Chapter 21:

The children stood crowded around the entrance to the path, their enthusiasm blocked only by the perilous road and the stone-faced teacher wearing a tank top. The gym leader was in top form today, his expression kingly. The lord of this mountain.

“Alright, brats, this ain’t no picnic. You don’t watch yourselves, you’ll be crying to your parents in the nurse’s office, alright?”

Everyone muttered, shuffling, impatient to get started. Eres was no exception. The only functional difference being that she only heard the teacher, rather than saw him. It wasn’t her fault! The damn crowd was too tall. They’d all worn stilts just to mess with her, that had to be it!

She glanced up at Leo’s calm face brilliantly peaking above his peers like a skyscraper. Eres frowned. She kicked his foot.

“How’s the weather up there?”

He smiled down. “Clear. Too bad you can’t see it.”

“…”

She shot herself in the foot with that one. With no rebuttal, she merely waited for her teacher to finish his unimportant, self-important speech. The campus was full of those.

Ah. Speaking of.

Felix walked from the side, his collar messily set, his top button open as always. He swaggered out of Eres’s view in a few short steps. Damn! That bastard, always getting on her nerves. Where’d he get the right? Was he the protagonist? 

She clicked her tongue when she heard his bright voice.

“Alright, everyone. I know you’re all excited, but remember, this is a test—not a vacation. If you let your guard down, you’ll regret it.”

One of the kids whom Eres also couldn’t see piped up. “P-professor, what if we…get hurt?”

Eres could hear the bastard’s smile in his response. “Don’t worry, no harm will come to you. Your reliable seniors are on standby to help should anything go wrong.”

Damn normie. Where did he get that confidence?! She snatched a rock from the ground, ready to throw it.

“Leo, lift me up.”

He looked down at her with a raised brow. “What are you even trying to do?”

“Normies should suffer.”

Leo’s lip twitched. “Eres.”

“Hmm?” Was he refusing?! A betrayal of the alliance??

“You got confessed to, like, twice last week. You’re the normie.”

Her blood froze. No, that couldn’t be right. She was…?

Wait.

She staggered, falling into Leo’s side.

Eres…Eres was pretty. She had more than two friends. She was confessed to twice, and…she even had a job. 

A slow horror rose in her stomach. With a tear, she dropped the pebble in her hand. She wiped her eyes, and looked at Leo.

“I-I’m a traitor…”

A hand fell on her head. This was her punishment. Her poor single dog brothers in her past life…sorry. This introvert went and bloomed from her chrysalis…!

A pinch at her earlobe made her flinch. She looked at Leo. “The fuck?”

“Shut up and listen.”

“I can’t hear. Lift me up.”

“…You think I’m strong enough for that?”

“Haven’t you been lifting weights for this moment? Chop chop.”

He stared at her. The audacity of this girl!

Leo sighed. “Fine. Don’t blame me when I drop you.”

He reached under her armpits and yanked her up like a disobedient poodle. Eres had the profound experience of reaching far above her height—the ultimate dream! If only she could be this tall all the time!

Eres ignored Leo’s shaking arms, staring at Felix with hatred. Where was her rock? Oh. She had dropped it. “Leo, get my rock.”

“?!”

“Hurry!”

“You’re not stoning the teacher, Eres. I’ll throw you over the side if you try.”

She paled, nodding quickly. This kid…was he a serial killer? Scary…

“…And to whoever manages to get the most points, the academy is willing to give out a special prize. So work hard everyone! And good luck!”

…

Fuck. She had missed it. She wiggled, kicking Leo’s stomach. “You ass! If you gave me my rock…!”

“This is my fault?!”

He dropped her like a sack of potatoes.

“Agh!!”

Leo walked off, waving over his shoulder. “Ungrateful…”

Her roommates walked over to her, staring at the pitiful sight of their friend covered in dirt. 

Eliza kneeled down and pat her head. “Don’t be sad. Leo still loves you.”

“?”

Eres looked at her roommate as if she were an alien. “Huh?”

Arille nodded. “Couples fight.” Celise gave a sharp nod. “Even my father and mother have tiffs.”

Eres stood, swept the dust from her clothes, and looked at her roommates with a prim smile.

The unexpected reaction to their teasing made them freeze. 

Eres beamed. “I believe the three of you,” She said, stepping forward, “Have a profound misunderstanding,” Her hand stretched out, flames licking over her wand, “That needs to, with great expediency, be rectified.”

Celise tried to joke about her vocabulary, but her throat couldn’t make the attempt.

D-danger!

Eliza, ever attuned with her intuition, bolted, only a dust cloud in the shape of her figure left behind. Arille activated her wind magic and jumped away, face pale. 

Celise shook, her lips twitching. Weren’t they roommates…? Why had they abandoned her?!

Eres smiled at her screams.

***

Celise slumped as she walked, her hands rubbing over the ends of her hair, the black singes the only reminder of Eres’s painful lesson.

Of course, had Eres done that in her old world, she’d be stabbed. It was only because healing magic could regrow hair in this manner that Eres could tease her like that. 

Yeah, that’s all it was. Teasing. Good ol lighthearted fun. For her.

Eres smirked.

She walked between Ed and Leo, the girls avoiding her in fear as they walked down the winding path to the forest. Not a bad team. The teachers had been surprisingly lenient when it came to group formation. Cliques formed together, lone wolves pretended they had chosen to go by themselves, and her group somehow ended up intact. 

Was this the first time she’d ever had such a large friend group? It made her feel somewhat fluffy inside. To be truly cared for by so many people—what a blessing!

She smiled at her terrified, shaking friends. Arille clutched her short hair, Eliza hid her tail, and Celise stared into the void like a lost soul wandering the underworld.

Leo looked down at Eres. Why was she so happy…? Like some silly little dog that got excited from a treat. If he looked away for even a moment, some bird might come soaring in to swipe her away. He gave an appreciative glance at Ed. I’m glad she’s got good people to rely on. Though, Ed seemed nervous for some reason. Leo gave him an uplifting smile.

Ed, noticing the tenseness of his peers, dripped sweat as he side-eyed Eres. He rubbed his arms, a sudden chill sweeping over him. The icy blue eyes of Leo’s gaze speared through his heart. Really?! I just glanced! 

The boy’s cruel smile stabbed into Ed’s chest. Ed lowered his head, unwilling to deal with Eres in front of this monster again. Way too possessive…

Eres, oblivious to the group atmosphere, skipped ahead. “Ca~mpiiing, ca~mpiiing…”

Eres’s sing-song voice landed like the final lyrics of a wraith’s taunting before death. Her friends shivered. The Eres they had teased back then…was way too scary!

***

Eres gazed around with the seriousness of a seasoned veteran. “Alright. Water, shelter, food. That order. Let’s do this.”

The others looked at her, shocked. Was she some kind of survival expert?! Though she liked to pretend to be—No! Absolutely not! Were Eres a survival expert, could Lana have found her starving on the side of the road begging for scraps? This was pure bluster. 

The group didn’t know that. For all appearances, Eres’s overbearing demeanor and boundless confidence were nothing but a natural progression of their hierarchy. 

Eliza nodded, her thoughts approaching zen. Eres is scariest, Eres is strongest. Eres is life.

With this silent mantra, the group followed the twelve-year-old girl with no survival experience.

Eres’s laughs faded into the distance as they entered the forest.