The Infirmary, Again

Jacob woke up, staring at the ceiling of the infirmary.

Again.

He was far more used to this scenario than he should be.

"Huuuuu" he sighed.

"Your awake, thank God. I nearly shit my pants when I stabbed you." A light-hearted and apologetic voice sounded from his bedside.

It was Arthur, I mean, who else had recently stabbed him?

Well technically the chef had, but his point still stood.

The young man was sitting to the right of his bedside while his teacher occupied the left, near the foot were Stephanie and Erwin who were also staring at what he assumed was his unconscious body.

"You've been here less than two weeks and somehow I've seen you more times than most challenger trainees visit in two months." Chimed in Alanna, the nurse he had met on his first day at UDRD.

"On that note, I would like to inquire about your actions mister Bochard" His teacher questioned, clearly wanting to understand why Jacob had gone berserk.

Jacob sat up from his lying position, trying to organise his thoughts.

Why HAD he done that?

He had no real enmity against Arthur, sure he disliked that the guy was better looking than he was but nowhere near the point of trying to kill him.

It wasn't like there was a priceless reward for winning either, just bragging rights.

It was like he his mind had simply seen the young man as a threat and in the heat of battle he momentarily forgot about the lack of lethality involved in the dual.

He simply believed that to survive he needed to deal with Arthur as an enemy.

This was deeply disturbing to Jacob.

He had been fully prepared to murder another human being.

He wasn't some edgy, badass character from a movie who could do something like that without blinking.

And yet that's exactly what he had become, all too easily.

"…I'm not sure sir, it might have been the sword making it too real, or the fact that I was properly fighting for the first time since my nightmare trial. But I just… snapped I guess, it all felt way too real, like a proper fight to the death." Jacob tried to explain his fugue state to his professor.

"Remind me as to the contents of your nightmare trial again?" The professor asked, in a voice that wasn't really asking.

Jacob once again sighed, realising he had to tell at least some of the truth after such a thing had happened.

"Well, I may have downplayed the danger a little. My trial was mainly about solving puzzles, but each one had some kind of countdown or a threat that usually put my life on the line." Jacob explained, still keeping the existence of intelligent beings to himself.

"I thought as much. A lesser known fact among dreamers is that those that awaken outside of the 5 great clans tend to have a much harder trial and quests initially." Howinster explained, unsurprised at Jacob's lie.

"I believed you to be hiding the truth from the moment you were so brief in covering the contents of your trial. I'd wager the same of you young man" the professor explained, gesturing to Erwin.

"The reason I didn't enquire then and why I won't now is that this information is yours to share, those outside the clans have limited advantages as it is. Therefore if you believe information from your trial or realm to be valuable, I won't attempt to prise it from you." He continued.

Jacob was a little shocked at this, he expected the professor to use this opportunity to get more details about his trial and possibly Erwin's.

He found himself warming to his teacher somewhat, it was hard to distrust someone who looked out for you.

"Class has ended for the day, general knowledge will resume on time tomorrow, do not be late" His teacher ended, walking outside the infirmary.

The remaining students were left there, a little unsure of what to do.

Eventually, Jacob broke the silence.

"Sooo… how's your nose?" He asked Arthur.

The young man took a beat to react, slightly stupefied.

"Never better! Miss Alanna fixed me right up. Super helpful since my healing is kind of weak…" He responded, trailing off as the looks from the others in the room gathered on him in indignation.

"What?" He asked innocently, tilting his head to the side.

"I guess we're just a little surprised that you'd complain about your ability, considering you have THREE OF THEM!" Erwin said, starting in his usual polite tone before ending with a shout.

"Uhhhh, well…" Arthur stuttered a little.

"Ungrateful" Stephanie muttered, showing off her signature deadpan stare.

"Yeah, I thought I had a shot after I got that first hit in, I was so excited that the plan worked as well…" Jacob reminisced.

"It was a great plan" Arthur consoled.

"I only planned to use my Jin affinity since everyone else is a mono-affinity dreamer, but I ended up getting surprised by both you and the pirate girl." He continued guiltily.

"Ressana certainly makes a habit of surprising people" Erwin commented.

"You were more surprising Jacob" Stephanie cut in, her toneless voice starkly contrasting the budding atmosphere in the conversation.

"You don't seem like a berserker." She followed up.

"Yeah, it scared the crap out of me when you suddenly stopped defending and let me stab you, not to mention that pummel to the nose. If the prof hadn't stepped in I would have been in trouble!" Arthur added.

"Yeah, sorry about… you know, almost killing you." Jacob apologised, feeling guilty despite the fact that he hadn't harmed the bright young man much.

"And honestly, I don't think Berserker fits. I wasn't even particularly mad at you. I didn't even want to hurt you per se. It was more like my whole body wanted to survive above everything else, and I tunnel-visioned on it. After that, you just became an obstacle to me staying alive so I did whatever I could to make sure you wouldn't be able to harm me. If it weren't for your movement ability, I might have ended up going for your leg and then running" Jacob tried once again to explain his state.

They all paused, taking in the information for a moment for Stephanie spoke up again.

"Have you heard of affinity adoption?" She asked.

Jacob shook his head, indicating it was the first he had heard of it.

"I'll summarise. Quite a while back a Dempster clan researcher noticed the correlation between personality types and abilities. For example, Dempster clan members tend to be more logical and curious in their pursuits. He theorised that mana affinity and to a lesser extent your ability might be determined by your personality, at least for those who are not clan descendants. The theory gained a bit of traction but was never properly accepted because there were several exceptions to the rule."

"That was the case until another researcher theorised that it was the other way around. Instead of the ability we gained being influenced by our personality, our personality would slowly be influenced by our ability. It once again gained traction but could never be confirmed as any changes observed could easily be explained as just people simply changing over time rather than influence from your ability." She explained, highlighting what she thought was important.

"So you think my ability to sort information is making me less emotional and more… objective focused?" Jacob asked.

"It's a possibility" She answered.

Jacob sat there in silence for a few seconds.

It was more than possible.

It was almost certain.

He hadn't noticed but since he came back from the nightmare realm he had been acting differently.

He adapted to his new circumstances instantly and thought about his actions far more than he did in the past.

In the past, he would never have cared about creating friendly relations due to the inconvenience but now he made an active attempt due to it being the logical best decision in his situation.

Not to mention his absolute lack of trauma from the mansion.

When a normal person, which he was until the nightmare trial, went through something like had in the mansion, they would have a much larger reaction than he did.

In fact, for most people, such an event would require therapy or at least an adjustment period to get back to daily life.

But he had pretty much just casually jumped into his university life like nothing had happened.

No matter how much he thought about it, it was abnormal.

"Well… moving to more interesting topics, how about we all get something to eat, I'm sure Shin, Ress, and Victoria are here somewhere, and it might be good to do a post-game recap of sorts" Ewin suggested, to Jacob's surprise.

He was clearly forcing himself. Jacob knew how shy the English boy was.

"That would be great! I only arrived yesterday, and I don't quite know where anything is yet." Arthur responded.

"Can you walk?" Stephanie asked Jacob, silently confirming her participation while asking about his.

"More or less" he responded as he swung his legs off the bed.

After that, they gathered the rest of their team and headed to one of the on-campus cafeterias.

Shin and Victoria seemed a little peeved that they would be made to spend more time with each other. But they relented at the thought of getting some food after such a fight as well as learning what had happened after their losses.

Ressana on the other hand was more than happy too.

"HOLY CRAP, you got yourself stabbed just to bash his nose in? Haha, I'd expect nothing less of Jax the whacked!" She laughed boisterously.

"Jax the whacked?" He asked, more than a little embarrassed.

"Cus you're whacked in the head! and cus you always get whacked when you fight! I mean first that thing with Victor the pricktor and now Arty here, I reckon you got something against pretty boys. Jealousy is an ugly emotion ya know. Ahh don't worry, I'm sure you'll find someone who can see past your looks to what you got inside" She ranted at him.

"So, we're just accepting that they won't like my face?" Jacob replied.

"Some realities can't be avoided I'm afraid" She stated in full seriousness.

"Indeed" chimed in Erwin.

"A proven fact" Stephanie added.

"Sadly not everyone is as beautiful as I" came from Vicotria.

"Such is life" finalised Shin.

Jacob sat there, taking each world like a stab to the heart, exaggerating the hits for dramatic effect.

Eventually, his eyes landed on Arthur, who had yet to insult him.

"It… it could be worse?" his last hope responded, more as a question than a statement.

Now that the final nail was in the coffin of Jacob's pride, he lay there slumped on the table.

Soon followed by laughter as he got up and threw one of his fries at Ressana who had insisted on just going by Ress amongst friends.

Something he apparently had now.

And like that, a month passed.