A/N: I have recieved your input comrades! Lowkey I was also thinking that the romance was pretty fast paced too. But! I just decided to keep hikigaya's relationship with Ichinose as is along with shiina. So no worries if I'm adding girls too fast!
I can slow the pacing of the romance, but i dont know how to pace chapters because i get bursts of energy, and they aren't connected. So like if I stop in the middle of the chapter and take a break, I can't think of ideas when I come back, so chapter length wise, you guys can deal with that.
Enjoy!
Hikigaya Hachiman POV
It was one day before the start of the new month, and Hikigaya… was chilling in his room reading a book.
Nothing of note had happened recently, but he had been having the weekly lunch with Ichinose, and it seemed that she was satisfied with their arrangement.
It was a similar situation with Shiina as well. This was because Shiina had joined the Tea Ceremony club, so they only met on Mondays and Fridays.
Well, Ichinose had started to join them on Mondays, but Shiina didn't mind, rather she welcomed Ichinose's addition to their little "Book Club." in her words, "The more the merrier."
So he had been enjoying his relaxing school life, and Hikigaya was a man of habit. He had created a semi consistent workout schedule, and indulged in meals out once a week, not including when he ate Lunch with Ichinose.
There was a surprise quiz on friday suddenly, but It wasn't has difficult as he believed. While Hoshinomiya had mentioned that it wouldn't impact his own grades, he still tried his best. It was better to see the comparision between classmates earlier than later.
But there was 3 questions on the math portion that he had a difficult time with, and on top of that it was one of his weaker subjects. Hikigaya thought that he did a decent job on the first two, but the third was practically impossible for him.
This had hurt his nonexistent ego a little. Hikigaya had prided himself on his improvement on subjects that he wasn't good at, so he had studied such subjects before taking the entrance exam.
But to see a problem that he didn't even know where to start.
It was crushing.
Hikigaya decided to go over his math notes once more, and even started studying math a little over the weekend, rather it was what he was doing up until he decided to read a little before midnight.
He wanted to see how much Class Points that the class had saved during the first month. He looked at his points.
3611281 Points.
It would be nice if they had barely lost any. He had observed his class, and they were all looked diligent in their studies, and seldom did anyone goof around.
If there was a time when they had lost points, it would be during the first two days, but that was unlikely as the first day they didn't even have classes, and the second they were relatively focused.
But there could have been times where he hadn't noticed anyone goof around, but the camera did!
He watched as the clock hit 12:00, marking the start of a new month. Hikigaya quickly refreshed his point count.
3705,281 Points.
94,000 Points gained.
—+—
Hikigaya had entered class with a refreshed look on his face.
This was nice, Hikigaya thought.
He glanced at Ichinose, who was getting compliments from their Classmates, as she was the person who had told the rest of the class about having proper behavior, and Ichinose looked embarrassed at all of the attention.
Hikigaya didn't understand her sentiments. She had all of the class's attention no matter what she did, what was different this time?
He made eye contact with Ichinose, and she looked at him with an embarassed smile and a hint of a… thankful expression?
He did the same, but with a hint of pride.
'Thank god everyone listened to her…!'
Hikigaya thought. If he asked anyone else, they would probably look at him like he was trash, then ignored him.
'Truly an Angel…!'
Hikigaya was bowing to Ichinose in gratitude in his imagination, before taking a seat.
Hoshinomiya entered with a happy expression.
"It's the new month, are you guys excited?"
There were yells of agreement.
Hoshinomiya had multiple rolls of paper in her hand, and placed them down before getting an expo marker and started writing on the board.
"You guys might have noticed already, but you guys didn't get 100,000 Points this month,"
There were nods.
She had written a ranking.
940 Class Points - Class A
940 Class Points - Class B
490 Class Points - Class C
0 Class Points - Class D
"When you guys were accepted into this school, the S-System put your "Value" as worth 100,000 Points"
Hoshinomiya explained.
"And after a month, they put your "Value" as 94,000. This is extremely impressive!"
Hoshinomiya exclaimed, clearly excited at the implication.
"In this school, the priority is "Merits". Only Class A can have the benefit of choosing whatever job or further education they please. But no worry! If you guys get more "Class Points" than them, you will swap positions!"
"Class B would be Class A, and Class A would be demoted to Class B,"
Hoshinomiya explained, crossing her arms to signify the "Swapped Positions."
"And currently, you guys are tied! I'm very proud of you guys!"
Hoshinomiya said, wiping her eyes as if she were crying tears of joy.
An emo looking guy rose his hands.
"Yes, Kanzaki-kun?"
"Then how do we raise these points?"
Hoshinomiya looked impressed and surprised, an eyebrow raised.
"You guys don't really look surprised, I was sure you guys would start panicking!"
The class looked at Ichinose, and Ichinose nodded with a small smile.
"Oh? I see~"
Hoshinomiya smirked, giving a glance to Hikigaya, causing him to shiver.
'What was that glance for?'
Hikigaya thought.
"But to answer your question, Kanzaki-kun! You can raise them on the midterm that's coming up!"
She took the rolled up posters before positing the 5 posters that had 5 subjects on them.
Hikigaya assumed that they were the scores of the sudden quiz they took on friday.
They were split up into 5 subjects: Literature, Math, Science, Social Sciences, and English.
"If this was an actual midterm, people who got below the average divided by two, would get expelled! But this class has no one who got such a score!"
Hoshinomiya noted.
Hikigaya looked at his own scores.
He had gotten a 100 on Literature, Social Sciences, and English. He had gotten a 98 on Science, and a 98 on Math.
Hikigaya assumed that it was because he had gotten one wrong on both exams.
'That last problem was so unfair…'
Hikigaya thought, remembering when he had searched up the problem to see that it was a college level problem.
Let Hikigaya say this once more.
A COLLEGE LEVEL PROBLEM.
Why was such a question on an exam for people who were first years in high school?
Science was understandable. A majority of it was memorization, and he had neglected his science studies during his first month. But in Hikigaya's defense, the teacher hadn't even taught them that much in science anyways.
While he was a little salty, he was satisfied.
"The class can get up to 100 Class Points in this upcoming midterm!"
Hoshinomiya continued.
"We won't tell you how much you gain though!"
"That's all I came here to say! Just for today, you guys won't have first period! Take your time to strategize~"
With that, Hoshinomiya left with a wave.
This left Hikigaya to contemplate.
Strategize? If she said strategize, what one would normally think would be to make study groups centered around the more academically proficient students.
But Hikigaya was thinking in the completely other direction.
Originally, he was thinking of ways to cheat, but decided against it. But maybe he could get previous test answers form the seniors? Now that Class Points are revealed they probably don't have much restrictions other than future 'Events'.
But then his thoughts drifted to how the Class Points would be increased by.
If it was by the average, it would make sense, but Hikigaya doubted that the school would use such an obvious method.
He decided to think about such things later.
He looked at the scores once more.
No one had gotten less than half the class average, but there were some that came dangerously close.
Unusually, Hikigaya was at the top of every exam.
Then he was followed by either Ichinose or Kanzaki, and then the rest were more random. The sole exception was Literature and Social Science, in which Ichinose had gotten an 82 and 85 respectively.
'Ichinose is surprisingly well rounded,'
Hikigaya thought, a little impressed.
Feeling nature's call, Hikigaya rose from his seat, looking at Ichinose to see that she was looking at him directly. Additionally it seemed that everyone else that was huddled up to Ichinose was also looking at him.
He gave a questioning glance to the group.
Ichinose, as expected of the leader, walked up to Hikigaya.
"Hikigaya-kun, we were wondering if you would like to join our study group… You do have the highest scores in the class,"
The first instinct that came to Hikigaya was to automatically refuse.
Hikigaya disliked large groups with a passion.
On the other hand, this was an opportunity to pass Class A if the class did relatively well.
So he could sacrifice a few days of his time to help.
"Uh… Sure, when are we doing the study sessions?"
Surprisingly, the rest of the group sighed in relief, some more noticeable than others when Hikigaya accepted, fully expecting Hikigaya's refusal.
Ichinose was the only one that smiled, as if expecting such a reaction.
"We decided to do them after school on Tuesday and Thursday until the exams!"
Ichinose responded.
"Yeah, I have time…"
Hikigaya awkwardly responded.
"Then we'll see you there, sensei!"
Ichinose responded with a salute, a joking smile on her face, and the other classmates laughed and giggled at Ichinose's joke, and some even did the same action. Truly a queen bee.
"Yeah, see you guys there…"
Hikigaya did not like speaking in front of so many people without any warnings.
"Now, if you excuse me, I have to use the restroom,"
Hikigaya added, making his way out of the room.
Hikigaya had thought of buying previous test questions, but there was no reason to buy them so preemptively. He'd rather have his class not dependent on such methods, and if changes were indeed made, he would be cooked.
'Maybe I should buy and hand them out a day or two before the exams,'
After using the restroom, he still had around 40 minutes left, so he decided to figure out how the they would determine how much class points they would get.
He had two possibilities.
Either it was dependent on the class average, or by improvement from the quiz they had last friday.
He leaned toward the latter.
Making his way to the Teacher's Lounge, Hikigaya inwardly prayed that it wouldn't be that costly to get the info.
Entering the Teacher's Lounge, he got noticed by Hoshinomiya who waved him over.
"Whatcha need~?"
"How much points to know how much class points we get?"
It looked like Hoshinomiya expected such a question.
"Hmm~ I'm in a good mood today, so 100,000 points~?"
Hikigaya sighed in relief. He had imagined that it would be in the millions at most.
"Sure."
After paying the price, she sent him a PDF through text.
Opening the PDF, Hikigaya started to read the conditions.
Midterm Class Point Assignment.
The Goal of the Midterm is to improve your academic abilities.
The Class Point Increases by 2.5 for each student that fulfills required conditions according to their total score across all 5 subjects on the Placement Exam took prior. The Class Points will round up to the nearest whole number if it isn't a whole number.
The Total Score is the sum of the individual points from each subject, with a minimum of 0 to a maximum of 500.
For students with their Total Score ranging from 0-100, they have to increase their total score by 50 to fulfill the conditions. If there is a score in one of the 5 subjects that is below half the average, the student will be expelled, and no Class Points will be awarded.
For students with their Total Score ranging from 100-200, they have to increase their total score by 45 to fulfill the conditions. If there is a score in one of the 5 subjects that is below half the average, the student will be expelled, and no Class Points will be awarded.
For students with their Total Score ranging from 200-300, they have to increase their total score by 40 to fulfill the conditions. If there is a score in one of the 5 subjects that is below half the average, the student will be expelled, and no Class Points will be awarded.
For students with their Total Score ranging from 300-350, they have to increase their total score by 35 to fulfill the conditions. If there is a score in one of the 5 subjects that is below half the average, the student will be expelled, and no Class Points will be awarded.
For students with their Total Score ranging from 350-400, they have to increase their total score by 25 to fulfill the conditions. If there is a score in one of the 5 subjects that is below half the average, the student will be expelled, and no Class Points will be awarded.
For students with their Total Score ranging from 400-450, they have to increase their total score by 10 to fulfill the conditions. If there is a score in one of the 5 subjects that is below half the average, the student will be expelled, and no Class Points will be awarded.
For students with their Total Score ranging from 450-500, they will need to maintain the range during the midterms in order to fulfill the conditions.
It was relatively self explanatory.
He would share this info with Ichinose, and she'd probably find a suitable excuse as to how she even found it out.
"Thanks, sensei,"
Hikigaya said, giving a small bow to Hoshinomiya.
Hoshinomiya smiled, before giving a gesture as to shoo him away.
"Yeah, yeah, no problem~"
"Are you going to tell us the scope of the exam or do I have to pay for that too?"
Hikigaya asked just in case.
Hoshinomiya giggled, before giving a joking sigh in exasperation.
"I was going to tell you guys tomorrow anyways for free, don't worry. I'm not someone who always asks for points you know~?"
"I see, well thanks once more,"
Hikigaya said, before leaving.
How the points were distributed were pretty self explanatory, focused on improvement. So far, in his class only he himself and Ichinose qualified for the last condition.
Entering the classroom, he subtly took photos of the scores on the "Placement Exam", the PDF called it.
He decided to send the Total Points along with the requirements to Ichinose later in the afternoon.
He gave a quick text to Shiina saying that he couldn't make it today to start studying for the midterms.
It would be a boring afternoon tonight…
A/N: I made up the requirements of gaining class points. But personally, I think it was relatively accurate to how it would probably be classified in my opnion. I checked the wiki and class D had the most class points gained with a total of 87 or so gained.
They probably had the most space for improvement so I made the class point increase improvement based and made a system from scratch staring from that basis.
I made it up because personally, hikigaya seemed like the type of person who'd try to know every piece before starting.
I also stopped here because it was a good stopping point lr else this chapter would have been way longer. I might make the midterm exams like 2-3 chapters long not including this one.
Also, I do think that Class B having similar class points to Class A is valid. Like Ichinose spread the information on the second day. It would be weird if the class didn't follow ichinose's example.
But I didn't want class B to be above Class A from the beginning, that's kinda boring.
Also, in the wiki it says that Hikigaya's best subjects were literature and social sciences, and since he has a hobby of reading a lot of books, I also added english in there.
I also mentioned earlier that hikigaya studied math and science to make up for his weakness. Also for hihs profile I made his academic ability at A and on the wiki Ichinose's was at B+ So I think it would make sense that he's higher. I'm also too lazy to go back and change his academic ability score.
Also, if there's a midterm, why is there like no mention of a final exam before the spring trimester ended before summer vacation? Like I ain't going to add it, but it's kinda confusing. Like was the cruise ship and the island supposed to be their final?
thanks for listening to my rant.
I hope you enjoyed.