NOVEL NEXT Chapter 39
When I finally came to my senses, I found myself trapped in a dim, narrow metal cage.
What the heck? I was definitely—
In a panic, I moved my body, and my arms and legs slipped right through the bars as if they weren’t even there.
That’s when I realized this was just a dream.
…Oh man, what a shock. I thought everything up until now was just a delusion while being trapped in that lab.
Maybe it was the sheer shock that made me let out a sneer. Seriously, it’s been ages since I escaped, and I’m still dreaming about that lab.
What a pathetic state to be in.
Letting out a sigh to act nonchalant, I slipped through the bars and looked around the isolation room.
The more I examined it, the clearer it became that this was a dream.
The faces of the other experiment subjects who were locked up with me looked all squished except for one, and even I, unlike back then, had grown in size, so there was clearly no reason to be scared.
Not even the oddly long-limbed researchers. Not even the strange hybrid of a syringe and saw they carried around.
Not even the bizarrely moving experiment subjects with electrodes stuck in their heads.
…Not even that face that looked like mine, none of it scared me.
But still. Yeah, looking at them for too long wasn’t exactly pleasant. Since I had no reason to keep dreaming, it was about time I woke up.
Even though this was a dream, my consciousness was oddly clear, so manipulating my ability to wake myself up was no big deal.
As I synthesized some wake-up substance and forced myself up, the first sounds I heard were the classic beeping of a hospital and someone’s breathing.
Why was the room so dark? Even with the morning sunlight creeping in through the curtains, it was still pretty gloomy.
Rubbing my bleary eyes to focus, I noticed an IV drip stuck to the back of my hand.
And next to my bed, there were other kids piled up asleep in chairs.
Yeonhwa, Jinhyeon, Minho, Lapiz, Ageha… everyone I had any connection with was there.
Which was only natural. To them, I was probably a really close friend.
But to me, their coming together like this felt awkward and unfamiliar.
I’d really never considered them friends after all.
Of course, I thought Justitia would be waiting, but… there were some unexpected faces, and my mind got all jumbled.
I guess that proves I’m doing a good job faking being their friend, which isn’t a bad thing, but… how should I put this?
“…Gratitude, maybe?”
It’s a strange thing to say, but… it seems I was really thankful they stayed by my side until I woke up.
“Thanks… sweet potato… uh, uh! Hey, guys, Blanca, Blanca’s here!”
Yeonhwa, who heard me mumbling to myself, woke up in a daze, still without wiping away the drool, and started waking up the others.
“B-Blanca?! Are you okay?! D-Do you remember who I am?!”
“Lapiz, I know how you feel, but let’s keep it down for now. They said you need absolute rest…”
“Yet your voice is the loudest, Minho. Well, I’ll let it go since I’m happy too.”
As one person woke up, the rest soon followed suit and the place became a noisy hubbub.
“Whoa, whoa. Hold on. Calm down a bit. I’m fine.”
“T-Thank goodness…”
I told everyone to calm down a bit and reassured them that I was alright, so they could stop panicking.
Then, seeing Lapiz looking like she was about to cry made me think I might need to intervene, so I pointed her out.
“You’re not gonna cry, so cheer up, Lapiz.”
“…Uuuuuuu!”
Oh man. I told her not to cry, but now she’s sobbing. What was I supposed to do about that?
With a dumbfounded expression, I patted Lapiz, and only then did the others seem to realize I was really okay, letting out relieved expressions.
“You’re alright. Just like the usual Blanca. Thank goodness.”
“I can only imagine how bad it would have been if something went wrong.”
“Yeah, phew. It was a big operation, so I was worried, but you seem fine. Glad to hear it, Blanca!”
Yeonhwa was yawning repeatedly, looking exhausted, but she still held my non-IV hand and said she was relieved.
“Glad… to hear it. Yeah, I’m glad to be fine…”
Minho nodded in agreement with a complex and peculiar expression.
This must be bothering him a lot.
A bunch of strong guys who shouldn’t be here in second year attacked, and yet the level of injury was actually less than what might’ve been expected.
In the original version, the original original, Minho had seen a scenario where a ton of people got wrecked.
So it must be confusing. Things had changed a lot from what he knew.
He must have thought a lot about where the guys who should’ve attacked us ended up, stuff like that.
“…Sorry, Blanca. If I had been just a little braver, you wouldn’t have gotten hurt like this.”
While I was lost in thought, Jinhyeon, who had been quiet this whole time, suddenly spoke up to apologize.
…Now that I think about it, Minho wasn’t the only one whose plans went south. Mine had gone pretty haywire too.
All because of that guy who brought out the fire.
I just stared at Jinhyeon.
Part of me wanted to blame him for everything going wrong, but given the situation, that didn’t seem fair at all.
“It’s not your fault. If there’s blame, it’s on the villains. And hey, even if it was late, you showed some courage, right? So there’s no need to apologize.”
In the end, the best I could do was give him some praise while subtly throwing in that he needed to read the situation.
“Yeah, Jinhyeon. Blanca’s okay, see? So… it’s fine. I know how big of a decision you made, so don’t beat yourself up too much.”
Yeonhwa comforted Jinhyeon, wrapping him in her warmth.
Ugh. I can’t watch this. I turned my gaze to Minho and asked what had happened while I was out cold, and just how many days I had been sleeping.
“Oh, that? It’s been just a day. In terms of time, about 18 hours, give or take.”
Minho explained the situation, seemingly eager to share the scoop of what had happened in that short span of time.
Right after I collapsed and Jinhyeon brought down the fire, Invictus showed up to handle the situation.
“Invictus?”
“Yup. As soon as he showed up, he tucked his tail and ran.”
Not a chance…
He couldn’t have seen Jinhyeon in action, so surely he wouldn’t care.
Trying to push away that ominous thought, I asked him what happened next.
“Well, Justitia was super busy with interviews and writing reports and couldn’t stick around you.”
Then she told me that class A would be temporarily closed for this week.
And that they had captured two people who called themselves Executors.
One was Alexei, whom Minho took down by himself, and the other was Dumas, who was subdued by Lapiz and the martial artists.
Fukukin stepped in here and there, but that wasn’t really important.
“No dead Executors?”
“None. Aside from the two we caught, everyone else ran away.”
“…I see.”
I wondered if that Eliza was still alive.
I felt a pang of regret wishing I had just gone for her neck instead of her fingers, but that thought didn’t last long.
She was in a state not far off from a living corpse anyway.
She’d soon rot away and die, so I didn’t linger on thoughts about Eliza for too long.
“That’s about all I have to tell you. Oh, and Blanca, you’re all over the internet right now.”
What could be worse than that?
When I casually browsed with the phone Yeonhwa handed me, I saw my pictures and videos floating around, clearly taken from who-knows-where.
“The school and Mr. Gazer asked not to share, but it seems becoming a public figure is unavoidable…?”
Yeonhwa said, smiling helplessly as she tried to joke about it.
“Looks that way…”
I grabbed the back of my neck in defeat at her joke.
As I wallowed in self-pity for a moment, thankfully, a doctor walked in, saying my condition looked fine.
He then told me about the state I had actually been in.
Fractures, internal bleeding, concussion. I learned then that I had been in much worse condition than I thought.
“…Thanks to your body being one that responds well to Regeneration Recovery Medicine, you miraculously recovered without any aftereffects, but I would recommend coming back for at least two more days to monitor your progress. Cases like this are rare, after all.”
The doctor even suggested I stay longer, but that felt like becoming an experiment subject, so I made it clear I wanted to leave as quickly as possible.
Apparently, he had no intention to press the issue and promised to prepare everything for my discharge by the next morning.
“Oh, and to your friends, if you all could please keep it down a little, I would appreciate it. There are many others who need to rest here alongside the patient.”
“Y-Yes…”
Lapiz, who had been crying dramatically, responded in a voice so low you’d think she was trying to find a mouse hole.
The doctor’s warning seemed to make the atmosphere a bit awkward.
And since I was starting to get tired of hearing “thank goodness,” I shifted the conversation.
“Speaking of which, we were supposed to go to the clothing store this week, right? Is that still on?”
As soon as I brought it up, the kids quickly jumped on it.
“About that… we’ve postponed it for next week. We all agreed to take this week off since we’re all pretty worn out.”
“I figured it would come to that.”
“But it’s not completely canceled. I will definitely find the perfect outfit for you…!”
Ageha declared passionately, her fervor ignited for a moment.
“Oh, Blanca. Is your phone alright? It took such a massive fall. Do you want me to buy you a new one?”
“And your uniform will need repairs too. It’s dirty and quite worn out.”
Then the others seemed to catch onto the strange enthusiasm and kept suggesting all sorts of things they could do for me.
Of course, I accepted without a hint of hesitation.
Because I really am that shameless of a person.
…I’m not just accepting goodwill; I’m taking advantage of it.
I repeated to myself.