A few minutes later, all the other students finally went inside the room with Satoshi Nakagawa following from behind with a smile.
"Okay students, now that everybody is on the same page. I will give you your assigned IVR pods" said Nakagawa as he called the students one by one, and it seems like the IVR pod assignments were based on their seats inside the classroom and after a while, everyone was standing beside their assigned seats with excited eyes.
"You guys ready!" said Nakagawa with a grin as he walked towards his own IVR pod.
"Mmm!" nodded the whole class as the hatches of their IVR pods all opened.
"Well get in! Remember to register yourself with your official data and not make up fake ones, we will know if you do that" said Nakagawa with a slight smile that shook the students as they nodded and went inside the IVR pods.
And with all of them inside, the hatches closed one by one with all of the IVR pods lighting up indicating that they are going to enter the Virtual World.
And entered they did as they all appeared in the same dark void when a person usually enters the IVR pod, it's a lobby of sorts that you can stay in before hopping from game to game.
"Okay class, everyone here?" asked Nakagawa who stood there with his real-life body model as the whole class nodded and raised their hands while he took a quick glance around with sharp eyes.
"Good, well I'll open the game now," said Nakagawa as they got enveloped by a spiral of white glowing squares like falling into a water vortex and before they knew it, they appeared in a different space with screens floating in front of them.
"I'll make a C class rift for us to test you guys, for now, the goal is to hunt the monsters along with the boss monster to clear the rift and make the portal open up once more. Remember to input your real stats and don't worry about your Gifts, we already registered it for you guys" said Nakagawa as a portal appeared in front of them while they inputted their proper stats and Aki wore a smirk inside his mind and without anyone knowing, two certain screens appeared in his vision that shows two certain status.
[Sora Kamiya] [Title: ]
[Race: Human]
[Class: Hunter]
[Gift: Enhanced Body(Legendary)]
[Body: A]
[Mind: C]
[Energy: B]
[Skills: ]
[Jong-ga Kim] [Title: ]
[Race: Human]
[Class: Hunter]
[Gift: Vampire Physiology(Legendary)]
[Body: B]
[Mind: B]
[Energy: B]
[Skills: ]
Aki knew the stats were fake but some of there were true, like Jong-ga's Energy or Body must be A at this point and maybe Sora's Mind or Energy is also at A.
But that doesn't matter, these stats are just one way to understand their minds for a bit and every little bit helps to achieve my goals.
"Okay students! Go inside now! Treat this as a fun game but you are still going to be assessed depending on your actions and achievements in the rift!" shouted Nakagawa as they nodded and all lined up in front of the relatively large rift.
"GO!" shouted Nakagawa and without hesitation, the whole class rushed inside the rift.
And inside it, they were greeted by the sight of a typical forest and in the distance, they saw Orcs along with a gigantic one that towers over all other orcs.
"Everyone, the game plan is that we surround the orcs in a circle and attack all at once when they are paralyzed or can't move, we need to reduce the damage to ourselves and maximized the damage to the enemy so does anyone have any suggestions?" asked Sora as the whole class started to rapidly plan out their attack while the orcs are occupied.
"Leave it to me, I already know what to do," said Zoran with a smirk as the whole class knew his capabilities and let him do what he wants.
"We only need to kill them right?" asked Zoran as Sora nodded.
"Well that's easy!" said Zoran as a line of floating snipers appeared in the air around him that was pointed at the group of Orcs in the distance.
"COVER YOUR EARS!" shouted Zoran as the whole class hurriedly duck down and covered their ears with their hands and with a resounding series of *BANG* the orcs fell one by one with the bullet lodging in on the Boss Orc's head but it wasn't enough to penetrate through.
"Oh ho? Well why don't you take multiple bullets then!" said Zoran with a sadistic smirk as another round of bullets shot towards the head of the stunned Boss Orc and just like that, Zoran singlehandedly defeated a group of Orcs with his guns efficiently with their corpses still being intact and is prime for selling.
"Good job Zoran!" said Sora as the whole class let go of their ears and look at Zoran in awe.
"Good job students, it seems like many of you are fine for C rank rifts as a group, so why not change it up a bit, each of you will have to tackle a C rank rift all on your own!" suddenly said Nakagawa from nowhere as a series of rifts appeared in front of them.
"W- what!?" exclaimed the whole class in surprise at the sudden task they have to face.
"Don't worry about it, take it as a learning experience, you guys have powerful Gifts and are talented, you can take care of a simple C rank rift!" said Nakagawa as the whole class gulped in fear.
"If you don't want to enter it, then you guys have forced my hand!" said Nakagawa and before the students could process what was about to happen, the rifts moved forwards towards them and with that, they all appeared in different rifts.
As Aki looks around the place he appeared in after the portal passed through him, it seems to be a dark cave with no light source so, with a grin, a ball of light appeared on his hand that illuminated the whole area around them.
'Fufufu, based on the data I gathered from Sora, his presumed Gift seems to be some sort of energy-based enhancement and he said he could only exert a certain percentage of the true strength his Gift holds… Kekeke, just based on that my knowledge of his Gift expanded to a great degree, if only I can torture him to get the answer straight from his mouth but my paranoia is getting the better of me at times like this, it's like there is an unknown fear I am facing in regards with him that just makes me have goosebumps' thought Aki as he walked through the darkness with a calm demeanor while a barrier of light protected his body.
And soon, he finally saw what the monsters are inside this cave.
Large mole-like creatures with metallic claws that chip off the walls they bump into, an easy foe for someone like him.
With a single wave of his arms, a wave of light rushed towards the monsters beheading their heads with one strike as blood spew out everywhere while Aki's response was to float off the ground with light pads appearing below the soles of his feet.
After flying around the cave for a few more seconds, he found the rest of the moles, and with beams of light, he killed them one by one with accurate hits on the head, and just like that, a rift appeared in front of him which he walked through to see that he appeared back in the lobby with Jong-ga already standing there looking at the series of screens floating in front of them that shows his classmates experience in the rifts.
"Yo!" I said while walking beside Jong-ga who looks at me with a smile.
"Great work Aki, I didn't expect you to be so good with your Gift already," said Jong-ga as I chuckled.
"Yep, it's so cool to see that I have a different Gift than what I previously thought my whole life," I said with a grin as we watched the others through the screens.
"Yeah… say, Aki, when did you unlock that part of your Gift?" asked Jong-ga with a raised eyebrow.
"Oh, after the end of the entrance exam for Hope Academy and we got back home, when we were eating dinner, I explained to them that I felt something strange and bam, I have this Gift now!" I said as light butterflies fluttered around us leaving trails of light behind.
"That's cool!" said Jong-ga with a smile as I saw a questioning glint in his eyes.
"Well, I do wonder if any of us have different Gifts than we previously thought, who knows, maybe I have two Gifts! Or maybe, you have multiple Gifts!" I said with a smile while Jong-ga's eyes widened with his body coming to a halt.
"But that would be impossible right?" I said with a nonchalant smile as a couch appeared below us which I sat on letting out a satisfied "Ngh!" while my body got swallowed by the couch leaving Jong-ga standing there alone.
AN: This is 1547 words, you're welcome.
The Sword of Damocles hangs above each and everyone one of you with its ever present threat of despair, so send me some power stones with your power of friendship and save the thousands perhaps even millions to come who will read this masterpiece immortalized in the tunnels of time.
(April 13, 2022 – 140th day of writing)