First Floor Investigation

I approached Kokichi and Nagito, and asked them if I could join their group. Nagito eagerly accepted my offer, and after everyone else left the gym, we decided to explore it more before leaving ourselves.

The gym had bleachers on one side, split up by a set of double doors that let us out. The basketball court was black on one side, white on the other, with red lines drawn along them. There was a girls locker room on one side, and a boys locker room on the other, each with some sort of electronic scanning device near the door. We decided to check out the Boys locker room.

I opened the door, then immediately looked up and jumped to the side. There was a fucking chaingun in the middle of the room, mounted on the ceiling, pointed at the door! Not hearing gunfire, I cautiously peeked around the corner, and the chaingun was slowly sweeping its barrel side to side.

Shortly afterwards, Monokuma appeared out of nowhere. "Ah, never mind that gun. It's just there to discourage you boys and girls from sneaking into the wrong locker room! Only boys are allowed in the boys locker room, and only girls are allowed in the girls locker room! If one tries to sneak into the other... Rat-a-tat-tat-tat-tat! They'll become holy, if you get my drift! Ahhh-hahahahaha!"

Monokuma then disappeared as quickly as he appeared, making me wonder if he was a hologram, despite looking very physically existent. Kokichi made some snide remark about the gun, but I paid him no mind and looked around the locker room.

It seemed like a typical locker room, with small lockers with our names on them. I opened mine, and there was a dark grey beach towel, and a black and grey pair of swim trunks. There was also a small hallway veering off to the left, which the chaingun could also point at. I decided to check that door out.

It lead to a swimming pool, with a life guard chair in the middle. One side had "3 Feet Deep" written in tile on the floor, and the other side said "10 Feet Deep" in tile. The pool floor was the typical blue color, and the slope appeared to be uniform throughout, versus the normal sudden drop halfway across. Akane and Hina were swimming together, with Akane wearing a blue and white two-piece swimsuit and Hina wearing a one-piece dark blue swimsuit. Hina was doing laps back and forth, but Akane seemed to be just swimming in random directions, while being careful to stay out of Hina's way.

We waved, and Akane waved back, but Hina didn't seem to notice us. We decided not to bother them any further, and stuck to our investigation of the place instead.

Nagito stared at the pool for a while. "Wow, we get a pool to swim in! That sounds fun, but we better be careful. Someone could slip on the tile, crack their head on the floor, fall into the pool, and drown in here alone. But my luck would protect me, so I would probably be alright."

Kokichi, oddly enough, didn't have much to say about the pool, only asking Nagito a question about his swimming ability. We didn't feel like swimming, however, so we decided to leave. There was another scanner at each entrance, so we swiped our E-Handbooks so we could leave.

Leaving the gym, we decided to check out the room marked "Classroom 1-A". We pushed the door open, noticing there was no scanner to open the door with. To our disappointment, it looked like just a normal classroom, with 16 desks and a teacher's desk, along with an electronic board.

"What? No windows in a classroom? That's weird," Kokichi commented as we looked around. I checked the teacher's desk, and Nagito checked the students' desks, but they were all empty.

Kokichi spoke up again. "This reminds me of one of the prison rooms my organization has! The small row of desks, no windows, the..."

"Wow, really? What kind of prison was it?" Nagito asked.

"Oh, that was a lie," Kokichi said, and laughed to himself.

Ignoring him, I decided there was nothing else of interest, and we checked out the game room next. Kokichi challenged Nagito to a game of Darts, while I did all the exploring (and, of course, found nothing). After three thuds, Kokichi exclaimed, "Woooww! You really ARE the Ultimate Lucky Student! You'd make a great member to my organization!"

I glanced over, and in the middle were 3 white darts, all in the bulls-eye. Nagito was smiling broadly. "Yeah, I know. Some of my best luck often followed some of the worst things that have happened to me."

Leaving the Game Room, we checked out the room marked "School Store" next. There was a vending machine of sorts, with a scanner and a Monokuma face for a knob, but it was impossible to see anything inside of it. There was a drop slot at the bottom to collect your purchase, but what currency did it use?

Monokuma popped up behind a counter. "Hey there! This here is the Monoku-machine! You can get up to 2 free items per day, but what you get is completely random! Alrighty then, see ya later!" Monokuma then disappeared, and we resumed looking over the machine.

Nagito decided to give it a shot, and scanned his E-Handbook, then turned the Monokuma knob. A rattling sound was heard, then from the bottom slid a red scarf. He scanned his E-Handbook again and turned the knob again. This time, he got a ring with a Hope's Peak insignia on it. Seemingly satisfied, he put the scarf and ring into his pocket.

I asked Kokichi if he wanted to try it out, but he declined, saying that he wasn't interested in anything the machine had to offer, so I decided to try my luck at it. I got a pair of weighted cuffs to go around your wrists or ankles, and a fluffy grey cat plushy.

"Wow, what a nice collection of useless junk!" Kokichi said, with fake awe dripping from his words. "We could use all these items to escape this place!"

Nagito's eyes lit up. "Oh? How so? Do you th-"

"Oh, that was a lie. This crap is all useless. Throw it away or something," Kokichi said cheerfully, smiling broadly. He was already grating on my nerves, and I felt there was no way Nagito could be this gullible.

Ignoring the gate with the stairs going upward, we checked out Classrooms 1-B and 1-C, with similar results to Classroom 1-A, then decided to check out the big room in the middle.

To our surprise, there was a big courtyard, with two sets of benches, a round stone table with 6 seats around it, and a round water fountain with water gushing from a Monokuma head's open mouth. It looked creepy, like the statue was vomiting water at a constant rate, but it seemed to fit in with the rest of the school. Looking up, there were other floors, each with windows facing the courtyard, though they all appeared to be made of one-way glass, merely reflecting all of us on the outside. I counted 5 floors in total, including the one we were currently on.

Ibuki, Mikan, and Kirumi were sitting at the round table together, talking. We decided to approach them and see what they knew.

Kirumi immediately stood up, curtsied to us, then asked if we needed any assistance.

"Not at this time, no. Just looking for information. We've checked out this entire floor, but noticed there was a 'Dorms' area we haven't checked out yet," I stated.

Ibuki spoke up. "Yeah, we got our own rooms! Mine's got an acoustic and an electric guitar, and the walls are completely soundproof! I was jamming out hard, but with the door shut, Mikan and Kirumi couldn't hear any of it..."

"Yes, the rooms all appear to be soundproof. This will make for great sleeping arrangements, but on the other hand, if someone were to try to kill someone in their own room, no one would hear the struggle either," Kirumi added.

"St-st-struggle? But...but why? Why would someone kill someone else?" Mikan stammered.

"Why else? To use the rules of this place to escape, of course!" Kokichi loudly exclaimed, which caused Ibuki to gasp and put a hand to her mouth.

"No no no! No killing anybody! Ibuki forbids it!" Ibuki started foaming at the mouth a bit, but Mikan seemed to take it in stride. With Mikan being an Ultimate Nurse, if Ibuki was truly suffering from something, I would expect more of a reaction out of Mikan, so I settled my panic down.

"A-a-anyway, you should...all check out your rooms. And if you feel sick or hurt, please let me know. My room has two beds, including a hospital bed, so you could rest there while I take care of you. I've also got a medicine cabinet with basic first aid supplies, so I can handle scrapes, cuts, and even broken bones!" Mikan was smiling happily at the thought of taking care of us, and it was good to have a sort of makeshift nurse's office, but I then looked at Kokichi, hoping he wouldn't say something stupid.

Instead, Nagito spoke up. "An Ultimate Nurse's Office setup for the Ultimate Nurse! How amazing! I'm sure that even a nobody like me would be taken care of, wouldn't I?"

"Oh, yes, of course. E-even if you hate me, I'll still nurse you back to health."

Kokichi finally spoke up. "You know, I'm interested in seeing our rooms. We should head there next!" Oh, good, something useful finally came out of his mouth.

"I agree. Let's head that way." I nodded goodbye to the three girls, then the three of us headed through the double doors marked "Dorms".

Immediately to our left were a boys and girls bathroom, with the boys bathroom closest to the double doors. Next to them was a room marked "Trash". We went inside, and a camera flashed once I stepped beyond the sweeping arc of the doorway, taking our picture and displaying it on a computer along the left side of the wall. Inside, there was a trash compactor, next to an incinerator. Nothing of particular interest, but good to know we have a way to get rid of trash. There was also a scanner next to each one, which I assumed was to show who used them, and when. The door also felt heavier than the other doors we've encountered, and would shut itself without even being pushed. I had a concern that people could use this to get rid of evidence, but it looks like anyone who enters this room has a full-body picture taken of them, and you could even see Kokichi's empty hands and Nagito's shoes in the picture.

"Hey, you two, check this out!" Kokichi was at the camera, looking at a picture of Peko and Maki entering the room. The timestamp noted the two girls had arrived about 10 minutes before us, and that Maki's hands were empty, but Peko, in the front, was reaching for her sword. It appears the camera only works when entering, not when leaving, but there was no blood to be seen, nor any signs of a fight, so I presumed Maki and Peko were just looking around. "Looks like we weren't the first ones here! Hey, I wonder if one of them got...disposed of...in here, huh?"

Nagito opened the compactor and the incinerator, but both were completely empty and devoid of blood, bone, or even hair. "Nope, luckily there are no dead bodies in here," Nagito answered back, as if we really expected to find someone dead in here.

Leaving the Trash Room, we poked our heads into the Dining Hall, where there was a long table, seating 3 on the ends and 5 in the middle, for a total of 16 seats. There appeared to be a kitchen in the back as well, but we were more interested in the dorms at this point.

We made a left, then a quick right to see a line of 6 rooms, all girls. Maki and Peko in the very back, then Akane and Hina in the middle, then Miu and Ibuki closest to us. Walking down the hallway to our right, we saw Mikan, Kirumi, Keebo, and my room. Looking down the last hallway on our left, we found Nagito's and Kokichi's room, across from each other all the way down the hall, then Byakuya and Taka, then Gonta and Soda at the hallway entrance.

I looked at the other two. "Alright, this may be a good time to split up and check out our own rooms." Nagito agreed, but Kokichi said he wanted to talk to him more, so I let the two of them go and entered my own room, scanning my E-Handbook to get inside. I noticed there was a button next to my door (likely a doorbell), and a peephole to see who was outside.

I entered my room. There was a bookshelf full of books, and a nice-looking bed and a closet full of outfits...just like the one I was wearing. I took a deep breath. Ok, this was weird, but I guess everyone else is in the same situation, so I may as well get used to it.

As if anyone could ever get used to this place...I should've known better than to think that.