The train hummed along the tracks, cutting through the city lights in a soft golden blur. None of them spoke.
Tanaka sat by the window, chin in hand, eyes glazed over in a distant sort of bliss. The world outside was moving fast, but inside his head, he was somewhere else entirely, replaying the glint of silver, the faint tremor in her voice, and the way the light had caught her hair when she turned away.
Lise Valkera. The knight who could've killed him ten times over and the girl who now lived rent-free in his daydreams.
He let out a long, dramatic sigh, the kind that carried the weight of one man's self-inflicted tragedy. "Ah," he murmured to the window, voice full of gentle melancholy, "my goddess of the arena… Fate is cruel to keep us apart."
The sigh echoed.
Then exploded.
"HUH?!" Kieran was the first to snap, whipping his head around so fast his hair nearly slapped Brock in the face. "You threw that match because you fell for her?!"
"I didn't throw it," Tanaka said calmly, still not looking away from the window. "I… offered her a poetic victory." Now that Tanaka was thinking to himself, she is letting off a lot of prana compared to him so he would have gotten rekt if the match had carried on.
"THAT'S LITERALLY THROWING IT," Kieran roared, half-standing from his seat.
Brock threw his hands up. "You realise you've just tanked the school's entire reputation for whatever this was?"
Tanaka finally looked over, utterly serene. "Love, Brock. It's called love." Roy pinched the bridge of his nose, muttering something that sounded suspiciously like a prayer for patience.
"Love?" Kieran sputtered. "You've known her for three goddamn minutes! You didn't even exchange names properly!"
Tanaka shrugged dreamily. "Love doesn't care for time. It's instantaneous. Like a firework. Or heartburn."
"Sounds more like a stroke," Brock muttered.
Roy sighed deeply, finally breaking his silence. "You realise, right, that you're going to be called in first thing tomorrow? I saw the principal's go red since the match ended."
"Oh, come on," Tanaka said lazily, leaning back. "It was memorable. People cheered."
"They also booed," Roy reminded him flatly. "And fainted. And one man called you an insult to the tournament."
Tanaka smiled. "Then I've succeeded. True art divides the audience."
Kieran slammed his head back into the seat, groaning into his hands. "You're insane."
Now that Roy had some time to think to himself. He wonders why everyone was mad at him for throwing his match, while when Tanaka did it, the peer pressure wasn't as bad as before.
Brock snorted. "He's lucky if they don't kick him out before the next round."
Kieran waved a hand dismissively. "No, he won't be able to go into the next round; he was fully disqualified."
The train rattled on. Silence returned, only now it wasn't stunned silence, but the exhausted kind that followed watching someone drive a metaphorical car into a wall and somehow call it art.
Roy looked out the opposite window, his reflection faint beside Tanaka's. He didn't say it aloud, but part of him almost admired the sheer conviction of it, the ability to ruin everything and still smile like nothing mattered.
Tanaka's name blared through the intercom like a death sentence the very next day.
"Tanaka Ewu. Come to the principal's office. Immediately."
He sighed again, not out of fear, but out of inconvenience, and strolled down the corridor as if headed to a tea ceremony. Students whispered as he passed, some snickering, some applauding.
Inside the principal's office, the atmosphere was thick enough to choke on.
The principal sat behind his desk, face tight with restrained fury, while two teachers stood behind him like bodyguards.
"Tanaka Ewu," the principal began, voice clipped, "do you understand the magnitude of what you've done?"
Tanaka smiled faintly. "I understand that love is a…"
"Don't." The principal's pen snapped between his fingers. "You embarrassed this school, this institution, and our sponsors. You represented us in front of national media and you surrendered mid-fight."
Tanaka opened his mouth.
"For a girl!" the principal finished for him, slamming a palm on the desk.
"I don't care what you do outside of school, but when you're wearing our uniform, you're also representing the school."
There was a pause. Then Tanaka blinked slowly, smiled again, and said with perfect calm:
"Would it make it better if I said she was divine?"
The principal's expression darkened to a level of despair usually reserved for men questioning their life choices.