Alex POV
"...Should I have just trained instead?"
Alex let the words fall out quietly, more to himself than anyone else.
He stared at the private room like it was a battlefield after the dust had settled, bodies everywhere, bottles everywhere, and not a single person left with enough dignity to sit up straight.
He glanced around again and exhaled through his nose.
Everyone was completely out.
It hadn't even been that long since they started drinking, and yet…
Chaos.
'What do I even do…?'
Normally, Alex would have done the sensible thing.
Slip away.
Go back to the dorms.
Return to routine.
Training, shower, sleep.
Pretend this never happened.
But that wasn't possible with his current predicament.
"Hehe… Alex…"
A warm weight shifted on his lap.
Olivia mumbled his name in her sleep, her arms loosely wrapped around him as if he were a pillow she had claimed without thinking.
Her face was relaxed, lashes resting softly on her cheeks.
She looked completely safe.
Alex's hand hovered for half a second.
If it had been anyone else, he would have shoved them off without hesitation.
He didn't like being restrained, even by accident.
He didn't like being used as furniture.
But this was Olivia.
And Olivia wasn't someone he could treat roughly, even when she was unconscious and drooling faintly onto his shirt.
"Tch…"
Instead of moving her, Alex patted her back gently.
It was awkward.
He wasn't good at gentle.
But his hand still moved in slow, steady strokes until her breathing evened out again.
Then his gaze drifted over the nearby wreckage.
Esper and Felix were face down on the table, mugs and glasses strewn around them like evidence of a crime.
Felix's hand was still loosely gripping a bottle by the neck, as if he had tried to take it with him into the afterlife.
Esper's hair was a mess, and she had somehow managed to fall asleep with a grin still on her face, like she was proud of what she had done.
'Then there's those three…'
Alex's eyes slid toward the floor.
"Ren…"
"Grrrrr…"
"Heh."
Soren had ended up flat on the ground in a way that looked painful even without a hangover.
His white hair fanned out messily, mouth slightly open, dead to the world.
Lilliana was curled against Soren's chest, using him like a pillow.
Her expression was oddly peaceful until Soren shifted, and then her brows knit as if she was annoyed her bed dared to move.
And Amelia…
Amelia was sprawled across Soren's lap, limbs heavy, breathing slow.
Every time Soren's body twitched, she growled in her sleep like a territorial beast.
Alex's eyes narrowed slightly.
"Seriously… what a mess."
He rubbed his forehead, pinching the bridge of his nose.
Being the last one standing meant only one thing.
Babysitting duty.
Alex lifted his mug and drained it, the liquid burning down his throat.
Flicker.
As the alcohol flowed through his system, his eyes shone gold for a moment.
The tipsy haze vanished instantly, as if it had never been there.
Alex blinked once, the sudden clarity almost jarring.
'Why's alcohol even considered poison…'
Thanks to his [Divinity], anything classified as poison that entered his body would be instantly dissolved, broken down into nothing.
It was a blessing.
And a curse.
He couldn't get drunk even if he wanted to.
Not properly.
Not in a way that let him forget, or loosen, or stop thinking for five minutes.
He could drink until his stomach hurt and still wake up feeling exactly the same.
Sometimes, he wondered what it was like for everyone else, to be able to switch their brain off with something as simple as a bottle.
Ting-♪
A sharp chime rang out.
Alex turned his head.
A translucent golden window hovered in the air.
It was similar to Soren's system windows, but the colour was different, warmer, richer, unmistakably divine.
Words appeared.
.
[I'm sorry (╥﹏╥)]
[I forgot how much humans enjoy alcohol…]
.
Alex huffed a quiet laugh, shoulders loosening slightly.
'A god apologising to a human… who would believe it if I told them?'
The identity behind the golden window was none other than Goddess Aryn, the goddess of time, his patron, his burden, and the one who had granted him [Divinity].
The fact that she communicated with a single human at all would send shockwaves through Ivansia if it ever became public.
Nobles would tear the kingdom apart for the chance to earn even a fraction of what Alex had been given.
Which was exactly why he had never told anyone.
Not Olivia.
Not even the people he trusted most.
He had kept it secret since the day he awakened at fifteen, when the first golden window had appeared, and his life had quietly stopped being his own.
.
[Are you having fun?]
.
Alex's gaze swept the room again.
Olivia curled on his lap.
Esper and Felix face down.
Soren sprawled on the floor with two girls using him like a nest.
He inhaled slowly.
"I don't know…" he admitted. "Feels like I should've just trained instead."
.
[Too much training is bad for you •`_´•]
.
A faint smile tugged at the corner of his mouth despite himself.
"I know, I just… can't help it," he said quietly, thumb tracing the rim of his cup.
.
[There is plenty of time.]
.
Alex's eyes drifted toward the white-haired boy snoring on the floor.
Soren Arden.
The boy who seemed to stumble into chaos and survive it through sheer stubbornness.
The boy who was somehow surrounded by people far stronger than him, princesses, heirs, heroes, and yet still stood at the centre of them.
Alex's jaw tightened.
"...I need to get stronger."
.
[You can rely on my ability. You carry too much alone.]
.
Alex fell silent.
The warmth in her words brushed against him like a mother's embrace, soft, protective, patient.
It should have comforted him.
Instead, it tightened something in his chest, a knot he couldn't untangle.
'I don't want to…'
He didn't want to rely on her.
He didn't want borrowed strength.
Every time he used [Divinity], it left a bitter taste behind, like he had cheated.
Like the victory didn't belong to him.
He swallowed and whispered under his breath.
"「Quests」"
.
▶ Main Quest: Act 1 ◀
[Details: Successfully complete the final exam of the first semester.]
[Difficulty: B+]
[Penalty: Death.]
.
Alex's gaze sharpened.
'There's less than two weeks left…'
Even now, the quest window sat there like a blade pressed to his throat.
The penalty wasn't failure.
It wasn't injury.
It wasn't humiliation.
It was death.
And Alex didn't have the luxury of pretending he could relax.
.
[I told you, you will be fine.]
[Look at those around you.]
[They're strong.]
[All except that girlish boy.]
.
Alex's mouth twitched.
'That girlish boy…'
He had nearly lost to that "girlish boy."
And that was the part that still bothered him the most.
'I almost lost to him, so what does that make me…?'
"Aria…" Soren mumbled in his sleep, and the name dragged Alex's thoughts back to earlier that night.
To the awkward weight that had settled over the room when Soren had spilt his heart out.
They weren't close.
Far from it.
Their only real interaction had been that duel, and Soren's hostility at the end had been sharp enough that Alex still remembered it clearly.
So why had Soren invited him?
According to Olivia, Soren had been avoiding her ever since.
Avoiding them.
And yet tonight, Soren had asked Olivia to come out, and by extension, Alex.
He didn't understand it.
'He's strange.'
Even when Soren clearly wanted to keep distance, he still reached out.
Even when Soren didn't like Alex, he still included him.
It didn't fit.
.
[What are you thinking about?]
.
Alex's eyes stayed on Soren.
"How strange 'that girlish boy' is…"
.
[He is strange…]
[So very weak, and yet surrounded by the strong.]
[It doesn't add up.]
[It's different from my calculations.]
.
'Strange enough to interest a god, huh?'
He grabbed another bottle and tipped it back, finishing it in one go.
The taste was meaningless.
The effect was nothing.
Still, the act itself felt… human.
Normal, in a way his life rarely was.
Then Alex's hand moved without thought, stroking Olivia's hair gently.
Her breathing stayed steady.
She didn't wake.
For a brief moment, the room felt quieter.
Safer.
Sleep tugged at Alex's eyes, not from alcohol, but from exhaustion.
The kind that training didn't fix.
The golden window flickered once more.
.
[Rest well, my child.]
.
Alex's eyelids lowered.
"...Yeah," he murmured, so quietly even he barely heard it.
And then he let the darkness take him too.
————「❤︎」————