"Hi. Are you the new student by chance?"

John's head turned in the direction of the voice.

Standing only a few feet away from John was a thin man with thick glasses and a long beard.

The combination of the nerdy aesthetic and the full beard made him look positively uncanny.

How did he find me?

Usually, John would hear people the instant they got within a few feet of him.

~It must be because I was distracted playing with the dragons.~

That was the only logical conclusion that John could think of.

"I probably am." Said, John

The man nodded.

"Okay, nice to meet you. My name is Harry. I'll be your drill sergeant for the course."

Harry offered his hand to shake.

John took his hand with a smile.

"Nice to meet you, Harry. My name's John."

Harry. That was a name you'd expect from a middle-aged accountant. Not for a nerd or dill sergeant. Or nerdy drill sergeant. John would know. He was an accountant, so he had known many accountants throughout his life. And he swore that at least half of them were named Harry.

"Okay. I'll take you to where orientation is happening. You're actually ten minutes late right now."

John smiled.

"Thank you. Also thank you for not being rude about my Dragons." Said John

Harry smiled.

"It's no problem. I was warned about them by Joe beforehand."

I can only assume that he's referring to Joe Stone. How is he on a first-name basis with Joe? Who is this guy?

John found no answers to those questions as he followed behind Harry.

The dragons spent a few minutes playing with each other before realizing that John was walking away. They all flew into the air and flew after John.

The dragons landed on him. Two on his shoulder and one on his head.

...….

"We're here."

Scattered on a grass field was an array of widely varying figures.

Some were tall and fat like John. Others were tall and jacked. Even more were short and skinny.

Some wore fancy designer clothes and looked like they were pretty well off.

Others wore only rags. Some of the men couldn't even afford shirts.

And based on their lack of abs, they weren't shirtless just to show off.

Warriors have one of the highest average salaries in the world. It's obvious that if someone was heavily in debt and looking to pay it off becoming a warrior would be a way to go.

And with the recent war against the aliens, I'd bet the number of poor people are increasing exponentially.

The dragons on John scanned the people around them with even more heavy suspicion.

John made a note to watch out in order to make sure that they didn't attack anyone.

"EVERYONE!"

John's head snapped up to the voice.

Standing on a podium was Harry.

The whole crowd was looking at Harry attentively.

"I think we're going to start today off with the hardest test! WARRIOR STYLE!"

"HURRRRA!"

The people let out an enthusiastic cheer in response to that.

John could see that Harry was smiling, too.

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

"UNLEASHE THE LIONS!"

Wait. What?

ROAR

John's eyes darted in the direction of the sound.

Running towards the crowd was a pack of at least twenty lions.

Everyone began to run in the opposite direction of the attacking lion pack. John couldn't help but smile as he saw the lions running towards him.

Free....

"FREE STAT POINTS!"

John began to jiggle in the lion's direction. A wide grin was on his face.

"I'll fucking eat you!"

One of the lions jumped into the air. Its claws were outstretched, and its jaws were wide open.

John bitch slapped the lion out of the air with as much force as possible.

CRACK

The Lion's spine bent at an odd angle. Its head compressed like a paper bag, and its eyeballs popped out of it's head.

It was destroyed.

"HA! Take that bitch!"

John face-planted.

Atop his back was the heavy weight of a big cat.

John struggled to find the strength to get up from the ground with his own weight. Let alone with the added weight of the lion on top of that.

He was stuck.

The lion bit into his neck.

With a mighty tug, the lion pulled out a chunk of John's neck.

"AHHHHHHHH!"

John couldn't help but scream from the pain.

"YIP! YI!"

The sound of one of John's dragon's pained screams echoed above John.

"NO!"

Another lion walked up to John. It's jaws filled his vision.

Shit.

The next thing John saw was the inside of a stomach.

.....

Light. Flickering light.

Ringing. Ebbing and flowing to an invisible beat.

Most importantly.

Life. The heart beating. The rise and fall of the chest.

John was alive.

How am I alive?

Before John was a cold steel compound. There were fridged blue lights on the ceiling and a group of people lying prone on the floor.

Wait a second

They were all the people that John had seen in the lion attack.

"Oh. So you're the first to die. Funny. Given your size I thought you'd be one of the last."

John's head turned to the voice.

Standing above the people with glowing green light surrounding him was a familiar figure.

"Harry?"

Harry smiled.

"Yes. Do you like my trick? It's called an illusion. I can put almost anyone without special charms into them."

John's brows furrowed.

"How did you gain power like that in just a few weeks."

Harry smiled.

"Something like pain is always years too early," Harry said.

That doesn't answer my question at all.

John chose not to press the issue. He didn't want to risk getting put into those Illusions again.

"There's coffee and donuts over there if you want some."

Harry gestured to a small Counter impressed into a wall a few feet away.

John smiled.

I could gain some stat points.

After eyeballing, John guessed there were approximately five hundred donuts on the counter, which was more of a long table. As it stretched on farther than any counter should.

I need to eat all the donuts before everyone else wakes up!