To change Eclipse's mind, one had to negotiate the moment she made a decision. Once she was set on something, no matter how much he pleaded, she wouldn't back down even a single step. This was a lesson Shinji Kitahara had learned from their many years together.
The thought of the hellish life that awaited him after his injury healed made him think he would have been better off not fighting back at all and just letting the other person beat him up. Although he didn't know her motives, it was clear she wasn't using much force at the beginning. If he hadn't resisted, it would have been at worst a superficial injury that would have healed in two days even without drinking his potions.
And now, not only had he ended up in the infirmary and wasted four bottles of potion, but he also had to undergo extra training...
Getting beaten up would have been better than this!
The more he thought about it, the more he felt it wasn't worth it. The more he thought, the sadder he became. In the end, he finally made up his mind.
Fine, I'll just stop thinking about it.
Time to slack off!
He took out his phone, originally intending to check the Tracen forum for any new idiotic trainer questions. But perhaps because the forum had just been cleaned up due to the rumors, it was pitifully quiet today.
With no dumb messages to read, Shinji opened a video app. But before he could even click on a video, the thought of the extra training after his recovery brought a wave of sorrow, and he lost all interest in watching anything.
Forget it. This might be my last moment of peace. I shouldn't waste it watching videos. I'll just find someone to chat with.
With that thought, he turned his gaze to the hospital bed next to his, separated by a curtain.
"Hey bro, you there?"
He couldn't see who the other person was because of the curtain, but since this was an infirmary ward specifically for trainers, the other person should be a trainer as well.
"Trainer Kitahara?" A familiar voice came from behind the curtain.
Shinji was taken aback for a moment, then tentatively asked, "Trainer Higashimori?"
"It's me."
Yosuke Higashimori actively pulled back the curtain, looking at Shinji in surprise. "Trainer Kitahara, what are you doing here?"
"That's a bit of a long story... What about you? Attacked by a horse girl?"
"Ah, no. I was just walking down the road and accidentally fell, spraining my arm."
Speaking of this, Yosuke Higashimori looked a little embarrassed and held up his arm, which was covered in ointment.
Shinji looked at the identical ointment on both their arms and his mouth twitched.
"Looks like we're in here for the same reason."
After a pause, Shinji continued, "By the way, where's your charge?"
"She's doing self-training. I was worried about affecting her practice, so I told her I had something to do and came here by myself." Yosuke smiled shyly. "We agreed to keep our distance, after all."
Hearing his answer, Shinji was silent for a moment, then extended his good hand and patted his shoulder.
"You'd better pray your charge doesn't find out about this."
"...Huh?"
"Anyway, don't say I didn't warn you when disaster strikes."
He retracted his hand and looked past Yosuke to the curtain behind him, where there was another figure.
"Who's that over there?"
"Ah, that's Senior Matsui. The reason he's in here is... a shattered pelvis."
Shinji Kitahara: "..."
Well, that's a pretty common injury around here.
"By the way, Higashimori, who's your charge again?"
Shinji asked, and Higashimori answered with a name he had never heard before, probably some background character horse girl.
"How's it going so far?"
"...It's okay, I guess."
Speaking of his charge, an unnatural expression flickered across Yosuke's face. "She's a horse girl who came up from a local academy. I was in charge of her before..."
Oh, then you can just wait for your doom.
Shinji silently mourned for his pelvis and his girlfriend for three seconds.
After chatting a bit about Yosuke's situation, Shinji spoke again. "By the way, Trainer Higashimori, there's something I want to ask you."
"What is it?"
"You've seen the forum the past few days, right?"
"Yes." Higashimori nodded, then said apologetically, "I actually wanted to speak up for you, but you said you didn't want people to know about your past, so I didn't say anything in the end..."
"That's fine. In fact, if you had said something, it might have given me a headache," Shinji smiled and continued. "It's like this. According to information from the Chairwoman, that public opinion storm was deliberately stirred up by someone, and the account's IP address was hidden..."
"Someone deliberately framed you, Trainer Kitahara?" Yosuke was surprised.
"They weren't framing me."
Shinji shook his head and sighed. "They're targeting Tracen."
Peeping, a public opinion storm, and an attack disguised as a fan.
Although he was the direct victim, if one thought about it carefully, one would find that if these things were allowed to continue to evolve and ferment...
Collecting blackmail material, provoking conflicts, and attempting to tarnish the name of Tokai Teio, Tracen's most dazzling new star in recent years, through the actions of a "fan"... Although he was the direct victim on the surface, a deeper look would reveal that these actions ultimately harmed the entirety of Tracen.
And the Chairwoman had been alert to this since the peeping incident. It wasn't just Shinji's case; other abnormal incidents had been happening in other parts of the campus as well. Although those incidents were all stopped by a certain individual before they could cause any damage, it made the Chairwoman start to suspect the other party's motives.
Before Shinji handed over the horse girl, the Chairwoman had already basically confirmed through certain information that the other party's target was Tracen as a whole. Shinji Kitahara was most likely just a collateral target—just one who had been targeted a few more times and a bit more intensely.
And this matter wasn't something that needed to be kept secret. Although the Chairwoman suggested they not disclose it to the students to avoid mass panic, it was fine among the trainers. After all, compared to horse girls, trainers, as humans, were undoubtedly much more fragile and more likely to become targets. Even if he didn't tell Yosuke about this now, before he left the Chairwoman's office, she had already started preparing a mass message to inform the trainers of the seriousness of the situation and to have them heighten their guard.
There was another point. Shinji remembered that at the welcome party, Yosuke had said that in the years he wasn't a trainer, he had been working part-time in the city where the main Tracen campus was located. Therefore, Shinji thought he might know something about the situation here and wanted to ask him if he could think of anything, like a suspicious organization.
"Well, I'm just an ordinary part-timer..."
Although shocked by Shinji's words, Yosuke still smiled bitterly and shook his head. "I'm only good at being a trainer. I'm not very good at other things. And because of my personality, I rarely participate in social activities. I probably know even less than you do, Trainer Kitahara. How could I possibly..."
As he was speaking, Yosuke's words suddenly stopped, and he frowned.
Wait a minute, speaking of which, he did seem to know of such a suspicious organization.
"Trainer Kitahara, I don't know if this counts." He frowned, trying hard to recall. "A while before I joined Tracen, someone did approach me, saying they wanted me to join them and offered a very high price. But they didn't seem like decent people, so I refused."
As if Tracen, where someone shatters their pelvis every now and then, is very decent, Shinji complained internally, then spoke.
"What's the name of that organization?"
Yosuke's brows furrowed tightly. "I remember, they, they seemed to call themselves..."
"Black Forest."
...
"Teio, you're just in time."
Just as Tokai Teio pushed open the door to the student council room, before she could even speak, Symboli Rudolf looked up, her expression serious.
"I was just about to look for you."
"What's wrong, President?"
"According to news from the Chairwoman, an organization called 'Black Forest' is targeting Tracen for some reason and is now trying to deal with us in various ways. One of the main targets is you."
Symboli Rudolf's tone was serious.
"You, and that trainer with a problem in his head, are in a very dangerous situation."
-------
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