"Why?" Nathan asked.

"Yes," Keith answered. "Why do you believe a word of what I said?"

"It fits your personality and hers," Nathan answered. "Simple as that."

"Sometimes, people have a secret side to them," Keith said.

"Sometimes," Nathan stated. "But you haven't gone out of your way to spread negativity about someone, and you simply accepted her doing that. In addition, you've mentioned – when it's brought up – that it was bullshit. Plain as that. You didn't answer until I forced you to."

"Yes," Keith frowned. "You hurt me, even though that shouldn't be possible without dying. Are you a part of-"

"Skill," Nathan said. "Unlocked for me at Level 40. Share it, and I'll use it on you again."

"Understood," Keith swallowed hard. "I won't tell anyone."

"Good."

"You know," Keith said. "This is probably the most I've ever heard you talk before."

"I don't usually have something worth talking about," Nathan stated, then walked over to Keith. "Arm."

"Huh?"

"You're going to fall on the way to the cafeteria."

Keith nodded, then wrapped an arm across Nathan's shoulder and leaned into the other senior, putting nearly all his weight onto him.

Nathan assisted the mage to the cafeteria, where he received several annoyed looks. It wasn't until he had gotten Keith into a seat that someone spoke up about him helping the mage.

"Why did you help him?" Madeline demanded as she approached, drawing attention from everyone around them. "It would've been better to just leave him to die! Do you even know-"

"How much more difficult," Nathan fixed his gaze on her, and the female mage stumbled back a step. "It would be for us to survive without someone as powerful as him?"

"He-"

"Is much more powerful than you," Nathan stated. "And hasn't done anything that proves a word of what you say about him being a force behind this. Now shut the fuck up and go slut yourself off, you whore."

"Who do you-"

"Shut the fuck up, bitch," Nathan growled. "Kieth has done much more to help people survive than you have. Was it not because of you gathering so many people together during the Survival Challenge that so many monsters were attacking you? And didn't you steal many of their kills? Keith at least lets people take a kill after he weakens it. Even if said person bullied the hell out of him for no reason. Isn't that right, Michael?"

Nathan turned his gaze to Michael, who timidly nodded.

"Yeah," the warrior responded. "Keith let me kill a G-3 when I was struggling against it during the last Main Challenge. He used a spell to hold it down, actually."

Nathan was impressed by Michael's honesty. The game had changed the bully, who normally wouldn't have admitted something like that. He had been half-expecting the other guy to lie, in fact.

"How does he know where everyone is?" Madeline sent Michael a death glare. "He always knows when someone's in danger, doesn't he? How can-"

"Because I'm psychic," Keith answered, removing his contacts and sending a violet glare to Madeline. "Now shut the fuck up, will you?"

"You-you-what?" Madeline almost shrieked. "How are you, of all people, psychic? I've worked my ass off my whole life in an attempt to gain the ability! I-"

"Shut. The. Fuck. Up. Bitch," Nathan growled, and Madeline went silent, turning pale and taking another step back, then another. "Now be a good bitch and fuck off."

Madeline sputtered for a few moments, then stormed out of the cafeteria.

"How many people here did Madeline 'protect?" Nathan asked, and quite a few raised their hands. "And how many did she go out of her way to save?"

All of those hands went down.

"And how many here did Keith go out of his way to save?"

Many of the hands rose back into the air, along with a few others.

"Keep that in mind," Nathan said, then turned and walked to the food area to pile two trays with food.

As soon as things turned against Madeline, she threw a fit. Nathan knew that she'd likely gotten too used to having her way. To have things change so suddenly, and to have someone actually blatantly defy her, was likely an entirely new experience for her.

She'd probably do what she could to get revenge on Nathan and Keith, and probably cockblock Michael if she could, but that didn't bother Nathan. Keith didn't mind her, he could handle her, and Michael wasn't staying exclusive to her in the first place.

And as pretty and influential as she was, Michael was hot enough that the chicks he was banging wouldn't stop just because Madeline didn't like him. Especially after having it so blatantly and obviously put that she was using them.

Nathan returned to the table with Keith and set a tray in front of the mage, who began to stuff himself. The warrior sat down across from him and began to eat, and Samantha walked over and sat beside him.

"You know she's going to find a way to get revenge on you, right?" Samantha asked. "She isn't the type of girl to let something go."

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Most things she could do would violate the rules and cause her to die.

"She'd better do it in a way that I don't know, then," Nathan responded, then returned to eating, not saying another word.

When he finished eating, he took care of his tray and trash, made sure Keith had enough to eat, then made his way to his room. When he arrived, he found Madeline pouring water from a pitcher onto his air mattress.

"You know," she smiled at him. "This doesn't count as stealing or anything else that violates the rules."

"No, it doesn't," Nathan said as she finished.

Then, he walked over to her, grabbed her arm, twisted her, and slammed her face into a desk, eliciting a cry of pain from the mage. He leaned his face down next to hers and glared into her eyes.

"However," he growled. "There isn't a damn person here apart from you, me, and Keith who will even believe that I slammed your face down like this. After all, we can't hurt others without being killed by the System. I know the truth about you, Madeline, and I'm not going to let you leave this place alive. How painful that death is depends on how much you piss me off. Do you understand?"

"How are you-"

He lifted her head up and slammed it down again, resulting in her gritting her teeth and biting back a scream.

"No matter what you say," he told her. "No one will believe that I did this to you. They'll think you did it to yourself, forgetting that we can't hurt others, with the intent of saying I did it. Am I clear? You're going to back off. Or I'm going to kill you."

Nathan then picked Madeline up and carried her out of Room 504, throwing her into the hall. As she scrambled to her feet, she found the pitcher flying toward her face, slamming with enough force to break her nose.

"You might want to get that looked at," he snarled. "Now fuck off!"

Madeline took off out of the room, and Nathan sighed, rubbing his temples, then shucked off his backpack and set it on a desk and looked down at the air mattress. It would be awhile before he could use it again, and there was no doubt that water had leaked through inside of it by then.

He lifted up the air mattress and flipped it over, then set it on a couple of desks so that the wet side was down. The pillows and blanket were soaked as well, so he set the former on desks and draped the latter across two.

With those set out to dry, Nathan made his way to the supply room where the 'sleeping materials' were located. As he pulled out a new air mattress, set of pillows, and blanket, he checked the lube supply.

There were six bottles of it left, and from what he'd heard, it restocked anytime it went empty. They were all plain, water-based lubes, but also completely edible. He wasn't sure why the System supplied them with lube – why whoever set up their hellish alternate dimension thought it was necessary for them to have.

Or at the very least, cared enough to let them have 'easier' sex. There were many things he'd yet to figure out. Such as Player-Striker. Was it a Skill that always unlocked at Level 40, or was it one of those Skills that he'd met the requirements to unlock? Skills didn't show what their requirements were, making some of them difficult to guess.

Silent Trigger probably came about because of his constant use of mumbling to trigger things, and Spatial Mobility because of his constant movement around and above his enemies. Damage Dealer and Stoneskin probably came from his constant hitting and high amount of damage dealt and taken. Combo Strike likely stemmed from the fact that his usual style of fighting involved striking fast and repeatedly – the main thing that let him win so many fights.

Well, that, and the mod for his Burst Knuckle, Stun Strike, which stunned his opponents for a single second. It'd increase if he raised its Level, but so far, that single second was all he needed. For most cases. Some monsters seemed immune to the Stun Strike mod.

Returning his thoughts to what he had been doing, Nathan checked the supplies under his arms and in his hands, then left the supply room and made his way back to Room 504 and set up his new bed. After everything was done, Nathan stripped to his underwear and laid down, closing his eyes and resting, though not sleeping.

Around an hour later, he opened his eyes, and Samantha jumped. Nathan checked out his girlfriend, who had stripped down to her panties and bra, and made no effort to hide that he was staring at her breasts.

"Jeez," she held a hand to her chest. "You startled me. Did I wake you?"

"Already awake," he grunted. "Mind if I feel?"

"No," she snorted, lying down beside him, the thing she had been doing when he suddenly opened his eyes. "What happened to the others?"

Nathan quickly glanced at the drying air mattress, blanket, and pillows, then back to Samantha as he worked a hand under her and undid her bra.

"Madeline had a pitcher of water."

"She seriously decided to soak our stuff?"

"Inconvenience," Nathan pushed her bra off and started fondling her as she leaned into him.

"Did you see her face?"

"Yes."

"She tried claiming you did it," Samantha said, rubbing a hand along his thighs. "Which is ridiculous. She was trying to claim that you were exempt from the rules and could hurt people at will. She's crazy, and that feels amazing."

Nathan smiled at her, then leaned over and gave her a kiss, moving his hand to her other breast and sliding down, taking the freed nipple into his mouth. After working it with his teeth and tongue for a few minutes, her other with his fingers, he swapped nipples, enjoying the moans he was eliciting.

When he felt himself coming close, Nathan released her and laid back down beside her, forcing his breathing to still.

"Nathan," Samantha moaned, turning onto her side and pressing her lips to his. "You having some experience isn't a bad thing. That felt amazing. Why'd you stop? Did-"

"I'm close," he breathed into her cheek. "If I kept going-"

She silenced him with a kiss.

"I know we said we'd wait on fucking," she kissed him. "But we didn't say anything about oral."

Nathan smiled at her, then she scooted down the air mattress and slid his boxers down to his knees, letting his erection stand at full mast. Opening her mouth as much as she could, she took him into her, and Nathan grabbed her head, running his fingers through her hair.

"Mind your teeth," he exhaled slowly. "Fuuuck, Samantha. Ow, teeth."

"Sorry," she pulled off of him for a moment, then returned to what she was doing.

She could only manage a few inches of him, but Nathan didn't mind. He knew it was her first time, she didn't have the experience yet.

"Gonna cum," Nathan grunted after a couple of minutes, and Samantha forced herself down as far as she could go, then choked as he started blasting his load into her throat.

When Nathan finally finished releasing his load, Samantha pulled off and licked her lips, swallowing what she could before using her tongue to clean up the mess of cum that had escaped her.

"Impaling yourself orally like that isn't a good thing," Nathan told her when she finished and laid back beside him. "Especially when new. Work your way to that."

"Alright," Samantha traced circles on his chest. "Did you enjoy it?"

"Yeah," he responded. "You?"

"It was definitely a new experience."

"You didn't like it?" He asked, and his expression told Samantha he was heavily disappointed – and upset – that she hadn't been into it.

"It wasn't how I expected it," she told him. "Seemed almost… boring and tedious."

"Next time," he told her. "Don't just suck it."

"Don't?"

"You've never really watched porn before, have you?"

"I prefer watching two guys get it on than a girl getting impaled by a monster."

"So you want to be blindfolded when we do go all the way?"

She pinched his nipple as hard as she could, and he laughed, playfully swatting her hand away.

"You could've stopped," he kissed her cheek. "If you want to enjoy it more, try doing more. Don't just suck. Lick from base to tip, the thighs, the area around, the balls, the space between them and my dick. And make eye contact."

"Eye contact?"

"Yeah," he smiled. "I'd like to see these beautiful jewels of yours a bit more if you're blowing me. You only looked at me to respond."

"Is that a turn-on for you?" She asked.

"As much as my foreplay to you is for you," he responded, sliding a hand back to her chest as he pulled their blanket over them. "Now shh, let's relax and rest a bit."