The first thing Lena did was take Rin to the hospital.
"I'm fine now, really! Look, I can even walk without feeling any pain," Rin insisted, trying to wave off her concerns.
But one sharp glare from Lena shut him up immediately.
Without another word, she forcibly admitted him to the emergency ward and paid his bills. Only after ensuring that he was in proper care did she return to Velcrest Academy.
---
Chairman's Office.
Lena stood in front of the large mahogany desk, her arms crossed loosely, while the Chairman gazed at her with a sharp, inquisitive look.
"So," the Chairman began, her tone firm but curious, "what kind of cadet is Rin Evans?"
Lena's lips curled into a faint smile, which made the Chairman's brow furrow slightly.
"Rin Evans…" Lena started, her voice calm but oddly soft. "He's a good cadet. He has the qualities of an ideal hero."
The Chairman's frown deepened slightly. Lena's words were complimentary, but there was an informality in her tone that caught the Chairman's attention. She rarely ever spoke so casually during reports—especially not during formal debriefings. It was uncharacteristic of her.
And the smile.
It wasn't her usual polite, professional expression. It was subtle but genuine, something the Chairman hadn't seen from Lena in a long time.
More importantly, the aura Lena was emitting had changed slightly. It was denser, stronger, and carried a trace of residual power. A faint remnant of something far beyond her current rank.
"Care to explain what you mean by that?" the Chairman asked, tilting her head slightly.
"Leave him alone," Lena replied flatly.
The Chairman blinked. "…What?"
"Leave him alone," Lena repeated, firmer this time. "That's what I meant."
For the first time in a while, the Chairman was genuinely caught off guard.
Her eyes widened slightly. Leave him alone?
Very few people ever dared to speak to her like that, especially not Lena. Anyone else would have paid a heavy price for such boldness. But Lena was… different. She was one of the few people the Chairman held in genuine regard.
Still, this was unexpected.
Her curiosity toward Rin Evans only grew.
"Leave him alone? Rin Evans?" The Chairman narrowed her eyes. "Did something happen between you two?"
Lena exhaled softly. She could feel the Chairman's scrutinizing gaze piercing through her like a blade, but she didn't flinch.
"No," Lena said simply, looking the Chairman dead in the eye. "Nothing happened."
The Chairman leaned back in her seat, fingers steepled under her chin. "Then explain why you're protecting him. Cadets don't get this kind of privilege, Lena. Not even the ones you favor."
Lena's eyes flicked away for a moment, just a blink—but the Chairman noticed.
"I'm not protecting him," Lena said, her voice quiet but resolute. "I'm giving him space. There's something about Rin Evans that I don't fully understand yet. But whatever it is... meddling with him now would be a mistake."
The Chairman tapped a finger against the armrest, her gaze unrelenting.
"You're not the type to make vague assessments," she said. "You've always been precise. Calculated. Cold, even. And yet here you are, sounding… personal."
Lena said nothing at first.
But she knows that she can't hide from chairman and if she did, Lena doesn't know what steps chairman would take.
So, she told her everything—the dungeon, the sudden appearance of the anomaly, and how Rin had risked his life to save her. She left nothing out.
When she finished, the Chairman leaned back in her chair, silent for a moment.
"Aha," she finally said, a sly smile tugging at her lips. "And here I was wondering how you managed to improve your level so dramatically in just a few hours. So that's what happened."
The Chairman's sharp eyes glimmered with intrigue.
Chairman's Office — Continued
"A power that could temporarily raise an A-rank hero to S-rank level?" the Chairman murmured, her voice barely above a whisper.
She leaned forward slightly, her fingers interlaced, resting her elbows on the desk.
Her eyes narrowed—not with suspicion, but calculation.
"That alone is a national-level threat... or asset."
Lena remained silent, jaw clenched.
The Chairman's tone had shifted. It was no longer a conversation between a superior and her trusted cadet—it was the voice of a politician, a tactician, someone already weaving possibilities in the back of her mind.
"Are you saying," the Chairman continued slowly, "that this power originated from Rin?"
Lena nodded.
"It came from him. I don't know how, and neither does he. But it was real. I felt it in every nerve of my body. It was like..." She hesitated, her lips pressing into a line. "Like I wasn't just empowered—I was meant to fight."
The Chairman leaned back again, letting Lena's words hang in the air.
For a long moment, nothing was said.
Then—
"You realize what this means," the Chairman said.
"I do."
"And you still want me to leave him alone?"
"Yes."
The Chairman tilted her head, genuinely amused now.
"You're asking me to ignore a cadet who houses something possibly ancient, undocumented, and capable of empowering others beyond natural limits?"
"I'm not asking," Lena said, her voice cutting through the tension like a blade. "I'm telling you."
The room went silent.
The air turned cold.
The Chairman stared at her, hard. Not in anger, but in challenge.
Lena didn't flinch.
Didn't look away.
She had made her decision.
"Lena, try to understand me."
The Chairman paused for a moment, the humor fading from her expression. Her voice, when she spoke again, was quieter. Heavier.
"I am not your enemy."
Her fingers tapped gently on the polished wood of her desk—once, twice—before she stood up. The long coat she wore shifted slightly as she walked toward the window, her back now turned to Lena.
"I know what it's like to carry a secret that shouldn't exist," she said, gazing at the distant silhouette of Velcrest Academy's main tower. "You think I haven't seen this before? Cadets showing 'anomalies.' Bloodlines that don't match their records. Strange awakenings. This isn't the first time someone like Rin has surfaced."
Lena didn't say anything.
"But it's rare," the Chairman continued. "So rare that the higher-ups lose their minds when it happens. And you know what happens next, don't you?" She turned slightly, enough for Lena to catch her profile—stern, bitter. "Dissections. Surveillance. A life where every breath is measured and every step recorded. Is that what you want for him?"
"No," Lena answered instantly.
The Chairman turned fully now, eyes locking with hers. "Then don't lie to me again. Don't tell me 'nothing happened.' You risked everything to protect him—and I want to understand why."
Lena's voice dropped to a whisper. "Because he saved me."
That gave the Chairman pause.
Lena took a step forward, her expression earnest.
"When I thought I was going to die in that dungeon, I didn't expect anyone to come. I'm used to that. But Rin... he didn't even hesitate. He was terrified. He didn't know what he was doing. But he came anyway."
Her fists clenched at her sides.
"He chose to save me when he could've run. He put his life on the line—for someone like me."
The Chairman watched her carefully.
"And now," Lena said, "I'm returning the favor. No matter what he is—hero, anomaly, or something else—I want him to have the chance to be."
Silence again.
Then, slowly, the Chairman returned to her desk.
"You've changed," she said, almost thoughtfully. "You used to see things in black and white. Enemies and allies. Threats and assets."
She sat down, folding her hands neatly.
"But now, you're talking about choice. About protecting someone not for what they can do—but for who they are."
Lena looked down, unsure what to say.
Then after few moments of silence, Chairman raised an eyebrow and said,
"You think I'd harm him?"
"I think you'd dissect him," Lena replied, still looking down at floor. "Piece by piece. Morally, politically, magically—you'd tear apart everything that makes him human just to understand what makes him powerful. And then you'd lock him in a box if you couldn't control him."
There was no hatred in Lena's tone.
Just truth.
The Chairman didn't flinch at the accusation. Instead, she offered a quiet chuckle. "That's a little dramatic, even for you."
"Is it?"
A moment of silence passed.
Then the Chairman turned away, walking back toward her seat.
"…Fine," she said, her tone losing some of its sharpness. "I'll leave him alone. For now."
A soft, almost imperceptible smile curled on the Chairman's lips.
Yes, she would leave Rin Evans alone for now.
But not out of kindness.
Out of curiosity.
For now, Rin Evans was out of the chairman's reach.
But that didn't mean Lena was free from questions.
Despite Rin's reckless self-sacrifice to save her, the chairman couldn't quite believe that Lena had grown so attached to a complete stranger.
Sure, Rin had saved her life—but still.
There was something more to Lena's protectiveness.
And the chairman had a guess.
A quiet one.
A dangerous one.
One she couldn't ignore.
Her eyes narrowed slightly as she studied Lena, then she asked, almost too casually,
"Is he like him?"
Lena blinked.
"What?"
The chairman's gaze didn't waver.
"Your brother, I mean." She paused for a brief moment, then added softly, "Does he remind you of your dead younger brother?"
The room fell into a heavy silence.
Lena's expression froze.
Her eyes, once warm and expressive, turned cold in an instant—a sharp, icy wall slamming down behind them.
The Chairman regretted the words the moment they left her mouth.
But she didn't take them back.
Instead, she waited.
Lena's silence was more piercing than a thousand accusations. Her posture remained the same—arms still loosely crossed, her frame unmoved—but her entire presence shifted. The soft warmth that had briefly surfaced vanished. What stood before the Chairman now was the Lena she knew—the perfect weapon. Controlled. Hardened. Untouchable.
And dangerous.
The silence dragged.
The Chairman slowly sat back down, her fingers steepling once more, watching Lena with a quiet patience.
"You crossed a line," Lena said at last, her voice low, every word perfectly controlled.
The Chairman didn't look away. "I know."
Lena took a slow step forward.
"You can question my loyalty. You can question my judgment. But don't ever—" Her voice dipped to a near-whisper, ice lacing every syllable. "Ever bring him into this again."
The Chairman didn't respond immediately.
She knew Lena wouldn't have spoken that name even if asked directly. The memory was still too raw, too tightly sealed behind layers of discipline and years of buried pain.
But the Chairman hadn't asked for sentiment.
She had asked for a pattern.
Someone who reminded Lena of a bond she could no longer have.
And Lena had given her the answer—not through words, but through her reaction.
"…So it's not just about saving Rin," the Chairman murmured. "It's about redemption."
Lena's jaw tightened.
She turned away.
"That's not your concern," she said quietly.
The Chairman leaned back with a sigh, folding her arms. "You know what your problem is, Lena?"
Lena paused but didn't turn around.
"You still think you can save someone without losing yourself. That maybe, if you protect this boy, you'll finally silence that guilt you've been carrying since all this time."
"I'm not protecting Rin to atone," Lena said. "He doesn't need a martyr. He just needs someone to stand in the way before people like you get too curious."
"And what happens when he becomes too dangerous to ignore?"
Lena glanced over her shoulder.
"Then I'll handle it."
There was no hesitation in her voice.
And the Chairman, for all her doubts, believed her.
Not because Lena was bluffing.
But because she wasn't.
"…Fine," the Chairman said again, voice quieter this time.
Her gaze shifted to the stack of reports on her desk, Rin Evans' name marked faintly in one of the files.
"I'll leave him off the radar. For now."
Lena gave a small nod, then turned fully and walked toward the door.
Before she reached it, the Chairman spoke again.
"He's lucky," she said.
Lena stopped.
The Chairman's voice softened, just slightly.
"Your brother wasn't."
Lena didn't turn around.
But for the first time in a long while, her voice trembled—barely noticeable, a fracture beneath layers of stone.
"I know."
And then she walked out, the door closing behind her with a soft click.
As soon as, she was out of doors Lena thought about Rin and her brother.
She trailed off, her eyes growing distant.
Her throat bobbed slightly as she swallowed, then she exhaled softly, the breath shaky.
Inside she lash out on chairman but now she thinks seriously, then the answer were becoming more clear.
"Yeah... he does sort of resemble him."
Her lips curled into a sad, faraway smile.
Her voice caught slightly, and she closed her eyes for a brief moment, holding her breath before letting it out in a slow, quiet exhale.
"Just like Rin Evans."
She didn't said to anyone else, she said to herself as she took a deep breath and started to walk again.
There was still more things for her to do.