"Teacher Briar… how about you don't push yourself this hard."
Inside the teaching building, seeing Briar sitting in a wheelchair, her face still somewhat pale, Axel couldn't help feeling a bit distressed.
After noticing today that Briar wouldn't be able to teach, he had planned to take the exam early, to see if he could get the History Department graduation certificate.
But considering Gardevoir's feelings, Briar refused to let Axel go find Gardevoir to cheat together, and even said she was willing to be an inconspicuous woman, as long as Axel wouldn't forget her.
So, Briar applied to be Axel's proctor, wanting to help him pass the exam.
This way, it would be far less of a burden on her than actually teaching classes.
But even after being treated by the Pokemon in the infirmary, Briar's mental state was still very poor.
Feeling Axel's concern, Briar unconsciously brushed the short hair by her ear, not letting him see the faint blush on her cheeks.
"It's fine. It's not a formal class anyway. If it's just an exam, there shouldn't be any problem."
"Axel, even though what happened yesterday wasn't intentional… I don't know why, but… I really do have feelings for you."
"I'm not asking for anything else. I just hope I can make it up to you a little, so I don't keep feeling guilty, okay?"
"Then… alright," Seeing her speak to this extent, Axel could only nod.
With no one around, Axel lowered his head and leaned closer, pinching Briar's earlobe as he looked at her pretty face, about to say something comforting.
But for some inexplicable reason, when the words reached his lips, they turned into, "After we're done with things here, I'll build you a school somewhere else, okay?"
Being so close, Axel's presence threw Briar's thoughts into complete disarray, and she couldn't help trembling slightly.
"Okay!", Her eyes suddenly lit up. She pressed Axel's hand onto her leg, her tone excited, with a trace of happiness.
"I knew you loved me too. I'll stay by your side forever and manage the school properly!"
Briar didn't know where Axel was planning to build this school, but she knew that as long as she accepted this position, the connection between them would naturally grow stronger.
Axel: "..."
Right now, he suddenly felt like he was such a damn scumbag.
He had clearly meant to say something comforting, so how did it turn into recruiting forced labor?
Lately, he had been thinking about developing the Ultra Wormhole, always feeling like it still lacked a school. But since there was no suitable candidate, he hadn't brought it up.
A place as far as the Ultra Wormhole, even compared to exile in ancient Aurient, was worse than being banished to black waters, yet Teacher Briar was actually this happy.
"Teacher Briar."
"Mm?"
"At noon today, I'll treat you to a nice meal, then spend the whole day having fun with you!"
"Yay!", Sitting in the wheelchair, Briar's eyes sparkled as she raised both hands, making a big "Yay" gesture with her whole body.
Her demeanor and emotions were like those of a young girl, with not a trace of a mature woman visible.
"Let's go take the exam first!"
"Alright!"
Watching the two of them leave, a certain student who had just reached the corner, intending to ask Teacher Briar how to handle the afternoon exchange battle, stood there dumbfounded. The plan in her hand dropped to the ground with a thud.
She really wanted to ask Briar, "Teacher Briar, did you forget we're here for an exchange battle?"
"How did you suddenly become someone else's history teacher!"
———
[Naranja Academy single-discipline exam application approved. The exam will now be configured. The number of candidates applying today is 2. Candidate "Peony," please take seat number one. Candidate "Axel," please take seat number two.]
Axel gave Briar, who was standing at the podium as the proctor, a reassuring look, then sat down at seat number two.
As for Peony, she didn't trust Axel, so she came over to see if she could help him.
So she modified her student records and retook the exam.
However, she was a bit confused. Yesterday at noon, when they were eating, Teacher Briar had been perfectly fine, so why was she in a wheelchair now?
[Candidates detected to be seated. Contacting Mr. Metagross, who is in charge of proctoring… Please wait while Mr. Metagross selects the question bank for you.]
As this mechanical announcement sounded from the speaker, Peony's attention immediately shifted away from Briar, and she became unusually nervous.
She had modified Naranja Academy's database many times before and was very familiar with the process.
But this time, the person she needed to help was Axel, the one who had changed Team Star and fulfilled her long-held wish.
Under these circumstances, it was hard not to feel nervous.
"I hope Metagross's trainer isn't nearby… If it's just him alone, it should be easy enough to fool him…"
———
In a certain basement, a Metagross that was simultaneously controlling hundreds of computers to play a certain escape game blinked and looked up, feeling somewhat displeased.
["I finally got some computers together to earn a bit of living expenses… I was just about to bring the most valuable item out of the match, and now I have to work again?"]
["Damn it… this affects my computing power."]
After grumbling a few times, Metagross still allocated part of its processing power to connect to the database. After all, maintaining Naranja Academy's exam system was its main job.
Things like game boosting were just a side gig, used to earn some money for snacks.
As usual, Metagross connected to the database with the most perfunctory amount of computing power, not even checking whether the questions had been altered, only making sure that history questions didn't include subjects like math or foreign languages.
Suddenly, the sound of a door opening rang out. Metagross's eyes widened sharply, instantly shutting down all the computers to avoid being caught by its trainer for boosting and eating snacks.
At the same time, it immediately entered work mode, pretending it hadn't noticed the trainer and focusing seriously on its task.
The exam system it was connected to instantly issued an electronic prompt.
["Hm? It's clearly a graduation history exam, so why does it only contain Paldea content? Isn't that material from the first semester?"]
["Bug detected in this exam. Suspected cheating. Analyzing correction plans."]
["Plan one: directly terminate the exam and reschedule it."]
["Plan two: intervene in the database and manually select questions based on previous years' difficulty."]
["Contacting the trainer…"]
Just as Metagross was halfway through its act, it suddenly put on a surprised expression and turned to look beside it.
"Master, you're here? I just found something wrong with an exam and was about to contact you!"
A man in a suit nodded in satisfaction, "Good work. These past few days, there were even reports saying you might be slacking off again."
"Now it seems those were just rumors. You're still working very hard."
The suited man skillfully sat down beside Metagross and looked toward the massive display screen.
"Peony has been going too far lately. It was one thing when she used the school system to fight bullying, but now she's actually trying to help someone cheat on an exam. This is simply nonsense."
"Metagross, set the questions to the hardest mode, and at the same time lock onto the student ID of the other candidate today. Track him for three years, and make sure he can't pass the history exam before graduation."
["Understood, mas—",] Metagross's deep voice suddenly cut off halfway, as if something had manually shut its mouth.
"Metagross, what's wrong?" The suited man instinctively felt something was off and turned his head.
The next moment, he was completely stunned.
At some unknown time, both he and Metagross were already inside a massive red claw.
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