The infirmary smelled like lemon polish and impending death.
It was a clean smell, sharp and aggressive, designed to cover up the underlying notes of blood and sickness. Caelus leaned against the doorframe, his chest heaving. He wiped his hand on his trousers again, but the sticky sensation of the purple beetle refused to leave.
He checked his wrist.
Life Force: 01:48:12
He had less than two hours.
The panic wasn't a scream anymore. It was a low, constant hum in his ears, like a refrigerator that was about to break. He needed points. He needed them now. He couldn't afford another accident. No saving people. No swatting bugs. Just pure, unadulterated selfishness.
He scanned the room.
It was quiet. The morning sun slanted across the white beds, most of them empty. At the far end, near the window, a nurse was organizing potions on a rolling cart. She was humming a tune, her back to the door.
And there, on the reception counter, was the target.
A wallet.
It was thick leather, dyed a deep crimson, resting next to a half-eaten sandwich and a stack of paperwork. It looked heavy. It looked important. It looked like the kind of object that, if stolen, would ruin someone's week.
Target Identified: Unattended Valuables.Villainy Potential: Low but Immediate.
"Perfect," Caelus whispered.
He pushed off the doorframe. His boots made too much noise on the tile—clack, clack, clack—so he shifted his weight, moving with the silent, practiced gait of a man who had spent his previous life trying not to be noticed by executioners.
He moved toward the counter.
The nurse didn't turn. She was clinking glass vials together, lost in her rhythm.
Ten steps. Five steps.
Caelus reached out. His fingers twitched. This was it. Petty theft. It wasn't glorious, it wasn't going to make him a legend of terror, but it would buy him maybe an hour. An hour was a lifetime. An hour was enough to find a better plan.
His fingertips brushed the leather.
It was warm.
Not warm from the sun. Warm like a living thing. Warm like a coal wrapped in velvet.
Caelus froze.
A prickle of instinct—sharp and undeniable—shot up his arm. It was the same feeling he used to get in the political assemblies right before the Second Prince would smile and ruin his life. It was the smell of ozone.
Trap.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
[LOCATION: THE SILVER TOWER - PRINCIPAL'S OFFICE]
High above the academy, in a room that smelled of old books and dangerous wine, the Principal watched the crystal sphere.
She swirled her glass, the red liquid catching the light. She was beautiful in the way a storm front is beautiful—dark, imposing, and promising violence.
"Let's see," she murmured. Her voice was smoke and silk.
She tapped the desk with a manicured fingernail.
Down in the infirmary, the rune woven into the leather of the wallet pulsed. It wasn't a standard security rune. It was a [Mana-Combustion Trap], modified to trigger on unauthorized touch. She had placed it there ten seconds ago via teleportation, intending to catch a spy she suspected was infiltrating the medical staff.
She didn't expect the Valerius boy.
"The failure," she mused. "Let's see if you have the sense to let go, or if you'll lose a hand."
She watched his fingers touch the leather. She watched him freeze.
"Run along, boy," she whispered. "This game isn't for you."
------------------------------------------------------------------
[LOCATION: THE INFIRMARY]
Caelus didn't let go.
He couldn't. His hand felt glued to the leather, not by magic, but by the sheer, paralyzing shock of the energy building up inside it.
The wallet vibrated. A high-pitched whine, audible only to him, drilled into his teeth.
Mana Spike Detected.Threat Level: Lethal.
The text burned in his vision.
It's a bomb, Caelus realized. His brain stalled. Why is the nurse's wallet a bomb?
He looked at the nurse. She was still humming, completely oblivious. She was standing five feet away from a magical explosive device disguised as a coin purse. If it went off, she wouldn't just be robbed; she would be paste.
Let it happen, a dark voice in his head whispered. Let it blow up. That's evil. That's destruction. You'll get points for the collateral damage.
Life Force: 01:46:30
He looked at the timer.
He looked at the nurse's back. She had a small stain on her uniform. A coffee stain. It was such a human detail.
"Dammit," Caelus hissed.
He grabbed the wallet.
He didn't pocket it. He didn't open it. He gripped it like a grenade, the leather searing his palm.
He spun toward the open window.
"Hey!"
The nurse turned around, startled by the sudden movement. She saw a boy in a black suit snatch her wallet from the counter.
"Thief!" she screamed. "Stop him! He's stealing my—"
Caelus ignored her. He ignored the burning in his wrist. He ignored the logic that said keep it, let it explode, survive.
He wound up and threw the wallet out the window with every ounce of strength his malnourished, aristocrat body possessed.
It sailed into the blue sky.
It cleared the sill. It cleared the flowerbed below. It arced toward the stone wall that separated the infirmary from the faculty gardens.
For a second, nothing happened.
Then the world turned white.
BOOM.
The explosion shook the foundation of the building. The windows rattled in their frames. A shockwave of heat and displaced air blasted back into the room, blowing the nurse's cart over. Glass shattered. Potions rained onto the floor in a rainbow of sticky fluids.
Caelus was thrown backward, landing hard on his ass.
Silence.
Then, from outside, a wet, heavy thud.
Something—or someone—had fallen off the garden wall.
Caelus sat up, ears ringing. He stared at the window. Smoke was drifting in, smelling of charred stone and... ozone.
"You..."
The nurse was trembling. She wasn't looking at Caelus with anger. She was staring out the window, her hands covering her mouth.
Caelus scrambled to his feet. "I was stealing it!" he yelled, pointing at the window. "I am a thief! I took your property and destroyed it! That is a crime!"
He needed the credit. He needed the points.
He ran to the window and looked down.
Below, in the smoking crater of the flowerbed, lay a figure dressed in grey stealth gear. A jagged piece of the stone wall—dislodged by the explosion—had crushed the intruder's chest. Beside the body lay a dropped dagger, glistening with green poison.
An assassin.
He had been climbing the wall. He had been right under the window.
And the exploding wallet had taken his head off.
Caelus stared at the corpse.
"No," he whispered. "No, no, no."
"You sensed him," the nurse breathed. She was standing next to him now, clutching his arm. Her eyes were wide, shining with adoration. "You sensed the killer. You grabbed the Rune-Wallet—I didn't even know it was a Rune-Wallet—and you used it to neutralize the threat."
"I was stealing!" Caelus shrieked. "I wanted the money!"
"You saved me," she sobbed, burying her face in his shoulder. "You saved all of us."
Caelus stood there, the nurse weeping gratitude into his expensive jacket, the smoke of his accidental heroism drifting around them.
He slowly, dreadfully, turned his wrist over.
Narrative Deviation Detected.Accidental Heroism Confirmed.Target: High-Level Assassin.
Caelus closed his eyes. Please. Have mercy.
Calculating...
Something cold moved through his chest. Life Force Penalty Applied. His knees went soft.
Life Force: 00:53:00
Fifty-three minutes.
He had lost an hour. He had saved a life, killed an assassin, and doomed himself.
"Get off me," Caelus whispered.
He pushed the nurse away. He didn't have the energy to be rude. He just felt hollow.
"I need..." He swayed. "I need to go."
"I'll call the Principal!" the nurse cried, wiping her eyes. "She needs to know! You're a hero!"
Caelus didn't hear her. He was already stumbling out the door, his vision tunneling. Fifty minutes. He had less than an hour before his heart stopped or his brain melted or whatever the System did to failures.
He needed something bigger. Petty theft was a trap. Assault was a trap. The world was rigged.
He needed to terrify someone. He needed to be a monster.
He staggered into the hallway. It was empty, stretching out like a tunnel to the grave.
------------------------------------------------------------------
[LOCATION: THE PRINCIPAL'S OFFICE]
The Principal stared at the crystal sphere.
She wasn't smiling. She was leaning forward, her chin resting on her interlaced fingers.
"He threw it," she whispered. "He felt the combustion rune, and instead of dropping it... he threw it at the breach point."
She rewound the image in the crystal. She watched Caelus's eyes. The fear. The hesitation. And then, the throw.
"He knew the assassin was there," she concluded. "He must have. No one throws a wallet out a window for no reason."
A slow, dangerous smile spread across her red lips.
"Caelus von Valerius. You play the fool, but your instincts are razor sharp."
She tapped the glass.
"Perhaps you're worth cultivating after all."
-----------------------------------------------------------------
[LOCATION: THE HALLWAY]
Caelus dragged himself along the wall. The stone was cold against his cheek.
00:51:12
He was going to die in a hallway. Just like a dog.
"Move."
The voice was soft, cold, and familiar.
Caelus lifted his head.
Blocking his path, standing in the center of the corridor like a statue of judgement, was Sylvia.
She wasn't wearing her armor. She was in a white training uniform that made her silver hair look like spun starlight. Her hand was resting on the pommel of her sword.
She was looking at him.
Not with the adoration of the nurse. Not with the confusion of the Saintess.
She was looking at him with a hunger that made the hair on his arms stand up.
"You look terrible," she said.
Caelus stared at her. The woman who killed him. The woman who was currently blocking the only exit.
And then, a thought struck him. A desperate, suicidal thought.
Intimidation.
If he could scare her—if he could bully the Sword Saint's daughter—that would be worth hours. It was a high-risk, high-reward play.
He pushed himself off the wall. He forced his shaking legs to hold him upright.
"You," Caelus rasped. He tried to summon the sneer of a nobleman. "You're in my way."
Sylvia didn't move. Her eyes darkened.
"Make me move," she whispered.
Caelus took a step forward. He reached out, intending to shove her shoulder, to show her that he wasn't afraid, that he was the villain.
His hand slammed into the wall next to her head instead, trapping her. Use the environment. Kabedon. That was the term. It was aggressive. It was dominant.
He leaned in, his face inches from hers. He could smell her—steel and rain and something floral.
"Get out of my sight," he snarled, pouring every ounce of his frustration, his terror, and his impending death into the words. "Or I will break you."
He expected her to draw her sword. He expected her to slap him. He expected to die.
Sylvia didn't pull away.
She shivered.
A flush crept up her neck, staining her pale skin pink. Her breath hitched. Her eyes didn't look scared. They looked... liquid.
"Break me?" she breathed.
She leaned into his hand. She looked up at him through her lashes, her expression a terrifying mix of submission and obsession.
"Do it, then."
Caelus blinked. The System text flickered in the corner of his eye, confused.
[INTIMIDATION ATTEMPTED][TARGET REACTION: ...AROUSAL?][SYSTEM ERROR][RECALCULATING...]
"What?" Caelus whispered.
"Do it," Sylvia said again, her voice dropping an octave. "Show me how evil you are, Caelus."
She reached up and grabbed his lapel, pulling him closer.
Caelus looked at the timer. He looked at the woman who was supposed to be his executioner, who was currently looking at him like he was the last drop of water in a desert.
"You're all insane," he squeaked.
And then he turned and ran.