I felt like my whole body was on fire. It was as if molten tal, not blood, was coursing through my veins. The excruciating pain dragged my consciousness back. Groaning, I opened my eyes and saw an unfamiliar ceiling and the pale, anxious faces of Berald and Yurina in Yuren’s disguise. They imdiately checked on .
“Brother! Are you awake?”
“Dale! Are you okay?”
I clenched my teeth against the burning agony and forced my mouth to move. “Where... am I?”
“The academy infirmary! You collapsed, so we brought you here right away!”
I asked, “How long was I out?”
“About two hours.”
Two hours was not a long ti, all things considered. I tried to sit up, but a searing pain coming from my soul stigmata slamd back down. It was as if I had fallen into boiling lava. “Guh!”
Yurina beca concerned. “D-Dale! Are you okay?”
Not even as an empty reassurance could I tell her that I was fine.
“I’ll call a healer right now!”
I reached out and grabbed her hand just before she pressed the call button, shaking my head. “No.”
I didn’t know exactly why my body was like this, but one thing I did know, this wasn’t sothing a healer could fix. So, I said, “I’ll be fine after a bit of rest.”
Yurina’s eyes glistened as though she were on the verge of tears. “Dale...”
“Can I have so water?” I asked.
“O-of course!”
I took the glass of water from her and chugged it down. The cold liquid helped clear my head a little. “Phew!”
“Feeling better?”
“Better than before.”
I still felt like my body was burning in a furnace, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as when I had first regained consciousness. Now, I wondered what the hell had happened. The last thing I rembered was talking with Yurina before my mind suddenly went blank.
Was Berald right? Have I been overtraining lately? I thought.
No, that couldn’t be it. At most, I had trained like that for only a few days. In my past life, I had pushed my body far harder for over a month at a ti. Moreover, if this were truly a case of overexertion, my body wouldn’t be radiating this kind of searing heat.
Then why had this happened? Frowning, I slowly closed my eyes. I steadied my breathing and turned my awareness inward. As my consciousness sank deeper, to the inner realm, my mindscape unfolded before . Flas blazed violently, as though ready to consu the entire world. As always, within this realm, the Primordial Fla raged uncontrollably.
No, scratch that. “As always” didn’t quite apply this ti. The Primordial Fla was more intense than usual. It was burning far more violently than I had ever seen before, as though it were struggling to survive.
I shifted my gaze, frowning. Sothing was pushing its way through the fire, as if trying to devour it. When I tried to look closer at the thing engulfing the fla, a blinding headache hit , and my vision flickered.
What in the world? Is that... the other power inside ?
I furrowed my brows as I recalled Professor Baldwin’s words. While I still didn’t know what that “thing” was, I was starting to piece together why my body was reacting this way: The Primordial Fla was in turmoil, and my energy network was overheating because of that.
I had never experienced anything like this while using the Primordial Fla before. Only one possibility ca to mind. Sothing completely unprecedented had just happened.
Is the Ashen Fla the reason behind this? Is this what Professor Baldwin ant when she said sothing about my powers being out of balance?
The professor’s warning echoed in my head. I had been continuously using this unstable power, so if that was the cause of this overheating, then everything made sense. This ant that if I used the Ashen Fla for too long, I could lose consciousness out of the blue. Moreover, it would not entail just blacking out; my entire energy flow would overheat, rendering my body immobile for a while.
I let out a long sigh at this unexpected flaw. “Haa!”
Looking at , Berald crossed his arms and said with a stern expression, “I was wondering why you were holed up in the training ground day and night the past few days. Didn’t I just tell you that overtraining would only harm your body, Brother?”
“Ugh!”
Technically, the issue wasn’t the overtraining itself; rather, it was the fundantal flaw in the Ashen Fla. Still, it was true that overusing the Ashen Fla had landed in this state.
“Dale, does anything hurt specifically?” Yurina asked.
“I’m okay now.”
My head still burned like I had a fever, but it was nothing compared to the agony I felt when I first woke up.
Yurina lifted my bangs and pressed her forehead to mine. “Hold still for a second.”
We were so close our noses almost touched. The soft breath slipping past her lips tickled my cheek.
Co on, don’t do this while looking like that. Please.
If she kept this up, I could fall for her blond pretty boy persona. It made protest inwardly: No! Not the boy-love corruption ending! Anything but that!
Yurina frowned as she watched writhe and clutch my head. “Dale? You really are still sick. Your fever’s still high too.”
She grabbed my shoulders and forced to lie down on the bed. “Don’t even think about doing anything today. Just lie there quietly.”
“Ugh, fine.” I couldn’t do anything even if I wanted to, with my body in this state.
Then Berald said, “Hmm, Brother, your clothes are completely soaked in sweat.”
“Oh, you’re right.”
My training suit was completely drenched. No wonder I had been feeling damp all over.
He continued, “First, let’s get you changed! I’ll help you!”
I tried to shove him away in a panic. “What? Hey, hey! W-wait! Stop, you bastard!”
However, I had no strength left in my body. Berald grabbed my clothes and began stripping them off all the way down. “Heh heh. We’re all guys anyway. What’s the big deal?”
Yurina’s eyes bulged as she recoiled in shock. “Whoa!”
Berald said, “Yuren, could you pass the hospital gown over there?”
Yurina mumbled, “It. It’s really big...”
“Yuren?”
“H-huh? What?”
“The hospital gown. The gown.”
Yurina hurried off to fetch it. “R-right!”
While I struggled, Berald pinned down with brute force and signaled to Yurina. “I’ll hold him down. You help dress him.”
“M-?”
“Ugh! Stop! I’ll dress myself, just please!”
“Hahaha. Patients should behave and lie still.”
“Gah!”
Why the hell is this bastard so strong?
Blushing furiously, Yurina said, “T-then, I’ll help you put it on, okay?”
As she helped into the hospital gown, I clenched my teeth and shut my eyes tightly. Damn it. I will never forget this humiliation, Berald!
Glancing around the room, Berald said, “Well, now that you’re dressed, next...”
I shot him a sharp glare. “What now?”
“Brother, aren’t you a little hungry?”
“Hmm, now that you ntion it, yeah.”
I hadn’t been eating properly during training, and I was definitely feeling it.
“Heh. I can’t just sit by while my brother starves! I’ll personally cook sothing for you!”
“Can’t you just bring the patient food from the infirmary?”
“Co on now! Have you never heard the rumors that the infirmary food at our academy is worse than dog food? I can’t let you eat that!”
“I’ve had it before... It wasn’t that bad.”
With a smug grin, Berald thumped his chest confidently. “None of that now. Just stay put. I’ll make you a special family recipe passed down through generations of the Ryu family! Just wait a little bit!”
Off he went, stomping as he left the infirmary. Thirty minutes passed. I was lying in bed, being fed peeled fruit by Yurina, when sothing acrid drifted into my nose. Wondering what it was, I scrunched up my nose, but the stench grew stronger.
Berald burst into the room wearing a pink apron while holding a pot the size of a washbasin. “Ahahaha! Brother! Your al is ready!”
I didn’t know where he had found that apron, but it was physically painful to look at. Choosing to ignore it, I asked, “What is that?”
“The health-boosting stew I ntioned!” Grinning proudly, Berald set the massive pot on the table next to the bed. “Behold!”
He lifted the lid, and inside it was a bubbling red liquid, thick like molten lava dredged up from the pits of hell.
This color did not look okay. I asked, “Hold on. What on earth did you put in that?”
Berald puffed out his chest, looking extrely pleased with himself. “Ho ho. Brace yourself. It’s a kimchi stew made with spicy chili peppers, ginseng, ginger, jujubes, cinnamon, onions, garlic, and a mountain of chili oil. It’s an exclusive Ryu family redy!”
He was seriously trying to feed this to soone burning up with fever. I yelled, “You goddamn lunatic.”
“Ahahaha! Sotis you handle fire with another fire! Ever heard of fighting poison with poison?”
“I think you an fight fire with fire, not poison with poison.”
Fine. Even if, for argunt’s sake, I pretend that this kimchi stew is okay. But how on earth am I supposed to eat sothing that looks like a witch’s cauldron, stuffed to the brim with ingredients like it’s trying to choke the pot? Also, wait, there’s not a single piece of at in this stew?
Had Berald abandoned his patriotic duty as a citizen of the Republic? According to so obscure national culinary law, serving kimchi stew without even a sliver of at was a cri punishable by death.
Berald said, “Co on, co on! Just try a bite!”
“I’m not eating that!”
I was already overheating from head to toe, and now he wanted to shove down my throat a demonic concoction that would make even hell weep?
Berald nodded, arms folded like so smug sage. “No helping it then.”
For a second, I thought maybe, just maybe, he was human after all. But then he said, “Yuren!”
“H-huh?”
“Hold him down so he can’t move!”
Yurina glanced at , hesitating. “But... he really doesn’t want to eat it.”
“This is all for his speedy recovery! Do you want Brother Dale to be stuck in the infirmary forever?”
“Well...”
“If you help, I’ll send you that photo we took during our supplentary class last year.”
“What? R-really? Which photo?”
“Hehe. The one where he was dozing off during the lesson.”
Yurina snorted so excitedly that I could tell how much she wanted that photo. She grabbed and pinned down like a lunatic. “Sorry, Dale.”
“W-wait! No! Don’t!”
“Just relax, Brother.”
Berald scooped a steaming spoonful of atless kimchi stew and shoved it straight into my mouth.
The kimchi stew made spot nonsense. “Yuckkk! O-our base... it’s... in the northern mountain range.”
Berald roared with laughter as I thrashed and choked on the infernal stew. “Bwahaha! All good dicine is bitter, my friend!”
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