened the night before. However, every time he tried to do so, he would just keep thinking about Mai sticking her face up close to his. It was completely messing up his expressionless attitude. When he walked past some of his classmates, his flustered face completely caught the girls off guard as they were blushing looking at this side of Kei that they had never seen before.
When he reached the school gate, he was greeted by Yanagi-sensei, who was in charge of the disciplinary committee. Yanagi-sensei was also in charge of the school's basketball team management. On another note, Keigo had been suspended from baseball practices for a week as punishment for the previous events involving violence.
"That's him huh?"
"I heard he's an athlete too."
"Do you think he will hang out with us?"
As Kei looked at his surroundings, he realized that he was at the receiving end of some curious and passionate gazes from the girls, whilst he was receiving deadly stares from the male students from his grade.
"Hah… it's always like this at this time of the year…"
Kei let out a small sigh as he knew the reason behind the stares and gazes that he was receiving from the other students. It was the first week since their second term of the year had started. As mentioned by Shiki-sensei mentioned the day before, today was the day when the results of the previous term were going to be posted on the board. As he was thinking about it, he suddenly felt a strong tug on his blazer. He turned around to meet the face of his middle school friend, Saki Chihaya.
"Looks like this is one thing that hasn't changed since middle school hmm? Heheh~" Saki said with a teasing tone.
"It's not like I wanted this to happen…"
"You say it as if it's a bad thing?"
The two continued their chat while walking to the school's public board where the results for the Top 50 students will get posted. When they arrived at the board, there was a horde of students standing there with almost all of them looking severely depressed. When Kei approached the board, he already knew what to expect. The figure beside him however…
"Kami-sama, Jesus, Buddha…"
"Oy oy, how many gods are you praying to?"
Chihaya was praying extremely hard when she arrived at the public board. Unlike the students who got into the academy due to their academic record, Chihaya was admitted into the school due to her athletic achievements. This meant that she was not as good as the others when it came to studying and was at risk of not making it into the Top 50, failure of which would put her in supplementary classes. When she opened her eyes and looked at the public board, her eyes went from top to bottom before she suddenly screamed when she saw the bottom of the board.
'50. Saki Chihaya 689'
"AHH!! I GOT INTO THE TOP 50! THANK YOU, KEI-CHIN THANK YOU!"
Chihaya screamed and jumped in joy as she wrapped her hands around Kei's neck. Because she was not as smart as the other students who were admitted into the school because of their academic record, she sought Kei's assistance to help her with her studies. Although Kei usually refused such requests from other students, he still had a soft spot for Chihaya since he had known her for so long.
As she continued to hug him, Kei could feel a strange and menacing aura around him. When he looked at his surroundings, all the guys were giving him death stares while the girls were giving him jealous looks. As such, Kei immediately shook her off.
"Let's go, before I get killed."
"Don't you want to look at your results?"
"I'm numb at looking at my results."
The other students were curious as to what he meant and started looking for his name on the first-year name list rankings.
"…seriously?!"
"You're kidding… it's not even close…"
"Ha ha ha… isn't he supposed to be an athlete?"
The students who were standing there were completely shocked at when they had found Kei's name. Because he didn't stand out in his classroom and kept a low profile among the other students, he naturally slipped under their radar as they thought maybe he somehow got in as an athlete. When they looked at the board however…
'1. Amane Kei 800'
'2. Chihiro Mai 773'
This was the reason why Kei was on the receiving end of those stares and gazes throughout the morning. The girls from other classes who found out about his existence through the results rankings were checking him out and were sending passionate gazes. This in turn caused the other boys to give him death stares because of jealousy.
"Well… congratulations on getting into the top 50… I guess… work harder so you can stay there."
"Gifted students don't deserve to talk!"
When they entered the classroom, Kei was instantly surrounded by his classmates. Since this was their first ever end of term high school exam, none of the other students other than Chihaya knew precisely how Kei's performances were in the academic department.
"How did you do it?!"
"Is this some kind of joke?!"
"Hey hey, Kei-san, would you mind helping me with my studies?"
As he was surrounded, he was on the receiving end of insults and abuse from the boys, whilst the girls were attempting to ask him to help them with their studies. As this was happening, the front door of the classroom slid open as Shiki-sensei stepped into the class. As she made her way to her table, the students started questioning her.
"Shiki-sensei! This has got to be some mistake, right? There is no way that someone like Amane would get that kind of results, right?"
"This is ridiculous! He definitely cheated!"
As the boys continued voicing their complaints to Shiki-sensei, her calm expression slowly changed into an angry one as the boys started quieting down after realising that they had made her angry.
"I want silence. This is no way to treat a classmate. You should be ashamed of yourselves. The other teachers had marked and examined Kei's papers multiple times, with all of them coming to the conclusion that he had gotten full marks in all his papers. Instead of trying to pull him down, you should be taking him as an example to try and score better results."
She was right to be angry. She would have hoped that they would take Kei's example and try to study harder. Instead, they insulted him whilst pulling him down and spreading rumours about him cheating. This was no way to treat a fellow classmate, even if they didn't get along with each other.
"As I was saying, there has been some changes to the system…"