"You've got to be kidding me..."
Allen stood there, frozen. You could imagine how pale his face was when he saw statues of naked men around the hallways. Allen cursed under his breath, thinking why do they have six pack abs. The fanfictions he read were still haunting him, these statues are just making it worse.
Suddenly, someone bumps into him. He snaps out from his thoughts and looks at the person. "Hey, watch where you're goi—" before he could even finish his sentence, he stopped speaking as he sees Larence and Rachel in front of him.
Allen immediately averted his gaze, refusing to meet Larence's eyes. The fact that he's also being paired with him in those fanfictions, he can't help but feel awkward.
"What are you doing? Are you going to just stand there or walk?" Larence says.
Allen clicks his tongue. "I'm walking, I'm walking!" he growled at him. As he starts to move his feet, he suddenly slipped on a slippery floor, causing him to stumble towards a naked statue. His head bumps onto it, causing him to yelp. "Ouch." he muttered. After he rubs his head that's in pain, he looks up at the naked statue. It didn't take him a while to let out an unholy screech. He stumbles again, but this time, it's on backwards. "Wah!" he exclaimed, grabbing Larence's arm without noticing. "Seriously, why are these statues here?" he says, closing his eyes.
Larence and Rachel looked at him weirdly.
"What's up with you? Do you have something against these statues?" Rachel arched a brow.
Allen opens his eyes. He wondered why Rachel's with the protagonist. In the novel, they're supposed to interact when they're about to find out Ted's identity.
"Hey." Larence spoke, snapping Allen out from his thoughts. "Your grip is tight. Let go, will you?" he says in a displeased tone.
Allen realized what he's doing and he immediately let go. He immediately backs away from him. A moment later, he notices a cute envelope in Larence's hand. His eyes widened. 'Did he read the message.' he thought.
Larence felt a bit uncomfortable when he noticed that Allen had been staring at him for a while now. 'Why is he staring at me?' he asks in his thoughts. He stares back at the boy, giving out a glare. "What? Is there something on my face?"
Allen's face suddenly flushed red, causing him to turn away from Larence. "N-Nothing! I'm going now." he says quickly, running in a different direction only to bump into Ryan who's just passing by. Both of them fell on the floor, causing him to land on top of the boy.
"Allen?" Ryan says, recognizing the redhead.
Unlike before, Allen's face was even redder. He starts to think that he's probably the only one who thinks this position is weird. "R-R-Ryan!?" he stuttered.
"Yup, that's me." Ryan smiled. "What's up with you today? You seem clumsy—" before he could even finish his sentence, Allen immediately gets off of him, quickly running away.
The people who were left behind, started to get confused.
"What's up with him?" Larence asked.
---xXx---
"Hahahaha! Ah, f-fuck—haha—I can't...breathe, pffft!" Az wheezed. He's now rolling on the floor, laughing as hard as he could.
Allen bangs his head again and again, telling himself to snap out of it. He keeps muttering nonstop about words that anyone can't understand. "Can someone please bang my head so hard until I forget about those bl fanfictions!?" he screamed under his breath.
"I'm afraid we can't do that, Mr. Allen. That kind of thing might result to brain damage." Alicia tells him. Az on the otherhand, keeps laughing nonstop.
"Az! Stop laughing, will you!?" Allen yelled at him.
"Hahaha! I'm s-sorry, pfft—haha. Just g-give me a second..." Az says, trying to catch his breathe. A few seconds later, he finally stops laughing. "Okay, so let's talk about something important."
"Since Larence had been warned, he's starting to investigate Ted... and judging by what we saw earlier, Rachel's with him." Alicia tells them. "Huh... That's strange. Their interaction is earlier than the original novel."
"Maybe it's because of the letter. After Larence read the message, he had been worrying nonstop. And we're here, just chilling around." Az shrugged.
"Excuse me. Knowing how my life is in danger, there's no way I could chill around." Allen crosses his arms.
"Okay, guys, stop. Let's talk shall we—oh boy." Alicia suddenly stopped speaking. Without warning, she disappeared with Az, causing Allen to back away in surprise.
"Hey! Where did you guys go!?" Allen asked, but his question wasn't answered. Right now, he's talking to nothing but air.
"Allen, there you are. We've been looking everywhere for you."
A voice suddenly surprised Allen, causing him to flinch a bit. He turns around and sees two people. He looks at Ryan who's the owner of the voice. As their eyes met, he subconsciously averted his gaze.
"Ryan, what are you doing here? I mean, what's up?" Allen says, trying not to sound awkward.
Ryan smiled, touching Allen's shoulder. "Class is now starting, Allen. Let's go before Sir Neil scolds us." he says. His voice sounds friendly as usual. If Allen didn't read the novel, he would've been fooled.
'Okay, Allen. Try to remain calm, act like you usually do.' Allen thought to himself.
"Allen? Are you okay? You're sweating." Ryan says, leaning a bit close to him. He may sound concerned, but Allen knows he isn't.
After Allen found out how dangerous Ryan was, he felt scared around him. Those yaoi fanfictions made it even worse.
"I'm fine. So get away from me, you're damn close." Allen says, shoving Ryan's face away from him.
"Sorry. You looked pale earlier so I'm just trying to check if you're okay." Ryan chuckled. For some reason, his smile made Allen shiver.
Ryan noticed Allen's uneasiness, but he just pretended to not know. If he hadn't known him for five years, he would've thought that nothing was different about the boy's actions. Ryan's curious on what Allen discovered about him, so he'll stick around him and observe.
"You shouldn't wander around when you're alone. Haven't you heard the news? There are students who're consistently getting kidnapped in here. Be careful." Ryan reminded.
Allen looked at him. From the outside, Ryan may seem like a concerned friend, but Allen knows that deep inside, the boy was actually thinking the opposite. Even though the blue-haired boy doesn't say it out loud, it was already enough for him to notice. If it weren't for the novel he read, he wouldn't have known Ryan's true nature.
"As if someone would try to kidnap me." Allen rolled his eyes. "Whoever dares to lay their hands on me, they will pay for their lives." he says in a confident tone, noticing Ted who's staring at him from the corner.
Honestly, Allen is just trying to sound nonchalant about the situation. He doesn't know why the demon is acting weird, but it's creeping him out. Ted had been eying him for a while now.
'What's up with Ted? Why is he glaring at me?' Allen thought. A moment later, he realized something. 'Could it be...he's suspecting me about something? Wait, did he find out that I'm the one who warned Larence about him?' the boy gulped. He averts his gaze, trying to think about what to do in this situation. 'Nah, there's no way. That would be impossible. Alicia and Az would normally warn me if an enemy was nearby.... But just in case...'
"Sigh. For at least once, listen to Ryan." Calia tells Allen.
The redhead ignored her. He looks again at Ted, giving out a malicious glare. This caused the demon to flinch.
"What? Is there something on my face, bastard?" Allen calls out the demon, trying to sound displeased. "You know, it's pretty annoying to be stared at. If you have something to say, say it." he spat.
Knowing Ted, he's very observant when he's suspicious of someone. He's been in this school for almost two months, it is already enough for him to gather information in his surroundings. Since Allen stood out much because of his bad reputation, it was easier for the demon to know his usual actions. He noticed that Allen hates it whenever someone stares at him too long.
Knowing Allen, he usually confronts those people and tells them to stop.
Right now, if Allen let it slip, Ted will will notice that he knows something.
'That demon, he's trying to test something...' Allen thought. 'I'm not entirely sure about it, but seeing those eyes, I could tell that he's wary of me.'
Ted stared at him for a while. A moment later, he stopped glaring. "Nothing. Sorry for bothering you." he apologized. The demon turns his back on them. 'It seems I have mistaken. He's just an idiot after all. There's no way he knows.' he thought, finally walking away.
Allen, who was unaware of the demon's thoughts, sighed in relief. He looked at the demon's back and thought to himself.
'Scary. That guy is really sharp.'
"Allen, that was mean." Calia said.
"Isn't he always mean?" Ryan chuckled. He turns to look at Allen, giving out a mischievous smile. "Allen. Let's go to class, shall we?"
Allen says nothing and frowns like he usually does. As he was about to walk ahead, he was blocked by someone. When he was able to get a full view, he notices that there isn't only one person, there are three of them. Allen recognizes them. These people are Larence, Einz, and Rachel.
"Hey. What's with you? Why are you all staring at me like that?" Allen glared at the three.
"You know why we're here." Larence narrowed his eyes.
Wrinkles on Allen's forehead started to appear because of frowning. He certainly has no clue on why they're here, so he asked.
"I don't know, so I'm asking. Why are you here?"
Einz let out a worried expression and whispered to Larence's ear. "Larence, I don't think he's the one—"
"Your highness, don't be fooled." Larence says firmly.
The prince was displeased in the way his friend called him. He often wish that Larence should break that habit when he's serious. They're close friends, they've known each other ever since they were kids. Larence doesn't need to be that formal.
"Larence. How many times do I have to tell you to quit calling me that?" Einz stared.
Larence flinched a bit and apologized. "Sorry....Einz. I'll try to get used to it."
"You've been saying that ever since we're kids." the prince pouted.
Ryan observed the situation. As soon as he finally understood, he shook his head. He looked at Allen and sighed. "What did you do this time?"
Allen let out a confused expression and replied in shock.
"Me? I didn't do anything."
"Lies. You may have fooled Einz, but not us."
Larence glared viciously at Allen. Rachel did the same. The two were looking at Allen as if he's a piece of trash that needs to be thrown away.
"Hold on. Before you accuse me of something, at least tell me what I did to offend you this time."
Allen says, taking a step backward. He doesn't have any clue on what he did. In fact, he hadn't been bothering them recently for these past few days.
"Yeah." Calia agrees with him. "How about we talk first? Let's go to a private place and settle this quietly, okay?"
Thankfully, everyone seems to agree with the suggestion. All of them went to a quiet place in order to avoid a commotion.