The silence after Ms. Nami’s explanation was cuttable.

  Thick. Awkward. Heavy with implications no one wanted to address.

  She stood there casually poking at the dirt with her foot, slowly turning into ink around the edges—like she was melting into the ground out of boredom. Only when Ishino cleared his throat did she snap back into full opacity.

  “Riiight… I should, like, toootally introduce you to my little inklings,” she said, her voice half-melted like butter on a hot croissant.

  She turned, motioned lazily to the group behind her, and began the presentation like she was giving a classroom slideshow she hadn’t read in advance.

  She pointed first to the tall girl with dark skin and a dozen rings.

  “This one’s Binka—super cute, super punchy, super broke. She’s got the Aspect of Wealth, which is sooo funny considering she spends like a dragon with a shopping addiction.”

  Binka cracked her knuckles with all her rings at once and gave Class D a cocky little wink.

  Next came the boy with slick light-blue hair and a smug grin.

  “This is Riku—my little lightning bolt. Aspect of Speed, sub-class Momentum Carry. The more he runs, the more he breaks things. We don’t let him near doors anymore.”

  Riku gave a dramatic bow. “I’m also incredibly humble.”

  Ms. Nami moved on without acknowledging that.

  Then came the wiry, twitchy boy with chains and wild hair.

  “This bundle of… unprocessed emotion is Joro. Think ‘build-a-club’ but like Tarzan.”

  Joro licked his arm again. No one asked him to.

  And finally, the small girl in the rabbit-ear headband, still half-hidden behind the group.

  “That’s Nari. She’s my precious little girl. Ears are real. Probably. Don’t pull them.”

  Nari waved politely. Then immediately hid again.

  But it didn’t end there.

  Ms. Nami clapped once—slowly—and turned back to the full line of Class C.

  “And now… fun facts!”

  She then proceeded to introduce all twenty-two of her students.

  By name.

  And with a personal fact.

  None of which anyone wanted to know.

  “This is Mako—he cried when I made him draw his feelings.”

  “Here’s Lina—she has six pet frogs and an unhealthy attachment to at least three.”

  “Grayson eats paper when he’s stressed. He thinks I don’t know. I know.”

  By the time she was halfway through, Class D was visibly suffering.

  Zach didn’t even blink. His arms stayed tucked inside his haori like he was meditating through the entire experience.

  Mika looked like she was about to combust.

  Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.

  Sato had his tablet open but wasn’t typing—just… frozen.

  Elle had gone still in the kind of way that suggested her brain had shut off all outside input.

  Derrin fed his bugs.

  When Ms. Nami finally finished her class-wide talent show, she turned back toward Class D with a bright, deadpan smile.

  “Aaand that’s everyone! Now don’t you feel sooo much closer?”

  Nobody answered.

  Ms. Nami clapped her hands together, entirely too pleased with herself.

  “Okayyy! Now it’s your turn, Ishi~nooo. Introduce your little disasters!”

  She said it like she was handing off the mic at karaoke.

  Ishino stared at her.

  Then blinked.

  Then said, very directly:

  “No.”

  Ms. Nami blinked back, visibly unbothered. “Oh. Boo.”

  Without another word, Ishino reached behind him and pulled out a collapsible whiteboard from—nowhere.

  No one saw where it came from.

  He just had it.

  Like this was normal.

  With the smoothness of a man who had done this far too many times, he popped the board open, clicked a marker, and immediately started drawing.

  A crude rectangle: the forest boundaries.

  A triangle in the center: the mock base.

  A dotted line: drop-in point.

  He didn’t look up.

  “This is your mission zone. You’ll have one hour to locate and report the location of the mock villain base. You do not need to engage. This is a recon and relay exercise.”

  He underlined that point three times.

  “Both classes will enter from opposite ends of the forest. You are not required to interact. However—” Ishino paused, looked pointedly at Class C, “—if you do engage, do not cause permanent injury. I don’t want to be pulled into another disciplinary hearing. Again.”

  He circled two outer zones on the map.

  “Scouting groups will be split here and here. Your cranes are your only form of long-range communication in case of injury. Crush one, and Ms. Nami will extract you.”

  He finally clicked the marker closed.

  Turned to Class D.

  And said, flat as ever: “Don’t embarrass me.”

  With the whiteboard erased and the mission parameters laid out, both classes were escorted to their designated drop zones—opposite ends of the forest. No good lucks. No handshakes. Just silence, tension, and the weight of unspoken pressure.

  The forest swallowed them the second they stepped past the gate.

  Dense brush. Twisting paths. Shadows stretched between trees like they were waiting to trip someone.

  Class D moved fast.

  Two groups.

  Mika and Derrin peeled off to the left, already arguing about who was the better scout.

  Zach, Sato, and Elle cut right—silent, focused.

  For about ten seconds.

  Then—

  “I’m out.”

  Zach’s voice came low, calm.

  No follow-up.

  Just that.

  Sato blinked. “Wait, what?”

  Zach was already stepping back from the group, eyes locked on the treeline above. “I’ll take the canopy. Better angles. Less noise.”

  “That’s not the plan,” Sato hissed. “We’re supposed to triangulate using the drone’s scan range—”

  “I know,” Zach said. And that was all he said.

  He jumped—one clean motion.

  Branches shook above as he disappeared into the leaves like he’d never been there at all.

  Sato stared up after him, mouth half open. “We talked about formation.”

  Elle didn’t look away from the trees ahead.

  “Did you really think he was gonna stick to formation?”

  “…I was hopeful.”

  She just kept walking.

  Meanwhile, on the other side of the forest, Mika and Derrin moved at a much slower pace.

  Not because they were inefficient.

  Just… vibing.

  Mika had her hands laced behind her head, chewing gum she swore she didn’t have a second ago.

  “So like—hear me out,” she said, stepping over a log without missing a beat, “if we do win this and Ishino doesn’t get fired, I think we should make him buy us dinner.”

  Derrin crouched beside a tree, eyes flicking across the underbrush. “He already does our training sessions for free.”

  “Yeah, but dinner. Real dinner. Something that isn’t cafeteria-grade regret.”

  She ducked under a branch. “Also, if you find anything gross or venomous, don’t just show me again, okay?”

  “No promises,” Derrin muttered.

  As they walked, Derrin paused, holding out one finger like he was testing the wind—but instead, two small ants crawled up his arm and onto his shoulder.

  The queen ants perched on him turned their heads—almost like they were listening.

  Then, without a sound, a ripple of movement began in the leaves.

  Tiny beetles. Forest ants. Even a few fat little pill bugs began trailing out from holes and nests, forming a slow, crawling tide that followed Derrin like a whisper.

  Mika glanced down, casually stepping around them.

  “You sure you’re not secretly like, a bug messiah or something?”

  Derrin didn’t answer. He was already focused, eyes darting between twitching antennae and vibrating legs like he was reading code in the way they moved.

  “The scouts say nothing yet. But there’s disturbed dirt ahead—three sets of light footfalls. Could be Class C.”

  “Neat,” Mika said, still chewing. “You can talk to bugs. I bring personality.”

  He didn’t respond.

  “…Rude.”

  She paused at a tree, leaned on it, and looked up. “You think Zach’s actually sticking to the plan?”

  Derrin raised an eyebrow.

  Mika sighed.

  “Yeah. Me neither.”

  Zach moved through the trees like a shadow.

  Barely a sound.

  Each leap calculated.

  Branches bent under his weight, but never snapped. He moved like someone who had grown up in trees—not trained in them. Fluid. Efficient. Focused.

  Below, the forest floor rolled by in patches of green and brown, shifting with wind and animal noise. Nothing stood out.

  Until it did.

  He froze mid-jump, landing silently on a thick branch as movement flickered beneath him.

  Three figures.

  Class C—no one he recognized from the core group. Probably background players. The kind of students who usually hung back and let the heavy-hitters do the real work.

  But they weren’t moving like extras.

  They were silent.

  Coordinated.

  One swept the path ahead with hand signals. Another ducked low, watching the underbrush. The third was already marking trees behind them with faint scratches—breadcrumbs.

  Zach narrowed his eyes, crouching low behind a tangle of leaves.

  These aren’t just kids following orders.

  This was methodical.

  Trained.

  Planned.

  They weren’t wandering. They were executing a formation.

  Zach didn’t breathe.

  Didn’t move.

  Just watched as the three passed beneath him in practiced sync, disappearing into the undergrowth without a word.

  He waited a few more seconds, eyes scanning every branch, every twitch of movement.

  Then stood slowly.

  “…That’s weird.”

  He slipped forward into the next canopy, moving quieter now.

  More careful.

  Because if those kids were moving like that…

  Then something bigger was waiting deeper in the trees.