Chapter 267: Chapter 266.

Chapter 266. Am I in trouble? (4/4)

“A short life isn’t necessarily a bad thing. When you have a stricter time limit imposed upon yourself compared to others, you value your time more. I won’t slave my life away trying to pursue success, I’ll enjoy it the way I wish to enjoy it, even if I’m destined for poverty.”

“Those rich and well off may laugh and scorn me, but I can only pity them for being unable to ever be satisfied. With the power and wealth they’ve accumulated, comes endless worries. How to maintain their luxurious lifestyles living far beyond their means. How to keep the cogs turning in the system they rapidly built up. Unending responsibilities follow and weigh down upon them.”

“All we at the bottom see is the surface level appearances those at the top portray. People become disillusioned by the idea that the grass is greener on the other side so they chase after such lofty lifestyles sacrificing anything in the name of reaching the other side.”

“Those at the top act like they’re happy because if they don’t act like that, they feel like they’ll be the loser at the end of the day for trying so hard only to realize how unhappy they wound up. They don’t want people to see how empty and hollow they truly are on the inside and hide it deep down in their stone-cold hearts.”

“So you’re saying you’re happy, content with living a frugal lifestyle even if it’s a short one so long as you can meet your basic needs to survive, and that you even enjoy life better with the bare minimum?”

“Yes.”

Mr. Oz suddenly said something strange, “Those who seek it don’t deserve it. Those that should have it don’t want it. Plato said something similar to this once.”

“That’s quite the contradiction though.”

“Oh? How so?”

“In regards to power and ruling which Plato’s quote would be referencing. It’s true that someone whose only objective is to acquire power for bettering their own life may turn out to be a bad leader. But if you forced that power onto someone who didn’t want it, would they bother to use that power properly in the first place? In all likelihood, they would not, they would simply squander it. They might not abuse it, but if they didn’t use it at all, it’d be just the same as them turning out to be a bad leader anyway.”

“If that was the case, then where would good leaders come from? They would only come from those who seek power, but rather than for themselves, it would be for others. At the end of the day, a good leader must have a certain level of ambition but be someone with a degree of self-restraint. A leader without any ambition at all still remains a failure of a leader.” It’s quite the shounen way of thinking.

“Hmmm… somehow we got quite sidetracked.”

“It seems so.”

“The tangent we got off on really doesn’t feel like the type of conversation an adult has with a child. You’re much more mature for your age compared to the other students in class.”

“When you’ve got less time, you think about things differently. If my total lifespan was half everybody else’s, would it not be possible that I’d mature at a faster rate, perhaps two times as fast? There’s also a difference in environment to take into account as well.”

“Half… you say?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, if I thought of you as having a mental age closer to thirty it might make a bit of sense.”

“Out of curiosity, if you had power, what would you do with it, Ran?”

“Nothing. I neither want nor need any power granted to me.”

“This is quite troubling for me as a teacher though. To have a student who can do much better academically purposefully choosing not to.”

“You’re making baseless assumptions without any solid evidence.”

“The ability to get 75% at will on all your tests is more than enough evidence. It means you know for certain that you are right in the questions you’ve answered. In a way, it’s harder than simply aiming for a high mark or 100%.”

“For multiple-choice questions, it means you need to also know which answer is right with certainty, so you can’t just make a random guess like you could if you got stuck on one particular question when aiming for full marks.”

“For long answer questions, it means you also need to understand exactly how many marks you get for each step or point in your answer.”

“But Ran, there is one way to prove whether you are intentionally manipulating your score or not.”

“Yes. By removing how many marks each question is worth.” I naturally knew. The instant I didn’t know how many marks were assigned to each question, the difficulty of scoring exactly 75% decreased. 

“Unless you get lucky, you won’t be able to get 75% if that happens.”

“But would you do that when it would disadvantage other students who use the mark breakdown as a guide to determine which questions to focus on?”

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“I could just give you alone a test sheet without the mark breakdown for the questions.”

“That’s certainly true. If you did that though, I’d just score a zero and fail the test though. It would reflect pretty badly on you as a teacher if one of your students suddenly got a zero, don’t you think?”

“Aren’t you too petty?”

“Not at all. It’s just terrible to discriminate against one kid in class by giving only him a test different from everyone else’s.”

“Then Ran, how about this? What if I arrange with teachers to allow you to do the final exams for all the courses you plan to take in high school? If you score 100% on all of them, you can pass all of them in one go and graduate from high school early. However, if you can’t do that, then you need to give your all in your studies from now on.”

My eyes shot open when presented with such an appealing offer. However, to score 100% on all of them, there was no way I’d be permitted to win. They’d definitely try to pull some sneaky tricks like including questions way beyond the scope of high school. I wouldn’t even be able to complain either, even if I called them out on it, they’d just claim I wouldn’t know since I hadn’t taken the course yet. Though... they’d be mistaken to think that would stop me from getting a perfect score. After all, how could they ever imagine I already had a university-level education at this age?

Hell, throw in some time-dependent partial differential equations in spherical coordinates for me to solve, see if I care. Maybe even throw in a few line, surface, and volume integrals for dessert while you’re at it.

No. If I went and did something stupid like that as a first-year high school student, they might misunderstand and think I was some sort of prodigy when in reality I was just a dumbass who returned to the past with memories of the future.

“Well, is this a deal you’d be interested in?”

“No thank you.” Refusing was for the best.

“What? Why? Are you afraid of losing? Where did your confidence from before go?”

“As I said before, Mr. Oz, I may not look like it, but I’m enjoying high school in my own way. The world outside of high school is also quite cold and unforgiving, why would I want to graduate early? Plus, if I’m no longer a student and I start working a job, I’d have to pay taxes. I’d lose out on two and half valuable years where I could skip out on paying income tax. Wouldn’t I be a moron to miss out on such a benefit?”

“Ah… right… I forgot about that particular benefit of being a student. Hmm… in that case, what if you can remain a student and attend classes if you choose to without graduating, but you no longer have to worry about the assignments, tests, and exams?”

That was an even better deal than before. Everything in me wanted to jump out of my seat and accept. It was too good to be true. But if I got conned, it meant having to put in more effort than I wanted to.

As a cautious person, I couldn’t accept conditions where I’d be playing on the enemy’s terms. I was at too great a disadvantage as they had free reign over what was on the exam they’d give me. 

I don’t know everything in the world, I’m not omnipotent. If it’s just simple high school material, I was confident, but if they played dirty and put questions on it that went beyond high school, there was no guarantee. Especially for biology. Chemistry I had a certain degree of confidence in, but it’s not like it was my major. My major specializations were subjects involving math and physics.

“Sorry, I will need to refuse.”

“You’re still refusing even with such favorable conditions?”

“Yes. I will take my time in high school and leisurely enjoy it while I can. You can only experience high school once in your life after all.” University, you could experience it as many times as you wanted, but high school was a fleeting moment in everyone’s lives.

“Haaaaah. I see. It’s certainly true that you only get to go through it once.” Mr. Oz let out a dejected sigh and slumped back in his chair defeated.

“It’s such a waste. An interesting student in my homeroom class will be buried in the dirt and I can’t do anything about it.”

“I’m not an interesting student at all. You’re overestimating me. You’ll be disappointed if you think too highly of me.”

“You’re too pessimistic.”

“I prefer to consider myself as a realist.”

“If you are ever interested in taking up my offer, I’ll leave it open should you ever change your mind.”

“It’s unlikely that I’d ever take it, but I’ll still keep it in mind.” There was no reason to completely shut out the possibility of an early graduation, however, I wanted to remain in high school with Rosa until the end.

“If there wasn’t anything else Mr. Oz, I’ll be going now. My next class is starting soon.”

“It’s that time already? Haaaaaah. Time really flies. There wasn't anything else I needed to speak to you about, you’re free to go.”

I left a rather depressed Mr. Oz behind in the staff room and attended the rest of my classes without any further incident.

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