After a long day of classes, combat, and watching Kagetsu beat Vanessa, and Individual training the boys finally returned to their dorms.
Ezren immediately faceplanted onto the couch with a dramatic groan.
"My legs are jelly. My brain is soup. Let me die in peace."
"That was pathetic," Kaguro muttered, already heading to the kitchenette for tea.
Enjin sat on a chair
Kagetsu tossed his jacket onto a chair and took off his shoes. "You were the one who begged to spar with Mira. Don't cry about it now."
"I didn't think she could summon the fist of Mother Nature!" Ezren moaned. "I saw my soul leave my body. It waved goodbye."
Kagetsu snorted. "You brought that on yourself, dumbass."
Then Ezren sat up with a jolt, eyes wide. "WAIT. HOMEWORK."
Everyone froze.
"Bront assigned us that rank analysis sheet on Essentia users!"
"We're supposed to write a breakdown of each rank and write how it applies to our own mana type," Enjin added flatly.
Ezren stared at them with horror. "I don't even know what my mana type is!"
"Did you even listen in class?" Kagetsu asked.
"No! I was trying not to pass out from fear!"
Kaguro sighed and sat at the table. "Fine. Let's just do it together. We're already stuck with each other."
Ezren's eyes sparkled. "Group bonding through mutual suffering… I'm in."
They all gathered around the dorm's wobbly table. Kagetsu brought out a stack of paper. Enjin drew a chart. Kaguro opened a textbook with the same energy someone might use to disarm a bomb.
"Okay," Kagetsu muttered, scribbling. "Dormant. Stirred. Awakened. Veiled…"
"That's me," Ezren interrupted.
"No, you're somewhere between Dormant and Dumber," Kagetsu said.
"RUDE. But fair."
Kaguro pointed at the book. "Saint rank, now that's nuts. They can alter reality. Like rewrite time, bend space, summon a castle out of thin air."
Ezren's eyes widened. "I wanna do that!"
"You can't even boil water without setting off smoke alarms," Enjin said calmly.
"We don't talk about the soup incident," Ezren replied solemnly.
Hours passed in a mess of notes, scribbles, tea spills, and one accidental explosion when Ezren tried to "enchant" his pencil with a magic circle to write for him. (It caught fire.)
But eventually…
They finished it.
Ezren held his paper up like it was a sacred relic. "We did it… we survived."
"Barely," Kagetsu muttered, eyeing the scorch mark on the floor.
"This is nice," Ezren added. "Us. Working together. You know, like brothers in arms, struggling against the tyranny of Bront's academic oppression."
"Stop talking before I change teams," Kaguro muttered, sipping tea.
Enjin actually cracked the tiniest smile.
For a brief moment, the dorm was peaceful. The chaos of the day faded into tired laughter and quiet scribbling. They weren't just surviving anymore.
They were starting to feel like a real team.
Even if half of them wanted to strangle Ezren every five minutes.