Chapter 55: Chapter 55- The Pain And The Gain

Rubbing her temples, Hyun-Jae went silent again. Her eyes wandered to the bag of food that Talon picked up. When she carried it around her shoulder, she felt her heaviness. Luckily, her strength was high enough to carry both Talon and the bag or she would've had to sacrifice it.

So, as she waited for the students to come back with the water, she opened the bag and checked the contents. She was positively surprised by what she saw. The entire food was filled with canned food, snacks, and all kinds of beverages.

'He really brought a lot of food. With careful rationing, we can feed everyone.' She thought to herself as she looked at Talon.

As she was about to speak, the door opened again and the three students came rushing inside with the towel and the water.

"H-Here!"

"Good. This should help his fever a little." Hyun-Jae nodded as she approached Talon again and started flipping her sleeves. "See that bag? Carry it back to the basketball court."

"Hm? What does it contain?"

"Food. We're going to ration it amongst all the students. Can you guys do that?" Hyun-Jae asked.

"Food?! Of course, we can! Please leave it to us!" Go Young-Soon said.

Hyun-Jae nodded her head before she said. "Everyone will get an equal part. If any one of you tries to get anything more, I will make sure you will regret it heavily. Understood?"

The atmosphere inside the room dropped a few degrees as the three students shuddered under Hyun-Jae extremely beautiful yet terrifying gaze.

"O-Of course!!"

The three students quickly nodded their heads before they quickly started dragging the bag out of the room.

When they left, Hyun-Jae turned around again and finally submerged her hand in the water as she got the towel wet. Then, she squeezed it and put it on top of Talon's forehead. The moment she did, Hyun-Jae could swear she heard a sizzling sound. Talon was now akin to a boiling pot.

However, when he felt the cold water over his forehead, his pained look became a little more relaxed and he finally went into deep slumber. Hyun-Jae looked at his pale face silently as she pulled the towel, submerged it in the water again, and put it on his forehead again.

Because of his unbelievably high fever, the towel would get hot almost instantly, so, she had to keep changing it again and again and again. Minutes passed in silence as Hyun-Jae took care of Talon.

For some reason, as arduous as this task was, she didn't find it annoying in the least. In fact, just watching her companion's face as she took care of him was a rather pleasant and peaceful moment amidst the constant chaos.

There was too much to handle every single day ever since the Integration happened that Hyun-Jae forgot how to have a peaceful time. Not that her normal life had much of that either.

So, just sitting there, doing something like taking care of Talon made a huge difference.

However, there was a small problem. Even though this was taking care of his fever, the rest of his body was still hot and sweaty. Hyun-Jae knew that leaving him like this would only hinder his recovery.

'I need to wipe the sweat off at least.' She thought to herself. However, that's when she realized what she was thinking about and her face turned weird.

She had just thought about wiping Talon... A man's sweat off which meant that she had to get him naked. There was no need to say that she had never done such a thing before in her life. In fact, apart from beaches and swimming classes, Hyun-Jae had never seen the naked torso of a man before.

Gulping down a mouthful of saliva quietly, her eyes wandered slowly from Talon's face to his upper torso. Luckily, Talon wasn't naked so it wasn't hard to look.

She was really glad that he survived that ordeal safely and she also didn't end up getting a punishment. Had Hyun-Jae been a split second late, Acrypha's rock would've hit its target and she would've been in a horrible situation.

In a sense, she owed that girl a lot for what she did even if she didn't know what was happening.

Acrypha's eyes moved to Hyun-Jae for a second. The latter was still focused on changing the towel constantly. Her eyes never left her partner at all.

So, Acrypha stood up and approached the girl slowly. Her expression was as calm as a quiet mystical lake.

When she got close enough to her, Acrypha stopped and gave her a deep glance. Then, she put her hands against each other in a particular way where two index fingers, two pinkies, and two thumbs were against each other while the rest of her fingers were tucked inside against each other.

"You saved my life and saved his life. I won't say anything like thank you or I appreciate it. But, it's a debt I will return to you in the future. I never back away from my words." Acrypha said as she closed her eyes.

Hyun-Jae didn't seem to hear Acrypha as she continued what she was doing. Standing there, Acrypha kept her hand sign for a few more seconds before she finally pulled her hands away and turned around before she floated back to her place.

Meanwhile, Hyun-Jae suddenly stopped her movement as she looked behind her. For some reason, she had a weird feeling that someone was standing behind her a moment ago. But, there was clearly no one there except for the two of them so she simply shook it off and continued her job.

A while later, Talon's eyes started opening slowly as he made a low groan. His dazed eyes scanned the place slowly before they landed on Hyun-Jae.

"You're awake," Hyun-Jae murmured as she looked at him.

"Yeah..." Talon nodded as he slowly rose up. A slight headache hit him, but it wasn't too bad so he ignored it.

"You shouldn't move. You're still sick." Hyun-Jae said.

"No, I feel a lot better now. My fever is gone and my body is slowly regaining its energy. I can move." He replied as he suddenly felt something fall on his lap. Looking down, he noticed that it was a wet towel.

Picking it up curiously, he inspected the towel before it clicked in his head. "Were you taking care of me?" He asked with a raised eyebrow.

When the girl heard the sense 'Take care of me', her mind went back to what just happened.

"... It's not much, your fever was too high, so I just put a wet towel on your forehead to ease it a little," Hyun-Jae replied with a weird expression as she looked away.

Talon blinked a few times as he looked between her and the towel before he smiled.

"Thank you. You didn't have to do all of this, but thank you so much. I really owe you a big one this time."

"Huh? No, it's really nothing much. We're teammates." Hyun-Jae shook her head.

"No, you saved my life. My father taught me to always return the favor no matter what. I will return it, take my word for it." He said seriously.

Seeing that expression, the girl didn't even find the words to retort back. In the end, she sighed and gave up. If he was that persistent on returning the favor, then she would accept it.

"So, it seems you grew way stronger than before, or am I imagining things?" Hyun-Jae changed the topic quickly to avoid any more awkwardness.

(A//N: Thanks to everyone who supports the book with power stones and golden tickets, you guys are the best:) )