My Scumbag System-Chapter 406: Welcome Home, King of the Strays

The ferry docked at half past nine.

Onyx House was lit up like someone had plugged it directly into the city grid.

I heard them before I saw them. Music thumping through the walls, voices overlapping, something shattering and then laughter. The usual chaos of seventeen people with superpowers sharing a building that wasn’t designed for any of this.

Noah held the front door open and I walked through into a wall of noise.

"HE’S BACK."

Jaime’s voice. Of course.

He came at me like a golden retriever who’d been told I was made of protein powder, arms spread wide, and I sidestepped on pure reflex.

"Don’t hug me, I have ribs."

"I will be gentle like a butterfly."

"You have never been gentle about anything in your life."

He settled for gripping my shoulder instead, beaming down at me with the specific joy of someone who’d been waiting to say something embarrassing for hours.

"Brother," he said solemnly. "I watched the interview."

"Great."

"You were magnificent."

"I know."

"The part where you said you’d die for her." He pressed his free hand to his chest. "Sakura-sama has a song about exactly that. It’s called ’My Heart is Your Shield.’ I think you have heard it in your soul without knowing."

"I genuinely haven’t."

"You have. You just don’t know yet."

He released my shoulder, already turning to tell Marco something. I stepped further into the common room.

The television was still on.

Our interview was still playing.

Someone had put it on a loop.

I stared at the screen long enough to watch myself say "some things are worth the scars" in a tone that sounded considerably more profound than I remembered feeling in the moment. On screen, Cel smiled at me. The camera caught it at exactly the right angle.

The internet had been very excited about that smile.

"Stray Dog Protects His Princess," Akari said from the couch. She had her phone out, nails glittering, reading the trending hashtags with the specific delight of someone who found all of this deeply funny. "Number one trending topic in Valoria. Number three globally."

"Congratulations," Hikari added from the floor, doing a handstand. Her face was red. "You are famous."

"I was already famous."

"You are romance famous now. It is different."

Cel had stopped behind me. I could feel her secondhand embarrassment from here.

Isabelle looked up from her book. She assessed the situation, decided it wasn’t worth her intervention, and went back to reading. I appreciated that about her.

Carmen materialized out of the kitchen doorway with a glass of something that was definitely not water, one eyebrow raised.

"There he is," she said. "The boy who looked into the camera on national television and basically proposed to the President’s sister."

"I didn’t propose to anyone."

"You said you’d die for her."

"That’s just a job description."

"You said you’d live for her."

I opened my mouth.

Closed it.

Carmen’s smile was the expression of someone who had been collecting ammunition for exactly this moment.

"That’s what I thought, sweetie."

She disappeared back into the kitchen. Braxton was leaning in the doorway behind her, synth cigarette dangling from his lip, watching me with the look of a man who’d seen everything and was no longer surprised by anything, but was mildly entertained anyway.

"Nice interview," he said.

"Thanks."

"You know Sterling Weaver was trying to get you to confirm a relationship on live television."

"I’m aware."

"And you almost did."

"I didn’t, though."

Braxton tilted his head. "Bad beat, playing it that close. You got lucky."

"I always get lucky."

"Nobody always gets lucky." He pushed off the doorframe. "Also, Petrova sent me a message. She watched the interview. She used the word ’concerned’ four times. Petrova doesn’t get concerned about things that don’t matter."

He left it there, because that was Braxton’s version of a warning, dropping a live grenade and walking away.

I watched him go.

Cel touched my elbow. "He’s right."

"He usually is."

"My sister watched it too. She messaged me during the commercial break."

"What did she say?"

Cel’s expression was doing something complicated. "She said it was a lovely performance. She used the word ’performance.’"

"Your sister’s smart."

"Terrifyingly so."

The word hung there.

I filed it under problems for tomorrow, which was getting to be a very crowded filing cabinet.

Around us, Onyx House continued being itself. Marco was arm wrestling Raphael at the dining table while Malachi watched from a shadowed corner, silent as always. Jacob had his three datapads out and was muttering numbers that probably related to the tournament. Soomin sat on the stairs, her pink hair loose, watching the common room with soft eyes that went slightly blue at the edges when she caught me looking. She immediately looked at the floor.

Monica was in the corner talking to her plants. She’d arranged four different pots in a loose semicircle and was gesturing to them in a way that suggested an actual ongoing conversation.

Juan was asleep standing up against the wall, somehow.

Normal. All of it completely normal.

This was my guild.

My house.

My weird, dysfunctional, dangerous, loyal pack of absolute disasters who had followed me into a Black Gate and come out the other side.

Something warm settled in my chest that I immediately decided was indigestion.

Carmen reappeared with drinks for Cel and me. She pressed mine into my hand with a look that communicated she saw directly through every layer of my personality and found the whole situation hilarious.

"Drink," she said. "You look like you’re thinking too hard."

"I’m always thinking."

"That’s the problem."

The next two hours were the best kind of chaotic.

Hikari challenged Jaime to a push-up contest that somehow became a debate about proper form and then a full group argument about training theory. Raphael took it personally, obviously. Isabelle mediated with the energy of a judge who’d already decided the verdict and was just waiting for everyone else to catch up.

Jacob presented his tournament analysis, unprompted, while people ate. It was actually good. Really good. The kind of tactical breakdown that would’ve taken a professional guild three days to compile. He delivered it in twelve minutes while spilling energy drink on his sleeve and apologizing to no one.

Monica asked the plants in the corner to move slightly for better light and nobody thought this was strange anymore.

Soomin laughed at something Marco said, genuine and bright, and the fox behind her eyes settled back down to sleep.

Cel sat beside Noah and let herself be a person instead of a symbol. I watched her relax, degree by degree, like ice thawing in spring. She laughed once, quietly, at something Akari said. Noah pretended not to notice how happy it made her.

Braxton played cards with Carmen and lost deliberately so she’d stop threatening to reorganize his office.

At some point, Marco put music on. Not the intense battle-prep playlists Juan preferred, but something easy. Something that made the room feel like a room rather than a staging ground.

Bartholomew was on the coffee table in his terrarium, doing absolutely nothing at a champion’s pace.

I sat in the chair by the window and watched all of it and thought, this is the thing worth protecting.

Not the guild ranking.

Not the Schema Points.

Not any game the gods were running.

This.

The indigestion in my chest did not go away.