Exiled Prince: I'm the Unexpected Extra in the Novel

Chapter 217: The Snow Fort

Chapter 217: The Snow Fort

When the bell rang for recess, the majority of the students couldn’t resist the charm of the falling snow despite the cold and quickly flocked to the courtyard.

Only a few people remained in Class 1B. Cassian sat at his desk by the window, watching the students having snowball fights outside.

At that moment, the classroom door opened.

The few students inside began to whisper in surprise when they saw the person entering. It was Imperial Princess Celine, with her flawless blonde hair and noble posture. Her coming to this class, especially during recess, could only mean one thing: she must have come to visit Saintess Alicia of the Holy Church.

But the students’ surprise doubled when they saw the second person walking in right behind Celine: the Eastern genius with the wide straw hat, Lunox. The even weirder and more absurd part was... in Lunox’s hands, which usually held a sword with such absolute seriousness, were a small red plastic toy bucket and a yellow shovel.

Celine and Lunox didn’t even bother looking toward where Saintess Alicia was sitting.

When Celine reached Cassian’s desk, she put on her sweet, cute smile.

"Cassian, do you want to play in the snow?" Celine asked, trying to keep her voice as cheerful as possible.

Cassian slowly turned his head from the window. He looked first at Celine, then at Lunox standing right behind her with an extremely serious expression, holding a red toy bucket and a yellow shovel. His eyes locked onto the plastic bucket and shovel.

"No," Cassian said, his voice flat and dismissive as always.

Lunox chimed in, raising the yellow shovel in his hand into the air. "We can build a snow fort!"

Cassian furrowed his brows slightly. His mental image of the ’Eastern genius Lunox’ was a taciturn killing machine who lived only for his sword, extremely serious, antisocial, and indifferent to everything around him. And now, he was talking about building a snow fort with a shovel in his hand.

"Why are you so excited about this?" Cassian asked, a rare hint of confusion in his voice.

Lunox pressed the bucket and shovel to his chest and replied. "Why? Because I’ve never played in the snow with my friends before."

The chatter in the classroom stopped for a moment.

Lunox continued to explain emotionlessly, as if staring at a blank wall: "I had no friends when I was in the East. Because I spent too much time on my sword training and was annoyingly talented compared to my peers, the other kids were always jealous of me and stayed away. In the winter, when it snowed, they would build snow forts together while I just watched those forts from afar and chopped trees with my wooden sword. So... yes, I want to build a snow fort with my friends."

This lonely and sorrowful story, told in a completely flat and emotionless tone, touched even Celine’s cunning heart. The princess pouted with genuine empathy and pity. She gently placed her hand on Lunox’s shoulder.

"Oh, Lunox... That is truly so sad. But don’t worry, you have us now," Celine said in an affectionate voice.

Lunox stared blankly at the hand on his shoulder for a second. Then, he stepped slightly to the side, slipping out of Celine’s grasp. As he brushed off his shoulder with his hand, he whispered to himself in a voice that wasn’t quiet at all:

"I guess I’ll have to wash my clothes again."

The affectionate, pitying expression on Celine’s face instantly froze. Her cheeks turned beet red with anger as she clenched her fists. "Hey! I was sympathizing with you here! What do you mean you have to wash them?!" she yelled angrily.

All the students in the class turned toward this weird trio, and the whispers grew louder. Cassian knew that these curious eyes and drawing this much attention was too much, even for him. With a sigh, he slowly stood up from his desk.

"Let’s play then," Cassian said, simply to get away from the noise and the crowd.

A very faint glint appeared in Lunox’s eyes, and he gripped his toy shovel tightly.

---

The trio passed through the main courtyard full of student groups and arrived at the back of the academy’s massive gardens—a wooded area covered in a pristine, pure white blanket of snow where no one had set foot yet.

As they trudged through the snow, Celine wrapped her arms around her cloak and tried to make small talk.

"By the way... the snowfall really surprised me," Celine said, looking around. "Just yesterday we could barely breathe because of the heat. Today, everywhere is white. I wonder what caused it? Are they running a new climate test or something?"

Lunox replied in a deadpan tone as he set his bucket down on the ground:

"Cassian did it."

Celine giggled slightly upon hearing this. "Why are you laughing?" Lunox asked.

"Huh? What do you mean why? Because you’re joking, of course," Celine said, maintaining her smile. "Making it snow over the entire capital in a single night? You don’t actually expect me to believe a student could do that."

"I’m serious," Lunox said, looking at Cassian without blinking.

Cassian glanced at Lunox over his shoulder. ’Just how strong is this kid’s intuition?’ he thought to himself.

"Right, Cassian?" Lunox asked, directing the question straight at him. "You did it."

Celine turned to Cassian, that mocking smile still on her lips, waiting for him to say ’don’t be ridiculous.’

Instead, Cassian slipped his hands into his pockets, looked at Celine with his freezing red eyes, and spoke quite casually:

"Yeah. I did."

Celine’s feet rooted to the spot. The other two stopped with her. The smile on Celine’s lips slowly faded, replaced by deep worry and doubt.

"Wait, wait, wait..." Celine muttered, taking a step back. "If this is a joke... it’s not funny anymore. Changing the capital’s climate in a single night... No one can do that. That is a power reserved for the Gods."

Lunox crossed his arms and shot Celine a dirty look. "Are you claiming to be friends with someone without even knowing who you’re friends with? What were you saying in the canteen yesterday?"

"He’s just a student like us!" Celine snapped, raising her voice, as if trying to convince herself. "Just... a little too mysterious and talented! That’s all!"

"Is that so?" Lunox said, narrowing his eyes. "Then what about that explo—"

Before Lunox could even finish his sentence, Cassian materialized right behind him and clamped his hand tightly over the boy’s mouth.

Lunox’s words turned into a muffled groan. "Mmhph!"

Cassian let go.

"What?" Lunox whispered. "Was that a secret?"

"Yes," Cassian said, sighing in exasperation.

"Oh," Lunox said, shrugging without feeling the slightest bit of embarrassment. "Sorry."

Then he turned back to Celine. His face was as serious as a brick wall. There wasn’t a hint of a joke in his voice. "I was kidding."

That thoroughly unconvincing, serious tone caused Celine to freeze in place. *The explosion in the North...* echoed in her mind. Two years ago, the legendary, apocalyptic explosion that engulfed the entire North. This boy... Cassian... Was he connected to that disaster?!

Celine’s face went pale as a sheet. Her knees were about to give out. She thought she had gained a powerful ally, but in reality, she had willingly walked right up to an apocalyptic monster wearing human skin, capable of destroying the world.

In a flash, she slipped her noble princess mask back onto her face and gave a fake, trembling smile.

"Ah... I get it, I get it! So it was a joke!" she said, her voice shaking. She hurriedly turned around. "Um... I need to get back to class! I think I forgot something... Hehe. You guys build your fort, I’ll catch up later!"

Just as she turned her back, desperate to run away from the terrifying monster and the blunt swordsman...

She felt a freezing breath right behind her ear, on the nape of her neck. The voice felt as if it were whispering directly into her mind.

"Where are you going... FRIEND?"

Celine flinched violently. Her shoulders jumped, her legs got tangled, and losing her balance, she fell flat on her back onto the thick blanket of snow with a loud shriek.

When she opened her eyes, she saw Cassian leaning directly over her with his pure white hair and blood-red eyes.

"Uhh... I-I... I was just..." Celine stammered, her heart pounding so hard from fear it felt like it would punch through her ribs.

Cassian’s black-gloved right hand slowly reached out to her. Thinking her end had come and that he was going to silence her right then and there for learning his secret, Celine squeezed her eyes shut in terror and buried her head in the snow.

But the fatal blow she expected never came. Cassian’s hand simply took her trembling hand gently, pulling her up from the snow as if she weighed no more than a feather.

"You can go back to class later," Cassian said, his voice calm. He pointed with his fingers to a flat area a few meters away. "That spot is clean. We can play there."

Without saying anything else, Cassian turned around and started walking toward the clear area with Lunox.

Celine just stood there in the snow on trembling legs. Even though a massive storm of anxiety and fear raged inside her, screaming *’who did I just make friends with?’*... she took a deep breath.

Now was not the time to think about this or try to run. She couldn’t run. She had to play this dangerous game by their rules, at least for today. With shaky steps, she followed the two monsters.

---

The playtime started much weirder than she had expected.

"For the structural integrity of the walls," Lunox said, piling snow together with his yellow shovel, "just packing the snow isn’t enough. We must compress them with mana. If we build the wall at a forty-five-degree angle, it will be more resilient against ballistic attacks."

"It’s a snow fort, you idiot! Not a military bunker," Celine said, kneeling on the ground and rolling snow with her hands. "Plus, it needs a tower! Ice icicles on the windows... Add a little aesthetics to it!"

"Aesthetics are useless in battle," Lunox muttered. He raised his yellow shovel into the air like a sword. "Sword Aura: First Form - Snow Carver!" he shouted, swinging the shovel. He sliced through a block of snow half a meter in size perfectly into a smooth square, cutting it like butter without a single millimeter of deviation.

Celine’s jaw dropped. "Did you... just resort to your sword aura to cut a block for a snow fort?!"

Cassian, on the other hand, completely ignored their ridiculous argument and was building a small snowman.

As time passed, the fear inside Celine slowly gave way to a childish joy.

Her luxurious cloak was covered in snow, her blonde hair ruined. At one point, thanks to a clump of snow Lunox accidentally threw at her, a short, chaotic snowball fight even broke out among them. It had been a long time since the princess had felt this free outside the rules of the palace.

The trio was building the final wall of their massive snow fort, which looked more like a military bunker than a castle.

Right at that moment... Cassian’s eyes widened.

His gaze locked onto a small group of girls walking toward them. The students were laughing, strolling across the snow.

And right in the middle of that group was Iris, her red hair shining like a flame against the snow.

"She..."

Cassian quickly crouched down. He dropped to his knees, ducking right behind the snow wall.

"Cassian?"

Celine dropped the clump of snow in her hands and looked at him in surprise.

"What’s wrong?" Celine asked, whispering with concern.

Cassian didn’t answer; he just lowered his head a bit more.

When Celine looked in the direction Cassian had been staring, she saw the group of girls. She didn’t understand why or who he was looking at.

Without thinking, she quickly reached out and snatched the straw hat right off Lunox’s head without permission.

Even though Lunox protested with a "Hey!", Celine shushed him. She quickly shoved the hat onto Cassian’s head, completely hiding his face, and using her own body as a shield, she huddled tightly behind the snow fort.

The group of girls walked past them, letting out cheerful laughs. Iris looked around at the snowy scenery as if enchanted, not even noticing the weird trio behind the wall. Their footsteps faded away and disappeared.

Celine carefully peeked back over her shoulder. "All clear," she said, relaxing.

Cassian slowly straightened up. His face was still hidden under that wide straw hat. His red eyes shone through the straw as he looked at Celine.

"Thank you," Cassian whispered. This was perhaps the most sincere, most ordinarily human sentence she had heard from him.

Celine smiled while still kneeling in the snow. "You’re welcome!" she said in a happy and cheerful tone. For that moment, she didn’t care why Cassian had hidden.

Right at that moment, the Academy’s bell rang. It was time for class.

As Lunox took his hat back from Cassian’s head, Celine dusted herself off and stood up. Completely ignoring the warning sound of the bell, she started packing the clump of snow in her hand again.

"Come on," Celine said, her eyes sparkling. "Our fort isn’t finished yet. We need to build the roof."