Luca only managed to stay up properly after his third fainting spell. And the medical team around him had gone nuts trying to figure out what was wrong when his diagnostics kept coming out clean.
And that was a week ago. He spent most of the week fainting and waking up. Then he was whisked into what looked like a dorm room to sleep off whatever this untraceable affliction was.
But then they wanted him to come back for a regular check-up.
Only to find nothing.
He walked there for nothing, and he would be returning back with nothing.
Inner peace, come to me.
[Hospital Hallway, Present]
"Third time's the charm."
Lucas learned about this during his short exposure to human society. Typically, it should mean a good thing to keep trying until you get it. But it meant something different for him.
He's got his three death flags. Normal people probably won't survive those, but he did, like a cursed doll that had to withstand layers of suffering so that they could be maximized.
And the third one really took him out.
Now that he's become Luca, maybe the cosmos could stop trying to kill him.
Like right now.
Death by walking might be the worst one if he doesn't make it back alive.
At least the first one was from the appearance of a mutated Dungeon when his body was six years old.
Then came that Esper rampage after he was imprisoned. That one should have killed him, but the government decided otherwise.
In the end, what took him out was the lab sucking out the vitality left in his organs to make potent medical pills.
Any of those three would at least look cool on his tombstone, not that anyone would bother to give him one. But on the off chance that he got one, it would look like he's lived a meaningful life.
However, if Luca were being honest, death by walking seems more in line with his unglamorous life.
By now, he'd become partially delirious from the pain as his bones clashed together.
How bad was this body's state before he moved in that he's practically clattering with his every move?
Then there's the lack of memories.
When Luca transferred over, he saw snippets, like footage from a surveillance camera. The view rarely shifted, and his body never really responded—like a doll with recording eyes.
Creepy.
Then he saw the people's reactions to him. The odd looks he kept getting prompted his research. Everything he knew about himself was something this body had heard or learned from his research on Starnet.
He did not have the right to judge the original Luca's social life when his social status kept on getting him killed. At least the guy was still in one piece.
It just sucked that he was a pariah even in this life.
He was panting heavily as he turned around a corner but had to stop when he heard them talking.
"Have you seen him?"
"Yeah! When he went to get his dorm assignment! I thought they were exaggerating every time they called him a beauty, but he sure had it out for the looks department."
"Really? But I heard no one wanted to room with him. Who ended up as the unlucky roommate?"
"That's the scary part. He ended up with that top student from the Junior Academy."
"What? Seriously?!"
"Yeah! They probably thought that since the guy was always away on missions, they wouldn't encounter each other, anyway."
Luca kept listening in, wanting to discover more about himself and this school.
Initially, he was shocked to hear so many people gossiping about him when he hadn't even done anything yet. And the body also had no recollection of doing literally anything.
But he could do nothing about it because he couldn't rebut any of their statements without digging a deeper grave for himself.
He figured he just had to survive this school, not that he survived his last life, but how bad could it be?
The Royal Military Academy—a school for the most promising generation of the Empire.
There were stringent requirements to get in and even more tyrannical requirements to graduate. However, as long as they were accepted into the Academy, students had to follow the rule of equality regardless of social status.
So why was Luca Kyros so hated? Because he got in by the backdoor.
It was a tiny backdoor that 99.99% of the population could not exploit. And "backdoor" makes it sound like it's all glitz and glamour when it was basically conscription. It guaranteed and practically expected the enlistment of members of the Imperial family and the four great Dukedoms of the Empire.
And Luca was the only son of the Duke of Kyros. So, he had every right to be here, just like the other children of the nobility.
It's just that Luca's reputation preceded him. And he wasn't even supposed to attend the Academy himself.
From his memories, Luca had a double body. And this double body was tasked to create sensational news about him.
He's got that spoiled and useless philanderer in the bag because his double did too well on his assigned task. But why would someone be hired to besmirch the good name of a high-ranking nobility?
Because they needed a potent smokescreen to hide even bigger problems.
One, Luca, the only heir, was a vegetative doll.
Two, that Luca was spiritually barren. The guy tested for no spiritual powers.
Even plants could beat him, as even those had innate spiritual essence.
The poor guy only had to go because the assessment would include a comprehensive DNA test, so they couldn't send the body double for this.
But Luca had heard that his father had already prepared to change his results to at least an E-rank.
S, A, B, C, D, E, and F. That was the scale for both spiritual and physical powers. The minimum requirement for entry to the Royal Military Academy was a C- rank on both aspects.
The real Luca had no spiritual rating.
At all.
And his Physical power would rate a pitiful F with how much of a vegetable he was.
If any of that leaked to the public, the Dukedom of Kyros would definitely collapse. Even now, it's being held together by the Duke's stellar achievements, but what would happen when word gets out that his son was as good as a pebble? Not even a rock because he was too weak to withstand a light push.
Luca shuddered at the thought and even feared being found by that group of students. It would make everything even more awkward if they found him huddled by the corner, listening to their gossip.
So when he heard the footsteps closing in, he decided he had no choice but to use the only ace he had up his sleeve.
Luca disappeared. If there were any onlookers, they'd react to how he vanished from where he stood.
But Luca simply hid in his safe space, the only thing he's got going for him in the entire cosmos.
He went inside his own Dungeon.
Yep, it's that Dungeon.