"Alright, dear. Give your papers here and I will check them out."
Olivier watched the old lady go through his papers with a nervous look on his face. He had never felt pressure like this before.
And the worst thing was, he had not even done anything to get into trouble yet. He did not think he would be dealt with by such an oppressive person so early in the morning. It was a little impressive if he had to say.
"Alright, looks like your papers are in order, dear. I will not take you to your class."
Olivier breathed a sigh of relief as soon as he heard those words. He was finally getting rid of the old lady in front of him.
The old lady walked slowly, causing Olivier to adjust his speed to match hers. The bell for the first period rang, alerting everyone that it was time to get to class.
It gave Olivier flashbacks of being late to class before but he decided not to let his past affect him anymore.
Besides, he had a guide this time so Olivier was not likely going to be scolded for being late to his class.
"You wait here while I have a firm talk with your teacher. I am sure you will be able to find a home in this school soon."
Miss Clair opened the classroom door without waiting for Olivier's reply. She looked determined and Olivier heard a loud gasp coming from the classroom as soon as Miss Clair entered.
She came out almost as soon as she had entered the room, but Miss Clair had a determined expression on her face.
"Alright, you can go in now. Make sure you have fun in the school and I hope to hear about your achievements soon."
Miss Clair walked away as slowly as she had entered the room. Her leaving caused a huge boulder to be taken off Olivier's shoulders.
But as soon as he entered the classroom, the pressure was back on his shoulder. He could see that everyone was looking at him with an interested look in their eyes. They were judging him and trying to figure out his worth.
Olivier would have remained rooted in his place, if not for the classroom teacher putting a hand on his shoulder.
"Alright class, that is enough. Do not wear the new kid out on his first day. At least wait for the break to ask him all kinds of uncomfortable questions."
The teacher addressed the elephant in the room, causing a lot of students to groan in annoyance.
But Olivier was thankful for the teacher's interference. All those curious stares were getting a little too much for his psyche.
"You can take any seat that is available in the classroom. I am your home-room teacher, Mr. Asher Stanford. If you have any problem, you can come to me for help anytime."
Somehow, Olivier doubted that his teacher would help him out if he needed help. Most teachers were rather heavy on lip service. But they hardly ever helped when it came down to helping someone out.
So, Olivier was not going to pin his hopes on his homeroom teacher.
He looked around the classroom, and coincidently, a lot of seats were open for taking. So, Olivier quickly took the empty desk by the window and took out his books.
A lot of people looked at Olivier with curious eyes and Olivier was reminded of the reason why he had taken the empty seat once more.
The classes ended up taking most of the class as well as Olivier's focus from then on. He was only able to breathe once the lunch break arrived.
But even then, Olivier did not get to rest too much. It was because he was surrounded by a lot of people who wanted to know more about him and where he had come from.
As soon as the break bell rang, Olivier's empty desk had a temporary deskmate.
"Hello, who are you? My name is Clement Arlo Yours is Olivier Williams, right? It reminds me of the Echoes coach who died recently. What a coincidence, right?"
Olivier tried hard not to choke on his food as soon as he heard the enthusiastic greeting. He was not sure he had ever heard such a greeting in his life before.
"Ouch, I think you need water. Did you accidentally inhale your food and it goes down the windpipe? It happens, man. Here, let me help you out."
Olivier was handed water and Clement rubbed his back to comfort him as well.
Somehow, Olivier wanted to point out that nothing like this would have happened if Clement had not surprised him with his words, but it was a little too late to be saying these words now.
Besides, Clement looked like someone interested in Echoes. And Olivier had a feeling that Clement would be able to guide him through the ropes of joining an Esports club easily.
"I am alright. But are you interested in Echoes as well?"
Olivier finally breached the topic he had been itching to say and half of the class groaned in response.
"Hey man, I do not think this is a good topic for a first-time conversation. Especially with Clement here."
"True. Clement is, what you call, a game nerd. Especially when it comes to Echoes. His most proud moment in life was participating in the regionals of the Echoes Cup for his previous school. Like, get over it man, it was under 12 championship and you did not even win."
The more Olivier heard the comments flying around him, the more he was sure that Clement was the kind of person he was looking for.
Looking at Clement was like looking at his past self - bound by the game and desperate to prove himself.
"Oh, come on. Stop complaining about this already. I told you that Echoes is more than a game. You would get it if you tried it out for yourself. What about you Olivier? Will you join the Esports club with me?"
Clement held Olivier's hand tightly in his own as he 'begged' Olivier to join.
"Of course, I will. I am a little interested in Echoes as well and I was meaning to check out the Esports club as a result. I will accompany you after school."
The only problem Olivier had was Natasha right now. He did not know if Natasha had club activities as well or not after school but Olivier was kind of bound to be with her.
If Natasha wanted to go back home sooner, then Olivier would either go home alone or abandon his beloved Echoes club.
And somehow, both options did not sit well with him.
"Of course, you will. Since clubs are an essential part of our student life, you would have been forced to join one anyway. You should join one you enjoy than one you will find restrictive."
Hearing this, one burden was laid off Olivier's shoulder. He would not have to worry about Natasha coming after him to drag him home for the time being.
The rest of the day passed in a daze. Since Olivier had something to look forward to now, he felt as if the time was passing too slowly for him. But the day ended before he knew it.
And now it was time for the club meetings.
As Olivier had been promised, Clement was waiting for him to go to their club together and Olivier picked up his bag.
"Our school does not have a big budget for gaming but we do have a big budget for computer-related stuff. We are also lucky that we have 2-3 technical labs so that we do not have to share with the coding club and as such."
Olivier heard Clément's chattering from one ear and it went out of the other. He did not care particularly for how the club operated. He just wanted to play.
As soon as Clement opened the door, Olivier was faced with a familiar face sitting on the table and logging into the game.
"Oi Clement, come here and help me out with the setup before everyone else arrives. And, did you bring someone with you? The kid looks familiar."
It was Mirai. She glanced at Olivier but it seemed that she was unable to recognize him again.
Now, Mirai has said that she had trouble recognizing people but Olivier had not thought that things would be this bad for her. She had seen Olivier this morning, but it seemed like she had forgotten him already.
"Ah, Senior Mirai. He is a new member of this club and he is in my class. Since he was interested, I thought I would bring him along early to see how the club functions."
Mirai looked uninterested in Clément's words but she did pay attention to Olivier after that.
Something sparkled in her brain and suddenly, Mirai had a 'eureka' moment.
"Ah, I know who you are now. You are Natasha's cousin I gave life to in the morning. I am so sorry kid if I offended you. I told you that my memory and recognition power is not the best out there."
Mirai had said this before. And she had apologized for the same before as well. Looking at her made Olivier feel bad about her situation.
"No harm done. I am not bothered that you do not remember my face. I told you before that I am like you as well. Also, you have the setting all configures wrong. The game will crash if you do not correct it."
Olivier turned the conversation from himself to the game in an instant. It caused both Clement and Mirai to be distracted as they looked at the game.
"Oh really? I cannot say I noticed anything wrong. Is that why the game is buggy today?"
Mirai questioned as she stepped aside to let Olivier sit down.
Olivier had noticed the speed connection of the game and it was high. Having checked the internet speed during the day, Olivier was sure that there must be something wrong with the connection somewhere.
It turned out that the PC was somehow using RAM to render the gaming graphics instead of the graphic cards.
Thankfully, the game setting swallowed you to change all this without any external drive or checks. Otherwise, it would have required a lot more time and effort to resolve.
"Wait, that is something that can even happen? I do not think I have ever heard about something like this before?"
Mirai sounded surprised once she saw the settings and Olivier was surprised to see something like this happen as well.
As far as he knew, this was a bug that had been present in the previous versions of the game when graphic cards were not as prevalent as today. There had been a lot of things that had been upgraded by now.
"I am not sure how this happened as well, but we better check other devices just to make sure nothing like this happens. It can cause your RAM to run slower and the game to crash."
Both Mirai and Clement got to work after that, checking all the available PCs.
Olivier had also noticed that the PC in the lab were hardly competent in running Echoes' latest version but it had to be expected.
Private school or not, no one was going to drop a couple of thousand dollars to get a gaming laptop for a whole team.
"Phew, we checked a lot of PCs today. No wonder our game crashed so often before. Hopefully, it will solve the problem of crashing now."
Mirai sounded happy and Olivier was about to start a match when the door opened and three more people walked into the room.
There were only 5 PCs but 6 people in the club now. And Olivier had a feeling he would be benched because he was the newest member of this club. He needed to protect his place on the team if he wanted to play this game in this club.