Chapter 84: Side Story - The Retroactive Trap

Chapter 84: Chapter 84: Side Story - The Retroactive Trap

Nanami’s monologue, POV

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?The digital chime of the classroom monitor cut through the quiet hum of the hall, marking the exact second our terminal input went live.

?Across the room, Faction A’s tablet blinked with the notification of our fifty-unit transfer. Up until that moment, Fāng Xuě’s public axiom—"A will not make a large transfer to B this interval unless B makes a large transfer first"—had successfully cast a psychological net over the room. But my small, calculated injection of fifty units bypassed her parameters entirely. It wasn’t a large transfer, nor was it a hostile attack; it was a deliberate, ambiguous grease spot on their carefully polished machinery.

?For a brief second, Fāng Xuě’s expression tightened. Her eyes darted toward our section, trying to reverse-engineer the logic behind a transfer that didn’t fit her model.

?But she didn’t have long to puzzle over it. Just as the system clock hit zero, several transactions went through, and the terminal interfaces snapped into immediate motion.

?The ink on our transfer had barely dried when the classroom monitor flared, automatically populating the screen with the rapid-fire execution of Faction A and Faction C’s pre-arranged backroom deal:

?[TRANSACTION LOG UPDATE]

?[A → C: 40 Liquidation Units]

?[C → A: 180 Liquidation Units]

?[B → A: 50 Liquidation Units]

?The numbers appeared in rapid succession, glowing in stark white against the black screen.

?Even though I had anticipated some form of capital exchange between them, seeing it execute right in front of us sent a sudden, cold jolt through our section. Ichika sat up straight, her eyes widening as she stared at the glowing text.

?"Wait," Ichika whispered, her voice dropping into a tense hiss. "Look at that. A sent forty to C, and C bounced back one hundred and eighty. That’s a net gain of one hundred and forty for A."

?Reina leaned forward, her face turning carved-stone serious. "They didn’t just coordinate. They established a closed liquidity pipeline right under our noses. If they keep cycling capital back and forth like that, they’ll stabilize their reserves without ever needing to touch us."

?The sudden display of coordinated movement created an immediate, uneasy ripple across Faction B’s rows. For the first time all morning, the sense of absolute control we held with our 1,250-unit lead felt slightly less secure. They were knitting themselves back together.

?Before anyone could dwell on the shift, the system interface blinked again, stripping away the transaction logs and replacing them with a stark, flashing prompt.

?[PREDICTION WINDOW OPEN]

?[Submit predictions regarding previous and ongoing transaction intervals.]

?[TIMER: 0:00:15]

?The classroom went dead silent. The timer was reduced too.

?Across the hall, Faction A didn’t hesitate. Fāng Xuě’s fingers moved swiftly over her terminal. With her faction’s prediction points whittled down to a razor-thin margin, she burned one prediction, locking it into the system with cold, clinical precision.

?Faction C sat motionless. Ginton didn’t touch his screen, leaving his prediction slots entirely empty. Having torched all 150 points during the first interval on failed guesses, they were legally and mathematically dead in the water on the prediction board.

?And in our section?

?I didn’t even blink. Without a moment of hesitation, I swiped my tablet screen clear, submitting zero predictions. It wasn’t a panicked reaction; it was the exact execution of our strategy. When uncertainty peaked and the enemy’s movements were deliberately theatrical, refusing to play the prediction game starved them of the data they desperately craved.

?[PREDICTIONS LOCKED]

?The word echoed across the massive screen in bold, unyielding letters.

?For a heartbeat, the room held its breath. Then, the monitor shifted once more, the interface expanding to reveal a notification that had been deliberately withheld by the system since the end of the previous round:

?■○ RETROACTIVE PREDICTION RESULTS: INTERVAL 1 ●□

?The entire hall leaned forward in unison. The tension in the air became so thick it felt tangible. This was the moment of truth—the reveal of whether Ginton’s high-stakes predictive gambits from the opening round had actually paid off, or if they had completely backfired.

?The screen refreshed, scrolling down to display the itemized results:

?Faction A’s Prediction Log:

?• Target: Faction A → Faction C (40 Units) — CORRECT

Reward: +50 Prediction Points, +10% Transaction Value (Deducted from A/C)

?+10% Liquidation Units (Deducted from A/C) — deduction will be done after prediction logs calculation are completed.

?A murmur ran through Faction A’s rows. Fāng Xuě’s solitary prediction had landed. She had successfully clawed back a sliver of prediction power, her tactical discipline finally yielding a tangible return.

?Then, the monitor scrolled down to Faction C’s results.

?My eyes locked onto the screen, and the breath caught in my throat.

?Faction C’s Prediction Log:

?• Prediction 1: Faction A → Faction C (40 Units) — CORRECT

Reward: +50 Prediction Points, +10% Transaction Value (Deducted from A/C)

?+10% Liquidation Units (Deducted from A/C) — deduction will be done after prediction logs calculation are completed.

?• Prediction 2: Faction B → Faction A (50 Units) — CORRECT

Reward: +50 Prediction Points, +10% Transaction Value (Deducted from A/B)

?+10% Liquidation Units (Deducted from A/B) — deduction will be done after prediction logs calculation are completed.

?• Prediction 3: Faction C → Faction A (180 Units) — CORRECT

Reward: +50 Prediction Points, +10% Transaction Value (Deducted from A/C)

?+10% Liquidation Units (Deducted from A/C) — deduction will be done after prediction logs calculation are completed.

?The classroom exploded.

?It wasn’t just a murmur this time; it was a collective, shock-driven gasp that echoed off the high ceiling. Students across all three sections stood up from their desks, staring at the monitor in sheer disbelief.

?All three.

?Ginton hadn’t just guessed; he had scored a clean, unblemished sweep across the board.

?My mind raced backward through the timeline, frantically recalculating every variable. How?

?In the first interval, Ginton had predicted our movements when we were completely blind. He had expected us to retaliate, expected us to balance the board, and we had shattered his expectations by deleting our inputs at the last second.

?But this...

?This wasn’t about Interval 1 anymore. The retroactive display was showing us the true depth of his architecture. He hadn’t just guessed what we would do in the past; he had engineered a timeline where our subsequent cautious behaviors—including our fifty-unit transfer to A just moments ago—fed directly into the precise parameters of his old predictions, or he had laid a trap so broad that every logical counter-move we made validated his matrix.

?Across the hall, Ginton finally shifted.

?He didn’t stand up, nor did he flash a triumphant grin. He simply leaned back in his chair, resting his hands behind his head, his face settling into an expression of quiet, terrifying certainty.

?The zero-point balance on Faction C’s scoreboard didn’t matter anymore. With three correct predictions landing simultaneously, the system calculation flooded their account with a massive injection of restored prediction points and siphoned capital, violently resurrecting them on the board.

?In our row, Ichika stared at the screen, her face completely pale. "Nanami... how is that even possible? He predicted everything."

?Reina didn’t answer. She just gripped the edge of her desk, her knuckles turning bone-white.

?I kept my eyes fixed on Ginton. The comfortable lead we thought we had built in Interval 1 had just evaporated under a tidal wave of recursive mathematics.

???◇? RESULTS ?◇??

?Faction A: 867 Liquidation Units (subtracting reward ○●)

?Faction B: 1,195 Liquidation Units (subtracting reward ○●)

?Faction C: 938 Liquidation Units (subtracting reward ○●)

??? END OF INTERVAL 2. ??

?TRANSACTION RESULTS

?Faction A: 778.248 Liquidation Units [PP: 150]

Stability 50% [+500]

?Faction B: 1,075.5 Liquidation Units [PP: 150]

Stability 50% [+500]

?Faction C: 1,146.252 Liquidation Units [PP: 150]

Stability 80% [+800]

?I fell into silence.

?Just how did he—

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"Missing thousands of shots and losing hundreds of games is the very reason for success."

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