"Varian!" Her sad voice reverberated through the barren lands.
The healing medicine was yet to mend her wounds, but Sarah somehow hauled herself just a bit more.
She covered just a bit more distance. Called his name just once more.
Just a bit more…
"Argh" her condition didn't allow her anything more.
Even though she tried her best, Sarah's body shut itself.
The healing potion Varian administered slowly started to work.
Sarah gave him a few potions before they headed for the mission. She wanted him to be prepared in case he encountered a level 3 monster.
The quality of medicine was high enough and just kept her alive.
Had she given him a slightly inferior potion, then she would have died.
As she slowly collapsed, Sarah only felt endless darkness engulfing her, and she lost consciousness.
***
"Do you want to die?!" Seth growled at the security guard blocking him.
"Sir, please understand. This is privileged students' dorm. Even teachers need to take permission before they enter." The guard replied with a professional smile.
"I know Sarah. Check the logs. I visited her many times." He argued.
"But you didn't get her permission." The guard replied nonchalantly.
"She's not replying. I'll just ask her after entering." Seth clenched his fist.
"That's really regrettable, sir. However, I am unable to do anything." The guard replied. His words sounded sincere, but his face was gloating.
Looking at the mockery in the guard's eyes, Seth lost it.
He raised his hand and slapped the face of the unruly guard with the back of his palm.
It was so sudden and was so fast that the guard couldn't even react.
Crack!
The guard spun and crashed to the ground. All his teeth were broken.
"Blurgh! " He spat his teeth out, along with a lot of blood.
"You think Xanders care about you?" Seth's blood boiled.
If Charles Xander didn't isolate Varian in the first place, Varian would've just gone to mission in a group and none of this would've happened.
"Do you think you're doing a service to humanity by suppressing a genius?" Seth's face twisted, and he kicked the guard.
Crack!
The guard curled up into a ball as he felt his ribs break. Despite being a Level 5, he was useless against Seth.
However, instead of fearing, he glared at Seth. "What do you know? You don't know what's its like to never progress. Spending years after years only to realize you'll never go higher."
He winced in pain, but continued, "Will you pay my kid's tuition? Will you get him the defense armor so that he won't die in frontline?"
"Two wrongs don't make a right." Seth calmed down after two beatings and replied.
"If I don't do it, someone else will. Look behind me, there are some 20 guards. Someone will do it." He yelled without remorse.
Seth fell silent.
He hated the system.
He hated the society more.
He hated himself the most.
'I know exactly what's its like. Spending years realizing I'll never go higher.' Seth sighed and was about to step forward.
He saw a few more guards gathering at the gate. They were all looking at him with anticipation and greed.
There was no fear among them.
"Bastards." Seth cursed and turned back.
The guards were disappointed and looked at their injured colleague with envy.
By reporting this to the Xanders, he'd earn more than his year's salary.
If fear kept people away from Varian, then it was an incentive that turned many hostile against him.
'The whole system is rotten.' Seth was on his way back to his dorm as he spotted a garden.
It was the same garden where he became a tutor for the first time. The time when he gained this eccentric, talented genius.
'Varian…' Seth walked in and reached the pavilion near the lake.
The past replayed before his eyes. He still remembered their banter.
'You, little fellow, will be someone important. If I tutor you, won't I get even more respected?'
Seth's body trembled.
He sat on the pavilion steps as he sighed in anger, sorrow, and despair.
Their relationship was short-lived. He thought he was a madman, and he'd torture his pupil until he requested to reduce the training.
It turned out his pupil was a bigger madman.
Varian struggled in the initial days, but as he adapted to the training, he started waking Seth early to train.
'It was torture to wake up so early.' Seth laughed, recalling those awful mornings, but the corner of his eyes turned red.
He couldn't hold himself anymore and covered his face. He didn't know why, but his palms were wet.
"I'm sorry." He muttered.
'If only I didn't choose Sarah's team. If I only I picked someone else.'
The voice inside his head didn't stop.
"Tutor Seth, we'll train one more hour today." His annoying greeting in the early morning.
"Damn old man. Why are you beating me so much?" His curses after being beaten.
"I'll tell Wendy you want to date her if you don't wake up." His occasional funny threats when he refused to wake up.
'Why?'
Seth stood up and took a deep breath. He lost his family once. He didn't know he would experience the loss again.
'If I didn't ask you to be my pupil, you could've at least survived.'
After his contact with Varian, Seth believed even though it would be dangerous, Varian had more chances of surviving a solo mission.
"I'll weed out everyone under this." He muttered.
"Mr. Seth." A weak voice sounded.
Seth looked up and saw Sarah's haggard face.
"You…" he was at a loss for words.
"I'm sorry." Sarah trembled and clenched her fist.
"He saved everyone twice. But we…" Her words were struck in her throat.
Seth wanted to scold her. Rebuke her. But in the end, it only turned into a helpless sigh.
"How is everyone else?" He asked, his voice apathetic.
"Thanks to him, they're alive." Sarah closed her eyes and said.
"I only accepted him because of you. But for us, he..." She shook her head wryly.
Seth felt something boil inside him and he declared, "I am proud of him."
Sarah looked up at him in confusion.
"I don't know what went through his mind, but I believe he did what he felt was right. If he saved you, it means he thought you were worth saving." A smile formed on his face.
Sarah looked at him for a moment and said slowly.
"Varian… might be alive."
"What?!"