Chương 56: Challenge

My portal exit was in one of the concept-math spaces where nobody would be taking homeroom. I walked out, and down the hall, and into the homeroom class. It was a large room built around a professor's lectern, the seats arched around on a series of staggered risers, so that the instructor could see and be seen by every single person in the class room. I walked in, and up the riser aisle. If the general level of mutters and whispers in the room increased at my entrance, I wasn't sure.

I just took a seat at the top row, the back row, near the center. Hands folded. Patient. Only a minute after, the professor stood up from her desk and bustled around to the lectern. She was short, stout, gray, middle-aged, with a face built for kindly smiles that never came because she was a bitter bitch.

"When I call your name, say present. Nothing more," she said, and started on the A's. Normally Nathan burst in just as his name is called. It's very dramatic, all 'Nathan Harigold?' boom!

'Present!' and everyone is staring at this figure that has crashed into their world. But Natalie comes alphabetically before Nathan. The only way I'm ever ahead of him in anyone's books. So the timing didn't change but the effect did. He was sprinting down the hall, I could hear it. Out of breath, out of time, out of patience. He spotted the right room, and veered in on it, used his hands to catch himself so he did not actually run smack into the door.

He grabbed the handle and threw it open in time to hear-"Natalie Harigold?"

"Present." He stared up at me. I stared back at him. He was red-faced, panting, and late. I was cool, immaculate, seated imperiously high to look down on him. And now, this was the first playable moment of the game, where expositions, cutscenes and 'press-enter-to-skip' tutorial screens all gave way to your first choices and decisions of the game.

"Nathan Harigold?"

"Present," he said. He pushed the door shut. He shouldered his bag and headed for a seat. There were a few he could choose from, but whichever one he picked would be right next to Josse Salles. I could not pick her out from here, there were several girls that could be her, all with the same ponytail. Nathan looked up at me, and his face was inscrutable. He sat down, and turned to ask Josse Salles for a pencil. She loaned him one, and started scolding him for being late on the first day.

She was the second love interest introduced in the game, and the first one you could speak to as a player. Filia's scenes were all scripted until he sees her in third period. She doesn't even register as a love interest for a while, she's just a helpful sidekick that helps Nathan out for the first year and a half before there's a moment that they both first look at each other like that. I looked over at the front left corner, at the slightly-disheveled girl with the wide, manic eyes.

She was staring at Nathan with a fixed gaze and a budding obsession. Skeici Gianwen. It takes a while for her to develop into a stalker, and from there to yandere, but I've already got her marked. She'll be the one that takes Josse Salles out of the way for me. And then it happened. [Skeici Gianwen][Pawn][Antagonist][The Yandere] Well, that didn't used to be there. Hmm. It seems that the rest of the System functions are coming online, now that we're out of the prologue.

And she has a flag to indicate whether she's a pawn, but it's not active right now. I can draw the implications of that. I have been bracing myself for this for years. Since before I could walk I've known it would come to this. I knew that one day we'd be at this school, and I would be planning the downfall of his love interests. Scheming and conspiring, bolstering the antagonists, hampering his efforts. He was going to find these young women, and find a spark of connection, and then it gets dashed. Ugh.

The only ways I can justify that is if I'm some kind of creepy obsessive brother-complex perv, or if I'm just a stone-cold bitch that's ruining his happiness as some sick sadistic game or maybe revenge for imagined slights. Maybe I could play it up to stone-cold bitch that is ruining everything for everyone, and his relationships are just collateral damage. Probably not though, it would take a lot of effort to cause enough trouble that all of these schemes fade into the background.

Or if I'm actually after all those same women by bizarre coincidence. Or if this is part of a scheme for me to keep him from inheriting Father's title. I know which option I personally want. If it were up to me I'd sit down for a civil conversation and tell him everything that I'm planning, and why. Something like "Nathan trust me this is gonna suck but I'm going to do a lot of things that don't look good. Just trust that I'm still doing all this for the right reasons, like I always have."

And he would listen, and he would trust me. I would love that. I am so ready to just use open communication and emotional maturity to solve this. I also know which option helps me the most. And that's answer D. All of the above. I need rumors that I'm an obsessive who wants to keep her brother all to himself. And that I'm a vicious schemer who is tearing his life down from behind the scenes like a kid pulling wings off a fly. And that I'm a devious maniac who is the enemy of all good things.

A power-hungry usurper craving an inheritance not rightfully hers. And also that I'm a kind-hearted girl whose visions of the future have put me on a difficult path. All of those. All at once. Skeici was part of that. The last student name was called, and the teacher set down her chalked slate with a clatter. All eyes on her.

"Welcome to Hearstcliff Academy. There's a few things you need to know-" She launched into her speech. I could probably recite it word-for-word, I've heard it a lot of times. It's weird that she sounds exactly like the voice actress. Why does that seem weird to me? I've had to restart the game a bunch of times, it was shocking how many times I had been trying to get a specific outcome only to realize that I'd made a mistake waaaay early in the game, and just deleted that file and restarted.

The orientation materials for this school? Knew it by heart, even before Yheta started briefing me. Blah blah schedule blah testing blah projects blah progress reports blah blah trial by combat. Heard it all before.

"Test of merit by practical exam" in a game like this is just code for a trial by combat. Everybody else in the room looked absolutely gripped by her speech. Jotting down notes, referencing their student handbook. After all, this is the first day of class in the most prestigious school in the kingdom and most of us traveled from hundreds or even a thousand miles to get here. Families raise themselves entire social classes by having a kid attend this school. This place is Oxford, MIT, Yale.

All the knowledge of the world is here. There's just a lot less of it than there would be back home on Earth. Nathan was absorbing the speech intently. After all, he was playing the game for the first time. God my perspective is so screwed up. Her whole lecture spot took her about thirty minutes so there was plenty of time for us before the next bell rang. Enough time to socialize, as long as we kept our voices down. So immediately the boy just to my left turns and leans into my personal space.

"Was that your brother? What's up with you two? That was some weird moment you had during roll call. What was that about?" How to answer that?

"It was pretty much exactly what it looked like," I said, a bit coldly. He shrank back a little. Encourage him to speculate for himself. I waved him back with two fingers to sit back and quit breathing on me, and he sank back with a hundred questions boiling inside him. I'm not good at lying, so I can't have people thinking I'm available to approach. I gotta keep an icy distance. An illusion of arrogance will help me more than anything else right now. So now, this is just a homeroom class.

For the rest of the year, this would be a good place to catch up homework, study ahead for classes, and pick up whatever we missed from previous study hall. There was nothing else for me to do here. Skeici was a slow boil, and would not need any of my intervention. Until second year, Josse was a good influence for Nathan and a source for valuable information. I can't afford to take her off the board too early. Also, I think if I do anything to help provoke Skeici, she's going to murder Josse outright.

Not right away, she's still early in infatuation. The murderous unhinged jealousy comes later. Sorry Nathan. I sat in imperious silence, maintaining the haughty illusion, until the bell rang for the next class. Ding. Dong. Everyone in the room lunged to their feet at once, some stuffing their things into bags, other shuffling to the aisles. All of it kept me penned in place, waiting for all of them to leave before I could move to my next class. Nathan was right up front, he was already to the door.

Well, I have my tricks. Because my void-portal lets off a lot of light, if I position it correctly nobody can even see me come or go. I curved the doorway directly under my feet, and in a flash of dazzling white light, I was gone. Gravity tugged me down into the spaceless abyss, where all existence was only potential and that potential glowed like staring at the sun. I opened the next doorway to leave, and out onto the fourth floor, advanced studies.

I stepped out of my tunnel of light, and onto the tiled floor, and walked to the door that was indicated on my class schedule. I need not check the paperwork, I felt intuitively drawn to it. Small details being smoothed over for me. For most of the day, Nathan and I were not going to see much of each other. I was on the most advanced track that the school had, and Nathan was not. I would later find out he's accepted as a merit student, so his Intellect score at this time is a 5.

Decently high, he's got access to most of the plot-lines and plot points, he should have no trouble advancing or leveling or gaining new abilities. But it means that I've got access to a lot of plots that he can't touch, so I can start pushing story paths without worrying that I'm poaching his XP. And you'd think that a math class wouldn't have many exciting plot-lines built in, wouldn't you? I opened the door and the teacher looked up from her desk.

"May I help you?"

"Lady Allebasi I presume?" I said, inclining my head.

"Natalie Harigold." She had a desk full of notes and graphs, and was tracing a particular curve with a fairly arcane-looking collection of jointed rulers. She had the room to herself, unless you counted the rows and rows of wheeled chalkboards covered in equations that were lined up around all the walls like an accusing jury. Bad analogy, I've got unresolved trauma. The teacher herself was a stunner, and if this game had a 'cougar' story-line she'd be a shoo-in.

Rich purple hair, a quirky knowing smile, and she was easily wearing a dress that few have the figure for. She raised an eyebrow into the Spock-Rock formation.

"Yes?"

"I'm in your fourth-bell class," I said, and picked a desk to sit down at. This room had thirty desks, significantly smaller than most. She glanced around.

"Is it fourth bell already?"

"Yes ma'am," I said, folding my hands together. She looked down at her graph and rulers, and with a sigh she set them aside.

"I guess it's time to teach a class," she said with regret.

"The things I do for access to grad students..." Then another body came through the door, and another. Most of the new arrivals wore the relaxed tailored uniforms of a third-year student, with a couple even older students that were wearing their own clothes. They looked old enough to order a drink, and presumably had no trouble getting an off-campus pass. Several of the students filing in had the look of second-year pupils, and finally at the end one other freshman: Kurumi Lautan.

I was surprised to see her here, and it showed. I am not good at keeping reactions off my face unless I've got plenty of time to prepare. She stood next to my desk.

"Can I help you?" she asked, tilting her head to the side. She examined me closely.

"I was not expecting to see any other first-years in this class," I said with good honesty. Not even you.

"You must be something special," I added.

"Someone has to be special to be in the same class you're in?" she returned, looking a little amused and a little annoyed. It's an expression that comes to her easily. Lady Allebasi stood behind her.

"Young lady, please do take a seat." Kurumi sat down hastily in the nearest seat, back one row and one over from me, behind a beige-haired boy. She set down her bookbag and started pulling out paper, charcoal, and a small abacus. Shit. I forgot my abacus. Lady Allebasi did a quick headcount, and nodded.

"All right, this is the correct number. Welcome to Advanced Calculus. If any of you are in the wrong class we'll find out fast. My lesson plan is under... that," she said gesturing at the foot-tall pile of graphs and sheets on her desk.

"While I'm excavating, you all.. I don't know. Each of you write out a solvable problem for each other and trade, left to right, and solve. Let's hit the ground running, shall we?" I conjured paper and ink, and started jotting down the first curve-area limit that came to mind. I checked that it was solvable, and traded sheets with the beige-haired boy. He looked about two years older than me, probably one of the more advanced third-year students. I looked down at the page. 72 / 6 = I glanced at him, and back down.

Then back over at him. The page I gave him was... well a little ridiculous. It took me a minute to recognize that he was working on a Fourier transform, which was not the problem I gave him. And he had definitely handed me some calculus problem, except that when it's in front of me it's simple division. This happened during the entrance exam too. The game world compensated my stats by changing the tests and answers for me so that I had a much easier time relative to everyone else.

Which was really condescending because I can work calculus, and given enough time I could probably do a Fourier too. The beige-haired guy turned and gave me an incredulous look, then back down at the page in front of him. He sat up straight, and used the heels of his palms to push the page a few extra inches away. Nope.

"Sorry," I said.

"I got carried away. One moment." I turned to my sheet, write in "12", and handed that to him while I took back the page I'd given him. In my hands it was an area-curve computation again. I erased it with sorcery, and replaced it with something a little racier than the one he'd given me. 72 ∓ 36 = And then I handed that back. It turned into something far more appropriate in the transition, and he got to work writing out the steps of his solution.

Kurumi was staring at me, and from her expression, I was pretty sure she'd seen the whole exchange. Not the part where the System translated problems up and down for me, but the Fourier and the way I'd solved his integral problem in five seconds with just a jotted answer. I remember she is our class's valedictorian if Nathan has an Intellect of 9 or less. If Nathan has a 10 or higher, she's salutatorian, second in the class. So, treat her as having a 9. 5 or something.

She's used to being the smartest person in every room, or if not the smartest, then the youngest person smart enough to be in that room. She glared at me. I think I'm going to have competition now. I welcome the challenge.

"Ah! There it is!" the professor cheered, lifting a notebook.

"All right. So, I'm Lady Allebasi, and I teach all the advanced math classes here. I see a lot of familiar faces. I see some new faces that look intimidated. And also, two first-year students in my Advanced Calc class, which beats my previous record by two. Ladies, I hope both of you are able to keep up." Kurumi and the beige boy both glanced my way. I smiled with utmost innocence, blinking by big ol' eyes.

It did not work as well with a dress more reminiscent of Maleficent or the Evil Queen Stepmother, but I did try. The teacher launched into her lesson plans, laid out her syllabus and grading plan. No curve, test scores only, all worksheets are just for self-evaluation, office hours, grade format, et cetera. And, "Additionally, the only non-exam grade in this class is a project we will be working on during off hours.

You will be working in groups of two-" The boy with the beige hair stood up from his desk, grabbed his bag, and walked to an empty desk four rows over and two rows back. Not taking any chances on getting assigned alongside me. I felt very judged by that move. Kurumi and I were partnered together.

"It just seems to fit, two first-year students, after all," Lady Allebasi said with a smile. The silence between Kurumi and me was stony. I was rapidly deciding that she just did not like me at all. That's not really what I was trying for. Okay Natalie, center and prioritize. You're not actually worried about grades, you're in this school for access, not for an education. You don't need to prove you're smart, that's all taken care of. Don't let her make you feel compelled to compete.

You're here to manipulate events, steer the course. It's not about whether you win or lose, it's about who you ruin along the way. After giving myself that pep talk, I did feel better. We kept busy with class stuff, math stuff, ordinary stuff until the bell rang for the next class. Bong. I dispelled the scratch paper I'd been using, and started to stand. Kurumi was instantly at my side, blocking me into my own desk.

"Pardon me, could I have a word," she said, which technically was a question but not really.

"Hallway?" I suggested. She grabbed her bag and led me out to the hallway. She rounded on me as soon as we were out of earshot.

"How do you know me?!" she demanded. Ah. This.

"Visions of the future and present, I know things that cannot be explained. You're Kurumi Lautan, you're going to be the class president, you're brilliant and very responsible. You're going to see my brother in your seventh-bell geography class, please help him as much as you can, he will live up to all your expectations. Our project is going to involve us traveling to pick up ancient books of lost math. Don't worry, you're in good hands."

"That's impossible," she said flatly. I chuckled, and shook my head with just a little self-deprecating amusement.

"Yeah. Of course it is." And then I dropped through a portal and vanished in a flash of light.