A middle school exam prep session descends into a ritual of forced chants and hollow cheers, the eyes of the students devoid of life. This is the world of educational abuse, where well-intentioned discipline warps into systematic destruction. The manga centers on educational journalist Ishida Daichi, who runs a firm called Education Kikaku. He investigates cases where the pursuit of academic excellence crosses into illegality, receiving desperate consultations from families caught in the grip of the high-stakes exam boom.

The narrative unfolds through multiple case studies. A child named Aako is pushed to collapse by an anxious mother who, alongside a charismatic yet predatory private tutor, justifies the removal of all sleep, meals, and personal boundaries as necessary for success. Other children, forced into rote learning and deprived of autonomy, begin showing visible signs of trauma, including self-harm scars hidden beneath uniform sleeves. Ishida works to uncover the truth in these closed environments, documenting the complicity of parents who treat children as status symbols and tutors who exploit the vulnerable setting for control.

The story is set against the backdrop of Japan’s intense academic pressure cooker, primarily within cramped study rooms, high-pressure exam prep schools, and Ishida’s consultation office. The parents are often the primary antagonists, driven by their own anxiety and social status. The child victims, ranging from elementary to middle school age, struggle with deteriorating mental health as they lose their sense of self. While some fathers and teachers serve as potential allies who recognize the abuse, they are frequently portrayed as powerless or absent until the damage is severe. The series follows Ishida as he leads interventions, exposing how love twists into obsession and how the pursuit of a single future can ruin a child entirely.