Chapter 205: Private Qingteng High School Pass and Fail (Patreon)

The eerie female teacher drifted slowly into the classroom.

When her gaze fell on Frank, who lay on the floor coughing up blood, and on Mark, unconscious on his desk, her stiff face twisted. It looked as though something were squirming beneath the skin.

Lin, Mitsuhashi and the others had their hearts in their throats, their hands already resting on their ghost items.

They all assumed the terrifying proctor teacher would erupt on the spot over Shido Makoto's violence.

But to everyone's surprise, the female teacher lingered on the two men for less than two seconds before looking away, as if she had seen nothing.

She didn't erupt.

Shido Makoto gave a silent, cold smile.

Before the Rollback, the female teacher hadn't entered until after the class bell rang.

And he had made his move in the last few seconds before morning study ended.

According to the Student Rules, the morning study regulations only restricted things like reading and posture. There was no clause saying "No fighting."

He had exploited that loophole.

As long as he dealt with these two ticking time bombs before the class bell rang, without breaking any morning study rule, the mechanism wouldn't trigger immediately.

"Good morning, students."

The female teacher spoke in her wavering, drifting voice. Her lines were exactly the same as before.

"Now, please put away all the books on your desks."

"We will be having a pop quiz."

The moment she finished speaking—

Boom!

The front and back doors and every window were sealed off once more by that writhing mass of flesh!

Eyeballs opened across the flesh, peering at every living person in the classroom.

Their retreat was cut off again.

The faces of the surviving players turned grim.

The female teacher hovered before the lectern and flicked a finger lightly.

Blank test papers fluttered down onto the desk of every player who was still conscious.

The ones who were unconscious naturally got none.

A new rule slowly surfaced on the blackboard.

[Answer on the test paper using your own blood.]

The procedure was exactly the same as before.

But the biggest unstable factor, the mentally fragile Mark, was now in a deep coma. He couldn't see the questions on the paper, so he had no chance of triggering an emotional breakdown and the mutation that followed.

Shido Makoto had snuffed out the source of the earlier rampage in the simplest way possible.

Shido Makoto looked down at the blank paper in front of him. Without lifting his hand, he drew a fingernail lightly across the pad of his left thumb.

A wound split open, and a bead of crimson welled up at once.

He touched the drop to the header of the paper.

The blood spread quickly across the rough surface and formed line after line of twisted writing.

[You watch helplessly as your sister writhes in agony on her sickbed, unable to do anything. Now you are given one chance: what would you trade to save her?]

This question again.

Sister… Kasugano Sora.

Shido Makoto murmured the name to himself, his tone dripping with mockery.

The same trick couldn't work on him twice.

At the same time, Yukinoshita Yukino, seated not far from him, saw the question on her own paper.

Sister… Mother… Family…

"Give up yourself…"

"Obey…"

The words made Yukino's breathing quicken.

Out of the corner of his eye, Shido Makoto caught her state, but he didn't act right away.

The time wasn't ripe.

He lowered his gaze to his own paper and the bullshit question about trade and redemption.

If you followed its logic, then no matter how moving the devotion or sacrifice you wrote, the end result was the same: a dead end.

The rules of this dungeon were twisted at the root.

It seemed to be searching for good students, but in truth it was raising slaves who would obey it.

Anyone who tried to find the optimal solution within its framework of rules was digging their own grave.

So…

Shido Makoto bit open the tip of his index finger without a flicker of hesitation.

More blood welled out.

[I won't trade.]

[Anyone who touches her, I'll cut into eight pieces and hang up as a specimen above my bed.]

Every word seemed to carry killing intent.

When he finished, Shido Makoto couldn't be bothered to wait for the blood to dry.

Smack!

"Done!"

He slapped the paper down on the desk with an utterly insolent air.

Lin, sitting not far away, caught the line of bloody writing from the corner of his eye. His pupils contracted and his scalp went numb.

This guy has lost his mind!

Is this even answering a question?

This is jabbing a finger in its face and cursing it out!

Lin could almost see the next second: Shido Makoto being wiped out in an instant.

Sure enough.

The proctor teacher floating in midair seemed to sense something and drifted slowly over to Shido Makoto's desk.

She lowered her head and stared at the paper.

Everyone thought Shido Makoto was as good as dead.

The resentment radiating from the proctor teacher had almost taken on physical form.

Yet as time passed, the expected attack never came.

Bright red numbers slowly appeared on the bloody paper.

[100]

Full marks!

"This… how is this possible?" a companion beside Mitsuhashi blurted out.

The eyes of every Veteran who witnessed it nearly popped out of their heads.

That answer earned full marks?

A faint, cold smile crossed Shido Makoto's face.

The real difficulty of this so-called pop quiz was the attack on the mind and sanity. The paper itself wasn't the point.

In other words, as long as those whose sanity had been eroded were still conscious, there was no way they could pass this quiz.

Having worked that out, Shido Makoto hesitated no longer.

He turned to Yukino. Her condition was already not good.

Her eyes had begun to lose focus, her breathing grew ever more rapid, and her face was drained of color.

"Write first!" Shido Makoto called out softly.

The next instant Yukino snapped back to herself. As if realizing something, she bit open her finger and wrote two words:

[Resist]

Likewise, a score of 100 appeared on her paper.

The others followed suit.

"Ding-a-ling-a-ling—"

Right then, the dismissal bell rang.

The quiz was over.

The flesh sealing the doors and windows slowly receded into the walls.

Sunlight streamed back in.

But no one felt relieved.

A piercing sound suddenly rang out above everyone's heads.

The echo of the dismissal bell brought no one any release.

The proctor teacher turned to face the group.

"This pop quiz is now concluded."

"To the students who passed: congratulations. You have proven yourselves to be Honor Students of Green Vine High School."

Her gaze swept across the faces of Shido Makoto, Yukino, Lin, Mitsuhashi and a few others, one after another.

On the desk of everyone she looked at, a bright red [PASS] stamp appeared out of thin air.

"As for those… failing students who did not pass…"

The teacher's voice abruptly turned sinister, and she looked toward the few who hadn't been able to take the quiz from the start.

"…you will be required to attend the special after-school remedial lessons the school has carefully prepared for you."

She pointed at Frank, sprawled on the floor, at the unconscious Mark, and at one more peripheral player who had never dared to answer in blood.

A pitch-black [FAIL] stamp appeared on the desks of all three.

"No… I'm not a failing student…"

On the floor, Frank seemed to realize something and struggled to get up.

"I'm an Honor Student! I have an Honor Student badge! I…"

He never finished.

Crash—

Three cracks split the ceiling open.

Three iron chains shot down from the void!

At the end of each chain hung a gleaming meat hook.

The hooks locked onto the three players who had been judged failures.

"Splurch!"

"Splurch!"

"Splurch!"

The three hooks pierced through the collarbones of all three.

"Aaaaaaah—"

Jolted awake by the agony, they screamed.

The chains abruptly pulled upward.

"No! Let me go! I'm a good student! I followed every single rule! Let me go!"

Frank's screams echoed through the classroom.

He couldn't understand why an obedient good student like him had ended up like this.

The three were hauled up by the chains and dragged toward the ceiling.

Once their bodies had been pulled completely into the darkness, the three cracks slowly closed.

But right after, a bone-chilling sound drifted faintly from the other side of the ceiling.

It was the sound of bone being sawed apart, mixed with the screams of the three, which no longer sounded human.

"Mr. Fang, thank you."

Lin got up from the floor, wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth, and walked over to Shido Makoto.

He deliberately lowered his own stance.

This man had already proven himself with his strength.

Shido Makoto paid no attention to his show of goodwill and had no thought of claiming credit.

His eyes were fixed on the ceiling.

As the three unlucky players were dragged away, several objects were drifting down from above.

They were a few armbands, yellow text on a red background. They resembled the Honor Student badges Mark and the others had received earlier, but they were not quite the same.

Just then, the loudspeaker on the wall crackled to life again.

"Congratulations to the students who achieved outstanding results on this pop quiz."

"In recognition of excellence, the school hereby awards you the Honor Armband."

"The remaining Honor Students are to put on your Honor Armbands immediately."

…