The Underground Council did not retaliate immediately.
That was their first move.
At Prison School, silence was never absence. It was preparation.
Johnson felt the shift before he could name it. The corridors were the same, the guards followed their routes, classes continued as scheduled—but something subtle had tightened. Conversations ended when he approached. Doors that once remained ajar now closed without explanation. Schedules changed without notice.
Pressure. Applied carefully. Invisibly.
By the second day, the effects became measurable.
Mika was the first to feel it.
She stormed into the abandoned gymnasium where Johnson trained alone, frustration written across her face. "They reassigned me," she said sharply. "Different dorm wing. No explanation. No appeal."
Johnson wiped sweat from his brow, unbothered. "Isolation through inconvenience," he said calmly. "Expected."
She stared at him. "You knew this would happen."
"I knew something would."
She hesitated, then lowered her voice. "They're trying to make us choose."
Johnson met her gaze. "They're trying to see who fractures first."
Mika clenched her fists. "And what if I do?"
"Then you'll know exactly what matters to you," he replied.
That answer did not comfort her—but it grounded her.
Elsewhere, Hana experienced pressure of a different kind.
Her authority within the disciplinary structure began to erode. Minor decisions were overturned. Reports delayed. Instructions contradicted. Not openly—never openly—but enough to undermine her sense of control.
She confronted Johnson that evening on the rooftop, her posture rigid, eyes sharp.
"They're targeting me through you," she said.
Johnson didn't deny it. "You're efficient. They need you uncertain."
Her jaw tightened. "You're turning me into a liability."
"No," he replied evenly. "They are."
She stepped closer, her voice dropping. "If I fall, you lose leverage."
Johnson studied her carefully. "If you fall," he said, "it will be because you tried to hold a system together that no longer serves you."
Her silence spoke louder than words.
The silver-haired girl noticed the patterns first.
She mapped them quietly—who was reassigned, who was delayed, who was suddenly under scrutiny. One evening in the library, she slid a folded paper across the table toward Johnson.
"They're testing the perimeter," she said. "Seeing which nodes destabilize the network."
He unfolded it. Names. Times. Subtle correlations.
"You're already countering them," he observed.
She nodded. "Information moves faster than authority when people feel cornered."
"And you?" he asked. "What do you feel?"
She hesitated, just long enough to matter. "Curious," she said. "And alert."
The black-haired girl, meanwhile, became a ghost.
She avoided Johnson publicly, never appearing where patterns could be drawn. Instead, she moved through the academy's informal channels—listening, collecting, seeding quiet doubt.
When she finally spoke to him again, it was brief.
"They're pushing stress fractures," she said. "But they're afraid to consolidate."
"Why?" Johnson asked.
"Because consolidation admits threat."
He smiled faintly. "Good."
By the end of the week, the Underground Council made their next move.
Not against Johnson.
Against perception.
Rumors surfaced—carefully worded, plausibly deniable. That Johnson manipulated people for personal gain. That proximity to him brought scrutiny. That those around him were becoming expendable.
The intent was clear: make him radioactive.
Johnson responded by doing nothing.
Instead, others acted.
Mika confronted her reassignment publicly. Hana refused to sign an amended report. The silver-haired girl leaked discrepancies in council decisions. The black-haired girl ensured those discrepancies reached the right ears.
None of it traced back to Johnson.
That was the point.
Late one night, Johnson received a message—unsigned, routed through an obsolete channel.
You're forcing escalation.
He replied with a single line.
You escalated the moment you noticed me.
The response came minutes later.
This ends badly for everyone involved.
Johnson stared at the screen, expression unreadable.
Then he deleted the message.
The following morning, the academy awoke to tension thick enough to taste.
Students whispered. Guards hesitated. Authority felt… negotiable.
Johnson walked through the courtyard as eyes followed him—not with fear, not with admiration, but with expectation.
He had become a variable the system could no longer ignore.
And variables, once introduced, could not be removed without consequence.
They wanted pressure without hands, he thought.
Now they'll learn what pressure with intent looks like.