"Who did this to you?" Klaus demanded, his voice dropping to such a low register that it made the iron bed frame vibrate beneath Kaizen.
"Mnngh... justice..."
Leo Crimson let out a snorting sound and wiped away the line of drool that had gathered on his chin. He blinked his eyes open slowly, still half-asleep. The first thing he saw was the looming silhouette of the roommate from hell standing over Kaizen's bed with glowing red eyes.
Every combat instinct Leo had developed through years of training started screaming danger signals.
"ENEMY ATTACK?!"
Leo vaulted out of the visitor chair in one explosive movement. It was a standing jump that went from zero to sixty in less than a millisecond. He landed in a perfect combat stance directly between Klaus and Kaizen's hospital bed, both fists raised and ready to fight.
"Back off!" Leo shouted, his hand instinctively reaching for the sword that should have been strapped to his waist but obviously was not there.
Klaus did not flinch or show any sign of being intimidated. He just stared at Leo with those unblinking crimson eyes.
Leo blinked a few times as the adrenaline rush started to fade and recognition finally set in.
"Oh. Wait. You're just the neighbor from across the hall."
Leo's entire body relaxed in an instant. The combat grimace melted away and was replaced by a blinding smile that had all the energy of an overexcited golden retriever.
"Klaus! You came here too? That's so great! Did you come to visit our best friend as well?!"
Kaizen choked on his own spit and started coughing violently.
'Best friend?! Since when?! We exchanged three sentences! Two of them were lies!'
Klaus completely ignored the Hero's blinding optimism. He narrowed his crimson eyes until they were barely glowing slits.
"Friend?" Klaus practically spat the word out like it was some kind of slur. "I am his assigned roommate. That gives me contractual rights to monitor his well-being and physical condition. Did you do this to him, Leo Crimson?"
"Me?!" Leo looked genuinely offended by the accusation. He placed one hand over his heart dramatically. "I would never hurt Kaizen! We have a bond now! A sacred bond that was forged in the fires of the Opening Ceremony!"
The Opening Ceremony was a twenty-minute speech by the headmaster! There were no fires! Kaizen wanted to scream this out loud but he could barely breathe under the pressure of their combined auras.
"Then why is he lying in a hospital bed covered in bandages and magical healing runes?" Klaus took a step forward, and dark purple mana started leaking from his shoulders like wisps of dry ice fog.
"Because I was not there to protect him when he needed me most!" Leo took an equally aggressive step forward, and brilliant golden mana flared around both of his clenched fists.
They now stood roughly two feet apart from each other. Red demonic energy versus gold heroic light. Demon versus Human. D-Rank versus D-Rank. Two of the most powerful first-year students facing off in a hospital room.
The air in the infirmary grew thick and heavy with magical pressure. The atmospheric pressure dropped noticeably. The windows set into the walls began rattling violently in their frames.
Kaizen, lying in his hospital bed directly in the middle of this clash between titans, felt like a soda can being slowly crushed by a hydraulic press.
[Status: Suppressed]
[HP: 15 / 15 (Dropping mentally)]
'Stop measuring your auras against each other! Please just stop!'
Kaizen wanted to scream at both of them. He was only F-Rank! If these two kept pumping out magical energy like this, his lungs were going to physically collapse from the pressure!
"Guys..." Kaizen wheezed out, barely able to draw breath. "I'm... I'm right here... can you both just..."
They completely ignored him. They were too busy having the most intense, testosterone-fueled staring contest Kaizen had ever witnessed.
In the hospital bed next to Kaizen's, Goon Number One had woken up the exact moment Klaus kicked the infirmary doors open with explosive force. He was now squeezing his eyes shut so tightly that he was starting to see stars burst behind his eyelids.
'Do not wake up. Do not make a single sound.'
If he opened his eyes and acknowledged what was happening, the scary demon noble and the crazy hero were definitely going to kill him. Just play dead and maybe they would forget he existed.
"Ms. Nurse?" the Goon whispered through barely moving lips. "Are you seeing this right now? Should you maybe call security or something?"
Nurse Jenny was absolutely not calling security.
She was leaning against the supply counter with both hands clutching a tissue box to her chest. Her cheeks were flushed a bright, unhealthy shade of pink that clashed with her skin tone.
Drip.
A single drop of blood fell from her nostril and splattered onto the white tiles below.
"So intense..." Jenny whispered, breathing heavily like she had just run a marathon. "The brooding dark prince with the tragic backstory... the golden retriever hero with the pure heart... both fighting over the helpless, completely average boy caught between them... this is... this is absolutely perfect."
"Ms. Nurse?" The Goon glanced over and saw the blood now dripping steadily onto the floor. "Are you having a medical emergency? Should I be worried that you are dying?"
"I have never felt more alive in my entire life."
Jenny breathed out. She yanked several tissues from the box and wiped her nose, but her eyes remained completely glued to the standoff happening in front of her. Her ears were twitching rhythmically with excitement.
"Just look at the tension crackling in the air. You could cut it with a knife. Or maybe a wooden skewer. They should just... kiss already and get it over with."
"What?"
"Nothing! I said nothing!"
Back in the eye of the magical storm, Klaus finally broke the heavy silence.
"If you claim you did not harm him," Klaus said in a voice colder than winter ice, "then who exactly did? He left our dormitory room to procure sustenance. Milk specifically. And some time later, I received this notification on my communication Scroll."
He pulled out his phone and held up the screen for Leo to see.
Displayed on it was the Zenith TeaScroll application, which was essentially the academy's incredibly toxic gossip and rumor page where students posted anonymous tips and stories.
[BREAKING: F-Rank Student Brutally Beats Up Lance's Personal Goon Over a Sausage?!]
[Comments: 502]
[LMAO, is this actually real or satire?]
[Corn Dog Meta is officially OP, developers please nerf.]
[Who even is that kid? His fighting form is absolutely terrible but his aim is godly.]
Kaizen's jaw physically dropped open as he stared at the glowing screen.
'The fight was already on the internet?!'
It had not even been a full hour since he woke up! Who could have possibly posted about it that fast? Was someone recording the entire fight?
"I saw this post approximately five minutes ago," Klaus explained matter-of-factly, sliding the phone back into his pocket. "And I came immediately to retrieve my... my roommate. He is absolutely essential for my ongoing research project."
"Well I found him first!" Leo declared proudly, puffing out his chest. "I was out patrolling the academy streets searching for any signs of Villainy or injustice!"
Both Kaizen and the injured Goon thought the exact same word simultaneously: Cringe.
"I was doing my patrol when I saw an injured person lying unconscious in an alleyway," Leo continued, reenacting the entire scene with overly dramatic hand gestures.
"He was knocked out cold! There was a wooden skewer stabbed clean through his thigh! The technique was super clean and precise! And then I followed the trail of blood that led away from the first victim..."
Leo turned to look at Kaizen with actual tears gathering in his admiring eyes.
"And there you were. Passed out among the garbage bags. A true martyr who sacrificed everything for the sake of justice."
Leo suddenly grabbed Kaizen's hand in both of his own and squeezed tightly.
"Kaizen! You fought so bravely against overwhelming odds! You stood up to bullies who were abusing their power! You are exactly the kind of righteous man I want standing beside me as my Best Friend!"
Kaizen tried desperately to pull his hand away from Leo's grip. It was completely useless. Leo's fingers were like iron bars wrapped around his.
"I... I just wanted to eat my dinner..." Kaizen whispered weakly. "The corn dog cost me 500 crowns..."
"So humble!" Leo actually started weeping tears of joy. "So pure of heart!"
"He is not your friend," Klaus interjected sharply, reaching out to grab Kaizen's other hand. "He is my assigned roommate. Unhand him immediately, Leo Crimson."
"You unhand him first, Klaus! Can you not see that he is delicate and injured?!"
"I am perfectly aware that this human is delicate and fragile! That is precisely why I came here!"
Leo paused, looking confused. "Human? Well yeah, obviously? We are all humans here, Klaus. You do not have to get all weird and Shdespearean about it."
Leo thinks Klaus is just a weird theatre kid, Kaizen realized with growing horror as he stared up at the fluorescent lights on the ceiling. The protagonist has absolutely no idea he is talking to a literal demon.
Kaizen lay there spread out like a crucifixion, with both of his arms being pulled in opposite directions by the two strongest and most dangerous students in the entire first-year class.
Nurse Jenny let out a high-pitched squeal of delight and immediately shoved two more tissues up her bleeding nose.
"I cannot take this anymore," Kaizen whispered to the fluorescent lights buzzing overhead. "This is it. This is how I die. Torn in half by a shonen manga trope come to life."