Following the combat css, I had support tactics with Silvia, Melody and Fara had an offense css, and Elle and Amane had a tank css. Melody and Fara’s css was in the same building as our previous two csses, but the rest of us had to walk. For Silvia and I, that was back to the Celestria building.

  We said goodbye to Elle and Amane, who were heading to some K building, then I said goodbye to Melody. My first css without her… and my first extended time period without her. We’d meet after of course, but an hour without her… kinda sucks. I think I’m a little too attached.

  “I heard the instructor runs a guild,” Silvia said about halfway through our short walk to Celestria Hall. “Means there’s a sub about fifty percent of the time.”

  “Huh.” Seems a little odd to teach if you run a guild. Assuming the guild is successful, which it should be, otherwise he wouldn’t have been hired.

  Also seems a little odd that Silvia’s saying so much. I guess walking with one person is different. Especially one person who’s less talkative. I might as well talk to make her more comfortable… it’s not that hard to talk to one person I already kind of know. “Why?”

  “Why work here?” Silvia asked, looking over at me.

  “Yea…” I nodded.

  “I don’t know.” Silvia shrugged, then went back to walking silently.

  Okay.

  Soon, we reached our destination and located room 112, in the second quadrant of the building, which appeared to have much rger rooms than the first. The room was decorated differently from the leadership css, much more normal. There were still rows of desks descending toward the center of the cssroom, although less rows with a rger open area in at the center, there were three boards, one connecting the two walls just like the leadership room, but with an additional board on each wall, the floors were still carpet, but the walls were a pin white color, feeling very… stiff and unwelcoming. Like most cssrooms. Although in high school the pin walls were usually covered with useless posters, unlike here.

  Silvia and I found seats around the middle row beside the left wall. Over the next few minutes, students filled up the room and in total I’d guess around fifty. It was a pretty rge css for a cssroom setting, but not rge enough for all A tier support… I think. There were probably multiple css times. Actually there definitely are. This isn’t just an A tier css, although they might have separate hours for A tiers and other tiers and whatnot.

  Speaking of css sizes, who takes the leadership css? There were only like twenty people in that one. If there’s other hours then maybe that’s just because it's early morning… or maybe it's just an opt-in css? But it definitely seems necessary for most people, when not joining some S tier-led raid, A tiers would probably be leading squads of their own. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter. I can ask Melody sometime…

  Soon, the teacher… instructor? I’m not sure how practical this css is. It’s a cssroom setting so I’d assume it’s rgely theoretical, but at the same time, you can’t learn tactics without practice. Oh… wait… that’s what the other csses are for. You learn some support specific stuff here and then practice in the team tactics css, so you actually have people to practice on.

  The balding professor walked in interrupting my thoughts with a loud cough. Then, after reaching the bottom of the room, where there wasn’t a desk, he cleared his throat and began speaking. “Greetings everyone. I’m Professor Hainsworth. Today we’ll be going over the most common type of support that most of you will eventually gain some ability reted to, healing.”

  And then I zoned out, resting my head on the desk and trying to pick up his occasional words. I’m pretty sure he gnced over at me a few times but just decided to ignore me, maybe a perk of S tier and beyond? Regardless, this css was absolutely boring. It passed very slowly. The professor rambled about positioning yourself at the back, maintaining line of sight of all party members, some other random stuff… and that was all I picked up before diving into fantasies… fantasies of Melody in her css, whatever her special attacking css is called, learning about all the ways to whip monsters more effectively… ways to make whips sting, ways to make whips bleed, ways to make them not bleed… and all the wonderful ways she’d be able to practice on me while I moaned and squirmed beneath her…

  At that point, Silvia shook my shoulder, waking me up and asking, “Have a nice rest?”

  “Yeah,” I replied groggily, then asked, “You?”

  Silvia stared at me.

  Uh—fuck. I’m still sleeping okay! I can’t believe I just asked that! I’m so… ugh! Frick frick, she wasn’t sleeping stupid! We’re talking about sleep, not about how the weather is or, ah, shit. Weather also isn’t a thing where you ask ‘you?’ Bleh. Okay. Whatever. At least it was Silvia and not some total stranger… god it’s so awkward when it’s a stranger.

  I shook my head, sat up in my seat, and looked around. The professor was staring at one of the boards down in the center of the room and all the students were chatting with one another. Silvia kept staring at me until I met her eyes and asked, “What’re we… doing?”

  “Sharing abilities.” Silvia shrugged. “Irrelevant for us. What were you dreaming about?”

  “Uh… nothing?” Most people don’t dream during short naps, right? It was probably only like… I pulled out my phone to check the time and… forty minutes. Css is almost over. Huh.

  “You spoke,” Silvia deadpanned.

  What? Oh, no… god I hope I didn’t… moan out Melody’s name… grabbing everyone’s attention, as they stared at a sleeping me… oh please no… that’s… that would totally ruin my reputation, even being an S tier. Everyone would look at me like a piece of dirt… and everyone would be so jealous watching me walk with a goddess all around campus. Jealous of my gorgeous perfect Melody. And I’d get so wet… I am wet…

  Silvia chuckled. “So you had an embarrassing dream. I see…”

  “You!” Since when was Silvia like this? I thought she was some slightly-less-shy-than-me person, not a teasing schemer!

  Thankfully, before she progressed any further, the professor spun around to wrap up the css, saying, “There’s nothing for you to do for me, but just to remind, I believe you’ve all had a combat css by now, so you should know your assignment from there. Support students must have five hours of logged exercise in a school-sanctioned gym each week.”

  No… I don’t know. I gnced over at Silvia and she had the same bewildered expression. Looks like our instructors forgot to mention a little something. That’s definitely going to create some tension next css.

  After the st minute announcement, css was over and Silvia and I left, meeting up with the rest of the group in one of many open areas on campus, and then we all split up again. Fara and Amane to their csses, Silvia and Elle to their dorms, and I walked with Melody to her css.

  “How was css?” Melody asked as headed towards a new direction, the direction of building Su… for… Submissive Hall… no? Okay…

  How was css… well… I dreamed of being whipped. Okay. Not what I should say… but also I don’t know… I need to talk to Silvia and get her to fill me in on that css. That stuff might be important for me… for Melody so I can support her. I can’t disappoint Melody… There is one thing I can mention though, “We have to work out each week. You too… I think.”

  “Yep. I noticed. The instructor, instructor K, sent a message in the academy app.” Melody pulled out her phone, showing me the message.

  Your assignment is exercise in academy gyms.

  - Attackers: 8 hours per week.

  - Tanks: 6 hours per week.

  - Support: 5 hours per week.

  Please exercise whatever muscles you deem most beneficial for you, but maintain some variety. Sitting on a bench and scrolling through your phone does not count as exercise—we will know.

  Instructor Khathengrixeliathal

  Holy that name… he wasn’t lying. No one’s pronouncing that correctly. He’d have to fill all the bubbles when taking a standardized test or something. That must suck. I can barely fill in my own name before the proctors move on to the next box. I don’t think my name’s that long, but I don’t know how other people are so fast. Do they not fully fill in the bubbles or something? I’m always spending like ten seconds per bubble, perfectly filling in the circle with a pencil… I think I fill them in too perfectly…

  Anyway, workouts… the message was sent a few minutes after the css ended. I should probably turn on notifications… hitting deny is kinda instinctual.

  Building Su, which actually stands for Suellen, some random famous person’s name I guess, came into view along with a rge brick that had its name carved into it before Melody and I had time to talk about anything else, and she waved goodbye, heading to her css and leaving me alone.

  Of course, I didn’t leave yet… Instead I watched Melody’s hips sway as she strolled into the building along with a handful of other wandering students. Once she left, my eyes had time to explore.

  The building was very tall, ten stories, and like all the rest, maintained the wooden cabin theme, although it looked odd on such a tall building. It felt uncanny, seeing such a tall stack of wood… The roof was ft though, which made it feel a little more normal. Or less normal. What log cabin has a ft roof?

  After a few more minutes, I found a bench under some trees to sit on… and I stayed there for a while, until my next css time approached. Melody’s css hadn’t ended yet, but I had my own css to get to. And despite how much the subject has fascinated me through high school… I’m not really feeling it today… I’m sure it’ll change once I’m there.

  Ten minutes before four, I realized I have no clue where building A is.

  7w1