I Enrolled as the Villain
Chapter 37: The First Rain Cycle

Chapter 37: The First Rain Cycle

As the words left my mouth, I saw it the cracks in their expressions.

Aurelia’s eyes narrowed, jaw twitching ever so slightly, as if she had a retort locked behind her teeth.

On Selene’s side, I spotted one of her aides leaning in to whisper urgently in her ear.

They weren’t calm anymore.

And that was enough.

I turned without waiting for their response, my cape fluttering behind me like a slow, final statement.

Then—

A sharp chime rang out from above.

The central hologram blazed brighter, and a cold, mechanical voice echoed across the Ground:

"STRONGHOLD SESSION INITIATED. DIMENSIONAL TRANSPORT IN — 3..."

The ground vibrated under our feet.

"2..."

I walked briskly back to my group, eyes sweeping over the Velvet Eye students.

"Be ready!" I called out, voice steady. "Stay close!"

"1."

A flash.

We were swallowed in a burst of blue light.

My body warped — twisted — stretched like spaghetti through the arcane weave of space. My bones felt like they were melting, unraveling into light—

Fwsshhh—!

And then I was falling.

Fwsshh—

I landed hard.

Not on solid ground not really.

Mud swallowed my boots halfway up the ankle. Water splashed across my legs, cold as ice, and the moment I tried to move, I slipped sideways into a current I hadn’t even seen.

Rain.

Not a drizzle. Not a storm.

A warzone of water.

It fell like it hated us. Like the sky had split and decided to drown the world in punishment. The wind howled through the air, dragging sheets of rain sideways, turning the battlefield into a gray blur.

My hair plastered against my face. My cape clung to my back like a dying thing. My breath came in gasps, each one stolen by the cold.

I tried to look around—

But all I saw was grey.

Dark, roiling grey swallowing the horizon. And the rain — gods, the rain. It wasn’t falling anymore. It was howling.

"Back to form—!"

I choked.

Water shot into my mouth mid-command. Cold. Sharp. Like swallowing glass. I doubled over, coughing hard, then yelled again:

"Get—cough—GET BACK TO FORMATION!"

No one heard.

Or maybe they did but the storm was louder. It drowned everything.

My cape snapped across my vision, soaked and heavy, flapping like a dying banner. I shoved it aside, staggered forward, reaching—

But my legs—

Sank.

The mud was thick, swallowing my feet past the ankle. Every step fought back. Like the earth itself wanted me to stay still and drown.

"Jessa! Cedric!"

No reply.

Just lightning. Just rain. Just the sound of something moving out there.

I kept moving.

One boot forward. Then another.

The formation was broken. The unit scattered.

And I was losing them.

The mud swallowed my knees. Then my thighs. Every step sucked like I was dragging my body through concrete. I couldn’t move fast enough. Couldn’t even stand without slipping.

So I dropped.

My chest hit the ground with a wet slap. The sludge soaked through my uniform, up my arms, into my sleeves. It crawled down my back like something alive.

Haaa

Haaaa

Each pull of my arms felt like dragging my own corpse. Rain slammed against my back, each droplet like a slap. Mud sloshed into my collar, choked my breath.

What the hell...

I blinked through the storm, squinting hard. This wasn’t how it played out in the novel. The rain...was worse. The cold had teeth.

I couldn’t see more than a few steps ahead, and everything felt like it was watching.

I paused. Just for a second.

Suddenly, I felt something grab my hand.

"Who—Jessa? Cendric? Who—"

Then

"Grahh!"

My right arm, soaked in freezing mud, screamed in pain. Not the kind you grit through. The kind that cracks your voice without warning.

I yanked back instinctively

My skin tore.

White-hot agony ripped through my forearm.

No.

No, not that thing.

That beast.

My panic flared.

So did my left eye.

Mythrigan lit, searing wild flame through the rain all of it focused on the thing gripping me.

Burn.

Just burn.

Even if the rain tried to drown it.

Few seconds passed

The flame i willed died,Soon I collapsed.

Back into the mud. My soaked uniform stuck to me like a second skin. My breath came in short, broken gasps.

I activated the Mythrigan.

Violet light bloomed.

As the glow deepened, the shape twisted. Flesh became fabric. Claws became fingers. My vision corrected the lie.

It wasn’t a monster.

It was—

I gasped.

No.

The pain in my arm vanished. Completely.

Not because it healed.

But because it had never happened.

The strong are always kind... You told me that, didn’t you?

My breath caught.

I looked ahead, the Mythrigan still flaring, cutting through the rain—

And froze.

Jessa.

Half-submerged in mud. Skin scorched. Uniform torn.

Her arm—

Her arm.

I had grabbed it. Pulled it. Burned it.

Its wasn’t a monster or a beast

Just her.

My brain didn’t want to believe it.

But the Mythrigan didn’t lie.

My hand trembled. The fire still flickered on my fingers.

The rain hissed where it met her skin. Steam curled into the air.

She wasn’t crying. Just breathing. Silent.

And that silence was louder than anything I’d ever heard.

I turned forward again.

The light of the Eye still burning in me, still showing everything.

And all I could do—

Was look.

No. No way...

My left eye slammed shut, as if the truth itself was too much to bear.

I crawled forward, mud swallowing my limbs, sucking at my knees.

"Jessa! You hear me? Please—don’t do this. Please..."

Her body felt too light. Too limp. I pulled her into me arms shaking, rain pouring down on both of us like punishment.

The Mythrigan flared.

A burst of violet light cracked through the haze

And in it, I saw them.

Faces I knew. Faces that trusted me.

My blood.

Valery students. Crawling. Struggling. Faces streaked with rain and mud and disbelief.

They were staring at us.

At me.

Their leader, clutching a burning girl he was supposed to protect.

Their eyes didn’t say anything.

They didn’t have to.

Because I knew what they saw.

Suddenly, I noticed it.

A crack thin, jagged splitting through the ground where we’d landed.

Then—

Crack.

A deeper one.

No.

I turned fast, dragging Jessa behind me, shielding her with my body.

Her skin still burned with the heat i left behind still warm. Where no amount of rain could undo it.

I grit my teeth. Reached out.

The others—my blood were slipping. The ground beneath them broke, a sinkhole forming in silence.

Their eyes widened.

I moved without thinking.

"Hold on!"

My left eye surged the Mythrigan flaring in full, wild bloom.

Violet light burst out —

And the earth obeyed.

A platform of dense crystal, laced with flickers of frozen light, erupted beneath them.

They drop safely onto the new ground.

Mud splashed. Someone screamed. But no one vanished into the dark.

I kept my arm outstretched, trembling.

Rain battered my face. Jessa’s breath was faint behind me.

But I didn’t let go.

I looked up.

A thin spire of ice began to form then another, and another until the rain no longer touched us. A dome of jagged frost encased the space, the last drops hissing as they hit the new walls.

"Haa... haa..."

My breath felt like it had cracked open my lungs.

I let my arm drop. My knees buckled. I fell back, still clutching Jessa against my chest.

She was still warm.

Still breathing.

But her skin... gods.

"Jessa. You—please. Hear me."

I pulled out a potion from my side pouch. My fingers slipped twice before I got the vial open.

"Come on... drink. Just a little—there you go."

The liquid slid between her lips. She didn’t resist. But she didn’t respond either.

Then green light flashed.

Marlen Thorned burst from the edge of the sinkhole, Her uniform was soaked, one arm glowing with soft emerald light.

Her eyes moved from Jessa... to me.

She saw it.

What I did.

"Tch."

It wasn’t anger.

It was disappointment. Maybe not even in me. Maybe in the fact that she’d expected it.

"Move," she said.

I hesitated.

"Kael. Move."

Her tone wasn’t kind. But her hands already shimmered, a muted green glow gathering at her palms.

I shifted back, holding Jessa steady. Marlen knelt without ceremony, planting one knee into the mud.

Marlen poured more mana into her hands, her energy weaving in precise, intricate flows.

"Mend by grace, light through limb. Let what was broken learn to shine."

Jessa’s breathing had steadied barely. The worst of the burns were sealed shut by Marlen’s healing, but her skin still glistened raw, her body limp with exhaustion.

The scent of scorched flesh lingered in the air, sharper than the smoke, sharper than the rain.

Marlen stood over us, breathing hard, her hands still faintly glowing.

"She’s stable," she said. "But she can’t fight. She shouldn’t move."

I didn’t answer.

My cloak was already wrapped around Jessa’s shoulders. Carefully. Like I was afraid she’d shatter if I pulled too hard.

Marlen narrowed her eyes.

"She’s bleeding through it. You know what that smell’s going to bring."

I looked up.

Rain poured down like a curse. But beyond it I heard the low growls. The shuffling of wet limbs. Movement in the mud.

"They’re already coming," I said.

"And you’re dragging bait with you?"

"No," I said flatly. "I’m carrying someone I burned."

She flinched. Just barely. A muscle in her jaw ticked.

"She can’t slow us down."

"She won’t."

"And if she does?"

"I’ll carry her."

The words weren’t dramatic. Just true.

Marlen stared at me for a moment. Her lips parted, then closed again.

The rain didn’t stop.

In the distance, something screamed wet and high and hunting.

"I’ll take rear," Marlen muttered finally, turning. "Don’t make me regret this."

I nodded once. Adjusted my grip. Jessa’s head rested against my shoulder, her breath shallow but still there.

I adjusted Jessa in my arms, her weight heavier than it should’ve been. Not from her body but from what I’d done.

Her breath was thin. The burns were stable, but the scent of charred flesh hadn’t left. It clung to us. Drew the monsters nearer.

Behind me, footsteps splashed through the mud.

"Kael" a voice said.

I turned my head, only slightly.

It was Cendric. Soaked, face pale, uniform smeared with earth and fear but standing.

He hesitated. Then stepped forward.

"Let me carry her," he said.

I blinked.

"You’re the leader now," he continued, louder this time, eyes not quite meeting mine. "You should be focused. We’ll fall behind if you carry her. Let me do it."

Others were watching. I could feel it the gazes of my blood, bruised and battered, waiting for my response.

I looked at Cendric.

He wasn’t wrong.

But he didn’t understand.

"I’m the leader," I said, voice quiet.

And then I shifted Jessa’s weight closer to my back.

"That means I carry what I break."

Cendric opened his mouth, then closed it. He lowered his head, stepping back without another word.