The Players' Game

Part 9 - || Cold Reality ||

Song : Castle - Halsey

It took a long time for me to get used to the system that the hierarchy Valentine ran with but if I looked back and really thought about it, I should consider myself lucky for having Nicole by my side at the time and a very persistent blond that went by the name of Joshua Peters.

On the last Saturday of every month, students of valentine would be able to access a portal through the academy website under the context of it being a buddy system which was the sole reason the school had given the student council (aka Royals) such a huge budget to begin with in order for the system to work.

Each rank was classified into colours in which every student must display on their forefingers. Red for the slaves, green for the peasants, blue for the governors and pure 24 karat gold for the royals.

To be honest, it was a depressing sight to watch every month. The moment their phone notifications would ring and screens would light up almost unanimously as they scoured for their names on the list.

Self-righteous males who used their bodies as weapons with smirks on their faces as they claimed their rings to commemorate a higher ranking, obsessive girls whose faces painted to perfection falling at the sight of a new colour on their fingers. The worst off were the freshman, confused and still stumbling around in this dark world and already being mocked.

It made me sick.

An exasperated breath left me as I watched from the second floor of the auditorium, watching the students with pity. Would I be like them if it weren't for Chase? No. I scowled at myself for even having the thought. If it weren't for Chase, I'd still be in Roche, I'd be spending my days laughing at Valentine's students or acting oblivious to the half assed efforts my parents were putting in to maintain my relationship with them.

"You should wipe that scowl off your pretty face, queen. The students would think you were just demoted."

My head snapped towards the voice of the Fox, Charlie Ford, the only boy who has managed to break Madeline Peters' heart in the middle of freshman year, earning him the ring and his title.

Demotion was the lowest form of punishment a royal could ever give to someone, a different type of power that held control over the student body other than fear of what we could do to them physically, not that I supported it. In my opinion, being demoted seemed like a much better ending than being abused but obviously to someone who wasn't from Valentine academy, that would just be viewed as wistful thinking.

Yes, being physically harmed is scary, but if you were surrounded by such a screwed up hierarchy system since a tender age of 13, losing your position in social ladder could mean death. You would be mocked, turned into someone who placed lower than a slave and treated far worse. To them, to us, physical abuse was temporary, a full 6 years of being targeted by every student in Valentine... you were better off moving to somewhere like Iceland while your will and mentality were still intact.

"Don't even joke about such a thing, Charlie." Madeline's voice came from my right, his name rolling off her tongue like venom and I didn't miss the way he flinched. "The queen is where she rightfully is and if someone ever heard that, you would be risking your own head."

He put up his hands I front of him in mock surrender and I resisted the strong urge to slap him. Luckily, Joshua did the deed for me with much more force than anticipated sending him stumbling a few steps.

I averted my gaze from the boys, trailing to the different faces in the crowd and automatically found the curvaceous body of Megan Hoover in a royal blue body con dress, strutting in the middle of the crowd as if she ruled them.