The Dominant Rivals

Prologue

On a beautiful day, the gentle rays of sunlight peeked through the lush leaves of the trees in the garden. The refreshing breeze made the leaves sway and dance to their rhythm, creating a symphony of rustling and bustling sounds. The birds joined in, singing their melodious tunes and adding to the vibrant atmosphere.

As the day progressed, the garden filled up with people talking and laughing and children running around, shrieking with joy. The sounds were not loud enough to cause a disturbance or complaint, but rather, they added to the relaxing early summer ambiance. The sky was a brilliant blue, and the colourful flowers in the garden seemed to reach towards it, as if in appreciation. It was a day filled with beauty and joy, reminding those present to appreciate the simple pleasures in life and to take a moment to bask in the wonders of nature.

A emerald-eyed toddler named Kailas signed,leaning on his chair lazily feeling bored.

Suddenly, sat up straight  and glanced in a particular direction.

Without any hesitation, he hopped down from his chair and made his way towards the flower bushes. His eyes sparkled as he picked a beautiful blue flower before sprinting towards his destination.

As he approached a water fountain, he saw a black-haired angel with steel-blue eyes sitting nearby. Kailas was stunned by the angel’s beauty. He had seen many beautiful children without or without their beast form before, but none of them could compare to this angel’s radiance. Despite his amazement, Kailas was too shy to speak to the angel.

With her black cat-like ears and tail out, the angel appeared in a half-human form that resembled that of an elegant and beautiful house cat.

Kailas cautiously approached her, but his apprehension quickly turned to excitement as he offered her a blue flower that matched the colour of her eyes, "Here,for a beautiful girl." His mother often say girls like beautiful flowers,so he gave one for this beautiful angel.

The angel glanced down at the flower and then glared at Kailas before abruptly leaving.

Confused and disheartened, Kailas looked down at the flower, shrugged, and headed off to find his mother for some snacks.

When Kailas was in elementary school, he encountered the same angel that he had seen in the garden. After realizing that the angel was actually “him” and not “her,” that was why he was glared at, so like a good boy knowing his wrongdoings, he went to apologize to that angel with his mother’s special homemade candy.

When that beautiful angel named Damien saw little Kailas, he glared at him like he was bullied by himself. As the person in wrong handed his candy, that angel frowned at him before staring at the candy in his palm. He described how the candy was made with love and care by his mother, leading the angel to accept it reluctantly. He believed that they would become friends in the future, but oh, how he was mistaken.

Every time the little Kailas went to talk with him, he was ignored, so he too got angry and ignored him. For instance, while they were playing together, they would play separately, and when one of them spotted the other, they would turn their heads in the opposite direction with a hmph.

At that time, it was only a misunderstanding between kids.

This continued up until Middle School , where there were times when little Kailas when confronted with disciplinary action because of a dispute that was, according to him, typically started by the other side. Even though his parents were rich and influential, they had already given up their hopes for him. During their meeting with the teacher, his parents could only shake their heads, sigh, and leave without saying anything.

After the punishment, his homeroom teacher forced him into a chair, even though he was too stubborn to show his exhaustion after standing still for an hour. The teacher sighed, “Have you reflected upon your actions?”

Little Kailas bit his lips and remained silent.

His homeroom teacher warned earnestly, “Don’t make the same mistake next time. Look at your face; when was it ever not injured?”

The homeroom teacher, unlike all his other subject teachers, was the only one he liked. She was the only one who would not reprimand him purely because of his results.

Every time Kailas was reprimanded, his teachers would, without fail, compare him to their model student. Little Damien was the model student in terms of both results and behaviour. On top of that, he was extremely good-looking, and no one disliked him.

The spirit of a child was frail, and so the word “Damien” became Kailas’s never-ending nightmare. There, it had developed from a misunderstanding into animosity.

The homeroom teacher patted little Kailas’s head, gently smiled, and encouraged him, “Don’t be dejected. Once you grow up and finally enter society, you will see that the courage you now possess is required to make it to the top.”

Kailas’s eyes gleamed, and those words stuck in his mind. That was the first time he had wanted to become a teacher like her.

During their High School period, their school’s committee was divided into the cultural program and the sports program. Traditionally, both programs have been on hostile terms.

As the Head of the Sports Committee as well as the Vice-President of the Students Council, the young Kailas considered the Head of the Cultural Committee as well as the President of the Students Council, Damien, as his sworn enemy.

One thing’s for sure: they both were very popular and good-looking, but not sure why, Damien was regarded as a prim and proper young man while Kailas was regarded as a playboy for the outsiders, also extremely famed and popular in their school’s local forums and magazines. Ever since Damien appeared, the young Kailas’s position as the high school’s top intellectual and handsome guy has been threatened!

For outsiders, Damien pretends to be a nice and gentle brother, but only he knows that he is an arrogant jerk!

And the people he liked will say that they like his sworn enemy more. He doesn’t understand why those people like that guy, who was an arrogant, self-centered, and a pretentious prick more than himself, a romantic, selfless, and simple-minded boy—well,  sometimes, just sometimes, he was naughty.

At least he thought that they would be in different higher studies, but too bad, they both joined the Under-Graduate programs at Arka University and had been tangled up in the first and second place positions since their freshman year in arts and sports, with either the east wind overwhelming the west wind or the west wind overwhelming the east wind.

When they learned that they were both were going to work under the same roof, they rushed to the Principal’s office together.

Principal Ester was a kind middle-aged woman and one of the Directors of the Edven City’s High School Boarding Committee, with great qualifications and superb knowledge about children’s psychology.

Damien: “There should be either him or me here.”

Kailas: “I’d rather starve to death than work with him!”

However, Principal Ester only glanced at the two of them with a smile on her face. She took a sip of hot coffee from her thermos cup and calmly replied, “It has already been entered into the system and cannot be changed. There is nothing that can’t be resolved overnight; just take a step back and let nature take its course. Come on, how about shaking hands for a new start?”

Damien and Kailas didn’t want to shake hands. The two gazed at each other, flicked their sleeves, and walked off with cold snorts.

Let’s see how their lives go on with strange feelings, secrets, heartbreaks, and challenges.