Don't risk it. Take it slow.

I don't want to push my luck. I've already gotten this far. Sandra gives my notebook back after copying notes down, and I sit through the lecture on derivative rules relatively bored.

After class, I decide to thoroughly check my app, and I notice something new. One of the icons is no longer grayed out. Its a golden star labelled achievements. I open it, and text displays on the screen.

Achievements commemorate impressive or unique feats that you accomplish. Until you achieve the first action in a category, the achievements are hidden so that there won't be any spoilers. After an achievement is acknowledged, some form of reward will be given for the achievement. Congratulations, and happy achievement hunting!

At the top there is an outlined box titled: Big Moves 1/?. In smaller text inside that, it says: gain 10 or more SP in a single interaction.

I tap the box, and my SP total at the top of the screen increases from 15 to 65. A fifty point increase! Not that I have anything I can use the points on, but maybe one of the other icons will use that in the future when it is revealed.

For now, I close the app, and go through the motions today until I get to English. Now that I know the app works, and a little about it, I'm starting to look for opportunities to use it. Although Ms. White is still way too intimidating to tackle on my own. I think I'll need to lay some kind of groundwork before I can make any moves there. If that is the case, I think I'll need to find, or make, an accomplice to help me in that department. If there is someone else in the class that I wouldn't mind getting some payback on, its Chloe Appleton, any time she has an opportunity to belittle someone, she'll take it. She's your typical queen bee type. Her parents clearly have money, because she wears expensive clothes, and she always talks up having parties in her apartment. All that said, she's quite the looker. Long blonde hair, clearly expensively maintained. D-cup tits, although I'm not sure if they're natural or not, and a figure that clearly is maintained through a focus on her body, there are some rumors she has a personal trainer as well.

I open the app up once she gets to the class and save her profile. Chloe Appleton, Submission Score: -65. Not a great starting point, for sure, but at least through my interactions with Sandra, I think I can make it with small steps. I close the app down, and get ready for class.

At the end of class, an opportunity arises. Chloe looks over and says, "You, carry my stuff for me. I don't feel like hauling my backpack today."

I know that I'll probably get an earful from Ms. White if I decline, but if I don't start pushing now, I'll never make any progress, so I speak up, and make sure its loud enough everyone else can hear, "No carry your own stuff, I'm not a caddy." I get a lot of shocked looks, and it seems like everyone wants to clear out ASAP before the fallout happens. That said, the look of shock on Chloe's face is priceless. Unfortunately, I know what is coming next from the loud sound of heels clicking towards me rapidly. Thankfully, Chloe also seems to want to clear out now, and picks up her own stuff and leaves, I can only hope that me telling her to carry her own stuff counts for this.

I turn around, and Ms. White looks like she's about to blow a gasket. I've never really eyed up Ms. White before, mostly out of fear, but she's not bad looking either. She's young, probably early Thirties, Black hair cut in what I would only describe as a "Karen" haircut, but she definitely looks like she's dressing down a pretty nice body under her clothes. The bad news is, right now, she's exceptionally pissed.

"Typical man. You raised your voice at Chloe. Couldn't calmly decline, couldn't think of any other way of handling the situation other than intimidation. Well guess what, in this classroom, in this school, I get to dole out punishment, not you, and I think I'll be docking a letter grade for that outburst. This is English after all, and if you can't figure out how to use it, I think that deserves demerit. Have fun with trying to recover that score." Ms. White huffs, before telling me to get out.

Goddamnit, I knew she was a bitch, but a whole letter grade just for that. Fuck. The hope at least, is if I can get her to submit, it won't matter what my grade was, I'll have what I want at the end.

For now, I'll check the App. With it, a notification: (Chloe Appleton: +5SP, Score: -60)

Its not much, but its a start. It feels like I'm making some small headway at least. Tomorrow I don't have any classes that I particularly care about right now.

Over the next two weeks, I look for small ways to nudge Sandra in math class, I manage to eek out a a few points here and there. As for Ms. White and Chloe, I avoid making any sort of fuss in English out of a concern of worse retaliation from Ms. White.

By that Thursday my standing with Sandra is Score: -2. Since we have a test tomorrow in Math, instead of a quiz today, its a self study day, where anyone can ask questions to the teacher or work together to study. I don't know if the app helps with this, or I'm just extra lucky, but today, not only is Kassidy missing from class, but Sandra seems to have been having issues with some of the concepts in this section. Sandra is studying her notes alone behind me. Alright, its now or never to do this.

"Sandra," I say while turning to face her, "I know you've been struggling with some of the concepts in this section. Why don't we study together, I'm confident I've got all of it down. I have one condition though. You have to ask for my help, and admit that you need it to get a good grade."

Sandra looks at me partly in anger, but also studying my face to see if I'm being serious. After a moment she speaks up, "I'll admit that your notes before were helpful, and easy to understand, but I don't need to stoop to the level of saying I need your help for a good grade."

"What was it you said before? Right, 'I don't want to fall behind in class just because I can't swallow my pride.' I guess you were just saying that to not hurt Kassidy's feelings huh. Her notes must have been really bad then. I guess I'll keep that in mind then." You smugly reply back.

"Wait wait. Fine. Will you help me study? I need your help to get a good grade." Sandra replies. That's exactly what I was hoping for.

The rest of the class goes by fairly uneventfully. A lot of back and forth of explaining how to derive the formula for different derivative rules and trying to explain it in an intuitive way, but overall a big success.

After class I check my app. (Sandra Rankine: +5SP, Score: +3). Alongside that, the saved profiles icon has a little exclamation mark next to it. I open it, and Sandra's profile has the exclamation mark next to it. Again I tap it. Her profile has a new icon on it labelled: TRAITS. I tap it, and again an instructional wall of text appears:

Traits are added effects that apply to a target. They might be a new addition to their personality you can choose, or they could be a retroactive addition. The traits themselves will describe in more detail what changes they will make. Whenever you move over a 50 point threshold with a target (-50, 0, 50, 100), you'll get the option of two traits to choose from based on their personality. Once you choose one, the other is gone forever, and it'll set up a permanent path for that person. There are other ways to get traits for a target, but you'll have to find those for yourself. Enjoy!

I tap past the explanation and what greets me is the following:

New Trait Options!

Option A: IF YOU CAN'T BEAT 'EM, JOIN 'EM
The target will develop submission towards the user whenever the user outperforms the target in anything. They'll somehow rationalize their behavior as a result of this.

Option B: IT FEELS GOOD TO BE WRONG
The target will feel sexual gratification of varying degrees whenever they are corrected for being wrong, or made fun of for it. This only works when they are genuinely wrong, not when they actively try to perform poorly. This creates a negative reward system which will likely result in them actively becoming less and less intelligent, albeit subconsciously.

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AUTHOR NOTE: Wow, that was a long chapter. I hope you enjoyed. I wanted to move things a long a bit, and as a result, there wasn't really any intermediate choices to make midway through. Anyway, we've made it to the first big trait choice!