Chapter 198: Powerhouses (4)

Perseus POV

Voices were just replaying in my head over and over, especially about that time I was forced to train under this stupid and ruthless instructor.

'I'm trying my best!'

'No, you're not, then why aren't you looking at me in the eyes when you say it?! Come on, look at me!'

'I am!'

'You're not!'

It just went on and on until I just raged and unleashed my powers onto the guy and broke his mind, apparently, he died after like 2 years or so from the insanity, he kept pushing me and pushing me to use my powers to the limit in hopes of promoting my grade.

"If I was needed to be calm, they had to do it forcefully by having several people over pinning me down while one of em tries to knock me out with sleeping gas, and every time it happens, I look into their eyes because I was scared and I was pleading them to not continue, but all I ever received was eyes feel with something worse than hatred.

"I was treated worse than an animal, they had me be interviewed by several people, and they would always require eye contact throughout the whole conversation, whenever I told truths, they called it lies. Worse was the fact that they pretended to care, they asked me to lay everything out with the promise of it being just secrets, but in the end, it was all lies.

"Every single time, the words of a person saying that they cared about my well-being only for me to find out that they're only using me as a test subject. Everything I said was used against me to push me past the limits, and even after I was able to escape from the nightmare, people looked at me with pity, hatred...

"Every time I looked someone in the eyes, I have this feeling of being judged, and that scares me, it just keeps on taking me back to when I first opened up to someone, telling them everything going on, only for my vulnerability to be known, so it's hard for me to stare at anyone's eyes without feeling judged and without feeling vulnerable."

Throughout me saying the whole thing, I couldn't really muster up the courage to look her in the eyes, like I said, it makes me feel vulnerable, and I'm afraid of that feeling, being at the mercy of someone else, I can't place myself in that position again, the feeling of helplessness is something I fear.

I compensate it by projecting myself as a confident person, I chose fights where no matter what, I won't be the victim, I fight for the position of the top so I won't have to experience it all again.

"Hah, you are pretty cute after all." Maple joked

"Well, I'm going back to sleep, you can think that over and tease me if you like."

"Wait, are you mad?"

"No, not really, unlike before I can tell if someone is lying to me, and I trust you. Besides, even though I feel uncomfortable about looking someone in the eyes, I can get by, I'm technically like in my 40s now, the only reason why I'm not acting anymore mature is cuz of the fact that I've never been properly surrounded by people my age after I reincarnated, I am mostly treated as a child."

*****

I went back and got a good night's rest, the dream and the talk, it's a bit mentally tiring for me. I got up the next day and went against this 7-star level mage which i won easily compared to the previous 2, and the day went on normally.

Though Leilah was eyeing me and Maple suspiciously, man, luckily Maple didn't tell her that her mother kissed me on the cheek, and I would like to thank my past self for not even physically touching Maple, cuz she will probably sniff it out, an ability which I still question to this day.

I went on to another block to watch over Sarah the hero, and she got this 10-star shield that is helping her do god work, it's made with the same material as my equipment since she was apparently gifted it by the people at the village of the golden sand, which caused some rumors to blow up about some heroes envying the fact that Sarah is the one getting all the gifts.

The heroes are all doing their own things, and only Trevor came to the arena and supported Sarah and Rolan on occasion, there's rumors about him being a weirdo though, like buying slaves and training them to be strong companions to follow him.

It's like he's following in the path of isekai protagonists, which makes sense since he's pretty much a big nerd, but he's doing good for himself, because his personal party is the most accomplished ones so far, even earning the personal sponsor ship for the royalties up north, heck, I think they love him more than Sheila's husband.

Sarah, the most accomplished individual, Trevor, the guy who got the most accomplished group under his name, while Rolan has endless resources due to his family's connections, that's the 3 that I have to be most afraid of for now. Rolan's strength will be overshadowed by the other heroes in the future, but he will still pose a good threat, even more so if his family is working with Cain in secret.

I'm watching his match, and his flames is nothing to be joke about, but sometimes I question his moves, it's a bit too explosive, there's a lot of wasted mana. It's like drinking water, you technically need to only drink when you're thirsty to survive, but most of us tend to go over what is needed, not that it's a bad thing.

But when it comes to Rolan, he's sending out a lot more money out than necessary, I don't know if it's intentional or not, but if he's purposefully trying to be flashy...It won't be long till the other heroes will show up earlier than my prediction, because they're actually pretty hardworking, and now they have a lot to prove now that they're starting to go out on their own.