Chapter 47: The Video

Leon’s fingers, slick with sweat, fumbled to unpause the Requiem. He needed the thunder, not her venom.

“Ignoring me?” Vera said, her voice echoing in a sweet, poisoned dart. “No wonder everyone neglected you!”

Leon tapped the screen. The datapad showed his seventh sprint time: three minutes, forty-eight seconds. He had maybe ten minutes left to log enough runs.

Sudden wind blew between them, raising two small green leaves.

He finally looked at her.

Vera stood like a portrait of curated pity. “I heard about your… condition.”

She hugged herself, lips in a soft pout. “Waking up in a stranger’s room must be so disorienting. Especially for someone from Dust Hollow.”

Leon said nothing. He tilted and picked up the hoodie.

“I’m talking to you, Leon.” Her tone sharpened.

“I heard you,” Leon said, his voice flat, devoid of the anger she was fishing for.

He pulled the hoodie on, the damp fabric chilling his skin. “I’m busy.”

He turned to dash for his final sprints. His eyes softly widened as they flickered to the datapad’s clock. 11:58.

His blood ran cold. ’The 60-minute ends at 12:00. Damn! Why did I lose track of time?’ He closed his eyes and shook his head twice.

He spun and sprinted for the field’s gate, the music in his headphones a forgotten roar.

“The key.” His expression changed when he tapped the side where he had placed the key. He needed it to get ready for the next task.

He shoved a hand into his pocket as he ran, slowing his speed.

’Empty?!’ saliva snaked down his throat.

He skidded to a halt just outside the gate, patting his hoodie, his trousers. “Not there too? How?!”

A soft, metallic jingle sounded behind him.

Leon turned.

Vera stood a few feet away, twirling his key around her index finger. The morning sun glinted off the metal. “Looking for this?”

Leon’s jaw tightened, his bones cracking. He walked back into the field toward her, his hand stretched. “Give it back.”

Vera’s smile widened. She let the key spin faster.

Clackclackclack

“You should be more careful with your things. Someone less… charitable… might have kept it.”

“Vera.”

“Ask nicely. Like a gentleman.”

Leon took another step, his hand still stretched out. “The key.”

Her fingers stilled. She held it poised over his palm. “Say please before I hand it.” She laughed, pulled it back.

Leon’s heart heaved, staring at her.

She stretched it back, held it poised over his palm. Then, with a tiny, deliberate flick of her wrist, she let it go.

Clink-clatter!

The key didn’t land in his hand. It clattered onto the gravel path, right between her feet.

Leon stared at it, then at her.

Her expression was one of innocent curiosity. “What are you going to do now? Beat me?!”

From the field entrance, laughter erupted. Two girls and two boys from Vera’s usual circle sauntered in, their eyes lighting up at the scene.

Silver light flickered at the side of the guy beside the ladies, his veins bulging up as his fingers curled, as if hiding something.

Leon’s ears burned. He could hear the Lacrimosa’s ghost in his skull. Dies irae…

He bent down, sweat prickling from his chin.

The gravel dug into his knees.

He snatched the key, his fingers closing over the cold metal just as Vera’s polished boot shifted, almost touching his knuckles.

He stood up, shoving the key into his pocket. Sparks of sand prickled on his trousers.

“Aw, was the little rat hungry?” Vera cooed to her arriving friends, her voice loud enough for Leon to hear as he turned to leave.

“He was just begging me for scraps. So pathetic.”

Seriously? Hahaha…!

Her friends’ laughter chased him like a pack of hounds as he fled the field.

…

The main academy grounds were a gauntlet. Eyes followed him. Snickers cut through the air like swords.

“Did you see the video?” a girl whispered to her friend, not bothering to lower her voice.

“The one where he’s on his knees? Begging Vera? I thought he’d have more pride.”

Leon kept his head down, the hood drawn tight. Their words weren’t just insults; they were nails hammering into a narrative he hadn’t written.

’A video?’ his stomach twisted.

Leon pushed into the cream-colored dormitory door, the sanctuary he’d left just hours ago. It felt like a different world.

The elevator’s calmness wasn’t there. It was worse. A river of whispers becomes an ocean.

As the doors closed on a crowded car, smart device screens lit up around him like malevolent fireflies.

On them, a short, grainy clip: a low-angle shot of him bent at Vera’s feet, her boot near his hand. The angle made it look exactly as she’d said.

Heat flooded Leon’s face. He stared at the floor number, counting the agonizing flashes.

Ding

He burst out, shoving past people, their laughter lapping at his heels on the second floor.

He fumbled for his key in his pocket, his fingers brushing something else – soft, yielding. He pulled it out with the key.

A rotten apple, brown and mushy, sat in his palm. It must have been in his hoodie pocket, giving him a bad smell – the one he thought to be his sweat.

Anger rose in his throat. ’Vera!’

He crushed the fruit in his hand, the putrid juice oozing through his fingers, and dropped it into the black-grey bin in the hallway.

Leon stabbed the key into the lock of door 7 and swung it open.

Inside, Zoe was standing by the open window, the breeze stirring her hair.

Her eyes, usually unreadable, were wide with something that looked like… disappointment as she turned.

“Did you really beg her?” Her voice came in quietly and coldly. “I never knew you’d be this low.”

The words hit Leon harder than Tiger’s fists ever had, sharper than the needles he plucked out of his skin.

He opened his mouth to explain, but nothing came out, only smelly air.

What was there to say? The evidence was playing on every screen in the academy, including Zoe’s.

Zoe shook her head, a flicker of pink shimmering on her cheeks – not embarrassment, but anger. She moved past him without another word and yanked the door open.

Crack…!

Bam…!

As she left, the hallway noise rushed in. Laughter. And clear, cutting words aimed at her.

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