“Hey, Judas Defecit.”
Judas Defecit. Judas Defecit.
Eliya rolled the name around in her mouth a few times.
It’s hard to pronounce.
It’s not just the name.
The boy in front of her.
And even the scenery around him.
It’s a sight she’s never imagined before.
But one thing she was sure of.
The boy called Judas Defecit.
This kid with white bandages plastered all over his injured face was the same Judas she knew.
The person she had been close to, whom she shared a long time with.
‘Where on earth is this…?’
Currently, she was inside the memories of that Judas Defecit, aka Judas.
Thanks to that, she could interpret most of the scenery unfolding before her.
She analyzed and understood based on the information in his memories.
‘This place is called… a school…?’
An educational facility provided at the national level.
‘And this is a classroom…’
A divided space mainly used by students attending the school.
‘The standardized outfit students must wear, school uniform…’
In this way, she synchronized various bits of information with her own knowledge.
‘The boy approaching in front of me is…’
Dressed less neatly compared to other students.
With a face and posture that seemed aggressive or threatening.
She figured out he was the kind of kid called a delinquent, a bully.
Eliya superimposed Aghan over him.
The relative who had acutely bullied her.
This brat who couldn’t stand not tormenting her.
From his expression to his mocking tone, it was all the same.
The scene tracked back again.
“Judas Defecit. You ignoring me?”
Judas Defecit…. Judas….
Eliya alternated between those names in her mind.
In the scenery, he was Judas Defecit, but in her perception, he was Judas.
Anyway.
Judas looked up at the male student and replied curtly.
“…Why?”
“Why, you jerk? Do you know how much trouble you caused with that bullying incident? I just came to insult you before you bail!”
The male student sneered, boldly shoving his face toward Judas.
It was quite the exaggerated move.
Judas thought.
‘Should I kill him?’
Not in the literal sense of murder.
More like, should he resort to self-defense violent enough that the other can’t fight back?
He was contemplating whether to go through with it.
‘What’s wrong with this guy that he’s living like this since back then?’
Judas was genuinely curious.
From the day he started middle school till now, just a few months.
He couldn’t comprehend his adversary at all.
Eliya knew the principles behind such human behavior, but there was no time to ponder that.
She hurriedly rummaged through his memories.
Gathering clues to grasp the context.
At 14, he was much more raw and unrefined than Eliya knew.
With less socialization, he essentially held a wild animal’s mindset.
Yet, he hadn’t always been this rough from the beginning.
In this area, there exists a concept called ‘school district.’
‘It classifies schools within a certain range, and the quality of the district is determined by the atmosphere of that locale.’
And the school Judas attended fell into one of the lower-tier categories.
‘In Bevel Principality terms, it would be like a slum with poor security and administrative reach, or maybe a crime-ridden area….’
Moreover, she uncovered the types of experiences Judas had in this low-quality district that brought him to this situation.
Judas was a student who was bullied at this school.
When he was first exposed to violence, he didn’t fight back.
He didn’t show the usual Judas candor that Eliya knew.
There was no trace of defiance he had shown even in front of the duke.
Instead, he followed social order and appealed to another authority figure.
His homeroom teacher.
‘Even though he’s a teacher, he’s a bit different from what I know. But can one individual manage dozens of students fairly and without issues?’
The homeroom teacher pretended to comfort him, claiming to be on his side.
That was all it was.
Nothing changed in reality.
The teacher merely played a role in soothing the victim to prevent things from escalating.
That presence was akin to how Eliya viewed Balak.
Someone who knows yet turns a blind eye.
People who ignore the sacrifices of a few for the interests and peace of the majority.
One day, the situation escalated to the point where a disciplinary committee was held.
‘A small local trial… is this what it’s like?’
The outcome left Eliya utterly baffled.
‘Isolation measures for the victim?’
The victim, Judas, was transferred to another school.
Multiple reasons played a role, one major factor being that the bully’s parent was the head of the school’s parent meeting.
It was an treatment that was hard for Eliya to comprehend.
‘Why is it the victim who suffered getting the unfair treatment…?’
It wasn’t just the bandages covering the bruises and tears on his face.
He felt chronic pain all over from the constant violence.
‘…Ah! Was it due to status? Was Judas a commoner even here?’
That was the only conclusion she could arrive at.
Interestingly enough, that wasn’t entirely wrong.
Judas’ background was indeed poor, while the others wielded power behind them.
‘But… why study in the same space when statuses differ? Wait, hold on…. Is the concept of status already gone here? Could it vanish? How would society hold up without statuses…?’
Even while perplexed, Eliya empathized with Judas.
The overwhelming power he faced, which he couldn’t stand up against, was just like that of Narcissi and the offspring of her family.
The scenery that should have felt foreign didn’t to Eliya.
Instead, she immersed herself in Judas’ experience.
The reason being, his life was structurally identical to her past.
Like a shadow.
After all, since the day the transfer decision was made, a realization dawned on Judas.
Like a bottleneck suddenly clearing, everything rushed in.
The only thing to believe in this world was himself.
If it’s not him, no one would fight for him.
There’s no rational or logical reason for people to exploit each other.
When they can do it.
When they are allowed to do it.
That’s when people execute those actions.
In the end, if he didn’t want to be trampled on, he had to show it.
Recognizing that, he had arrived at today.
“Is this how the kids raised without parents turn out?”
Aimless, indiscriminate condemnation.
Creating blind discomfort in others, providing him with a sense of superiority and satisfaction through the control of situations and opponents.
That’s how Eliya analyzed it.
Judas, along with Balak and Narcissi’s kids.
Facing similar treatment, he had been persistently tormented.
After countless reflections, Eliya came to know this kind of person in detail.
In contrast, Judas lacked that knowledge or intelligence.
He thought simply.
‘I should kill him.’
His judgment was cautious, while his actions were swift.
He grabbed the hair of the boy who got close.
“Ugh—!”
And slammed him face-first onto the desk.
-Bang! Bang! Bang!
The desk cracked under his relentless blows, echoing violently amidst the classroom’s silence.
The boy who had never known rebellion reached out for violence.
The curled-up figure shattered his own world.
He had broken out of his shell.
In that scene, Eliya saw herself in him.
When she learned the news about Maria’s death later than others and realized everyone in her family had been deceiving her.
When she figured out Narcissi was the perpetrator and living, threatening her with her mother’s life.
When she discovered Balak had kept silent despite knowing all of that.
She had once grabbed Sara, who mocked Maria’s death, by the hair.
At that moment, Eliya also gained a refreshing revelation.
The sole entity to trust in the world was herself alone—a truth.
Thanks to meeting Judas, it’s now an adjusted truth.
That Maria hadn’t actually died.
Finally, the male student rolled his eyes and collapsed.
Judas threw him away like trash and escaped the classroom.
He risked more severe punishment but, surprisingly, nothing happened.
He had no interest in what happened next.
Even at the new school after transferring, he got embroiled in brawls like before.
However, he was no longer the same.
Any confrontation he faced, he fought back with equal intensity.
In one-on-one fights, he did not lose.
It was a profoundly hollow victory.
Had he really been so scared of such weaklings?
A hollow laugh escaped him.
Sometimes they charged at him all at once, but he didn’t back down.
Even if it meant dying, he’d face it.
Even if he lost, he fought until the end.
What tempered his overflowing fighting spirit was the suggestion from the orphanage teacher.
How about starting some sports?
And that’s how Judas found himself in the martial art called ‘judo.’
*
Since transferring and displaying anger in a few fights, he hadn’t gotten into arguments anymore.
Thus, after starting sports, he focused solely on exercising.
It was in the gym that he first realized.
He had a natural talent.
Strong build.
He was inherently stronger than others.
There are people with inexplicable brute strength.
He was one of them.
Beyond being strong, he was adept at overpowering others physically.
He just hadn’t known it due to the lack of experience until then.
Once he realized his talent, he became addicted to training.
He stayed late into the night at the gym.
He slept during school and ran at night as if he would die.
It was only natural for him to excel in the athlete department and get accepted into a sports university focused on practical skills.
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