"What the hell was the point of that entire epiphany?" Soren mumbled into his pillow.
The words came out muffled and pathetic, which somehow managed to make the feeling in his chest sharper rather than duller.
An hour ago, he had been walking out of the second-year arena with something in his head finally… aligned.
Not fixed, not magically healed, but placed into the right slot, like a gear clicking into place after months of grinding.
Like he could breathe without that old, poisonous flinch.
Like he could want something good and not immediately reach for the nearest punishment to balance it out.
And now?
Now he was face-down in the clubroom bed, cloak half-hanging off the side like he had been dragged here unconscious, boots kicked off somewhere near the doorway with all the grace of a corpse being discarded.
He let out a breath that barely counted as a sigh, then turned his head just enough so he wasn't actively suffocating himself.
"…Seriously," he muttered again, more to the mattress than to anyone else.
Soren stared at the pillow for a long second, then dragged his arm up and flopped it over his eyes.
He had, very briefly, imagined himself doing something dramatic.
Not out loud.
Not "hero speech" dramatic.
He wasn't suicidal.
But the mental image had been there anyway, stupid and clean and scripted, of marching straight after Yvette, catching up to her, saying the perfect thing at the perfect time, starting the process immediately as if life ran on cutscenes and clean transitions.
As if the world would give him a prompt and a dialogue wheel and a chance to undo the damage with one well-timed choice.
Then his body had reminded him it was filled with wet sand, and his brain had reminded him it was running on fumes.
The truth was simple: he was exhausted.
He had fought, bled, watched second-years fight until his head felt like it was full of gears grinding against each other, and somewhere in the middle of all that, he had dragged himself through a quiet internal shift that had taken months to build and only felt "sudden" because he had finally stopped pretending it wasn't happening.
And now his nervous system had apparently decided the correct follow-up to personal growth was…
…horizontal.
Soren let out a slow breath, rolled onto his back, and stared at the ceiling like it might offer him an apology.
The boards above him were dark, barely visible in the dimness, and his eyes kept trying to close on their own.
He fought it for a few seconds out of stubbornness, then gave up, because stubbornness didn't refill the tank.
"Okay, so, apparently, I'm a new man," he whispered.
His eyelids drooped, and he didn't bother forcing them open this time.
"…Tomorrow."
The word came out automatically.
Not as an excuse, not as the old avoidance with guilt wearing a rational mask, but as a practical acknowledgement that if he tried to do anything right now, he would either pass out in a hallway or say something so catastrophically wrong he would set his own progress on fire out of pure fatigue.
His head turned slightly, listening.
No footsteps.
No voices.
The clubroom bedroom door was closed, and the rest of the clubroom was silent beyond it.
The party mess had been cleaned days ago.
Even the air felt settled.
Soren stared upward a little longer, letting that earlier feeling float back up.
It was faint, like an ember under ash, but it was there.
That alignment.
Not excitement or motivation.
Not some sudden belief that he was invincible and healed and ready to "save the girl" in one dramatic sprint.
Just that quiet, stubborn knowing: when the moment came, he wouldn't freeze and hide behind guilt dressed up as reason.
But knowing didn't magically give him energy.
Knowing didn't make his limbs lighter.
Knowing didn't make sleep optional.
He lifted one hand and let it drop back down onto the blanket with a soft thump.
"Step one," he murmured, voice already slower, the edges of it rounding off as exhaustion tugged him under. "Save Yvette."
His eyes half-closed.
"Step zero… sleep."
He reached up, tugged the blanket higher, and then paused with his brow faintly furrowed, because his brain had apparently remembered one last thing it refused to let him ignore.
"…I didn't even eat dinner."
For half a heartbeat, nothing happened, and then, as if his stomach had been waiting for permission, it gave a quiet, offended growl.
Soren stared at the ceiling in betrayal.
"…Shut up," he told it, with absolutely no conviction.
The growl did not shut up.
His mouth opened, ready to argue with his own body, and then he stopped, because he didn't have the energy to win a fight against hunger.
Not tonight.
Not when his whole existence felt like it was stitched together with frayed thread and stubbornness.
He closed his eyes anyway.
He could solve hunger later.
He could solve plans later.
He could solve Yvette later.
Right now, the only thing he was capable of saving was his own consciousness from collapse.
His breathing slowed, the air in his lungs turning heavier with each exhale, and the last thing that crossed his mind, blurry and tired, wasn't strategy or guilt or routes or "what would the protagonist do."
It was just that plain, aching want again.
'Live.'
Then the room went quiet, and Soren fell asleep.
••✦ ♡ ✦•••
"President!"
The clubroom bedroom door slammed open so hard it hit the stopper with a loud thud, the sound snapping through the room like a slap.
Soren jolted upright so fast his spine complained, breath catching in his throat.
For a second his brain was still in that dead space between sleep and waking, where everything was threat-shaped and nothing made sense.
"The fuck?!" he rasped, hair sticking up, eyes half-open, heart already annoyed before it was awake.
Lev stood in the doorway like he owned it, grinning wide enough to be punched for free.
"President!" he repeated, volume still unreasonable. "I finished it!"
Soren blinked, once.
Twice.
The room swam into focus in slow pieces: dim lantern glow bleeding under the door, the wardrobe in the corner, his cloak was tangled around his legs, the long fabric bunched and twisted, and his pillow had an imprint where his face had been pressed into it.
He turned his head toward the window.
Pitch black.
A headache arrived like it had been waiting just outside the door, stepping in the moment Lev did.
Soren pressed his palm to his forehead and breathed in through his nose, because if he opened his mouth too fast, something violent would come out.
"Lev, do you know what time it is?" he asked, voice flat with warning.
"Couldn't give a shit," Lev replied instantly, like it was a proud stance. "You told me to report to you when it was done, didn't you?"
Soren stared at him in silence, the part of his brain that still believed in social contracts quietly dying.
For a brief, peaceful moment, he weighed whether murder was a valid option in his current situation.
A slow sigh escaped him.
"Alright," he said, wiping his eyes with the heel of his hand, blinking away grit. "Tell me what was so important you had to wake me up in the middle of the night."
Lev's grin sharpened, pleased with himself in the way only someone who had never been punched for their behaviour could be.
He walked in like he was doing Soren a favour and slammed a bottle onto the dresser beside the bed.
Glass clicked against wood.
Soren's eyes widened properly this time, fatigue peeling back just enough for alarm to get through.
"You finished—"
"That's what I said, isn't it, President?" Lev cut in, clearly enjoying the moment.
Annoyance spiked, sharp and immediate, and then hit a wall when Soren's brain remembered why this mattered.
That mattered more than his pride, more than sleep, more than the fact Lev was currently committing a felony against basic human decency.
Soren exhaled through his nose, slow and controlled.
"Excuse me for sleeping at a reasonable time."
"Oh, shut up. Stop bitching and pay attention."
"Why are you such an asshole?" Soren muttered, voice hoarse.
"Can't be assed," Lev said, and then, as if he hadn't just kicked Soren out of unconsciousness, he yawned dramatically, like he was the victim here. "Can I give my report now? I want to sleep soon."
Soren stared at him for a long second.
"…Fine," he said, the word scraping out. "Hurry up."
Lev hopped up onto the dresser like it was a chair and started talking like he was reading off a checklist he had written purely to irritate people.
"Well, as you said, I completed it. The Elixir of Growth is done. You wanted it by the day of the mock duels, right? So technically, I made it."
Soren narrowed his eyes, jaw tightening.
"Lev. When people say 'by the day of,' they usually mean before the day of."
"Whatever. It's done. That's what matters."
Lev waved it off like deadlines were an aesthetic choice.
Soren clenched his teeth.
"Continue."
Lev tapped the bottle with two fingers, and something about the casual motion made Soren tense.
"There's only one."
Soren went still.
For a beat, his brain didn't process it, because it refused to believe it.
Then the words caught up properly and slammed into place.
"…What do you mean only one?"
His voice rose despite himself, irritation flaring hot and immediate.
"I gave you enough materials for three. What the fuck did you do?"
"If you'd let me finish, I'd explain," Lev said, tone lazy, as if Soren was the one being dramatic. "The first batch was a mess. I tried messing with the longevity, then the effectiveness. Neither worked. The rat I tested it on dropped dead within a minute."
Something sour rolled through Soren's stomach, a flash of image and implication he didn't want.
He swallowed it down, because interrupting Lev would just make this take longer, and the longer Lev stayed in this room, the higher the chance Soren snapped and did something he would regret.
Lev continued, unbothered.
"After that, I stopped trying for a bit. Things weren't making sense, so I started messing around with the materials instead. Stress relief."
Soren's eye twitched.
"Stress relief."
"Yeah. And your materials were too good," Lev said, like that explained everything. "I ended up making a bunch of other potions just to see what they'd do. Used more than I meant to. So when I finally went back to the Elixir of Growth, I only had enough left for one."
Soren stared at him, expression dead enough to qualify as a corpse.
Inside his head, something screamed.
'Why did I contract this guy?'
Out loud, he forced his throat to cooperate.
"So you wasted two elixirs' worth of ingredients because you felt like doing side quests."
Lev's grin returned, bright and obnoxious.
"Don't worry, I put them to good use."
"Fantastic. Truly comforting," Soren said, voice dripping sarcasm so thick it could've been bottled and sold.
Lev ignored him, because of course he did.
"So yeah," he finished, tapping the bottle again, "only one. But it works. All's well that ends well."
Soren didn't even pretend to humour him, just held Lev's gaze until Lev finally clicked his tongue, irritation flickering over his features like he had expected applause and was offended he didn't get it.
"Ah. One more thing," Lev added, eyes gleaming like he was about to make it worse on purpose. "I improved it."
Soren's suspicion landed immediately, sharp and heavy.
"How exactly?"
Lev held up a finger, enjoying himself.
"First, the original duration was a year and a half, right? Now it's six months."
Soren sat up straighter, fatigue sharpening into disbelief.
"How the hell is that an improvement?"
"Hold on, President, I'm not finished," Lev said with exaggerated patience. "I doubled the effectiveness. And I added an ingredient that increases your vitality."
Then he made a crude, very unnecessary hand gesture to illustrate his point.
Soren stared at him for a long second, too tired to even be properly offended, because being offended required energy and Lev had stolen most of it.
Anger did something strange then, looping back around into calm, the kind of calm that preceded decisions.
"If that's all, you can expect to never be commissioned again."
Lev leaned forward like Soren was the unreasonable one.
"Now, now. Your expectations are too low."
"Then explain," Soren said, voice quiet and dangerous, "before I make it so you never have to worry about 'vitality' again."
"Ooo, scary," Lev drawled.
Then his expression shifted.
Not softer, but sharper, like he had decided to stop playing for two minutes and speak like an actual professional instead of a pest.
"Fine. I'll be serious."
He gestured at the bottle.
"The vitality isn't just for… that," Lev said, tone flat with disdain at his own earlier joke. "It's general. More stamina day-to-day, less exhaustion, better recovery. With the stupid shit you do in fights, that last part matters."
Soren's brow tightened.
That part at least sounded believable.
"And the tradeoff, six months instead of eighteen, is worth it because the original recipe was dogshit."
Soren blinked once, slow.
"What?"
"It was made for self-destruction," Lev said bluntly. "If you drink the original and keep using it, it slowly poisons you from the inside. By the time it wears off, you don't just 'lose the buff.' You drop dead."
Soren's body went cold in a way exhaustion couldn't explain, a chill that slid under his skin and wrapped around his ribs.
His pulse thudded slow and heavy, like it wanted to crawl out of his chest and leave.
Lev's voice stayed level, almost casual, which somehow made it worse.
"I don't know who gave you that recipe," Lev added, "but if you want my advice? Kill them. They were trying to get rid of you."
Silence settled for a beat, thick enough to choke on.
Then Lev hopped down off the dresser like he hadn't just dropped something monstrous into Soren's lap, stretched like a cat, and waved.
"Right," he said brightly. "I'm going back to sleep. Sweet dreams."
"Lev—" Soren started, because there were about twenty questions fighting for space in his throat.
But Lev was already leaving, and of course he slammed the door on the way out.
The room fell quiet again, except for Soren's breathing and the slow, insistent thud of his pulse.
He stared at the bottle.
"It was poisonous?" he muttered, the words tasting wrong.
It didn't make sense.
He hadn't gotten the recipe from a person.
He had gotten it from the game.
From the in-game crafting system that had always presented itself as clean and correct and reliable, with neat descriptions and tidy numbers and the kind of certainty that didn't leave room for "this will kill you slowly if you keep using it."
So why would it be—
'Was he lying?'
The thought tried to take root, and Soren didn't let it.
Lev was an unbearable bastard with a mouth like a weapon, but he was talented.
Talented enough that Soren had felt genuine relief when he managed to lock him down as an exclusive alchemist.
Lev didn't gain anything by telling him this, not unless the goal was to scare him for fun, and even Lev's particular brand of cruelty tended to have a motive.
If Lev said the recipe was poison, then it was poison.
Which meant something else too, something Soren didn't want to stare at for too long in the dark while his body still trembled with leftover sleep.
Potentially, every recipe he "knew" was untrustworthy.
The thought was a pit opening beneath his feet, wide and hungry, filled with all the quiet assumptions he had built his survival on.
But the pit could wait.
Right now, there was a bottle in front of him, made by someone who had just proven, crudely, obnoxiously, but undeniably, that he understood what he was doing.
Lev had proven he could be trusted.
And so Soren would trust him.
…Even if his personality was a crime.
Soren swung his legs off the bed, stood, and walked to the dresser.
His cloak dragged around his calves, the long fabric catching and shifting as he moved, and the cold floor bit at his bare feet.
He picked up the bottle, fingers tightening around the glass, uncorked it, and downed the elixir in a single gulp before his brain could start arguing.
.
▶ Item [Elixir of Growth (Improved)] Consumed! ◀
[Elixir of Growth (Improved)]
[Boosts growth of stats and skills by 200% for 6 months. Stamina +0.5. Health regeneration increased by 100%]
An elixir made by Lev, a talented human alchemist. He poured blood, sweat and tears into its creation so that the consumer would be healthy.
.
The translucent window hovered in front of him, familiar in shape and feel, but the last line snagged his attention like a hook under the ribs.
Soren stared at it longer than the rest.
The words felt… strange.
Hard to believe.
'Did Lev really put that much effort into it?' he thought, eyes narrowing slightly.
They had only known each other for around a month.
They barely interacted outside of transactions and insults, and most of those insults were thrown like knives.
It was difficult to imagine someone caring about him that quickly, especially someone like Lev, who treated sincerity like a contagious disease.
His mind tried to find a shape that made sense, because his brain hated loose ends.
'Maybe it's just repayment.'
That was the easiest answer, the one that didn't demand anything emotional from him.
Soren had become Lev's sponsor, and in return Lev could finally research the cure he had been chasing his whole life.
To Lev, Soren probably looked like a saviour, a wealthy idiot with coin to burn and a contract to sign.
The thought left a bitter taste in Soren's mouth.
Because he hadn't actually done anything yet.
All he had done was throw money at a problem and call it help.
Soren swallowed, eyes still on the window until it faded, leaving the dim room behind it unchanged.
'I'll need to figure something out, I guess…'
————「❤︎」————