"Ah, mister Kristy, I see you're first...again." The Professor hummed as a slightly tanned boy with brown-ish hair and glasses with a green sweater handed in his test.

Looking up, Haru let out a slow breath. They'd barely started and this guy was already handing it in?

Feeling defeated, he eyed the graphs and numbers on his paper, before pulling off his glasses to clean them on his shirt.

It was going to be a long hour...

Lunch came not long after that and all the castes fell right into place at their own tables. It was hard to call it the most diverse school when everyone was keeping it so segregated.

Haru himself was spending his own lunch hour in the computer lab, reading up more and more about the different skills in The Game that his healer could use.

There were a few people around him and at least a gentle few of those were also on the game, but playing it rather than researching. But here in the lab, they wouldn't have the up-link capabilities. They couldn't feel the world as acutely as they could at home.

He paid them no mind, completely entranced by the fact that healers, when paired with mages in particular, could be extremely powerful damage dealers... especially in places with un-dead monsters, where they could use their area of effect heals, when amplified by a mage's area of effect amplifier, to take out undead creatures.

The door came open and he looked up to see the Kristy boy from earlier come in- taking a seat at the terminal across from Haru and flipping on the computer.

For a few moments Haru paid him no mind, but after finding it increasingly harder to concentrate on what he was doing he sighed and sat back.

This guy was smart... smarter then anyone he'd ever met before. It was enchanting... part of him wanted to approach the guy but... what would he say? 'Hi, I'm an exchange student from Japan, I think you're super smart'?

No way... as far as he was concerned that guy would be impossible to talk to.

With a sigh, Haru grabbed a set of link-ins and clipped them over his ears, feeling the small pinch as they dug in and allowed his vision to cloud over, bringing up The Game.

He wouldn't be able to smell or feel without the full system back in his dorm room, but he couldn't head back there... he had a class in an hour.

--SCENE BREAK--

Arashi stumbled out of the gate and right into another player.

"Oof!" He cried, surprised that he couldn't feel it for a moment even as he stumbled back.

"Watch new- oh it's you." Cyprian sighed. "What the hell, aren't you in school?"

"I have an hour between classes," Arashi explained, dusting himself off - and realizing in awe that there was actually dirt on his outfit. "I wanted to get my new armor and skills while I was not doing anything."

"I take it you're not an excel student or you'd be studying." Cy rolled his eyes. "C'mon, no-one else is online yet...except maybe Ukeru, but I don't know where he is."

"Actually, I get all good grades and I finished my homework in class," Arashi hummed, following Cy as they headed into town. "What about you...? Didn't you have a test today, too?"

"Is that any of your business?" Cyprian asked.

Arashi's eyes went wide and he looked down."Well, no..."