A day had passed.
And only now—only now—had the full horror of his actions finally caught up with Kai.
He was lying on his bed, staring blankly at the ceiling, a pillow over his face, dying slowly in silence.
"What have I done?"
The question echoed in his mind like it had been carved into stone by a hammer made of shame.
"Since when… since when had I grown so brazen?"
He remembered it all too vividly.
The crowd. The kneeling. The declaration.
"Beautiful slave Kathlyn—!"
His whole body cringed.
He actually rolled off the bed and hit the floor in a slow, miserable flop, landing like a sack of potatoes full of regret.
"I feel so… so embarrassed."
He hadn't even left his room since then.
Which, to be fair, wasn't unusual. He technically didn't have to be anywhere today. The academy did not force you to attend class especially not when you had just been crowned top performer of the survival exam. If anything, the administration probably expected him to be off basking in praise, flexing his rewards.
But for Kai, this was less "rest" and more strategic hiding.
The kind of hiding only possible when you know your entire existence is now a live comedy act for a room full of traumatized teenagers.
"What was I supposed to do…?" he groaned, face still planted against the floorboards.
"I'm literally her biggest fan…"
That wasn't hyperbole.
Back in his old world, Kai had been Kathlyn's #1 fan.
He had the credentials to prove it.
From spending hours on message boards arguing about her character arc and writing heated rebuttals against haters who said she was "too proud" or "needed to be humbled," to writing 30,000-word forum essays on why she deserved her own solo spinoff.
He even got the author himself to acknowledge Kai as Kathlyn's Number One Supporter.
That wasn't even the peak.
There was the body pillow.
Tastefully done, mind you.
Minimal cleavage. Graceful posture. Elegantly defiant expression.
It was practically artwork.
He coughed into his sleeve.
"Nobody gets to judge me," he muttered darkly.
"What you do as a secluded, emotional teen with too much internet access is nobody's business but your own."
But still.
He had met her yesterday.
Face to face.
He saved her.
He enslaved her.
He proposed to her in public.
He called her "beloved" and "beautiful slave Kathlyn" like he was auditioning for an MC role in a magical harem anime made by a slightly unhinged studio.
"Am I retarded?" he whispered into the void.
No answer.
Just shame.
Even his mana was embarrassed.
Still, he couldn't hide forever.
As much as his soul wanted to become one with the bedsheets, to fuse into fabric and be forgotten by time, he eventually had to eat.
So, like a war general preparing for battle, Kai slowly dressed himself, fixed his hair, smoothed out his uniform like a man headed to trial, and made his way down to the main dining hall.
And the moment he entered
The entire hall went silent.
Spoons froze mid-air.
Conversations stopped like someone had unplugged the sound from reality.
All eyes turned to him.
He was living out the exact scene from the novel.
The one where Alaric showed up after stealing June's kill, acting smug, trying to pretend the whole thing had been tactical genius instead of dumb luck.
Except now?
It was Kai.
Class C students looked at him with awe. With envy. With whispered disbelief. He could feel their stares dragging across his coat, lingering on the faint aura of mana that clung to his form like aftershock static.
A few whispered—just loud enough for him to hear:
"Is that him…?"
"He really stole it?"
"Dude, he got four trips to Felis Hall."
"Did you see him call Kathlyn his slave yesterday?"
"That was either legendary… or disturbing. I still can't tell."
Kai kept walking, hands in his pockets, face calm and unreadable.
But internally?
"This is worse than I imagined," he thought.
"I've become the exact kind of edgy MC I used to roast on Reddit."
He didn't want praise. He didn't want admiration. He wanted soup.
A seat.
Something warm.
Some peace.
Anything that could help him digest the emotional war crime he had committed in front of hundreds of students and one confused heroine.
But the universe, as always, had other plans.
Footsteps.
Click. Click. Click.
Sharp. Unyielding. Confident.
He turned.
And there she was.
Kathlyn Lionheart.
Red hair tied in a loose braid. Sharp eyes. Arms crossed. The same no-nonsense expression she wore when she faced down beasts and classmates in the novel.
She looked like she was about to assign both homework and public execution.
She walked straight up to him.
The dining hall went from quiet to dead silent.
Then
"Youuuu," she said flatly, drawing out the word like it physically pained her to speak to him.
Kai flinched on the inside. Externally, he nodded with stoic calm.
"So when do you want to go to the Class A hall?" she asked coldly.
"Once we start the month we can't stop."
She said it like a threat. Like a contract. Like a curse disguised as a schedule.
Kai nodded again, forcing a neutral expression while his brain screamed like a cornered raccoon.
"Oh, it's only natural for her to be distant," he told himself.
"Makes sense. She doesn't know me. Doesn't trust me. She probably thinks I'm mentally unstable. Which… is fair."
But he had to focus.
Training.
That was the priority.
Especially now that he'd altered the story.
He'd claimed the Guardian Beast kill, which meant the Underground Relic Arc one of the best in the novel might trigger differently.
In the original timeline, Kathlyn had sought out those relics to claw her way to Class A. She had no choice. Limited training. No resources. Constant pressure.
But now?
Now she had one and a half months of Class A-level access.
Two trips to Felis Hall already queued up.
But she would probably still go.
She would still push herself harder than anyone else.
She would still be searching for maximum benefits, taking every edge she could find.
That's just who she was.
And Kai?
Kai had to stay ahead of her.
"With my knowledge of the relic arc," he thought, "I can help her through the trials."
He clenched his fist.
"We should visit Felis Hall first, don't you think?"
He said it with quiet determination.
Because that was the key.
That hall the place where comprehension exploded, where spell mastery could be compressed into hours instead of months was the perfect starting point.
He'd train there.
And if all went well…
He'd be able to change things.