[User ID accepted. Welcome, Blood Evolver.]
Quinn had chosen this name for a couple of reasons.
He could feel his body getting stronger with each person's blood he drank.
It was as if his body was "evolving" into something else, and in the future, he knew he would be far stronger than he was right now.
He thought the name fit him perfectly.
The next step was to actually design his character.
The body proportions of his characters were set to his natural body proportions, but he was able to choose whichever hair color, hair style, and outfit that he wanted.
While Quinn had always had black, curly hair, something deep within his soul was telling him to pick red, short, spiky hair.
It was as if something in his very blood was calling out to him.
As for his outfit, he decided on a simple, villager's outfit.
He looked like a farmer from an old fantasy world.
Once the "character creation" process was done, Quinn was once again teleported to a large, empty, white room.
It was then that Quinn had noticed something.
While within this room, he could walk around freely, and move his body just like he could in the real world.
Quinn looked down at his hands, and saw that he had his Basic-Tier Black Horned Gauntlets already equipped.
On a hunch, Quinn tried to open up his System's Status Screen.
To his surprise, it opened up just like normal.
Quinn looked down at his gauntlets, and decided that he wanted to try something.
"Blood Swipe!" He announced, swinging down his arm.
Instantly, the claw-like lines of red aura released from his fingertips.
The Blood Swipe impacted with the white ground, scratching it.
For whatever reason, it seemed that Quinn's System and abilities worked in here.
Slowly, a smirk crept across Quinn's face.
"Maybe Tsukuru would have been able to use his Ability in here!" He replied.
After Quinn had executed his Blood Swipe, he noticed that the usual "-1 HP" System message that usually accompanied his usage of the Skill didn't appear.
Confused, he re-opened his Status Screen.
When he looked at it, he saw that his HP was perfectly fine.
It was still at its full "20/20".
Quinn raised an eyebrow in confusion.
'Is it because I'm not actually IN the real world?' Quinn thought.
Whenever Quinn used his Blood Swipe Skill in the real world, he always felt a portion of his body's energy leave his body the second the red aura left his fingertips.
Quinn didn't know if this was his life force or his blood.
But inside this game, the attack had no such drawback.
It was simply replicating what his mind told the system to do as the VR Pod scanned his body to see if it was possible.
Quinn decided to further test this.
He swiped his hands non-stop, replicating the Blood Swipe barrage he had used to finish off Loop.
The lines of red aura left his fingertips with every swipe, but Quinn felt perfectly fine.
He checked his Status Screen again, only to find out that his HP Stat was still full.
Quinn then opened up the game's system, and checked his own information.
[User ID: Blood Evolver
Ability: None
Ability Level: None]
Seeing it kind of reminded Quinn of how Tsukuru had initially described his System's "scanner" function.
As Quinn looked at the information, another thought came to him.
If it was true that he didn't lose HP in this game, that meant that his Blood Bank Skill would be completely useless here.
Whenever he got attacked, it would have no effect on his real body.
Thus, he couldn't rely on it like a safety net like he had in the real world, like in his fight against Loop, and against the group of second-years in the assembly hall.
But, the fact that Quinn was able to use his Blood Swipe Skill indefinitely in here made him think.
'This 'Vampire' thing…' He thought. 'Is this really an Ability?'
When he had first unlocked his System, he had originally thought that the System as a whole was an Ability.
However, once he had met Tsukuru, that idea went flying out the window, as Tsukuru had both a System and an Ability.
'But…If this isn't an Ability…' Quinn thought, looking down at his hands. 'Then why did I get it from what looked EXACTLY LIKE anAbility Book?'
Even though Quinn had never heard of an Ability like this 'Vampirism' thing, he also knew that there were some crazy Abilities out there among the Originals, who had decided to keep their powers hidden.
Quinn then thought back to when his "race" had changed after his evolution.
All of these strange "Blood" Skills had started appearing after he changed from a "Human" to a "Halfling".
If these Skills were all part of some "race change" thing, and NOT part of an Ability, it would explain why they seemed all over the place.
Even with how radically different all of Tsukuru's Skills seemed from one another, creation, summoning Beasts, telekinesis, teleportation, they still all carried a connected theme.
Quinn looked down at his hands.
"What…on Earth…am I becoming?" He muttered.
Suddenly, a jolt of realization surged through him.
Instantly, his mind flashed back to when he had been given the Earth Ability Book at the start of the Ability Level Placement Test.
A System screen had appeared in front of him.
[You are incompatible with this Ability. It cannot be learned.]
Quinn's eyes widened.
"It said this Ability!" He gasped in realization. "Not Abilities in general!"
Quinn glanced around the empty room.
"Does that mean…that I could learn an Ability?!"
Quinn hadn't even tried to learn an Ability up to this point because he thought that it simply wasn't possible.
But now, if he was going to test this, he needed to think very carefully about which Ability he wanted to learn.
However, Quinn decided to put that on the back-burner for now.
Before he started his first match, he wanted to test out the Hammer Strike.
He had spent all last night watching and re-watching the video, and now, he felt ready.
Quinn took a deep breath, and thought back to the words of the blonde-haired Vampire.
"'Place your foot forward like this, and at the same time, rotate your body. The energy should flow through your toes upwards.'" Quinn repeated, as he went through the motions. "'Then, as you pull back your hand, stomp on the ground. At the same time, release the energy through your fist!'"
At first, Quinn did all of the steps slowly, making sure he matched the movements perfectly, without him using any of his energy or his strength.
He did everything step-by-step, just like the man in the video had explained.
After repeating the motions a few times, he was ready.
In one motion, he did the steps as fast as he could.
Just like the man had stated, Quinn could feel the energy rising up from the bottom of his feet, into his fist.
The powerful strike left his hand, and the loud "bang" that he had heard in the video could be heard.
Like in the video, a small shockwave appeared in front of Quinn's fist.
"Yes!" Quinn said with an excited look on his face. "I did it!"
Meanwhile, back in the real world, the sun was starting to rise in the sky.
As a result, rays of sunlight began to bleed through the window blinds of the rooms in the dormitory.
As the rays of light his Tsukuru's face, his eyes tightened, and his face began to twitch.
He let out an audible groan, and opened his eyes.
Slowly, he lifted his upper torso upwards into a sitting position.
Still groggy, he brought his wristwatch up to his face so he could see the time.
In the upper-right corner of the screen, it read "8:15".
Tsukuru stared at the time for another minute, before he let out a sigh.
Slowly, his eyes scanned across the entire room.
He saw Vorden sleeping peacefully in his bed, Peter with his blanket completely covering him, and finally, Quinn's empty bed.
Tsukuru raised an eyebrow in confusion.
He then looked up at the door, and saw a white piece of paper taped to it.
Seeing it, Tsukuru smirked.
Due to his enhanced eyesight, he could read the letter perfectly.
However, even if he couldn't, he still would have had a pretty good idea of its contents.
Slowly, Tsukuru brought his hand up to his forehead, and began to laugh.
The laugh started small, but slowly grew in volume, until his full-blown laughter filled the room.
Hearing the laughter, Peter and Vorden slowly began to stir from their sleep.
The lump under Peter's blanket rose up, and the blanket slowly slipped off.
Vorden, meanwhile, rose into a sitting position like Tsukuru had, Vorden rubbing his eyes.
"What the hell?" Vorden muttered, narrowing his eyes at Tsukuru.
However, at the same time, Peter began to glance around.
"Hey, where'd Quinn go?" He asked.
Hearing Peter's words, Vorden's eyes widened.
Instantly, his gaze snapped to Quinn's empty bed.
Slowly, Tsukuru's laughter died down.
He accessed his System's Inventory, and began "equipping" a fresh set of clothes.
"He probably headed straight to the VR Room before any of us could wake up." Tsukuru replied, an amused tone in his voice, as his shirt appeared over him.
Today, he wore a black shirt with the same image on both the front and the back of the shirt.
The image depicted a cute, cartoonish baby dragon with silver scales holding what appeared to be a white twenty-sided die with black number in its hands, looking down at it.
It had text written in big, bold letters that appeared both above and below the image.
Above the dragon, it read "ADHD&D".
And below the dragon, it read "Roll for Concentration".
Vorden raised his eyebrow in confusion as he saw the strange shirt.
"What makes you think that?" Vorden asked.
Tsukuru turned his head towards Vorden, a smirk on his face.
"Because it's exactly what I would have done." He replied.
Tsukuru jumped off his bed, and began walking towards the door.
"Well, see you guys later." Tsukuru replied, waving behind him. "I got stuff to do."
Vorden and Peter watched Tsukuru's retreating body, as he left the room.