COTE: Class D's Masked Guardian

Vol 1. Chapter 5 - Excitement

"The nameplates on the seats. I memorised them and correlated them with each of your faces and appearance. I know every single one of your names." They were silenced at my explanation. Then that blissful silence turned into chaos.

"There's no way!"

'Karuizawa Kei'.

"You can't just memorise everyone's names like that!"

'Mori Nene'.

"That's impossible!"

'Shinohara Satsuki'.

To them, my explanation may have seemed impossible. To be honest, I couldn't blame them. When someone says that they memorised everybody's name just from a nameplate on a chair, you'd be stupid to believe their words without considering them properly. However, I am not just 'someone', I am capable of doing such things that normal people would call impossible, and there was no reason for me to hide it.

"Karuizawa Kei, Mori Nene, Shinohara Satsuki. Do you believe me now?" The three flinched as I said their names. Now, it was almost undeniable. They knew that I did at least memorise 5 names through this method: Hirata Yousuke and Yukimura Teruhiko during the speech, and the three I had just called out.

"I... I can't believe it," an exasperated Shinohara sputtered.

Mori and Karuizawa could only nod their heads in agreement. I had not intended to attack their psyche, yet they seemed dazed.

I had to stop the discussion before we could go into anything more about myself. While I did not intend to keep my abilities under wraps, there was no benefit in telling them about myself any further than that I am a capable student. However, there was one person whose stares bore deeper into me than any other's. It was like they were trying to decipher my very existence.

'How does this have anything to do with your placement in Class D?'. Inevitably, someone had already picked up on Chabashira's wording when speaking with Horikita. That someone was Matsushita Chiaki. I had greatly underestimated her. Matsushita had figured out the real meaning behind Chabashira's words and most likely came to the conclusion that the entrance exams had little impact on our admittance in this school.

Now, she was confused as to how I was in Class D. She most likely deduced that academics weren't the only thing assessed by the school. But still, to her, I probably seemed almost perfect. High intelligence and academic ability. Although we hadn't participated in any P.E classes, she could probably tell after staring at me continuously that my physique was considerably above average. My social skills also didn't seem to be lacklustre from my talk with Chabashira and the way I addressed the class. Thankfully, however, I was basically an enigma, an anomaly. That was all she could ever possibly conclude, especially with the little amount of information I had disclosed.

Shaking myself out of my thoughts, I then spoke up to stop my rowdy classmates.

"It's time for the entrance ceremony. Please try to be on your best behaviour and at least try and pay attention. Our actions during this assembly may affect our class points without knowing it. We can not afford that, especially after we lost 200 class points in exchange for the information about the school system."

Hirata, Kushida, and I gathered all the students of Class 1-D and got them to form a single-file line. This sort of formality may not have been needed, however, it would send a message to the teachers and the chairman. That message was: 'we have it all figured out, we aren't just the defects you think we are'.

When we finally made it to the gymnasium, I could see Chabashira and three other teachers on the right hand side. They were most likely lined up in alphabetical order depending on their class. On the left, who I assumed was Class A's homeroom teacher, was a tall man with brown hair and green eyes. To the man's right was Class B's homeroom teacher, a woman with chest-length light-brown hair. Class C's mentor, sitting in between Chabashira and Class B's homeroom teacher, was a middle aged man with greyish coloured hair and glasses.