11 hours left.
The system was silent. But not the tower. The tower spoke through details. A glitch on the interface. A glance thrown the wrong way. The silence in which someone breathed… differently.
> "Each loss of control — minus one point."
We were losing. Slowly, almost imperceptibly. Not points — balance.
I pretended to check the terminal, but in truth I was watching. The ones who talked too much. And the ones who suddenly talked too little.
Hayato acted cautiously. Too cautiously.
Kana didn't answer questions directly.
Toru got angry more and more — even over nothing.
And Mina…
She seemed like she was waiting. For something. Or someone.
—
"Do you think all of this is staged?" Aoi asked. "That the tower is breaking us from the inside?"
"No," I replied. "It's not breaking us. It's exposing us."
"Exposing?"
"Who we really are. Without rules. Without teachers. Without an external enemy."
"And who are you without all that, Takumi?"
I didn't answer. Because I wasn't sure.
Later, someone from Class 2-B started a fight in the hallway. They made up a reason — allegedly a dispute over resources. But I saw the test in it. Who would snap? Who would lose it?
Toru couldn't hold back. He threw the first punch.
The screen lit up immediately:
> "2-D: minus 1 point for aggression. Your stability level has decreased."
It wasn't just a punch.
It was a trigger.
I didn't sleep that night. Not a minute.
I activated the dark terminal interface — invisible to most.
Opened the hidden log system. Started cross-checking the timestamps.
And then I found it.
> 02:46 — user *** entered the food zone.
02:52 — signal distortion detected on level 2.
02:55 — returned to zone 2-D.
03:01 — request from Takumi sent.
03:01 — signal partially intercepted.
Coincidence?
The username was masked by the system. But the time — matched either Hayato's or Kana's movement.
Or…
I stepped into the hallway. Mina was there.
Sitting alone. In the dark. Staring at the floor.
"Were you following me, Takumi?" she asked.
"No."
"But you could've."
I sat down beside her.
"You don't trust anyone," she said. "Not even yourself."
I looked at her.
"That's exactly why I'm still here."
"And me?" she asked. "Why am I still here?"
I didn't know. Or didn't want to know.
> "In this trial, you don't have to be guilty. You just have to be a convenient suspect."
Mina raised her eyes to meet mine.
"Someone's going to snap tomorrow. I can feel it. Can you?"
I nodded.
Because I knew.
8 hours left.
And the tower was closing in.
Not from the outside. From within.