[POTENTIAL ABILITY UNLOCKED]

The notification threw Happy off, but he had an expert poker face. On the outside, his serene facade stayed the same. He would check the notification later, but now was not the time. The bullied girl blushed and took his hand while trembling. Happy slowly pulled her up and took the initiative, it was important to stay in control of the conversation if he wanted to make his plan work.

"Are you alright? I'm Happy by the way, what's your name?"

Happy closed his eyes and gave another award winning smile, all of his pearly white teeth shining on display. Deep down, he hoped the girl would take the hint and say something. Slightly opening his left eye, he observed the girl's reaction. Her face, which had been as white as a ghost before, was now a burning red. Happy was fairly confident that was a good sign.

After a few more moments of awkward silence, Happy continued without skipping a beat.

"It seems I got a little lost, I'm new to this school after all ... if you wouldn't mind, could you bring me to the school entrance?"

Happy then proceeded to open his eyes real wide and clasped his hands together like a schoolgirl. He hoped this was enough to convince her that he was just an innocent boy. The bullied girl seemed to have broken out of her daze and quickly nodded her head. She shyly looked at the bathroom door then him, gesturing Happy to follow her. Before he left, he quickly slipped one of the broken pieces of mirror into his pocket.

The boy followed the girl out of the restroom, a scene any passerby would react to. However, not a single student even glanced at the two. A feeling of unease was slowly setting into Happy's bones. An instinct that had been born from being extremely paranoid in his last life was disturbing him. It wasn't just the students that had him feeling off, there was something else... it was almost as if something, or someone was watching his every move.

As the two walked side by side down the hallway, Happy decided to stay silent. It seemed no one in this building wanted to talk. As he followed the bullied girl, he decided to check his status.

NAME: Happy Sinclair
AGE: 17
RACE: Human (NPC)

ABILITY: (NEW!)
SKILLS: NONE
TRAITS: Traitor, Silver Tongue

STATS:
STRENGTH: F
AGILITY: E
VITALITY: E
PERCEPTION: D
INTELLIGENCE: A
WILLPOWER: C

First, Happy decided to check his stats, which all seemed self-explanatory. Agility meant how fast you are, perception measured how perceptive you were, e.t.c. One thing that he found amusing was his extremely low strength stat, he wondered if he could increase it later on. However, seeing his high intelligence stat made the corners of his mouth turn upwards by a tiny amount.

Next, he checked his traits. With his finger, he touched the trait Silver Tongue.

[Silver Tongue: Your words have a 10% higher chance to persuade a target.]

Huh...how interesting.

[Traitor: Attacks that you land on the back of your target deal 10% more damage.]

... Did I get this one because of my past life?

Noticing that he had no skills, Happy just assumed it was because he hadn't chosen an ability yet.

Finally, he clicked on the ability tab.

[ABILITY: CON MAN (RANK: F)]

[Claim ?]

[Your actions in the tutorial world impact what abilities you receive. The greater the feats you accomplish in the tutorial world, the higher the ability rank will be.]

[WARNING: Once an ability is claimed, you can no longer return to the tutorial world.]

Happy contemplated his choices as he walked. It seemed if he took this ability, he would finally be able to meet some real people other than these mannequins with moving legs. However, there was a catch. He would be out there in another unknown world with a weak ability.

And if I die... even if it's a game who knows what will happen to me...?

There was also the benefit that he could possibly get a different or same ability, but with a higher rank. So he decided to take the risk.

Looking up from his status, Happy's stomach dropped. The girl had led him to a dark corridor, the lights above were smashed similarly to the broken mirrors in the bathroom. Before he could react, the bullied girl yanked him to the side with monstrous strength. Gazing into her face, he acknowledged that he had made a error in his judgement. Before, he had assumed the girl was just blushing. Now he knew. The girl right in front of him was red with rage, the veins on her forehead were even bulging out a little bit. She hadn't been trembling with nervousness ... she had only been shaking with anger.

"Listen idiot. I'm only going to tell you once...okay?" the girl whispered as venomously as possible. "A terrible monster lurks in these cursed halls. It can possess anyone, as long as there is a reflection in their eyes."

Happy crossed his arms and smiled. It was fine, he still had it all under control.

"Those robots by the way? The monster can see through their eyes. You better pray it hasn’t set its sights on you after the stunt you pulled..."

... John Smith...wait a minute, something's not right...

"...the monster waits near the only entrance to the school all day... and all the windows are unbreakable. The only way to escape this place is by someone acting as bait so the rest can escape ... or ... my plan. At midnight, my group and I will turn off the power in the building. If all goes to plan the monster will have no way of attacking us."

Escaping the school... that sounds like a great feat. Well... worst case scenario I'll just claim my ability and escape...

"Follow me... I'll lead you to our hide out."

Happy followed the girl silently. Something was suspicious.

At the end of the dark hallway was a classroom that also had its lights shattered. Inside were two boys and a girl, they didn't seem surprised to see Happy enter the room. Instead, they all seemed to look down on Happy, as if he was like a little worm that had just crawled out of the earth, except for the girl Happy had never seen before. Instead of wearing arrogant expression or an angry glare, she just had a somber look on her face.

They didn't bother to introduce themselves, so Happy didn't either.

"There are five different power stations in the building. If all goes according to plan, we will destroy them all with water." the angry girl proceeded to point at the five buckets in the corner of the classroom. Happy noticed that while four of the buckets were only filled a quarter of the way, one of them was filled to the brim.

"After that, we will all meet up over here..." the angry girl pointed at a location on the map, "... and escape together."

All four of them nodded solemnly in agreement.

Happy tried not to laugh, barely maintaining his outside appearance. The group would all be dead by sunrise.