"What took you
so long?"
Toto grumbled.

He rolled his chair around,
facing me.

"Got hung up by
the lunch rush, thot,"

dropping the can on the desk,

"you never go there,
so evidently, you
wouldn't know how it is."

Toto reached for
the can,

and promptly crunched
it open.

Sipping on my own,
I watched as the chubby dude
easily returned to his work,
some coding thing I could care less
to understand.

"Where's my 'thank you'
for sneaking that into
an unsupervised

computer lab?"

I snarled.

"Much appreciated,"
he hissed with sarcasm,
raising the can of
black coffee.

"I take cafe au lait, though."

"Unfortunate,"

I sighed,

"but I much prefer
my coffee 
black as the abyss."

"You and your

edgy nerd vibes,"he seethed.

"Keep it down
or we'll get caught,"
I grumbled, 
picking out a bag of potato chips
and tearing it right open.

"You're one to talk!"
he swore.

Now I simply ignored
the boy,

continuing to
munch loudly
in my corner.

We weren't supposed
to eat in the lab,
but really,
who cares?

Chaa-chang!

That made me leap
in surprise, and turn to my phone,

to the unfamiliar
ringtone that only
one game gave me--

『EXTERMINATOR』

is near you!

『Challenge to a PvP?』

YES ⋆              NO

I groaned,
annoyed.

This new function
is hella annoying.

My finger landed on NO
before I even thought twice.

Taking an angry bite of
chips, I went to my
menu to just

block this new asshole.

╔═══════════════╗

『EXTERMINATOR』

cannot be muted.

╚═══════════════╝

"Are you
effing kidding me?"
I swore right
out loud.

"Language,
you're a Literature
student, show some
tact, please,"

Toto spoke up
absent-mindedly.

I was ready
to claw my hair out.

I never wanted
to see this guy's name
ever again.

I want to
throw my phone
to the ground!

But I didn't,
of course.

I'm poor.

"Well, at least the game is
working again,"

I tried to be positive,
even though there was
nothing to be nonchalant about.

I led my avatar to walk around
Player Town again,
buying new equipment
and talking to NPCs.

"Huh?" 

something was rather odd
on the screen--

Why's my health bar
down by a third?

And it was still
going down further.

"Was I poisoned
or something?"

I took another bite
of my potato chip.

But the poisoned status icon
wasn't on the avatar.

It was at half now.

"What's going on?"

My max HP was high,
it wasn't something
so easily and quickly decreased.

Then I remembered.

『 Each player's Flavor Text will henceforth be established as their personal Rules to abide. Do be aware that violation of said rules will result in loss of health points. 』   

╔═══════════════╗

『RULEKEEPER』

There is
an order
to everything
in the world.

╚═══════════════╝    

"Am I...
breaking the rules,
somehow?"
I couldn't think
of any other
reason it could happen.

I didn't think
my avatar was
breaking the rules,
anyhow at all.

Then, what?

It struck me--
that at this moment,

I was eating
and drinking,

in the computer lab.

Feeling sweat drip down my chin--
my breath was still and 
my throat was sticky.

Dread filled me.

Toto put his drink down.

I, too, put my food down.

And immediately, my HP
stopped depleting.