The clearing was empty save two souls.

Ira glanced around the trees he was hiding behind to see his Host and her roommate in the middle of what seemed to be a ritual. If his understanding of it was correct, it was meant to increase the caster's raw power.

He observed as his Host bled all over the symbols carved into the ground, as she chanted some made-up sounding words and poured her magic into it.

A pillar of light emerged from the ground right where his Host and her roommate were sitting. It rose high into the sky, so high that he couldn't see the end of it. A soundlessness took over the area, granting it an eerie atmosphere. The wind blew heavily around the pillar of light, rushing back and forwards like it was the center of a raging storm.

Ira squatted down on the ground and held onto a tree to stay in place.

He squinted his eyes, trying to see what was happening inside. When it didn't work, he zoomed in in his mind and observed his Host, passed out in the middle of the storm.

Her roommate didn't display any life-signs.

It was obvious her roommate wouldn't survive such an ordeal, not without having the halo of a protagonist.

Sighing, Ira could just imagine all of the complaints that his Host would wage when she realized that she had inadvertently killed her roommate. The girl was far too sensible to come up with an idea so suicidal as this one, so it had to have been his Host's idea. And she must have convinced her roommate with some impressive deceit too, because Ira could never have imagined she would do something so monumentally foolish of her own choice.

The light dissipated with nary a sound and Ira stood up straight again. He had no desire to go closer, he could see perfectly well from here, so he supposed that it was time to go back to his dorm and hope his Host didn't wreck the world while away from his supervision.

He sighed in annoyance and turned to walk away, feeling his heart almost jump out of his chest when he came face to face with Silas, standing utterly silent behind him. Ira might have, possibly, known he was there and ignored him because he was in the middle of his entertainment and was thus busy with more important things.

He might have also forgotten he was there at all.

Involuntarily, he brought his hand up to his chest and felt it beat like a train derailing under his hand. It was going way too fast to be healthy. Probably; he didn't actually keep track of such information.

Ira swore and demanded, "What are you doing?"

Silas grabbed ahold of Ira's hand and started dragging him away from the area by brute force. "Saving your life. Did you know she was going to do this?"

"No. It's not like I keep track of what she's doing. That's absolutely no fun at all," Ira answered in a dry tone.

Silas cast a look over his shoulder at Ira. "Good. Don't ever let anyone know that you were here."

Ira rose an eyebrow. "Sure."

What had his Host done wrong now?

As he was dragged away from her, he zoomed in on her in his mind. He saw as she realized that her roommate was dead, as she realized that it was all her fault and burst out crying with loud ugly sobs that didn't fit her at all, and as her magic swelled around her to become something more. The ritual had obviously done something, but he didn't think it was what she had been aiming for.

Silas dragged him out of the woods and into the common school grounds and continued dragging him, not to Ira's room as he would have expected, but to Silas' private rooms that all teachers that lived on the premises had.

Supposedly, they were quite luxurious.

Ira frowned as he was brought into the teachers' dorms, but he didn't say anything because he was actually curious. It had never occurred to him to check them out before, but now that he had the option, he found that he wanted to know.

Actually, now that he thought about it, he was sort of curious how Silas' personal rooms looked like too.

That was a first.

He wondered if he was getting sick.

Hopefully, it wasn't terminal. He had heard that that was a very painful way to go that he really didn't want to experience.

Ira was brought into a pair of rooms on the highest floor and if he wasn't wrong, the whole floor belonged to Silas. He wondered how he had managed to get so much room as a common teacher and figured that maybe he had been on to something when he imagined that Silas had a secret identity. But what was it? There were so many options.

He could be a spy from another nation, a prince from another nation, an assassin sent to kill the Second Prince, a special bodyguard to guard the Second Prince and so much more.

Yeah, Ira really needed to get out more.

He stared around at the top quality room, the mirrors lined in gold, the marble walls and floor, the rugs that screamed money, and the many paintings that looked like they could be melted into money on the walls.

Everything screamed 'RICH!'.

Ira felt like torching the place.

He turned around in the middle of the room he was standing in. "So? Why did you drag me away?"

He was promptly kissed.

Ira stumbled backward from the force that the man used to hold onto him as he kissed him. Silas held on tight to his waist and back, angling Ira's head for the easiest access. Ira's eyes widened from surprise and he rose his hands to push the man away before he stopped.

This was kind of, sort of, nice. Maybe he should give the man a bit more time before he murdered him for it...

He could feel a hand wandering down towards his ass and he was pretty sure that that was Silas' tongue in his mouth, but he still didn't try to resist. He wasn't really the sort of person to feign resistance just to satisfy some strange pride. This whole kissing thing was relatively new to him, but if it always felt this good, maybe he should try it out more often.

He would have to try it out with other people, see how it felt with them. It would be an experiment.

Silas pulled back just enough that they were no longer kissing. "You're distracted," he said and pulled a little on Ira's hair. Ira hadn't noticed him getting a hold of it.

"Just think only of me," Silas said and went back to kissing Ira hard.

A few embarrassing noises left Ira as a result of the man's skill at it. Ira found himself being pushed backward and he walked along with it in order not to fall over. His legs hit a fairly high bed and before he could protest, he was pushed down on it.

Oh, so this was what he often saw in mangas. Come to think of it, he was pretty sure that there was a genre specifically for male same-sex relationships in manga. Maybe he should buy a few of those.

A hand sneaked under his clothes to touch his bare skin.

Ira used every inch of strength Bran had to push Silas away from him. The man looked down on him from above and it was like a scene straight from a manga.

Even Ira could admit that he made an attractive picture like that.

Still, though, Ira wasn't about to be so swept along and forget himself. "I've let you do more than enough."

"Really?" Silas asked in a low voice and bent down to kiss him again. Ira pushed him back and glared at him.

"Really."

Silas stared at him with narrowed eyes for a few tense minutes. If he pressed the issue, Ira had no problem with relieving him of a few precious attachments. He would not be pushed into doing something that he wasn't sure he was absolutely comfortable with.

After a few minutes of staring, Silas smiled and sat back on the bed. Ira struggled up and leaned back on his hands.

Silas coughed out a small laugh. "You're one of a kind, Bran. I truly do love you."

"And you're getting more delusional by the day," Ira shot back.

Silas stood from the bed. He walked away to the door and just before he opened it and left he said, "I love you. Otherwise, your lack of consent would mean nothing to me."

Ira narrowed his eyes, but the man had already left.

He fell back on the bed. It was actually really comfortable and come to think of it, be had been awake for a long time. It was already starting to edge in on morning. And it was that man's fault for just leaving him behind.

Ira fell asleep within minutes.

The following few days were quiet. Absolutely nothing happened that caught Ira's attention and he had already stopped paying attention to his studies. They were useless now and as he had spent the past few days living in Silas' rooms than his own, he had already learnt all that he could on magic theory from the man himself. Apparently he really enjoyed the subject, because he would gladly talk to Ira about it, even when he didn't ask.

Aside from a few chaste kisses, they didn't do anything more than that, which Ira found that he actually liked. It was nice to be listened to.

Of course, it could also be because Silas was distracted by something else, but Ira didn't care about that.

He wasn't sure how he had ended up living with Silas, had no idea how that had happened, but Silas was a surprisingly good roommate and so he didn't mind. It helped that the place was huge and the bath was gigantic. He might have been spending more time in there than what was strictly healthy.

Somehow, a lot of his books had been migrating to Silas' place, despite the fact that Ira had yet to be back at his place. He just kept getting distracted by one thing or another. And Silas liked delivering breakfast in bed. Why would Ira deprive himself of such a good servant when he didn't need to?

Rolling his eyes at the idiocy of some people, he dragged his covers over him and bunched them together tighter. They were much more comfortable than his own, and so he had booted Silas out of the bed as soon as he apparently moved in. Curiously, Silas had had no problem with this.

He hadn't even protested.

Maybe he didn't like his bed? Well, if that was the case, it was his loss and Ira's gain, because it was really freaking soft.

And he was pretty sure the sheets were made of silk.

He felt his eyes fluttering closed again as he was surrounded by a cocoon of warmth. His natural aptitude for sleeping was like a blessing in this bed. Just laying in it was enough to make him sleepy.

There was a banging on the door, but in his relaxed state, Ira could only barely hear it. And he chose consciously to ignore it because frankly, he could not care less.

The banging got louder until, finally, the door gave way and was destroyed.

Ira buried his head underneath his pillow.

"SYSTEM?!"

His Host screamed so loud that the whole school had probably heard her. Ira kept his eyes closed and hoped that she wouldn't find him. He sensed trouble following her and wanted nothing to do with it.

"Where are you?! I know you're here, so just come out!"

Yeah, no. There was no way that he would be doing that. Did she think that he was an absolute fool? Who would ever respond well to a tone like that?

A loud crash sounded as part of the wall was demolished and his map now helpfully informed him that his Host was in the same room as him. Ira groaned and pushed himself up from the bed a little because otherwise, she would probably destroy it too, and it didn't deserve that.

"Well," he said as he stared at her ragged visage. "Don't you look crazy."