The school I attended—Saigou High—was a private prep school.
But it wasn’t just any prep school—it was a good one, boasting some of the highest percentiles in the nation. And it was founded by the Saigou Corporation, one of largest businesses in Japan. In other words, it was a big-name school.
They had a reputation for sending students to higher education, too. In fact, they sent ten or more students on to Tokyo’s most famous university every year. They were shooting for twenty this year, and their success rate was climbing. Their reputation was rock solid.
Saigou High was a top-tier prep school run by a top-tier corporation.
…Or it looked that way from the outside anyway.
In reality, the school was a pointless, inferior institution with no redeeming traits whatsoever. And one student deciding to withdraw wasn’t going to change that. The day after I spoke with that mysterious girl on the roof, my school was still run by bile-spewing dirtbags, just like it always had been.
“Okay, let’s start first period.”
Everyone stood, gave the teacher their attention, and bowed. This was the standard greeting. Once we sat back down, our math teacher blasted us with his standard greeting.
“Anyone not done with your homework, stand up.”
This was routine for the students, too. The sound of chairs sliding back echoed through the classroom. There were so many people standing, I couldn’t see the front of the room.
Thirty-seven students had risen. I knew right away—even an elementary schooler could do arithmetic this simple. Forty minus three. There were forty students in our class, and only three students were still sitting. Only three had managed to finish their homework.
Roaming through the room, our teacher sighed. “All right, we’ll start from you, on the end. Say what you didn’t finish.”
The “Unfinished Homework Report” was a fixture of Saigou High.
The student up front explained their progress. They weren’t done correcting the quiz from last week. They hadn’t finished the workbook from page thirteen to the current page, forty-seven. They hadn’t finished Math I from page seventy to the end. Each student rattled this off, totally used to it.
Pacing the room, the teacher responded to each report with spite.
“If you can’t finish your homework, quit your club. Your adviser’s telling you the same thing! Why are you still playing soccer? Sports are a luxury reserved for those with nothing better to do!”
The teacher’s complaints varied from person to person. If they only criticized your membership in a club or a sports team, you could count yourself lucky.
“You still haven’t gotten past page sixty in Math I?! Get it together! Do you think if you ignore the first-year material long enough it’ll just go away? Quit the crap, or I’ll blow your brains out. If you have any, that is. Next.”
For most people, it was general criticism and death threats.
“You can’t manage your homework, and you haven’t even finished your assignments from last summer! You’re a total failure as a human. I’d love to see your parents. I mean, with a kid like this, it’s a wonder they even function in society.”
When it got really bad, they’d extend the abuse to your family.
“Why do you look so confident, moron?! You think I’m gonna let you off with work like this?!”
Sometimes, the teacher would even kick students’ desks.
…Man, this school was worthless. Rotten to the core. How many more times would I have to sit through this ritual today? Just the thought of it made me sick.
“Hmph. Put your desk back in line. It’s in the way. Next.”
Naturally, I hadn’t finished my homework, either. My turn came five minutes in. The teacher arrived at my desk, where I was standing, just like everyone else.
“……”
“……”
We stood there for a moment, deadlocked. Our eyes met. He glared at me like I was an insect.
“I have nothing to say to you, Natsume. You may sit.”
He spoke with utter contempt, and I sat back down.
I felt eyes on the back of my head but wasn’t sure if it was the teacher, unsatisfied that he hadn’t gotten to chew me out, or the other students who somehow saw this as preferential treatment. Honestly, I didn’t want to know.
The reports went on, as did the abuse. More desks were kicked.
A huge chunk of class time was wasted on this public humiliation, just like always.
“Right, today’s assignment is page forty-seven to page fifty. Those who still haven’t turned in older assignments, stay after school. If you don’t, I’ll blow your brains out, so you better shape up!”
Let me assure you, our math teacher was no special case. This approach was the standard at our “top-tier” prep school.
Every student here had to put up with abuse from basically every teacher. Every one of them had their humanity denied each day. All of them except me, that is. And at this point, none of them even saw the situation as messed up anymore.
It had been a year and two months since I entered Saigou High, but I still couldn’t get used to this madness.
✦ ✦ ✦
Naturally, there was a reason things had gotten this bad.
In general, Saigou had a good reputation as a prep school. But in our prefecture, things were a little different. Here, it was the first-choice backup school.
Any students in this area trying to slip through the eye of the needle and get into, say, a famous university’s affiliate high school would sit for the exams at Saigou, just in case their efforts proved futile. This place was their insurance policy.
As a result, Saigou High had wound up collecting all the losers—students who’d aimed high and come up short.
These were kids who’d spent their lives studying just like their parents wanted, convinced they were gifted. And then, with all that parental pressure riding on their backs, they’d crashed and burned. And now they were filling the halls at Saigou.
In other words, everyone here had a chip on their shoulder.
The faculty had no faith in the students. They didn’t believe anyone who failed their high school entrance exams was capable of self-motivated studying, and they didn’t expect their grades to improve. So their language got harsh. They chewed the students out and tried to force them to study, twisting their arms in the hopes of getting as many of them as possible into college. After all, the school’s reputation was riding on it.
And the students, with their humiliating defeat festering inside them, saw nothing wrong with the teachers’ behavior. In their minds, getting yelled at for bad grades was totally normal.
The teachers didn’t trust the students, and the students didn’t trust themselves.
And all of them were trapped inside the crucible of Saigou High, their values steadily warping. The classrooms, hallways, and even the students’ routes to and from school were all shrouded in gloom and stress.
In other words, this school was hell on earth.