The Author's POV

-Shua!

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[Rank 1750, Ren Dover, confirm access Y/N]

The helmet's display gradually illuminated, revealing rows upon rows of information. Taking a minute to adjust my mind to the sudden changes, I looked through the information and pressed Y. After confirming, abruptly, a lively jingle that felt oddly familiar began playing, echoing through my ears.

The fact that there were a lot of procedures placed when entering the virtual cabin wasn't strange. With current technology, pretending to be someone else was as easy as turning on your phone. With just some custom-made masks someone could easily make themselves look like someone else.

Fortunately, it wasn't that difficult to distinguish a villain as villains undergo several genetic modifications when making a pact with a demon. This phenomenon occurred due to the fact that the human body cannot fully adapt to the power given to them by the demons.

Imagine an empty balloon.

Now imagine yourself filling it with air. Gradually as time passes the balloon will turn round and float.

That's how the human body usually worked when their mana increased.

Now imagine the same empty balloon, but this time instead of filling it with air we fill it with water.

In contrast to the air balloon, the water balloon instead of becoming perfectly round will droop down due to the density of the water, causing its shape to change.

Now take this example into consideration and apply it to humans, where water was the energy that came from the demons.

Because of how dense the energy coming from the demons was, the weaker villain's bodies tended to undergo drastic changes in order to withstand the newly found power that entered their body.

Due to these drastic changes, a simple retina, fingerprint, and gene test could verify if one was a villain or not.

Of course, this only worked for relatively weaker villains. For stronger villains, this sort of test was useless as their bodies could contain the power given to them by the devils they made a pact with, like professor Thibaut. Fortunately, this wasn't necessarily a problem as the stronger villains didn't bother disguising themselves.

However, even though strong villains tended to avoid disguising themselves, these sorts of tests were still a necessary precaution against villains. The consequences of not checking whether someone was an imposter could potentially be disastrous. Imagine what would happen if a villain was to make its way inside of the VR capsule. He/She could potentially put all the students at risk of brain trauma if not even death.

If a villain were to suddenly gain access to the virtual equipment main control system, he/she could suddenly discharge all of the electrical power inside of the capsules, essentially turning everyone inside of the capsule brain dead.

This sort of accident occurred several times in the past, resulting in strict checks and procedures getting installed by the company creating the capsule as a result of the backlash they received from the public.

Well, what about professor Thibaut? Technically he could override the system and kill everyone present, right? Actually, he couldn't, especially since his job was extremely important.

The reason why I was not necessarily worried about him was because his primary role in the lock was to turn potential heroes into villains. He was what was called a 'manager' or an 'agent'. His main responsibility was to turn students into villains by exploiting the emotions and resentment they had towards certain individuals or the academy.

Moreover, it wasn't that easy to override the system and discharge high amounts of electricity towards the capsules. Especially if this was happening inside of the lock, where several highly ranked heroes resided. They could easily sense the abnormal accumulation of electricity making it almost impossible for this plan to work.

Plus, Professor Thibaut simply couldn't afford to perform such a high-risk maneuver to kill an individual as turning students into villains was his main priority.

If not for the fact that professor Thibaut got direct orders from the demon he made a pact with to get rid of Kevin, he would've never tried fighting him, as it wasn't his responsibility.

Just as it was not my responsibility to get rid of him. If I suddenly got rid of the mini-boss, Kevin would never go through any hardship, creating a liability for when he faced the Demon King.

Gradually the world around me started to change, and a blinding light caused me to cover my eyes.

Blinking for a couple of seconds, and recovering my bearing I found myself inside of a white room.

Looking around the room, I could see a couple of students from my class similarly checking their surroundings.

After approximately five minutes, and seeing that no one else showed up, I made my way towards the other classmates.

There were a total of five people excluding myself in the waiting room.

Seeing that I was making my way towards them, some students went to greet me directly.

"Rank 834 William K. Johnson, a pleasure to meet you"

The first person to greet me was a rather short-statured browned hair teen, with a somewhat lively disposition.

"Rank 623 Rosaline Tluve"

"Rank 739 Edward Smith, greetings."

"Rank 956 Park Jinho, nice to meet you"

Following William, a red-haired pretty girl who stood proudly like a regal peacock greeted me. She had an indifferent air around her that made it seem like nothing interested her. Her tone was cold, giving the impression that she detested everything around her. She like me was an extra and thus I knew nothing about her, making me assume that her cold attitude came from some sort of past trauma. Most probably faced a similar to Amanda, who like her was cold.

After Rosaline, a black-haired youth with square-shaped glasses and neatly combed hair greeted me in a serious tone. Judging from his disposition and the way he talked, I made a mental note to myself to not interact with him in the near future. Not very fond of such straight-laced individuals.

Lastly, Park Jinho, who seemed to be of Asian descent, most probably Korean, greeted me with a modest attitude. He seemed somewhat wary of me, not sure why...

Turning my head to the last person, who ignored my presence since the beginning, I tried to greet him but I was promptly ignored.

With a fairly tall stature and a muscular upper body that did not lose out to any professional bodybuilder back in my world, was Arnold Kane. he carried an intimidating aura around him that reminded people of a wild gorilla that would attack anyone at the smallest sign of provocation. His hair was cut in a buzzcut and his eyes were tightly knit together in a frown.

Shaking my head, I presented myself to the rest.

There was no need for me to actually greet him as I already knew who he was, but as to not come off as too disrespectful I made sure to at least greet him. Had I skipped over him, I might've been the target of his bullying, which I really did not want to have any part of.

'Rank 75, Arnold Kane'

One of Jin's three main lackeys. who will later be known as 'Iron Mountain Arnold' due to his iron-like defense that could ward off several attacks from several individuals at a time.

He was what you called a 'Strong to the weak, and weak to the strong' type of person. A typical bully. His arrogance probably originated from the fact that he was Jin's lackey. To which I can only secretly express my disgust. You are actually proud of being someone else's dog?

"Pleasure to meet you, everyone, I'm Rank 1750 Ren Dover"

"..."

It took a couple of seconds for the rest to process what I had said before losing all interest in me.

Shrugging at their reaction, I could only sympathize with them as I understood where they were coming from. I mean, 800 ranks lower than the second-lowest in the group was quite the difference.

This was a society where power ruled over everything else. If you were not that powerful you were looked down on by everyone. Well, this mainly applied to the lock where individuals were still young and prideful. Once they entered the real world and actually fought against demons, only then will they realize how immature they were.

"Trash"

The first to speak up was, of course, Arnold, who looked at me with disgust.

Secretly shaking my head, I couldn't help but lament to myself for making this world full of arrogant characters.

Couldn't be helped, it was what the readers wanted...

Fuck you, readers.

Your pleasure was my suffering.

Well whatever, I'll just stay quiet for now and wait for the professor's instruction.

Fortunately, after I told them about my rank, no one approached me, helping me avoid unnecessary conversations.

[Ehm..ehm...Group 7 can you guys hear me?]

Disrupting the awkward atmosphere that developed due to my rank reveal, professor Thibuat voice resounded across the room.

[If you can hear me say 'Check']

"Check"

"Check"

"Check"

"Check"

"Check"

"Check"

[1..2..3..4..5..6, great look's like everyone is present. Okay, listen carefully as I will now explain the rules. Pay close attention because I will only say them once.]

[Since this is most likely the first time some of you have entered the virtual world, today's class will be on the lighter side]

[The people around you right now will be the group that you will work with for today's class.]

[Before you say anything, your group is balanced according to the computer and for the most part, each group will be evenly matched. Although there are some exceptions, which I really can't do anything about]

'Don't look at me like that! he was referring to Kevin and the others!'

Noticing the glares coming in my direction, I couldn't help but silently grumble to myself.

The professor was obviously talking about the top-ranked individuals who could most likely take on a team by themselves.

There wasn't actually that much of a difference in power between me and Park Jinho, the second-lowest in the group. Well, that was if you were comparing me from before I took over because right now my fighting strength was leagues above what it was a week ago.

The only reason they glared at me like that was probably because they wanted an outlet to unleash their grievances against

'Immature bastards'

[You will each be dropped into a remote terrain which will be randomly generated by the computer.]

[Your goal for today is to survive 1 hour]

[There are extra points awarded for those who manage to complete certain hidden tasks]

[This will count as a pass as long as you manage to survive for 1 hour, extra points will be awarded for each teammate that survives alongside you]

[I will give you 2 minutes to let you discuss your plans with your group.]

[Best of luck!]

[Oh~ Before I leave I forgot to mention. The last group will automatically fail this class]

-Click!

Somehow the glares towards my direction became stronger.

How the professors haven't realized that professor Thibaut was a villain was beyond me. He was obviously trying to sow discord among the groups to create grudges with each other, with the lower-ranked individuals being his primary targets.

The 'fail this class' thing is a total lie, as he had no power in regards to deciding who to pass or who to fail on the first day.

This was just an excuse he made to create a situation where a grudge could be created by making the stronger guys target the weaker individuals.

This was one of his typical strategies that made certain individuals suffer so that he could weaken their state of mind, and later on, take advantage of their weakness to turn them into villains.

If not for the fact that there were a lot of heroes present in the lock, professor Thibaut would've used more extreme measures to turn someone into a villain.

"You"

Pointing towards my direction, Arnold's deep voice resounded across the white room.

"Yes?"

"Make sure you survive, else..."

Placing his hand on my shoulder, Arnold exerted an incredible amount of pressure making me almost kneel on the floor.

-Thud!

"Ugh..."

After confirming his strength, I kneeled down as he intended and let out a fake groan.

"Understand?"

Seeing me kneeling in front of him, Arnold let out a satisfied smile and turned towards the rest who immediately nodded at him.

"Good"

While pretending to struggle to get up, I fell into deep thought.

From the exchange I just had with Arnold, I could approximately gauge my strength.

I could pretty much confirm I was still weaker than Arnold, but not by a large margin. If I had to make a rough estimate about my ranking, it should be around the three hundred's.

Fortunately, because this was a virtual world, I didn't really suffer much from the exchange I had with Arnold. But don't get me wrong. Just because I didn't suffer much didn't mean I wasn't angry.

In fact, I was furious. How dare you gorilla-like bastard use me to exert dominance over the rest?

If not for the fact that I didn't want to start shit with you and your gang, I wouldn't have kneeled down and humiliated myself like that.

I'm not like those braindead protagonists who scream 'I will only kneel to god and my parents, no one else shall make me kneel!'

I will kneel when I need to. But be ready to face the consequences of making me kneel.

Staring at his proud and arrogant face which acted as if everything was beneath him, I secretly swore to myself to make him pay ten times for what he had done to me.

'I take my grudges very deeply'

[Alright! the simulation is ready]

[I will start the simulation in 3...2...1]

-Shua!