So I had this dream that meridian was teaching a class at a local school. He had and picked a ton of students based off of... Some sort of criteria and the goal was he'd slowly weed us out one by one until there was only one left. The last remaining person would be his new apprentice.

There were several of us from varying parts of the world. I very distinctly remember Sora being there as well as this dude named Niel who looked suspiciously like Nergil.

Anyway, the class was simple enough. Normal high school level stuff, at the start. But our tasks slowly got stranger and stranger, and as time went on this bizzare point system was added in. I can't remember exactly how it worked but I remember if your score hit a certain number you divided it by four and then multiplied your original number by the sum. It was strange.

The task I remember doing was a test of strength. Meridian had a sword out for some reason and said he'd duel us one by one. But I knew something was off about it. His sword had a purple sheen to it as if it'd been enchanted.

So like, this kid Niel says he'll go first. Then it clicks. Meridian would never fight one on one in the set timeline. Something tricky was about to happen. Right as it clicked I screamed NO and ran over to Niel. I grabbed a sword off the shelf, knocked him over, and then struck Meridians sword out of his hands.

Meridian just smiled at this. He told me "good luck" and then class was dismissed. Suddenly three werewolves in wolf form appeared. They had the personality of the hyena from the first lion king movie. Anyway, their goal was to kill me. They ran at me, I ran away with my sword still in hand. My goal was to separate them and attack one by one.

As I ran Sora followed, saying I was an idiot for doing this and blah blah blah I should have let Neil face off because he volunteered. I said that by doing this I also volunteered and that it wasn't a big deal. I remember ducking and dodging attacks from the werewolves as this happened.

The end of the school day arrived and my mom came to pick me up in her car. As I was running away from the werewolves I managed to kill one of them. I got in her car and she began to drive away. As she did she also expressed her worries about this whole class and said that I really wasn't cut out for something like this. That pissed me off so I downplayed the situation while uh... Boosting myself? I mentioned that the minions attacking me were mice and that I had already killed two of them.

So for some reason all us students had Meridian on discord. Or at least me and Sora did. By the next day I had killed all the werewolves but now I was constantly on alert for anything else. Meridian is just like that. As his assistant you always have to be on guard, so of course there'd be more threats than what I saw originally. But I really wasn't strong enough, so I sent him a message.

Basically, I asked what I could do to get stronger. He totally ignored my question and reminded me about the upcoming homework assignment and if I had any questions blah blah. That confused me because Meridian isn't like that usually. He'd never just overlook something like that. So I asked him again. I got a two word response to that. "Japanese comics".

This confused me, but Sora was also in the room with me. Right as I got that text he also got one, which for some reason he read out loud. it was something to the effect of "this is another test. I'm testing the Icarus effect. Don't let her know". Which, by the way, that is NOT the name of that. The "effect" he was trying to test is ignoring and dismissing someone to see if they'll still continue on. Like, leave them in the dark and see if they'll give up or fight for more information. Idk if this has a name or not but it's sure as hell not the "Icarus effect". I think my brain was just trying to come up with something clever in my sleep.

Hearing this I laughed to myself before replying to his message. I told Meridian "oh come on, you of all people should know it's called Manga". I then turned to Sora and smiled and said basically "well, if he wants me to read manga to get stronger I'm reading beastars again. What better way to get stronger than by reading a book about animals fighting to the death?". I only said this to throw him off. Pretending I didn't hear him reading the message out loud. Sora agreed and then the time for class began, so we both started going inside. Then I woke up