It had been a month since Luvi received the gift and after converting to a liquid diet completely. He had lost a lot of his weight in the recent week.
The cast on the injured leg was taken off a week ago so his exercise frequency also increased. In turn, his body burns more calories causing to get slimmer faster.
And even though he still looked the same on surface and only lost around 6kgs since he began. It was still a huge achievement for him. There was noticeable progress through his regular practice.
And as he used certain parts of his body more, even though the fat didn't decrease much, his muscles developed and the control over his body increased a lot from before.
So while he still looked as fat as before. He was somehow able to do all the steps in the exercise, albeit at a slower pace.
But it was enough.
He had already started to practice doing both the mana circulation and body movements together. And although multi-tasking was a bit problematic, there was still some progress.
The best part, this simple exercise was increasing the focus of his mind and although it didn't get easy with time, there was still hope for the future.
And so today as well, Luvi was in his room like the introvert he was. Exercising away from the eyes of everyone.
He didn't look for adoration and support from anyone. He was doing it for himself. To him as time went by, this boring physical activity started to feel fun.
Though still not as fun as his usual games and shows he watched. But it was a close 5th in his hobby.
*dingdong
Usually rarely would anyone visit him during this time of the day. So it was odd for someone to ring his doorbell.
It was midday and probably lunch break in the academy. There would have been a chance of it being Andy if not for Luvi knowing that Andy usually uses lunch break to practice in the field instead of coming back to his room.
Which meant either something happened to Andy or it was someone else.
So, while covered from head to toe in sweat, Luvi shouted. "Wait!" Before chugging a bottle of mango juice to half.
Then he went ahead and drank normal salt water to re energize himself. It was only then he went and opened his door.
And the people he found in front of him, he didn't know any of them. To him, they were complete strangers. If not for the uniform on their body, Luvi would have shut his door.
"I wonder why you people are here?" Luvi aske, as sweat dropped from his chin and his whole body smells very bad.
Causing the two boys that came for a visit to back away.
They have heard of the legends of this weird guy.
Before he was pretty unknown and more of an enigma. Always taking 1-3rd ranks without ever coming to class. Making him sound like an ultimate genius.
People even thought that genius had a rating of either 1 or 0 in talent, making him dangerous, hence never allowing him to study with others.
Though this illusion was broken the moment he got famous after his small meeting with Triptan outside of a small tea shop. And Rose's mention of the name Kuluvi was all it took to connect the dots.
It didn't take long for the academy to learn who this weird boy was actually.
Even though the year was not over yet. People were already aware of the fat wastrel that hid away from the world due to his trash power.
But this was not why the two were here.
"Are you Kuluvi?" They asked, already knowing the answer, but they still asked for confirmation.
"I mean, is there another fat guy like me in this building?" Luvi turned to look around in the corridor before saying. "I guess not, huh!"
Luvi was well aware of his current popularity now.
On the Biryani day when Andy told him about some guys asking questions. There was already a post on the school forum about his identity for the whole academy to see.
People who cared learned about him and those that didn't were forced to learn about him.
Though it had little to no effect on his daily life and soon that post disappeared from the boards losing popularity.
But it didn't mean the interest in this strange guy had died down.
"Then you are Kuluvi." The guy, although a bit disgusted over why a fat wastrel like Luvi would be sweating so hard for, he still did what he was asked for. "Do you know Ramanthan?"
Hearing the name Kuluvi was aware why these two were here.
'Another bunch of sheep.'
The day he sent that tweet, he had forgotten to activate the proxies on his phone that might have masked his IP. Causing all of it to be exposed in the open.
If not for using the dormitory wifi at that moment, he might have worried over being found out. But this network is shared by over five hundred students, and each of them had multiple devices connected to the network as well.
It was nigh-impossible for him to be found out.
Or so he thought.
But what Luvi forgot was that there were only a few in the campus who were into computers as much as he was.
And with his name being famous recently due to the incident with Rose, he was also put in the suspect list for the people who might have abused Ram's ID.
"That fire guy?... I know him." Luvi said while picking his nose, not giving an inch to the boys in front of him.
And why should he? These people had so much free time to play detectives for someone else instead of practicing or just simply watching good shows.
If they're gonna waste their time, it's better to waste it by enjoying the heck out of it. He didn't even understand why these boys would do something like this.
"He is from the same middle school as me… and man did he get bullied a lot… Like really a lot!"
The way he spoke was crass and unbecoming of someone who was always in the top 3 of theoretical classes. But this was the persona he showed to the public and it was not that far from who he was in reality.
Though hearing these words, the words from the two boys were different. "So you do…" While one was trying to say something, he was cut off by his friend.
"What do you mean he got bullied? Wasn't he the strongest?"
Hearing the guy that they somewhat worshiped sounded weird and unbelievable to the two. Ram was kind and helpful to even the weakest of the class.
Never flaunting his strength nor his talent to anyone, he was the symbol of humbleness. It was why he was so popular in his class as well and held so much respect.
So when people learned that someone used his twitter ID to promote and support a gambling app, the people were angry.
It didn't help that some small drama youtubers finding the chance had made fun of him and asked him to say sorry on multiple occasions.
Which further angered them.
It didn't help that some bastards that wished to see his downfall were talking behind his back, which hurt the people that Ram had helped once.
It was why after Ram requested them to find who it was, they started to search and then came across Kuluvi.
But who would have known that Kuluvi actually knew Ram from his school. And it even turned out that Ram, who they thought had no blemish also had a sad past.
"Strongest? Are you guys stupid or something? He awakened at the age of 15 if I remember right. And even if he awakened, it's not allowed for a young adult to use their powers in the open unless they have the appropriate license or in a situation where their power is needed to save a life."
"None of which was true for that guy."
Luvi laughed while telling the dark history of the academy's hero.
"He just had that energy to attract trouble to himself, you won't believe just how many people bullied him."
"And even after that unlucky guy awakened, he was still bullied because those guys knew that it was the only chance they had to beat someone of such a high rank then them."
It was a classic tale of envy and jealousy. Before he had nothing hence people bullied him, after he had too much making the people bully him even more.
Though Luvi had to respect that Ram suffered through all of that without a single cry for help.
A perfect being.
It's why he hated him even more.
And the two, hearing the things Ram suffered through, they felt a bit sad for their hero.
'He suffered so much, but he never said a thing to us.'
'No wonder he never spoke about his past.'
'My respect for him just increased by a whole new level.'
Their hearts went through a lot of changes as Luvi told them the tale, even making them almost forget about why they were here.
The story of their hero's past was just too sad and heart wrenching.
"Did you… Did you do anything to him as well?
One of them asked, curious whether a crass individual like Luvi would have done the same. "Hah, if I did it, you think I would have joined Skyward Academy? He would have beat my ass to pieces and I ain't a maso, if you know what I mean." Luvi said while winking and shoving elbow into one of the boys in a knowing manner.
"No, I don't know what you mean and please stop doing this."
The boy backed off, rubbing the place where Luvi's elbow touched in a hurry.
Luvi's smelly sweat just stuck to his body, disgusting him in the process.
Though the other boy that hadn't been touched by the sweaty Luvi, asked. "So is there anyone else in this academy who took part in his bullying?"
They thought, if there was someone like that in the academy, there was a high chance that it was the criminal who hacked Ram's ID.
But the answer Luvi gave them shut their mouth.
"I dunno, I just stay here all day doing my stuff." Luvi said as he pointed at his dark rook, causing the two to step back.