My Bothersome Life

Hell-like School

I looked up to find a large building intimidatingly stare back at me.

The entrance to the school was blocked by tall formal black gates with additional security from the hired guards. They stood in front of the gate like it was their duty to protect the important people behind its gate.

It was hard to believe that this school was built for children that did not even reach the age of six.

Once the guards checked the license plate of my mother's car, my mom drove me to the entrance to the enormous school with their approval.

The size of the school and its facilities resembled an average University campus from the world I originally came from.

Maybe everything appeared to be massive due to my small figure as I analyzed that this campus was bigger than the college near my house in my former life.

The building continued to tower in front of me once I got out of the car. I was impressed of the carefully sculpted stone cravings on its exterior walls when I explored the entrance of the building.

There were no traces of the building aged from the flow of time. There was a lack of any yellowing of the sparkling white bricks nor the rusting of the iron embellishments that decorated the door.

I had no clue where to go since I just got reincarnated into this new world. It rendered my excellent directional sense I have built up in my former life as useless as well as most of my knowledge.

I continued to observe my surroundings in one spot as I turned when a young child-like voice called my name.

"Rika! What are you doing there? It's almost time for class!" The dazzling sunlight glazed over his large, worried blue eyes that reflected back a clear flowing river in the midst of an untouched forest.

The young toddler possessed a fair face with his carefully carved features that made him appear as beautiful as a breath of fresh air.

A touch of his glistening silver hair created a boy that came out of a fairy tale while he wore a fine collared shirt with a plaid pattern tie created from the finest silk and shining dress pants and shoes.

When he wore the male equivalent of my uniform, I saw a child model that was advertising the exquisite school uniform instead of an ordinary student.

I could immediately foresee that he would break many women's hearts when he grew up.

There was no way that he would grow up to be ordinary with his gorgeous young features he currently possessed.

The young toddler grabbed my hand and started to drag me inside the huge facility while my eyes widened from his assertiveness.

I wondered what our relationship was as I suddenly found myself inside a classroom resembling my high school. However, the desks were fine works of craftsmanship created from the materials of fine polished wood that carried a modern laptop on each of them.

The tuition for this had to be expensive due to the high operation costs from running the school. The school had invested all their money into upgrading the student's learning experience from the quality of the equipment they placed in the classroom.

I briefly questioned how my new family afforded to send me to such an extravagant school as they seemed to be from an average middle-class family.

The boy gestured me to sit in the desk beside him as the teacher who looked like in her thirties with sleekly trimmed black hair walked into the glittering classroom with a professional aura.

"Today, we are going to learn how to graph a straight line on the x-y plane based on the formula that you learned to make last week," the teacher announced with her confident marble-black eyes that reflected in the gazes of my classmates and I.

I tilted my head in confusion as I wondered if I was really in a kindergarten class for the ages of four. Even though I had died at a young age of seventeen years old in my past life, I clearly remembered learning the same level of math when I was eleven.

I blocked the teacher's explanation from my mind as the material was just repetitive knowledge that was the foundations of what I had practiced daily for the SATs.

Even if I were to be tested, this level of material couldn't compare to the days where I concentrated on passing the SATs with every fabric of my body ever since I entered high school.

Every student in my country had to write entrance exams where the exam would determine their futures. The entrance exams were excruciatingly competitive to the point that it became a norm for students to wake up at 7AM to go to school by 8AM and go to cram schools for extra schooling until 12AM. 

Unfortunately, the day didn't end until they finished their homework given from their cram schools and the actual schools they attended.

When they were finally finished with their miserable daily routine, they would sleep at about 2AM while hoping that the next day would never come.

Unfortunately, I was not exempt from this exact routine that caused life to be hell in high school as I struggled to keep up with my peers while I balanced my otaku lifestyle.

I sighed as I didn't wish to go to a world where I would have to repeat the same thing over again even though I hoped to go to a world with modern technology.

The world I came from considered my country to be abnormally strict and hard with education compared to other countries.

However, not even a strict country whose norms that had high levels of strict education was this cruel! We only started these miserable routines when we were at least ten years old.

No one forced a young child that was in kindergarten to study the X-Y plane that the teacher was devoting her heart out onto the electronic whiteboard.

I started to open my foreign laptop as I glanced at my fellow classmates opening their laptops. I already begun to conclude that this reincarnation to be difficult in the future as my peers had their workbooks out as I just started to look through my bag for it.

When I finally started to pay attention to the front of the class, I found another teacher with odd blue hair coming into the room while the math teacher elegantly left the class after her lesson.

I wasn't surprised with the strange coloured hair the people from this world possessed. I appreciated how these strange combinations added more value to their beautiful appearance.

It reminded me of all the anime characters who possessed bright neon colours as their character profiles.

"Hi! Today we will be learning about the history of this country. Today we will go to page 1006." The new teacher brightly announced.

I struggled to find the file since I was unfamiliar with the folders within the laptop.

I reluctantly asked the adorable toddler beside me for help after my previous failures, "How do I get to the textbook?"

The silver haired boy quickly erased his wonderment as to why I would not know to how to get to the textbook before he started explaining efficiently.

"You go onto to the history file and then go to this grade and to this book," His head slightly drooped as I observed his long eyelashes.

I sighed from the short unfortunate interaction with him as I was interrupted by the teacher beginning to ramble on the facts for today's lesson.

After the 2nd class ended, another teacher walked into the classroom right away after the history teacher greeted his farewells to the class.

From my short interaction with the schooling system, I was able to determine that each class to be about two hours. I stopped paying relatively any attention to the lessons as I gave up after the first thirty minutes.

I knew that if I concentrated into the high-quality lessons that the teachers had carefully prepared for its students, I would be both physically and mentally exhausted.

Even though I already knew most of the material, the lesson itself was quickly paced. This meant that if I missed a single second of the lecture, I would likely miss an important fact that would probably be essential to comprehending what was given.

I waited patiently for a break as the teachers kept switching in and out of the classroom.

I kept my concentration up to hear the sounds of a bell for a break after the 3rd class. However, no such bell existed until the eighth class that I tried to stay awake for.

I tried to convince myself that I wasn't dead as I hung my head down on the desk for both physical and mental support.

I had to admit to myself that I had never felt this exhausted in my life as I included my experience of studying for the SATs from my former life.

My stomach grumbled from its more frequent pangs of hunger as I struggled to not slam my fists on the expensive desk and leave the classroom.

Eventually, I gave up on spending energy on any non-essential thoughts as I pretended to prepare myself for next excruciatingly painful class.

"Rika, you're not going to get lunch?" An angel's voice rang inside my ear.

I was slowly being healed from the small trembles of his warm pure gaze that adorably reflected worry in his bright translucent ocean eyes.

I was seeing invisible splendid wings behind the young boy who waited for me while he held out his hand for support.

"Is this all over?" I hopefully wished to go back to the house I woke up in today.

The angel cautiously encouraged me, "We're half way there. Lunch is the only break we have, so you're going to get hungry again if you end up sleeping in the infirmary room instead of going to the cafeteria as usual."

I could understand why my 'past self' would sleep instead of eating. I felt like doing the same as my hunger pangs wore off after I stopped thinking altogether during class.

The angel grabbed my hand as my body familiarly accepted his gesture while he dragged me into the cafeteria.

The cafeteria sparkled as not a single stain or mess was to be seen. Everyone sat down orderly in a seat at the long wooden table.

The staff served us the simple, but lavish food that filled our tiny plates.

"Hey Luke! Want to compete after you're done eating?" A pink haired boy with crimson eyes asked.

I discovered the name of the angel who took care of me.

'Luke,' I smiled when the word echoed inside my head.

"Not today, Slivest. I have to make sure that Rika eats today or else she's going to faint during class again," Luke politely declined Slivest's offer.

I did question myself many times when he would warmly look over me during class, but the thought of why Luke was taking care of me stubbornly remained in my head. He could have just ignored me and did whatever he wanted to do like all my other classmates.

I wondered what my relation to Luke was.

'Cousin? Distant relative?' The words instantly popped up in my mind.

"Luke, why are you so concerned about me?" I voiced my thoughts out loud.

"It's because we're engaged to each other." Luke stated as if it was a fact.

I struggled to maintain my uninterested expression as my jaws instantly dropped from hearing about my sudden engagement.

'How? What? How can four year olds get already engaged?' I turned to look at Luke and myself repeatedly until my neck was sore.

"Why? How?" I exclaimed as I could not stop my astonishment of the news that could not be true.

"By lottery. Once you enter this school at two years of age, you get a partner with the opposite gender to accumulate points together. Once you accumulate points, you can get access to superior class education to eventually unlock the next grade level class. In school, they use the partner system in order to teach teamwork and social skills." Luke gave me a through explanation of the situation I was placed in.

I could not stop gaping my mouth as I admired his efficient but effective explanation that perfectly communicated the things I needed to know.

Luke gave me an impression that unmatched his age due to his competency and maturity to the point that it was almost creepy.

'Maybe this was normal in the new world I arrived in' I thought to convince myself that this angel was only unexpectedly brilliant due to the different norms from the world I came from.

"But wouldn't the sky be normally dark after ten hours of classes?" I accidentally spilled my thoughts out loud again.

"They use space-time magic within the classroom to make sure that the time goes slower inside the classroom than outside. But, you already know about this Rika. Why ask all these questions now?" Luke stared at me silently while he waited for an explanation.

He was right. Rika would already know all things as part of the knowledge she accumulated that served as common sense in this world.

"It's just that I kind of forgot. It must be from fainting all the time?" I tried to curry favour with Luke as I hoped that he would not find out that the 'Rika' he knew wasn't in this body anymore.

An announcement came from the speakers as it saved me from answering his suspicions: "Students, only ten more minutes of break time!"

"Rika, hurry up and eat," Luke started to push more food into my mouth with his small hands.

I accepted the fork full of food into my mouth as Luke begun to scoop up more forks filled with the various dishes laid in front of me.

I started to eat as fast as possible with Luke's help because I somehow knew I would die during the next ten hours if I didn't.

As soon as the bell rung to indicate the break was over, Luke started to drag me back into that hell-like classroom that had earned my hatred due to its intense schedule.

I had never thought that I would greatly suffer for the next ten hours while I had to sit in one spot with great tediousness as soon as I arrived in the world that God had sent me to.

By the time 'class-time' or more like hell was finished, I felt both mentally and physically unable to function.

"Wow S-class students are really different from other people!" I heard while Luke supported me as I walked in the spacious hallway.

"Look! They're so handsome and pretty ~"

"I heard they're really smart as well!"

"When will I be able to accumulate enough points... My partner is way too stupid!"

I gasped as I knew the situation I was just in was somewhat suspicious.

There was no way that normal children in the ages of kindergarten would normally sit in a classmate with no complaints for twenty-hours.

"Do all people our age have classes this long?" I confronted Luke.

I did not have to go through this while other children went on with their normal childhood. I had already suffered enough when I died before being to take my SATs. I was not going to willingly go through the next-level suffering of almost the same thing.

"No, your classes get longer as you get into higher ranking classes," Luke replied.

I confirmed my weird suspicions as I turned to convince Luke to find another partner who was willing to go through this hell with him.

I was not willing to give up my only chance to play no matter how good-looking that opponent was.

"Please find another partner," I asked the young toddler who was likely a victim of a lost childhood as I would be if I continued this road with him.

The sixteen desks that I glanced inside the special classroom blinked back at me.

"I do not think I can go through this with you," I conveyed my unfaltering determination to the angel who helped me adjust to the strange environment.