Perhaps it was the way that she was dressed, but everyone could tell.
Ms. Happi was chipper and crisp like an apple. [Warning: NEW, keep upright.] She hadn't lost the spark in her eyes (that would come with age) or experienced exhausting days (with inadequate pay).
Even so, her core felt a tiny crack. It was tasteless like arsenic. It came deadly. And it was the handy attendance list that did her in. She stuttered. The student replied.
A slow answer, "yeah."
Which was met with a couple of innocent laughs. But as he turned around, the sounds that had been flying around dropped into silence.
The boy's dark, wine-red eyes veered across the room with a tilt of his head. The soft movement shuffled his white hair and caused it to wave in the breeze. He brushed the strands out of his eyes, but they fell back and stayed at his eyebrows. When he blinked, his eyelashes fluttered, which drew glances down to his flushed lips. Hushed whispers.
His features were filled out by delicate, pale skin that flickered in the sunlight. The class felt a hitch in their breath like they had seen a ghost... or a boy that didn't belong to any abstinent world.
"Yeah, my name's... Zero Dreams," He gently explained, wrenching everyone over with a glance, "Parents were drunk when they thought that up."
Ms. Happi couldn't say a word to that, so she continued reading the attendance. Which was only interrupted by a rumbling growl—
[NEW] Classroom Notification: "GROWL!"
The source? A boy in the front, who was sleeping: [Status: 'Do Not Disturb'].
Napping wasn't normally permitted, but Ms. Happi's generous heart had already thought of an explanation: the boy had been so excited for the first day of classes that he hadn't slept. She walked over to remind the boy to wake up. But before she got there, the boy awoke, muttering sleepily, "...here."
Ms. Happi asked him, concerned, "Are you feeling alright?"
"Fine," The boy answered—
[NEW] Classroom Notification: "GROWL!" x2
| 'Achievement Unlocked: Iron Stomach! [+1 Resistance to Hunger Pangs]' |
"I might be a bit hungry," The boy sheepishly smiled after his stomach growled (again), "I haven't had... breakfast." But as soon as he finished talking, another notification sounded:
- 'Ding!'
['Face-Saving Fortitude + 1']
<Dieze, stop it. No more pings.>
["No!" X]
"Oh, that's not good," Ms. Happi warmly glanced at him. "Here,"
Into thin air, Ms. Happi stuck her hand out, and out of thin air, pulled out some peanut-buttered almond cookies. The cookies were still perfectly crumbly and toasty as if freshly baked. She proceeded to fling one to the hungry boy, not realizing that she put too much force into her throw.
Instinctively, like a puppy eagerly waiting for a biscuit, the boy jumped backward, flipped over a desk, a student, and caught the cookie with his mouth. In one big gobble, it had disappeared, with not a crumb in sight.
'Hmm...' As a teacher, Ms. Happi was dedicated to fostering young talent. Now, she stepped back and proceeded to throw more cookies like how she would throw a frisbee, and amazingly, not a single one touched the floor.
'That's interesting,' Ms. Happi recalled the list of names off the top of her head and was about to speak when the boy introduced himself.
"Steven," The boy answered with a carefree smile. "Sorry to ask, Miss. But they spelled my name wrong in the database. Can that be corrected?"
Ms. Happi was charmed by the kid who seemed so gentle and happy.
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Fantasy[??? book - D grade] [Description: A third-rate novel about the slice of life adventures of a boy and his friendly AI assistant. Nothing bad happens.] Recalibrating description... [Description (Revised): A hand-me-down novel about a boy who goes mi...
