Dear God, Why Am I Like This?

Four hours into the foggy, winding mountains of Leyte sits Edenbridge Academy-a prestigious sanctuary for the brilliant, the elite, and the broken.

For sophomore Tristan Liongson, it is his fourth school in two years. He is a boy who carries himself like an interruption, surviving a quiet family collapse and an unspoken crisis that left him feeling like a ghost in his own life. Stripped of his past and sent away by his grieving mother, Tristan arrives at Daniel Hall with a trunk full of secrets, a famous family name he doesn't understand, and a burning question he only whispers to the dark: Dear God, why am I like this?

Raphael, the pristine student council leader and prefect, lives a life perfectly mapped by schedules, duty, and flawless expectations. He is a boy who moves with absolute precision. But the moment a quiet, sharp-featured boy in baggy clothes steps onto the grand staircase of Moses Hall, a single look catches the afternoon light-and snags something deep inside Raphael's tightly controlled world.

Behind the stone walls, stained glass, and unyielding mist of Edenbridge, Tristan is just trying to survive the fire. But in a place that already seems to know his name, keeping his walls up might be the hardest thing he's ever had to do.