Chapter 102: Useless Obstacles

Nikolai’s mood was already at rock bottom before he ever reached Starlight’s suite.

His morning had started with a barrage of insufferable updates about AsterBuzz rumors that had been spiraling out of control over a secretive encounter between the Prince of Apogee and Starlight Dawson at the academy swimming complex. The mere thought of them being alone together in the pool, with no one else around to know what had happened between them, had set Nikolai’s blood on fire.

Driven by a volatile mix of irritation and possessiveness, he had used his imperial authority to pull strings within the school administration, demanding access to whatever Kage had attempted to cover up. He wanted to know why the academy security team had been ordered to scrub and confiscate the swimming-complex CCTV footage.

If the academy had gone to such lengths to suppress the footage, then surely there had to be something serious enough to warrant such secrecy. But when Nikolai finally forced the administration to hand over the raw video files, what he saw on the monitors left him stunned, staring at the administrator in disbelief.

It wasn’t a flirtation or a romantic secret rendezvous. It was a violent near-strangling that had nearly ended with Kage drowning in the pool. Starlight had actively tried to hold him underwater, her hands locked onto him with terrifying, lethal intent. What stunned Nikolai even more was how she had somehow managed to overpower Kage, an Apogee prince and one of Asterion’s strongest swimmers, with such frightening ease. Seeing Starlight react to Kage with such pure, unadulterated hostility had given Nikolai a momentary wave of dark satisfaction. At the very least, she had not let the Apogee clan prince get close to her without making him pay for it. But the fleeting relief vanished almost instantly, replaced by a lingering, foul bitterness.

Why did it feel like history was constantly repeating itself? Why was he always stuck in some pathetic, drawn-out tug-of-war with Kage over a girl? First, it had been with that useless girl Vicky, and now it was going to be with Starlight, another pointless rivalry all over again. And the moment Okami learned that his friend, Kage, had already made a move and encountered Starlight, he was bound to step into the ring next, unwilling to let Kage gain an upper hand over him.

Before long, they would turn the whole thing into another ridiculous competition over who could get closer to her first.

Nikolai deeply resented the entire situation. It was Mikhail who had recognized Starlight’s value first. It was the Imperial Twins who had found her and brought her into the academy before the other five great clans even realized there was something about her worth competing over.

Now they were expected to compete for her with those lowlifes. Even the Princess of Umbra had made her move, swallowing her pride to issue a public apology and transferring three whole months of accumulated Apex voting points directly into Starlight’s account. And now everyone was talking about it as though Sera had done something extraordinary, praising her humility and generosity as if no royal had ever done anything like it before. What about them? What about the Imperial Twins who had brought Starlight onto the Apex Rankings in the first place? She had started at Rank 100, and they had been the ones who pushed her upward, pouring their influence and resources into getting students to vote for her and advocating for her before anyone else even knew her name.

Yet somehow, all of that had already been forgotten, and everyone was now talking about Sera’s apology and three-month point transfer as though it were the greatest gesture anyone had ever made for Starlight. Nikolai knew that was Sera’s calculated, desperate move to win Starlight’s favor and buy her loyalty, and he also knew she had people paid to spin the story and amplify her apology so that her act could be seen in an even more favorable light, but that did not make it any less infuriating. There should never have been a competition for Starlight’s attention in the first place. They had found her first, and the others should have stayed out of their way.

Mikhail had urged him to be patient.

"Calm down," his twin brother had told him earlier that morning. "With our plan already in place, things will eventually favor us." There was no reason to rush when they already had Starlight within their reach. Nikolai understood the logic.

He simply could not make himself feel reassured by it. He just couldn’t sit back and watch the sub-royals throw themselves at their find while he waited for a strategy to mature. The only thing that ever restored his sanity was control. Absolute, immediate control, the kind that would make it clear to everyone who Starlight Dawson belonged to. He needed to move quickly enough to make it clear to those leeches that Starlight was not some prize that every sub-royal heir could simply approach whenever they pleased.

He had already squeezed Starlight’s personal contact details out of the headmaster’s office. He could have easily sent a brief text message, ordering her to report to the newly designated corrective conduct facility they had set up for her mandatory sessions. Instead, he had walked up here himself. He wanted to command her presence in person, to make sure she understood that when he summoned her, he expected her to come. And then, after all that frustration, instead of Starlight being the one to open the door, it was some girl whose hair looked as though there had been a scarcity of bleach.

Nikolai stared down at the nervous girl stuttering on the threshold, his cold eyes slowly looking her up and down, his expression completely unimpressed, as if assessing an unwanted obstacle. Why was there always a barrier?

Why did every single step toward Starlight require wading through an endless sea of annoying, useless hurdles?

"Go get Starlight Dawson," Nikolai ordered, his voice cold and clipped. "It’s time for her corrective conduct session."

Elle swallowed hard, entirely confused as to what kind of program or session he was talking about. Still, she wasn’t stupid enough to disobey or question an Imperial Prince. She gave a quick, nervous nod, squeaking out a hasty, "Y-yes, Your Highness," before instinctively pulling the heavy door shut to retreat inside.

"Grrrrr!" Nikolai growled under his breath, his teeth grinding together as the heavy wooden slab clicked firmly into its frame. How dare that girl close the door in his face? The absolute nerve.

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Uhm...guys, I’m running out of ideas ooh 😂😂