I was lying in my bed and I counted every person that was entering the room one by one. As each person entered the room, they lined up by the wall on Gary's side like some sort of military drill. Everyone who I had interacted seriously with at one point were in the room including Slyvia, Gary, Ian, Dan, Monk, Kyle, Martha and the two red-haired twins.
"What's going on?"
Just then, Sir K entered the room. He closed the door and put some sort of magical device on the door. The device looked like a stone spider and attached itself on the door and a magic ring appeared.
"Don't worry, the device here is just to make sure that no one is listening in on us" Sir K said then continued. "What I'm about to tell you all today is top secret but Wilfred and I have decided it's best if we inform you students of the current situation."
"As you all can see, two of our students were seriously injured. In truth, they were lucky to make it out alive."
Sir K then walked over to the two red-haired twins. "For Sloth and Badger, could you please explain what these people looked like Slyvia?"
Slyvia then stood up from her seat next to my bed.
"There were three intruders in total. We only managed to catch a glimpse of them but they all had one thing in common: they all wore red masks."
"Gary and Ray, I believe you saw the face of one of the men in the masks. Would you care to say who that was?"
Gary gulped down before answering.
"It was the squire master Lancy."
Loud gasps and chattering started in the room. Everyone couldn't believe what they had just heard.
Sir K clapped his hands and everyone immediately went silent.
Just then, Slyvia had raised her hand to ask a question,
"Were they members of the dark guild?"
Sir K shook his head.
"If they were, it would be fairly simple. This is the reason why I have gathered all of you here today. The red mask men are from a faction called Pureblood. Eleven years ago, there was a prophecy spread through all of the lands from the divine being. It stated that our saviour would come from a boy with red hair. We sent our best knights in search for children all over and that's how we came across Badger, Sloth, Kyle, Ian and Ray today. This same prophecy led to the creation of Pureblood. Their goal is to get rid of the red-haired children."
"But that doesn't make any sense. Why would they kill the saviours?" Monk asked.
"There is a second part of the prophecy that was also told at the same time, that the red-haired boy would be the destruction of the world as well. It was the first time that two prophecies were given and they even contradicted each other. This tore the Alure Kingdom in half causing the Purebloods to form. Sadly, many knights at Avrion Academy are also part of the Purebloods."
"Why bring us into this?" Dan asked, "We have nothing to do with them." Dan said pointing towards Badger and Sloth.
Slyvia snapped at what Dan had said.
"How could you say that Dan? Ian, Kyle and Ray are our friends. Of course, this involves us."
Martha pulled Slyvia back to try to calm her down. As soon as the two of them stopped arguing, Sir K continued.
"Whether you like it or not, you are involved now. For this, I am truly sorry. We never expected the Purebloods to act so strongly. So far, all they had done was protest the students being at the academy. This is the first incident. The Lurker has been protecting Badger and Sloth this whole time, but we had no one to protect Ray, Ian and Kyle. Thankfully you had surrounded yourself with powerful allies. With Slyvia by your side, I didn't think the purebloods would dare attack you."
Sir K then turned towards me.
"Ray, at this moment you are the most likely candidate as the child from the prophecy."
"What! What makes you think that?!"
"You're body. Three times you have been put in a near-death situation but every time, your body manages to heal itself. People can only think this is a blessing from the divine being. Student medical records can be accessed by high ranking knights. I'm sure the purebloods already have this information, as well as information about everyone on your team."
I wanted to tell him he was wrong. My body healed because I wasn't a human. Even now, the red aura mixed in with my body suggested I was currently some sort of mix. After what Slyvia had said, it confirmed my thoughts. This was why my body healed faster than ordinary. They also didn't know the fact that my hair was originally black and later turned red. I started to grind my teeth. I wanted to say I was a dragon but that would just make them think I was crazy.
"I can't be…I'm sure I'm not."
"It doesn't matter if you believe it or not, for this is what the purebloods believe and now the people who are surrounding you are in danger as well. There is no way for us to protect you all 24/7 so I have warned you all today. Please look out for each other and be careful."
As Sir K finished speaking, he took the device off the wall and opened the door.
"Wait! You mean you're not even going to protect us?!" Dan shouted.
"There isn't much we can do; we have our normal knightly duties. We will look out for you the best we can but it's best not to do anything too obvious to raise suspicion. Also, we currently don't know who is part of the Pureblood faction. We could just be sending someone to guard you to later find you dead."
Everyone was silent for a while as they took everything in. Avrion academy was meant to be a knightly place where they all were united against the enemy, but now they had learnt that there was also an enemy within the academy itself. It was a shock to them.
Everyone then left the room and allowed Gary and me to recover. Although I was already fine, I stayed with Gary for a while to cheer him up. After learning about what happened, I felt guilty that Gary was hurt in the process. After two weeks, his wounds were fully healed and we could leave the hospital. The doctors there wished that they would never see us again.
As we went back to the dormitory, there was a sealed envelope left on the table.
The envelope was made out to Gary.
The Academy didn't allow letters to be received or sent unless it was important. The last time I had seen one of these, it was news about my father.
Gary picked the letter off the table.