Five days after Grandmother’s [Trial], Isse woke up to the usual sound of the invisible orchestra playing an energizing tune. Sometimes she wondered if those arachne were sadomasochists, giving already hyperactive children even more energy the moment they woke up. Maybe it was some kind of vendetta towards the [Carers], an inside feud among the various groups that formed this tribe of arachne.

It was sort of like after school clubs: you had the [Carers], the [Mages], the [Warriors], the [Hunters], and then the utility Classes, like [Cooks], [Seamstresses], [Musicians], et cetera et cetera. She’d found out that, apparently, [Carers] were not considered some sort of utility Class among arachne, since those poor women had to take care of the literal future of their species and make sure they grew up as good, helpful adults. And possibly without killing each other while playing ‘Hang the Child’. A surprisingly popular game among most spiderlings, for some reason.

So the [Carers] were like the big, responsible book club. Most of the time. Makira was the exception, often encouraging the children to give in to their wilder side and do extremely stupid things. Like playing ‘Hang the Child’. Or transforming any game of ‘Queen of the Tree’ into full on battles with blood feuds and the likes. Or covering entire areas of the forest used by the [Warriors] to train in webs. Which, in itself, wasn’t so bad. They were arachne after all. What made that last part aggravating were the messages and barely visible pictures and patterns she somehow managed to get the children to make.

She was chaotic, but in a good way. And no, there’s no ‘most of the time’ to add at the end with an example of her being chaotic in a bad way that hurt more than someone’s pride. She just liked to have fun, and always got the spiderlings to join in.

All things considered, the last five days hadn’t been bad at all. The Voice, Siidi, had calmed down after a good night of sleep and a short conversation in her Mind Castle. Sure, Isse dreaded the idea of going back to Grandmother in two days, but she managed to let that thought haunt her only in the last moment before she fell asleep, exhausted and happy, embracing Anda and being embraced in turn. It felt right. Good. It calmed her.

That day, after she woke, the morning started as usual: get down the tree she slept on, be greeted by Makira and the other [Carers], the music stopping, the ghostly [Musicians], or [Bards] as Siidi liked to call them, disappearing into the nothingness they seemingly lived in. She didn’t understand the reason the Silken Choirs were so secretive. Even the Voice didn’t know why. Maybe they were trying to Level in some mysterious Class, experimenting. It was a possibility.

Siidi told her that, in her time, during the Era of Hunts, arachne had also been feared for that reason: their numbers were so great that they could allow themselves to experiment, creating new Classes to fight in stranger, more unpredictable, ways. And, while those peculiar Classes developed, the other, more typical Levelers fought armies and nations.

Much had changed since then, but not their desire to experiment.

After an unusually calm breakfast, a new arachne appeared in the clearing where they were eating. She looked at all the spiderlings with calculating eyes, nodded, put on a bright smile that promised hell, and clapped her hands.

"Children! The time has come!"

Something in the woman’s too-cheerful tone sent a shiver down Isse’s spine and made the soft fur on her spider half stand on end. The Voice’s sudden silence was also an indicator of how serious the situation was.

"Today is going to be your first day of school! Aren’t you excited?!"

…What? she thought.

Yep, was the Voice’s answer.

How?

I have no idea.

Makira, who was on the woman’s left, had a pained smile on her face as she placed two fingers on her forehead, throat, and heart.

Please tell me it’s a sick joke. I’ve been alive for only a week.

From the chatterbox’s face, I’m afraid it’s not.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

A screech erupted from her throat as she tried to give voice to that last thought, but her vocal chords were still incapable of that action.

Makira looked her way and nodded, her pained expression scrunching up in understanding as the other children looked at the [Teacher] in confusion.

Apparently the woman who had just ruined her day was called Skaladia, Skala for short, and was one of the highest level arachne in the tribe. Why? Well, imagine trying to get over two dozen hyperactive children to sit still in front of desks made out of tree stumps, keeping their attention as you taught them things, and then actually managing to teach them something. Anything.

Now, after you’ve done that, take that mental image, shred it into pieces, and try harder, because no matter what you’ve thought, it most certainly doesn’t compare.

The little arachne were walking and climbing all around the new clearing that looked distinctly more artificial than the ones they’d been in so far, orienting themselves, not really paying much attention to the woman calmly sitting on the ground at the center of the circle of stumps.

She wasn’t moving or talking, just looking at them as the [Carers] on the outskirts of the clearing got ready to capture any fugitive child. And there would be, after they realized that the activity they were about to be unwilling participants of wasn’t as entertaining as any of the other tests and free-time afternoons.

Makira knew there always were. Initially just out of boredom. Then desperation, caused by said boredom. There was nothing quite like learning new languages from scratch while you couldn’t even speak that just made you want to disappear into nothingness like the Silken Choirs did every morning.

The [Carers] were already preparing themselves physically and mentally for the morning hunts for escaped children. And the worst part was, the other adults wouldn’t move a finger to help. Because they found it funny. They would only step in if a child got lost somewhere they shouldn’t be.

So they looked at the clearing and shook their heads with resigned smiles. Because, even if their workload was about to increase drastically, there was something to smile about: there were children, they were happy, untouched by the hunts of the outside world or the knowledge they were hated just because of their species. They were pure, innocent. That would change. They would change. The [Carers] knew that. And, exactly because of that, they smiled even now. They would always smile for their little charges. It was the least they could do for them, knowing what the future had in store for them.

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Sure, maybe nothing would happen. Maybe they’d stay in this forest and nobody would find them. Nobody disliked the peace. But they’d been created for war and death and destruction. And they knew for certain that, one day, sooner or later, those things would find them. That’s what this was: a large scale game of hide and seek where every living race in the world was a seeker, a hunter, while they were hiding. Some would call them cowards. They didn’t care. Who were they, those seekers, to judge them? What gave them the right? Their puny, hateful, bored, gods? Arachne didn’t pray to them. At most, they trusted Death to do its job and be there in their last moments to shake their hands and play one last game with them.

Makira remembered an old story Grandmother had told her. A story that had been passed on to her by the elder before her. A story of the changing of an Era, when the Hunt had ended, giving its rightful place to the Era of Games. A story from the last, greatest, battle between the Hunters and the Arachne. When their species had nearly been wiped away.

The story went that, when one of the elders, just a young [Warrior] at the time, had been killed with a sword going through her upper heart and one lung, she’d opened her eyes to a great, checkered, board, crowded with the souls of her sisters. She didn’t know the game. Nobody knew, in those times, even among the living. It was chess.

On one side were all the arachne that had fallen in battle, acting as pieces, from simple pawns, to bishops and knights and rooks and queens. And, floating on top of them, the king, one of them, playing and trying to beat Death itself, who played on the other side with pieces carved of white Void.

Every single one of her sisters had gotten to play: Hundreds, no, thousands, of games. And Death had been there to shake all of their hands, embrace them, thank them, ask for forgiveness. Some of the girls just laughed it off and disappeared in his cloak. Others accepted the apology. Others still gave her a parting kiss before disappearing in its embrace, while others shouted in anger. Some asked for another game because it was fun. They all went. The board slowly emptied. Pieces started appearing, carved from the dark of the night sky between stars.

Finally, the elder was the last one left.

She played.

And she won.

So Death made her an offer.

She accepted.

The story didn’t tell what the offer was. It just ended with the elder waking up on the battlefield, alone, surrounded by the mutilated bodies of her sisters, somehow alive and well.

An old story. Not a happy one. But one told to give hope.

Makira and the other [Carers] looked, and the smiles never left their faces.

They only became bigger when Skala coughed to get the children’s attention and used her first Skill: [Children, Sit At Your Desks].

Immediately every child that wasn’t sitting in front of a stump moved to reach one.

They stared at the woman with wide eyes. What was this sorcery? Why were they here?

The only one, apart from the [Carers], who knew the answer to that question, was Isse. Who, currently, was at a random stump, forehead on the smooth wood, thinking about how shitty her life was for having to go back to school just a week after she’d died and been reborn.

"Now, children, let’s begin!" cheerfully began Skala, which reminded Isse of some of her elementary school teachers. Too happy sounding for what they were doing.

Sure, it meant they liked their jobs. But the chances of their enthusiasm being passed on to the students were usually nil. Unless the lesson entailed watching a film.

"You can call me Skala. I’m a [Teacher], and I will be in charge of your education! With me you will learn how to read and write in the languages of the continent we’re on, Irevia, and the closest one, Eva. You’ll also be learning Coroman later on, the language of merchants.

"The lessons will be in the morning after breakfast, will last three hours, and then you’ll have the rest of the day off. I want to ask you to bear with it. I know it may look useless. Stars, I’m pretty sure right now you don’t even understand why you’re here and why I’m talking like this is a bother. I’m told you will understand soon. But learning the languages of this world could very well save your life one day. After all, knowledge is power!"

She wasn’t even giving them any illusions about this possibly being pleasant. She was outright telling them it would feel like a bother. But she did say it would be useful.

Then Isse, who had only partially listened to what the woman had said, like any good student with a total attention span of 7 seconds or less, had a realization: she was from Earth! She knew how to write in English, and everyone here talked in English. She could show how superior she was! Sure, she didn’t know this Coro-something that sounded like the name of a character from an anime, but whatever.

"Very well, let’s begin! [A Pile a Day: Paper Sheets]; [Class: Refill Inkwells]. Now girls, don’t use the ink to draw around. [That’s an Order]."

A small pile of sheets of paper appeared on the larger tree stump in front of her and she immediately started distributing them to her students as all the inkwells that had been embedded in the wood, which nobody had noticed until now, filled themselves with black ink and a small bird feather. Their pens.

Immediately, Isse began scribbling the English alphabet of the paper, her hands moving quickly and leaving smudges all over the page. She wasn’t used to having to dip a quill in ink to keep writing, and didn’t know the art behind taking just the right amount. Her hand kept touching the still fresh letters when she went down a line, and many times she just kept scribbling at the page with a drier and drier pen, her letters slowly disappearing into the whiteness of the paper.

Still, by the end of it, she had written down the entire alphabet and even some sentences and, all in all, it was quite legible.

She walked towards the [Teacher] and proudly handed the now curious woman her great work! She expected her to open her eyes wide in surprise, maybe start sputtering and saying things like ‘This is impossible’ or ‘It doesn’t make sense’ or even ‘How did you know all this?’

She already felt the smugness rise in her.

And it was promptly demolished the moment the woman just frowned and said:

"Children, I believe I ordered you all not to scribble on the paper. It’s a limited supply, and my Skill takes a day to recharge. Now, little one, I don’t know how you managed to overcome my Order Skill. But please, don’t waste any more paper."

She looked at the paper, sighed, crumpled it up and threw it on her table.

"Now go back to your seat, please."

Isse did as she was told, all the while wondering what the hell had just happened. How come she said that her writings were ‘scribbles’? That was the English alphabet! She knew how to write!

That’s when she noticed the cackling in her head.

What’s so funny, Siidi?

The cackling only increased. She managed to stop only when she reached her stump, and simply said:

It’s funny, because you think you’re speaking English, but in truth it’s just your brain translating the language of this world into something you can understand. English doesn’t exist in this world. So far you’ve heard only Irevian. I’m sorry Isse, there’s no easy way out of this.

In other parts of the world, two other people were discovering, or were going to discover, this same thing on their own. The first was a very surprised Alice, who had decided to try and read an alchemy book from her boss’ library. The second was Liam, who’d been tasked with reading a book from his instructor.

It was a headache. But, at least, they had people around them willing to help. So there was that at least.