"What did you say?!"
The scream snapped down the dorm corridor like a whip.
Maya's head jerked from the impact before her body could even react. Her back hit the wall hard enough to rattle the cheap metal paneling, and the girl holding her didn't loosen her grip—she tightened it, fingers tangled deep in Maya's braid and twisting until the roots screamed.
Pain burst across Maya's scalp.
It was a sharp, tearing kind of pain, the kind that made your eyes water even when you refused to cry.
Her face was already swollen. One cheek bruised purple. Blood dried at the edge of her mouth where she'd bitten through her lip at some point and stopped noticing.
Her hands reached up instinctively, trying to pry the girl's wrist away.
Every time Maya's fingers found purchase, the attacker's free fist hammered down into Maya's forearm—again, again—short punches meant to numb, not break. Efficient. Practiced.
Maya's arm went heavy.
Then useless.
"S-stop… please—" Maya's voice cracked. It barely made it past her throat.
"Stop?" the attacker shrieked, spit flying. "Stop?!"
Around them, the corridor was crowded.
Class E students. Thin uniforms. Bruised faces. Hollow eyes.
They weren't watching like witnesses.
They were watching like a queue.
Some leaned against the wall like it was entertainment. Some stood stiff with clenched fists, anger vibrating under their skin.
But none of that anger was aimed at the aggressor.
It was aimed at Maya.
"We're all stuck here!" the girl snarled. "We all suffer every day! What right do you have to run around begging higher classes for help?!"
Her grip slid from Maya's braid to her throat.
Fingers closed.
Tight.
Maya's breath vanished.
Her nails scraped uselessly at the girl's wrist. She couldn't even scratch deep enough to leave marks. Her vision glittered at the edges.
"You think you're better than us?" the girl hissed. "You think you're special?"
Maya tried to shake her head, but the choke only tightened.
Her feet dragged.
Her knees began to fold.
"You don't train. You don't fight. You don't do anything." The attacker's face twisted with hatred. "All you do is crawl to other classes and make us look like trash."
A laugh came from somewhere behind the crowd.
Not funny.
Just cruel.
"This is normal," someone muttered.
And it was.
Class E devoured its own.
No instructors came.
No cameras rotated.
No alarms screamed.
The Triangle didn't need to look at Class E.
It had already decided they were expendable.
Maya's fingers slipped.
Her lungs spasmed.
The world narrowed into sound and pressure.
A last, panicked thought fluttered through her mind—I didn't even do anything wrong.
Then her body betrayed her.
Her eyes rolled, and she went limp.
The girl holding her froze for half a second, surprised by how quickly the resistance disappeared—then she shook Maya like she was trying to pull the fight back out of her.
"Don't you go unconscious on me—!"
Far down the corridor, a figure pushed off the wall.
A boy.
Dark hair.
Gold stripe on his uniform.
Class A.
He had been watching.
Not with curiosity.
Not with amusement.
With his jaw clenched so tightly the muscle jumped.
Dreyden Stella.
"In the novel," he muttered, voice low, "I only saw this as a memory."
He took a step.
The crowd didn't notice him yet. They were still fixated on the spectacle, still hungry for it—like watching Maya suffer made their own misery feel justified.
"But seeing it in person…"
His hand flexed.
His knuckles cracked.
"…pisses me off more than I thought."
He remembered this scene as text on a screen.
A paragraph.
A footnote.
A justification for Maya's later awakening.
The novel hadn't captured the smell of blood and old sweat trapped in cheap dorm walls.
Hadn't captured the sound of someone choking while everyone waited their turn.
Maya Serenity.
Last daughter of an original family.
Wielder of a rare original ability.
And here she was—pinned like prey.
Begging.
Punished for trying to survive.
A contradiction the Triangle's so-called "meritocracy" couldn't admit existed.
Dreyden's breath came out slow.
Controlled.
He didn't move immediately.
Not because he didn't want to.
Because he understood Class E.
If he intervened too early, the moment he left, they'd return.
Worse.
With more rage.
With more justification.
He needed the lesson to land hard enough that it stayed.
He watched until Maya's body truly went slack.
Until the hallway's hunger shifted—she's not fighting back, so she's not fun anymore.
Only then did Dreyden's restraint snap.
Magic surged up his arm like a tide.
Heat ignited at his knuckles.
Blue flame—dense, compressed, violent.
He moved.
Not like a student walking into a dorm conflict.
Like an impact.
The crowd split when they saw the uniform.
Fear spread outward in a wave, fast and instinctive.
Class E students backed away as if the air itself had turned sharp.
Dreyden didn't look at them.
He only saw Maya hanging in someone else's grip.
He stopped in front of the attacker.
No warning.
No speech.
No moral performance.
Just—
BOOM.
His fist drove into the girl's stomach.
Not a punch.
A statement.
The force lifted her off her feet and slammed her into the wall hard enough to rattle the corridor panels.
Her uniform smoked where the blue flame kissed fabric.
She fell with a dull thud, breath gone, eyes rolling.
Silence.
Even the students who hated Maya stared at Dreyden now—because hatred was easy.
A-Class pressure wasn't.
Dreyden stared down at the attacker.
"She's alive," he said flatly.
It wasn't mercy.
It was control.
And for everyone watching, that was worse.
Because it meant he had chosen to let her live.
The corridor scattered like rats in light.
Students fled.
Some pushed each other.
Some didn't dare look back.
A few higher-class students who had wandered in to watch didn't run—they just froze, eyes wide, trying to pretend they hadn't been entertained by the scene seconds ago.
Dreyden knelt beside Maya.
Her skin was cold with shock.
Her throat was bruising already.
Her braid was half torn, strands stuck to blood at the scalp.
He removed his outer uniform jacket and wrapped it around her with a kind of gentleness that didn't belong in this hallway.
Gasps rippled through the onlookers.
No one covered a Class E student with a Class A jacket.
It was practically heresy.
Dreyden didn't care.
He lifted her carefully, adjusting her weight so her head wouldn't drop.
Then he walked.
The corridor parted.
Not out of respect.
Out of fear.
Maya drifted in darkness.
Her neck throbbed.
Her ribs ached.
Her scalp burned.
She tried to open her eyes, but even thinking hurt.
A soft sound escaped her—half gasp, half whimper.
"Don't get up."
The voice was deep.
Firm.
Warm.
Her body reacted before her mind did—freezing, then trembling.
Her eyes opened slowly.
A ceiling she didn't recognize.
Clean air.
A room.
A private room.
That didn't exist for people like her.
She tried to sit up anyway, panic overriding pain.
Then she saw the jacket on her.
Gold stripe.
Class A.
Her heart fell straight through her chest.
"No… no, this isn't—why am I wearing—?"
A boy sat on the floor near the bed.
Back against the wall.
Forearm faintly marked with a burn.
Chest damp with sweat—circulation training.
He opened his eyes.
Sharp.
Calm.
Not cruel.
Dreyden Stella.
Maya's voice came out small. "W-who…?"
"So you woke up," he said.
He stood, then sat on the edge of the bed—not too close, not looming.
Careful.
Maya's body shook violently.
Class A meant power.
Violence.
Domination.
It meant the kind of people who hurt you because they could.
"You're from Class A…" she whispered, voice cracking. "P-please… please don't hit me…"
She curled in on herself, hands over her head like she was waiting for it.
For the inevitable.
Dreyden blinked, genuinely stunned.
Then his expression softened into something Maya hadn't seen in months.
Not kindness.
Not even sympathy.
Pity.
"I'm not going to hit you," he said quietly.
Maya peeked through her fingers.
"You're… not?"
"No." His voice stayed steady. "You asked for help. I'm going to help you."
Her breath caught so hard it hurt.
"…Y-you are?"
"Yes."
He pointed toward the bathroom. "But first, wash up. You're hurt everywhere."
Maya looked down at herself—torn fabric, bruises, dried blood—and her throat tightened.
"I… okay…"
She slid off the bed, unsteady.
Then hesitated at the doorway, like leaving his sight was dangerous too.
"W-wait." Her voice trembled. "Your name… what's your name?"
Dreyden lifted an eyebrow.
"You didn't recognize it? I thought everyone was talking about me today."
Maya shook her head quickly.
"No one tells me anything."
For a second, Dreyden's gaze sharpened—anger flickering behind calm.
Then he exhaled.
"Dreyden Stella," he said.
Maya blinked.
Her shoulders shook—not from fear this time.
From relief so sharp it felt like a wound opening.
She rushed into the bathroom and shut the door like it could keep the world out.
Hot water hit her skin.
It stung every bruise.
It burned every cut.
But it was warm.
Real warmth.
Not hallway heat.
Not adrenaline.
Warmth that meant safe.
Maya stared at her reflection.
A girl with red hair—messy, torn, uneven.
A face that looked older than it should.
Eyes that flinched even when nothing moved.
Her mother's voice echoed from somewhere deep in memory.
Your ability will make you great. Don't be afraid. You have a bright future.
Maya's hands curled into fists.
"If this is a dream…" she whispered, "don't let me wake up."
Then her fingers brushed her hair.
Or what was left of it.
One side had been ripped shorter.
Jagged.
Uneven.
Like a reminder.
Tears welled again.
She stared at herself for a long time.
Then she grabbed the scissors near the sink.
Her hand trembled.
Snip.
Snip.
Each cut felt like cutting away the last thing she had that still belonged to the girl she used to be.
When she finished, it wasn't pretty.
But it was even.
And when she looked up—
A different Maya stared back.
Still bruised.
Still scared.
But cleaner.
Less… owned.
She dressed in the spare uniform folded neatly beside the sink.
Not Class E.
Not ripped.
Not bloody.
A temporary kindness she didn't know how to accept.
She stepped out.
Dreyden was still sitting on the floor, eyes closed, sweat sliding down his temple—magic circulating with slow discipline.
Not a predator.
Not a savior.
Just… someone trying not to become either.
Maya sat quietly on the bed, hands folded in her lap, waiting like she'd learned to wait her entire life.
Dreyden opened one eye.
"You finally came out," he said.
Maya swallowed and nodded.
His calm smile twisted something in her chest.
A painful, unfamiliar hope.
"It's okay," he said. "We'll talk now."
Maya's breath trembled.
Because for the first time in forever—
She believed someone.
And that belief scared her almost as much as the Triangle ever had.
Because if this was real…
Then losing it would hurt worse than anything she'd survived.