The heavy oak doors at the back of the Grand Lecture Hall creaked open, catching the attention of a few students near the back, though most of the five hundred people inside remained buried in their own nervous first-day chatter.

Up in the very front row, the atmosphere was entirely different. Yumiko sat with an immaculate, almost terrifying posture. Her iPad was perfectly squared with the edge of the mahogany desk, and her fountain pen rested beside it with lethal precision. She didn't look back at the doors. She didn't look at anyone.

Beside her, Daichi leaned back carelessly in his seat, a smirk playing on his lips as he leaned in to whisper. "So, Kuro-san... which campus club are we taking over first? The Finance Society has a nice budget, but the Sailing Team has better connections."

Yumiko didn’t blink, her gaze fixed forward as she adjusted her cuffs. "We are here to study, Daichi. Not to play playground politics." Her voice was soft, but it carried a chilling, razor-sharp edge that instantly silenced a freshman sitting a seat away.

But as the heavy doors at the back finally thudded shut, a sudden shift in the room's energy made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. A familiar aura rolled down the stepped aisles—one she hadn't felt since Tokyo, before everything fell apart. Before he left.

Yumiko’s fingers tightened imperceptibly around her pen, her icy composure fracturing for a fraction of a second. No. It couldn't be.

"CraveU user..." she murmured, the name tasting like poison on her tongue. The coldness in her expression turned to pure, unadulterated venom. "What is he doing here?"