“Ah…”

Rael sighed heavily. It wasn’t like she was cursed, yet somehow she kept getting injured every day.

“That looks painful.”

Hearing the flat, emotionless voice, Rael glanced sideways to find Juletan staring intently at her bleeding knee.

“It’s fine. Just a small scratch.”

“That’s more than small.”

Juletan rose and approached her. A breeze slipped between them, carrying the scent of blood toward him. His nostrils flared slightly.

“So that’s what it was.”

He knelt on one knee before her. Rael wanted to tell him that he didn’t need to examine the wound, but she froze when his hand grasped the back of her knee.

“Now I understand clearly.”

His red eyes gleamed unnervingly. Fear suddenly gripped Rael—those crimson irises glowing in the darkness seemed inhuman.

“P-Professor?”

When Rael tried to pull her leg away, his fingers traced over the wound.

“Ow!”

Pain shot through her as his hand brushed across the torn flesh.

Juletan looked at the blood on his fingertips, then brought it to his mouth. Rael recoiled in shock and horror, a perfectly natural reaction to such a disturbing sight.

“Ah. You’ve been hiding something interesting.”

For a moment, his smiling face seemed to transform, corners of his mouth stretching upward like a malevolent spirit. Rael backed away instinctively, step by hesitant step, overcome by an inexplicable sense of dread.

“This would drive anyone mad with desire.”

Juletan’s hand shot out and grabbed her wrist.

“Ah!”

When Rael screamed in surprise, he quickly covered her mouth with his other hand.

“Mmph!”

Her eyes widened with terror as her voice was silenced.

“Let me have a taste too.”

Something strange happened when Juletan’s red eyes flickered—Rael felt her body stiffening, like a moth caught in a spider’s web.

Desperate to escape, she bit down hard on his hand.

“Ugh!”

When Juletan pulled back his hand, Rael shoved him away and turned to run.

‘This psycho!’

The downgrade from respected health teacher to deranged lunatic happened in an instant.

But Rael’s escape attempt was pitiful. Juletan caught up to her quickly with his long legs, and she tumbled onto the grass. He climbed on top of her fallen body.

“Are you insane?”

She shouted with a voice full of panic, but Juletan ignored her, burying his face in her neck and inhaling deeply.

“I wondered why that bastard was holed up in this pathetic human academy. With this scent, I’d be drooling too.”

“That bastard? What are you—!”

Rael pushed against him, but overpowering him physically was impossible. Juletan lifted his head to look down at her and spoke again.

“The bastard you’re breeding with. Don’t tell me you don’t know what he really is?”

“What he is?”

It wasn’t hard to guess that “the bastard she was breeding with” referred to Rubellan, since he was the only one she’d been intimate with.

“You know Rubellan?”

Yes, something had seemed off from the beginning. Black hair, red eyes. She’d jokingly wondered if they might be related when she noticed how strikingly similar they looked.

“Are you family?”

“What an offensively disgusting question.”

“But…”

Why was he getting upset when he brought it up first?

“Get off me.”

“You’re remarkably calm. Perhaps you’re not unfamiliar with situations like this?”

“If you’re going to talk such nonsense—!”

Just as she was about to tell him to get lost, Juletan’s body suddenly lifted into the air and was thrown sideways.

Rael’s eyes widened in shock. A body suddenly flying through the air? Whatever was happening, she needed to get up.

As she tried to rise, pain shot through her tailbone where she’d hit the ground when she fell.

“Ugh…”

“This is why I told you not to wander around at night.”

A familiar voice reached her ears.

“Rubellan?”

Standing there looking down at her and Juletan with his usual composed face was Rubellan. The air around him seemed unusually turbulent.

“Senior, you have a real talent for finding trouble.”

His face was expressionless, but his voice was sweet.

“I told you not to get involved with that bastard.”

“That bastard…?”

Rael’s gaze followed Rubellan’s direction.

This one calling that one a bastard, that one calling this one a bastard. What kind of relationship did they have to refer to each other this way? She grew curious about their connection.

“Get up.”

“Oh… okay.”

Rael scrambled to her feet.

“Go straight to your room.”

“Huh? Um…”

Rubellan’s gaze toward Juletan, who was still rolling on the ground, was so chillingly cold that Rael instinctively shrank back. She turned and headed toward the dormitory.

“Don’t look back, no matter what.”

She wanted to turn her head at the sound of his voice, but somehow felt she shouldn’t.

Rael continued toward the dormitory. A strong wind hit the back of her head as she ran.

‘What’s happening?’

She couldn’t tell if her pounding heart was from the terrible situation she’d just escaped or from anxiety about some enormous revelation looming on the horizon.

Tap, tap.

Rael’s footsteps, which had been racing toward the dormitory in a hypnotic trance, suddenly stopped.

“…”

A cold, desolate breeze ruffled her white hair. Her head, which had been frozen in place, turned slightly. Then her waist, then her feet—soon her entire body had turned around.

‘Don’t look back, no matter what.’

All the strange incidents lately… her instincts told her the answers were back there. But her body’s senses were sending red alerts of danger.

Her feet wavered between the dark corridor and the open door.

Turning back to the comfort of her bed would be easy.

But.

Her feet moved toward the door she had run through.

But still.

She began retracing her steps.

Sleep was always available, but opportunities to face the truth didn’t come often.

* * *

Juletan, who had been rolling on the ground, barely managed to raise his upper body. The pressure still weighing on him made even this simple movement difficult.

“You seem quite protective of her?”

Juletan’s intention in speaking was all too clear.

“Brothers should share good things.”

He wanted to provoke Rubellan.

Looking at Juletan’s vile smirk, Rubellan approached slowly.

“My third eldest brother truly has no fear. Unlike our other siblings who at least know to grovel in my presence.”

Rubellan’s voice, carried on the wind, held a serenity that matched the night’s atmosphere.

“Because between you and me, there’s an insurmountable wall.”

“Ah. That purity of blood nonsense? Is that what you’re talking about?”

Rubellan sneered. How pathetic that immortality was all his brother had to rely on.

“Brother.”

As Rubellan approached, Juletan’s body, which he had barely managed to raise, was slammed back to the ground. Rubellan’s foot came down on Juletan’s hand.

Crack.

The horrific sound of breaking bones echoed through the night.

“Ugh! You son of a b*tch!”

“What’s the point of cursing your beloved brother over a hand that will regenerate soon anyway?”

Juletan sensed something was terribly wrong. Rubellan had always dismissed his provocations with indifference. This reaction—showing genuine anger toward him—was unprecedented.

Crack.

Rubellan’s foot broke Juletan’s wrist.

Snap, crunch.

Next, his kneecap shattered, then his ribs gave way.

“Kuh.”

Juletan could barely speak as bone fragments pierced his internal organs. The power difference was overwhelming—he, a pure-blooded demon, couldn’t even move a finger.

“My leniency ends here. Brother.”

“Kuh… ugh.”

Rubellan’s gaze at Juletan, who was whimpering and trembling like an injured beast, was utterly cold. His brutality suggested that compassion had never existed within him to begin with.

“With that immortal body you’re all so proud of…”

He stomped once more on the already mangled body, likely damaging any organs that might have remained intact.

“If you don’t want to end up crawling at my feet, begging me to kill you, stay out of my way.”

“Urgh!”

Juletan’s body was shattered like garbage.

“Why such resentful eyes, dear brother?”

Rubellan bent down to face Juletan, who was coughing blood and trembling violently. He brought his face close to Juletan’s, which was pressed against the ground, and met his gaze.

“It makes me want to burst your eyeballs too.”

Rubellan’s cruelty was already legendary among demons. Though he wore a disgusting mask here, his true face was far from kind.

Juletan’s eyes began to close, his body a broken mess that couldn’t even fight back. His breathing stopped, but as Rubellan had said, he was a being who couldn’t die even if he wanted to. Even now, his grotesquely distorted bones and flesh were slowly knitting back together.

Rubellan dusted off his clothes and stood up.

He kicked Juletan’s corpse-like body into a corner in front of the bench. Then, adjusting the end of his sleeve with his hand, he turned away without hesitation. His movements were light and carefree.

“…”

But when he turned around, Rubellan froze completely.

So unlike him—the same man who hadn’t blinked at the sight of bones piercing through flesh.

“Senior.”

Rael, who had been standing there petrified by the scene, took a hesitant step backward. Rubellan, who had been about to approach her, also stopped in his tracks.

“…What are you?”

Her blue eyes clearly reflected fear and hostility.

“I told you not to look back.”

The smile that had reflexively appeared on his face when he saw her shattered completely.