Chapter 139: ¹³⁹: sudden silence

Chapter 139: 13?: sudden silence

"What is there to be excited about?!" Rose asked, giving me an exaggerated are you serious look. I could practically see the disbelief written all over her face.

"He is Gamma Derek! Have you ever actually seen him?" she continued, lowering her voice slightly as if she were about to reveal some important secret. "Just as his position suggests, he is a delight for the eyes. He is too handsome."

I stared at her for a second, trying to decide whether she was actually being serious; apparently, she was.

"We are at our seats," I interrupted before she could continue with whatever list of praises she had prepared for Gamma Derek.

As soon as we reached the row where our seats were, I grabbed her arm and pulled her down beside me before she could get distracted again.

Even though the hall was already considerably full of students, it wasn’t yet time for the assembly to begin. There were still plenty of empty seats around us, and students continued trickling into the auditorium in small groups.

Rose dropped into her seat beside me, adjusting herself comfortably before looking at me again. "So, where was I?" she asked immediately.

I turned my head toward her and found her looking at me with her signature googly eyes, as though she had completely forgotten that I had interrupted her only a few seconds ago.

I couldn’t help the slight sarcastic smile that appeared on my face. "You were describing Gamma Derek’s handsomeness."

"Exactly!"

I raised an eyebrow. She either didn’t understand my sarcasm or simply didn’t care. Judging by the excited smile on her face, I was pretty sure it was the second one.

"Gamma Derek used to be the army General of our Empire," Rose continued, completely returning to her previous train of thought. "Can you even imagine? The General! Just imagine his aura when he walks in!"

I furrowed my brows at her words. Used to be the General? That immediately caught my attention. I had thought Gamma Derek was here to talk to us about our exams, so how exactly was an army General connected to our academy?

If this had been about our brute force run, I could have understood it somehow. Someone with his experience would obviously be qualified to guide students in that area.

But our exams? This was only the beginning of our academic year, and as far as I knew, the upcoming examinations were for the theoretical and dialogue portions of our curriculum.

So why would someone who had once held such a high military position be responsible for announcing them?

"Used to be the General?" I asked, turning toward Rose with a confused expression. "What do you mean by that?"

Rose’s excited expression immediately changed. "You don’t know about that?" She leaned closer to me, lowering her voice as she looked around the auditorium.

I glanced at her curiously. "What am I supposed to know?"

"Don’t worry, it is normal for you not to know," she whispered, apparently trying to make sure no one nearby could hear us.

She moved even closer, her eyes darting toward the students sitting in the surrounding rows.

I couldn’t help but look at her suspiciously. Why was she suddenly acting as though she was about to tell me some forbidden secret?

Only after she seemed satisfied that no one was paying attention to us did she turn back toward me.

"Gamma Derek, like Beta Ryan, is very close to the Alpha," she explained in a hushed voice. "Because he was one of the trusted people around him, he was given the position of General and was responsible for handling the Imperial Army."

I listened carefully, my earlier confusion only growing.

Rose paused for a moment, seemingly deciding how much she should tell me. "But on the Imperial Army Forum Day, something huge happened at the army base."

My brows drew together. Something huge?

She lowered her voice even further. "That incident led to him being transferred from his position as General to the one he is holding now." I looked at her in surprise as she continued "So now he is responsible for the education department of our Empire."

I remained silent for a moment, processing what she had just told me. A military General being transferred to oversee the entire education department? That was certainly not something I had expected.

And judging from the way Rose had lowered her voice while talking about it, I had a feeling there was much more to the story than what she had just told me.

"Do you know what happened at the army base that day?" I asked, my curiosity getting the better of me. There had to be a serious reason for Kael to make such a major decision, especially when Derek was supposed to be one of his most trusted comrades.

I leaned slightly closer to Rose, lowering my voice. "Isn’t your father working in the council? Didn’t he know anything about it?"

Rose immediately shook her head, her eyes narrowing slightly as she glanced around the auditorium. She seemed just as careful about the topic as I was.

"No. My dad didn’t say anything about what happened there," she whispered. "Apparently, it is a secret. Even the media wasn’t informed. They only knew that Gama Derek had been transferred for some internal reasons."

"Oh, okay." I nodded slowly, taking in her words. If even the council members were keeping their mouths shut about what had happened, then whatever had occurred at the army base must have been something the Empire didn’t want ordinary people knowing about.

I quickly pushed the thought away, however, and moved slightly farther from Rose. The two of us had been whispering so closely that, even if no one could hear our conversation from a distance, anyone watching us would probably realise that we were discussing something suspicious.

Rose seemed to notice my movement and immediately changed the subject. "Okay, enough with that." A smug smile slowly appeared on her face as she turned towards me. "Let’s continue talking about Gama Derek. By now, you should know that your friend has a thing for handsome men with a strong aura around them. It is just too sexy."

I couldn’t help but roll my eyes at her dramatic expression. "I know very well, Miss Rose," I replied, giving her a teasing smirk. "You like strong, handsome men. Is that why there have been rumours that you have been taking a keen interest in a specific senior class from our academy?"

I deliberately bumped my shoulder against hers, enjoying the way her eyes immediately widened.

"There is nothing like that, Athena!" she shot back, her voice turning cold enough to make me laugh. But despite her attempt at sounding offended, the faint blush spreading across her cheeks betrayed her completely.

"If I had something going on with him, why would I keep discussing other men with you?" she argued, folding her arms across her chest as if she had just presented an undeniable piece of evidence.

I raised an eyebrow. "Well, it isn’t a relationship yet, so there is nothing restricting you from discussing other men." I leaned slightly towards her, my smile widening as I continued teasing her. "But there surely is some kind of connection."

"There isn’t!"

"Then why did you specify someone when I had only mentioned a vague class and not even a particular person?"

Rose opened her mouth, only to close it again when she realised she had walked straight into my trap. Her cheeks became even redder.

"Stop!" she finally complained, lightly hitting my shoulder. I laughed under my breath, watching her turn her face away from me in embarrassment.

For a few moments, the two of us continued sitting there like that, the earlier serious conversation about the army base completely forgotten. The auditorium was gradually filling up around us, with students talking amongst themselves as they waited for the assembly to begin.

But then, all of it suddenly disappeared. The entire hall went quiet. Students began standing up almost simultaneously, their movements so sudden that I instinctively straightened in my seat. "What happened?" I whispered, turning my head to look behind us.

And then I saw him, Louis stood at the entrance of the auditorium, surrounded by his usual bodyguards.

The atmosphere itself seemed to have changed with his arrival. The bodyguards stood around him with their usual emotionless expressions, their attention constantly sweeping through the crowded hall as they maintained the strict distance around him.

My fingers unconsciously tightened around the edge of my seat. I had been enjoying the peaceful conversation with Rose only moments ago, completely absorbed in teasing her. I hadn’t even thought about Louis entering the auditorium.

Until his gaze moved across the hall and then his eyes stopped, right on me. The smile that had still been lingering on my face disappeared completely as his eyes met mine from across the crowded auditorium.