Charlus was walking in the corridor, asking everyone he bumped into if they would show him around.

“Hey! I’m new here. Charlus.” Charlus offered his hand to a short boy with glasses but the boy just turned away and walked, ignoring Charlus.

Charlus’ expression soured. He didn’t do anything and continued walking. He offered his hand but most of the students just ignored him. Only one gave him an explanation.

“Everyone saw your stunt with Bruce. Bruce’s brother is scary. Very scary. It’s better to avoid him. You won’t be getting any help. Sorry.”

Charlus smiled at the girl who gave him the explanation.

“Oh really? Thanks for telling.”

Charlus continued walking, happy that there was a proper reason behind his social isolation. He was turning a corner when he bumped into someone.

“Sorry about that. Are you okay?” The girl who Charlus bumped into asked him.

“Wow. You are… very beautiful.” Charlus just said what came to his mind. The girl was taken aback.

“Thank you?”

Charlus introduced himself. “Oh. Sorry, Charlus.”

The girl smiled, “Eva. Nice to meet you. And sorry about my reaction, but no one said that to my face the first time they met me.”

“Well, glad to be the first. I have a favour I want to ask you, actually. Could you give me a tour of this school? I am an exchange student.” Charlus decided to ask her if she would help him.

“I have class in a few minutes so I won’t be able to cover that much. How about later?” Eva smiled apologetically.

“No problem. Could you tell me where the principal’s office is? I have to report there.” Charlus was okay with it as she gave him a  promise to do it later.

“I can take you there, actually. It’s not that far from here.” Eva started walking and Charlus followed her. They walked until they came to the principal’s office. Charlus looked at Eva.

“So maybe during lunch? Is that okay?”

“Yeah! You can find me in the cafeteria. Bye then.” Eva walked away, but Charlus called after her.

“It’s a date!”

Eva’s face became flustered, and though Charlus wasn’t able to see it, he still smiled knowing what he had done. He entered the office, finding a middle-aged man sitting behind the desk.

“Hello, Mr Black. I heard from Mr Robert about what happened. I am truly sorry. Are you okay?”

“It wasn’t a big deal Mr Principal. I’m okay.” Charlus just shrugged it off.

The principal smiled.

“Okay then. Now, this is your schedule.” The principal handed a schedule to Charlus. “Classes were picked based on your classes while you were at Lewisville. You have the room numbers for your classrooms. You are going to be here for the entire semester so I hope you make friends. Class has already started but I am sure your teacher will excuse you. Your first teacher is actually Mr Robert, the same teacher you encountered this morning.”

Charlus nodded. He took the schedule and gave it a glance. Then he looked straight at the principal. His gaze made the principal uncomfortable. 

“Well… if you don’t have any questions you can go to your class Mr Black.”

Charlus nodded and left the room. He then smiled. He looked down at his schedule and then looked around. The rooms were pretty ordered so he was able to find his class very quickly. Charlus quickly went to his class and entered his class. 

“Excuse me?” Charlus spoke up after entering the class. Mr Robert looked up from his book. The class was quiet and Mr Robert was reading out from the book. It was an English lesson.

“Yes. Ah, Mr Black, nice to see you here this quickly.”

“Charlus is alright.”

Mr Robert’s face soured. He didn’t like that Charlus spoke so informally.

“You can find an empty seat, I hope?”

Charlus nodded. He went to the back, where he would be able to see everyone. He put his bag down and took out a book from it. He waited for Mr Robert to start teaching.

Mr Robert looked away from Charlus and started teaching.

“As I was saying, Robert Frost….”

It didn’t take too much time for Charlus to get bored. He started checking his inventory and quests. He didn’t see anything out of the ordinary, so he decided to formulate a game plan. He wasn’t planning on slacking after coming to Los Angeles. He needed to level up to be ready for whatever was thrown his way. And as far as he knew, the difficulty would be upped since he was in a ‘city’ and not a ‘town’. 

Charlus took his phone out and started searching for parks and forests near his location. He was hoping that something similar to the Lewisville Park Goblin infestation would happen here so he would get a quest to pass time.

“Excuse me, Mr Black? Are you feeling my class boring?”

Charlus heard Mr Robert’s voice and quickly put his phone in his bag. His hand moved so quickly that no one was able to notice it. Charlus looked up at Mr Robert.

“Um…. no sir.”

“Well, I’m glad you don’t find Robert Frost’s work boring. Would you summarize his poem that we were talking about.”

“Sure? Fire is passion and Ice is reason. One will be the one to bring about the destruction of the world.”

Charlus gave a very concise explanation of the poem that was being taught which shocked Mr Robert. He had seen Charlus not paying attention. Charlus smiled and looked away. While Charlus had been scrolling through his phone, he was also listening, thanks to his ability to multi-task – the one he got after putting 50 points into Int.

Charlus sat down and looked around, trying to gauge their reaction to his performance. No one seemed bothered and everyone seemed half asleep. Charlus figured it was because it was still the morning and they were not fully awake. It didn’t help that they were in English class. He continued looking around when he saw someone that interested him.

[Brody Lvl 49]