A Certain COTE Slice-of-Life Player! [2]

After An Xiao exchanged a few simple words with Ichinose Honami, the classroom bell rang. A woman in a short-sleeved pink top walked into the room with a smile, holding a black clipboard.

For some reason, the smile on the woman’s face sent a shiver through An Xiao. It felt strangely familiar.

Almost like… the kind of smile his mother and older sister wore at home whenever they were about to mess with him.

An Xiao quickly shook his head, throwing that terrifying thought out of his mind. By then, the teacher had already written her name and contact information on the blackboard.

“Hello, everyone. My name is Hoshinomiya Chie, and I’ll be your homeroom teacher for the next three years.”

After writing her name on the board, Hoshinomiya-sensei clapped her hands, turned around, and introduced herself to Class B with a smile.

“So, having a cute teacher like me makes you all happy, right?”

She put on an adorable expression as she teased the class.

That slightly narcissistic remark quickly narrowed the distance between her and the students, and a few boys even laughed and called out, “We are!”

She was a teacher who was extremely good at socializing.

That was An Xiao’s assessment. However, for some reason, he kept getting the feeling that this new teacher’s gaze was flicking toward him every so often.

Something about this teacher feels like trouble.

Without thinking, An Xiao couldn’t help shrinking a little closer to the window.

As if noticing that her gaze had become a bit too obvious, Hoshinomiya-sensei withdrew her eyes quite naturally, acting as though nothing had happened. Then she smiled and cut through the students’ noise, continuing.

“I’m sure that before enrolling, all of you gained some understanding of our school either through the enrollment guide we sent out or from the entrance ceremony earlier—especially regarding the unique nature of our school.”

At Hoshinomiya-sensei’s words, the students below all nodded in unison. An Xiao was no exception.

To be honest, he really was quite curious about how capable a school like this had to be, to let students freely choose their schools, majors, and career paths while still maintaining a 100% higher-education and employment rate.

Were they not afraid of inciting a revolt among all the students outside who were studying themselves into the ground?

And also… recalling the sheer number of surveillance cameras he had noticed while wandering around the school earlier, An Xiao couldn’t help clicking his tongue.

I can’t shake the feeling I’ve accidentally wandered into some strange social experiment.

While An Xiao’s thoughts were drifting, Hoshinomiya-sensei first gave another brief introduction to the school according to the materials that had just been handed out. Then, after a slight pause, she took the phones that had been prepared in advance from the lectern drawer and began passing them out to the students in the front row.

As she handed them out, she explained to the class.

“In addition to the rules I mentioned earlier, the most distinctive thing about our school is the mechanism I’m about to explain—the S-System.”

Once she saw that every student below had received a phone, Hoshinomiya-sensei took out a phone of her own and explained, “Since your phones were collected at the start of enrollment, this phone will serve as a replacement while also functioning as your student ID.”

“You can use it for communication within the school, but only within the school. All contact with the outside world will be blocked. At the same time, this is also your only means of payment on campus.”

Hearing that, An Xiao raised his eyebrows in surprise.

He hadn’t expected Japan to use mobile payments too. He had assumed they would use some kind of campus card, and had even been worried he might lose it. Now he didn’t have to worry about that anymore.

“Each of you can spend using the private points stored on your phone. As long as you’re inside the school, you can use points to buy anything you want.”

“Of course, that’s assuming you have enough points.”

“Everyone’s points will be automatically deposited on the first of every month. One point is worth one yen, so you can think of it as your living expenses. This month’s points have already been deposited into each of your accounts.”

“Incidentally, that would be one hundred thousand points!”

The moment Hoshinomiya-sensei finished that last sentence, the entire class fell silent at first. A few seconds later, it erupted into commotion.

“One hundred thousand points? According to what Hoshinomiya-sensei just said, doesn’t that mean it’s the same as one hundred thousand yen?”

“One hundred thousand yen? That’s almost as much as I get in allowance for an entire year!”

The whole class instantly burst into excitement.

That was understandable. For students who had only just entered high school, one hundred thousand was still a rather large sum.

An Xiao estimated it silently. Converting it roughly according to the recent yen exchange rate, it would be about five thousand yuan in domestic currency.

At that thought, the corner of An Xiao’s mouth twitched. Looking at the glaring “100,000” displayed on the student terminal he had already logged into, he was not especially delighted. Instead, his feelings were complicated—and more than anything, he wanted to make a snarky comment.

What kind of school gives students money instead of charging them a single fee? And this much at once?

A normal university student back home usually only had about two or three thousand yuan a month for living expenses. This was already double that. Was this really appropriate?

It wasn’t that An Xiao didn’t want to believe it. The problem was that it made far too little sense.

Back in middle school, his classmates had been run ragged over scholarships worth only one or two thousand per semester, juggling exams while taking part in all kinds of extracurricular activities until they barely had room to breathe.

And now the money they were being given had doubled. Surely that didn’t mean the things they had to do would double too, right?

Remembering those classmates from middle school who had been run ragged, An Xiao couldn’t help swallowing. He pressed his palm hard against his chest several times before finally letting out a heavy sigh, consoling himself as he did.

Maybe I’m just overthinking it.

On the podium, Hoshinomiya-sensei looked over the students below with great interest. Only after everyone had more or less finished being excited did she speak.

“Does anyone still have anything they don’t understand about the school rules? I’ll do my best to answer your questions here.”

An Xiao did, in fact, have many questions he wanted to ask. His hand, which had been resting on the desk, was already about to go up. But when he recalled the strange unease he had felt the first time he saw this teacher, he ultimately swallowed every question back down.

I feel like getting involved with this teacher would drag me into some huge mess.

That was the intuition An Xiao’s sixth sense gave him.

Because of that, not a single person asked Hoshinomiya-sensei a question before the end.

T/N: NGL CHIE IS SOOOOOO HOT I KNOW SHES TOXIC IF YKYK BUT LIKE IF I EVER DO A FANFIC OF COTE SHE’D DEFF BE A BIG CHARACTER

This is a fan translation of 某实教的日常系玩家 by 星语安潇 Rights to the original work belong to the creator. Please support them by exploring their original work or sharing it with others if you can. Thank you for reading and supporting my efforts to bring this story to a wider audience!