Chapter 57: ⁵⁷: dazed

"Yeah," Rose nodded. "Now everyone thinks you might be his girlfriend, and you know how Maria behaves when it comes to Louis."

"After he saved her, she has become even more possessive of him. She must be seething right now! You have to be careful, Athena. She’ll definitely do something stupid." She said and held my arm, her expression filled with worry.

I knew she was worried about me, but I was still struggling to understand why Louis had uploaded that video in the first place.

What did he want?

My confusion slowly turned into irritation, and then into something much closer to hatred.

I turned toward Rose, my jaw tightening. "Where is Louis? I’m going to confront him right now. If he’s the one who created all this useless mess, then he should be the one to clear it up too."

"I don’t know what he’s planning by doing all these things so suddenly, but I do know one thing, I hate him for all of this. I can’t have a single normal day in my life because of him." I pushed myself up, ready to find him.

Rose immediately grabbed my arm and stopped me. "Today is Imperial Army Fourm, so as a royal, he must attend the army base in the Starlight Pack along with Alpha Kael. He isn’t in the Academy today."

I grabbed my hair in frustration.

Of course.

The urge to march straight to the army base and demand answers from Louis only grew stronger, but I forced myself to take a breath. I couldn’t act recklessly. Whatever childish game Louis Dreven was playing, I would have to deal with it calmly.

At least, that was what I told myself.

Before I could think of anything else, the classroom door suddenly flew open with a loud bang making me look towards the door like everyone else.

I froze.

Standing in the doorway was Maria.

She was practically seething with rage, her eyes locked onto me with such hatred that, for a moment, it felt as though she wanted to kill me right there.

Her chest rose and fell rapidly as she stormed into the classroom. Within seconds, she was standing directly in front of me.

Before I could even react, she shoved me hard. I lost my balance and crashed onto the floor.

"Wasn’t my warning enough for you the first time, bitch?" Maria spat.

Before I could push myself up, her foot came down against my face.

I winced as a sharp sting spread across my cheek and lower lip where her shoe had struck me. For a moment, everything seemed to blur.

Then I tasted something metallic.

Blood.

I swallowed instinctively, only to realize that my lower lip had split from the impact. A small trickle of blood slipped into my mouth.

But the pain from Maria’s attack wasn’t what frightened me most.

Almost immediately after my blood touched my tongue, I felt something strange surge through my body.

My cursed wounds reacted. It was as though the curse inside them had sensed the fresh blood and awakened.

A sickening sensation spread beneath my skin, crawling deeper into the wounds that already plagued me. It felt as though whatever was consuming me from the inside had suddenly found fresh sustenance.

I wanted to get up. I wanted to show Maria that I wasn’t someone who would simply take shit from others.

But my body refused to cooperate. It felt as though something was holding me down, weighing me against the floor. An invisible force seemed to be wrapping itself around my limbs, sucking the strength out of me little by little.

As if whatever was inside my cursed wounds was deliberately draining me. Making me weaker. Making me vulnerable. Making sure I couldn’t fight back against Maria.

"What now, bitch? Cat got your tongue? huh?" Maria sneered.

She squatted down beside me and grabbed a fistful of my hair, yanking my head upward until I was forced to meet her furious gaze.

"You thought I was injured, so you had a chance with Louis?" Her eyes burned with jealousy. "I’ll kill you before that happens!"

I glared back at her, even though my body was trembling from the effort of simply staying conscious. Slowly, some of my strength seemed to return as the blood from my split lip began to dry.

I tried to move. But before I could do anything, Maria slammed my head hard against the floor.

Pain exploded through my skull. My vision blurred instantly, and for a moment, I couldn’t tell where the floor ended and the walls began.

Before I could even comprehend the pain from the first impact, Maria grabbed me again and slammed my head against the hard floor a second time.

A sharp gasp escaped my lips. Everything around me seemed to spin.

Then I felt something warm and strangely slick near my temple. Blood - I could feel it slowly soaking into my eyebrows, trickling down the side of my face.

And the strange surge I had felt inside my cursed wounds moments ago intensified. It was as though the curse was feeding on the blood escaping from my wounds.

My heart began to race. What was happening to me? Why did I feel so weak?

What was stopping me from fighting back?

"You weak-ass omega." Maria sneered as she stood up, leaving my head to drop heavily against the floor. "You don’t even have the strength to take a punch from me, and you think you can take my Louis away?"

I clenched my teeth. No, I couldn’t let myself become this pathetic.

I placed both hands against the floor and tried to push myself up. My arms trembled violently beneath me as I forced every ounce of strength I had into them.

I had to get up. Even if my body screamed at me to stop. Even if the strange weakness inside me was getting worse. I refused to stay on the floor while Maria looked down at me like I was nothing.

"You aren’t even worthy of cleaning his shoes. Understand?"

My arms gave out. I collapsed face-first onto the floor again.

I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to gather enough strength to move, but the strange sensation inside my body was becoming more intense.

The more blood seeped from my temple, the stronger the surge inside my wounds became.

It was feeding, growing, draining me. My head felt lighter and lighter, and my thoughts began to blur together. I couldn’t even focus properly anymore.

My vision grew hazy. Then my right eye suddenly stung. I flinched as a drop of blood slipped down my forehead and reached my eye.

This was getting too much. Why had I become so pathetic? Why couldn’t I even get up on my own? I had fought before. I had survived worse. So why was my body betraying me now? Why couldn’t I fight back?

"Ahh!" A scream tore from my lips as the pressure landed directly on my wound.

Pain shot through me so violently that my entire body jerked.

It felt as though she wasn’t simply hurting me, she was tearing apart every bit of protection I had.

For a terrifying moment, I felt as though all the procedures Mother Elena had performed to keep me safe from the curse’s pain had broken down in an instant.

The pain I had been protected from for so long came rushing back all at once.

"Ahh... Maria, take your foot off! Please!" I pleaded, realizing that nothing else was working.

I had no strength left. No energy to fight. No way to push her away. Never in my life had I imagined that I would one day be lying helplessly beneath someone and pleading with them for a little mercy.

But this had gone too far. If she kept pressing down like this, I could feel my stitches pulling painfully beneath her shoe. They were going to tear. And that was the last thing I wanted.

"Oh, this is your weak spot, it seems!" Maria said, amusement creeping into her voice as if she was enjoying this. She pressed down even harder.

"Ahh!" Another cry escaped me as the pain intensified. I slammed my fist against the floor, desperately trying to endure it.

The pain wasn’t staying in my back anymore. It spread through me, shooting along my nerves and radiating into every part of my body until it felt as though every organ was being squeezed from within.

I had to stop her. I had to stop her before my wound opened. I couldn’t let that happen. I certainly couldn’t.

"Please..." My voice came out weaker than I wanted it to.

"Oh, look." Maria’s voice suddenly sounded almost delighted. "You’re oozing blood from there."

Her gaze dropped toward my back. "Did you have a wound there, slut? Huh?" She sounded amused by my suffering. "Then it will be even more pleasing to crush you there!"