Ethan didn't struggle.
Not even when Lena rose to her feet, blood still on her gloves, and bound his arms behind him with a searing spell chain that hissed and smoked against his skin.
He didn't scream.
Didn't curse.
Didn't even look anyone in the eye.
He just stood there—empty, deflated—like someone who had been waiting to lose all along.
Lena didn't say anything to him at first. She looked down at him with her usual steel-hard expression, but the tremble in her jaw betrayed her anger. Her eyes weren't just angry anymore.
They were tired.
Disappointed.
"You knew this wouldn't work," she said quietly. "So why?"
Ethan chuckled.
It was low. Broken. Not cruel like before—just... hollow.
"Because even if I lose, I still get to ruin things," he whispered. "That's what people like me do, Professor."
