The Royal Military Academy's Impostor Owns a Dungeon [BL] Chapter 1216: Chewing Cardboard

What were the odds, really?

As though quietly calling out to him, a small handwritten note rested neatly beside the unexpected breakfast spread, and he really should’ve braced himself before picking it up.

Killian didn’t even need to see the lopsided heart or that suspiciously oversized letter J at the bottom to know who could’ve possibly left it.

Then again, he was far too busy getting stuck on the opening line to pay much attention to how the note ended.

He tried reading it as slowly as possible.

Unfortunately, the further he got, the more thoroughly outclassed he felt.

By the time he reached the end, Killian honestly wasn’t sure how he’d even managed to sit down and eat breakfast. His hands shook the entire time, and he nearly suffered a second death when he happened to catch his own reflection in the mirror.

With an expression like that, even someone with the worst eyesight imaginable would’ve known exactly what kind of morning he’d had.

And after catching himself looking like that for what felt like the nth time, he could no longer dismiss it as some bizarre fluke unless he happened to be suffering from a debilitating illness he knew nothing about.

That wasn’t even taking into account what happened whenever his gaze drifted toward the bed.

Or whenever he stepped into that same bathroom, a place he’d never once thought twice about until last night.

Both immediately dragged his thoughts back to everything that had transpired only a few hours earlier.

Even now, while showering within those same four walls, his eyes slowly lowered, clinging to the hope that he’d simply imagined it.

He hadn’t.

Because even through the steam, the evidence was unmistakable and most definitely throbbing.

Tch.

"Haaaah...!"

__

By all accounts, a morning like that should’ve left him smiling to himself for the rest of the day. After all, Jax had spent the entire morning doing exactly that.

So why, exactly, had Killian shown up looking as though he’d spent most of the morning chewing on cardboard?

That...

Hmm...

Killian would’ve liked to know why as well.

Perhaps it had something to do with the series of emergency virtual conferences he’d been dragged into at such ungodly hours, all in preparation for what would happen once the Aeruns realized their people weren’t appearing in that day’s broadcast, or discovered the information they expected to receive was no longer coming through. The fallout might not come immediately, but they needed countermeasures in place before House Luxastra inevitably made contact.

With all that on his plate, so much for having an actual "day off" to attend the gremlin’s exam. Then again, no one could’ve predicted those lunatics would attempt something so absurdly reckless and spectacularly public that it’d force everyone to prepare for a situation like this in the first place.

Given the circumstances, the back-to-back meetings were perfectly understandable, and he was more than accustomed to dealing with them. The only problem was that, unlike most times when he could devote his full attention to work, his thoughts kept drifting toward one simple message he still hadn’t managed to send to a certain redhead.

Just a simple for breakfast.

At the very least, he wanted to send that much. After all, he genuinely appreciated everything Jax had done for him earlier.

Yet every single time he reached for his terminal, someone would beat him to it by asking for his opinion on those demented twins before he could even unlock the screen.

By the time the meetings concluded and it was time to head for the arena, Killian still hadn’t managed to send a single word.

Strangely enough, that bothered him. Enough that he found himself walking noticeably faster than usual, hoping to reach the lounge before they all had to go to the bleachers.

Then he arrived.

And immediately discovered that Jax appeared to be doing perfectly fine.

The redhead was laughing with his friends, and the moment he spotted Killian, he simply beamed at him with that same effortless smile.

It was a stark contrast to the official who’d spent the entire morning jumping from one meeting to the next while wondering whether he’d somehow made Jax feel neglected after not being able to contact him that entire morning.

Naturally, he was relieved to see Jax looking perfectly alright.

But at the same time...

He would’ve had to be delusional and in complete denial not to realize he’d become far more invested than he’d ever imagined possible. After all, there he was, thumping his foot right beside two obviously lovesick fools simply because he seemed far more troubled than the actual rascal over there.

It was a rather frustrating realization, but apparently there really would come a day when the lot of them ended up wearing the very same expression.

Not that Killian had ever imagined it’d be because of romance. If someone had told him years ago that the three of them would one day look equally miserable over matters of the heart, he’d have laughed them straight out of the room. Looking that way after bringing down a common enemy?

Certainly.

But because of relationships?

Never.

He let out what was probably his twenty-second sigh that morning, and it took no small amount of restraint for several onlookers not to snicker at the supposedly worrying sound.

The unusually quiet audience simply couldn’t risk being discovered by the already irritated subjects, could they?

Then again, if they were caught trying to blend into the background so they could continue observing, they’d simply argue that, at the very least, the youngsters’ temporary hardship wasn’t entirely without purpose.

After all, there were still members of the older generation occupying the very same room who found the entire spectacle endlessly entertaining.

Surely that counted for something, right?

Truly, what a spectacular day to be flies on the wall!

__

Of course, not everyone could say the same about their current situation.

While certain parents were quietly enjoying the sort of panic they never expected to witness from their own children in this lifetime, others were genuinely on the verge of losing their heads.

It had already been so long, yet none of the people they were monitoring through the devices they’d painstakingly smuggled into the waiting rooms were saying anything remotely useful.

Did they truly have nothing to say about the exam?

About the mecha?!

Or were the Imperials really that unconcerned?