"I think there's more to the story than what's being let on," said a classmate of Ameri's. "Ameri's always been a bit of a mystery, but I never thought she was capable of something like this."

The after-school air at Meiou Academy was thick with the scent of chalk dust and desperation. Final exams were a week away, and the tutoring center was a war room of slumped shoulders and whispered equations.