I was woken up by rapid tapping at my chest. I opened my eyes, and saw the blade end of a spear, it was risky, but I quickly reached for my pistol and aimed it at the spear-wielder, that was until I was greeted by Kenneth and Nicholai.

"Hello to you too" Nicholai was holding a scythe. Kenneth, wielded the spear. "Yes, it's ironic the doctor is holding a scythe, don't mention it. FYI" She moved the scythe away from her shoulder, dropping it, before catching it when it was aiming to my left "It'd wake her up" I looked over and saw Sam peacefully sleeping.

"Nicholai and I felt you two needed the rest, considering the first day of the trial, it must've been difficult" Kenneth's spear folded inwards, making it smaller, like a machete(Though the blade is at the end, not an entire side) and attached it to his back.

"Riiiight..."

"You two did fuck all yesterday didn't you?" Nicholai looked irritated.

"Not exactly, we did find something odd"

"Oh?" Finding out we didn't sit around all day, Nicholai's irritation expression, had reverted back to normal.

"We were walking along a trail, however we came across a wall, Sam hopped over, and unlocked it, then we went through it..but it brought us back to a different path, leading back to the campsite again."

"Hm..." Kenneth put his hand to his chin as he began thinking. "That..., it could be a way to ambush people"

"Exactly my thou-...wait..." I had started to wake up more and realized the two holding their weapons "How did you summon it?"

"Neal decided kicking our asses was the best way for us to learn how to summon our weapons, apparently, summoning it the first time requires something dangerous to happen, yet I don't see any of them doing anything" Nicholai complained about Neal a little bit more after, something about acting all high and mighty, yet I couldn't recall the exact words.

"What Nicholai is trying to say is, we can't exactly teach you, now, desummoning and resummoning it, that we can" I leaned to the left a bit, and noticed Kenneth's spear was gone. "By the way, you learn how the HUDs work yet?" I nodded

"We found out yesterday, near the start of the trials"

"What about the database?"

"I saw it"

"Have you used it?"

"No" I answered Kenneth "We saw all the memories though..."

"They're playable"

"Huh?"

"Like a video recording, any key moment can be replayed, meaning-"

"I can get a better view on the guy who killed us..." I opened my HUD and went all the way back, it however, was locked.

"That's not right" Nicholai saw the lock.

"You're telling me" I was going to wake up Sam to check her HUD, however Nicholai grabbed my arm.

"Let her sleep a bit more, she looked ready to knock out when we saw her, stubborn girl as always"

"I assume you know I tried to tell her to sleep?"

"Yes, at the cost of your sleep" She hit the top of my head with the blunt end of the scythe "I don't intend to take care of you 24/7 when you're tired"

"Yes...sorry" I stood up and joined them outside, yet there was something I noticed "You know...some of those guys have guns...how do you all handle range?" As though on command, their weapons were resummoned to their hands, and molded, Kenneth's into a bow, and Nicholai's into a modern-day pistol, with minor sci-fi elements, mostly the fact there was no mag and instead what looked like a battery. "Uh..."

"Our weapons have a melee and a range form, mine, is a bow for my accuracy, though I guess that's mostly based off when I work with tech" Everytime he pulled the string back, an arrow instantly appeared along the bow "There's a sorta...infinite ammo type of thing, though it uses MP everytime...only when you shoot it though, however" A quiver summoned along Kenneth's strap "He grabbed an arrow and held it" If you do have normal ammo, it's not only stronger than the infinite ammo, but it doesn't use MP"

"Okay...okay.." My thoughts trailed off as my head started hurting

"Fair enough" The two desummoned their weapons.

"Though, I do have one more question...Nicholai...what's with the pistol?"

"I can't showcase it hear, it'd wake up Sam and then some...and not the normal pistol way"

"Huh..."

"So, what's the game plan leader?" Kenneth jokingly, yet somewhat seriously asked

"I'll stay with Sam, no reason for all of us to head out" Nicholai sat beside the tent.

"Well, if it's just the two of us, we might as well find the other two"

"There...are no other two"

"We met two people at the start, since 4 teams can win, we decided if we find each other, we'd team up."

"That is a good idea, there's been some huge teams"

"I noticed" I began walking in the opposite direction of before, Kenneth of course, followed. "By the way, you guys got here in the middle of the night, based on what you said, aren't you tried?"

"A bit, but it's not enough to hinder anything"

"I'll take your word on it." It only took a few minutes of walking before we heard people talking.

"Piney? The hell kinda nickname is that?" From their voice, I could tell who it was, while Kenneth stopped walking, I continued on until I saw them.

"Whaaaat? Spiky hair, I got blue hair, so Bluey and Piney"

"You understand just how stuuupid that sounds right?" Eventually, the two noticed me standing there.

"Oh! It's you again...where's your buddy?"

"Doesn't matter, regardless, there's no reason not to team up, we've got more numbers"

"Right, and who's that guy?" I looked behind me and saw Kenneth walked up more.

"I told you, we've got more numbers"

"oooooh, that's what you meant" Bluey snapped his fingers as he understood what I said. "I take it, he's your friend, considering you're fine with him just sneaking up on ya"

"We should head back to our site, get everyone introduced to each other" I looked to Kenneth, who nodded with agreement.

"Rightio, lead the way leader" I looked to bluey confused "Well, they seem to follow your lead, majority rules"

"I guess so" We started the walk back.

"So, how'd you all meet" Bluey made conversation.

"Lee was playing guitar, and, b-

"You can play guitar?" Bluey cut Kenneth off, Kenneth rolled his eyes.

"Alright then"

"Oh...sorry, continue"

"We just so happened to be around when he was playing, it's not often someone so young plays a soothing tune" I could tell he was keeping Nicholai's existence away from them.

"Sounds like a miracle, especially if you all stuck together after all these years."

"We may not get along all the time, but we're there for each other when it matt-" Cutting me off, five people walked out of the forest, before blocking our path.

"Seems we've come across some others" Piney walked in front of me, he summoned his weapon, being a big hammer, however the main part of the hammer had a few holes in it. Bluey stayed beside me, summoning a mace.

"It's nothing personal kids" The five summoned their weapons.

"You sure as hell make it seem like that" I faced the person who was frontmost.

"Only 4 teams can win, and from what we can tell, you already got 2, we got 3, there's no passive way to solve this."

"Says who? Isn't joining together technically making 1 team?" It was silent for a moment. Kenneth scooted closer to me, before whispering.

"These guys just tried to kill us, you gotta be joking with them joining"

"Nothin in the rules say anything about the merging of teams, only that you can join others, if there was, some saint would've had everyone win sooner or later" The guy spoke as though he knew of that. I tapped my foot in the snow, getting the other two's attention.

"Anyone got a knife to spare" Piney stepped back, summoning a knife then twirling it so the handle faced me. I grabbed it before speaking.

"Make an opening so we can all rush through, get them to follow, but not too fast, then I'll use that door to get behind them" They all seemed to agree in unison. We all grouped up before moving to the right side of the trial where there was enough of an opening to fit through.

"The hell're you doing? You all think walking slow will make it so we can't see you?"

"Not at all" I did my best not to sound condescending "Rather, I'd prefer we learned a bit more before we get killed" We kept going, we were practically past them, however, one got ahead of themselves, as they started rushing us. "This works too" I threw the knife at them before running with the others, if it hit, good for me, if it didn't, it gave me an extra second or two.

"Hey Leada" Bluey's accent was clearly on purpose "The knife counts as yours now, you can summon it back"

"I don't know how to do that"

"You sure? I thou...nevermind, it's like the HUD, just think of what you own or have and" He swiped his hand midair like he was grabbing something "There's an advanced version, but i can't be bothered" I took a breath, I tried thinking of the knife before I swiped my hand, just like it was explained, the knife reappeared in my hand, with the blade red and dripping.

"Would you look at that, my throwing is still good."

"What the hell?" As we continued running, we saw Nicholai sitting at the site.

"Pleasure to meet you, we're being followed" Bluey spoke out before sliding to a halt, the other two soon followed while I kept going.

"And wher-" Kenneth stopped Nicholai from giving me away. Soon, I had gotten far enough that it was silent, I could only hear my beating heart as I started getting tired. After a minute of silence and running, I made it to the wall. Going against my body's desire for rest, I kept pressing on, until I had noticed I was on the path as before, I could see the footprints, and up ahead, everyone arguing. I slowly trudged forward, no longer having the energy to continue, slowly my body caught its breath, yet I kept using this as an opportunity to regain my energy. When I got close enough that my movements could be heard, I lowered myself to a crouch before getting even closer to one of them. As I got alarmingly close, I stuck to the nearby trees, beside the trial.

"That ain't our problem" Piney, sounding extremely annoyed spoke.

"It ain't that big of a deal!"

"It is for us you bastards!" Nicholai instantly replied to one of the hostile people in the opposing group.

"Everyone, let's relax now! We can just fight later no? The trials are meant to be a place where we get a grasp of our powers" I looked at the formation of the group, if I gave it my all, I could probably get everyone without them noticing.

"Well too fuckin bad, we've done this for too long." When I got close to the person most at the back, I kicked the inside of their leg before grabbing their mouth and stabbing them in the neck, instantly, they faded away. Well, no need to hide the body then. Kenneth looked at me through the crowd, he tilted his head slightly before blinking with his left eye once. That's one of our codes from the zombie outbreak isn't it?..."Give a signal" When I understood what he wanted, I made a stomping motion.

"The hell was that?" Seeing that the person who said that was the next in my line, I waited for them to finish before I did the same thing as the other one, now it wouldn't be weird if they didn't talk later. I looked back at the rest of the group, they had moved a bit more forward, being more together.

"Here we go then" I leaped forward, stomping my leg in the snow, letting out a crunching sound, as two of them looked back, my group rushed forward, going for the person in the front. I was able to slash at one of their legs, however they managed the same, I stood back up, yet staggered slightly. The one to my left began approaching with a halberd, I was looking for a chance to counter it, yet one never came, they were however, stopped with an arrow through the chest. As I smirked from Kenneth's support, I was struck by a bat. I felt my head as I fell to the floor and was greeted with warmth, as I could feel myself bleeding. I looked up, they were raising their bat in the air to slam down at me. As they swung down I attempted to block with the knife, at the very least it would put up some resistance, yet, the hit never came, and the body hit to the floor beside me before vanishing, and with it, a dagger connected to a chain was there, when I looked to where the chain led to, I saw Sam looking away with her hand extended, and the chain wrapped around her arm. Another weapon, a sickle-like weapon, dangled from her other arm, also wrapped around with chain.

"Heh, good job kid" Bluey spoke as he clashed with the leader of the group, Nicholai tried slashing at them, but their weapon split into two, blocking Bluey and Nicholai. The leader let go of one weapon, moving slightly right to avoid Nicholai. As soon as she was preparing another slash, the leader did a motion before a shockwave knocked everyone back. My body got covered in snow after being thrown back, I began using my arm to wipe away the snow covering my face before I heard a click, when my sight returned I saw the leader holding a flare gun, they had just loaded it. I used my arms to stand faster and I was ready to sprint to at least try and tackle them, yet, right when I took a step on my recently cut leg, I was brought back down to the snow, with my leg in even more pain, as though someone was actively crushing it. They aimed the flare gun at the sky, they pulled the trigger and soon a loud pew sound launched into the air before the entire sky above us was engulfed in bright red. When i looked back down, a beam shot towards the leader, piercing their chest causing them to fade, and from the snow, Nicholai rose up with the pistol from before, yet, one of the pieces connected to the battery were now spinning.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Everything was silent for a while, everyone, except for me begun to stand, seeing everyone was okay, I rested my head back in the snow, trying my best to ignore the crushing pressure on my leg. Using my right arm I turned myself over, I saw the fake sky this place had made, though faint, I could see the constructed stars in the sky. I only got the chance to see it for a moment before I saw pink, I looked slightly more up and noticed Sam.

"Are you alright!?" She crouched down before looking at me, eventually seeing the cut leg and turning away from it after seeing enough. "Nicholai!" I heard the snow crunch before Nicholai was also within my sight.

"Jeez, how much blood do you have?"

"Wha-?" Sam grabbed under my arms after hearing my confusion, helping me sit up, I looked towards my cut leg and saw that the entire area's snow was red. "oh..god" Although not totally out of it, I still felt slightly faint from it all.

"On three" I saw Sam nod, they both took an arm. "Three" With no previous warning I was raised up, and the pain on my leg worsened

"Fu..nnngh...Really!?" I looked at Nicholai.

"Baby about it later" I saw her look behind us "Ken, you're carrying"

"I can limp the way" Nicholai looked back at me, clearly annoyed

"Even if you could, it's not healthy, and yeah, key info, you can't walk with this" There was no use arguing, anytime I tried I get proven wrong anyways. We all turned around, letting me see Kenneth walk over before turning around and crouching.

"Come on now" I couldn't do much but practically throw myself. Kenneth did his best not to grab my injured area while picking me up, yet I could tell it was difficult, I felt stupid.

"Sam, you're next in line" Nicholai looked over to her

"Huh?"

"We decided this"

"We decided that as a zombie thing...incase something goes wrong, not as a new life with all this"

"Same thing, no use going out of order here anyways" As Nicholai and Sam spoke, I saw Piney's hud appear.

"Hey, we're gonna have to go"

"Go where?" Kenneth moved his head to face piney.

"We're needed somewhere, meaning we gotta split"

"Huh? And that makes sense how?" Nicholai spoke with clear irritation.

"Sorry, it's not really something we're allowed to go against if we wanna be one of the top 4. Just take care all of you" Nicholai and Kenneth sighed, while Sam looked worried, soon, the two took off, leaving us.

"Great, those guys you brought did so well" With sarcasm, Nicholai directed the comment to me.

"They did well enough" Kenneth began moving.

"Nicholai, help me carry some stuff" The two went into the tent, before coming back out with the bags of supplies we had.

"So, where to now?" Nicholai walked ahead of everyone, using the back end of her scythe to clear anything on the ground.

"We could try going into the woods, create a new camp there" I suggested, thinking of ideas was about the only thing I could do.

"Well, that tent you two had is a bit big to carry around"

"I know..." I looked into the woods, it looked endless, the trees would be good cover I thought. While we were moving on, Kenneth tripped up on something, yet managed to keep going, I however, felt the sudden movement in my leg, causing even more pain.

"Sorry"

"I-it's okay..."

"What'd you trip on anyways?" Nicholai looked back at us.

"I don't really know, I couldn't see it"

"Want me to go check?" Sam stopped walking as she waited for an answer.

"No, no, you're fine" I waved my hand at her, motioning for her to not go. "We can start heading in now" Everyone came to a stop. "This looks the best, it's a straight path for most of it unlike the others, however we can take a turn to get the cover of the trees"

"Finding it after walking would be easier too" Nicholai rested most of the scythe on her shoulder.

"Exactly, just look for the one part of the woods that is a straight line in and out"

The group continued on, heading into the forest, it wasn't loud, yet the snow was the heaviest here, and every step had a quiet crunch.

"At least the snow feels nice"

"It's also audible"

"No need to be a buzzkill" Sam slouched over. While they continued talking I paid attention to how the trees were, seeing which place was the best to go to.

"We should take a left here"

"Why's that? They seem the same, left and right" Nicholai, once more looked back at us.

"That guy shot a flare, meaning there's more people who're gonna be around, if we go right, the straight line we're on right now makes it easier to see the right side from the left, and vice versa, they're the same, but, they're probably going to come from the left...so we'll be less visible this way"

"Huh" Sam started walking backwards "I'll check it!" Sam raised her voice so we could hear her. We shifted a bit to the right. "Yup! It's good!" She ran back over to us.

"So, what's the plan to make shelter?" While Nicholai asked the question, I patted Kenneth's shoulder, signaling him to let me down. He set me up agaisnt a tree with the least snow around it.

"Well, we could make a quinzee"

"A fucking what?"

"A quinzee...it's like...an igloo? Sorta? They take a while to make though..."

"How much is a while?"

"an hour and a half? minimum"

"Better than nothing"

"They're also used more so for below freezing temps"

"Well, we're not doing it because it's cold" Kenneth pulled his sleeves over his arms

"Quinzee it is then" With my conflicting instructions, for two hours and a half, they scooped up and dug out snow with just their sleeves.

"My hands are freeeeezing" Sam started shaking her hands, making her sleeves flop around.

"Your sleeves are too thin then" Nicholai, still going at it, commented on Sam's cold.

"It's a jacket, it's as puffy as it can be"

"I thought it was only the neck area with that extra floof?" Kenneth begun shaking his hands too, taking a break.

"It doesn't matter anymore" Trying to put as little pressure on my leg as possible, I leaned against the tree and stood up. I limped my way over and went into it, using the knife to dig a bit down, then, pushing up extra snow to have an elevated place to go on. After it was done, I went back out.

"Come here, if it does hurt, it's my responsibility" Nicholai was holding Sam's hand, they had gotten a bit paler. Nicholai took off her jacket and laid it over Sam's arms "Take a break and you" She looked over to me. "Leg, lemme see" There wasn't much I could do but sit down. I stuck my leg out, setting it on the snow, Nicholai crouched down and pulled up the cuff. The area around the cut was stained in red "Ugh" She pressed around it slightly "How is it?"

"Much...less pain than before"

"Considering the pause I assume it's still noticible"

"I can stand though"

"It's not if you can, it's if you should"

"I can't have Kenneth keep carrying me"

"You know Sam is going to if she notices you're falling behind...just don't overdo it" Without warning, she pressed on the cut itself, it hurt enough that I was forced to grit my teeth. "At least you're not screaming it out...So it's enough to grit, but not enough to be uncontrollable" She thought for a while "If you want to walk, you do so slowly and for only a few minutes at a time, do you understand?" I nodded. "I'll try finding something for it, steal if I have to"

"That's a bit..."

"We're not killing anyone here, there's no need for morals"

"I guess so" She stood up before going over to Kenneth.

"How're you holding up?" I zoned out of their conversation. That zoning out didn't last for long as snow crunched to the right of me.

"It's only been a day and half..." I could tell Sam was dejected.

"Well, at least everyone is together...and we have things to defend ourselves"

"We do...you...still can't."

"Yeah, speaking of which, thanks for that" I leaned back, facing my head towards Sam. She was holding her hands together while looking at the snow.

"Don't mention it, it's what we're here for, to look out for each other." It got colder, I could see my own breath now. "I should probably give this back to Nicholai" She stood up, unwrapping the jacket around her arms. I really couldn't do much, if I stood up for too long, Nicholai would scold me, and I probably would be more harm than good, as such, I took a look at everything around me. Of course, it was mostly trees, I could however, hear birds chirping, it made me wonder how many animals were being replicated at once, or, was it just noise?

"It's pretty" The sun shining through the leaves made beautiful rays and every breath I took was refreshing, though, that could be due to the pain in my leg being relieved with every breath. With nothing better to do, I inspected the knife I had. The serrated edges were stained, but when I looked at the part of the blade closest to the hilt, I noticed what looked like roots of a plant, I moved my hands to the bottom of the hilt, to allow myself to see what it looked like. More root engravings were around the hilt, with an empty section in the middle. I wiped the blade along my leg, it didn't clean it fully, but at least it mostly was.

"So with Lee out, who's cooking this time?" Nicholai started the discussion, in my mind then, I was confused as to why it needed to be someone else, I could still cook, Sam had the same thought.

"Why not Lee? We can't just help him up or get him the stuff he needs to get?"

"And if Lee isn't around to cook for us?" There was silence, and with that silence, it was agreed a second person should practice.

"Well, should be easy, we just gotta follow the instructions" Kenneth went to go reach for something in one of the food bags we brought.

"There are none" After hearing me say that, Kenneth paused, took a breath, then stood up.

"I'm outta ideas"

"You're joking" Nicholai glared at Kenneth. Sam was ready to say something until all of our HUDs opened and Raymond's face was there, everyone jumped.

"What the hell!!" Nicholai instinctively swung at it.

"Relax" Raymond's voice came out clearly, not like phones or mics that have that effect, it was as though he was right beside us."I could've sworn I made it so you get an incoming call message first, and get the choice to accept or decline. Oh! by the way, being able to see the person in the call is not on by default, so, if you wanna keep it on, at least put some kinda profile pic"

"That's a thing?" Sam brought up a second HUD, and scrolled about.

"Anyhow...about why I called, you all had a robot with you guys right? Dave?"

"He was mine, but yes" Kenneth crossed his arms.

"Right, anyhow, we're bringing your stuff down, a camera...that robot...there was also...someone...I think, who went with, they claim to know you...honestly it seemed surreal that you guys knew...whatever it is, when you were human...oh right, since I'm not with you all right now, your HUD has settings, changing the color, accessibility, all that, should be at the bottom of that bar on the left...other than that, take care" The call ended and we were all there, confused.

"Did...we know something strange as humans?"

"I don't think so" Sam responded to my question...though it wasn't exactly a conclusive answer. We all went into our HUD's settings and made some adjustments, whether it was the color it appeared as, all the way down to whose call was auto accepted. "Oh! There's a chat thing instead of that email stuff"

"Hm?" I stood up a bit too fast, I winced, holding my leg, before recovering and walking slowly over. Along the way, I heard a quiet ping sound, considering how the others reacted, everyone heard it in their own heads. We all went back to our HUDs, looking at the notification.

'You have been added to group chat: Bravo 6'

"Bravo 6?" Nicholai looked at Sam.

"Well, I mean, there were six of us, it has six letters, it sounds cool...why not?"

"I...actually see where you're coming from, nevermind then"

Soon a chibi like version of Sam appeared in the chat, both of her eyes were closed as she stuck her left arm out with her thumb up with a smile.

"What the..." I could only look at it confused.

"We all got our own, they're perfectly based on how we are" Considering the HUDs are part of our minds now...it made sense. A second later, another chibi appeared, though this time, of Nicholai holding a sign saying 'Don't be reckless' with her usual deadpan expression.

"It's actually pretty cute" Though rare, Nicholai smiled, seemingly content with her portrayal. On inspection, it seems everyone also chose a profile picture, Sam's was a Pink Rose, Kenneth had a cog wheel, Nicholai's was a heartbeat, and mine was a sword engraved on a shield.

"Oooh! When I get my camera, we should take a picture and make that our pfps" Sam swayed back and forth with joy.

"That's if your camera can connect to it."

"It better" Sam looked annoyed at Nicholai for her comment.

"I wouldn't see why not, if it's connected to our minds"

"I wouldn't get your hopes up though"

"My mind tells me to be more inclined to listen to Lee than you, Nicholai"

"That's fair, by the way, how are we gonna cook anything?"

"With a...fire..." We all looked around, none of us brought anything to start a fire, and all the branches on the trees were higher up.

"Well, let's forget about cooking then, there were some snacks left over right?"

"Rightio! Let's have a movie night in the Quinzee!" Sam grabbed a bag of stuff and headed in.

"OI! You're not picking the movie!" Nicholai followed. The thing was pretty big, but considering it was around other piles of snow, it was overall hard to notice.

"It'll be fine, no need to stand guard, come on" I soon headed in with Kenneth.

"Cozy" Sam sat with her legs to her chest.

"It's deserved considering most are normally made for two or three people" We were now all sat down somewhere.

"Right, we sorta had to extend it" It took a minute to explain how, but Nicholai was eventually taught how to use her HUD for movies, in the middle of her being taught, I sorta realized something.

"So...who's gonna find that thing being dropped?"

"With our stuff?" Sam leaned forward.

"Yeah"

"Hm, well-" Kenneth was about to stand until I did

"I'll go for i-"

"Sit down" I sat instantly back down after Nicholai glared at me.

"I'll get back to it" Kenneth stood up and went out.

Nicholai continued to search for something to watch, while she did that, I tried summoning a few things that could be considered mine, yet none of them worked. I held my journal recently before I died...maybe...It strained my head a bit, but when I shut my hand slightly, the journal appeared in my hand.

"Would ya look at that" I flicked off the clip keeping the mass amount of pages closed, it opened up and stopped at a random page.

"Oh! That one was the school festival" Sam was peeking over.

"We're taking a trip down memory lane huh?" Nicholai closed her hud and looked over at the both of us.

"We could use the HUD's database, but this feels much more personal...even if the database is our memories." I put my thumb at the bottom so the pages wouldn't move.

"I get what you mean, instead of just rewatching it all happen again, we can see how you felt about it all" Sam opened a box of chocolates and ate one.

"Well, I guess I'll give it a read then"

2 Years Ago-December ??

Of course, I wouldn't just rewrite what was in my journal, instead, I'll include everything that I forgot about when I first wrote it.

I was walking to school as normal, trudging through the snow, stores and the streets had set up lighting to make up for the darker days at this time of year, it was always odd to me how it would look like it was midnight during the day sometimes, but, at that point in time, I considered it normal. I heard someone scooping up snow and patting it down, while walking I leaned over slightly and grabbed snow from a pile. She had done this many times at this point, that me doing this is warranted. After i patted down the snow into a ball, I waited until I stopped hearing footsteps crunching in the snow, and the moment I did, I turned around and threw the snowball at her, the two snowballs collided mid-air and the snow fell down to the ground, causing a small pewf sound.

"Come ooon Lee~ Why can't you just let me have one win?" Sam slouched a bit, clearly joking about being upset, once she was done her normal, positive attitude came back as she skipped over to me.

"I simply just remember how you are"

"Wow, I mean that much to you?" Her voice obviously implied that she was teasing. "Oh! Do you know what today is?

"Festival, I recall"

"Yep Yep!" I continued walking, with her soon walking at my side. "I'm gonna do the run! Ooh! or! That Cafe thing"

"You can admit to wanting to do it all"

"I wanna do it all!"

"I guess it makes sense you'd be so hyper about it"

"Of Course I'd be hyper about it, I'm gonna make sure I never have to go back to a hospital"

Current Time: "Hold on" Nicholai interrupted

"What?" I looked up from my journal.

"Who's to say Sam isn't still inflicted with that illness?"

"Well, I seem and feel fine" Sam had put her feet together while her hands were placed in the little circle her legs made.

"Still...we were able to find something for you before you died, and it's unlikely it would run out instantly...we should keep a lookout for it returning...anyways...it was just something I noticed, continue." I looked back down and continued.

Back to the Journal:

"You can't stay out of it forever, you still need checkups"

"Waaaah, It's been working for two years, I'll be okay."

"Riiight"

"Sir, Miss"

Current Time: "Oh! It's Dave!" Sam's interjected.

Back to Journal:

A small robot the size of a torso floated in the air in front of us.

"Where's Ken?"

"The Broker twins have already made it to school, I was sent to go after you two as you are later than normal"

"Yeah, Sam overslept" With her foot she gently hit my ankle.

"You could've woken me up"

"Hey, I tried, you're something else when it comes to not waking up, you could win a competition with that"

"That's fair" Before we knew it, we had made it to the school, students were running about, parents were amused, and the teachers looked dead inside from dealing with us

"Ah, you two are finally here" One of the teachers leaned on the gate, seemingly making sure any adult was actually a parent.

"Not surprised you noticed us"

"Pink-haired girl, [email protected] guy, pretty noticeable"

Current Time: A painful headache washed over me, that wasn't right at all, that's not what I wrote...

:"Uh...wasn't...it green hair? You got the white hair when you died" Sam leaned back, giving me space.

"You gonna be alright?" Nicholai sounded concerned. "Maybe you read it wrong?" She took it from my hand and looked at it "...or not..."

"We all make mistakes...but...Lee's journal having one...and it being about white-hair..." Sam looked down.

"Would that mean our memories in that database would be you having white-hair?" Nicholai started going through the database on her HUD.

"You know...it's sorta odd that Lee was the only person who changed visually" Sam pointed it out, and we all began thinking on it..

"What Raymond said about what I may be able to do if I get my power...the visual change...Sam gained her weapon to protect me and not herself like we were told..."

"And the fact he clearly has a bias to us"

"Right, why send us our stuff in the middle of thi-" A spike pierced through the snow beside Nicholai, if Kenneth was still in here he would've gotten killed.

"What a waste of two hours!" Nicholai, clearly pissed off, summoned her scythe and slashed above us, splitting apart the snow. Another spike flew at us, grazing Nicholai's shoulder. We all went to run, it caused my leg to burn heavily, but I managed.

"How is Kenneth gonna find us?"

"He'll figure it out" Nicholai was the person to answer Sam, as I was focused on running and keeping my leg from locking in pain.I winced as the pain had gotten to its peak, I looked down and gritted my teeth that was until my focus went to something else, as my leg was in the middle of the air, before touching the ground, I saw a purple line, something like a tendril, for where I was about to be. It was too late to redirect myself, and as soon as I landed, the tendril recoiled back before it swinged at me, I thought it would be nothing, yet, it felt like I was hit with a cannon, as I was sent flying into a tree. My head slammed into a tree and everything went numb as I landed in the snow on my stomach, i hadn't realized how far I was until I noticed Sam and Nicholai far off in the distance. Both of them looked worried and frantically looked around. I wanted to tell them to just leave, yet I couldn't, all I could do was let out a wheeze as I couldn't catch any breath. I reached out for them, with my shaking, numb hand, yet it was futile, as it didn't take long for me to succumb to the pain, my eyes closed and my grip on life had eventually let go with it