78 Bothered Too Much

In the classroom, Hayden did what he always did. Activate Divine Perception and listen carefully to the teacher. Well, at least that was what he appeared to do as Hayden has studies the lessons they were tackling beforehand.

'Damn, taking these classes are getting increasingly boring…' Hayden thought to himself without displaying emotion externally. 'It's all too basic now.'

If anybody in here heard Hayden's thoughts, they would certainly beat him up till he can't be recognized by his mother. Well, figuratively at least, because Hayden will just kill them if they do so.

One must be reminded that they were in an elite high school, one that has a foundation of pure intellect. Their present class was also mathematics, a class that even many of the so-called geniuses in the Scholar Academy struggled with. What more, their current topic is calculus 1, which is taught in the 11th grade for students at regular high schools.

If Hayden found calculus easy then the feelings of wanting to beat him up that his classmates would have when he voices this out is simply rightful. As for why Hayden found this undemanding was because he had a firm grasp of mathematics even before his awakening, what more after.

With this in mind, Hayden chose to think of other things. What was presently running through his mind was, 'What would be the gift I would give for Eun-ha and the others?'

For a few hours, Hayden's mind was exclusively occupied by this. It's not like he'll learn anything new by listening. At the subject prior to lunch break, Hayden has temporarily decided to give the CHORUS members two things for the incoming fansign event at Saturday at the Maharlika Hall.

These three things were a perfectly drawn, printed and framed digital portrait of the eleven members, a handcrafted stuffed toy of the animals they are being mostly compared to by fans, and a miniature figurine.

Yes, Hayden learned how to sew in his free time. He was that bored and was in dire need of something to do, okay?

'Wait, is 3D printing an animal toy better…?' As the alarm sounded, Hayden was second thinking his decision. 'No… Stuffed toys are cuter. Wait… That'd be lovely, yeah, I'll give them those three things then!'

As the teacher bade goodbye to them, Hayden has made up his mind and gave up on racking his brains for any more ideas. The three gifts he decided on was the printed digital art portrait, the stuffed animal, and a miniature 3D printed model of them.

'With Divine Perception, I can do those all within two days.' Hayden estimated. 'Well, within twelve hours I can complete those…'

With the precision that Hayden got from Divine Perception, all of these tasks were as effortless as drinking water and eating food. Don't get Hayden wrong though, it was not that he's underestimating the artists that do this with all their hearts, it's only that Hayden had an unfair advantage.

Hayden groaned at the notion of writing an actual letter. It was not like he was 'that' attached to CHORUS. He was merely a regular fan who admires their astounding and cutesy visuals, their melodious singing voices and style, and their groovy dance moves. He admired them, not put them in a pedestal.

Apart from those, Hayden really had nothing to say to them, with the sole connection he has being with Eun-ha, who was his girlfriend, and probably Sayuri as she was too adorable to be ignored.

With Hayden mulling things over, he walked out of the classroom to eat in the cafeteria. By the door, Hayden was jumped upon by Daniel. "Dude, what's up with the serious look?"

"I'm thinking of a letter to the CHORUS members." Hayden impassively replied. It was a well-known fact to Daniel that Hayden was a VERSE.

In truth, due to Hayden, Daniel got pulled to appreciating their music and visuals as Hayden's Harmony app literally only has k-pop and anime music paid for, nothing else.

"Why am I so bad at expressing my emotions through writing?" As they walked, Hayden sighed in frustration. "I can write a 10,000-word essay on a topic without exerting that much effort, yet, when it comes to personal letters, I suck so bad!"

"Don't sweat it, man." Daniel discreetly enjoyed the rarely seen upset Hayden when it came to expressing himself. It was not every day that you'd see a one-in-a-billion-genius suffering from something. "You'd get around it."

"I hope so." Hayden rolled his eyes, heading for the stairwells. "Oh yeah. Are you going to the concert?"

"Yep." Daniel said. "Scarlet's apparently a huge VERSE, much like you. We're also going at the fansign, giving me a ticket. She won't tell me how she acquired such rare tickets."

"Nice. You can go with me on my car." Hayden flashed a rare teasing smile at Daniel. "So, how was the kiss?"

"Oh yeah!" On the landing, Daniel halted and enthusiastically wrapped his left arm around Hayden's shoulder. "Dude, how are you such an effective wingman when you can't socialize?"

"I'm good at reading people, you said it yourself." Hayden's face twitched. He was exasperated of Daniel's touchiness. "Okay, that's enough, remove your arm around me or I'll kill you."

"Yeah, yeah, sorry." Daniel let go of Hayden, understanding that Hayden will act upon his words if he kept doing so. "I know I'm not supposed to ask, but I'm seriously dying to know. Who's the lucky girl?"

"You escaped a crisis and you're already putting yourself in the grave, huh?" Hayden coldly smiled, emitting his powerful killing intent that induced goosebumps on the people around them. "Ask again. I dare you."

"You're that uptight on keeping that under wraps, huh?" Daniel shrugged. He was surreptitiously terrified of Hayden's tone. "Well, not like I hoped that you would give me a name. Nevertheless, it was worth a try."

Hayden shook his head in irritation. Daniel didn't change one bit. Deep down, Hayden was secretly relieved that Daniel has recovered and had these banters with him. 'There are some relationships worth keeping, and there are those that should be severed without remorse.'

Ever so slightly, Hayden's lips jerked at Daniel's presence. 'Although he's still the annoying little talkative bitch that he is.'

"Oh yeah, let me warn you," The loudness of Hayden's voice diminished. "I think there's a new wielder here that awakened."

"Really?" Daniel's playful attitude was wiped off, becoming solemn. "How can you say? Did something happen?"

"Do you remember the woman in our grade who stole the attention of everyone when she came in?" Hayden described Courtney to Daniel. "When I stared at her for the second time, her figure somehow glitched out. It was strange witnessing that, I tell you."

Hayden didn't divulge that his Indestructible Devil was probably the cause of the 'glitching out' of Courtney's figure.

"Ahh…" Daniel was speechless. He remembered the people gasping at her entrance. He swiftly grasped the severity of the situation. "Her? Really? So that's not her true form? Does her Ability have something to do with illusions?"

"How the hell should I know?" Opening the door to the cafeteria floor, Hayden creased his eyebrows. "However, that seems to be the likely case. Otherwise, my Heavenly Sense is wrong. And I don't see how that is imaginable."

"Huh." Daniel shrugged, falling in line 3, the currently shortest line, to buy food. "What are you going to do about her? Are we going to report this to them?"

"I'm ignoring her." Hayden shook his head and whispered to Daniel. "It's as if you don't understand my character at all. I'm not tied down by my responsibility to them. You're aware that I merely joined them for the protection of my parents. Outside of that, I don't care about them at all. Until I'm bothered by her, I won't mess with her at all."

Ironically, the second Hayden's words left his mouth, Courtney lined up behind them. "Good afternoon, Hayden."

"Good afternoon." Hayden turned around and greeted back politely, not following up to their greeting at all.

'Tsk, is he one of those guys that can't express himself at all?' Courtney's face jolted. Earlier, Hayden was clenching his fists in excitement, yet now, he was ignoring her. 'Or is he a tsundere? A male tsundere?'

Occupied with her thoughts, Hayden and Daniel moved forward. Daniel was conscious that Hayden was using his Divine Perception, hence, he didn't face him at all as he whispered, "I see that trouble has come to you."

"Shut up." Hayden couldn't help to roll his eyes at Daniel. "Just buy your food silently or I'll kick your ass."

"Yeah, yeah," Daniel chuckled at Hayden. This giggle from Daniel was perceived by Courtney, mistaking it as Daniel falling for her as well, or Daniel teasing Hayden.

'He does like me!' Courtney took the latter as an explanation instead of the former. 'Hehe, the school heartthrob will be mine! I'll take my sweet time with him.'

As for Hayden, he will stick to his words. Courtney plainly greeted him, that isn't analogous to 'bothering him.' After all, as a famous person, many people greet him and smile at him in the hallways.

With the two finishing buying their food, Hayden and Daniel found an empty seat. Hayden refocused on the problem he has at hand, "What the hell am I going to write on the letters!?"

"Just write about what you feel." Daniel took a spoonful of rice in his mouth and a bite of the fried chicken he bought. "It's not that hard as you think."

"No, no," Hayden shook his head, blankly swallowing rice and the kare-kare he procured. "It's that hard for me."

Noticing Hayden starting to eat in automatic mode and disregard Daniel's existence as usual, he snorted and continued to eat in silence. Bored, Daniel retrieved his phone and earphones from his pocket and watched a War of Honor video.

That persisted for a minute until Courtney blithely sat on the table that Hayden and Daniel was sitting at. "Hayden, I'm a big fan. I hope to be your friend."

With Courtney disrupting Hayden's train of thought, he was irked. What the hell did he do this time? He was only planning on letters and somebody came to knock to cause trouble! 'Son of a bitch.'

Reining in his aggravation, Hayden displayed an expressionless countenance and said, "Okay, but please refrain from being impolite the next time and ask if the seat is taken."

"Is the seat taken?" Courtney's eyes widened, clearly attempting to be cute.

"No." By this point in time, Hayden's plate was half empty. He was a fast eater. "Be that as it may, isn't it basic manners to inquire first prior to sitting? What's your name?"

"Courtney… Courtney Ilusyon from 3-7." Courtney gulped, stumped of Hayden's attitude. 'Isn't this too much of a tsundere? What the hell is he going at!?'

"Okay Ms. Courtney." Hayden's eyes sharpened, choosing to nip this in the bud. "I know you're a wielder. Drop the act as you won't trick me."

"He's right," Daniel suddenly articulated on the side. "You won't be able to trick this guy. Howbeit, I'm curious Hayden, what happened to not doing anything?"

"She talked to me too many a time. If that's not bothering me, I don't know what is." Hayden glared at Daniel, who prompted to smile at him. "As for you. I'm not going to tell you to stop or something as I don't care how you use your Ability at all. Notwithstanding this, don't ever bother me again."

All this while, Courtney was stunned of Hayden's words. Specifically, the enunciation at the end, which was full of… murderous intent? She couldn't explain, "So… Don't tell me you two also have… Abilities?"

Hayden didn't reply, nor did Daniel. Daniel was taught by this to Hayden before and he would not want to make the mistake of divulging his own status to anybody.

"He is and he can sense your status as a wielder." Hayden mechanically put food in his mouth. Subsequent to finishing chewing his food, Hayden spoke, "He's also stronger than you. I suggest you to not make any move as you won't be able to beat him in a fight."

Daniel was startled of Hayden's words. Accordingly, he nearly choked on his food and threw a questioning gaze at Hayden, conveying the message of 'What the hell dude?'

As a response, Hayden tossed him a glance expressing, 'Hey, you got to pay for what you did for disseminating so much information of my Ability to people I'm not familiar with. Why can't I do the same?'

From that, Daniel was absolutely wordless. He couldn't possibly refute Hayden at this point in time, right? He had to admit that he did Hayden wrong by doing that carelessly.

Consequently, he simply hurled Hayden a look saying, 'In spite of that… We're friends… What a vengeful bastard.'

'Hey, not my fault.' Hayden shrugged, proceeding to finish his meal and cleaning up, patting his face with tissue. "It seems that the two of you have much to catch up on. I'll leave you guys."

Standing up with plate in hand, Hayden directed an expression that meant, 'Don't you dare disclose mine. This time I'll really kill you if you do.'

With that, Hayden walked away, leaving a befuddled and distraught Daniel. Sighing, Daniel smiled at Courtney and initiated a conversation with her to get this over with, "So… I'm Daniel Luntiang-Dahon…"

…..

Somewhere in Makati in a high-rise apartment building in the city, in a regular apartment.

A sickly thin black person with short black curly hair and a long face was slouched on a white sofa, wearing a greasy white t-shirt and simple jeans. He dozed off whilst the TV was on.

In his sleep, he talked, "Oh goddammit Miyuki… What the hell did you do this time?"

At that moment, the doorbell rang within the house. Despite of the inane volume of the doorbell, the sickly thin man didn't wake up at all. He didn't even budge an inch, keeping on snoring.

The ring of the doorbell continued on ringing and only ceased when it rang for the fifth time. Soon, the man's cellphone on the table beside him vibrated. This vibration roused the man up in an instant, causing him to jump up.

"Oh crap…" The man didn't answer the phone but darted towards the door. As he opened it, he was already apologizing, "I apologize, man!"

"What the hell is your problem, George!?" When the door opened, two people can be seen, a short, nerdy, stocky, and bespectacled white man with slanted eyes wearing a blue shirt with a superman logo, and khakis. The other was a brown muscular and tall man with an army cut, sporting cargo pants and a white tank top. "We've been here for five minutes!"

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry." George constantly bowed in contrite.

"Tsk, this is why we always get in trouble." The nerdy white man threw his hands up in the air. "Whenever we're on a mission, you doze off. Seriously, you're a sniper and whenever we're in a rock and a hard place during a mission, when we need your help the most, you're asleep! Narcolepsy has been cured long ago, so really, what the hell?"

"It's a habit, what can I do about it?�� George pouted and looked away from them. "It's not like you don't have any flaw, Zhang Yu! Look in the mirror, an American with Chinese eyes. Where the hell do you see that?"

Zhang Yu and the muscular brown man stared at each other with a frown. The muscular brown man verbalized with vexation, "Dude, not cool. We're in 2058, racism is ruled out. If we're not from the underworld and that we'd committed more felonies than an outdated racist statement, we'll report you to the police."

"And I am of Chinese descent, you idiot!" Zhang Yu angrily phrased. "It's literally in the name, Zhang Yu. What kind of an idiot would you have to be to mistake that for an American name?"

"Uh…" George couldn't refute them at all. Stammering, George verbalized, "W-well then, how about you, Kim Min-jun—"

George wasn't able to finish his words with Kim Min-jun interrupting him exuding intimidation. "Yeah, what about me? Remember that I'm a Filipino-Korean."

"Okay, okay, this is stupid." Zhang Yu grunted, walking inside the apartment as he massaged the bridge of his nose with his index finger and thumb. "Close the door. We have a huge bounty that can exclusively be described as a pie falling from the sky."

On that note, the trio gathered in the living room, with Zhang Yu pulling out a paper from his pocket. "See here? Two high school students with bounties of millions of credits. If these aren't freebies, I don't know what is."

"Isn't that too easy?" Kim Min-jun narrowed his eyes in suspicion. "Two high school students? There's definitely some kind of catch."

"Or maybe they did something that aggravated someone, hence the bounty." George argued. "I mean, some people in the underworld are eccentric and unpredictable. Most of them are psychos as well."

"Fair enough." Kim Min-jun nodded.

"Are we done making sense of this? How does it matter?" Zhang Yu rolled his eyes. "Anyhow, you guys want to assassinate them covertly or overtly?"

"What's the covert option?" George queried.

"We wait for them to exit their school at Makati Scholar Academy, and when nobody is around, we kill them." Zhang Yu explained.

"How about the overt?" Kim Min-jun was the one to speak this time.

"School shooting." Zhang Yu explained in two words. "We've killed so much people that a few kids' lives doesn't really matter. If anything, we're doing them a favor as today's society is so cruel that me, a Harvard graduate, doesn't have any job and has resorted to providing intel to two idiots."

"Psh, you say you don't like killing people?" George scoffed at Zhang Yu. "Whenever I see you through my scope in the distance, don't pretend that you don't smile when you use your Ability to knock someone down with your fists."

"Hey, I'm short in stature, I've always been bullied in my entire life." Zhang Yu scowled at George. "And you with your Ability should be the one to do these kinds of things anyway. If you just exerted effort and study, you'd be out there and graduate summa cum laude with ease on any top-tier university as long as there's nobody more studious than you."

"Hey," George proudly stood up with chest puffed out. "My Ability is suited for sniping. Don't tell me that your asses haven't been saved by me once or twice disregarding my sleeping habit."

"He's right." Kim Min-jun had to give George credit. "Though you are still the reason that we're put in that kind of danger."

Following that, the three bantered as if they weren't talking about the lives of multiple high school students. It was obvious that the three have plenty of experience playing with life and death.

A few minutes of pointlessly mocking each other later, Zhang Yu cleared his throat and declared, "It's decided then. We're going to cook up a storm."

At the same time, all around the underground dens within Philippines, in drug cartels, human trafficking centers, stuff like that. Similar scenes played out. They all planned to kill Hayden and Daniel.

Seeing the huge bounty placed on Hayden's and Daniel's head incurred the greed of professional assassins, some of which were wielders. They all thought that Hayden and Daniel were easy money due to them being high school students.

…..

RWL, Category – Constitutional Laws: Privacy Law is one of the most important law in the world established by the World Government. The main goal of the creation of the Privacy Law is to protect people's privacy on virtually everything. It makes activities such as spying and physically stalking people illegal, though it was already illegal in some countries pre-World Government era.

Privacy Law protects the following information (but is not limited to) of a person: Text messages, online messages, photos and videos sent out, their Identity Number, healthcare information, their home address.

Accordingly, you can go to jail for leaking nude photos and sexual video tapes on the internet and/or sending it to other people (the third-party can also be sued if they specifically asked for it, or if they extorted the picture, which would clear the blame on the sender); taking pictures of someone in their homes without their permission; spreading someone's Identity Number on the internet (and in real life if it had malicious intents); physically stalking (spying) on someone; hacking into someone's or an organization's social media accounts (which is hard, but remains to be accomplishable by the greatest of the greatest); spreading rumors (only if sued); placing secret cameras in bathrooms, restrooms, and dressing rooms in malls; unlawful searching of a person's home (in simpler words, without a search warrant); breaking into someone's home; if you're determined to make someone uncomfortable through violation of their intimate space (search proxemics; coincides with sexual harassment laws and Human Rights Law); and disclosing private information of someone (such as medical and financial) situation of someone (warrants a higher punishment than spreading rumors).

The Privacy Law also inhibits companies from saving personal information of people without their permission, which is known to be violated by most internet-based companies in pre-World Government. This also effectively prevented those companies to make up 'contracts' that the user definitely won't read, stating that companies should put up a summary of a contract when a user will sign. The World Government warns people to at least read the summary, and as the world was more sensible in modern times, they do.