Chapter 213: Sun’s accusation
Byun moved closer to the remains, his shadows flickering faintly at his feet. He crouched, fingers brushing just above the blackened soil. His gaze tracked the scorched circles, sharp and unblinking. "It matches what I saw earlier," he said, voice flat, almost cold. "These weren’t random burns. They were deliberate. Branded into it."
He straightened, looking toward Jae. "You saw it too, didn’t you?"
Jae’s red eyes shifted to him briefly, then dropped back to the bones. His face betrayed nothing, but his answer was short and firm. "Yeah."
Mrs. Lira’s attention snapped back to him at that. Her gaze lingered, hard yet softened by an undercurrent of concern. For a moment she seemed less instructor and more protector, but her voice remained level. "And you faced it head-on."
"He didn’t just face it," Tirel interjected sharply, her tone cutting through the air. The usual playfulness in her voice was gone, replaced with fire. "He carried the fight. If he hadn’t acted when he did, we’d be cleaning up bodies instead of bones."
That stirred a reaction from the crowd. A murmur of agreement rippled through the students standing closest, voices rising in scattered affirmations. Yet admiration carried a shadow behind it, tinged with unease. Respect and suspicion wove together like twin threads, binding their gazes as they turned toward Jae. Some looked at him like a leader. Others, like something dangerous in his own right.
That was when another voice cut through the unsettled murmur of the crowd.
"Or maybe," Sun said, stepping forward from where he had been lingering with Fin at his side, "the beasts are simply drawn to trouble."
The sound of his words struck the clearing like the crack of a whip. Conversation faltered. Students stiffened, instinctively parting to make space as the prince moved to the forefront. The air itself seemed to tighten, as though even the lingering smoke from the slain wolf bent toward the weight of his presence.
Jae turned his head slowly, his expression calm but sharpened at the edges, red eyes narrowing in deliberate focus.
Sun’s lip curled faintly, aristocratic and disdainful, every syllable of his next words polished to a cutting edge. "Farmboys with inflated egos, for example. Wherever you go, disaster follows. First the academy attack, now an alpha variant in training grounds. Strange, isn’t it?"
The insult wasn’t subtle. In fact, it was crafted not to be. It was the kind of barb meant to bite deep in public, to sow whispers and reinforce divides. Around them, students reacted in ripples. Some stiffened uncomfortably, their gazes darting between Jae and Sun as though caught in the pull of two storms. Others smirked in thinly veiled agreement, eager to see Jae put back in his "place." Rivalries thrived in moments like this, and Sun knew how to wield them like weapons.
But Jae didn’t rise to it immediately. Instead, he let the silence stretch. His eyes remained locked on Sun, the weight of his stare heavy enough to make even some of the onlookers shift uneasily. A faint smirk tugged at the corner of his lips, but it was an expression that never reached his eyes. It was sharper than amusement, closer to challenge.
When he finally spoke, his voice was low and steady, each word carrying a deliberate bite. "Funny," Jae said, "I didn’t see you rushing in when that thing nearly tore the line apart. You were what—sharpening your swords in the back?"
The clearing broke with a ripple of nervous laughter. A few students chuckled despite themselves, the sound quick and guilty, as though they weren’t sure if they were allowed to find it funny. The tension shifted, tilted, though it didn’t break.
Elise’s cheeks flushed with anger, color burning bright against her pale skin. Her fists curled at her sides, her body nearly vibrating with the urge to speak out, though she held her tongue. She knew words said in Sun’s direction had consequences—yet her silence came at a cost of visible restraint.
Byun, however, wasn’t nearly so cautious. He barked out a laugh, the kind that carried no kindness at all. His grin stretched wide, teeth flashing like a wolf’s, his voice loud enough to carry. "Careful, Sun. You might hurt yourself pretending you did something useful."
The mockery landed harder than Jae’s controlled jab, because Byun lacked subtlety and restraint. He enjoyed drawing blood. Some students gasped, others snickered, and the already-tense atmosphere thickened into something volatile.
Sun’s eyes flickered, a sharp glint betraying the offense beneath his carefully cultivated poise. But he did not lash out at Byun. Instead, he did something more calculated—he dismissed Jae entirely.
He turned his gaze to Mrs. Lira, his chin tilting upward just enough to remind the crowd of who he was: heir to a throne, crown prince of the realm, untouchable in ways none of them could hope to be. "It’s reckless," he said smoothly, "to let one boy throw himself at a beast like that. If this academy prides itself on discipline, then perhaps it should start teaching restraint."
The words weren’t just criticism. They were layered, a blade with two edges—cutting at Jae for his "recklessness" and at Mrs. Lira for her authority. A challenge, veiled as suggestion, but spoken with the audacity of one born to command.
Mrs. Lira’s jaw tightened. Her posture remained composed, but the air around her shifted, faintly charged. When she spoke, her voice was even, but every syllable carried weight. "And perhaps you should start showing gratitude when someone saves your life, Your Highness."
The silence that followed was suffocating. It pressed down on the students, on the clearing, on the very air. No one dared breathe too loud, let alone speak. The title she used was deliberate, cutting away Sun’s disguise of being just another academy student and forcing him to stand in the truth of his rank.
Even Fin, ever loyal at his side, shifted uneasily. The muscles in his jaw worked, but he said nothing. His silence was telling.