Liam Carter had known Aldridge Academy was built on numbers before he ever set foot on its pristine, glass-and-steel campus. He had memorized its ranking system, analyzed its meritocratic ethos, and understood—on a logical level—the brutal efficiency of its structure.
But knowing something and experiencing it were two different things.
At Aldridge, everything came down to rank. The school was divided into four grade levels, each with four classes—Class 1 housing the best, Class 4 the academic deadweight. Every week, students were reshuffled based on performance, their names flashing red or green on the digital leaderboard posted outside the headmaster's office. A single misstep—one failed test, one project gone wrong—could drag down an entire class, punishing not just the offender but everyone assigned to their group.
Competition with forced collaboration. A brilliant strategy. An absolute nightmare.
The top 20 students were gods among mortals. They had access to private mentorships, exclusive research grants, cutting-edge AI labs, and internship placements with world-renowned tech firms. For the rest, the battle for upward mobility was ruthless.
And Liam, at Rank 14, was untouchable. Or so he had thought.
He sat in the headmaster's office, facing Dr. Aldous Whitmore, a man whose reputation was as polished as the mahogany desk he now sat behind. Whitmore was impeccably dressed, silver-haired, and possessed the kind of calculated patience one would expect from a man who wielded absolute control over 560 of the world's most ambitious teenagers.
Behind him, the school's Leaderboard Wall displayed every student's rank, streaming in real-time, a quiet but constant reminder of who mattered and who didn't.
Whitmore laced his fingers together. "Liam, do you know how long it's been since a top 20 student failed to secure an Ivy League placement?"
Liam met his gaze, unblinking. "I assume it's rare."
Whitmore exhaled sharply through his nose. "It's never happened. Until you."
Liam had known this conversation was coming, yet the words still landed with a strange, hollow weight.
"You have six months before your scholarship expires," Whitmore continued. "And considering Aldridge's investment in you, we are not in the habit of allowing assets to go to waste."
Liam said nothing. He understood the subtext: You are a resource. You are valuable only as long as you perform.
A black leather folder slid across the desk toward him. "Ten schools," Whitmore said. "You will gain admission into at least one of them, or you will lose your scholarship. If that happens, you can expect your place in the top 20 to become… unsustainable."
Liam opened the folder. MIT, Stanford, Caltech, Cambridge, Cornell… The names blurred together, all equally unreachable unless he figured out why his previous applications had failed.
"You still have access to all the top 20 privileges," Whitmore reminded him, as if dangling the benefits would suddenly make Liam more capable of faking humanity. "Use them wisely."
He stood. The conversation was over. Dismissal, like everything at Aldridge, was precise and efficient.
Liam left the office to find Ethan Reyes slouched against the wall, hands stuffed into the pockets of his custom-tailored blazer, his tie loose, brown curls perpetually disheveled. Rank 322 out of 560. Class 4. A miracle he was still here.
"How'd it go, Mr. Algorithm?" Ethan asked, falling into step beside him.
Liam handed him the folder.
Ethan flipped through the pages, whistling. "Damn. So they basically told you, 'Congrats on being brilliant, now prove it or die trying?'"
Liam gave a noncommittal hum.
Ethan's grin widened. "Man, I love this school. It's like capitalism raised in a Petri dish and fed growth hormones."
They stepped into the central atrium, where students gathered in clusters, their uniforms immaculate but their faces sharp with calculation. It was an ecosystem of intellectual predators, and the Leaderboard Wall—which updated every Monday—was the only law that mattered.
A sudden notification chime echoed through the hall. The screens flickered, and then—
THE WEEKLY CLASS REASSESSMENT HAS BEEN UPDATED.
The leaderboard shifted, names jumping up or plummeting down as students held their breath. A murmur spread through the room—shock, disappointment, satisfaction.
Ethan glanced up lazily. "Welp. Let's see how bad it is this time."
A moment later, his name flashed red.
ETHAN REYES – Year 3 Class 3 → Year 3 Class 4
Ethan let out a long, theatrical sigh. "And down I go."
Liam, of course, remained in Class 1. He always did. His name was a constant in a sea of variables.
"You should try harder," Liam said absently.
Ethan snorted. "And give up my title as Aldridge's least-deserving rich kid? Never."
He wasn't lying—Ethan's family could buy Aldridge three times over. Unlike Liam, who had crawled here through sheer ability, Ethan had coasted on legacy admissions and last-minute cramming.
And yet, despite the chasm between them, they were friends.
A voice interrupted them—sickly sweet, predatory.
"Well, well. If it isn't our favorite scholarship case."
Liam didn't need to turn around to know who it was.
Jasper Voss. Rank 7. Heir to VossTech Industries.
Jasper leaned against the wall, examining Liam with the same casual cruelty he might reserve for a lab rat. "How's it feel, Carter? First top-20 student in history to choke."
Liam remained impassive. "Statistically, an outlier event is bound to happen eventually. Someone had to be first."
Jasper's smile didn't waver. "Shame. If you drop out of the top 20, who's going to be our favorite AI-powered freak?"
Ethan took a deliberate step forward. "You wanna rephrase that, Voss?"
Jasper ignored him, eyes locked on Liam, calculating. Then, with a smirk, he turned and walked away, leaving only the faint scent of wealth and superiority in his wake.
Ethan exhaled. "Man, I hate that guy."
Liam wasn't paying attention. He was already mentally running through his next steps. He had six months to crack the human condition.
And he would. Because failure wasn't an option.