German with Ms. Edelwei? always felt like an eternity had already passed when it had only been half an hour since the start of the lesson.

  My seat, luckily, was to the back of the class near the window. I tried my best to listen, but I felt a bit drowsy for some unknown reason. Maybe I didn't sleep long enough last night.

  I looked outside through the window, watching the wind slowly shake the snowy trees. Time continued passing, and the serene voice of our teacher slowly faded from my mind.

  "Hanah."

  Hmm? Did someone just call my name? Certainly sounded like it.

  "Hanah Mayflower!"

  A finger poked into the shoulder that I rested my head on as I watched the outside world. "Wake up! The class is not a place to sleep in."

  I jolted awake, accompanied by the giggles of my classmates. I felt blood rushing to my head as my ears turned a slight shade of crimson.

  "Sorry, Ms. Edelwei?..." I mumbled a halfhearted apology to her, trying my best to hide my embarrassment.

  "Just be more careful, Hanah. While my class may be boring to you, I highly recommend you don't let this show on the exam next week. You are a fine student, but you could be so much better if you just stopped daydreaming so much. Or actually dreaming in this case..."

  Gods, did she never shut up? Please just stop talking! Don't make this worse than it has to be. I didn't like being the center of attention, not in the slightest. This was just handing out free material to Blake and friends to make fun of and further embarrass me in front of others later.

  Just as Ms. Edelwei? walked back to the front of the class to continue her lesson, something unexpected occurred. A bright white light suddenly flooded the room. Then, before anyone could react, everything went black.

  ...

  As my groggy mind slowly pulled itself together again, I propped myself off the ground and slowly took in my surroundings. Around me, I could see my classmates and Ms. Edelwei? do the same, everyone having confusion written all over their faces.

  We were in some enormous, extremely extravagantly decorated room, sitting on a very luscious-feeling red carpet that was embroidered with golden ornaments on the edges.

  On the end of the carpet, overlooking the entire room, stood a huge throne made of some white stone that looked a bit like marble.

  On the throne sat an old-looking man with hair that was slowly fading to grey and wrinkles already evident on his face. He simply watched us from his throne with a regal expression, giving no indication of his intentions.

  Next to him, and towards the side of the room, stood orderly rows of guards who held spears and had swords strapped to their waists. While I didn't count them, there must have been at least thirty or forty in total.

  The confusion among my classmates slowly turned to panic as a cacophony of voices erupted, talking over each other.

  "Where are we?"

  "What happened? What is this?

  "Are you alright? I'll help you up."

  "Everyone! Calm down!"

  "Is this a prank? Did we get kidnapped?"

  Nobody calmed down. At least not until the guy on the throne suddenly stood up, a regal aura erupting from him, forcing everyone's focus away to target him.

  "You must all be confused, but there is no need to worry. I will explain where you are and why you are here."

  "This," he said as he made a sweeping gesture not directed at anything, "is the grand Kingdom of Astelios, one of the last three kingdoms remaining on this world. And all of you were summoned here as heroes to save the world."

  Sounded ominous, but oh well. Judging from the kinds of faces my classmates were making, his wording didn't do much to calm them down. For some reason, however, I could spot a couple of very excited faces among my classmates. Did they know something I didn't?

  "This world is in danger. Over the last couple of decades, stronger and stronger monsters, also called magical beasts, have appeared. Those beasts have always existed, but their population was fairly stable. However, as time passed, sightings of strong monsters became more common. Many towns were wiped from the face of the earth, and even entire cities fell into ruin. Now there are only three Kingdoms left, all surrounded by a great wall separating us from the fallen lands, also called the wilderness by many."

  Okay, and what are we supposed to do? I'm not sure how a group of fifteen-year-olds and one adult are supposed to change or save anything.

  Suddenly our teacher, Ms. Edelwei?, stepped in front of our group and spoke to the probably-king of Astelios.

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  "Your Majesty, if I may interject, how are we supposed to change the perilous situation this world is in? These are still kids barely fifteen years old. We are no special heroes that have the power for something like that. All this sounds incredibly dangerous, can't you send us back and summon someone else instead?"

  Bless her heart, I don't think I would have the courage to stand up and demand something from a very clearly insanely powerful king with unknown magical powers, if he is the one responsible for our summoning that is.

  "You make a fair point. However, while the makeup of your group is truly unusual in both the number of heroes summoned as well as the age of the heroes, it is not unprecedented. According to ancient records, there have been summonings before, all of them made in times of great danger. The summoned heroes have always varied greatly, and yet every single one of those ended in a success. I trust the Will of the World to have guided the most fitting heroes for this task here, no matter what those may look like."

  "You also speak of having no power. While that may be true now, it won't be for much longer. This world is governed by the Will of the World, also referred to as 'The System' by heroes of the past. The Will of the World is a natural part of this realm and is the way to power. Unlike the worlds heroes seem to stem from, this world is home to a unique type of energy called Mana. Mana is generated by every soul and can be thought of as the spiritual equivalent of blood, the blood of the soul, so to speak. However, this comparison is, for various reasons you will touch upon later, to be taken with a grain of salt. Inferring the behavior of mana from the behavior of blood is neither possible nor intended."

  Oof, that guy really likes to hear himself talk, not too different from some of the teachers we have. This is turning into a full-blown lecture rather quickly. No idea what the hell that comparison was supposed to tell us about this so-called 'mana'.

  "Every being in this world uses mana. Mana is the fuel that allows us to manipulate the world in ways that we desire, which would be completely impossible without. This manipulation is what heroes of the past coined 'Magic', a term that is now the generally accepted term for changes in reality induced by mana. This is where the Will of the World comes in. It is, in its core, a law that converts experience into power woven into the soul. For example, say you kill a high-level magical beast. In that case you would receive a lot of experience, because its high level fundamentally is equivalent to a high strength, which in turn equals a strong soul. This experience gets bound to your soul by the Will of the World. To make this usable to conscious beings, it developed a unified expression of power for the collected experience. This is generally what we refer to when we mention 'the system'. While its definition is interchangeable with the Will of the World, it is easier to differentiate between those concepts by treating the law and the actual expression as different things. The main indicator that shows the general strength level of an entity is generally referred to as its 'Level'. In what form the gained power expresses itself in is related to both the Will of the World and your own soul. This expression is what we refer to as your 'Class'. Some examples for this may simply be [Spearman], [Pyromancer], or even something not related to combat like [Weaver] or [Stonemason]. These classes gain experience not through slaying creatures, but by creating excellent products that are recognized and graded by the Will of the World."

  "Speaking of grades, every class is given a grade as well, determining how rare and good that class is in a general sense. The rarities are from lowest to highest: Common, Uncommon, Rare, Epic, and Legendary. The only ever recorded legendary class in our records is the class [Hero]. With every summoning, there's always exactly one [Hero] who is going to lead the salvation of this world."

  "You can access your own profile to inspect your class, level, and other aspects by simply having the intention to inspect it. Some heroes of the past have found it easier by thinking or speaking commands like 'status' or 'profile'. Like with so many other things, the intent is important here, not the execution."

  "That is as much as I am going to tell you for now. I hope my quick introduction was enough to answer some of your questions and for you to get a glimpse into the opportunities that lie here. If you have any questions, feel free to ask any of the instructors later for advice. They are more qualified to explain in-depth functionality than I will ever be. For now, I would advise you to visit the bedrooms or baths we have readied for each of you and let all of this sink in. I know it's a lot to receive such a huge responsibility so suddenly."

  The king, finally finished with his lecture-turned speech, suddenly bowed to us in an unexpected turn of events.

  "While it may hurt some of you to hear this, there is no way back now. Even if necessary for the survival of this world, the summoning is completely irreversible for us. I hope you can forgive me and the world for this. We will not force you to fight. If you wish so, you may spend your time living here in this palace as long as you wish. If so desired, you may also leave by yourself and settle down or go explore the remaining world on your own, we will not force you to stay here."

  He stood straight again, a slightly solemn expression visible on his aged face.

  "You, the summoned group of heroes, are the last hope this world has. Please keep that in mind before you come to a decision. I will now leave you to your own, the guards will guide you to your rooms. No matter what you decide to do, I thank you in the name of Astelios."

  While we were escorted out of the grand room we were in, I, like most of my classmates, was deep in thought about what the king revealed to us. I just don't know what to think of this. I cared only a little bit about not being able to go back. I barely had any attachments to begin with. While I do feel bad leaving Mom behind, the risk to her job and livelihood is gone now, since Blake and his friends are stuck here in this world as well. I just had to hope that she wouldn't take the loss of her daughter too hard when they'd inevitably declare us for dead. There was no way back anyways, no use dwelling on it. Maybe we could go back when the hero 'saved the world' or whatever they were supposed to do.

  On that note, I wonder who of us is the rumored [Hero]. While I held no hope in my heart that it would be me, I couldn't help but speculate. Jane or Leyvin seemed like fitting candidates, they had good enough personalities and a good sense for order and justice. Jane is our class president after all. I could also see Ms. Edelwei? ending up with the [Hero] class, that would certainly be funny. Though I somehow doubt she is ever going to participate in a fight. Wouldn't be smart to have her as the [Hero] then.

  Nobody talked while we walked, not even Blake and his friends Eric and John, who were usually so annoyingly talkative. Everyone was probably too busy digesting the king's words or checking out their status page.

  Having said that, I should check mine out soon as well. No use in pushing it away any longer. Maybe I'll even end up with something unexpectedly good? As heroes or hero candidates, we should have something that makes us better than other beings of this realm. Otherwise, we would never catch up to have a chance to change the fate of this world.