Rasmus turned to the girl behind him — the one with a crush. He leaned closer to her and smiled sweetly. “Hey, tell me how much time we got left of lunch break?”
The girl looked at him like he was an idiot. Nonetheless, she checked her phone. “Ten minutes.”
Rasmus thought.
He was part of the Scenario, so he only had this short period of time left to class. A class would be roughly an hour, so he’d have about half an hour after class. Recess would be no more than ten minutes or so, he figured, so in total it would seem like he had twenty minutes. Two hours seemed like a lot, but that was only if he could make use of all of it. Instead, he had large chunks that wouldn’t be that helpful to him.
“Hey,” ha said again, “do you know any Ediths in the next class?”
“Rasmus, there’s just one Edith in the class next door,” the girl answered with a complicated face.
“Could you go with me over there? I’m curious.”
“What are you even curious about?”
“Your friends,” he smiled, with teeth and dimples clear.
She returned his smile wryly. “I’m not friends with her.”
Can’t the System give me some background information about these NPCs? Fitting in is so difficult!
Ding!
Rasmus was starting to get really annoyed by the pinging.
He checked the phone he was holding.
The System must have been mocking him, because the information he got was essentially all things he had figured out. The only piece of information that was new was the girl’s name, Ida.
Perhaps it only revealed what he already knew.
He looked at Ida. “I thought I saw you with a girl from the next class last week? It wasn’t at school.”
“I’ve got other friends too.”
“Don’t I already know all of your other friends here at school?”
“How would you know?” She lowered her voice after looking at the boys at Tim’s desk. “It was personal, so don’t tell anyone about it.”
Rasmus blinked innocently. “I have no clue what you’re talking about.”
“Perfect. Keep that up, all right?”
But he really had no clue. Why were these NPCs dropping clues left and right about things? His mission was to get a bottle of juice, not look into the geography teacher or this mystery date between the girls. He didn’t have time for any of that, anyway.
He hummed in response.
But he was really curious about it now.
Was there some hidden plot, and that was why the System indulged him in the extra information?
Didn’t seem likely. These plot points must just be to distract him. If he got too distracted, he would fail something as easy as getting the juice.
He still had ten minutes before class. Used well, it could be considered plenty of time.
All right, he’d do this.
“Well, you can still help me out,” hehe told her. “I actually have something to talk about with her. Why else would I ask you?”
“You’re a bad friend,” she muttered, then agreed. “Let’s go.”
Having somehow convinced one NPC, he got up with her. Now he needed to convince another one.
Following Ida, he left “Classroom K”. He glanced at the information on his phone and saw his current location changed to “Corridor B” in real-time. He expected Ida to bring him to the next classroom, but she moved past the door. He had nearly done the same when…
“Rasmus!”
He immediately took a step back and looked into the classroom. A few guys waved to him. It would seem his character had friends in the neighbouring class.
“What’s up?” he asked casually, having no idea how close they were or what their names could possibly be.
“What were you doing earlier, not coming to play a game with us?” the one calling for him asked.
“Headache.” He looked to Ida and motioned for her to wait. He walked up to the guys. “Did you lose?”
They laughed.
Another boy said, “Without you on the other team, how could we?”
Hearing this, Rasmus thought about his stats. Wasn’t his Strengtha mere 4 and his Stamina barely higher at 5? He couldn’t help but wonder how bad these guys all must be at sports if he was the backbone of the opposing team and the true opponent of this class’ team.
He couldn’t even begin to imagine the embarrassment either he would be for definitely not living up to expectations, or they would be for losing to someone who could barely manage to keep up with the average guys during PE in reality.
There weren’t any chairs he could just take without inconveniencing anyone else, so he simply sat down on the desk of the one who had spoken to him first. “Since you guys won, give me a consolation prize?”
“What do you want? I’m not buying you anything.”
Rasmus felt amazed about how it was immediately assumed he wanted them to buy something. Wasn’t it a bit of an unfair assumption he came to use up their money right away?
“That’s fine. I’m actually not interested in something you need to use money for.”
“Oh? That’s unusual?”
“Unusual? Don’t you mean that’s never actually happened before?”
The boys around Rasmus laughed.
“…”
He really wanted to shake the System and ask if he was supposed to be some sort of scum. He would never treat his friends this way in real life. He was friends with everyone in his class and the next class over. He had never had any relationships like this.
Well, mostly. He had got himself into a brawl about two years ago.
“…There’s a first time for everything. Anyway, tell me about your class’ Edith.”
The laughs instantly went silent.
When the lively boys didn’t make any noise anymore, the classroom turned strangely silent. Even people who talked between themselves initially fell quiet to look in their direction.
“Wh… What. What are you guys so…?”
The entire classroom seemed to share a collective ellipsis at Rasmus’ stuttering. The boys around him seemed especially curious, but Rasmus could see even Ida peek in through the door to look at him as well.
“…quiet for…?” he choked out.
He flushed.
Amidst the humiliation, he also just had to remember his profile had listed his Charisma stat as 3. Was this why?! Was it that he would flush sometimes? That he wouldn’t know how to fill a silence? How not to make things a little awkward at times?
Everything had gone so well and then…
“Man, Rasmus, do you like her?”
Face still burning, he hurriedly shook his head, while thinking that Tim had the same reaction when he said he didn’t like anyone. Rasmus couldn’t only curse inwardly.
The boys started teasing him, and Rasmus felt his face grow hotter. Eventually he spat out, “You’re the one who likes her,” before he fled the classroom. He grabbed Ida’s wrist and pulled her along as he left in a hurry.
Only when he felt a tug at his arm did he slow down and turn to Ida. He had calmed down somewhat, but he still felt incredibly flustered, so while his face wasn’t bright red , his cheeks still surely had a pink tinge to them.
Ida stared at him when their eyes met.
“What?” he sputtered.
“Nothing. I don’t know where you’re going, but Edith should still be out on her daily walk, so let’s head outside to meet up with her. Otherwise, you might not get to speak with her.”
“Oh, okay.”
He followed her outside. He took in how it all looked incredibly generic for a high school. At the same time, it was eerily familiar.
There were students still returning during this time to get to class in time. One of them stopped Ida. “Aren’t you heading to class?”
“We’ve gotta get someone who hasn’t returned yet,” Ida replied smoothly. “We’ll go back in a minute.”
Rasmus figured this must be another one of his classmates.
He truly had been given no information. At the same time, he was going to leave this virtual world and these NPCs soon, so it would be odd if he got too invested. He only needed to be invested enough to get his bottle of juice and then be done with it.
But these NPCs seemed so very real. They had backstories which he knew nothing about, and their reactions were very natural. If the System hadn’t told him they were NPCs, he would have believed that they were all “Players” like him.
As Ida led him somewhere, he noticed that there was someone at the sports ground, sitting on the grass. They had their back toward him, but he saw brown hair. He poked Ida. “Isn’t that her?”
Ida stopped and looked. She frowned, which was enough to convince Rasmus. She was clearly about to ask what he was happy for, but Rasmus put his hand on her shoulder. “Go back. Don’t miss class. Take notes for me, ‘kay?”
He didn’t wait for the reply and instead headed for the girl sitting there on the sports ground.
After several steps, he threw a glance back at Ida and shooed her away with a hand motion. She hesitated, but left eventually. Rasmus went to the lone girl, squatting next to her in the slightly damp grass.
He glanced at her. She had brown hair in two braids and steel-grey eyes. She glanced at him at the same time and instantly averted her eyes. He thought for a moment, and then said, “Pretty girl, why be alone like this? Don’t you have class too?”