Chapter 28: Shifting Balances (1)

"Hey, wanna go downstairs for a bite to eat?"

Amaris had come to Hope's room because she was hungry and wanted to take her to eat with her as it was nearing midnight.

"It's not healthy to eat at this hour," Hope frowned.

"Okay, then you won't eat and you can keep me company," Amaris said as she took Hope by the arm and led her out of the room.

Hope sighed as if she was used to her behavior and closed the door to her room. She wore her auburn hair in a messy bun on top of her head. She was as beautiful as ever, wearing a white t-shirt and pink sweatpants.

Her hazel eyes were slightly sleepy as she stared into the yellow eyes of Amaris, who she didn't understand how he could be so energetic at this hour.

Amaris was drooling as she thought about the delicious food she could eat downstairs. Her short hair was pulled back in a high ponytail to keep it out of the way. Her bangs were a little long and stung her yellow eyes. She was wearing a black halter top and tights in the same color as her blouse.

"Let's get Dante and Felix," she said, and without letting Hope answer, she knocked on the door of their adjoining rooms at the same time.

When Felix and Dante opened their door at the same time, Amaris looked at them with a cute smile on her face.

Felix, his dark blue hair disheveled and eyes the same color, looked sleepily at Amaris' smiling face and Hope, who looked embarrassedly behind her.

Dante looked at the girl with an angry expression on his face because whatever he was doing inside was interrupted. He was wearing only black sweatpants. He was sweaty, so Amaris guessed he had been training.

His blue eyes stared at her with displeasure. Felix folded his arms across his chest and leaned against the door, closing his eyes as he asked.

"May I know why you're bothering us?" Felix asked, and Hope worried that he would fall asleep at any moment..

"I thought you might be hungry, so I came to call you so we could eat."

"More like you were hungry yourself," Hope muttered. When Amaris heard her and glared at her, Hope pulled an imaginary zipper over her mouth.

"Is that why you showed up on my doorstep?" Dante asked with a frown.

"Stop playing hard to get and let's eat. I'm hungry!"

"Actually, I'm kind of hungry too," Felix mumbled sleepily.

"More like you're hungry for sleep," Hope said.

"Wait for me, I'll be right back," Felix said and walked in, ignoring Hope's words. Not even a minute later, with his hair fixed and wearing a black sweatshirt over his white T-shirt, he came out and closed the door.

"What are you waiting for? Let's go," Dante sighed and disappeared inside, leaving his door open.

Five minutes later he came out, fully dressed and his hair wet.

"Did you take a shower or something?" Amaris asked, pointing at his wet hair with her index finger.

"How can I take a shower in five minutes?" he rolled his eyes at Amaris.

"I only asked you one question, you asshole!"

"Try asking a smarter question," he said, walking away nonchalantly, again managing to irritate Amaris.

"Stop picking on each other like children," Hope warned them and Dante shrugged.

With Amaris tagging along, the three of them started talking in the hallway about the missions and how easy they were. They also found out where each other finished.

Dante finished in second place, while Hope finished in third. Amaris was fourth and Felix finished in seventh.

Since they had already guessed who finished first, they discussed who the others were. As they were making fun of Felix for being behind, Dante, Amaris and Felix heard Hope's surprised voice.

"Cale!"

The three of them looked at her bewildered face and turned toward where she was looking. What they saw was an eerie and horrible sight they had never seen before.

Cale was covered in blood from head to toe and was in such a terrible state that they wondered how he was still alive. When Cale's unconscious eyes slipped and fell to the ground, they shook off their astonishment and ran to him.

"Cale!"

As Dante shook Cale gently, trying to wake him up, Felix looked at his pulse, completely out of sleep and with a serious expression on his face.

The pulse he could barely feel made him press his lips together with worry.

"Don't stand like that, idiots. Let's get him on a bed," Amaris said, and when Amaris scolded them, Dante nodded without saying anything and lifted Cale onto his back with Felix's help.

They hurried back the way they had come and took him to Felix's room. Dante carefully laid Cale on the bed as Felix pulled the comforter aside from the messy mattress.

Felix entered the combination to the safe in his room and took out the vials of healing potions. As Dante took off Cale's shirt to get a better look at his wounds, Felix handed two of the vials to Amaris.

"You make him drink while I pour it on his wounds," Felix said, and Amaris nodded.

As Hope watched them anxiously from the back, she wondered what mission Cale was on that would cause him to become like this.

Amaris lifted Cale's head and put the red bottle in her hand to his mouth and emptied it. When the whole bottle had entered his mouth without any reaction from Cale, Amaris frowned, worried about the seriousness of his condition.

Felix and Dante poured it on the deep scars on Cale's stomach and chest. When they noticed the scars on his back, they poured it there too.

Hope went to the bathroom to clean the blood off Cale, filled a bowl with water and came back with some towels from the closet.

The two girls carefully cleaned Cale's wounds while Dante and Felix made room for them. There were too many wounds and too much blood. The more they cleaned, the more visible the wounds became. When they finished and stood up, the four of them looked at Cale, who lay motionless on the bed, his eyes closed.

"His wounds... why aren't they healing?" Hope asked worriedly.

"He's really not healing," Felix muttered with a frown.

"What did you make him drink?" angrily asked Amaris and Felix rolled his eyes.

"The stuff I gave him was of the highest quality!"

"It doesn't look like it!"

"Stop arguing, you idiots, and look at him!" said Dante as the two of them stopped arguing and looked back at Cale who was sleeping on the bed.

They let out a deep sigh of relief when they saw that he was recovering, albeit very slowly. Amaris rolled her eyes when Felix looked at her with a hint of a smile.

"How did he get like this?"

Hope's worried and curious question was the one on all their minds. The only thing that could have made him like this was his mission. And what kind of mission was it that brought him back covered in blood?

"Maybe the mission was really difficult," said Felix.

"Or maybe something unexpected happened during the mission," said Amaris, and different theories continued to swirl in their heads.

As the silence stretched on, they all knew that the person who could answer all their questions was lying seriously wounded.

"Shouldn't we notify Professor Hill and Professor Qarat?"

Dante considered Hope's question for a moment, then replied, his blue eyes remaining calm.

"Let's wait for now. Their wounds are healing, albeit late. Besides, we've already administered the treatment, there's nothing they can do."

With nothing else to do but wait, they all found a place to sit and waited for Cale to wake up.

After an hour or so in silence, lost in their own thoughts, they watched in startled silence as Cale got out of bed, gasping for breath.

When Cale groaned and clutched his head, Dante was the first to come to his side.

"Cale, can you hear me?" he asked, and Cale's vacant gray eyes flashed red for a moment before returning to their normal state.

Dante swallowed hard at the sudden and fleeting bloodlust he felt from him.

"Cale, are you okay?" His calm voice reached Cale's ear.

Cale blinked as his unfocused eyes turned to him. Then he frowned and asked him a question he hadn't expected.

"Black King, you know him, don't you?"

"What?"

Dante wondered how he knew that name, and Amaris frowned, remembering that she had heard it from Dante when they were in the dungeon together.

Felix and Hope wondered who the Black King was and why Cale had asked about him.

"How do you know that name?"

"You said it in the dungeon, remember?" Amaris asked, frowning.

Dante, remembering that time, didn't understand for a moment why Cale was asking him now.

"Wait..." he said, anger at the Black King rising in him. "Is he the reason you're like this?"

"I need to know what you know about him before they come to get me!"

"Who's coming to get you?" Hope asked curiously as there was a knock on the door.

All five of them looked to where the door was and Cale was the only one who wasn't nervous.

"They're here."