As James began speaking, Logan split his attention, listening to him while his eyes kept flicking towards David's group sitting on the stands to his left.
"From now on," James said with a grin, "even you F-rank students will be learning some basic self-defense skills."
That caught everyone's attention. Logan sat up straighter in his seat as he started paying close attention to James.
Around the room, whispers broke out.
"You're probably wondering why this change is happening all of a sudden," James continued, pacing in front of the class without any change in his expression.
He paused, scanning the faces of all his students.
"My answer to that is… I don't know either!" he said, laughing. "Orders from the top, which I just have to comply with. Trust me, I don't like having to waste my time with you F-ranks either."
A couple of F-rank students who had started raising their hands quickly backed down.
'So much for complaining to the principal. Figures.'
James gave a lazy shrug. "Anyway, might as well make the best of it. You two—yeah, you and you—into the ring."
He pointed to two F-rank students near the edge of the mats, both of whom froze mid-conversation.
"We'll begin with some basic self-defense techniques," James started, demonstrating some self-defensive moves that focused purely on using the physical body.
'It's quite interesting,' Logan thought, paying close attention to the teacher's movements and replicating them in his mind.
Ever since he was young, he had great memory and was exceptionally good at observing patterns because of it.
His memory was also the reason why he'd been better at studying than David.
Watching James repeat the same move again and again, Logan noticed something off about him.
Naturally, the F-ranks who'd never done anything remotely close to this couldn't follow his moves without mistakes.
'Doesn't look like he has a lot of patience for F-ranks,' Logan frowned.
As James watched them fail again and again, his smile disappeared, and the technique he was showing kept increasing in speed.
The tips he gave got worse, making it even harder for the F-rank students to replicate it.
"Stop," James suddenly said, halting his teaching.
Looking at the stands, he pointed at two of random D-rank students. "You guys, come down here and help them in my stead."
Nodding, James continued. "Yeah, that'll work."
"I'll be dividing you into groups with higher-ranked people with experience," he said, pointing at the rest of the people on the stands. "David and Rebecca, follow me. I'll be teaching you two something more advanced."
With that revelation, whispers immediately broke out. Students in the front row got up and walked off the stands while others followed.
Cursing internally, Logan got up and followed the person sitting beside him.
As he walked down the steps, he saw David talking with James, smiling as he pointed in his direction.
'I got a bad feeling about this.'
Watching James raise a thumb, Logan felt a chill run down his spine.
'I'm f**ked,' he thought, cursing. In his eyes, it was very obvious that whatever David asked was about him and couldn't be good.
Logan felt trapped. As he'd grown older, he'd come to understand that being an orphan with an F-rank affinity was no different than a death sentence.
'Normally, F-ranks are just outcasts with their only chance being a scientist or engineer, but those colleges are extremely expensive. I wouldn't be able to get in there even if I worked my job for a hundred years.'
'In other words: there's nothing they lose, even if I were to somehow die.'
'Because who's going to care about an F-rank without family, when compared to gaining a favor from a kid with a B-rank and a good background?'
When everyone had reached the bottom of the stairs, James had a wide grin on his face.
"Alright everyone, I'll be pairing you up with your partner now," he said.
Working down the line of students, he matched most F- and E-ranks with D-ranks and C-ranks until he finally reached Logan.
Looking around him, Logan realized the only person left was one of David's friends, Tiël — a C-rank lightning affinity, about three-quarters of the way to a Bronze core.
Sighing, Logan walked towards the grinning Tiël before James could even get the chance to say anything.
"Good. Now that everyone's paired up, I'll be going to a separate area to train these two," James said, smiling. "I expect some improvement in all of you when I get back. Also, make sure to control your strength and leave the weaker students alive."
Logan noticed James glance at him just before he turned around and left, with the B-rank students walking ahead of him.
"You heard the teach," he heard behind him. "Let's get this started orphan."
Turning around to look at Tiël, Logan noticed that everyone was looking at him. Some looked at him with pity, some with disgust, while others feigned not looking at all.
But the one group that stood out the most were the rest of David's friends, who laughed.
Logan's alarm bells rang louder as he watched the unrelated classmates spread out through the gym while David's friends and their partners stayed near him.
'There's nowhere to go,' Logan thought, trying his best to stay calm while his mind raced for a way to escape this situation.
Hearing noise beside him, he turned his eyes back to Tiël, his instincts screaming at him to move. From the corner of his eye, he noticed a blur moving toward him at high speed.
Before Logan could think, he was struck.
"Ugh," Logan spat out, taking a few steps back in a daze.
The sounds of laughter around him completely disappeared, drowned out by the thumping of his heartbeat.
Blood rushed to his head as he looked at Tiël, who had started moving toward him again.
Watching him pull back his right arm once more, Logan quickly stepped to the side, dodging the incoming punch by a hair's length.
As Logan stumbled back, Tiël's smile disappeared. Without hesitation, he followed up with another punch aimed at Logan's stomach.
Having no time to dodge, Logan took the heavy blow to his stomach.
Gagging from the impact, he reached for his stomach as he fell over.
"Good. That's where you belong," Tiël said, smirking.
Then, he kicked Logan in the side.
Vomiting what little he'd eaten in the morning, Logan collapsed onto the ground in pain.
Barely managing to look up, Logan saw David and his friends take out their phones to snap pictures.
"Wait, wouldn't it be even funnier if he laid in the stuff he threw up?" one of David's other friends asked, laughing.
It didn't take long before Logan felt someone grab his hair and lift his head.
Struggling to get out of the person's grasp, Logan got hit in the face once more before finally being dropped in his own filth.
Blacking out from the punch, Logan laid motionless while the rest of his classmates scattered.
Waking up after a few minutes, he watched the lights being turned off as the final students left the gym.
"Ugh."
"Everything hurts," Logan mumbled in broken words.
In the time he'd been knocked unconscious, one of his eyes had swollen severely, making it hard for him to see through.
Time passed as Logan gathered his strength to slowly stand up.
Breathing heavily, he held his side as he struggled to walk toward the restroom.
Leaning on nearby walls, he finally got to the restroom, where he could wash the filth off his face and clean his wounds.
Staring into the mirror as he scrubbed the filth off his face, Logan felt cold and bitter.
'No one helped, no one even stayed,' he thought, bitter.
While his rational side also understood that no one wanted to make themselves a target by doing so, he had hoped that maybe there was even one person who would care enough.
'If it wasn't for the trashy protective gear, I would've probably broken a rib or two,' he thought, numb.
He couldn't afford a hospital. All he could do was pray it wasn't broken and that his wounds would heal on their own.
Time passed in a daze. He'd cleaned the filth off his face and walked out of the gym.
Walking through the school building, he felt countless stares directed toward him.
But Logan cared about none of that. The pain he felt right now was far worse than any damage to his already bad reputation.
Leaving the school grounds, he walked toward his crappy apartment. Despite the intense pain he felt, Logan pushed on. Passing out on the streets wasn't an option.
Minutes passed as he walked in excruciating pain.
Reaching the street in front of his apartment, Logan noticed something strange.
A few black SUVs were blocking the main road leading to his apartment, while strange men in suits lingered everywhere.