Chapter 23: Choosing A Weapon!
The morning sun had barely begun to peek through the high, clear windows of the dormitory when Ren stirred from his bed with a grin stretched across his face like a kid on his birthday.
It was one of those rare, perfectly blissful wake-ups; the kind where you don't immediately remember your problems or your responsibilities, just the warmth of the sheets and the lingering dream of victory.
For a moment, he just lay there, watching the faint light dance across the walls, breathing in the scent of clean linen and delicious breakfast bread wafting from the canteen down the street.
Then, with a slow turn of his head, he saw Lia curled up like a sleeping cat on her bed across the room, one hand over her mouth and the other lazily dangling off the side.
She looked peaceful... and totally unaware of the way her towel fiasco had practically rewritten the script for the most hilarious moment of Ren's year.
He snorted to himself, barely suppressing the urge to cackle.
"She's never gonna live that down," he muttered under his breath, the corner of his lips twitching upward in wicked amusement.
But he wasn't so evil that he'd wake her up just to laugh again. He moved like a whisper, slipping out of bed and tiptoeing toward the private washroom.
A quick splash of water, a mental checklist of the day's tasks, and a sharp, focused gleam returned to his eyes.
Today wasn't just another day. No, today was one of the most critical steps in his plan to stomp Mirabella's smug face into the ground in two weeks' time.
It was Weapon Day!