Thwack! A dull pain lanced through him, and in the same instant Teron twisted his body and rolled onto his stomach.
Bracing himself on arms that barely worked, he swayed and rose slowly to his feet.
At the same moment, another kick landed.
His body, already worked well past its limits, couldn't take it.
Kicked straight back down onto the ground, Teron sat there and stared blankly at the people in front of him before letting out a hollow laugh.
Those five smirking boys were people Teron knew very well. Milo, Nicholas, Ulrich, Hans, Christoph...
Knew them well? He was practically intimate with them. They were the ones who had, all along, gifted him such glorious moments of torment.
From their expressions, they seemed pretty thrilled to have finally caught him at a disadvantage.
Had Teron simply taken it quietly, they might have lost interest, but ever since returning to the past, he'd needled them with a tongue even sharper than the one he'd had in his previous life.
“Isn't this the repulsive Teron, right here?”
Milo, the red-haired boy, grinned and tapped the toe of his boot against Teron's stomach. The other four snickered.
“Graced us by coming outside the academy, did you?”
Why, of all times, right now, were these things here in this pine forest? Did they not even bother going to class anymore?
A tight, aching anger boiled somewhere in his chest. He tried to suppress it, but it wouldn't stop.
An indescribable disappointment welled up in him, aimed at himself. He'd lived this many years and still couldn't control a single emotion, and it had been giving him grief for months now.
When on earth would he stop acting like an idiot?
Desperately, he choked back his killing intent.
“Stop it.”
“Huh? What'd you say? Can't hear you. Speak up!”
The redhead graciously crouched down and leaned in, offering Teron his ear.
“Don't pick a fight.”
He'd have loved to lay on the sarcasm, but the truth was that this situation was overwhelmingly against him.
There was the numerical gap of five against one, and the untreated wounds on both his arms sent tearing pain shooting through him at even the brush of the wind.
On top of that, every one of them was carrying a sword. Real blades were banned only inside the academy, so out here, well, what was there to say? And these were the sort who, when things didn't go their way, would draw their swords and rush him all at once.
Teron, who had always parried back at them in that unshakably calm, clipped voice, now showed himself unable to resist at all, a picture of weakness. That fact excited the boys.
Milo swung his fist at Teron's head.
No, he tried to. The fist he'd cocked back with all his might only cut through empty air and dropped straight down. That insolent little... As Milo ground his teeth in rage, his friends closed in one by one to threaten Teron.
The Teron who, moments ago, had shown a startling amount of panic was somehow wearing that infuriating expression of his again, the usual one. Leaning back against a tree, he drew out his words as he warned the boys who loomed over him.
“Stop, all of you. You're not really here skipping class just to throw punches, are you?”
That set every one of them off. Teron was seized by the hair and slapped across the face. It was hard enough that blood burst and pooled in his already-ravaged mouth. When he spat it out, Milo, sneering that it was filthy, gave an order.
“Lick it back up. Like the bug you are.”
“Filthy commoner trash... The world's gone so rotten the authority of the nobility has fallen to the very ends of the earth. Milo, you're too soft. Quit messing around and show him what's what for real.”
Teron endured it. Causing any more of a scene would only put him at a disadvantage.
The academy students were all sons of noble houses. In fact, if this hadn't been the academy, he was in a position where a single word of back-talk could get his throat cut by a noble.
So he...
“I said eat it.”
His head was shoved into the dirt. He couldn't breathe and thrashed, but his badly damaged body could only be mercilessly crushed underfoot by the large boy.
The moment dirt got into his mouth and he flailed, trying to spit it out, a short command flashed through Teron's mind.
He had to endure. Unless they were trying to kill him, he had to endure.
“That's it. Swallow! If you're a bug, then eat dirt. Stop clinging to the academy like a leech and go back to where you belong!”
“...Wait, what's with the look in his eyes?”
He'd tried hard to hide it, but the killing intent he couldn't quite conceal surged violently in Teron's gray eyes.
Milo frowned, then grabbed Teron by the hair with one hand and scooped up a fistful of dirt with the other.
He reached out to shove it directly into the helpless boy's mouth.
The boy's eyes wavered anxiously, and in the end, trying to avoid the dirt and tiny insects being pushed into his mouth, he let out a muffled groan and began to pull his face back.
Delighted, Milo crammed the dirt into Teron's mouth. But an instant later he let out a scream of pain.
A sudden impact had struck his jaw.
“Ugh!”
Teron staggered to his feet at once.
His dirt-filled throat kept coughing, trying to expel the foreign matter, but without hesitation he strode forward and kicked Milo square between the legs.
Milo crashed backward with a loud cry.
“You garbage, aagh!”
Seeing Milo's hand scrabbling, face gone crimson, for the sword he'd dropped, Teron kicked him again.
The other four boys exchanged glances and drew their swords in unison.
A thick, viscous killing intent radiated from them.
The kind of killing intent that comes when you've been attacked by some lowly creature, your pride wounded, and you resolve to kill it no matter what.
This was a pine forest. To say it again, real blades were permitted in the pine forest. Why had he thought to rest here of all places? Lately, thanks to that damned Lloyd, the bullying had only gotten worse.
The academy was an institution for training swordsmen. Every noble house in the Kingdom of Deluah could be called a swordsmanship house, and they didn't hesitate to use a blade. It went without saying, of course, that Teron Meyer was a worthless commoner it was perfectly fine to kill.
Teron Meyer wanted to throw a punch at the self he'd been just moments ago. Ah, how could he be this foolish? He glanced down once at his wrecked body.
He slipped a hand into his robe and drew out the dagger he carried against his chest.
Twirling the blade round and round, he smiled.
“Not coming? If you've drawn your swords, you ought to attack. Isn't that right? Don't tell me you're scared just because I'm holding this?”
One boy immediately swung his sword, and Teron rolled aside to dodge. It was a way of fighting those boys, wrapped up as they were in their pride, could never bring themselves to use.
Teron slashed the boy's leg with the dagger, sending him sprawling, then instantly pressed the blade to his throat.
“Don't move.”
When a small nick opened on his neck and blood seeped out, the hostage began to sob and thrash, begging them to hold still.
“Stop, stop it! He's trying to kill me, that bastard!”
The boys froze, but the hostage soon had his throat choked until he passed out. At that, the boys, who hadn't an ounce of real friendship between them, exchanged looks.
“Just die!”
And they charged Teron again. They were huffing with rage, utterly beyond reason. Even so, they managed to wound Teron again and again. His sixteen-year-old body was weak in a five-on-one fight, true, but... it was pathetic, this sight of himself unable to even swiftly subdue that pack of monkeys without black magic.
In the end, every one of them took several slashes to their arms and legs from Teron, and a few even passed out. By the time it was over, quite a lot of time had gone by.
Teron looked at the ground, now a total wreck, and muttered a curse.
Nothing was going right at all.
He needed to get back to his dorm room, but now it seemed his mind had gone too.
Why else would he be seeing things?
Far off in the distance, a golden-haired boy was staring dumbly at him.
Now I'm even hallucinating.
Having reached a kind of enlightenment, he laughed at himself.
When he kicked the fallen Milo before him with all his strength, the golden-haired boy went pale... which was to say, the hallucination that looked like Leopold Deluah came walking toward Teron.
“What do you think you're doing?”
“You're watching with your own eyes, so why ask?”
At Teron's jab, he strode closer, took in the ghastly scene, and ground his teeth.
“You really do it all, don't you. I'm not even sure what I'm seeing is real. Have you lost your mind? This is grounds for expulsion.”
“...”
Teron Meyer had no strength to argue. His vision kept blurring, so he had to keep closing and opening his eyes.
He had no idea why that thing was here either, nor whether any of this could be salvaged.
When, without a word, he tried to walk past Leopold and slip away, Leopold Deluah snatched his wrist.
“An explanation, or something, right now...”
In that instant, at the wet feeling on his hand, Leopold flinched. His eyes turned on their own to look at the arm. His own hand where it gripped Teron, and Teron's arm, were both slathered in blood.
He saw Teron's expression tighten slightly, as if trying to bear the pain.
Unlike himself, Leopold stared at him blankly.
