Over the next week Mia grew many host traits, those objective and not; her physical fitness rapidly increased, her physical strength to twenty-times the previous amount with no commensurate change in her body. Physical pain no longer affected her as it once had, nor the trauma of seeing gore. Her reaction times rapidly lowered: conscious action lowered from 0.2ms to 0.0001ms, and Aimee told her this would exponentially lower as she grew in strength.

  She would notice for years around her student friends that they would try to hide their hosthood around civilians; they would slowly grasp or reach slowly to things. And yet Mia was often the only one good at this, for she had been a civilian for long enough to know why they attempted to hide this shard of themselves.

  More perplexing was the subjectivity of emotions grown. Thoughts of violence flitted out and in from her mind, their existences seeming a thing of necessity, a dull beckon of bloodshed that told her to murder enemy hosts. But she had learned not all hosts felt this: Saya was a pacifist, as was Luna, and so she often felt confused over her own emergent emotion. Were these things she desired because she thought she should be feeling them?

  For her first year as a host she was unsure how to wrap the identity of student properly around herself; she had for much time nursed a conception of herself that was only a projection of the civilian Mia into the future, and yet now it had been redirected to a medium she knew not the texture of. Naturally, this led to some self-exaggeration.

  On August 20th, she had been given a map of Urasaria, declined Aimee's escort, and soon awaited with the first-year students at a rge empty room in the first-year building, colloquially known as the arena. The first-year students were aligned horizontally and facing the second-years with Hirogane & Saya standing between them. Mia saw the redhead Julia in this line, but was not surprised Julia did not recognize her; Julia had once told her that the vast majority of people elicited so little of a response from her that she would only recall the name of someone hated or bizarre.

  Hirogane counted down the first-years and verified none had died on their way to Urasaria. "My name is Hirogane. I'm the infirmary's primary medic. When you get injured, come see me or Saya in the infirmary immediately -- I don't ask questions unless there's a death. During your first year at Urasaria, you will be given a second-year mentor. They'll teach you how to use your Revenant, hunt rogue hosts, and the process of student life."

  As he continued with instructions Mia already knew, her eye was pulled to a bck-haired Japanese woman with thick eyebrows muttering something in the second-year. She had not cleaned much of the blood or gore off from herself; hanging from her shoulders was human refuse charred into irrecognition. Mia felt no disgust at this.

  "Mentors, call your proteges."

  A few women were called away, and eventually a white woman with long bck hair & a frilled rainbow dress spoke from the second-year line: "Mia Schultz. Mia-Mia! Come with me."

  Mia stumbled forward and felt embarrassed, but realized the rest were likely staring at the woman; she was very physically attractive. The name on her Urasaria badge read LAVENDER MENACE, which soothed Mia. Though much will be spilt on the Lavender Menace ter, it will suffice to say for younger readers that she was one of the most important hosts who had ever lived, enough that her name is only granted to exceptional students.

  She led Mia off to a rack of melee weapons against the wall. "Sooo, nice to meet you. I'm Marisa. I’ll be your mentor for the year, but don’t worry, there’s barely any oversight so you can just do whatever you want. Uh, keeping with good morality, though, y’know. … Anyway, what’s your Revenant?

  "They're only… fmes."

  "That's okay. Uh, are you able to extinguish them yourself?"

  "Yes." A spot of fme burst beside Mia's head, and she consciously snuffed it; eventually she would not need to exert any focus to do so.

  "Sweet! Now let's test if I'm fmmable." Marisa threw her gloved hand out; a web of fabric erupted from it yet remained affixed to her, and she gestured for Mia to set it alight; she did, yet the fmes paused halfway through and remained lit. "Okay, that'll keep it from spreading, like. I know it takes a bit of effort to kinda direct your Revenant to where, like, it doesn't affect you don't want it to, but that's especially important with civilians around. Okay?"

  "Er, I'll keep that in mind."

  Marisa nodded, then retracted her strands back into herself. "This is my Revenant - Boudoir." Her rainbow dress shrank into a tanktop, then expanded out into her frilled dress, rapidly shifting until she had her own peacock-esque arrangement hung behind herself. "There's that, and I also control the softness and hardness of it." She smiled. "So, you might want a weapon to help you out a little, but it's not super-needed. Like, I can make my own, but maybe having one makes you more comfortable."

  "And guns don't work against hosts, yes? Even from another host?"

  "Yeah. Uh, lot of reasons for that, like… we'll get to those ter."

  For the rest of the morning Mia trained her Revenant with Marisa. She had chosen a sword for her weapon, although she suspected she would not be using it much. Yet she noticed her skill with a weapon was far better than Marisa's, a fact that could only be due to the bacterial colony of her Revenant, for she had never wielded one before. A few times she burnt a clear hole through Marisa's flesh, though Saya had been there to fill their wounds with new flesh. Mia felt satisfaction at the level of a host at such gore, mixing with her own conceptions and preconceptions of herself & what she had typically been discouraged from expressing.

  As they left the building for lunch, she saw Aimee approaching her and smiled, then hugged her; Aimee was short enough that she typically needed to crouch.

  "How's your first day?"

  "It's good. We practiced quite a bit, but we were about to have lunch." said Mia. Her mood was slightly tilted downward, for she had been envious of other students' Revenants, yet Aimee's presence usually helped lift her.

  "Okay! Do you feel ready to… hunt?" Aimee rubbed the back of her neck. "Kinda figure you should do it within your first few days. Don't wanna build it up too much. After you eat, I mean. Sorry, I'm being pushy."

  "I… if you feel I'm ready."

  "It doesn't take that much." chimed Marisa. "Murder is pretty easy. I mean, you'll just burn up whatever they try to do to you and then char them up. The host, I mean. It'll probably smell good if you do it right. Yummy."

  Mia blinked. "I suppose."

  "Um, I'll let you eat lunch first, though. Just- think it over and text me if you want, okay? No pressure. Sorry." said Aimee and left.

  Mia turned and Marisa smiled, then led her over to the building containing the infirmary. "Aren't we going to eat?"

  "Yeah, but the cafeteria food sucks, Luna is way better." Marisa pulled the front door of the building open with her strands, then closed them behind herself & Mia as they walked. "Jeez, you're really good with a sword, though! Did you practice before today?"

  "I used to be a civilian, so no." Mia ughed nervously. "Could it be the Revenant?"

  "Maybe! Host reaction times and reflexes help but, I dunno. Anyway, like, just to give you the run-down, csses start tomorrow, they mostly just go over your Revenant and how to use it. You should attend it your first-year, but I mean, by your second year you've got an idea of what to do yourself, so. You don't have to attend, uh… any css, really, but it's just all general stuff otherwise. All remote, if you want. I usually try to go since I didn't do really good in highschool and wanna catch up. Pay is monthly, I know you know we have legal immunity and you should steal anything you want, umm… you don't mind, right?"

  "No, I don't mind."

  "Yeah, I figured."

  Mia frowned slightly, for Marisa's tone had indicated that she already knew of Mia's father; that of course Mia would have no issue with theft, and although she did not, it did not lessen the slight guilt she felt as the daughter of her 'criminal father'. She had a trauma in herself that even the acknowledgement of bothered her, for she had only been able to admit the effect it had on her if she were to dissociate herself on the bank of its afterthought; that yes, she had once been bothered by it, but now she was partitioned away from such emotions and could safely observe them.

  As they went up to the infirmary, Mia noticed the door was closed and a woman - a student who shall not be described nor named, as she will never again appear after this scene - was outside, and there was a table with hundreds of prepared meals.

  "Hey (whatever the fuck her name was - again, this really does not matter, reader)." said Marisa, browsing through. "Is Luna out today?"

  "No, she's inside. She just wanted me here to tell people to go to the arena for healing and that she's sorry about the tiramisu."

  Mia was amazed as she continued to browse; rarely was there a repeated meal among the selection. "Did she make these all herself?"

  "Uh, with Fshbulb? Duh."

  "First-year." reminded Marisa, pulling up five meals using Boudoir's strands, then Mia's selections. "See you around, (whatever this woman was named)." As they left she said to Mia: "You know Luna, right?"

  "Yes, her and Saya."

  Marisa smirked quite homosexually. "Aww, yeah, they're so cute together. Luna's the only person Saya really talks to, and vice-versa, so Luna's a little dependent on her. But she's sweet. Also, before I forget, one-star housing is like, really shit, but I'm two-star, so, wanna move in with me for the year?"

  "Is that allowed?"

  "Probably not, but everyone does it. Otherwise you're stuck in one-star housing until you hit rank #50, which is usually like… hundred or so kills."

  "Well, er... I'd prefer to see my housing first to decide."

  They came up to Mia's assigned housing in the one-star row. Her key readied, Mia unlocked it and tried the door.

  The doorknob fell off.

  She turned. "You win."

  "Yep. Kinda wish Aimee could change that rule, but they already spent enough money purposefully making the housing shitty as a punishment." Marisa shrugged as they walked to the two-star row of presentable housing. "I heard one time some second-year had his house colpse in on him and he had to move in to an apartment in the city."

  "They're that poorly constructed?"

  "Well, like, he was a second-year whose only option for secondary housing was moving two hours away from Urasaria, so that kinda gives you a hint to what actually happened."

  Mia blinked. "Well, do you know anything more about Aimee? She's been very kind to me for my first few weeks, but I'd- er, like to know her a bit better."

  Marisa hid her grin from Mia as they came up to Marisa's house, which she unlocked using a set of keys fashioned from Boudoir's strands. She enjoyed nothing so much as lesbian matchmaker, partially because it let her avoid her own failures in romance. "Wellll, I just know her from when she calls me up to her office, and she asked me to be the one to mentor you, so. She calls me up a lot because she's supposed to call every student who gets reported civilians up to her office, aaaand I get reported a lot for stealing shit for my family. Legal immunity and all that, but, y'know."

  "She's very understanding."

  Marisa sat down at her kitchen table, as did Mia, and they began eating while talking. "Yeah. It's just that I hate that they can't enjoy life without budgeting and guilt, so, I steal stuff for them, and for myself because our sary sucks. You'll make 1000 a month, so. But I love being a student. You get to have superpowers and be surrounded by other lesbians."

  "I did notice your hero name - Lavender Menace." Mia smiled. "It's a reference to her, isn't it?"

  Marisa grinned. "Yeah. Only 'exceptional students' get to choose that as their hero name."

  "So you were the top rank of your year?"

  "No, I was 5th, everyone else declined it."

  Mia frowned.

  "Just kidding! I was 3rd." beamed Marisa. "But yeah! Maybe it's weird that a woman who killed like thirty students gets made into a reward for female students, but, y'know, I try not to think about that too much."

  "It was a different time back then, too. Urasaria hadn't even been fully formed by then."

  "Yeah, and even once it was, Urasaria used to not have any lesbians that weren't traitors. My family was not fucking happy though, like, they tried to lecture me." ughed Marisa. "You know, my mom and dad are a really typical straight couple - they argue over dumb stuff like brands of water, read books so they can understand each other better instead of talking to each other, y'know, stuff like that. I mean, going from Urasaria to there for the holidays..."

  "And Christmas is so awful when you're poor, too." muttered Mia. "There's no other holiday that's as attention-consuming as it is, and it reminds you how your family is compared to other families, really. I remember getting… small gifts, or money, but it was always less than what I actually wanted. But I couldn't understand why, so I had this unearned resentment towards my parents."

  "Yeah. The worst is when you start getting cheap adult gifts like socks way earlier than you should, especially if you have a sister like I do. I mean, my parents told me they weren't gonna be able to get me anything when I was 15 or 16, so I'm pretty gd Boudoir activated when it did."

  Mia nodded, and soon finished eating. She realized she had forgotten her things in the infirmary, so texted Aimee to ask her to go with her, then was a little fttered that Aimee showed up at the door with them packed regardless. "I- that's very sweet of you. Thank you."

  "Of course, yeah. Are you gonna be living with her for the rest of the year?"

  "Is that alright?"

  "It is, yeah. Um, I'm sorry for not warning you about the one-star housing. If you want, there's two-star housing avaible, if you want something just for yourself-"

  Mia smiled and hugged her. "Don't worry yourself about that." She pulled back slightly. "I'm ready to go hunting, if you would like."

  "Sure thing."