Chapter 1: Life Is Complicated.

"And this, class, is how you find the missing degree of a right angle. Is there anyone who needs a second example?" Miss Flanagan asked.

"Can you do a different problem like this one? I don't think I get it yet." A student said.

"No problem, Kimberly. As long as you follow the formula I gave you, there is no reason why any of you should get these wrong unless you punch the wrong numbers in your calculator." Miss Flanagan began showing the formula and working through each step in the formula as she solved a similar problem.

  Zoey wasn't really paying much attention to all this though. Something far more interesting and weird was taking up all her attention. Right in front of her was a floating box telling her some cool things about herself and the existence of a fictional force that might be present in her world. Was she in a video game or something now? From what she could tell, no one else could see this thing.

  At first, she thought it was part of her dream as she woke up in the morning. Like what if life on Earth suddenly became like an RPG? She was initially going to try and become a combative healer type class. A combination of dishing out huge damage and healing from any wounds would be just too strong. But then the dream shattered when her little brother burst into her room telling her to get ready for school without mentioning anything at all.

  The status screen went away but she could still bring it back up. It was still here just floating in front of her face. Zoey didn't know if her stats were good or horrible considering that she never worked out or exercised a day in her life. The only time she ever willingly did physical activity was for P.E. At home she did anything but things that were healthy for her.

[Status]

[Name: Zoey]

[Sex: Female]

[Body: 0.3]

[Mental: 0.5]

[Magic: 0.0]

[Skills: 0]

  It was hard to think of numbers that went into the decimals as good. No matter how ignorant someone was, if they were told they had a 0.3 body, they wouldn't assume it was good. The only way that could be twisted positively was if they said, "At least it isn't a 0.0! Am I right?!" Zoey had a dislike for people like that.

  It wasn't as if optimistic people did anything wrong to her. It just made her sick and a little bit jealous that they could look at this shitty world and just see the good parts of it.

'Having a positive attitude when the planet is slowly dying by our own hands, when the people in power are only becoming more corrupt and greedier, and when I haven't even had a single boyfriend all my life when I'm a fucking high schooler!' She inwardly shouted, getting to the crux of her anger.

'I know that I'm not like putting myself out there by acting slutty or whatever but still! Guys should be interested in girls who don't act like thots!'

"Zoey? Do you mind paying attention to class instead of trying to break that pen in half?" Miss Flanagan asked in a voice that swiftly brought Zoey back to reality.

"I'm sorry." Zoey responded with a faint blush on her cheeks as everyone looked at her.

"Thank you. Now how would we find the missing degree of this obtuse angle?"

"Uhh..."

  It wasn't hard to see that Zoey wasn't an A or B student either. Zoey wasn't able to answer any of the teacher's questions based on what they were learning today. This earned her after class detention today. Making today one of the worst days ever. She's never been more embarrassed than she was today. Miss Flanagan made her look stupid in front of the entire class! And in front of Ethan of all people too! The cutest boy in her class with just the most adorable personality she's ever seen in a guy.

'The things I would do to him...' Her mind wandered into all sorts of fantasies while she was in detention with the Disciplinary Teach, Brock.

  Detention at her school was pretty much torture for people who can't handle sitting still for hours doing nothing. What detention came down to at Sun Valley High School was basically this: Sit down at a desk, do homework or do nothing, and wait till your time was up. You couldn't sleep, put your head down, use anything that even resembled an electronic device, or chew gum. Zoey didn't have a problem with this, as she spent the time trying to figure out what else her status could do, besides showing her what it has already told her.

  The zero skills part was what was bothering her. It bothered her more than her weak body and obviously low mental stat. The magic was understandable as humans haven't yet found that magic particle in the universe and haven't figured out how to harness that particle for our own uses. But she had to have at least a single skill in her life! Like who goes 17 years of their life without having one skill? Even something meaningless like juggling, whistling, or hell, twirling a pencil through your fingers!?

  Zoey grabbed her pencil lying on her desk and in her anger, tried to gain a skill by twirling it in between her fingers. She made sure to prop up her math book in front of her desk before attempting this stunt. If that hard-ass Brock saw her having the tiniest bit of fun, he'd surely order her to stop. When she successfully placed her only means of defense up, she began spinning. Immediately, the 0.3 in body and 0.5 in mental shown from her status showed their fighting spirit.

  Zoey dropped the pencil on her first attempt and proceeded to curse several deities for giving her such a useless body.

"Zoey Winters! Place that book flat on your desk and do not let me hear another sound from you!" Brock yammered loudly.

'Ugh! Asshole!' She cursed inwardly.

"I won't do it again..." She promised outwardly.

  The next two hours were spent actually doing her homework. Since she didn't learn anything in the classroom, she had to figure out how to do it through the actual math book. Which didn't help her at all because she couldn't find a single damn formula listed in the book! Zoey distinctly remembered Flanagan talking about a formula that would help solve every problem.

'Then why the fuck isn't that formula in the god damn book!?' She raced to the front of the book to see when her shitty math book was published and felt like ripping it to pieces.

  2000 was when it was published. It was the year 2020 and this cheap ass school still hasn't gotten better books?! No wonder her school was always ranked so low online. Zoey didn't know if it was because they had no money at all or just had no idea what the fuck to do with the money they were getting.

'Well, if I fail, at least I know it wasn't my fault. It was the school's fault for being so cheap and not giving us the most recent academic books.'

  The last bell of the day rang and they were ordered out of detention. Brock called them out in alphabetic order before releasing them which meant that she was the last to leave. Zoey argued that it would've made more sense to release them based on the offense of their crime but knew her words would only fall on deaf ears. Brock definitely wouldn't listen to a trouble student like her. He considers every kid that gets detention as a delinquent.

'Such a fucking loser.' She swore while leaving the classroom.

  Zoey made her way towards her locker. Most of the hallway was empty by this point as it was 2 hours after school normally ends. The only people still here are teachers, janitors, coaches, and the kids that actually do stuff at school. Clubs, sports, and other stuff like that. Zoey didn't really have any interest in any of the clubs at school.

  Well, no that was a lie. She was interested in joining the Video Game Club but that was because she heard that they don't do anything but play games all day. Zoey wasn't like some hardcore gamer or anything like that. She just played from time to time because of her dad. Now he was the biggest gaming nerd ever. He even went to gaming conventions and stuff like that with her little brother who is becoming just like their dad with his obsession with games.

  While sifting through her locker, Zoey realized that she forgot something in Miss Flanagan's classroom. She could just leave and come get it tomorrow but she might as well do it now. Miss Flanagan's class is her third period and anyone could steal her stuff before she gets it tomorrow. It wasn't worth being lazy right now.

  On her way to Miss Flanagan's room, she heard two voices inside. A boy and a girl. This stopped Zoey straight in her tracks as a faint blush formed on her face as she heard what they were whispering about.

'Has school morals seriously fallen to this point?!' Zoey exclaimed while pressing her ear against the door.

"Are you sure no one is going to come in?" The girl asked. She had to be a slut if she was willing to do this at school.

"Of course, I'm sure. I even have measures in place for if someone does try to come in." The boy reassured.

'Oh, he must do this often. Was there a desk against the door or something?' Zoey thought.

"Well, okay... I trust you." She sounded pretty innocent.

  Maybe this was her first time doing nasty stuff in public.

"You have nothing to worry about. I've done this loads of times. Just make sure to relax and it'll make everything easier." The casanova told the girl.

'Holy shit. They really are about to have sex! I wonder who they are... They must be one of the popular kids if they have the confidence to do something like this. But I need to get my stuff! Should I knock before they begin? That would be so awkward though. What if they get mad at me for ruining their perfect opportunity? I should take a quick peek.' Zoey slowly peeked through the crack in the door and saw two figures close together.

  Their faces were inches apart and from this angle, Zoey couldn't glean anything except that their skin was white. But then all of a sudden, they got even closer and a bright light was visible inside. Zoey wondered what that light was and just as she did, even more lights began to shine around them. The beat of her heart started to rapidly pump within her chest. These two weren't about to have sex! They were doing magical shit!

  Zoey accidentally exhaled the air she didn't know she was holding in and the two stared in her direction.

"Who's there?!" The boy yelled in a voice that sent shivers through her body.

"I DIDN'T SEE ANYTHING!" She yelled.

  Zoey instantly regretted saying anything but that didn't stop her from running down the hall at her fastest speed. She could hear the door to the classroom bursting open as she turned the hall. Her legs didn't stop moving until she was successfully out of the school building and a distance away from the school down the street. Hopefully, they didn't see her while she was running.

  Zoey dropped on her butt completely out of breath. She had never run as hard as that ever in her life. She could've sworn she saw like 2 teachers chasing her when she was running through the building. The fast beating of her heart matched perfectly with her emotional state right now. Magic was actually real and there were people who could use it! And they probably were going to kill her for seeing them use it!

"I need to find a way to defend myself!" Zoey exclaimed.

  Once she made her way home, Zoey began doing everything she could to try and use magic. Chanting long magical spells to cast fireballs, magic missiles, and teleporting. But obviously, nothing worked as her magic stat was literally at 0. So, she did the next best thing and started looking online for self-defense classes. Since she couldn't bring weapons to school, she had to learn a way to defend herself with just her body alone. Magicians were usually weak in close combat, right?

  The only self-defense classes near her for women were things for like rapists and defending herself from people trying to assault her. That wouldn't be too helpful against people who could use fucking magic! So instead, she started looking for self-defense classes that weren't targeted at women. In her local area, there was a boxing gym that had a 4-star rating, a taekwondo class with 3-stars, a karate dojo with 4-stars, and several fitness classes.

  As an American, Zoey only had one strong impression of any of the classes listed. And that was boxing. There were no famous taekwondo fighters that she could name and only a few karate fighters that she could. The famous karate fighters didn't count though because they were movie actors and Zoey didn't know enough about those actors to tell if they really had a background in karate. But with famous boxers, she could name a few. Nike Lyson and Buhammad Kali were some. Zoey prepared herself to visit the boxing gym tomorrow. The chilling tone from that casanova's words earlier still ran through her mind. He definitely planned to do something bad to her if he managed to get ahold of her.

'Wait is he a casanova? He was just doing magic stuff with that girl. There was no proof that they were going to do any naughty stuff but then again... There is nothing saying that they weren't going to go at it like animals after doing secret magic stuff.' She got distracted.

  Zoey focused back on her computer and got back to shopping for boxing equipment. Their family shared a Lamazon Prime account so, she could put whatever she wanted into her dad's shopping cart and when he goes on Lamazon, he could buy them for her if he has the money this week. He worked as a video game designer. She already looked up what equipment she would need for boxing classes and added several things to his cart. Hand wraps, dark purple boxing gloves, a heavy bag to carry her stuff with, and boxing shoes.

  Tomorrow when her dad asks why she needs all this boxing stuff, she'll tell him she wants to learn boxing to protect herself. It wouldn't be a lie either because that magic guy was for sure going to try and find out who she is and silence her. Boxing was just the best alternative that wouldn't make her look like a nutcase for the next few days. She could try and conceal a weapon on her at all times but getting in trouble for something like that would be annoying. Zoey also doubted she'd be able to persuade any teachers that she was keeping a razor or knife on herself for protection.

  Zoey didn't have a suspicious look to her or anything. Just your normal 17-year-old girl. She had dark brown skin, a short and thin frame with straight black hair that went past her neck slightly. Sadly, she wasn't gifted with large tits but her ass was nice. In her opinion, anyway. She'd screw her. If she started working out, she'd probably be able to get her ass to pop too.