The session ended, Lyra closed her book. "It's getting late. You should head back to your room now."
Code stood and turned to leave.
"Thank you… for the tea," she said suddenly.
Code glanced back. "It's my pleasure."
Then he stepped out into the night.
---
At the Locker Room
Code had changed back into his academy uniform. He shut his locker and stepped out into the open air.
Outside, the campus shimmered under the silver moonlight. The lamps hummed softly, lining the empty streets like quiet sentinels.
A sound caught his attention. A shadow flickered behind him.
He stopped walking. "You're really bad at stalking, you know that?"
The bushes rustled. Code turned.
The figure stepped out, light spilling over her face. Ivy.
"Code's expression didn't change. Calm. Lifeless. But his gaze—sharpet than steel—didn't leave her face".
"Stalker?" Ivy repeated sweetly. "I don't know what you mean. I was just passing by—it must be a coincidence. I'll be on my way now." She brushed past him lightly.
"For how long..." Code's time dipped, quiet but cutting ." Do you plan to keep hiding behind the name Crimson Petal ?"
A gust of wind stirred. In a blur of motion, Ivy was on his back, legs wrapped around his waist. A knife pressed cold against the side of his neck.
She smiled, her breath warm against his ear. "Cute… I can't sense any fear."
Slowly, she slid the blade away and dropped down from him, dusting her skirt as though nothing had happened.
"So, Code," she asked with a smirk, tilting her head, "how did you know it was me? For all you know, it could've been anyone else."
Code's gaze sharpened. "It wasn't hard. From the beginning, you made one mistake."
Her smile widened. "Oh? Enlighten me."
"When I was in the locker room," Code began, "I got a message from Crimson Petal saying I looked good in my uniform. Then Caden said the exact same words to me right after."
"Then that makes him Crimson Petal, doesn't it?" Ivy teased.
"No. It was coincidence more than suspicion. I asked him where he'd heard it, and he told me Meira had complimented him with those same words earlier."
Code's tone stayed flat, but his explanation cut sharp.
"Caden didn't say those words because he thought of them himself. His brain just repeated what it had already heard. When Meira told him, 'you look good in your uniform,' the phrase stuck in his memory without him realizing. So later, when he saw me in the same uniform and felt pressure to say something, his mind didn't create new words. Stress blocked his ability to think of anything original, so his brain just pulled out the last compliment it had stored.
That's how the human brain works. When we're caught off guard, the hippocampus—our memory center—hands us whatever's been primed most recently. It's the same reason why, during an exam, if you blank out, sometimes you just write the exact line the teacher drilled into your head, word for word, without even thinking.
So no—Caden wasn't lying. His brain just echoed what it already had in storage. Automatic recall. Nothing more."
Ivy tilted her head, smiling. "Which means you ruled out Caden as Crimson Petal."
"Yes," Code said. "That brought me to Meira. She complimented Caden, which made him say those words to me. That could've meant she was Crimson Petal. But she couldn't be. Meira wasn't there when I changed into my uniform. Only the boys were in the locker room. Which means Crimson Petal was already watching me from inside the room."
His voice dropped lower. "When I called the number, Meira's phone rang—but the call disconnected instantly. If she had truly been the one texting me, the call would've gone through properly. I'd have seen her number, and she'd have seen mine. But it didn't. The signal was being rerouted. Someone set it up so that when I called, her phone would ring . That means she was being framed."
Ivy tilted her head. "Why not her? You saw her phone ring."
"The instant disconnection," Code said flatly. "Normal calls ring until picked up, ignored, or timed out. Only a reroute drops instantly. That told me someone was interfering."
Her smile twitched.
"Then came the second message," Code continued. "'Tea or coffee?' That gave the culprit away."
"How so?" Ivy asked, though her emerald eyes narrowed faintly.
"I received that message while in my master's room. No one enters that room without her permission, and I know Crimson Petal couldn't have planted cameras in there. Which meant the camera wasn't in the room…"
Reaching into his uniform, Code pulled out a tiny device and held it up between two fingers. "This. Planted in my clothes."
Ivy's eyes lingered on the device, but she said nothing.
"The only chance you had to plant this was in the locker room," Code pressed on. "When Caden called me away, saying he saw a shadow. There was nothing there. That distraction gave you the time you needed. Later, you even had Meira bump into me, just to make me think she might've slipped it on me herself."
His eyes bore into hers. "You staged everything. You told Meira to compliment Caden, knowing he'd repeat it to me. You rerouted the call to make her look guilty. You orchestrated the bump to seal the suspicion, so even if I found the device, my mind would go straight to her as the one who planted it.
Every piece was arranged to mislead me. Isn't that right, Ivy?"
Silence hung. Then Ivy's lips curved upward.
"You really are the only one I can't deceive, Code."
He didn't respond.
Her smirk softened into something strange—her cheeks flushed, and she placed her hands on both sides of her face. A shiver of excitement danced in her eyes.
"Since you know everything… then you must also know this." She leaned closer, smiling creepily.
"I love you.
Her smile stretched, almost creepy, as she giggled. "Will you accept my love, Code?"