Chased slowly turned toward the cheerful voice calling his name, only to find himself staring at the last person he wanted to see. A red-haired boy stood among his friend group, grinning at Chase. He was tall, muscular and intimidating. Chase froze, eyes wide with terror, dreading what was about to unfold. Chase took too long to answer, so the red-haired boy strode toward him, leaving his group behind, carefully watching their interaction.
"Hey, I asked you a question," the boy said menacingly.
"Huh? n-nothing," Chase replied, his voice trembling with fear. He looked around, trying to find a way to escape this situation. He could feel himself panicking: his heart racing, breath quickening, cold sweat breaking out across his skin, and his body consumed by fear.
"Don't lie to me, or you know what's going to happen to you." He said as he jabbed Chase's injured rib, making him wince in pain. He smiled, "Does that still hurt?" He found great joy in Chase's pain.
"I was just in the principal's office," Chase said, trying his best to mask the pain and fear surging through his body.
"Leave him alone, Lucas." A girl said as she pulled him away from Chase. "We need to report back to the principal."
"Relax, Iris, " Lucas said as he smiled sweetly at her, "We still have some time, let me mess with him for a bit."
"No, let's go!" Iris said as she dragged Lucas away, threatening to punch the living daylight out of him if he wasted her time. The rest of the group followed. They headed towards the door of the building Chase had just exited from.
"Don't worry, Chase, " Lucas said, smiling, as he reached the door
"I'll deal with you later."
"Come on!" Iris moaned as she pushed him inside, leaving Chase alone in front of the building.
He exhaled, the tension in his shoulders easing as relief washed over him. "Well", Chase said as he started walking back to class, "At least I am safe for now..."
*****
It was 3:30 pm, and school had ended, but Chase had found himself sitting in detention alone doing his physics homework, which he had received from the last period. The teacher in charge of detention had left for a while to get something from the teacher's lounge.
The chemistry teacher had put Chase in detention for skipping class this morning. He hadn't had any friends since sixth grade. Now, in tenth grade, he was still friendless, which weighed heavily on him. Trying to push aside the feeling of loneliness, he focused on finishing his homework.
He groaned. "How do you even calculate this?" He asked himself as he violently flicked through his textbook, trying to find the formula for change in thermal energy, but gave up halfway and sighed. He heard a couple of voices outside the classroom and hoped that those people would not notice him and leave.
The door opened. Chase put his hood up and acted busy, hoping that the person who walked in would ignore him and leave immediately. But instead, a loud voice happily exclaimed, "Oh, look who we have here!"
Lucas!
The realization made Chase panic; he hastily shoved his things into his bag, trying to leave as quickly as possible before Lucas could reach his table. But Lucas moved fast and appeared in front of Chase before putting an arm around his shoulders.
"What's the rush, Cheesy?" He smirked, "Trying to ditch your friends is not cool, you know?"
Chase clenched his fist. He wanted to brush Lucas' arm off his shoulders, but Lucas had tightened his grip.
"I do not want any trouble," Chase said quietly.
"I do not want any trouble," Lucas repeated mockingly as he gave Chase a savage punch to the stomach. Chase fell to the ground, clutching his stomach and rib in pain.
"Well," Lucas said as he grabbed Chase by the hair, putting him on his knees, "It appears you haven't recovered from your injuries from last week." He smiled, picking him up slightly and kneeing him where his bruise was. Chase spat blood, groaning in pain as he collapsed to the floor again.
"Lucas, stop it." A voice calmly said as it walked towards them followed by about thirteen people.
"We're just playing Iris." He playfully said as he violently threw Chase towards nearby tables, causing them to fall down on him.
"Whatever." She said, taking a seat on one of the tables in the middle of the classroom, and the others sat near her.
"When's our next mission?" A boy asked, completely ignoring the kid trying to recuperate his breath on the floor amidst a set of fallen tables.
"Don't know", another girl replied, twirling her hair, "Ms Pierce didn't tell us. Do you know Lazuli?"
"No," Lazuli replied to her friend Kate.
"I want to get stronger quickly; training isn't really boosting my power." Another boy said while shadow boxing.
"Relax, Alex." A boy named Kabé said as he tried to calm down his friend.
"Hmph! Boys." Jaimin grunted while rolling her eyes and went back to checking herself in a mirror.
It looked like everyone had forgotten about Chase, who was still at the back of the classroom. Chase, nearly recovered from those blows, tried to find an opportunity to leave. Three students said their goodbyes and left the classroom. Lucas was distracted by Iris, and everyone else couldn't care less about him, so he took this chance to leave. He swiftly stood up whilst clutching his stomach and walked as quietly as possible towards the door, trying to avoid bringing attention to himself.
Lucas caught a movement out of the corner of his eye and saw what Chase was doing. He immediately pulled Chase by his collar and dashed him backwards. All heads turned to look at him, but nobody spoke.
"Stay put," Lucas warned as he continued his conversation about missions and other stuff.
There were about thirteen people left inside the room, including Chase, and it appears that the twelve most popular kids in school were in that classroom. They were not only popular, but they were also the top twelve strongest of the school, and the three students who had left were runner-ups. In the midst of them, Chase's elder sister was there. She ranked among the top five strongest students on the school leaderboard. Here is the list of the top 12 students: