Chapter 49: Found Something
Only when they had disappeared down the corridor did Ethan finally release the breath he had been holding. He sagged slightly against the wall.
That had been close.
Way too close.
He looked toward Ronan.
So this man had actually saved him?
For a brief second, Ethan almost felt grateful.Then he immediately reminded himself who he was dealing with.
No.
There was no way Ronan had suddenly developed a conscience. The man definitely had an ulterior motive.
True to his thoughts, Ronan’s next words immediately confirmed it.
"Don’t mistake me, Ethan. I’m not doing this for your sake."
Ethan’s expression twitched.
Of course.
Ronan turned toward the well-built men who had accompanied him, men Ethan had barely noticed until now. "Enter his room."
Ethan’s eyes widened.
Ronan’s expression remained completely unreadable. "Search everywhere and don’t leave a single pin unturned."
"What do you mean, search my room?!" Ethan blurted out warily, his heart already practically leaping into his throat.
He immediately moved to block the doorway, his body tensing as the men behind Ronan stepped forward, but there were too many of them. Ethan barely managed to brace himself before the men overpowered him and forced their way inside, with Principal Ronan following behind as though Ethan’s protests were nothing more than an irritating interruption to an order he had already given.
"Yes, Ethan," Ronan said calmly, his expression giving away nothing as he stepped into the room. "We are searching your room. You are currently under investigation."
Ethan whipped around to face him, disbelief flashing across his face.
"Under investigation? Why?"
"After all the recent stunts you have pulled, did you honestly think they would go unnoticed?" Ronan’s voice hardened slightly. "You expect us to simply ignore an incident where a D-Rank Guide successfully guided an S-Class Sentinel who had gone into a rampage, especially when that same Guide was previously registered as an F-Rank?"
Ethan gritted his teeth.
There it was again.
His sudden advancement, Drey’s rampage, his ability to guide him; apparently, every single thing he had done since arriving at the academy had suddenly become suspicious.
He could not believe this man.
"Wow! My recent stunts?" Ethan snapped, unable to hold himself back any longer. "Weren’t you the one who told me to upgrade my rank? Now that I actually did it, you’re questioning me about it. Why? Was there never supposed to be a way for me to advance in the first place? You literally gave me that as a condition, and now that I managed to do it, you’re suddenly suspicious?"
Ronan’s expression darkened.
His hand curled slowly into a fist at his side.
"Watch it, Ethan. You are a student, whereas I am the principal of this academy. You have no right to question me."
Ethan almost scoffed.
Of course.
The moment Ronan had nothing reasonable left to say, he pulled rank.
Meanwhile, the men had already begun rummaging through his room, opening drawers, checking shelves, looking beneath his bed and inspecting every corner as though Ethan had somehow transformed his humble dorm room into a criminal hideout overnight.
Ethan swallowed hard.
He had no idea exactly what they were searching for.
More importantly, he had no idea whether Aster’s book would implicate him if they found it.
His stomach twisted at the thought.
He had not used the book since arriving in this room, which meant he had barely even thought about where he had left it. Now, with several people tearing through his belongings, that uncertainty suddenly became terrifying.
What if they find it?
Ethan forced himself to remain still.
He could not panic.
If he started acting suspiciously now, Ronan would notice immediately, and Ethan had no intention of handing the bastard evidence that he was hiding something.
So he kept his expression as calm as he could manage while his eyes carefully followed the movements of the academy personnel.
Ronan, however, seemed determined to make the situation even more uncomfortable.
"If you have nothing to hide, then you should be perfectly calm and reassured, shouldn’t you?" he remarked, his gaze moving across every inch of the room as he watched his men search. "But somehow, I doubt that."
Ethan let out a quiet snort.
"Reassured? Why the hell would I be reassured when I’m dealing with you?"
Ronan’s eyes narrowed.
At this point, Ethan was done pretending to respect the man simply because he happened to be the principal. Ronan had dragged him out of class, stopped him from leaving the academy with his parents only for him to order for his room to be searched, and now had several men going through his belongings.
Ethan had had enough.
"Who knows?" he continued, folding his arms across his chest. "With how much you seem to dislike me, how am I supposed to know you won’t plant something in my room and frame me with it, sir?"
"Ethan Ashford, mind your words!"
Ethan raised a brow.
"If you don’t find anything today, then I hope you’ll finally leave me alone and stop watching me and suspecting me like I’m some kind of criminal!"
The words landed heavily in the room.
Ronan stared at him, his expression growing darker by the second.
How could this boy be so disrespectful?
Ethan was standing in front of the academy principal and speaking as though he had completely forgotten who he was talking to.
Yet despite his growing anger, something else was beginning to bother Ronan far more.
The search had been going on for several minutes.
They had checked almost everything.
And they still had found nothing.
Ronan’s gaze swept across the room again, his jaw tightening as he watched another one of his men search through Ethan’s belongings.
Where is it?
There had to be something.
Everything surrounding Ethan’s recent advancement was too strange to simply dismiss as coincidence.
Then, just as Ronan’s patience was beginning to wear thin, one of the men suddenly stopped.
His hand rose.
"Sir."
The entire room seemed to still.
Ronan immediately turned toward him.
The man’s expression had changed, his eyes fixed on something he had just discovered.
"We found something unusual, sir."