Person

--I bumped into someone just as I was making my escape.

The initial impact caused a small joint of pain to rocket up my wound. Luckily, I was able to grit through the pain and just barely control my voice from leaking out.

As I wobbly tried to stop myself from falling, I looked on at the thing I had bumped into.

It was a girl.

Probably a student from this school, although, no surprise, I didn’t recognize her. She was rather plain looking, with normal proportions, or at least that’s what I first thought. Truth be told, I couldn’t really tell, much of her face was covered by a haggard amount of hair, and she was wearing an exceptionally large sweater, which hid most of her figure.

I looked through her curtain of hair, and saw the initial surprise on her face. She didn’t look scared, rather startled, and from the expression she was showing, it looked as if she was about to scream out due to pure reflex.

I was fully aware that the bull nosed giant in the previous room was well within earshot. Although it might not have noticed me yet, a scream would definitely attract its attention. Not to mention there was also the possibility that any sudden noise might attract other monsters.

Going by how things have turned out so far, it was a safe bet to assume there was more than just minotaurs and goblins that roamed these hallways.

Frantically, I covered the girl’s mouth. I ignored the spit that touched my hand, as I kept it in place, blocking out any sound that may or may not come out.

I put my free hand up to my own, making a ‘shh’ gesture.

Naturally, she struggled at first, but soon calmed down. She briefly expressed a knowing glance, before her attention shifted and her eyes vigilantly began to scan from left to right.

It looked like she had enough experience with monsters to know their real danger. Her alertness was a good feature.

I slowly removed my hand from her mouth, and nodded. She nodded back, and motioned to a nearby stairwell, indicating her original goal.

Without words, I understood her intention, which I found odd at first. I’ve never really been this in sync with someone. Maybe it was the situation? Who knows, but this feeling of connectedness was pretty… nice.

I glanced over, before I made a worried expression. I looked down at my thigh, it was still as bruised and painful as ever. I don’t really think I could go down a flight of stairs without reflexively screaming out in pain.

With a hint of bitter regret, I shook my head. Motioning fruitlessly to my injured thigh. The girl followed my indication, and grimaced at the injury. She thought long and hard, a mask of indecision overtaking her face.

After some forethought, it seems like she finally came to a decision. She nodded once more to me, and this time indicated at the corner from which she just came from.

Wordlessly, without waiting for a response, she moved on.

I more than eagerly followed, fully aware that we might have spent a bit too much time out in the open.

She led me to a nearby classroom. Next to the classroom, were a pile of dead corpses. They looked fresh, and most of them were students. I shivered at the scene. Although I had several brushes with death since this whole mess started, it was my first time being so up close.

It was rather unnerving.

Sparing only a quick glance at the mound, the girl didn’t quite have such an impactful response as I did. She entered the classroom, making sure to open the door as noiselessly as possible.

I followed her in, closing the door just as quietly as she had opened it.

Once I got in, the first thing I noticed was the destruction.

From the looks of things, this room was once an art classroom. Broken canvases littered the walls, while chairs and tables were frantically strewn around everywhere.

What was odd was that, despite the condition of the room, it had no corpses. I’d expect that if something rampaged in here, there’d be at least a body or two.

Unless….

[Ah...now it makes sense…]

I had a brief moment of insight.

Somebody had moved all the bodies outside the classroom. That would explain the dead that guarded the door outside. But as to why someone would do such a fruitless thing, I don’t know. I mean, it was pretty meaningless, not like a corpse-less room would save anyone in this situation.

After I finished looking around, I turned back to the person who led me here.

Now that I was away from the oppressing sense of danger I faced out in the hallway, I more leisurely took a closer look at the girl.

Night black hair curtained her face so I really couldn’t get a good luck at her.

Actually, a lot of her was covered up by either hair or baggy clothing. What was left exposed were pieces of pale white skin which looked as frail as a newborn. She was the type of girl who you couldn’t help but think she’d break under her own weight.

She also had a naturally slouched posture, which she maintained as she looked out through a window that opened up into the hallway.

After she had confirmed we were relatively safe for the time being, she turned back to face the room.

I half expected her to start talking, but contrary to my belief, she wordlessly moved deeper into the room.

It may have just been my imagination, but I felt that her movements had a pretty depression gait to it.

She walked over and reached the area behind the teacher’s desk. The desk itself was half destroyed, littered by giant holes on its surface. It was propped over, blocking the view of whatever lay behind it.

After a second of hesitation, I followed her.

“hah,hah,hah…” As I drew closer I was now keenly aware of the heavy panting noise that came from behind.

As I got within eyesight, I first thought I was looking at another corpse. Luckily, the slight rise and fall of the chest revealed otherwise.

The body that lay broken and injured, was that of a female’s. From her figure, and her relatively clean, albeit pale, face, she was probably really pretty. Probably, she was one of the popular types.

Rather than her cute face, what shocked me most was the amount of blood that pooled beside her. For now, the blood showed no indication of growing, but her body, littered in various scratches and wounds, was more than just a cause for concern.

I looked silently at her, a dark expression masking my face.

[She looks like she’s dying….]

The girl who brought me here, kneeled down, and caressed the bleeding girl’s forehead. Although the girl showed no signs of being conscious, her face did visibly loosen up upon the contact of flesh.

I waited a while, but the only noise in the room was the soft groans of the dying girl who laid in a pool of blood..

Breaking the long silence, I decided to talk first.

“What happened to her?” I asked.

After a minute of no response, she finally talked back. Her voice was frail, and soft, barely audible.

“...I don’t know.”

She looked up, and seeing the expression on my face, she began to explain further.

“This isn’t my classroom.” She looked around the room as if to indicate.

“I was a few halls down, when… you know, the countdown went zero. I managed to survive when the first monsters did come to my classroom. I hide in a supply closet, and...and I waited until everyone was dead and the monsters had left.”

A look of deep regret was plastered on her otherwise stoic face. She quickly shook that expression off though, and continued to explain.

“After it left, I went out and came here… for her.” She looked down gently onto the poor girl.

“She’s my sister.”

She spoke simply, as if such an explanation was enough.

I nodded, I got her situation. Family bonds were pretty strong I guess, even in a time like this.

Although, I couldn’t help but quirp in a hint of bitter reality to her one sided conversation.

“She’d dying.” I said.

Hearing these words, she bit down on her own lip, before slowly nodding.

It seems like she realizes it as well.

“....”

“....”

In this silence, I had an idea, but I was afraid to speak out. I was afraid that I might be wrong.

There were too many variable I didn’t know about, and the mechanics to this crazy reality were still knew to me, so I hesitated to voice out my opinion. If I, on some of chance, ended up being wrong, that would only bring more grief to the person in front of me.

“...”

After some time, I decided to screw it. I’ll trust in my instincts for the time being.

“...She… she might not die.”

The girl looked up at me. She was startled at my sudden declaration, but her eyes glowed with a bit of faint hope.

I scratched my head, trying to gather my thoughts for what I was about to say next.

“I’m sure you’ve realized this but… the world has changed.”

Remembering the floating countdown from earlier, the girl nodded with eager eyes.

I nodded in response as well.

“...then, I’m not sure if you realized this or not, but, I,no, probably we… we have changed as well.”

Hearing this, the girl flashed a confused and doubtful frown.

Seeing this expression, I thought for a moment before I said, “..Try saying “status” out loud while thinking of...um, yourself.”

It was better to show her than to explain such a ridiculous thing.

She looked blankly at me for a second before she opened her mouth. She hesitated for a moment, only gaping with her mouth slightly open but with no sound coming out. Eventually, she finally did speak

“Status.”

What came next was that the girl jumped in surprise. Her eyes widened as she looked at what I presumed was her own status screen. Of course, like I half expected, I couldn’t see her status window. It seems like things like that are personal.

After a minute of quietly looking, she turned back to me, and spoke, a tone of astonishment still lingering in her voice.

“It… it says here I’m level 1.”

I nodded. “Hm, I’m level 2.”

“How?”

“Well, somethings happened.” I answered awkwardly before I scratched my head.

Her eyes moved over to the injury in my leg, before she nodded.

“So, what was that about saving her?” She spoke, her voice now louder and filled with more hope than before.

[I never said I could save her…]

Ah well, what’s done is done.

I began to explain the gist of my logic.

“Ah, you know how in things like rpgs and mmos, your life is determined by your HP, right?”

She nodded. Such information was common sense after all.

“Then… if we just bring her hp backup, I don’t think she’ll die.”

It was simple. Logic based on rpg experience. Even the most grievous of wounds could be healed by a simple healing spell. As long as the hp never reached zero, then it was basically impossible to die. And if it ever did reach zero, then I guess you’d need to look into revive spells and such… although, I have my doubts as to their existence…

Upon hearing this, the girl frowned. It looked like she wasn’t convinced by such simple logic.

As if to word out her doubt, she asked, “But what about her wounds?”

I accepted this question a little too eagerly. In fact, it was something related to this that I actually came to my conclusion in the first place.

In response I pointed to my leg.

“Actually…”

I began to explain.

In short, my leg was healing.

I didn’t notice while trapped in that classroom, but once I started moving about through the hallway, I noticed that my leg didn’t hurt as much. It became easier to move, and the pain lessened considerably. It was healing considerably faster than normal. I connected this to my hp, which was also now steadily regenerating health.

As long as there was no detrimental effects like [bleeding status] in place, I was convinced that I could basically heal from almost any injury, given the right amount of time.

After my explanation, the girl was still frowning, but now her eyes glowed with a bit of understanding.

“Of course, we could always test this theory.” I said. “We simply have to wait until my hp bar reaches max. At that time, it’ll be obvious whether I’m right or not.”

Although from how slow my health regeneration was, it would take at most a few hours for me to completely heal.

The girl was quiet for a moment. She looked down, and from the quiet mumblings (which were a little creepy) that leaked out, I assumed she was deep in thought.

After a while, she looked back up.

“It makes sense.” She affirmed. “Although, I’d like to test it out, just to be sure.”

“That’s why I said we should just wait until I fully recover, it might take a while but--”

She interrupted me with a shake of her head and said.

“Don’t worry. There’s no need to wait.”

Without a shred of hesitation, she took a pencil from on top of the desk, and jabbed it deep into her arm.

“Tch!”

With a wince, the leaded weapon sunk deeper into her flesh, and with another wince, she pulled it out just as easily as she had stabbed it in.

“...!”

I stood there, aghast, not knowing how to respond. The girl also did nothing. She dropped the pencil and watched it roll through the floor as she just quietly sat there, with a deep look of concentration on her face.

“....”

“....”

“...”

“... I lost 5 hit points.” She broke the silence and stated.

“D-did you check your status window?” I asked.

“Yes. and since I have an hp regeneration of 0.005 per second…”

After a bit of mental calculating she said, “...We’ll only need to wait 17 minutes for my hp to fill back up.”

“Ah, um, okay.” I spoke dumbly, still a bit shocked that she had just stabbed her hand for such a reason.

And so we waited. Our attention completely focused on the bleeding wound on her left hand.

As time passed by, it was a pleasant discovery to know that my theory was correct. Slowly, ever so slowly, the wound closed up, and at 16.666 whatever minutes, her hand was as good as new.

She moved her hand around cautiously. She flexed it left and right, opened and closer her palm, she did all sorts of things in order to confirm how her hand had healed.

After a minute or so of doing this, in a tone of wonderment, she awed, “Y-you were right…”

I smiled a bit at her words.

“Well, this is good then.” I replied.

She nodded.

“If… If it’s like this, then my sister can be…” Her words choked up in the middle, as tears quietly rolled down her hair matted cheeks.

She hiccuped and sniveled while trying to restrain her budding emotions.

For a while, she just sat there, whimpering as tears continued to gather in a pool before her. After five minutes or so, she finally stopped.

She rubbed her reddened eyes, while looking at me through a familiar curtain of hair.

“M-my name’s Cielle…”

It was a little late for introduction, but at least I could stop referencing her as ‘girl’ now.

“Ah, I’m Hide.”

With a small bow, I likewise, introduced myself to Cielle.