Chapter 465
He simply walked, moving away from the gates of the Star Academy, away from the firecrackers that no longer exploded, away from laughter that had turned into whispers of fear.
His steps were fast, hurried, like someone fleeing from a battlefield, yet behind that speed lay the same awareness as when he left the cafeteria.
That he was not running from enemies outside, but from the enemy within himself, from the anger that had nearly destroyed him, from the katana that had almost split that boy's face, from the darkness that had nearly taken control once again.
"If summarized, today has hardly given you a single moment of peace."
Between the pillars of the gate now lit by the dim glow of evening lights, Theo stood with his still-transparent body, still untouchable and unseen by ordinary beings.
The invisible veil that had covered him all this time functioned perfectly, reducing him to nothing more than a disturbance in the air that would not draw anyone's attention, even as the crowd still gathered around the gate, witnessing the brief clash between Ilux and the firecracker throwers.
He stood several meters away from Ilux, who was now beginning to leave the Academy, close enough to capture every small detail of her movements, yet far enough to avoid the risk of being noticed if Ilux were to suddenly glance back with unwarranted suspicion.
Ilux's steps sounded heavy despite the speed of her movement, hurried like someone who wanted to get as far away as possible from the scene, yet behind that speed lay something deeper, something only eyes trained for billions of years could perceive.
An invisible burden, unseen wounds, exhaustion that was not merely physical.
And Theo, from a distance, continued to follow, his steps unheard, his breath unfelt, his existence nothing more than a shadow fainter than ordinary shadows, faithfully following even without being asked, faithfully guarding even without acknowledgment.
Theo's right hand slowly slipped into the folds of his clothes, pulling out the small yellow book that had become an inseparable part of his existence.
Its worn cover caught the reddish glow of the evening light, reflecting a dim shimmer visible only to eyes sharp enough to notice such subtle detail.
With his other hand, he took out a pen from the same place, a simple pen filled with black ink that never ran out despite having written millions of words throughout his journey across layers of reality.
As he continued walking, his gaze still fixed on Ilux's retreating figure, Theo opened the last page he had written, the page that recorded the chaos in the cafeteria, the food and drinks clinging to Ilux's body, the anger that had nearly erupted but was restrained at the final second.
His fingers moved, the pen began to dance across the paper with the same rhythm as before, a steady rhythm, neither hurried nor hesitant, a rhythm born from the awareness that every word written would endure until the end of time.
Three fragments of sentences were inscribed on the page, no more, no less, yet their weight was enough to make the paper feel heavier than before.
The first fragment recorded the firecrackers exploding around Ilux the moment she crossed the gate, the arms raised to shield her face, the eyes tightly shut beneath a rain of bursts she never asked for.
The second fragment recorded the transformation of Ilux's arms into a katana and a sword, the slashes that cut every incoming firecracker before they could explode, the brief fight that nearly ended in tragedy when the katana blade almost split one of the throwers' faces.
The third fragment, the shortest yet the deepest in meaning, recorded Ilux's decision to restrain herself at the final second, the spit that replaced a strike that could have taken a life, the steps that then left the Academy without looking back despite the mocking whispers that still followed her.
Three fragments of sentences written in no more than a few seconds, yet containing the entire essence of what had just occurred at the gates of the Star Academy, all the suffering, all the struggle, all the decisions made at the threshold between becoming a victim or becoming a monster.
After the final word was written, after the black ink began to seep into the fibers of the paper with undeniable certainty, Theo slowly closed the small yellow book.
His movement was gentle, careful, like someone closing a chest containing the most precious treasure that must not be damaged even by the fiercest storm.
He tucked the book back into the folds of his clothes, right near his chest, the same place from which he had taken it moments earlier.
The pen followed, stored at the same side, resting beside the book that had never left his body since the moment he wrote the very first word on its first page.
"If I were out there right now, I wouldn't throw firecrackers like them. I would do something far simpler."
Fhoooh!
"A cosmic bomb."
Amid his continued steps, just as the small yellow book had been neatly stored away again within his clothes, another vibration suddenly spread from the depths of consciousness.
A vibration already familiar to Theo, one that signaled that Aldraya had awakened from her rest, that the ongoing synchronization process could not fully silence the voice that had become part of his existence.
The voice came for the third time since the synchronization process began, and this time there was a different tone in the way the words were arranged.
Not open resistance as in the first time, nor a heart-wrenching confession as in the second, but something closer to restrained anger, something born from witnessing injustice that continued to repeat without anyone stopping it.
Aldraya expressed that she was deeply irritated by the behavior of the firecracker throwers toward Ilux, that seeing those children explode firecrackers in the face of someone who did not even have the chance to defend herself stirred something within her in a way she could not fully control.
"As I expected, you've closed your eyes again. And this time, you've truly fallen asleep."
Theo's steps never stopped, even within his mind, after the surge of emotion so dense with the image of a cosmic bomb that Aldraya desired, silence once again crept in.
Not an awkward silence like when two people who have just argued fall quiet because they do not know what to say, but a silence born from the awareness that everything that needed to be said had already been said, that the explosive outburst of emotion had merely been an intermezzo within a far greater and more important process.
Aldraya's voice was no longer heard, no new vibration spread from the depths of consciousness, no more declarations, confessions, or desires needed to be voiced.
What remained was a calm silence, a silence that almost made Theo wonder whether Aldraya was truly there or merely an illusion born from exhaustion after a day spent observing the chaos that kept befalling Ilux.
To be continued…