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The next day at Juuban Middle School, Usagi was rushing to the usual meet-up spot in the classroom where Harusuke, Ami, and Makoto were waiting for her. She was excited.

"Ami! You did it again! I saw the national practice exam results!" Usagi panted. "You got another perfect score!"

"Way to go, Ami," congratulated Makoto. "Once again, you're at the top of the exams."

Ami sheepishly blushed. "Thank you, but I wasn't the only student who was perfect," she said humbly. "There's bound to be some others too."

"Don't be so modest," said Harusuke. "You studied hard and looked at the fruits of your labor. You inspire me to study hard too."

Just then, the four then heard a commotion coming from outside of the classroom. Curious about what was going on, the teens peeked outside in time to see their classmates run past them and join two crowds of others standing outside some classrooms. Wondering what the fuss was about, Usagi and her group came over and peeked inside the classrooms as well. When they did, they were surprised to find that it was filled with students diligently studying, but they weren't wearing their school uniforms. Some were from Mugen, while others were from different schools.

"You seeing this?" Harusuke spoke in surprise. "They're all from different schools."

"But what are they doing here?" asked Makoto. "Last I checked, this wasn't their school."

Usagi then saw Umino, who happened to be a few feet away, staring inside too. "Hey! Umino! Do you have any idea what's going on?" she asked.

Umino then came over. "Well, you know that Mugen Academy is hosting the national practice exam?" he said. "Well, there's going to be a lot of people showing up there, and the classrooms are filling up, so I heard that the teachers decided to send some of the students from Mugen here so that they can study here along with some other people."

"So that explains it," said Harusuke. "One thing's for sure, they're sure are serious about studying."

"I'll say. It's almost like those students possessed or something," commented Makoto. "It's starting to make me a bit uncomfortable."

"Now, now, don't judge them too harshly," chided Ami. "They're just studying hard, so they can follow their dreams. Nothing wrong with that."

"They're studying hard to follow their dreams, huh?" Usagi repeated, heaving a sigh. "In comparison to them, I must look like a lazy bum."

"You should have thought about that before, Sis," said Harusuke. "It's kind of late to be regretting it now."

"Come on, Harusuke! That was your queue to tell me I'm not a lazy bum!" Usagi huffed. "What kind of brother are you?!"

The others couldn't help but laugh. At that moment, a female Mugen student made their way from the crowd and came up to the group. She had short black hair and wore glasses.

"Excuse me, miss," she said while giving Ami a light tap on her shoulder. "May I have a moment?"

Ami turned around. "Yes? May I help you?" she asked.

"First, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Lily Vildou, and I'm from Mugen Academy," the girl introduced. "And you must be Ami Mizuno, the girl who always scores so well on the practice exams. You and I had the same test scores on the last national exam if I recall."

"Hold on! You tied with Ami on that exam, too?!" exclaimed Usagi. "That's amazing!"

Lily looked across to Usagi. "And who might you be?" she asked. "A friend of hers, perhaps?"

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