I got caught up in the wrong crowd

An Nam Il

There was something weird in the air, a strange sensation that Nam Il had noticed around the school for a while now but had never really taken the time to pinpoint. It was definitely some sort of aura, like the one that was characteristic of the Ishikawa family. That one was pure and simple power, the sort that told you yes, it came from that place up there and you might not really want to mess with it. This aura, however, was simply full of wrong. He had the sinking suspicion that something awful was probably going to happen but no evidence either way on whether it was true or not. That was the thing about aurae. They liked to lie a lot, unfortunately.

To be perfectly honest, Nam Il didn't care too much about academics. There just wasn't much point to it when he was already doing all of the work that would be assigned the following month. Homework was done, exams were. Well, he definitely wasn't studying for them but at the same time, he wasn't unprepared either. He still made it by with perfect scores. Near perfect on his worse days.

With a meek excuse, the boy ducked out of study hall, snapping closed the books that he had long since mastered and only really kept out for decoration and guilt for having already understood them all. High school, in short, was boring. C'est la vie.

That awful aura became stronger as Nam Il left the building. It was making his teeth jitter a little in anxiety. That was just plain strange. Okay, cut it out, me! It's just a little magic. Nothing that I haven't felt before or anything. Because, really. Nam Il had been legitimately attacked by demons before. This shouldn't have been any worse and the aura didn't even feel demonic to boot!

Curiously, he trailed the aura to a relatively shady wall of a nearby building. This was still Academy grounds so he wasn't particularly worried about his safety. Glancing over by the dumpster, what he found was. A perfectly normal person. The uneasy feeling was still there, though. He watched for a few moments as cigarette smoke curled up into the sky.

"Um, hello?" He called out. "Is everything okay over there?" It wasn't every day that people put out frightening aurae, after all.

An Nam Il

The feeling of fear grew a bit as Nam Il edged closer to this person. For the life of him, he couldn't figure out if they were supposed to be a girl or a boy. Or maybe the answer was supposed to neither if he couldn't readily decide? He concluded that the appropriate action to take here was to simply assume that they were a. Well. Them.

Still, if there was one thing that really excited Nam Il, it was the opportunity to be useful. Useful to somebody who looked like they were trying to do something right, even if maybe they weren't going at it the right way. Logically, he knew that if drug pushing really was going on, they should probably call campus security to be sure. But what if they were wrong? And what if security didn't believe them or didn't get there in time? So many things could go wrong.

Okay, to be honest, maybe that last part was just from the aurae. Even with that uncertain feeling, though, Nam Il was already won over. Their logic made sense. When all else failed him, there was always logic. Always.

He nodded with wide eyes. "Okay, sure! What exactly do you want me to do? Do you know who exactly will be over there?" The boy fidgeted a little anxiously, as if his eagerness alone wasn't enough. "I'm good at picking locks!" He blurted out. "Does that help?"

An Nam Il

Nam Il was a genius. This was a fact, proven through IQ tests and near perfect memory. He was, however, terribly sheltered and with all of the information that Gen was giving him, his first thought was that somebody had just dropped him right in the middle of some sort of crime show. His second thought was Oh God. Where was the sign up for this when I went looking around last week?

He nodded readily at what was being said to him, carefully adding Abia Defan to the list of people that he ought to be familiar with. "Okay, so I just need to go in, dig around, and get out fast. I guess on the surface, it seems simple enough." The boy couldn't help but feel downright cheerful about it. He was actually doing something useful and good for once! Somebody was asking him to do it, he wasn't just going off on his own. Only God knew how many times he'd dream about doing things like Batman and Robin Hood did on a regular basis.

"Don't worry about me, though. I'm pretty fast for my age. It'll be done in no time!" Nam Il gave Gen an enthusiastic salute before rushing off to do what he had been told to. Quietly, of course. It was, in his opinion, just to act like he was supposed to be there anyways. People tended to catch on pretty quick whenever somebody started acting like they were, well. Sneaking around. Nam Il knew that from experience.

As casually as he could, he approached the building, determined that nobody seemed to be really watching him, and slipped right in.

An Nam Il

Even though he knew it was coming, Nam Il still froze for a moment as Gen's aura suddenly pounded down on him furiously. For exactly three seconds, the boy thought and, moreover, genuinely believed that maybe it hadn't been such a good idea to get involved. He forcibly shoved the feeling away, however, knowing that wherever it had come from, it definitely wasn't purely him. Even if he was a little scared, at least his brain wouldn't just freeze up. It was only the aura, that was all. He had to remember that.

Peeking over the windowsill, he could clearly see Gen outside. Their eyes met and Nam Il grinned, an expression which was hidden by the wall. He just nodded to get the point across and waited for the noise of shoes on flooring to turn transform fully into soft scuffling on dirt and grass.

When things were relatively quiet, he slipped out of the corner, ducking out of the coarse material that somebody had set up to act as a curtain. He crawled to the area where the other students had been and found a collection of left behind items. There were backpacks carelessly thrown everywhere, along with some jackets and shoes. It also smelled a bit rancid, kind of like a locker room, actually.

Nam Il wrinkled his nose a bit as he searched for the ledger, opening up random books just to make sure that otherwise boring academic covers were hiding something less than legal within. Ledger, ledger, ledger, where is it? He hadn't really expected to find a big, fat book just obviously sitting out under a ray of light or anything but there was still the vague idea that he would have.

Now, if he had something like that, where would be the second place he'd think to hide it?

The boy thought for a few more moments, went to check, and then mentally smacked himself in the forehead.

An Nam Il

Completely unaware of what Gen was doing in way of distraction, Nam Il pushed the rickety table away. He winced a little as things began to slide off the table but didn't let that stop him from taking the book which had, up until that point, been acting as a stabilizer for a leg that was an inch or so too short. It was kind of a weird place to put something that important but Nam Il still remembered those days when he used to tape envelopes of money to the underside of tables 'just in case.' Tables were awesome places to hide things, they really were. Also chairs.

He flipped through the book hurried, skimming the information on its pages. It certainly seemed like a legitimate ledger but he wondered briefly if he ought to search around a bit more just to be sure. After all, what if it wasn't real? What if it was just a red herring of some sort? But then again, these were only high school students and everybody knew high school students tended not to think things through that much.

What would Nancy Drew do? Now that was an example of a high school level detective. Nam Il really expected there to be some kind of catch just because of all of the books he had read but then again, he had the book with him right now. Maybe it really was that easy. In any case, he got out of there, ledger tucked under his arm.

Now was he supposed to hide behind the dumpster or in it? He was pretty sure he remember it was behind but. Hm. Maybe that was In Suk rubbing off of him. A few rounds of voluntary dumpster diving really were eye-openers.