Chapter 12: First Classes

"Hey, that's exciting! What kind of club will you be joining?" asked Will, with sparkling eyes.

"Well, I don't know what clubs there are… I guess I'll decide tomorrow," I answered.

My friend seemed like he was intrigued by that answer. "Do you think there isn't going to be a debate club?"

I was taken aback slightly by his comment. It was likely there was a debate club, since it's quite common in high schools, but I wasn't looking forward to being part of one.

"No, I'm sure there'll be something like that, it's just that I'd like to participate in other kinds of clubs," I expressed.

"Oh… I see. Personally, I'd love to learn something new, so I totally get what you mean," he commented thoughtfully.

William stayed silent for a moment, he was looking outside my window. You could see it was almost becoming night time.

"Ah, that reminds me, would you like to go hang out? I feel like we haven't spent that much time together since we came here," he said, inviting me to spend some time with him.

"I've heard there's a lot of things to do in the city, why not try that?" I suggested.

His smile became clearer, and he seemed to be really happy about something. "Oh, wanna try Karaoke? A friend told me you can get a private room to sing in, we can even get dinner there!"

I thought about it for a second. "Uhh… I don't know, I don't really like singing that much…"

"That's fine, we can just hang out there, you don't really have to sing," he told me.

That was a fun evening! We talked about lots of things, including our thoughts about the academy. 

He wasn't the best singer, but he sang the lyrics so passionately that it was a really fun time.

Honestly, I focused so much on the club fair being tomorrow that I had totally forgotten we had school that day.

In fact, I had only just realized it would be our first real day at school, since today was just an introduction.

Before heading to sleep, I decided to check my timetable for tomorrow, so I opened the Calendar app on my smartphone.

I had Mathematics and Literature in the morning, a one hour break and Arts for two hours. Then, a two-hour break for lunch and two more classes after that, history and science.

The following day, I woke up with mixed feelings deep inside me.

In some way, I felt oddly relaxed. It was an early Thursday morning, and the sun had almost completely rosen already.

After washing my face, I brewed some coffee and opened the window in my living room. It was slightly chilly, and the morning was quite peaceful.

You could hear the sounds of birds and wind hitting against the leaves.

As I finished my coffee, I checked the calendar app again. I tapped on the notice that I had "Mathematics A" at 8am and a screen with some more information appeared.

My class would be at class 101 in the classrooms building at the academy, and my teacher would be Mr. Sergey Umnov.

The only people I knew weren't in my class, so I didn't really bother trying to walk to class with them.

I checked the message group on my phone that I had been added to yesterday, and there were thousands of messages of people discussing who was in what classes.

I scrolled down to the bottom without really paying attention to any message in particular and decided to head out. It was still rather early, but I figured it was better to be early than late.

It was a lonely path; the rhythm of the trees marked the way to the academy, and you could see a few people walking to the academy.

I didn't see anyone I knew, so I just headed there on my own, peacefully looking around at the environment.

I entered the building and looked at the indications on the walls. Classroom 101 was easy to find, so I entered the classroom.

There were a few people sitting down on the right side of the room. They were chatting, so I assumed they were already acquainted.

Back in middle school, we were always told where to sit down in classrooms, but here at Halsey we were free to choose any place to sit in.

Without giving it much thought, I chose to sit down on the left side of the second row, which was empty.

The classroom started slowly filling up. Sometimes, it was groups of people that sat down together, while other times it was a single student sitting down alone.

"Is that seat free?" asked a familiar voice somewhere behind me.

I looked to my right and saw Athena, who I had just met recently. She was pointing to the chair next to me.

I didn't mind if someone sat next to me, but I thought if it was her, it would be beneficial, since she looked like a responsible person.

"Yeah, it is." I answered.

Athena sat down next to me and started getting things from her backpack. "Also, do you mind if some of our classmates sit here with us? You probably know most of them from yesterday's lunch."

"No problem with that."

The classroom started to fill up, with clusters of students forming in different parts of the room. Some of them sat near the front, while others preferred the back.

It was almost time for the class to start. I didn't mind waiting in silence, as I was early to get here, but Athena wanted to idle chat.

"This school's kinda weird isn't it? Like, it's really cool and all, but I wouldn't say it's your average high school." she started wondering."

I agreed with her. "That's true, there's a lot of things that you wouldn't be able to do usually. And there's so much more that we don't know yet."

Suddenly a group of a few people came to us and sat in the same row.

"Ahh, sorry! I kinda struggled to get out of bed, so we were almost late!" said one of the girls.

"Seriously, Soph, I told you to go to bed early yesterday! I even had to bang on your door so you woke up, do you understand how people passing by thought I was crazy?!" said a short, red-haired girl.

Athena introduced the group of people, who I recognized from yesterday's group lunch.

The girl who was late was Soph, a blonde who had pretty messy hair, but she had two braids yesterday, so you could assume she didn't have much time to do her hair this morning. She was wearing a large purple hoodie and looked like the social type.

The redhead who answered her was Sam, she seemed to be hard-working for her friends, and was wearing jeans and a t-shirt.

I also remembered Adam and Chris from the introductions. Overall, it seemed like a good group of people. I wondered if we would be able to form a study group together and help each other out.

Athena seemed eager to continue talking about the school, adding her group to the conversation. "Oh, we were talking about how this school is so different, but there's so much we don't know about it"

"About that… I heard some older students talking about some complex systems, power and whatnot. I really don't know what's going on here." said Chris.

"Hmm, I don't know, I feel like it's really cool. Like, you can do all sorts of things in the city, like buying clothes and going out with your friends." said Soph.

"Yeah, I did hear we get more of the Halsey Coins monthly to spend on those things, so it seems like a paradise, like having a free stipend." added Adam.

Despite the utopian ideas, Athena looked worried. "That's true, but food does cost coins as well… We did get a large amount at the start, but… I just hope nobody blows all their budget off too quickly."

That was exactly what I thought about. "I agree, that's why I haven't been spending a lot of points, just in case."

Chris looked deep in thought after I said that. "That just… seems like an odd thing to do. But, you're probably right about playing it safe." 

At that moment, an older gentleman walked to the front of the classroom and started to write on the blackboard.

The chalk made a distinct, faint noise which echoed through the room. Noticing this, the groups of students gradually stopped talking.

By the time the teacher finished writing his name "Mr. Umnov", the whole class was silent, which was pretty impressive to witness.

The man at the front turned around and looked at the crowd of students in front of him, scanning it with his eyes. He had a serious expression on his face.

He then proceeded to start talking, those being the first words he'd say since he had entered the room.

"Good morning, everyone. I am Mr. Umnov, and I will be teaching you mathematics while you're here at Halsey. I hope we get along these three years."

Some students started mumbling in their groups, while others chose to just look at each other and exchange glances.

"Ahem." The man continued speaking. "Some of you already met me yesterday in my tutor group, but in this classroom I will be everyone's teacher, and I will fulfill my role as that."

This time, there was a louder wave of mumbling, including in my group. Sam commented that she doesn't think that would be fully possible, and that the teacher would most likely benefit his group's students.

To some extent, we were told that the students in different groups compete with each other, which would mean teachers are doing so as well.

"But." Said in a bold tone Mr. Umnov. "I do value brilliant students, those who are capable of showing me they're special."

I wondered, what did that mean? This subject was math, which is one of my strongest areas, so I wasn't too worried, but would someone who struggled in math not get help from the teacher?

No, that couldn't be right… I figure he'd be willing to help students who tried to work hard, regardless of their ability.

Anyway, I wasn't too worried as I had always had good grades without much effort.

Mr. Umnov finished his lesson, which was basically an introduction to the subject. He didn't give us any tasks, so that was great.

I wondered what William was up to, how did his first class go?