“Kyaaaaaah—!”
“E-everyone, step back!”
Panicked screams from the medical staff echoed inside and outside the examination room. Shards of broken glass were trampled miserably under fleeing footsteps, scattering like sharp powder.
Amid the intermittent vibrations and falling medical equipment, voices struggling to calm someone leaked out. However, they were soon suppressed and buried under fierce shouts and unleashed mana, unable to accomplish anything.
“Commander, this way!”
At the same time, outside the infirmary, hurried footsteps came through the main entrance. Among the medical staff rushing straight for the examination room, Hugo’s face was tight with anxiety.
The root of the problem was that he’d been delayed since early morning, finishing incomplete reports for the higher-ups—including Abraham—and discussing the handcuff issue with Deputy Commander Shorendo.
I should have accompanied him...
As the vibrations shaking his heart drew closer, Hugo’s mouth went dry.
He shouldn’t have left him alone. His mind filled with worst-case thoughts.
Fearing the same nightmare as before would unfold, he abandoned decorum and overtook the medical staff, cutting down the corridor at full speed. Finding the examination room wasn’t difficult. Following the commotion and screams, the energy of Leonardo engraved within him led him straight to his destination.
“Oh, y-you’re here!”
“Commander!”
In front of the tattered examination room door, opened and closed over and over, the medical staff were huddled together, trembling. Some greeted Hugo like they’d found a savior, but most just stared blankly at one spot, pale-faced, unaware he’d even arrived.
“Blaine!! Calm down, please—!”
Meanwhile, Flynn’s voice grated sharply through the broken window. Hugo’s spine went cold for a moment.
“Move aside.”
He shoved through the crowd at once. The moment he neared the entrance, the smell of blood hit him, relentless.
His heart hammered, and indistinct clamor lurked close. Then, as he stepped into the examination room, the devastation inside unfolded before Hugo’s eyes.
Finely shattered glass fragments threatened the soles of his shoes, but he had no time to care.
“Haa, ha.”
“Stop—stop it!”
Broken furniture and medical equipment were strewn about as if a beast had clawed through everything. Scattered glass shards and transparent cylinders on carts were engulfed in flames, exploding with a boom. In the middle of the pandemonium, bright red bloodstains stretched long across the floor like splattered paint.
And in the midst of it all, Flynn—his voice hoarse from shouting—was clutching a panting blond man, pleading in what was almost a scream.
Hugo could only stand there, frozen in shock.
Leonardo, drawing rough breaths, wore the face of a fierce yaksha, blood dripping from his chin and fingertips.
“...Leo.”
With difficulty, Hugo forced his frozen lips to move and barely called his name. In response, the beast’s eyes—pupils contracted—snapped to Hugo.
An alien killing intent lived in those golden eyes. Hugo instinctively held his breath, just as he had the first time he’d encountered Leonardo.
The two stared at each other, locked in a standoff. In the silence that abruptly fell, tension thickened—until a low, growling murmur pressed first.
“Did you order this?”
It was a single sentence, bare with taut nerves and wariness. Hugo hesitated.
“What?”
A breath laced with metal drifted through the air again. Beside Leonardo, an exhausted Flynn buried his face against Leonardo’s shoulder, gripping the upper body he was holding as if afraid to let go.
Not understanding, Hugo furrowed his brow and asked again.
“What do you mean, Leonardo.”
“Did you order them to put me to sleep and draw my blood?”
The moment the words left him, red lips continued in a flat monotone—packed with anger. Hugo fell silent.
Silence is affirmation. But it wasn’t clear whether Leonardo was furious about the blood draw itself, or about the attempt to force him to sleep. Either way, it was anger with a reason—they’d acted without his consent. Still, the priority was calming him before he got hurt again.
“Yes. I did give that order. But Leo, listen to me.”
Hugo answered evenly, but Leonardo’s eyes trembled. Blood that had run down his fingertips dripped to the floor, one or two drops at a time, as if marking his dwindling patience.
“To check whether there was any toxicity left in your blood, there was no other way but to draw it. If you were asleep, you wouldn’t feel any discomfort, so I ordered them to do it while you were sleeping.”
Keeping his voice as gentle as he could, Hugo also signaled quietly to the medical staff behind him to step back. As trembling footsteps hurried away, Leonardo’s eyes flicked after them. Hugo quickly planted himself with his back to the door and continued.
“Of course, not asking for your consent beforehand was my mistake. You must have been shocked—I understand. But—”
“When I fall asleep, how much more were you planning to take?”
Leonardo cut him off, letting out a bitter sneer.
“Did that bastard tell you to bring it? Does he need more from me again? Ha. Just how long...”
His blood-smeared face twisted, and Leonardo suddenly clutched his forehead as if in pain, shaking his head and rambling, words slipping out in fragments.
“...What?”
Hugo paused at the incomprehensible muttering. His expression hardened ❖ Nоvеl𝚒ght ❖ (Exclusive on Nоvеl𝚒ght) as he watched Leonardo’s words and movements closely.
“Creepy bastard. I should kill him... Ah, fuck. I’m dizzy.”
Those were words Hugo hadn’t heard from him in a long time. Hugo’s eyes crumpled slightly. He held his breath without meaning to, afraid they might be aimed at him—but listening carefully, it didn’t sound like they were.
More importantly, Leonardo’s condition was wrong. He didn’t collapse only because Flynn was holding him, but his legs kept staggering, likely from excessive blood loss.
Dragging his feet, swaying, Leonardo lurched toward a surgical cart standing alone to one side.
Still gripping him tight, Flynn looked up at him—trembling. Leonardo stared down at Flynn with indifferent eyes, then reached out and picked up a sharp piece of glass from the cart.
...!
He held it tip-down, only his thumb braced upward. It was unmistakably the grip of someone about to stab.
“Leo!”
Hugo shouted, instantly concentrating his mana to draw streams of water from the pools of blood. At the same time, the shard in Leonardo’s hand—sharp enough to bite into skin—was instantly slicked with red.
Whatever he was trying to do, both of them were in danger. Hugo rushed forward, wrapping Leonardo’s arms tightly with water streams.
But Leonardo was faster.
Splash—
A red line splattered diagonally across Hugo’s face, from just a step away.
“...”
Leonardo had slashed his own left palm with the shard. Bright blood burst out like a fountain from the torn flesh.
Seeing it up close, Hugo’s face didn’t just go white—it went blue. The droplets streaking across his pale skin ran down with sickening clarity.
“Leonardo—!”
Hugo barked, grabbing Leonardo’s wrist and twisting it outward, forcing it open. Pain flashed, and Leonardo’s brow furrowed as the shard dropped from his hand.
Clang—
The piece rolled across the floor, so coated in red its shape was hard to make out. Leonardo’s eyes tracked it as if searching, then he lifted his left hand—only half-cut through—and held it out. Then, as if squeezing juice, he clenched his fist.
Squelch, plop plop—
Blue veins stood out on the back of his hand. Blood spread between the lines of his palm with a wet squelch. Then a thick amount oozed out in clumps and dropped to the floor. It mixed with the already swollen puddles, soaking Leonardo’s white examination gown and Hugo’s uniform trousers—red, damp.
At the same time, bloodshot golden eyes glared at Hugo as Leonardo muttered:
“If you want it so badly, take it.”
“...”
“But—right in front of me.”
Leonardo, thrusting a blood-slick fist toward him with a grave expression, looked like madness itself. Unlike usual, the light had gone from his golden eyes; focus had long since slipped, even as they remained fixed on the other person.
But the same was true of the blue eyes facing him. Intelligence had drained from Hugo’s gaze, too. This wasn’t a moment where he could afford to “come to his senses.”
Hugo lowered his gaze, following the drops pouring from Leonardo’s trembling fist like an hourglass.
It was enough blood loss that it wouldn’t have been strange if he died.
His hands and feet wouldn’t move easily, but forcing himself through it, Hugo clamped down on Leonardo’s wrist, hard—trying to stop the flow.
Leonardo’s expression, murderous a moment ago, twisted further. His eyelids trembled violently as his body swayed. He looked like he wanted to fight, to tear free, but dizziness had stolen obedience from his limbs. Eventually, still gripping Flynn’s collar, he lost his balance and slowly pitched forward.
Hugo kicked a nearby surgical cart out of the way, dropped his stance, and threw his arms out. Leonardo, collapsing with Flynn, went limp into him, and Hugo caught both of them by a hair’s breadth.
The medical team, watching from outside, peered in and confirmed Leonardo had lost consciousness. Responding to Hugo’s call, they moved in unison and forcibly administered a sedative to Leonardo’s limp arm.
Even as they hurried to treat the torn left palm, Hugo just knelt on the blood-soaked floor, staring down at the two of them, blank.
He had no sense of reality—of how this moment was even passing. He almost hoped it was a nightmare brought on by days without sleep.
