Tony realized something was wrong before he even understood where he was.
The desk was cold under his palms. The chair felt too stiff. The air carried a sharp, sterile scent, like disinfectant layered over something older and metallic. His eyes opened to a bright classroom flooded with sunlight, rows of desks arranged with uncomfortable precision, and students seated around him in matching uniforms—black blazers trimmed with crimson, white shirts, red ties, and a strange silver emblem stitched over the chest: a stylized eye wrapped in circuitry.
School uniforms.
That alone made his stomach twist. This uniform...he recognized it almost instantly, it was the school uniform from a game he played so much that he knew every nook and cranny of it all; REDLINK HIGH —but he hadn't been wearing one when he logged in last night. He looked down. Same blazer. Same emblem. Same tie. His clothes had changed.
A low murmur filled the room. Confused voices. Nervous laughs. The scrape of chairs.
"This has to be a prank…"
"Did you sign up for something?"
"I swear I was at home—"
Tony's heartbeat picked up. His memory was clear. Too clear. He had been in his room, controller in hand, grinding through a late-night session of Redlink High. He remembered the loading screen. The music. The familiar menu. Then—nothing.
Now he was here.
A faint blue shimmer flickered at the edge of his vision.
[SYSTEM BOOTING…]
Tony froze. The translucent letters hovered in the air like a digital ghost. He blinked. They stayed. He rubbed his eyes. Still there.
A cold sensation crept down his spine.
This wasn't a glitchy overlay. This wasn't VR. This wasn't a prank.
This was a system.
More text followed.
[LINK ENERGY SYNC IN PROGRESS]
[PLAYER STATUS: ACTIVE]
[WELCOME TO REDLINK HIGH]
A girl two rows ahead gasped. "You see it too, right?"
Several heads snapped toward her. A boy near the aisle swallowed hard. "It's… it's in my vision too."
That confirmed it. This wasn't just in his head.
Tony scanned the room properly now. About two hundred students. All wearing the same uniform, though some looked like it didn't belong to them—tailored for different body types, different styles, as if the clothes had been forced onto them to fit a rule rather than a person. Some students looked older. Some younger. A few didn't even look like they were from the same place at all.
Like they'd been collected.
The door at the front of the classroom opened.
The sound cut through the room like a knife.
Every voice died.
She walked in slowly, heels clicking against the floor in a calm, measured rhythm. She was tall, elegant, with long black hair and a posture that radiated authority. Her uniform was different—darker, with gold trim instead of crimson. Her presence made the room feel smaller. Heavier.
She smiled.
Not a friendly smile.
A controlled one.
"Good morning, class," she said gently. "Welcome to your first day at Redlink High."
The door closed behind her. The click echoed.
A red screen flashed into Tony's vision.
[NEW MISSION RECEIVED]
Mission: Survive Homeroom Lecture
Difficulty: EXTREME
Failure Condition: Death
A nervous laugh broke out somewhere.
"You've got to be kidding me," a boy muttered.
Another student raised his hand, forcing a shaky smile. "Ma'am, I think there's been some kind of mistake. I was at home. I didn't sign up for—"
The teacher turned her head slowly. Her eyes locked onto him.
"No mistake," she said softly.
She took one step forward.
Then she was beside him.
Tony's eyes widened. There was no blur. No visible movement. Just a skipped moment in reality.
A wet sound filled the room.
The boy's body dropped back into his chair. A second later, his head slid off his neck and hit the floor. It rolled once. Stopped.
Blood spread across the tiles.
For half a second, no one reacted. The human brain struggling to process what it had just seen.
Then the screaming started.
Chairs screeched backward. Someone vomited. Someone collapsed. A girl started crying hysterically.
The teacher wiped her hand with a pristine handkerchief.
"That," she said calmly, "is what happens when you interrupt class."
[STUDENT ELIMINATED]
Cause of Death: Instructor Execution
Tony couldn't breathe. His chest felt too tight. His ears rang.
This wasn't scripted.
This wasn't a cutscene.
This wasn't reversible.
In the game, death reset. Here, it didn't.
Students rushed the door. One slammed into it at full speed—and bounced back as if he'd hit solid steel. He hit the floor with a cry of pain.
"Invisible barrier…" someone whispered.
The teacher clasped her hands behind her back, watching with mild amusement. "There is no leaving during homeroom."
Another system message appeared.
[RANKING INITIALIZED]
Tony Vale — Rank 198 / 200
Status: AT RISK
Tony barely registered it. His eyes were locked on the blood pooling on the floor, soaking into the crimson trim of the uniforms nearby.
A tall, muscular boy slammed his fist against a desk. "This is insane! You can't just—"
The teacher appeared in front of him.
Not walked.
Appeared.
Her hand rested lightly on his chest.
The boy froze. Sweat poured down his face.
"You may speak," she said, "when you are strong enough to survive the answer."
She stepped back. The boy collapsed to his knees, shaking. Alive. For now.
Fear shifted in the room.
It wasn't just panic anymore.
It was understanding.
This teacher wasn't here to teach.
She was here to judge.
And judging meant killing.
Tony felt something strange behind his eyes. A dull pressure. A faint sense of wrongness around her movements, like the world lagged half a second behind her. He didn't understand it yet. He just knew his head hurt when he focused on her too long.
A quiet girl near the back whispered, "We're going to die…"
"No," another voice said quietly. "Not all of us."
That was when the room changed.
Fear turned into calculation.
Panic turned into survival instinct.
Students started watching each other. Measuring. Judging. Who looked strong. Who looked weak. Who looked useful.
The system chimed again.
[CLASS RULES UPDATED]
• Unauthorized departure = Death
• Disrupting class = Death
• Failure to meet survival requirements = Death
Simple.
Brutal.
Tony swallowed hard.
This was worse than the game. In the game, you learned patterns. You learned mechanics. You learned how to win.
Here, the teacher was the mechanic.
She paced slowly at the front of the room. "Some of you will awaken abilities. Some of you will not. Those who do not… will be removed."
Removed.
She smiled wider.
"Think of this school as a filter."
A chill ran through Tony.
The strongest would rise.
The weakest would disappear.
A soft blue light shimmered over several students. Gasps filled the room as small manifestations appeared—faint sparks, flickers of shadow, distorted air.
Abilities.
Just like the game.
But slower.
More painful.
More real.
Tony waited. Nothing happened to him. No glow. No sparks. Just the pressure behind his eyes and the sense that something was watching from inside his own perception.
A countdown appeared in the corner of his vision.
[HOMEROOM TIMER: 03:00]
The teacher clapped once.
"Survive until the bell," she said pleasantly. "That is your first lesson."
The room descended into chaos.
Students backed away from her. Some screamed. Some tried to hide behind desks. Others, fueled by desperation, stepped forward, fists clenched, eyes wild.
The first brave one rushed her.
He never made it halfway.
She moved once.
He hit the floor in two pieces.
Blood sprayed across the front row.
Tony flinched, heart pounding so hard it hurt.
This wasn't about courage.
This was about knowing when to move.
When to hide.
When to survive.
He slid lower in his seat, breathing slow, eyes tracking everything. The teacher's movements. The students' reactions. The system timer.
He didn't fight.
He didn't run.
He watched.
Because in Redlink High, the first ones to act were usually the first ones to die.
The bell rang.
The sound cut through the room like a gunshot.
The teacher stopped moving.
"Class dismissed," she said. "If you are still alive tomorrow, we will continue."
The door unlocked.
Students poured out in a flood of terror and shock.
Tony stayed seated for a second longer, staring at the blood-soaked floor, at the empty desk where a boy had been alive minutes ago, at everything stained dark red.
This wasn't school.
This wasn't like redlink high and it most certainly wasn't a game either.
This was a slaughterhouse with desks.
And he had just been enrolled.