The Map Drawing class had ended, and the students left the hall chatting among themselves. But Ryan was not like them.
He was silent. Absent.
He walked beside Edan without uttering a single word. Edan noticed his silence, but he didn't ask. He knew Ryan well enough to know that when he closed himself off, there was no point in trying to open him.
Ryan said suddenly.
"I'm going to my room."
"Alright. See you at dinner."
Ryan separated from him and walked toward his dormitory. But he didn't go directly to his room. He wandered through the back corridors of the academy, where there were no students. He needed to be alone.
He stopped at a large window overlooking the night garden. The moon was almost full, and the stars twinkled in the clear sky. The scene was beautiful, but he saw none of it.
He was thinking about something he never wanted to think about.
The competition.
One year from now, a competition would be held between the there Academy and the Kavalon Imperial Academy. A major event, attended by high-ranking figures from both sides.
He had also heard that a member of the royal family of Kavalon might be among the attendees.
That empire. The same empire that had kidnapped him and tortured him when he was eight years old.
He closed his eyes, but the images did not disappear.
The fire. The burning skin. The screaming that no one heard. The hands that lifted him above the pit of flames. Then the fall.
He opened his eyes suddenly. He was breathing heavily, and his hands were trembling slightly.
"What if that person is the prince?"
That prince. Who ordered his torturer to continue. Who cast a cold glance at him. Who saw him for the last time as he fell into a pit of fire.
he remembered his voice. Cold. Confident. As if Ryan's life meant nothing. As if what was happening was just routine.
"If he sees me... will he remember me?"
Probably not. To the prince, Ryan had been just an ordinary child among hundreds. A tool he used and then discarded. Perhaps he forgot him after a week. After a day. After an hour.
But Ryan had not forgotten. He could not forget.
"And if he sees me... what will I do?"
Here the real headache began.
The angry part of him, the part that still felt the fire burning his skin, wanted one thing: revenge. He wanted the prince to feel the pain he had felt. He wanted to burn him alive as they had burned Ryan. He wanted to hear him scream and beg as Ryan had done.
He imagined it. He imagined the prince's face as he suffered. He imagined him crying for mercy. He smiled for a moment, but the smile disappeared quickly.
Because another part was whispering to him: You cannot.
Not because he was weak. Not because he was a coward. But because the price was far too high.
The prince was not an ordinary person. He was the son of the Kavalon Emperor, one of the most powerful men in the continent. If Ryan attacked him, even if he succeeded, what would happen next?
War would be declared. Or perhaps war wouldn't be declared. Perhaps his own kingdom would hand him over to avoid conflict. He would be executed. Worse than that: his entire family would be executed.
His father. His mother. Little Eri, his three old sisters. Everyone would pay the price.
"Is revenge worth all that?"
He answered immediately: No.
It wasn't worth it. No matter how great his anger, no matter how deep his pain, he could not risk his family's lives for a moment of revenge.
But...
"Will I be able to restrain myself if I see him standing before me?"
He didn't know the answer. And that was what frightened him.
Then he thought of something else. Something he had been trying to ignore for years.
He had heard that a peace treaty was signed between his country and the Kavalon Empire just weeks after his kidnapping.
Was it a coincidence?
He held his head. Thinking about all of this gave him a terrible headache. It pounded in his temples like a hammer on an anvil.
Was he kidnapped as part of a deal? As leverage against his sister?
He didn't know. And he never dared to find out the truth. He was afraid of the answer.
He sighed deeply. He looked out the window again, but the sky seemed dark to him now, even though the moon was still shining.
"Don't think about it now," he told himself. "You don't have any other choice. Just... don't think."
But he knew this thinking would not leave him easily. It was a ghost that had been haunting him for five years, and it wouldn't disappear just because he decided not to think about it.
He left the window and headed to his room. His steps were heavy, as if he were carrying a mountain on his shoulders.
Inside him, there was a silent struggle. Between the desire for revenge and the fear for his family. Between his hatred for Kavalon and his inability to do anything about it. Between what he wanted to do and what he had to do.
He entered his room and closed the door behind him. He lay down on the bed and covered his face with his hands. He closed his eyes, but the fire was still there. It was always there.
He didn't know what he would do if he stood face to face with that prince.
But he knew one thing:
The fire had not yet cooled in his body.
And it would never cool.