Chapter 2: From Truck to Treasure
Pain.
Not the kind of pain one expects after being hit by a truck. This one was more like—
"...A heatstroke in a sauna," Souta groaned, cracking one eye open like a hungover squirrel crawling out of a manhole.
The air was thick. Muggy. Scented with something floral and suspiciously sensual. And then came the uncomfortable realization that something sticky was clinging between his legs, and his abdomen was throbbing like he’d just done a thousand crunches with a watermelon inside.
"Am I in hell?" he croaked, dragging himself upright on a hard-ass mattress. The room looked like someone had decorated it using a medieval fantasy Pinterest board. Stone walls. Wooden furniture. A weird coat of arms that screamed rich dead people lived here.
"What kind of hospital is this...?" he muttered, still foggy.
That’s when the door banged open with enough force to dislodge his soul.
"Young Master! You’re awake!" a man cried, rushing in with a theatrical flourish. "You had us worried sick!"
"WHAT THE HELL?!" Souta squawked, whipping around to see a white-haired man in a perfectly pressed black suit barreling toward him like an emotional freight train.
The stranger looked like every butler from every aristocratic drama ever aired—dignified, elegant... and dangerously close to sobbing.
"I feared the worst when you fainted in the rose garden!" he gasped. "Do you feel lightheadedness? A fever? Dizziness? Delirium? Are you seeing angels? Smelling lavender?"