This wasn't good... I was certain that I knew who stood behind my door right now. It was most likely a very big and very angry lady that wanted to rip me to pieces because of my betrayal.
My mind worked fast and I quickly summoned my clone and made him hide in the practice room before I walked to my door.
There had been yet another fatal flaw in one of my otherwise perfect plans. I just didn't think that Sophie would have the gull to walk into the guys' dormitory this late at night without caring if someone saw her.
'Damn those extroverts and their disregard for feeling ashamed about not following social norms!'
Opening the door, I was met by exactly what I expected; A furious Sophie with eyes shining with anger.
"Oh, hello there lovely lady. What brings you to my humble abode this late at night? Are you perhaps here to try and seduce me?! Please do know that..."
"Shut up and let me in!"
Not wanting to anger the tall woman, I just turned myself around and walked back into my apartment, showing her that she was welcome to join me.
"I was just making some tea, do you want some? It's some kind of special camomile that is supposedly really good for making one feel calm and serene..."
"Please just shut up. But yes, I would love some..."
She sat down on one of the two chairs that accompanied my small kitchen table and stared daggers into my back as I was preparing our drinks.
"Here you go..."
"Thanks... You traitor..."
While I was taking my seat in front of her, I wanted to say that I felt a bit guilty. Sadly, I did not. This meant that I only had one choice left, to use my glib tongue to try and smooth things out.
"So... I guess you are mad at me? Wasn't my little magic trick pretty cool?"
She froze while looking at me like I was an idiot. After a couple of seconds of silence, she finally regained her verbal footing, "Are you retarded? You left us alone forcing us to deal with those bastards!"
My glib tongue had failed me.
"Haaa. Fine. I'm sorry about leaving you, but I really couldn't help it."
Raising her brows a bit, she seemed intrigued, and irritated, by my words, "What do you mean? Weren't we in the same position at the bar?"
If one were to look at our situation externally, it might look like we were in similar positions, but when one started to look deeper, we truly weren't.
"Let me ask you, and no you don't have to tell me the exact Manual you chose, what star grade does your Manual have?"
A bit confused about why I was asking her this, her eyes slightly mellowed out. "7-stars, of course. Just like yours, right?"
"And this is why our situations were different. As of right now, you can regard my Manual as a 1-star at most. In other words, I'm really weak...'
It did hurt my pride to admit that the Trickster of Death was currently just a weakling with an idiot clone, but it was the truth.
Sophie's eyes widened at my words, clearly understanding that I had for some reason chosen an ungraded Manual. "But why? Why didn't you just choose a 7-star like me and get overpowered? I just beat that stupid Mike like it was nothing, all thanks to having the Dragoon Manual! Ah..."
'Moron...'
Once again she couldn't stop herself from telling me too much, now even revealing what Manual she had chosen. Crossing her arms and pouting she tried to cover up her blunder with an excuse, "You would have known anyway as I have to transform a part of my body to fight... So I figured I might as well tell you now..."
"You honestly don't have to lie you know? It's fine, I have no intentions of becoming your enemy anyway."
Even though I tried to help her get over her little mistake, she was still pouting. 'Cute, but it would be cuter if she wasn't towering over me...'
"Anyway, that's the reason I left. I can't risk getting targeted by prideful nobles who want to make my life a living hell. Not right now, at least."
Raising her head, she looked at me with piercing eyes. "I understand... But..."
"But what?"
"If that was all there was to it, why did you do your little theatrical play of yours while carrying a huge grin?"
Silence enveloped us. I now knew that she knew that the biggest reason I left was that I thought It would be cool. In fact, I had already decided that I was going to take my leave that way to make sure to plant the thoughts that I could teleport into both of them.
'[Swap], and retrieve clone!'
*Poff!*
With a puff of smoke, I disappeared from the kitchen table and was now hiding behind the weapon rack in my practice room.
Unfortunately, it didn't take more than ten seconds before the angry lady opened the door and entered the room, quickly laying her eyes on my hiding figure.
Knowing that she had caught me, I rose to my feet and spoke with a dignified tone, "How did you know? My plan was perfect..."
One of her veins seemed ready to burst because of my serious voice, "What do you think? If you, an extreme introvert, suddenly disappear, would you think that you would have gone outside, or would he have hidden inside his apartment somewhere?"
"Good point!"
And the rest is history. Painful history which ended in several bruises and me getting to see the awe-worthy partial transformation symbolizing the Dragoon Manual. Unfortunately, I got to see those blue scales very, very closely...
****
The day had finally arrived. The day where I would be forced to leave the safety of my home, the day where I would finally become a man...
"So, clone-me, be sure to pay attention to whatever the teachers talk about today, okay? We must do well in this academy after all."
"I hate myself."
"I know, I do too..."
And with that, I was off to the races, making my way to the first homeroom class of the year.
It wasn't all bad though, I had luckily gotten placed into the B-class, which meant that I didn't have to fear getting bullied by nobles quite as much. If I remembered correctly from the game, there were at least 3 out of eight students in that class who were commoners, excluding me.
'Wait... If I am going to attend the B-class, wouldn't that mean that one of the students lost their place?'
As I was distracting myself with irrelevant thoughts as a way to not feel bad about being around other people as much, I continued my internal musing.
'And what if Sophie also gets placed into the B-class? Would that mean that one of the previous students would go up to the A-class or did the gods somehow just eradicate their presence completely?'
They were interesting thoughts, irrelevant to me, but interesting nonetheless.
Before I knew it, I was standing in front of a classroom that had a sign which said 1-B. In other words, this was my homeroom from now on.
'Haaa... Here goes nothing...'
Sliding the door open, I was met by a classroom full of students, as well as a gorgeous lady in front of a big digital whiteboard.
Our teacher was a complete knockout. A perfect hourglass-shaped body, long dark hair which seemed to carry the softness of a cloud, and an incredibly well-put face adorned with a small nose and puffy lips.
Adding on her tight, black skirt and white shirt, she made my head go completely blank.
"Mr. Jackson! Are you listening to me?!"
'Oh, shit!'
"Yes, beautiful lady. I'm listening!"
Streams of laughter started to escape the mouths of my fellow kids, the opposite of the reaction that my lovely teacher had.
"Go and sit your ass down already! You are 20 minutes late, for Theia's sake!"
"Yes, ma'am!"
Not wanting to anger my goddess anymore, I quickly made my way to the only empty seat left in the room which was, thank the lord, right in the corner next to the windows.
Looking around, I couldn't help but be impressed by the modern facility we were using. A digital whiteboard, a podium equipped with interactive projections, and every single desk adorned with a built-in keyboard that connected to the smartwatches.
Unfortunately, as I scanned the room I couldn't help but be reminded that I was stuck with seven other students, most of which I couldn't recall their names.
Though there were two that I knew pretty well. One was Arthur, sitting in the front like the good boy he was, and the other one was a silver-haired beauty that was sitting in the middle of the room.
The elven princess who, oddly enough, didn't manage to make it to the A-class, going against what I had learned in the game.
'I guess the god did tell us that this world wasn't completely like the game...'
Still, it made me a bit anxious as one of the conjunctions that could be made was that maybe my Manual wouldn't work as it did in the game either. Thankfully, I could calm my nerves by thinking about how it had been pretty much identical so far.
Suddenly, my thoughts got interrupted by an angry, shrill, but still oh so sweet, voice, "Mr.Jackson! Are you going to introduce yourself or not?! You are the last one!"
Quickly standing up, I tried to fix the nasty situation that my clouded head had created, "I'm sorry, Mom! I'll begin right away!"
Her face crumbled, "Mom...?
'I hate my life...'