Chapter 43

‘What is this…?!’

Rey felt like he was in a lion’s den, a prey to the predators that all stared at him with suspicious eyes.

He swallowed hard, his throat felt dry and scratchy, as he mulled over Adonis’ direct question.

How could he explain himself without giving too much away?

"Well, there was training. Obviously…" he started, hoping it would suffice.

“After that.” Adonis’ voice was curt, straight to the point.

He didn’t even give Rey a chance to buy time and think up an excuse.

‘I thought we could spend our time however we wished. No one ever bothers to ask, so I never thought of an excuse!’

Rey's mind raced as he grappled with the pressure mounting around him.

Wasn’t it his own business how he spent his time? Surely, Adonis understood this.

So why? There had to be a reason why he was being targeted!

‘I should just come up with a believable excuse and—!’ Before Rey could finalize his decision about lying, he saw something in the hand of the Grand Mage, Lucielle herself.

The Truthseeker!

‘They’d go this far? I can’t even lie about it?!’

Beads of sweat formed on Rey’s face as he tried to compose himself, his eyes darting nervously around the room.

Avoiding Adonis' piercing gaze became a challenge in itself, his discomfort growing by the second.

The pressure on Rey’s shoulder intensified as he nervously took a step back.

‘H-huh?!’ He noticed strange movements behind him.

When he realized what was happening, his eyes nearly popped out of their socket. He tried his best to hide the fact that he knew, but it was very difficult to do so.

‘Guards are waiting outside the door? There’s a lot of them…’

His mind struggled to comprehend why they would be doing all of this, and why it seemed like he was the object of suspicion.

At this point, Rey felt like he had been backed into a corner.

“Just tell the truth, Rey. That’s all we’re asking…”

Brutus’ words cut through the tense air, his expression and those of the other guards leaving no room for misunderstanding. They were ready to do things the hard way if needed.

Even Lucielle, typically composed, wore a deep frown.

Rey had never seen her like this before.

“I… I… well, actually I…” Rey stuttered, his mind scrambling for words that wouldn’t incriminate him further.

Rey’s eyes scanned the room, landing first on Noah, who avoided eye contact with a nervous expression.

Next, his gaze settled on Trisha, who stared back intently, her eyes seeming to search for the truth. At least with her, it didn’t seem like she harbored a deep suspicion towards him. She merely looked confused.

Taking a deep breath, Rey turned his attention to Alicia.

He initially feared doing so, as he dreaded her reaction. He didn’t want her to look at him the way everyone else was, but he had to know where he stood with her.

‘Ahh…’

Her gaze was filled with worry, and her eyes were on the brink of tears, as if his situation deeply troubled her.

Rey could see her eyes glisten as she stared at him. He had never had anyone look at him that way before.

Unfortunately for him, he wasn’t afforded the luxury of dwelling on those thoughts.

“He’s not responding! He’s clearly guilty!” Billy suddenly yelled, his face contorted in anger.

Rey couldn’t have known this, but Billy had noticed the shared gaze of the two, and right now he was boiling in rage.

How could his dear Alicia look at scum like Rey with such compassion?

It was unacceptable to him!

“That’s enough, Billy! Don’t be so hasty to judge one of our classmates!” Adonis interrupted sternly, his frown conveying his disapproval.

The moment Adonis said this, Billy backed down, instantly apologizing with a somber expression.

No one said anything, but they were really with Billy on this one.

Still, because of Adonis, no one murmured.

They simply waited for the suspect to confess.

Thankfully they didn’t have to wait for much longer.

“What exactly am I guilty of? Can I know that at least?”

Rey’s voice was calm and low. It was almost as if he was completely numb to the tense atmosphere.

That wasn’t the case at all, but at that moment, he was simply tired.

He cast his gaze to the floor as he spoke.

“Do you really not want to say where you’ve been?” As Adonis asked this, Rey didn’t budge an inch.

“Just tell me… what happened.”

A heavy silence stretched out, amplifying the tension in the room until Adonis finally broke it.

“Something was found in your room, Rey. In your closet…”

The moment Adonis said this, Rey felt his heart race.

‘T-they found the rest of my Monster Core stash?!’

Cold sweat formed on his forehead, and he couldn’t suppress the slight tremble in his legs.

‘What? How? How did they… why did they enter my room in the first place?!’

“I received a tip from someone that you’ve been acting suspiciously lately, so I personally conducted a search.” Brutus’ voice pierced the air at this point.

“Of course, I involved the Hero Adonis in the matter.”

It seemed like Brutus's last words were an attempt to justify his actions, but Rey couldn’t care less about due process at that moment.

Only one thing stood out from what Brutus said.

‘Someone tipped him?!’ Rey’s eyes shot towards Noah accusingly.

‘Noah, you SNAKE!’

Rey had always seen his relationship with Noah as temporary, expecting it to end eventually, but this betrayal was unexpected and cut deep.

Noah betraying him like this wasn’t within his calculations.

Rey’s eyes faltered the moment he glared at Noah and found him slowly shaking his head in distress.

‘What is he trying to say? That he isn’t the one who did the tipping?!’

Now that he thought about it, it was too impractical for Noah to betray him now.

‘He has a lot to gain by being with me. Plus, I know his secrets.’

Rey knew that even if Noah was greedy, executing a plan to benefit from betrayal would take time and careful planning.

‘We just started our business! There’s no way he’d want to mess that up this early.’

Once he thought things through, Rey could tell that Noah wasn’t the culprit.

He couldn’t have been!

As Rey scanned the faces of his twenty-eight classmates, excluding Adonis, he couldn’t help but wonder, ‘T-then who could it be…?!’

The Hero was clearly out of the question.

‘Trisha? No… I don’t think so. Billy? He had a motive, so it’s most likely him!’

A quick glance at Alicia told Rey that it couldn’t be her.

‘Who else, then?!’

‘I’m a nobody! An Extra! No one cares about me enough to do this!’

It made no sense to Rey.

Fortunately for him, as he was racking his brain trying to figure out who could have orchestrated his downfall, a voice spoke from among his classmates.

“It was me, Rey. I did it.”

Rey's initial response was a quiet, surprised, “H-huh…?”

The one speaking was none other than Adam Sanchez.

‘What the hell? We don’t even know each other…’

Adam was the most unlikely suspect in the room.

They both didn’t have anything that tied them together apart from Training.

Even throughout their training as Beta Class students, they hadn’t said as much as a word to each other.

So what was this all about?

*

*

*

[A/N]

Thanks for reading!

I'm guessing you didn’t see that coming.

The mystery remains… how did he know?