Buffy, wanting a normal high school experience, decides to try out for the Sunnydale High cheerleading squad. However, when her fellow competitors are being mysteriously eliminated one by one in freak accidents, Buffy soon discovers that this is the doing of another girl who desperately wants to make the squad and isn't willing to let anything or anyone stand in her way.

Buffy's new substitute Biology teacher, Miss French, seems to be catching the eyes of all the male students, including Xander. Buffy soon learns that Miss French isn't what she appears to be, and that Xander is in horrible danger.

Buffy's social life and her slayer life collide, when she must foil The Master's plans to bring forth The Anointed One, while on a date with a classmate, Owen.

A school field trip to the Sunnydale Zoo leaves Xander and a few other students enthralled by the spirit of hyena hybrids. This in turn causes them to become more aggressive and mean as they begin to act like wild animals. When Buffy and Willow notice Xander's change in behavior, Giles originally dismisses it as a teenage hormone issue. However, when the possessed students begin to do some unimaginable things, such as eating the school mascot and the principal alive, Giles becomes convinced that they do in fact have a mystical problem on their hands.

When Buffy and Angel are attacked by a vicious gang of vampires and barely manage to escape alive, Angel spends the night at Buffy's house. The undeniable passion between the two of them continues to grow as they finally share their first kiss. However, things come to a screeching halt when Buffy discovers the truth about who Angel really is.

When a demon named Moloch is accidentally released into the Sunnydale computer system, he begins to go target Willow, by posing as a teenage boy named Malcolm and chatting with her through Internet connection. However, Buffy becomes concerned with Willow's growing relationship with this mystery boy and tries to uncover the truth. When she gets her nose in too deep, Moloch sends his minions to dispose of her.

While being forced to take part in the annual Sunnydale High talent show, Giles, Buffy, Xander and Willow discover that danger lurks backstage when people begin dying gruesome deaths. The number one suspect is a student and his ventriloquist dummy, but as Buffy and her friends soon learn, not everything is as it seems.

The nightmares of the entire Sunnydale population start to become reality, and Buffy discovers that a comatose boy named Billy may be the cause of it. The only way to get things back to normal is if Buffy can get Billy to overcome his fear and wake up from his coma.

A series of mysterious attacks leave the students of Sunnydale High stumped. When Buffy comes to the conclusion that all the attacks revolve around Cordelia Chase, she and her friends do some more digging and discover that it's an invisible force that's doing all the attacking and is holding a grudge against Cordelia. It is now up to Buffy to stop this menace from exacting it's revenge, but how can she do battle with something she can't even see?

Giles reads about an ancient prophecy which states that Buffy will face the Master and die, thus setting him free from his underground prison. Buffy finds out about this by overhearing a secret conversation between Angel and Giles, and reacts by deciding to abandon her slayer duties. However as more signs of the end of the world keep appearing, Buffy realizes that she must face the Master.