The soft sound of a broom moving across the floor was the first thing Vash noticed.
Swish. Swish.
He slowly opened his eyes.
Morning light had already entered through the small window of the room behind Grandpa's Noodles.
Grandma was sweeping the floor near the doorway.
She noticed him moving and glanced over.
"Good morning, Vash."
"Good morning, Grandma."
Vash sat up and rubbed his eyes.
For a moment, he simply stayed there.
Then he remembered.
Homework.
He reached for his phone.
The screen lit up.
Last night's mathematics problems were still open.
Vash looked at the unfinished work for a few seconds.
He had already solved most of it before sleeping, but there were still a few questions he wanted to check.
He opened his notes and worked through them one by one.
The first was easy.
The second took a little longer.
The third required him to go back through the example from the previous lesson.
He made a mistake.
He noticed it.
Then corrected it.
Finally, he closed the mathematics material.
Homework completed.
Vash placed the phone beside him.
At least I won't have to stand outside the classroom today.
That thought made him smile.
He changed, washed up, and went outside.
The restaurant was already beginning to wake.
Grandpa was checking the ingredients while Grandma prepared the morning work.
Vash helped where he could.
He carried a few things from one side of the kitchen to another, checked the tables, and made sure nothing had been left out from the previous night.
His movements were still slower than those of a completely healthy person, but they were becoming more natural every day.
The difference was small.
Someone who hadn't seen him before might not even notice it.
But Vash noticed.
Every step felt a little easier than it had weeks ago.
After breakfast, he picked up his schoolbag.
His new phone went into the bag as well.
Then he headed toward school.
---
Rohan was waiting near the entrance.
The moment he saw Vash, his eyes went toward the schoolbag.
"Did you bring it?"
Vash knew exactly what he meant.
"Yes."
Rohan grinned.
"The phone?"
Vash nodded.
Rohan immediately looked satisfied.
Vash shook his head.
"You're still thinking about the game?"
"Of course."
Vash remembered the four matches from the previous night.
His first game had been terrible.
Eleven deaths.
By the fourth game, he had reduced that to three.
And somehow, they had actually won.
"I still don't understand half of it," Vash admitted.
"You'll learn."
They continued toward the classroom.
The conversation soon shifted to schoolwork.
Vash didn't mind.
There was something strangely comfortable about walking to school with Rohan again.
For years, he had been separated from normal school life.
Now, small things like this felt important.
Not every day needed to contain something extraordinary.
Sometimes simply walking into school with a friend was enough.
---
The computer class came later that morning.
The students entered the computer room and took their seats.
Rows of computers filled the room.
Vash looked at the monitor in front of him.
He had used computers before, but mostly for basic things.
This felt different.
The teacher entered and placed a few sheets of paper on the desk.
"Today we're going to begin with web development."
The room became quieter.
The teacher explained that websites were built using different technologies and that the students would first learn the basic structure of a webpage using HTML.
He also briefly introduced C++, explaining that it was a programming language used for writing programs and solving computational problems.
The students listened.
Some seemed interested.
Others looked confused already.
Vash opened the editor on his computer.
A blank screen appeared.
The teacher began demonstrating a simple HTML structure.
Vash watched carefully.
Lines appeared on the screen.
They didn't look like ordinary sentences.
There were symbols.
Brackets.
Words that seemed to have special meanings.
Tags.
The teacher explained what each part did.
Vash followed along.
At first, it seemed simple.
Then he tried doing it himself.
His first attempt didn't work.
He looked at the screen.
Nothing appeared as he expected.
Vash checked his code.
He couldn't immediately see the problem.
He stared at the lines again.
Where did I go wrong?
He checked the beginning.
Then the middle.
Then the end.
One of the tags wasn't written correctly.
He fixed it.
The page changed.
Vash blinked.
"So that's what that does."
He continued.
---
The teacher eventually gave them the actual assignment.
They had two hours.
Each student had to create a simple front page using HTML.
It didn't need to be complicated.
A title.
Some text.
Basic structure.
Maybe a simple section or two.
But they had to create it themselves.
The timer began.
The room immediately filled with the sound of keyboards.
Vash looked at his blank page.
For several seconds, he didn't type.
There were too many things to remember.
He knew what the teacher had explained.
But knowing something when someone else demonstrated it was different from actually doing it yourself.
He started slowly.
One line.
Then another.
The page appeared differently than he expected.
He changed something.
It broke.
He changed it back.
It worked again.
Vash frowned.
Why?
He looked at the code.
Then something inside his mind began connecting the pieces.
He had seen the same structures repeated several times.
One part opened something.
Another part contained the information.
Another part closed it.
It reminded him of patterns he had noticed in other situations.
The System didn't appear.
There was no instruction telling him what to type.
Instead, Vash simply stared at the code.
His Pattern Recognition began doing what it had always done.
It didn't give him the answer.
It helped him notice relationships.
The same symbols appeared in different places.
Certain lines always worked together.
Some changes affected only one section of the page.
Others affected the entire structure.
Vash began testing his understanding.
He changed one line.
He checked the result.
Then he changed another.
The result changed again.
Slowly, the strange collection of symbols began to make sense.
Not completely.
But enough.
Then his Deep Analysis helped him break the problem into smaller parts.
Instead of looking at the entire page as one confusing block, he separated it mentally.
This part controls the page information.
This part controls what's displayed.
This section contains the actual text.
He typed again.
This time, the page began taking shape.
Across the room, several students were already struggling.
One student raised his hand to ask about an error.
Another kept deleting and rewriting the same section.
A few students seemed to be progressing well.
Vash wasn't the fastest.
He stopped several times.
He made mistakes.
He even had to compare his work with the teacher's earlier example.
But each mistake taught him something.
An hour passed.
Then another thirty minutes.
The page on Vash's monitor was finally starting to resemble an actual front page.
It was simple.
There was nothing impressive about its design.
A title sat near the top.
Below it was a short introduction.
There were a few sections arranged beneath it.
It wasn't professional.
It wasn't supposed to be.
It was his first attempt.
Vash looked at the finished page.
I made that.
The thought surprised him.
Not copied.
Not given to him.
He had made it by understanding the pieces and putting them together.
The teacher began checking the students' work.
Some had completed their pages.
Others hadn't.
A few had working code but incomplete designs.
Vash's turn came.
The teacher looked at his screen.
"Simple, but you've got the structure right."
Vash nodded.
That was enough.
He didn't need praise beyond that.
He knew how much trouble those simple lines had caused him.
When the class ended, Vash saved his work.
He looked at the file name for a moment before closing the computer.
There was still a lot he didn't understand.
HTML wasn't suddenly easy.
C++ was still mostly unfamiliar.
But now he knew something important.
He could learn it.
---
The journey home felt different.
Vash walked with a little more energy than usual.
His mind kept returning to the computer screen.
The code.
The mistakes.
The moment when the structure finally started making sense.
I actually made a webpage.
It was a tiny achievement.
Probably nothing special to most people.
But to Vash, it felt new.
Before his accident, computers had simply been computers.
After waking up, he had spent so much time thinking about recovery, school, cooking, and helping his grandparents that he had barely considered what else he could learn.
Now another path had appeared.
Technology.
When he reached Grandpa's Noodles, Grandma was preparing ingredients.
Vash put down his schoolbag and helped her.
"You seem happy today," Grandma observed.
Vash smiled.
"We had computer class."
Grandma looked at him.
"You enjoyed it?"
"Yeah."
He didn't explain every detail.
He didn't need to.
The excitement was still in his expression.
He helped with the evening preparations and eventually returned to his normal restaurant work.
The day continued.
Customers arrived.
Orders were taken.
Food was prepared.
Tables were cleaned.
Nothing about the restaurant had changed.
But Vash's mind had.
A new idea had quietly taken root.
Maybe I should learn more.
---
That evening, after dinner, the restaurant gradually became quiet.
Grandpa finished the final cleanup.
Grandma went to rest.
Vash returned to the small room behind the restaurant.
He sat down with his phone.
The screen illuminated the room.
He remembered the computer class again.
HTML.
Webpages.
Programming.
He wondered how much information was available online.
His thumb hovered over the screen.
The System remained silent.
No mission.
No instruction.
No objective.
For once, Vash wasn't waiting for the System to tell him what to do.
He simply wanted to know.
He opened the browser.
The search bar appeared.
Vash stared at it.
Then he typed the first thing that came to mind.
He pressed search.
At that exact moment, a notification appeared.
---
[LEARNING PROCESS DETECTED]
Subject: Web Development
HTML Understanding: Increased
Pattern Recognition: Applied
Deep Analysis: Applied
Practical Experience:
Completed
New Skill Unlocked:
[Web Design — Beginner]
Proficiency: 1%
---
Vash stared at the notification.
His eyes widened slightly.
Web Design.
He looked back at the search results.
Then at the System.
A small smile appeared on his face.
This was only the beginning.
He turned the screen back toward himself.
And began reading.