The Missing Name in the Manifest

Kasai Minoru enters the private academy classroom as the final poker hand freezes on the table. Red blazers crowd the desks, their attention snapping toward the arriving journalist.

Five cards lie exposed beside a sixth card hidden under one player’s palm. A marked sleeve, torn open moments ago, rests among the chips. The cheating has been proven, but the wager still leaves a crushing debt.

Hazel Forrest stands behind the players, youthful and polished in her red blazer, fair face composed beneath warm-brown eyes. Her pleasant smile does not reach them.

Beside her, Ritsu Dokusai watches through a black fox mask, athletic shoulders still and dark hair tousled around its pointed ears. The accused student, a slight teenage boy with tousled black hair, a tense narrow face, and a rumpled dark school uniform grips the table’s edge.

A hush settles over the classroom. The losing student’s uniform already bears the small housepet tag, while every witness waits for Kasai to decide which truth becomes official.

That student becomes a housepet, loses all human rights at school, and is treated as the scum of the earth until the debt is repaid.

Kasai’s declaration settles over the table with the weight of an official record. The witnesses lower their eyes as the classroom accepts the ruling.

Ritsu removes the accused student’s remaining claim to the chair and gestures toward the small housepet tag. No one offers him a hand.

The accused student’s fingers slip from the table edge. Around him, students begin gathering the cards and chips, already treating his former place as empty.