It was a good thing the others were here with him, because John hadn't been keeping track of the days at all. It wasn't uncommon for him to not know what day it was before the world was ending. Now, he hadn't the slightest clue.

The general consensus among his comrades was it was Tuesday—of course the world had ended on a Friday, how typical—which meant that the first class would be Algebra of the Damned in room 8-B. Apparently, an A after the number referred to the doors on the right of the corridor, and B labelled the left. John casually strolled down the corridor with his hands in his pockets as had become his default state, and so he had plenty of time to glance through the classroom windows out of the corner of his eyes.

Seeing giant insect monsters sat on typical school chairs before two-person tables covered with work books and pencils and even, in some cases, water bottles was up there with the most surreal experiences of his life, and that was a tough competition after the last few days. It was only made worse by their postures. There was an ant sat ramrod straight like the class boffin. A centipede was slumped over its table like it was sleeping. Slouching in its chair with its front legs crossed like a kid too cool to care about class was a hairy tarantula with red markings around its eyes that almost looked like glasses. He even saw two praying mantises with their heads ducked close together like gossiping schoolgirls.

Every room he passed was a frozen parody of a school class. It was giving him the vibe that this was supposed to be funny, somehow, but it sent a shiver down his spine instead. The fact these monsters had clearly been fed some info on a typical classroom dynamic and then instructed to act it out in a freeze frame just struck him as awfully eerie.

Still, he forced himself to look at every class he passed, mentally cataloguing their layouts and enemy composition for later. He intended to treat his return to school like he was an overachiever, and he wanted to pass every class on offer.

It didn't take long to reach 8-B, even with his casual pace. The classroom was no different to the others, large enough to fit fifteen two-person tables in a three by five grid, and the insect monsters were in full attendance. Ants, beetles, mantises, spiders, cockroaches, centipedes, millipedes, all of varying shapes, sizes, and colours. Some were too large for their place to a comical degree, like a spider whose round, bulbous abdomen barely fit on its chair, contrasting with the pug-sized ant on the chair next to it that had to stand on its hand legs and lean around the spider to see the front of the classroom.

The classroom door slammed into the wall when John booted it open, then strode in. There was a slight hitch in his step when every insect monster in the room snapped its gaze to him—fucking creepy—then locked on with unerring intensity as he crossed towards the lectern at the head of the room, hands still in his pockets.

"Alright," he started talking just before he reached the lantern. "Class is in session."

+1000 Aura

The moment the last syllable left his lips, the door slammed shut. John activated Accelerate and got to work.

Aurora Blade and Steel Skin were the play here, and he rushed forward, carving a path through the more diligent students that were already halfway out of their seats. His blade left a puff of frost in its wake as it sliced a praying mantis in two, then he used the momentum of his attack to pivot and stab a giant centipede in the face right between its mandibles. The blade went through chitin and membrane like a hot knife through butter, which was ironic since it was freezing cold. The thought mildly amused him, and he found a smirk on his face as he set about slaughtering a classroom of giant bugs.

+2000 Aura

Duellist led him on a merry dance, darting back and forth, slashing, stabbing, severing. Black blood painted the walls and floor, a beautiful artwork of violence. He did his best to make it a flawless victory, but enemy numbers meant he couldn't be looking everywhere at once, even with Accelerate making him far faster than any individual blue monster could hope to deal with. So the enemy landed a couple of hits—to their detriment. None of them were strong enough to dent the Steel Skin aspect of his Adamant Defence, and they definitely had nothing to let them resist the Voltaic Chain part.

+2000 Aura

Lightning roared out from his back when another praying mantis tried to cut him down, leaving the monster a blackened, smoking, twitching husk in an instant before seeking out further prey. As the name suggested, it formed a chain of lightning between several monsters, weakening each time it moved on, before fizzling out after its fourth victim, unable to stretch itself to another. Seeing that, John saw an opportunity for more Aura gains.

+2000 Aura

He darted back to the front of the classroom, ducking, dodging, deflecting, but not attacking back. There, he waited for Accelerate to end, dismissed his Aurora Blade, and held out his arms to his sides.

"Come on, then," he said. "Do your worst."

+1000 Aura

The monsters—those idiots, those morons, those complete fucking simpletons—obliged him without hesitation. There were about a dozen left by that point, and they all rushed him at once, screaming with rage. A grasshopper thing was faster than the others, and seemed to want to rely on simply bludgeoning him with its body, leaping across the room as if to tackle him.

It struck him dead on the chest, and the lightning responded instantly. With a flash of light and a deafening zap, the grasshopper exploded in a shower of gore that sprayed across the other bugs. The viscera wasn't the only thing that struck the others insects, either. The lightning wasn't anywhere near satisfied with such a paltry kill, and it jumped immediately to the next nearest monster, a slimy millipede that had been hot on the grasshopper's heels. Sadly for it, despite its ostensible second place finish, it never got the chance to even land a blow on John's steel body. The lightning travelled along its body like it was made of copper wire, and it convulsed in midair before slamming into the floor, smoking like a burned sausage. John spat on it for good measure.

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+2000 Aura

The Voltaic Chain aspect of his Adamant Defence wasn't done there; it moved on to three more monsters in quick succession, with much the same result. In a mere second, an ant, a weevil, and the spider with the large abdomen were smoking husks on the ground.

Quite amusingly, none of this discouraged the remaining insects. In fact, it only seemed to motivate them to attack him faster. As a daddy long legs slammed into him and got fried from the inside out, he wondered if they had a death wish. He certainly wouldn't be impressed if he had to live as a giant insect.

That made him think about the giant eyes and the river of 'souls' they were feeding on, and the thought lost its lustre.

John didn't bother waiting for the last few. Ultimate Shot roared its arrival half a dozen times in quick succession, and in a matter of seconds the classroom was bereft of any monsters and had some exciting new decorations. His soul counter ticked up a few. Silence fell like a blanket. A scratchy, uncomfortable one, he thought with a grimace.

+2000 Aura

The door creaked on its hinges as it opened once more. Turning his head, he stared at the seven people waiting there, standing just outside the classroom. Doug, Chester, Jade, and Lily were blank-faced, almost bored. They were used to his contempt for blue-souled monsters, at this point. Killing those was barely even impressive to them, at this point.

Daniel, Marius, and Farah were frozen still, though. Even though none of their faces were visible, and their appearances made it hard to read their body language for various reasons—and he wasn't the greatest at reading body language at the best of times—he got the vibe that they were a little taken off guard by his display. In the grand scheme, he decided to take that as a good thing.

A dilemma presented itself. He'd probably get more Aura if he threw out a little one-liner here. But what? There were a few angles he could take, given the fact this was, ostensibly, meant to be a classroom. He gave himself some time to think by shoving his hands in his pockets and walking slowly towards them with all the nonchalance of a man who'd just done something totally routine.

"What do you guys reckon of my teaching skills?" he asked when he was in touching distance. He glanced at the classroom, where every single table and chair had been toppled, thirty piles of rapidly decaying monster mush littered the floor, and black stains marred the walls like someone had flicked a giant paint brush back and forth. It smelled of rot and ozone. Only the lectern still stood, relatively unmarred. "Think my students learned their lesson?"

+1000 Aura

Only Doug laughed. John decided to take that as a win, anyway. It was better than no one laughing, which was a feeling he knew all too well.

"13-A next," Daniel said tightly, turning on his heel and walking away.

In the interest of being a good ally, John let his comrades handle the next class. No one liked an XP hog.

Their team synergy was in evidence once more: Chester strategically drew the aggro of the monsters by turning his radiant spell off and on at Doug's barked command, allowing Jade and Lily to pick off their distracted targets with deadly precision, while Doug laid into them with impossible speed, his punches puncturing right through carapace and chitin. It took longer than John had on his own, but none of them took a scratch of damage. The monsters didn't even get close. So he'd admit it was an impressive display in its own right.

After that, John magnanimously allowed Daniel, Marius, and Farah to take the next classroom, located in 4-B. The trio quietly conferred as they moved back down the corridor, but seemed ready by the time they reached the room.

John lingered in the doorway with his comrades behind him, watching. He was curious to see what abilities these three would have unleashed, if they'd been given the chance. He was under no delusions they'd show the full breadth and depth of their power, but watching would still give some insight into what, exactly, the system demanded of them, and from there he'd be able to theorise what they were capable of.

A small smile came to his lips as he pondered what conclusions they might have come to after watching him. He shook his head as if to dislodge the thought, focusing on the fight before him.

It seemed the trio had plenty of teamwork experience of their own. Much like they'd displayed out at the front of the school, Marius charged ahead, his ruby armour turning the deep hue of blood. He wielded no weapon. Hell, he didn't even really attack at all. He just… ran. With every step, he seemed to get faster, his footfalls heavier, until in a handful of seconds he was blurring around the classroom like a living battering ram, the ground shaking like they were standing next to the god of rampaging bulls. Any insect he bulldozed through was turned to pulp.

But it wasn't as if he was passing through them like they weren't there. Each time he struck an enemy, they slowed his momentum a slight amount. That was where his comrades came in. Farah had some similarities to Chester, in that her glowing body seemed to dazzle her enemies. Any insect that gazed upon her twinkling form gained a drunken mien, stumbling all over the place, legs and wings and mandibles twitching involuntarily. But the slightest break in line of sight seemed to snap them out of it instantly.

Daniel was there to deal with those enemies. The gnarled, knotted stick of wood he pulled out of his voluminous sleeve proved immediately to be a magic wand, as John had suspected; what the sickly green light it fired out in staccato bursts did, though, remained a mystery. The neon green energy bolts would sink into the enemy's body, and they'd fall like ragdolls, their life force gone just like that. It seemed pretty strong, except he wasn't shooting it off rapid-fire, instead waiting between shots. Was that a cooldown, or a misdirection? Impossible to say.

The trio's classroom clear out landed somewhere between John's and his comrades' efforts, and closer to John's on the messiness scale. Marius somehow ended up looking pristine, any gore slipping off his armour like those old videos he'd seen of water on hydrophobic material. The same couldn't be said for the classroom, which appeared similar to a car windshield after it had driven through a cloud of bugs, which felt appropriate.

Still, when the door opened, John couldn't help asking, "What took you lot so long?"

+1000 Aura

Once again, he had no way to read their faces or body language, but he got a delicious vibe of indignation from them anyway. It felt like how he always imagined fighting back against his bullies should have felt.

He smirked, because he knew there was nothing more annoying in the world than some bastard smirking at you when he'd just said something annoying. "Next class, then?"

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