English...?

Physics wrapped up, and Mr. Antov let out his students just before the bell rang. Nevertheless, the halls were already completely packed and despite his best efforts, John was swallowed up by the crowd. His next class was English, back in the main building and two floors up. It would be an absolute nightmare to fight against the tide of students all the way there. Thankfully, he knew a shortcut. Breaking away from the crowd, he walked through the courtyard to the back of the building and entered a propped open door. It led into the back stairwell, which almost nobody used since it had no air conditioning. To John, the trade-off of a bit of heat to avoid the crush of students was worth it.

He ran up the stairs and easily made it to the third floor before he ran out of breath. The extra endurance points were clearly showing. Once again, John wondered about the value of a single stat point, and what exactly his new enhancements were doing to his body. Was it magic? Was it changing his physique? Was it magically changing his physique? How much strength would he need to pick up a car?

While he contemplated the important questions, John pulled up his Character Sheet and briefly surveyed it. He'd fully recovered from the encounter with Frank and refraining from throwing around Observe in physics had allowed his mana to top off. John felt good, great even, healthier than he could remember. It took a moment for him to realize why. He'd gained ten hitpoints since he'd woken up, nearly a fourth of his total health, likely as a result of his two new points of endurance.

John grinned, the Game was awesome!

Quite comfortable with his recovery, he opened the door to the third floor and blinked. Beyond the threshold was undeniably the third floor of Ashcroft Academy but there was nobody in the halls. He walked in and looked in either direction. Empty.

It was strange, but John put it down to somehow being very late or very early and walked to his English classroom.

There was nobody there either. No teacher, no students, not even desks. It was like he was standing in a replica of the classroom rather than the room itself and John couldn't deny that something was wrong. Trying to copy the way he remembered characters from stealth games moving, John crept back to the door and glanced out into the hallway. It was still as empty as it had been before, but now the quiet felt oppressive. The only sound, aside from himself, seemed to come from the courtyard, a dull clanging and a thud.

Moving much more cautiously, he left the room and crossed the hallway to look out the windows. The sky was a dark purple, and where the sun should have been was only a black hole in the clouds. More importantly, in the courtyard below, there were people fighting. A humanoid figure with long blonde hair moved to heft a gigantic axe on one shoulder and faced off against what looked like a whirlwind of bone. At this distance, John couldn't read the text that floated above their heads. He cast Observe and hoped to get a popup he could.

Illusion Barrier - Artificial Conjuration
Level 13
Creator: ?i?????? ?????o??h
Escape impossible while enemies remain.

Skill Rank Increased: Observe ~ 3 -> 4
Observe no longer requires mana and automatically performs low level assessments for the Gamer.

Skill can now be evolved. Evolve "Observe"?
Yes / No

Achievement Unlocked - "Apprentice"
Improve a skill to rank 4.
+200 Experience
+1 Unallocated Stat Point
+Geode

Instead of examining the combatants, Observe had assessed his surroundings and leveled up in the process. He'd take it.

John didn't know what an Illusion Barrier was, but he took some solace in knowing that he wasn't just going insane and hallucinating the entire situation. It seemed to be some sort of magic alternate dimension... thing, and he was trapped in it along with whoever was in the courtyard and whatever they were fighting. That could be a problem. It wasn't all bad news though, the experience from his latest achievement put him ever closer to level four and he'd gained a stat point. John tried to stay positive.

The other prompts faded, leaving just the choice about Observe, which waited patiently for his input.

Why not? It can't hurt, right?

John pressed 'yes' and a little spinning wheel appeared. He raised an eyebrow.

Reality has loading time?

Observe has gained the Astral evolution.
The infinite cosmos holds many secrets.

John stared at the flavor text of this new message. It was different than before; a flowing script that changed between painfully iridescent colors while remaining impossibly readable. After a couple seconds the text turned pure white and John blinked. It was gone, as though it had never been there and something else had taken its place.

Spell Learned: Astral Observe ~ 1
Observe can now reveal the fabric of reality. Be careful where you look.
Mana Cost: 5 per minute
(Domain: Veritas)

The description was vague as usual, but John was more interested in the addendum. At this point it was undeniable that someone was responsible for his abilities, a Developer of sorts. They'd had a bit of fun at his expense and asked him to stop messing with the Progress Screen, but had never directly warned him before. He wasn't sure what to make of it. Still... nothing ventured, nothing gained.

John cast Astral Observe.

In an instant his vision went white, like a flashbang had gone off right in front of his eyes. John screamed in pain and covered them with his hands; collapsing to his knees as the brightness blinded him. Even with his eyes held tightly shut, it was still there, and he could do nothing but endure the agony of waiting it out. Slowly things came into view. He could see pulsing lines of energy that ran across the floor, walls, and ceiling of the hallway. They glowed with a color that John had never seen before and every few seconds the hue shifted, as if he were looking at a living rainbow. Following the flow of energy, John looked out the window to where the lines ran down the building and connected at the center of the courtyard. He could see more in the distance, wrapping over and surrounding the school in a dome of shimmering magic.

That must be the barrier. How big is this thing?

Staring at it, John realized he'd never actually opened his eyes. They were still as tightly closed as before, but it didn't matter. He had no trouble seeing the magical lines crossing the sky, or his own hands when he held them out. John braced himself and prepared to deactivate the spell if it blinded him again. Then, he opened his eyes.

The details of the hallway came into clear focus and John realized how many details he'd been missing. The glass of the windows, the cut stones in the courtyard below, the trees in the distance and much more, but with them open he couldn't see the energy anymore. He shut his eyes again and the flow of magic returned, as though he was looking at a different layer of the world. There was the outline of the floor and buildings, but none of the details. Everything was flat and textureless.

John tried experimenting with one eye open and one closed.

It reminded him of wearing 3-D glasses. On the left side was the 'normal layer' while on the right he could see the 'magic layer'. At the center of his vision they overlapped, showing the coursing energy against the structure of the academy's green walls and beige tile floor. Similarly, at the edges of each side of his vision he could only see the respective layer; magic fading out to nothing on the left and glowing brightly on the right.

John conjured up his Character Sheet, noting that the window looked the same in both layers. He'd been using Astral Observe for a couple minutes and it had already eaten up 10 mp. It was a hefty chunk, and while his new skill might prove useful later, he wasn't particularly enthusiastic about draining his mana for a fancy light-show. He shut it off, vision returning to normal the moment he cancelled Astral Observe.

He looked back at the courtyard below. The axe-wielder had been pushed backwards by their opponent, who had solidified into a gigantic skeleton. One huge bone arm slammed down, narrowly missing the figure and leaving visible cracks in the tiles. John watched the destruction and hesitated. He knew nothing about the person fighting below, but... they were also the only human he'd seen since getting trapped in the barrier. At the very least, he should get a closer look. He might be able to help.

John unshouldered his backpack and tried stuffing it into his inventory. The bag appeared in it, but everything inside landed on the floor. Apparently, his inventory was a bit picky about what he could do with it. Sighing and reminding himself to come back for his things, John put only the essentials into his inventory and left the bag full of textbooks leaning against the wall.