The hum of the cafeteria seemed to fade into a distant, underwater murmur as Bill Maël's voice took absolute command of the table. Around the large mahogany circle, the "Monsters" of Krow City sat in a heavy, respectful silence that felt almost sacred. Even the air seemed to thicken, vibrating with the ghost of a story that had been buried beneath layers of prestige and silence for too long. Belt watched the Captain closely, noting the way the overhead lights cast deep, jagged shadows across his face, making him look less like a student and more like a weary soldier recounting a lost war. This wasn't the confident leader who commanded the pitch with a sharp whistle; this was a man reopening a surgical wound that had never truly been allowed to close.
"Everything started for me last year," Maël started, his voice dropping into a low, gravelly register that made the freshmen lean in. "I arrived at this academy not as a celebrated recruit, but as a ghost. I was a victim of a violent transfer, kicked out of my previous school with a brutality that left me hollow and questioning every choice I'd ever made. At the time, I was reckless—a mountain of muscle with no direction, searching desperately for anything that could give a concrete meaning to my existence. I felt discarded, like a weapon someone had forged and then thrown away because they were afraid of the edge."
He leaned forward, his large hands clenching on the mahogany table until the wood groaned under the pressure. His knuckles were white, and his eyes were fixed on a point in the past that only he could see.
"Back then, my sanctuary wasn't the grass. I didn't care for the roar of the crowd or the tactical complexity of a ball. I lived for the mats. I chose Judo. It was my only solution to the chaos screaming inside me. I participated in every tournament, every grueling, bone-breaking training session I could find. I integrated quickly because Judo wasn't just a sport to me; it was a physical transcription of my soul. I've always loved the raw honesty of a struggle—the way you can express every ounce of rage and hope through a single, explosive throw. On the mats, I wasn't a problem to be solved. I was a man having a magnificent conversation with gravity. It gave a prolific sense to the prowess I craved, a meaning that the world tried to deny me."
Maël let out a sharp, dry laugh that echoed against the glass walls of the hall, sounding hollow and cold.
"But in the eyes of the system, I was just a delinquent. My old high school was a breeding ground for crime—thugs masquerading as students who lived for the thrill of destruction. Because of my size and the way I carried myself, I was branded a 'voyou' before I even opened my mouth. When I applied to move establishments, Director Benite Bam only accepted me under one permanent, suffocating condition: he didn't want another brute in his hallways. He saw this frame," Maël gestured broadly to his shoulders, "and he saw a symbol of brute violence. He gave me my first official warning during our very first meeting, hunting for any sonorous excuse to expel me before the ink on my registration was even dry. He didn't want a student; he wanted a reason to lock the cage. To him, I was a molossus—a beast to be chained and watched."
Belt narrowed his eyes, feeling a strange, dark resonance with the Captain's words. He recognized that feeling—the suffocating weight of being judged by one's biology long before a single word of character was ever spoken.
"I fought against the wind and the tide to adapt," Maël continued, his gaze drifting toward the high windows where the Krow City rain began to smear the glass. "I forced myself to be enigmatic, to learn the rules of a society that clearly didn't want someone like me. It wasn't easy. I was coming from a middle school that had taught me tactical discipline and the core values of life, but I found myself surrounded by idiots fighting over nothing. I prayed for the year to end because, beyond the 'voyou' reputation of that place, it held the keys to promotional scholarships—my only ticket to leave this country and start over. I kept my head down. I played the part of the 'intègre' student. I was a ghost in the machine, counting the days until I could vanish."
"But the system is a hungry machine, and it doesn't like to let go of its assets," Maël's voice dropped an octave, turning into a low rasp. "At the very end of the year, when the sun was finally beginning to feel warm, the principal called me into his office. He congratulated me on my grades. He told me I was a model student. And then, with a cold, administrative smile, he told me it 'wasn't enough' for his vision of the school. Without a clear reason, he handed me a transfer request he had already signed. Destination: Krow City High. I was devastated. I didn't understand the level of rage and value this place demanded. But you don't fight the Empire; you resign yourself to its movements. Two weeks later, I walked through these gates, feeling like a soldier being sent to a front line he never asked to fight on."
The Captain looked toward the library doors, his gaze softening for a brief, human second.
"The first thing I did was ask for the Judo dojo. I needed the mats to keep the darkness at bay. But there was no Judo here. Director Bam... he is a zealot who has turned football into a religion. He idealizes the game to the point of obsession. When I saw the orientation counselor, he didn't see my soul or my history. He saw my shoulders. He told me I was a 'perfect opportunity' for the football team. He didn't want a playmaker; he wanted a molossus. A giant to clog the defense and press attackers until they broke. He wanted a product for the commercial spectacle of the academy, not a human being with a passion."
"I refused," Maël said, his eyes flashing with the memory of that defiance. "I had principles. I didn't want to be a tool for their social image. I decided to write another transfer request, aiming for a more prestigious university-track school where I could return to my Judo and find the life I actually wanted. I spent my mornings in the library, drowning myself in research to plan my escape from Krow City. I was a man with one foot out the door, waiting for the right moment to disappear. That's when I heard it—a sudden, pathetic noise echoing through the silence of the books. It was coming from the restroom nearby."
"Very unexpectedly," Maël said, glancing at Bobby, "I found a young boy, smaller and far less imposing than I was, trapped in a stall. Some 'comrades' had played a cruel joke and jammed the lock from the outside. You should have seen him. He was screaming against the wind and tide, his voice cracking with a desperation that was almost comical: 'Help! Someone! Get me out of here!'"
Bobby blushed, looking down at his plate with a sheepish grin. "I was... having a very long and very embarrassing Tuesday. Don't remind me."
"When I broke that lock and opened the door," Maël laughed softly, the first bit of warmth returning to his voice, "he looked like he wanted to vanish into the pipes. He was so embarrassed his face was practically glowing. But from that day on, we were inseparable. In this cold, imperialist system, we became true friends—the only two people who made sense in a world of pretenders. We were the anomalies. We shared everything. But then, the rift happened. Bobby told me he was going to join the football club. I was furious. I told him he was being used—that they only wanted to exploit his natural talent to polish their own social image and line their pockets while he did the work. I was halfway through a lecture, standing in the hallway near the trophy cases, when the atmospheric pressure in the room suddenly shifted."
The Captain's breath hitched, and the "pressure" in the cafeteria seemed to spike in the present. The freshmen felt a phantom weight on their shoulders as Maël's aura expanded, filling the space with the memory of a fear that hadn't faded with time. It was the feeling of being watched by an apex predator, something that sat at the very top of a hierarchy they couldn't even see.
"It wasn't just a shift in the air," Maël whispered, his eyes wide and fixed on the cafeteria entrance as if he expected a ghost to walk through. "It was a total suppression of the environment. My Judo instincts, the tactical discipline I'd spent years perfecting—everything screamed at me to run, but my legs felt like they were rooted to the floor. The shadow that appeared on the wall seemed to stretch across the entire hallway, swallowing the light and turning the heat into ice."
"A voice came from behind me, cold and heavy as a tombstone. It didn't sound like a student. It sounded like a decree from a throne."
'So... is that how you perceive the Empire we are striving to build?'
"I froze," Maël said, his hands clenching into fists so hard his arms shook. "I turned around, and for the first time in my life, I felt like prey. My muscles meant nothing. My height was a disadvantage. I was staring into the eyes of the man who had built this dynasty with his own two hands and his own ruthless will. The Absolute Monarch of the pitch."
"Vincent Stringler."
"He approached me, and I felt a shiver that wouldn't stop—a vibration that went straight to my marrow. He was perfectly styled, his uniform fitting him like armor, and he commanded the air he breathed. He didn't look like he was going to school; he looked like he was governing a kingdom. I had never felt so small, so utterly exposed. In that moment, the Judo practitioner I was died. I realized that at Krow City, you don't just play a game to have fun. You either serve the Emperor... or you are crushed by the sheer weight of his world."
Maël stopped, his chest heaving slightly. He looked at Belt, then at the others, his eyes burning with a warning.
"That was the day the 'Trio of Angels' began its formation, but it wasn't out of choice. It was out of necessity. We were drawn into Stringler's orbit, and once you are caught in that gravity, there is no escape. You either become a star in his constellation, or you burn out in the darkness."
The silence that followed was absolute. The "Monsters" sat in the shadow of that memory, the weight of Vincent Stringler's name hanging over the table like a guillotine. Belt stared at his hands, his mind racing. He could feel the pressure Maël described, the crushing authority of a man who had claimed the title of Emperor. But in the back of his mind, a new thought began to form—a dark, analytical spark.
If Stringler was the Emperor, Belt thought, his eyes narrowing, then what does that make me?