Chapter 50

Gakushuu sneaked into school after classes were over. And just as he had expected, class A was still slumped over in their desks, unbothered by other students and staff. They were far too exhausted after such a long session with his father.

Gakushuu understood.

Honestly, it wasn't a good idea to test out something experimental on people you cared for, but he didn't have much of a choice.

He replaced Gakuhou in front of the class, and Ren was the first to raise his head, almost instinctively sensing Gakushuu.

He took a deep breath.

There was an element of hypnotism in Gakuhou's manipulation of people. Maybe it also needed a certain level of respect for his authority or a feeling of mutual understand but, Gakushuu didn't need to recreate it.

He just needed to break it.

Gakushuu snapped a book shut, and the students' spines snapped straight with sharp attentiveness. They focused almost eerily on Gakushuu.

Then the slight hint of dazed confusion started to show.

"Listen," Gakushuu demanded.

He set his phone on the table and played what sounded like a steady tapping noise. Then Gakushuu lowered his voice, and spoke.

It was gibberish.

It made no sense.

But that didn't matter.

What mattered was the way Anaya swayed, then her eyes rolled back and she fainted in her seat.

Gakushuu didn't move to catch her.

Or specifically, he couldn't move.

One by one, his classmates dropped off in a dead faint.

Mori lasted the longest, to the point where Gakushuu's throat went dry. But even he relaxed and sagged down in a very unlikely fashion.

Gakushuu stopped.

Then he coughed.

He turned around to grab a bottle of water and-

His father stood at the doorway.

Gakushuu froze. His insides froze and his skin prickled from the attention Gakuhou gave him.

He had been mostly ignored for quite some time now, until the command to stay at home. And when he had expected his defiance to be discovered, but maybe not quite this soon.

Gakuhou looked at Gakushuu curiously. Like he was seeing him for the first time.

"How curious," he said. He stepped inside the room.

Gakushuu stood frozen even as he approached.

Gakuhou walked around, checking the state of the students.

"Were you planning to reverse the malleability of their minds?" He asked, tilting Anaya's head back, staring at her relaxed closed eyes. He let it drop, and then wiped his hand.

He turned back to look at Gakushuu with an- an expression he had never seen on his father.

Genuine interest.

"When did you start researching this?" He asked, and then he made his way to Ren. He grabbed his chin, turning it both ways, opening his eyes to check before dropping his face too.

Gakushuu frowned.

"When I saw you during the baseball exhibition match," he answered.

Gakuhou hummed.

"This will cut into your studying time," he warned casually. Gakushuu frowned harder.

"I know," he replied, confused.

Gakuhou nodded.

"Very well then," he started to walk towards the door.

Gakushuu opened his mouth, then let it close. He watched his father leave the classroom silently.

Gakushuu had never been afraid of speaking his mind. He prodded his father, added reasons, informed him of his choices even when he shouldn't, and they talked.

But this time…

This time, it felt like Gakuhou had just silently given Gakushuu permission to do what he wanted.

Like he was shrugging while saying, 'it's your life'.

Gakushuu looked at his classmates and sighed.

He snapped his fingers.

Ren jerked back, almost like he was electrocuted. Then he put his hand on his forehead, and groaned in pain.

Unlike his father's normal way of brainwashing people into doing his bidding, he had utilised his teaching and used his hypnotist-like powers to make them focus on the lesson like never before.

They were still exhausted.

Gakushuu was there to give them a break from the fanaticism and remember who they were outside of the school, at least.

Hinata burst into tears.

Amami hugged her, still clutching her head in pain. Kimiko shook her head violently like she was expecting the pain to shrug off, like a dog with water.

A few just laid their heads on the desk and quietly tried to take in the rush of not only information, but exhaustion.

"Go back home," Gakushuu spoke softly, but everyone heard him, tilting their head towards him in acknowledgement, "and rest. Then, come back tomorrow morning for school."

He stoically took in their surprised expressions at his words.

"But-but!" Suzuki protested, almost tearing up. "I can't. I really-" she pressed a hand to her mouth to stifle a sob. "I can't, please."

Gakushuu looked at the other faces, looking at him desperately.

"Go home and sleep, " he commanded. Then his voice softened, "but come back here and study. You don't have to give in. You don't have to fight it either. You just have to follow the class of your own will."

Kimiko's eyes shot up to meet Gakushuu's calm- almost uncaringly hard- ones. She gave him a wry smile.

"Is this how you learned to study?" She asked bitterly. Gakushuu met her gaze.

"Yes," he acknowledged. "It's hard, but if you can survive this month, you'll reach much closer to me," he looked at Mori who had been silently contemplating something.

The class was silent until Mori raised his head. He shrugged under the gazes of the class.

"I'm in," he accepted. He met Gakushuu's gaze head on. He looked back stubbornly. "I'm not going to give up."

Gakushuu's smile became softer, a little sadder and he nodded.

"And even if you do give in, I will wake you up again. Every day, without fail. You can trust me to do that," then Gakushuu fell silent. He met everyone's eyes one by one. Sending them his request silently. "Can I…ask this of you?" He asked, almost hesitating in the middle.

Only a few caught the pause.

Hinata sniffed, pulling away from Amami.

"I'll come back tomorrow. I need to get my scores back up into the top five. I can't leave Kunugigaoka with low scores!" She protested.

Kimiko smiled fondly. Then she caught Gakushuu's gaze and nodded in agreement.

Slowly, everyone in class raised their heads and met Gakushuu's eyes.

(When Gakuhou entered the full class, with the exception of Gakushuu, he almost hesitated. He raised a brow in surprise, and the few students who caught it, sat up straighter, staring him down.

Gakuhou smirked. He didn't hate this kind of perseverance.

Then he started class.)

The longer they spent under Gakuhou, the harder it was on Gakushuu.

He didn't tell them that.

He didn't tell them about the way, it was getting hard to speak, how he struggled to maintain a steady pace of speaking, with perfect pitch and tone as he brought his classmates back to their senses.

He didn't let them see the pain, didn't let them hear the hoarseness of his voice, and didn't deny when his housekeeper kept a constant supply of throat soothing medicines at the house.

He broke off in the middle once, to cough, and had to start from the beginning again, and his classmates, in a daze as they were, didn't notice Gakushuu curled up by the teacher's desk, coughing his lungs out.

It took longer sometimes and Gakushuu, uncharitably, wished he could skip a day because it was pretty hard to do this every day.

But no. He couldn't.

He would lose.

And not only would he lose against his father, he would lose his respect. He didn't know what his father would do if the new interest that had lit up his father's eyes was gone.

He didn't know what he would do if he saw it gone.

So he didn't say anything.

He treated himself, and waited.

And waited.

(Gakushuu coughed blood once.)

(He burnt the evidence down, took care of his throat with even more delicacy.)

(It was only for a month.)

(A month was a pretty long time.)

The night before the exam, when he woke up most of his classmates, he looked at them with pride.

Because there were a few who were dazed, but awake.

"Good luck," he told them, his voice sounding only slightly hoarse. He stifled a cough, knowing it would sound like he was about to drop dead instead of just coughing because his throat itched.

A few looked at him with concern but he smiled at them all reassuringly.

Then he left.

When he reached outside, he ran for the closest hidden spot, before coughing his lungs.

Once again, there was blood, and it hurt like he was setting his chest in fire. But he sighed in relief. It was finally the day before the exam.

They just had to give the exam.

And Gakushuu only needed to worry about himself there.

He had minimised the long term aftereffects on them, just by making sure they were in the right mind every day, and Gakushuu's throat would heal too.

But meanwhile, it was going to be a pain to hide it and pretend it was okay. At least, he didn't need to give a valedictorian speech anytime soon.

He rested his head on the wall and closed his eyes.

He sort of wished Karma would pop up from somewhere to shoot him a snark comment that would make him feel better about life.

Instead he had to deal with his father.

He opened his eyes and his father was standing in front of him, looking at him with mild concern.

Gakushuu looked up at the man uncaringly. He didn't care if his hostility towards him was discovered already.

It wasn't like not knowing about it had stopped him from acting out against Gakushuu or his classmates.

Gakuhou seemed startled, but only for a moment. He recovered quickly enough that Gakushuu didn't even have time to offer a sarcastic comment about it.

"I see you've made some improvements to the technique. But you still haven't managed to fix the strain on yourself," Gakuhou noted. Gakushuu rolled his eyes.

"And why so you think that is?" He asked dryly. Gakuhou didn't acknowledge the words.

"You are directly trying to counter my approach, and while you know that it works this way, you should have spent the time actually tinkering with this to find what suits you instead of just doing what was most suitable," Gakuhou frowned. "I taught you this." He insisted.

Gakushuu scoffed.

"People and theoretical problems are two completely different things," he responded. "If you think for one second that I would risk even using something I wasn't completely sure of, on them-" he pointed towards the direction of the class, "-then clearly you've been assuming things about me instead of actually looking. Let alone experimenting with something already messing with their minds."

Gakuhou hummed, like it was a minor problem for him.

"Then, how about I show you people who no one would care to miss?" He asked.

Gakushuu knew exactly who he was talking about. He made a sound of disgust.

"Give up already," Gakushuu turned away, his voice was hard when he spoke to his father. "Give up on tormenting people who did bad things when they were young. Give up on finding a way back to me. You've done enough. Sensei," he mocked.

He mocked what the word was meant to represent and what his father thought it did. There was no happiness, no relief down that path.

He didn't want to talk about more useless idealism anymore.

He was about to graduate from his father, more so than the school. And he didn't have time to care about someone who wouldn't care back for him.

Specially his father.

Gakushuu walked away.