Four Pulleys

The examination hall's device had four sounds.

Garam noticed it first. Four pulleys lifted a single platform, and if the four didn't wind at the same tempo, the platform would tilt and fall. Ability use was forbidden. So they had to wind it by hand.

A water barrel sat on the platform. If the water spilled, points were deducted. If the platform fell, they failed. There was one reason for the water barrel: so anyone could see with their own eyes whether it had tilted.

It meant four people were each supposed to take one pulley. And it was a setup that already assumed the four of them would wind at different speeds.

"We just wind at the same time," Doyun said. "Start on three. One, two,"

"Wait."

Garam pressed his palm against the pulley axle. One of the four was slower than the other three. A tooth on the gear was worn down, and that axle lost half a beat every half turn.

"The third one's slow. If we wind together, the third one falls behind and the platform tilts."

"Then if we wind the third one faster,"

"No." Garam cut him off, and only after he'd done it did he realize he'd cut him off. It wasn't something he could normally do. "If we wind it faster, the tooth goes. The other three need to wind slower."

"If we wind slower, we go over time," Doyun said.

Garam heard the offbeat in Doyun's voice. It wasn't the overtime that scared him. What scared him was the sound of having to follow the slowest person's rhythm.

"How many seconds over?" Mirae asked.

"I'd have to calculate,"

"I'll calculate it." Mirae already had her notepad open. "Garam, how many seconds is the half beat, and how many turns does it happen every?"

"Every half turn. I can't give it in seconds. I only know it in beats."

"Then give it to me in beats. I'll convert it to seconds."

Garam paused for a moment at that. Until now, people had always asked him to turn his senses into numbers. She was the first person to say she'd do the converting herself.

"The offbeat happens once every two turns."

After he said it, Garam realized he'd swallowed the end of his sentence. When overload hit, verbs disappeared. Today there were three more people, so there were three more sounds.

Mirae's pen moved. "Then out of sixteen total turns, that's eight offbeats. If the other three slow down by eight percent, it works out. That's fourteen seconds over. There's a deduction, but we clear the passing line."

"That puts us at the bottom," Doyun said.

"It's a choice between passing at the bottom and everyone failing."

Seorin hadn't said a word until then. She'd been watching only the last stretch of the platform.

"I'll hold the last thirty centimeters steady."

"Abilities are banned," Doyun said.

"It's not an ability, it's weight." Seorin lifted her scabbard. "I'll brace it with the scabbard. There's no rule against it."

Mirae checked the rulebook. "There isn't one. If there's an objection, I'll answer for it."

They started winding. Garam counted the beat. Without making a sound, palm still pressed to the axle, only his head moving.

The first five turns were quiet. The water shifted to one side inside the barrel, then came back.

Doyun held back three times. On the third, Garam saw his hand start to move ahead.

"Doyun. On my beat."

"...Got it."

On the fourth offbeat, Doyun wound half a turn ahead. The platform tilted to the left.

"Stop."

Garam said it. He hadn't known his own voice could come out that loud.

Doyun's hand stopped. Completely. From where he'd let go, the line spooled back half a turn, and the platform leveled out again.

"That's one veto used." Mirae recorded it. "Garam, you don't have to give a reason."

"I'll say it anyway," Garam said. "Doyun being fast isn't wrong. Fast is what breaks the third axle."

The next twelve turns went at Garam's beat.

It was slow. Garam spent all twelve turns just enduring the fact that this slowness was his own. Listening to other people's sounds was familiar. Having other people match theirs to his was new.

The platform rose, and in the last thirty centimeters Seorin wedged the scabbard in. The platform caught. End signal.

"Pass. Fourteen seconds over. Placement rank: bottom." The examiner read it out.

"What about the use of the scabbard?" Mirae asked.

"It'll be noted. It's not a violation."

No one looked happy. Mirae flipped through the settlement sheet, Seorin checked her scabbard for scratches, and Doyun looked at his own hand.

Garam touched the third pulley axle again. The tooth hadn't broken. There were no points for confirming a tooth that hadn't broken.

The placement list went up ten minutes later. Quarter Group 7, bottom quarter class, third floor, rear classroom.

The bottom quarter class wasn't a class for students with weak abilities. The notice read: intended for students with unstable modes of choice, with lower priority for practicum placement and scholarship support.

Mirae read the two lines aloud. "Lower priority. That means we get pushed back every time we apply for a practicum."

Beside it was an individual notice. Han Doyun, scholarship support frozen at fifty percent.

"How much is half?" Garam asked.

"...Don't ask." Doyun was looking at another line on the board. Supplementary exam application. One spot left. Deadline today.

Garam watched the way Doyun looked at that line. He wasn't reading it. He was looking at it like someone who'd already applied.

"Are you going to take the supplementary exam?"

"I have to. I can't survive on half." Doyun walked toward the application screen.

That's when the noon bell rang.

Garam had once thought everyone counted bells. But people didn't. The bell rang twelve times, people checked the time around the twelfth, and that was the end of it.

Garam counted. Eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve.

It was over.

And then it rang one more time.

Very faint. It didn't sound like it came from the bell tower, more like the underside of the sound that came from the bell tower. Garam looked up.

"It just rang one more time."

The other three looked at him. Doyun's hand was still on the application screen.

"It was twelve times," Mirae said.

"Twelve is right. Then one more after that." Garam said it precisely. "Only I heard it. So this isn't evidence. My senses could be wrong."

"Then why say it?" Seorin asked.

"Because there's one thing I can check."

Garam walked toward the third floor rear classroom. It was the direction the underside of the bell had come from.

The classroom door was open. Twelve desks had been assigned inside, and there was one more desk at a thirteenth spot.

The assignment sheet listed only twelve.

Garam listened once more at the doorway. There was no sound. The underside of the bell had already passed, and a sound that had passed couldn't be heard again.

Garam stood in front of the desk without touching it. Dust was stirring. The window was closed.

"The dust is moving. Either someone just passed by, or something's coming up from below."

Mirae came in and checked the desk's height. "This desk is two notches higher than the others. It's adjusted for someone tall."

Seorin looked under the desk. "Chalk dust. Recent."

Doyun came in last. He looked at the desktop.

There were marks on the surface. Marks pressed in with pencil, then erased. Erased and written again.

Kang Somi.

Below it was a date. It had been erased and rewritten, and it was today's date.

"Don't touch it," Garam said. "Just take a picture."

Doyun reached out, then stopped. It was his left hand.

"...If I open it, I'd be able to see."

"See what?" Seorin asked.

"What someone gave up on, at this seat." Doyun didn't lower his hand. "If whoever wrote this gave up on sitting here, then opening that giving up would let them,"

"Stop."

It was Mirae. Doyun's hand stopped. It was the second veto, and the second time that day the clause had actually taken effect.

"You don't have to ask for a reason." Mirae spoke first anyway. "But I'll say it. We're still under the no-abilities condition. We can't freeze the whole group just to open up one student."

"We don't even know who gave up on what. If you open it now, you don't know what you're opening." Garam didn't press his palm to the desk. He wanted to, but that would leave one more mark. "And the ability ban isn't over yet."

Doyun lowered his hand fully. It took time, and Garam didn't count that time. If he counted, he'd end up judging Doyun by that number later.

Mirae opened the attendance system on her handheld terminal. Third floor rear classroom, enrolled student list.

There were twelve names.

"She's not here."

"Try refreshing it."

Mirae scrolled the screen down. There was one line at the bottom of the list. Gray, half erased.

Kang Somi.

The four of them looked at the line.

And then the line disappeared. No one had tapped anything, no refresh happened. The screen erased the line on its own, and an empty line was left in its place.

"Did you see that?" Mirae's voice dropped.

"I saw it," Seorin said. "All four of us saw it. That makes it evidence."

Doyun turned the supplementary exam screen back on. Four minutes remained until the deadline.

Garam said nothing. If he asked, Doyun would give up his own scholarship, and that debt would come back to Garam later. Instead, he decided to say what he wanted. Not a sensation, a request.

"I want to get this desk on record today."

"Why." Seorin asked.

"Because I want to check whether what I heard was right. It's for my own sake. Not the school's, not that person's." Garam pressed his palm against the wall beside the desk. "But if it's not now, I can't check it at all."

Mirae checked the time. "Four minutes to the supplementary exam deadline. Recording this here takes ten."

Doyun closed the screen.

"Let's look at this first."

"You're frozen at half," Garam said.

"I'm frozen at half." Doyun admitted it. "But this mark is dated today. If we come back tomorrow, it might be gone."

"That's not you deciding for me, is it?"

Doyun paused for a moment. His face showed he knew exactly where that question came from.

"No. You said you wanted to check, and I'm giving up my own exam. Write the two down separately."

Mirae was already writing. Yi Garam's request, Han Doyun's voluntary withdrawal from the supplementary exam. Two lines.

That's when a vibration came from the floor.

Once, and then once more. This time Garam's palm went to the floor instead of the desk. The vibration came from below, and the rhythm matched the thirteenth ring he'd just heard.

The desk legs shook. On Mirae's screen, the empty line flickered once.