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"HOW HAVE YOU BEEN...Lev?" Kim Hee-joon asks, almost making the vice president start crying as soon as he hears the voice of the man sitting in front of him.

     Lev swallows the lump in his throat and tries his best not to break down. "Brain tumor," he answers instead, and that alone instantly made Joon look away from him. The room falls silent as the rest of the members of PHD try their best not to look too shocked to hear about what the white uniform has to say. The worst thing they can do now is look at him with pity when he's obviously trying his best with the condition he's in.

     "All of you. Leave," Joon then commands.

     "No," Uchdryd quickly retaliates, but Levi turns to him and grabs his hand to squeeze it, reassuring him that he'll be safe alone with PHD's leader.

     Ren, Killshot, and Blade started walking out of the room first with no question, while Uchdryd looked back at Levi again. "I'll wait for you outside," Uchdryd tells him before finally following the others.

     As soon as the door closes behind him, Levi takes a step forward so he can have a better look at the leader, but Joon quickly stops him.

     "Don't," he says. "Don't come any closer."

     "Why?" Levi asks back, but Joon decides not to answer him.

     "How's your king?" Levi asks instead, the question startling Joon because he never thought the vice president would even mention him.

     "You're here to be questioned. Not the other way around," Joon coldly answers this time, making Levi sigh in disappointment.

     "We haven't spoken to each other for two years, and this is how you treat me? This is how you treat an old friend?" Levi asks, obviously annoyed, but Joon continues to show him a cold expression that he usually shows to everyone else. Even Levi wasn't an exception to the ice prince.

     "Old friends? We were not friends. If you thought I cared about you for a second, you're wrong. Do not embarrass yourself here," Joon answers, making Levi chuckle.

     "What did I even expect from you? You're the one who abandoned me for a selfish man like Viktor. I should have known you'd act like this despite everything we've been through together," Levi truthfully tells him, making Joon clench his fist and grit his teeth to hide what he truly feels about the white uniform.

     The room falls silent again. Hee-joon wanted to change the subject so he could proceed with the very reason why the vice was even called here in the first place. He didn't call Levi because he wanted to talk about the past or about them.

     "Enough with this nonsense. I called you here because—" But because Joon could even finish his sentence, Levi suddenly touched his temple and lost his balance. Without even thinking about it, Joon immediately stood from his seat and ran to Levi to hold onto him tightly. "Are you alright? Does your head hurt?" Joon asks, looking at the vice president with worry in his face.

     Levi doesn't say anything for a while, but then he starts laughing, making Joon furrow his brows in confusion.

     "I thought you didn't care about me?" Levi asks, and Joon immediately lets go of him in furry.

     "Do you think this is funny?"

     "No, I don't. But do you know what's really funny? The person who I consider a brother now ignores me and treats me like some loyal subject he can just call into his castle to demand things from him. Why, my lord? Do I not please you enough?" Levi sarcastically asks, and Joon immediately grabs him by the wrist, squeezing it tight as he looks straight at Levi with anger burning in his eyes.

     "You still mock me because I decided to be Viktor's prince?"

     "You became the very thing we wanted to destroy. You became a filthy royal just like them, and here I thought you could be better than that," Levi fired back, and Joon squeezed Levi's wrist even tighter, his anger reaching its highest point.

     "Do not compare me to those bastards. I am nothing like them!" Joon suddenly shouts right in front of Levi's face, surprising the vice president. But as soon as he realized what he had done, he finally let go of the vice president's wrist and turned away from him.

     "I was not like them," Joon whispers under his breath as he walks back to his seat.

     Levi touches his aching wrist before taking a deep breath to calm himself. This wasn't his intention. He shouldn't have provoked Joon like that. Both of them had to make sacrifices to protect the people they loved. He shouldn't have questioned him like that.

      "I'm sorry," Levi finally says. "I know you weren't like them. Your brotherhood custom alone proved that. I just...I just felt—"

      "It's okay," Joon quickly cuts off so Levi doesn't have to explain his side. "I also apologize for screaming at you like that. I lost my temper."

     "You always lost your temper back then. You were extremely hot-headed, and that's why I was surprised when they started calling you Ice Prince. You really have changed a lot," Levi says with a chuckle, and a sad smile appears on Joon's face. But after a while, he immediately went back to his usual blank expression as he turned to look at the vice president again.

      "Whatever happens in the past stays in the past," Joon then says. "I called you here to talk about the present. I called you because of a certain white uniform who finally arrived at your house."

      "It's Maximilian Leigh Sinclaire, correct?"

     "That's right," Hee-joon says, and the vice president takes a deep breath and adjusts his glasses, looking back at the brotherhood leader with a serious expression. He was now standing in front of him as a council member and not as his old friend.

      "What about him?"

     "Sinclaire was also invited to the banquet," Joon then reveals, surprising Levi. "And unlike you, he was able to accomplish all of his tasks with little to no worry."

     "The task you gave me was impossible to solve," Levi immediately defends, making Joon scoff at him.

     "Impossible? It wasn't impossible, Vice President Dubois. You just didn't want to do it, and that's the reason why you failed," Joon fires back, and Levi doesn't say anything against it anymore.

      "Now, the reason why I called you here is because I need your help with something that only a vice president can do," Joon says, making Levi furrow his brows in confusion.

     "Help? It's rare for you to ask for help."

     "Beggars can't be choosers," Joon answers. "And besides, I don't have much time. If you don't know it yet, vice president, I'm not staying here for long. I am a prince of J.S High, and I have no business here in the House of Bishops. The sooner I leave, the better."

      Levi takes another deep breath and adjusts his glasses again. After thinking about it for a while, he looks back at Joon and tells him, "Alright then. What can I do for you, Lord of Gluttony?"

...

The bell rings, and everyone steps out of their room so they can eat breakfast at the cafeteria. Max was already awake and reading the student handbook when Keigo sat up from his bed with his eyes still closed and his hair a complete mess.

     "It's morning already?" Keigo complained.

     Max looks away from his handbook and gives his friend a smile. "Good morning, Keigo," he greets him.

     Keigo immediately opened his eyes, and then his cheeks suddenly turned red when he realized that he had just gone to sleep in the same room as Max. Even though Keigo doesn't want to admit it, he still has a tiny secret crush on Max. Unfortunately for him, Felix and the others are still aware of it, too, because Keigo isn't really discrete himself.

     "G-Good morning," Keigo greets back as he slowly gets down from his bed. "Where's the others?" he asks.

     "Xander went to the bathroom just a couple of minutes ago, while Vesper Cinna has been missing since last night. Does he even sleep? I wonder," Max then comments since no one has seen Vesper since their encounter in the hallway yesterday.

     While Keigo was brushing his hair, Xander finally got back, wearing his glasses, retainers, pimple patches, and a messy bun like the first time Max saw him yesterday.

     "Morning, guys."

     "Morning," Max and Keigo answer in unison.

     "Yesterday was way too crazy for me," Xander says as he walks in front of a mirror so he can pluck the excess hair in his eyebrows. "I'm starting to get worried about the other things that might happen to us in the future."

      "You don't even know half of it," Keigo replies, making Max chuckle." 

     "Anyway, you ready to eat breakfast? I'm freakin' starving right now after all the drama that happened to us," Xander then says.

     Max slowly closes the handbook and stands from his seat before looking at his roommates with a bright smile on his face. "I'm ready. I'm actually going to talk to the serfs again about the points we need to acquire this week. Fifty thousand points isn't going to be easy," Max says, and Xander and Keigo immediately look at each other before looking back at Max with worry.

     "Max, I don't want to burst your bubble, but you already have an injury on your very first day here. Maybe we can talk to the serfs some other time. Who knows what they'll do to you again," Keigo warns, but Max just brushes him off, confident that whatever happened last time won't happen again.

     "I have a good feeling that it's going to be different. Trust me. I have a plan," Max insists, and his two roommates finally give up and just let Max be. One thing everyone needs to know about Max is that when he decides on something, no one else will be able to persuade him to go against it.

     "Then let's go," Max says with a smile as he heads out of their room first. Xander and Keigo couldn't help but feel nervous for him, but they swallowed the unnerving feeling down and went out to follow the heir.

     The three of them arrived at their dorm's cafeteria, and like yesterday, the place was dirtier than a restroom, the food was still terrible, and the students looked like literal zombies. Everyone was talking amongst each other, not caring about the environment that they were eating in at all. But as soon as Max went inside with Xander and Keigo, the serfs instantly became quiet.

     "This is it," Keigo whispers under his breath.

     Keigo was worried because he thought the serfs would ambush him after Max encouraged them to put red paint on the other students during the morning assembly at the atrium. Like their classmates yesterday, they were definitely punished because of it, and Keigo thought they'd blame Max for what happened.

      But when Max got inside the cafeteria, Keigo and Xander were left speechless when the students started clapping and whistling for him. For a quick second, the zombie-like students looked alive.

     "Look who it is! It's Max!"

     "You showed them!"

     "Putting red paint on those bastards felt fucking amazing!"

      "You actually got guts!"

     Everyone was shouting words of encouragement to Max that even Max was left speechless. This wasn't the reaction he was expecting from any of them, but he will definitely take it.

      "Everyone saw your video," someone then says, and the three serfs turn their heads to see Stefan Kross, their classmate whom Max also saved from Sister Celeste's punishment yesterday, walking towards them with a smile.

     "I doubted you for a second and got mad when you made a decision on our behalf. I thought you were all talk and that you overestimated yourself because of the things you achieved in J.S High, but I was wrong. When I saw you take thirty hits for us and didn't even bat an eye, I was in awe. You did a foolish thing, and to be honest, what you did might not even be worth it. But I now realize why J.S High trusted you so much. So this time, let us trust you too," Stefan says, and everyone in the cafeteria nods their heads in agreement.

     "What can we do?" Another serf finally asks.

     Max takes a deep breath and looks down at his wounded hands again. Stefan says that his selfless act might not have been worth it, but if it was enough to persuade the serfs to start helping themselves, then it was definitely worth it in the end.

     "Thank you," Max says as he looks at the serfs, who now have hope in their eyes. He then took a deep breath and suddenly touched his chest before giving a deep bow, surprising everyone there. "Thank you," he says again.

     Keigo sighs in relief while Xander chuckles, glad that everything worked out in the end.

     "Alright, we only have one week before the Tax Collectors come back, so for the next six days, we're gonna milk this place dry until our division achieves 50,000 merit points," Max says as he walks towards a table and stands on top of it so everyone can see him.

     "Compared to the merit system in J.S High, the bracket for ranking is different here, which is why there are more serfs and dwellers than gaffers." Max begins. "I saw your data, and there's a total of 260 serfs in our division. If we can manage to individually get at least 200 points, we can make the cut," Max explains.

     "200 points is still difficult for us," someone voices out, and Max nods his head to agree to it.

     "You're right, 200 is a lot. But there's something you all have to remember," Max tells everyone who is eagerly listening to him. "There is a big misconception that you have to do big things to earn big amounts, but that's not always the case. If you read the handbook, it explains that students can earn points by doing the simplest tasks like volunteering to clean the campus during weekends, assisting professors, and even helping other clubs. These small tasks can only give ten to twenty points max, but if we do it continuously, we'll definitely get the number of points we need."

     The serfs started to talk amongst each other as soon as Max told them about the tasks. No one really knew about it because most students wouldn't want to waste their time cleaning only to get 10 points. But Max is right. These small tasks can make a huge difference.

     "Now, as I said before, I'm not here to act as a hero and save you all. So, for this to work...what do you guys actually want to do? What's your overall game plan?" Max suddenly asks, and that question honestly surprises the serfs because no one has ever asked them what they want.

     "What do you think we should do?" Max asks again, and everyone becomes completely silent.

     Keigo and Xander looked around and waited for someone to say something. For a second, the two of them thought that the serfs might have expected Max to do all the work for them and that they would just take advantage of the situation, but thankfully, amidst the silence, Stefan raised his hand to say something.

     "I have a suggestion," he says, instantly making everyone turn to look at him. "It seems like the stars aligned for us because March is ending next week. And at the end of the month, there's always a dorm inspection. The cleanest dorm earns 2000 points, which will be equally divided among each student in their division. It might not be enough for our 50,000 merit goal, and we never really cared about that, but I think this is the perfect time that we did."

     "That's a good idea," Max says with a bright smile. "What else?"

     "We're members of Omega Society. We can ask around if other clubs need help in cleaning," another serf suggests.

     "I think the professors will be sorting their monthly files this week. We can help with that, too."

     "Oh! The Garden of Eden needs cleaning! We should volunteer and take that up as well."

     Everyone started shouting suggestions left and right, making Max smile as he looked at Keigo and Xander, who gave him a thumbs up. And since the serfs were now fired up, Stefan helped and started listing everything down so they wouldn't miss anything. This was just the beginning, but Max could already feel the impact of what this could do to them.

     "Alright Serfs Division! It's time we paint this town red!"

     "Yeah!"

     But while everyone was working on a plan, they weren't able to notice the man who was standing right outside the cafeteria, leaning against the door with his arms crossed.

     "Looks like things are starting to get exciting," Vesper Cinna, a fourth-year serf, says with a smirk before finally moving away from the door and walking out of the dorm.

     Vesper leaves Hell's Sanctum so he can go back to his secret spot, but when he steps out, he's surprised to see a black uniform waiting for him there. It was none other than Uchdryd Rease of Rank 7 brotherhood, Checkmate.

     "Oh, Lord Uchdryd, how may I assist you?" Vesper sarcastically asks, and Uchdryd walks towards him with his hands inside his pocket, looking back at the serf with an intimidating expression that would have definitely scared anyone other than Vesper.

     "Stop with the formalities. You're making the hair on my skin crawl," Uchdryd suddenly says, making Vesper chuckle in response.

     "You really have grown a lot Uchdryd. Back then, when you were still a freshman in J.S High, you were just a little white uniform following Checkmate around. Now, you've become their leader. Isn't that amazing?" Vesper asks as he looks straight into Uchdryd's eyes with a menacing grin. "But how does it feel that the brotherhood who was once the prince is now a mere lord?"

     "I would rather be a lord than a prince who is a tyrant," Uchdryd quickly answers, making Vesper laugh out loud while Uchdryd stares at him with annoyance.

     "A tyrant? You're right, Dai Tengfei was definitely a tyrant. He tormented white uniforms, started an illegal auction, and even beat Krist Hyusen up on the rooftop. I know because Tengfei wouldn't stop bragging about it in the past. He was definitely something," Vesper explains while wiping the tears in his eyes after laughing so much.

     "That bastard never took a break, but do you know what I hated about him the most? He was also Paradox's bitch. He did everything that they told him to do, which could be the reason why they kept their prince title for so long. I hated all of them. And if Paradox didn't protect them so much back then, I would have easily beat the fuck out of those chess pieces," Vesper explains further before taking a deep breath and smiling in Uchdryd's direction.

     "But you know, I'll give credit where credit is due. You really made Checkmate a better brotherhood than what it originally was. But don't think of that as a compliment. I'm just stating facts. I don't want you to get mushy on me all of a sudden," Vesper then says, making Uchdryd roll his eyes in response.

     "You never change."

     "And why would I?"

     "You're roommates with Max, am I correct?" Uchdryd asks instead, instantly changing the subject.

     "The new kid? Yeah, I am. And I believe you had something to do with that. Did you ask your bitch to arrange the rooms for you too?" Vesper then asks, and Uchdryd finally grabs the serf by the collar, his eyes burning in anger the moment Vesper said those words to him.

     "Do not speak to Levi with such disrespect. I've been holding back Vesper Cinna. You don't want me getting mad at you," Uchdryd threatens, and Vesper whistles at him before pushing the leader away with little to no effort, displaying a wide gap when it comes to their strength.

     "You're only starting, boy, so don't go grabbing me like that. I might be a fourth-year again, but I'm still way older than you. If it weren't for that fucking favor, I wouldn't have gone back to these god-forsaken houses," Vesper threatens back, making Uchdryd clench his fist in irritation.

     "If you have forgotten, Cinna, right now you are a white uniform and a mere serf. I have a higher authority over you, so whatever you were or whatever you thought you were no longer has any value here. And that small favor you speak of isn't the only thing keeping you at bay, so remember that," Uchdryd says back with no hint of fear in his eyes.

     Vesper stares at Uchdryd for a while, surprised that the leader talked back to him like that. But instead of laughing at him or mocking him, the serf smiles and nods his head.

     "That's good," he whispers under his breath before putting his hands inside his pockets and taking a deep breath. 

     "I talked to him yesterday. He seems to be planning something interesting for the serfs. You should watch out," the senior finally reveals.

     "That's not what I'm interested in," Uchdryd replies while massaging his temple. He almost forgot how difficult it is to talk to Vesper Cinna. He should have at least let his right hand join him.

     "I want you to do something for me."

     "And what could that be?"

     "I want you to get me a DNA sample of Maximilian Sinclaire," Uchdryd suddenly reveals, and this time, Vesper showed a surprised expression that he usually doesn't show to anyone.

     "A DNA sample?"

     "Don't ask questions. Don't mention anything to anyone. Just get it done," Uchdryd demands, and Vesper takes a deep breath before laughing again.

      "Checkmate...the masters of information...wants me to get a DNA sample of one of the most powerful heirs in this new generation? The world truly has gone mad," Vesper says out loud before looking back at the brotherhood leader again. "Alright, since you did me a favor in the past, I'll get that fucking sample for you," Vesper says as he pats Uchdryd's shoulder. But before letting go, he suddenly grips it tightly, instantly making Uchdryd turn his head to look back at him.

     "But after this, our agreement is over. I won't allow you to corner me twice, Uchdryd Rease."

     Vesper finally lets go as he starts walking away from the lord of pride. But as he walks away from the leader, he grins and reveals, "By the way, tell your brotherhood to hide better next time. I could sense them from a mile away."

     As soon as Vesper said that, four members of Checkmate appeared from behind pillars and trees, making Uchdryd sigh again. 

     "He really hasn't changed one bit," Uchdryd says as his brotherhood members walk towards him. While they watched Vesper leave, and while Uchtryd stared at Vesper's back, an image suddenly appeared in front of him. It was an image of a powerful brotherhood leader, and that image alone made the hair on Uchdryd's skin stand.

     "Vesper Hugo Cinna...the leader of disbanded brotherhood, Demons. J.S High's former Duke and the man everyone called the devil. Watch out for him, Checkmate. We might have him on a leash now, but when the time comes, we'll need more than just an exorcist to hold him down."

- END -