Uninvited Guests
The day after the incident. The drugs in my system were completely cleared out thanks to my Super Regeneration. After undergoing various medical tests, I was safely discharged from the hospital.
As I changed out of my patient gown into my school uniform and prepared to leave the room, Arin and several other students from Class 1-A arrived to visit me. Aside from Arin and Aris, I hadn't really interacted much with my classmates, so their sudden friendliness caught me a bit off guard. Had my bizarre antics on the bus left that deep of an impression? The class vice president, Soo, even checked to make sure my head was still properly attached to my neck before letting out a sigh that could have collapsed the floor.
Surprisingly, Aris was not among the students who came to visit. I expected her to show up, even if no one else did. Was seeing my head get severed and roll across the floor really that traumatic for her?
Following the other students, I paid another visit to Yujin and Leo, and then went to see Angelica and Siul. For some reason, Angelica looked rather pale, but she seemed to be recovering quickly. Thank goodness. Her injuries had been so severe that I was genuinely worried.
After being discharged, I finally caught up on the details of what had been happening in the outside world. The field training for Class 1-B and Class 1-C had been suspended indefinitely. With the research institute completely devastated, they simply didn't have the luxury to continue.
It was no exaggeration to say that the Anti-Monster National Research Institute was a facility where the nation's entire strength was concentrated. While Cheonmyeongdae fought monsters on the front lines, the institute supported them from the rear. They were invaluable partners, completely inseparable, and now one of them had been utterly destroyed.
Cheonmyeongdae was now absolutely desperate to find the girl in the red fox mask. One of the country's four research institutes had vanished overnight. Someone had to be held accountable. Furthermore, they were entirely focused on bolstering the defenses of the remaining institutes to prevent a repeat of the disaster.
I didn't want to belittle their efforts, but no matter how many heroes they stationed at those institutes, they wouldn't be able to stop Astaroth. If she made up her mind to slaughter everyone, it wouldn't matter if there were a hundred heroes or a thousand. The only ones who could even put up a decent fight against a Main were the Captain-level supernatural ability users. And even then, they had to band together just to stand a sliver of a chance. The sole exception was the Commander-in-Chief of Cheonmyeongdae. That man was basically humanity's ultimate weapon.
While I was busy snapping my own fingers in the hospital, the world outside was spinning rapidly. Whether visible or hidden, countless conflicting interests tangled together, triggering massive shifts. But none of that had anything to do with me. I was just a mere first-year academy student. What good was having future knowledge? Who could I possibly convince with information from an unknown source? I'd be lucky if they didn't just lock me up as a lunatic.
There was absolutely nothing I could do. At best, my only option was to quietly return to my dorm and satisfy my pent-up desires.
Stepping out of the hospital building, I looked up to see a clear, cloudless blue sky. The sunlight beating down on me was prickling hot. Spring was gradually fading, and summer was on its way. What lay ahead in this now completely blank future was entirely unknown to me. I just hoped nothing out of the ordinary would happen.
Naturally, something out of the ordinary happened immediately.
It happened right after I returned to my dorm, took a shower, and was happily rummaging through my toolbox with a wide grin on my face. Should I tenderize my thighs with a claw hammer? Or maybe drill a hole through the back of my hand? As I was indulging in these blissful dilemmas and was about to slide an awl right under my fingernail, a sudden knock rattled my door. Who could it be? Was there anyone who would come looking for me? Ah, maybe Aris?
I kicked the toolbox under my desk, quickly regenerated the tiny prick under my fingernail, and hurried to open the door.
"Ah, so you're Lucia?"
But the person standing on the other side was a complete stranger. She had hair the color of aged red wine, and vivid red eyes that felt almost hypnotic to look into. The slight upward tilt of her eyes gave her a distinctly cat-like appearance.
"Hi! Nice to meet you. I'm coming in."
She offered a bright, cheerful smile and stepped right into my room without even waiting for my permission. She slipped past me so smoothly and naturally that I didn't even have a chance to block her. As I turned around with a dumbfounded expression, the other visitor who had accompanied her let out a heavy sigh.
"Good grief, at least wait for permission before you barge in. You have zero manners. Well, I guess I'm not one to talk."
Fortunately, I recognized this one. A girl clad in shades of purple, distinguished by an excessive amount of accessories.
"Regina? What are you doing here?"
"Can we come in first? I'll explain everything inside."
"Um... sure, come on in."
Regina trudged inside and slipped off her shoes. I quietly closed the door and followed her. Meanwhile, the red-haired girl who had barged in first was acting completely at home, without a shred of hesitation. She had already opened my mini-fridge, pulled out my grape juice, and was pouring it into cups.
"Here, it's not much, but help yourself! Sorry I don't have anything better to offer."
"But that's mine..."
Before I knew it, she had poured enough juice for everyone and set the cups on the table. She was acting like a gracious host welcoming guests, but this was literally my dorm room.
"Seri. Stop being a nuisance."
"Pfft~ This doesn't even count as being a nuisance~"
It is absolutely a nuisance. What else do you call a complete stranger rummaging through your things in your own room? I narrowed my eyes and scrutinized the girl. Her appearance: wine-red hair and blood-red eyes. Her familiar banter with Regina. And most decisively, her name. One of the notorious troublemakers of Class 1-D. There was no mistake. It was Seri, one of the infamous delinquent trio. Okay, so I knew who she was, but why on earth was she here?
"We actually went to visit you at the hospital a little while ago."
I found myself sitting down at the table before I even realized it. Regina, sitting across from me, toyed with her cup of grape juice as she spoke.
"But they told us you'd already been discharged. So we had no choice but to come find you ourselves."
"Seriously~ What a total waste of time. If I'd known, we would've just come straight here."
Seri grumbled, downing her juice in a single gulp. Then she immediately refilled her empty cup.
"Did you have business with me?"
"Yeah. It's a pain, but I figured it's always best to provide proper after-sales service."
"After-sales service...?" I asked back, thoroughly confused. Had I ever bought anything from Regina? I did inhale some of her drugs, but it felt a bit weird to call that a purchase, didn't it?
"I told you, didn't I? Your condition was uniquely severe, so I had to crank up the concentration of the drug."
"Yeah, you did."
"I did give you an antidote, but that only neutralizes the active drug components. It doesn't do anything else."
Regina pulled a round, bead-like object from her pocket. It was the same antidote I had already taken a few times.
"With the concentration I pumped into you, you're bound to experience withdrawal symptoms."
Ah, I'd already had a massive taste of that. My mood had plummeted so hard it felt like I was suffering from bipolar disorder. Honestly, I was still feeling it right now, even if it was slightly better than yesterday.
"Seeing how you got discharged way earlier than I expected, you must have detoxified the drug using your own ability, right?"
"Yeah. I tried it, and it worked."
"Did it cure the withdrawal symptoms too?"
I hesitated for a moment before answering honestly. I shook my head from side to side. It looked like it would clear up in a few days, but the withdrawal symptoms hadn't completely vanished. Still, it was at a level I could easily grit my teeth and bear, so it wasn't too serious.
"Just as I thought."
Regina let out a heavy sigh, pressing her fingers against her temples as if a headache were coming on.
"That's why we're here. To fix that. If I cause another incident, I might actually end up in juvenile detention this time, so please cooperate with us."
"Huh?"
Cure the withdrawal symptoms? How? I was about to ask, but the answer was sitting right next to her. Regina could manufacture drugs, but she couldn't erase the addiction or withdrawal. However, just because Regina couldn't do it didn't mean no one else could.
"My condition for entering the academy was that I would never cause trouble with drugs again. If word gets out that I got another student addicted, things will get incredibly messy. Given the circumstances, they might show some leniency, but I absolutely detest unnecessary drama."
Ah, so that's why she came all the way to the hospital to give me the antidote. Though, knowing Regina's true nature and her past, she probably would have come even without that excuse. She carried a deep sense of guilt over the fact that the drugs she had irresponsibly sold just to make some pocket money had ruined other people's lives. She had been young and foolish, completely unaware of how dangerous her actions truly were. She had believed her family. She had believed them when they said it was no big deal. She had implicitly trusted her parents when they told her that addicts would return to normal if they just endured it for a little while. By the time she realized that wasn't true, it was already too late to turn back.
"If that's what you're worried about, don't be. The symptoms aren't that bad. I'll be fine if I just bear with it for a few days."
"I can't trust that. I've seen someone say the exact same thing before, only to suddenly lose their mind and go wild. Besides, enduring it is painful and exhausting, isn't it?"
"...Ahaha."
I couldn't bring myself to deny it. Even for Lucia, who welcomed physical pain as pure ecstasy, this sickening, hollow nausea was impossible to enjoy. I had tried to find some pleasure in it, but it was just plain miserable. For there to be a form of suffering that Lucia actually disliked—now that was truly unprecedented.
"For the record, I can't fix it myself. My supernatural ability is only to manufacture the drugs. I could keep supplying you to keep the withdrawal at bay, but obviously, that's not a real solution."
"But I can fix it for you."
Seri spoke with a knowing, mischievous smile. Yes, with her supernatural ability, she actually could resolve the withdrawal symptoms. Depending on how it was used, her power was far more dangerous than Regina's drugs. That was precisely why I harbored a subconscious wariness toward her. While Regina was someone I hoped to become close friends with eventually, Seri was... well, a bit of a question mark. Her supernatural ability: Hypnosis. Seri was a hypnotist. Simply put, she was a mental manipulator. Brainwashing, suggestion, mind control... she was capable of it all. She was easily the most dangerous of the Class 1-D delinquent trio. While hypnosis didn't work well on supernatural ability users with strong mental barriers, one could never afford to let their guard down. The combination of Regina and Seri was incredibly lethal. Regina's drugs would shatter the target's judgment, and Seri would slip right into the resulting cracks in their mind. Even a seasoned supernatural user could find themselves completely hypnotized in an instant if they fell into their trap.
'But looking at it another way, Seri isn't nearly as dangerous when Regina isn't helping her.'
While she could plunge ordinary people into hypnosis with a mere gesture or a glance, she couldn't do the same to supernatural ability users. Seri knew this well, which was why she was always glued to Regina's side.
"I can use my ability to make you completely forget about those withdrawal symptoms."
Seri declared with absolute confidence. I looked at her, struggling to hide my skepticism. Seri was a textbook troublemaker. She had a devilish, impish personality and absolutely loved playing pranks. Nine times out of ten, whenever the delinquent trio caused an incident, Seri was the root cause. I was grateful for the offer to get rid of the withdrawal symptoms, but... could I really trust her?