Black Badger

I really thought I was perfectly fine.

So why did I suddenly pass out?

I was sitting there thinking how strange it was that my memory had simply cut off, when the upper part of the bed smoothly rose.

Thanks to that, I ended up sitting upright without effort and took in the seniors around me.

Ricardo and Yun were there, and three more chairs had been placed nearby.

One of them had a familiar jacket draped over it. Judging by that, Kairos must have come too.

Ah, and those car keys with the keyring are Ami’s.

These were the same people I used to see often in the hospital room even before being discharged.

So I caused trouble again.

I smiled awkwardly and was just about to apologize.

At that moment, Yun hooked his phone onto a smartphone stand attached to the bed rail—a stand I hadn’t even realized was there.

“Yun?”

I asked in confusion, but the senior didn’t answer.

Instead, he started playing a video on the phone, which had been laid sideways.

I blinked and looked at the footage playing right at eye level.

The dodgeball match....

[WAAAAAAH!]

[DODGEBALL VICTORY! DODGEBALL VICTORY!!]

People were cheering.

It seemed to be right after I hit Yun. Maybe it had been filmed by a drone, because it was surprisingly easy to watch. There were no spectators blocking the front, and the audio was clear too.

The seniors and the dodgeball players were all visible.

The eliminated members of our team hopping up and down in celebration, and the Snake-Eagle team looking drained.

Ricardo crossing the line with a relieved expression, and Trevain snorting as he pulled off the bracelet....

[Huh?!]

“Oh.”

The me in the video clutched my chest and pitched forward.

[Hey! He collapsed!]

What is that.

Watching myself suddenly crumple, I let out a hollow laugh.

I didn’t even remember being in pain, so it was honestly shocking.

What surprised me even more was the fact that Trevain and Yun had both caught me in the middle of my fall.

[What the hell?]

Trevain’s voice was caught in the video as he grabbed the back of my clothes.

[What’s wrong with him?]

[Hilde!]

People started shouting.

[Hilde!!]

This is seriously embarrassing.

Feeling heat rush to my face, I started rubbing the back of my neck.

Did Yun play this to shock me on ◆ Nоvеlіgһt ◆ (Only on Nоvеlіgһt) purpose? Like some kind of warning to manage my body properly from now on?

To be fair, I really had no warning signs at all, which made it feel a little unfair....

But looking back on it, maybe I really shouldn’t have participated in the sports festival in the first place.

I looked awkwardly at the seniors.

“I’m sorry.”

I greeted them with a bitter smile.

“I said I wouldn’t overdo it.... and in the end I caused trouble anyway.”

“You should’ve gone out together when I got eliminated~.”

“Usually after it hits me like a seizure once, I’m fine for a while.”

In fact, I felt excellent right now.

“I really thought I’d be okay. I was honestly fine right up until I threw the ball at Yun.... I still can’t believe I collapsed like that.”

“You’re saying you forgot all about how you groaned the whole time while we carried you.”

“Huh?”

I blinked at Yun’s words.

“I did that?”

I hadn’t even meant it as a request for confirmation.

But Yun deliberately replayed the video and showed me the transfer scene in detail.

I grumbled that I didn’t want to watch something so embarrassing, but of course that didn’t work.

...I do look like I’m in pain.

Still, they didn’t need to worry that much.

Seeing everyone rushing toward me made me feel embarrassed all over again.

The cheers were replaced by worried murmurs, and Yehyeon and the seniors came running over pale-faced.

The moment I saw their expressions, guilt welled up inside me.

Knowing that the entire crowd had gone silent until I was carried away only doubled the feeling.

I ruined the ending of the sports festival.

Ricardo was right—I should’ve stepped out at the right moment.

I’d been so confident in using my body that I thought I had a perfect grasp of my own condition.

Did the backlash from the control interference affect me?

Or had moving so violently after such a long time simply put too much strain on my body?

Either way, regretting my own foolish choice, I looked at Yun.

He raised one eyebrow.

“What.”

“...You let yourself get hit on purpose back then, didn’t you?”

I smiled awkwardly again.

“Thank you. For getting yourself eliminated on purpose because of me....”

“Because of you?”

Yun asked, sounding puzzled.

“Why because of you?”

“Huh?”

A stupid sound escaped me.

Wasn’t it because he noticed I was in pain?

I stared blankly at him.

“Didn’t you get hit on purpose because you saw I was hurting?”

“I did.”

“Then that means you took the hit out of consideration for me.”

“Even if I hadn’t, you were going to collapse in a moment anyway.”

Yun’s voice still held that same genuine confusion.

“Whether I took the hit or not, the result would’ve been the same.”

No.

I opened and closed my mouth.

“Then why did you let yourself get hit on purpose? It couldn’t have been something sentimental like wanting to let me enjoy the joy of victory.”

“I just didn’t want to keep playing.”

Sasu answered in the tone of someone explaining the most obvious fact in the world.

“I didn’t want to be left alone all cozy with Trevain while those eliminated idiots kept trying to hit the two of us.”

Ricardo and I both stared at Yun.

Yun truly seemed unable to understand why we were making those expressions.

He asked in confusion,

“If I hadn’t deliberately taken the hit, what would’ve changed?”

“Well. I probably would’ve collapsed before hitting you.”

“Right. And then you would’ve been carried off immediately. Same thing.”

“Then what were you about to say right before I threw the ball? You opened your mouth like you were going to say something.”

“I was going to tell you that you looked like you were about to keel over.”

“Then why didn’t you say it?”

“Would you have listened if I did?”

...I’ve completely lost the trust of my seniors.

Honestly, after everything I’d done, I had nothing to say in my defense.

And somehow Yun’s explanation was both absurd and perfectly logical, leaving me with no way to argue back.

I stared silently at my Sasu for a moment.

“...I’m sorry.”

Then I placed a hand over my chest.

“I interpreted your actions with the logic of a normal person again. Please forget what I said before, and let me thank you instead for catching me before I collapsed and carrying me over.”

“Good boy.”

Yun replied.

The green-eyed senior sitting across from us looked away from Yun.

Even though Ricardo still clearly had a what the hell are you even talking about expression, he didn’t say anything.

He looks like he wants a cigarette....

I gave Ricardo my thanks too.

The green-eyed senior waved it off with a flick of his hand.

“The doctor says you can be discharged later today~?”

“Oh!”

That was good news.

“Thank you. Then later I’ll ride Kai—ah, I mean Jack’s car back.”

“Don’t wander off anywhere stupid. Just go back and sleep~.”

“There’s nowhere else for me to go.”

I smiled at the senior’s nagging.

“The sports festival was basically my whole schedule lately.”

Once I returned to the cabin, all that would be left was to hear the report on the new Elder.

It was Yoow’s level of skill. I wouldn’t even be surprised if he’d already identified who had been controlling the Creatures.

Kairos probably had a decent idea too.

Depending on the report, I’d need to decide whether to contact Erich Erhart.

While thinking that, I suddenly realized I’d missed something.

“Ah, right—so who won the sports festival?!”

“It was a tie.”

I see.

I nodded while mentally going over the event results.

“If it’s a tie, what happens to the special leave reward the winning team gets?”

“No special leave. Instead, everyone gets company meal vouchers.”

“Oh!”

That’s not bad at all.

As my face brightened, Ricardo snorted and pulled out his phone from his inner pocket.

“Want mine too~?”

“You don’t use meal vouchers, Rick?”

“Absolutely not.”

The answer came back firm.

I nodded enthusiastically.

“Then I’ll gratefully take it.”

“Take mine too.”

Yun said as he pulled out his own phone.

“I’ll just add eighty percent of the voucher amount to your debt, so don’t feel pressured.”

Ricardo and I both stared at Yun in disbelief, unable to hold it in.

Yun, completely unfazed, was already transferring the vouchers to me on his own.

Naturally, my refusal was ignored.

I was just about to grumble something at him for blatantly pretending not to hear me—

when Ami walked in.

“Hilde!”

She had come with Kairos and, surprisingly, Ro.

“Yay, you’re awake! Samuel said you’d wake up soon, so we waited!”

“Ami.”

I smiled brightly as I welcomed the seniors and my kin into the room.

“Ro sunbae, Kai. I’m sorry for making you worry.”

“Hey, Kumde!”

Ro strode over, overtaking Ami.

Ricardo narrowed his eyes as he watched Ro approach, but naturally Ro didn’t notice in the slightest.

He stopped beside Ricardo’s chair.

“Did you know?”

Huh?

For some reason, I stared blankly at the visibly fuming Ro. 𝑓𝘳𝘦𝑒𝑤𝑒𝘣𝘯ℴ𝘷𝘦𝓁.𝑐𝑜𝑚

“Know what?”

“The straw!”

Ah, the team name leak culprit?

Come to think of it, who was that?

Recalling the small incident I’d completely forgotten, I blinked.

“No. I don’t know. Do you know who it was, sunbae?”

“You little bastard!”

Ro pointed a finger at Ami.

“Peanut leaked our team name!”

What?

I looked back and forth between Ami—standing calmly at the end of his finger—and the furious Ro.

How exactly am I supposed to interpret that...?

After thinking it through, I asked carefully,

“You mean Ami heard the name from someone on our team, right? Since Ami was on the other team, she technically couldn’t be the mole.”

“No, it was her!”

“...What?”

“She’s the straw!”

“...Hm. How is that even possible?”

“I saw Giacomo’s phone.”

Ami, who had been standing there expressionlessly, suddenly giggled.

“When we went to play Whack-a-Mole together. He doesn’t put a password on his phone.”

What?!

I was horrified.

“Ami! How could you do something like that!”

“Security is the most basic quality of a public servant, Hilde. The one who failed to protect it is the one at fault.”

“You underhanded peanut bastard!”

Ro raged.

“Don’t you know anti-morality?!”

“It’s business ethics, idiot! And your team smashed the energy bar Kudo was carrying too!”

“Alright, alright.”

Kairos stepped between the bickering seniors with a smile.

“Please calm down, both of you. If this keeps up, Tita is going to come kick all of us out.”

We spent a while in peaceful time inside the hospital room.

The usual bickering between those two, and Kairos keeping the noise level down.

Maybe Ricardo’s ears were starting to hurt from the endless First Generation quarrels, because he left first, passing along Jonathan’s regards since Jonathan couldn’t visit tonight due to patrol duty.

Not long after he left, Yehyeon came by.

The moment he confirmed I was perfectly fine, he smiled gently, told me to take my time getting discharged, then grabbed Ro by the back of the neck and vanished.

Ami and Yun stayed a little longer before leaving.

Ami told me John was perfectly fine, that contrary to my worries the sports festival closing ceremony had gone smoothly, and that the sudden Creature attack had been handled without issue.

“Actually, last time we were the ones who broke the audience Core device!”

...Aha.

“So something like this is nothing at all!”

Then the senior recommended an idle mobile game about growing mushrooms before leaving with Yun.

After seeing them off, I completed the discharge process with Kairos.

When we stepped outside the hospital wing, the sunset was staining the sky.

Breathing in the evening wind of Center Core, I got into the car Kairos had brought from the outdoor parking lot.

The moment the door shut, I asked,

“What about the Creature incident?”

“The strategist plans to report on it. But apparently it isn’t that urgent.”

“They retreated pretty obediently. Maybe it was just meant as a display.”

“The bigger issue is that you attempted control interference.”

What?

How did he know?

I turned to Kairos in alarm.

But the red-haired controller didn’t seem interested in explaining how he found out.

Instead, he smoothly drove the sedan and added,

“Control interference is not easy to pull off.”

“I know. It’s not that I didn’t trust you—I just wasn’t sure if you were there. You could’ve gone to the bathroom or something.”

“So it seemed. In the end, I intercepted the control myself and scattered them. They released control fairly obediently after that.”

“Who was it?”

I asked while looking at the side of the controller’s face.

“Just tell me this first. Was one of our kin being threatened by the Elders, or did they do it willingly?”

“I heard it was a chick’s talent show.”

Kairos answered with a faint smile.

Then, the moment the car stopped at a light, he turned toward me as I finally relaxed.

He stared into my eyes in silence for a long moment.

What.

“...Why?”

“So I’ve decided to drop the sixth-sense concealment.”

What?

At that bombshell declaration, I jerked upright from the passenger seat.

The controller’s eyes curved.

“It was decided while you were unconscious.”

What is that supposed to mean?

From the look of it, I’d only been unconscious for a few hours. What kind of discussion had happened during that time?

I asked in shock, but Kairos only deflected, saying he’d tell me tomorrow.

I pressed him to explain right now, but he only smiled the whole drive back to the cabin.

“Kai!”

“Rest today, Hilde.”

Kairos declared firmly with a smile.

“There’s plenty of time. Hearing it tomorrow will be cleaner.”

And so my first sports festival day came to an end.

Leaving me with embarrassment, joy, and all sorts of other emotions.

I returned safely to the cabin.

And fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.