The girl's blank stare had felt incredibly heavy. The staff member was looking right at him, waiting for an answer.
Then, the girl broke eye contact. She turned her back to the counter, completely ignoring Albert, and addressed the staff member. "Can I fill out a missing item slip, just in case someone brings it in later?"
"Yes, of course," the staff member said. She pulled a small pad of paper toward her and clicked her pen. "What's your name and homeroom?"
"Tendo Haruka," the girl said clearly. "First-year, Class 1-51."
Tendo. That made six.
Up until that exact second, Albert was sweating. He was standing right next to a pretty girl, awkwardly hiding her lost handkerchief in his pocket because he lacked the basic social skills to just speak up.
But hearing that name instantly wiped away his social panic. Instead, a cold chill ran down his arms. Encountering a sixth Tendo on the very first day of school was mathematically absurd. The situation went from being socially embarrassing to just feeling downright creepy.
Before the staff member could even press her pen to the paper, Albert forced his hand to move. His fingers trembled slightly as he pulled the neatly folded pink fabric from his pants pocket.
"I... I found this," he had managed to say, his voice sounding a little too raspy. "Near the stairs."
The girl's eyes widened. The heavy pressure vanished instantly, replaced by obvious relief. "That's it," she said, taking a quick step toward him and gently accepting the cloth. "Thank you. I was really worried I lost it."
"You're welcome," Albert muttered, immediately looking down at his shoes.
The staff member smiled. "Well, that worked out perfectly. But you both better hurry back. Lunch is almost over, and the warning bell is going to ring in five minutes."
The girl gasped.
"Oh no." She bowed quickly to the staff, gave Albert one last hurried "Thank you so much!" and practically sprinted out the door. She didn't wait for him. She didn't ask for his name.
The immediate threat of being late for class completely erased him from her mind.
Albert had stood there watching the door swing shut. He was alone again. He had just been a minor NPC who delivered a quest item and was immediately forgotten.
Date: April 7, 2026 (Tuesday) | Time: 4:35 PM | Location: Classroom 1-4
The last period of the first day was Mathematics. The teacher, a tired-looking man named Hirano-sensei, stood at the front of Class 1-4.
Since it was the first day, nobody expected a real lecture.
"Before we end the day," Hirano-sensei said, picking up a board marker. "Since there is no formal lesson today, let's play a game. Consider it a test of your logical reasoning. I want everyone to take out a blank piece of paper. Write down your name, and choose a whole number between 0 and 100."
The classroom buzzed as students pulled out their notebooks.
"Here is the rule," Hirano-sensei continued. "The winner is not the highest number. The winner will be the person who guesses the number that is exactly two-thirds of the class average. Whoever gets the closest wins a reward from me."
Albert stared at his blank paper. He recognized that guessing game. It was a classic Game Theory experiment. The Keynesian Beauty Contest.
He didn't need a calculator. He instantly began running the logical regression in his head.
If numbers are picked completely at random between 0 and 100, the baseline average is 50.
Therefore, a Level 1 thinker will assume the average is 50, and calculate two-thirds of that, choosing 33.
A Level 2 thinker will assume everyone else is a Level 1 thinker. They will calculate two-thirds of 33, and choose 22.
This is just the math of psychology, Albert thought. It is the exact same concept the school used to predict our seating arrangement this morning.
The morning experiment had felt like a massive physics simulation. The school had placed them in a controlled environment—a phase space—and manipulated the time variable by releasing them in fifteen-second intervals.
By mapping out everyone's psychological constants and social coefficients from the entrance exam survey, the school had accurately predicted where the "active particles" would settle. They had mathematically mapped their vectors to the correct chairs (the attractors) with an 88.9% success rate for the controlled variables.
Albert analyzed, tapping his mechanical pencil against his desk.
The seating arrangement was a complex physical simulation with complete data. This math game is a simplified cognitive simulation with incomplete data. The teacher doesn't have a twenty-page survey to predict what number we will write. But I don't need a survey. I just need to observe the active particles in the room.
If everyone in the room was a perfectly rational computer, this infinite regression would go all the way down to zero. Zero is the pure mathematical answer. The Nash Equilibrium. But this classroom was not filled with computers. It was filled with human variables.
Albert mentally divided the forty students. He did not possess psychic abilities; his accuracy relied on strict, passive data collection.
Because he lacked the social skills to interact, he had spent the last six hours sitting at his desk at the back of the room, silently cataloging his classmates' baseline behaviors. He tracked who formed social clusters, who read the syllabus early, and who isolated themselves. He used this behavioral data to assign cognitive values.
Variable Group A: The Karaoke Extroverts. Roughly eighteen students. He had watched them loudly coordinate their after-school plans during the lunch break. Their current cognitive load was entirely dedicated to social processing, meaning their academic effort would default to a zero-level strategy. They wouldn't overthink the puzzle. They would pick random or 'lucky' numbers, dragging their group average right to the baseline of 50. (18 students multiplied by 50 equals 900)
Variable Group B: The Average Introverts. About fourteen students. During lunch, he had observed them reading light novels or browsing their phones independently. They demonstrated a baseline logical capacity but lacked a highly competitive drive. They would think exactly one step ahead. They would realize the random average was 50, do the basic math, and guess 33. (14 students multiplied by 33 equals 462)
Variable Group C: The Overachievers. Eight highly competitive students. Albert had noted them highlighting their pristine textbooks, organizing their stationary, and paying strict attention to the teacher's introductory remarks. They possessed the drive to outsmart the baseline. They would think two steps ahead, trying to outsmart Group B. They would guess 22. (8 students multiplied by 22 equals 176)
Albert added the values together. 900 plus 462 plus 176. The total sum of the class's guesses would be exactly 1538.
He divided 1538 by the 40 students in the room. The expected class average would be 38.45.
Finally, he calculated two-thirds of 38.45. The answer was 25.63.
Albert picked up his mechanical pencil and wrote the number 26 in the center of his paper.
Before he could even put his pencil down, a hand reached across his desk. Maya snatched the paper right out from under his nose. It was a fluid, practiced movement—a habit she had perfected over three years of middle school.
Albert didn't flinch. He just watched as Maya looked at the number 26. She didn't look surprised. She looked at it as if she already knew he would have the exact right answer before the game even started.
She leaned back and handed the paper over her shoulder to Leo. Leo glanced at the number, smirked, and handed it back to Maya. Maya then placed the paper back on Albert's desk, perfectly centered, as if nothing had happened. They didn't say a single word. They didn't need to. It was a silent exchange that proved how deeply they understood how Albert thinks.
"Alright, make your final choices," Hirano-sensei instructed. "Pass your papers to the front."
Albert looked at the number 26.
If he passed this paper forward, theoretically, he would win. Even if some of the human variables deviated slightly from his behavioral profiling, his calculation had the highest statistical probability of being the closest guess.
But winning meant the teacher would praise him. Thirty-seven students would turn around and stare at him. They would ask how he figured it out. He would instantly become the center of attention. A target of curiosity. The absolute opposite of the background character which his classmates thought he should be.
The social cost of that probability was too high. The thought of that much attention made his stomach twist.
Albert calmly picked up his rubber eraser. With three quick swipes, he completely erased the number 26. In its place, he scribbled the number 50.
He handed his paper to the student in front of him.
Hirano-sensei collected the stack of papers and sat at his desk. He began inputting the numbers into a spreadsheet on his laptop. The classroom was filled with quiet chatter as they waited.
Three minutes later, Hirano-sensei hit the 'Enter' key. He looked at the screen and raised an eyebrow.
"The results are in," the teacher announced, pulling his glasses down slightly. The room quieted down. "The total sum of your guesses was exactly…"
Endnote of Chapter 9
Subject: The Math of Psychology
The "game" played in Class 1-4 is a famous real-world experiment called the Keynesian BeautyContest. It tests how well you can predict other people's behavior.
Here is how Albert's guessed, using Math:
1. The Random Guessers (Level 0)
If you ask a room full of people to pick a random number between 0 and 100 without thinking about it, the average will naturally land right in the middle: 50.
Albert noticed that the noisy, highly social students weren't going to overthink the game. They would just pick random numbers, anchoring their group's average at 50.
2. The Basic Thinkers (Level 1)
A logical student will realize the random average is 50. Since the winning rule is to guess two-thirds of the average, they will simply calculate two-thirds of 50. Their guess will be 33.
Albert assigned the quiet, average students to this group.
3. The Overthinkers (Level 2)
Highly competitive students will try to outsmart the basic thinkers. They will assume the class average is going to be 33. To beat them, they calculate two-thirds of 33. Their guess will be 22.
Albert assigned the overachievers to this group.
Why the ultimate answer isn't Zero:
If everyone in the room was a perfect, emotionless supercomputer, they would keep outsmarting each other in an infinite loop. They would take two-thirds of 22, then two-thirds of 14, and so on, until the answer hit 0. In mathematics, this perfect zero is called the Nash Equilibrium.
But Albert knows he is dealing with flawed humans, not computers. If he guessed 0, he would lose, because humans are not perfectly rational.
Applied Calculation:
Albert bypasses the Nash Equilibrium by treating the classroom as a weighted dataset. He just counted heads and did basic math:
*18 people guessing 50.
*14 people guessing 33.
*8 people guessing 22.
He added those estimated guesses together, divided by the 40 students in the room, and found the exact point where human logic and human randomness balance out. The result was 26.