Back to Kenneth's state inside his study room, upon sitting positional on his chair with his arms barely resting halfway on the desk and thirty minutes after reading another philosophy, literature, and psychology book which was entitled "The Prince" by Niccolò Machiavelli, he had felt his phone vibrating in notification once again from his pocket. He gently put down the Machiavellian book first to get his phone and read the message.

Earlier after he had sent the direction to the robbers on how to mug the bank according to what they had requested from him, Kenneth had previously assumed that the message right now would be about the robbers' briefing after stealing the bank, or if that might not be the case, then it could be that the robber would inform him where he should retrieve his loot as per his request.

"Your prize will be at this address." Upon reading that first sentence of the message he had just read, Kenneth then thought that he was undoubtedly correct. And so, he resumed reading the text, "It's worth 500,000 like what you asked, so better get it immediately before the operator will get it himself. The world is hungry for money, you know. By the way, thanks for the plan. We successfully robbed the bank and got the money."

Confident and very bold; Kenneth had a hundred percent certainty of his skills. He although had considered the potential all the time that his presented scheme may fail, but not with his intellect. There had always been a Plan B, C, D, E, and F to his framework, and informing criminals about the plan he had to present would not take more than five minutes. With Kenneth's talent and vital competencies, failure was never an option.

Knowing his burglar customers, messaging Kenneth would help him discover about them even just through texting. In that way, he could determine what sensible instructions he had to figure out that's fitting for them; a clumsy customer would take a lot of Plans even if it had to be from Plan B to Plan Z and that should take more than forty-five minutes for them to accomplish the task without any harm, a clever and easy-to-understand customer would just take thirty minutes depending on the location, the distance from the entrance to the vault to the exit, so on and so forth. All circumstances had to take every necessity to accept consequences. Kenneth, as though his job had been so life-risking as well as his customers, had considered spending his life in prison if someone— somebody would leak about him and report him to the authorities. But whether he might spend his life in prison or not, at least Kenneth had helped those people who were desperate to make a living. He had always been part of those dirty people accomplishing things through cruelty, cheating, and crime, but that's part of his way of making a living. He had pitied those customers of his, knowing that they had to rob just to make a living would make him want to pursue law and politics even more. Some of them desperately wanted to rob just to buy medicines for their sick family, some of them wanted to kidnap someone for ransom but had no guts to hurt the victims physically, although they did mentally, and some of them wanted to feed their needy family, some of them had to rob not only banks but food supplies as well. Sometimes people had to be so selfish only for their needs. That much would want him to fuck up and end this shitty society by taking law and replace those selfless inhumane politicians who do nothing but be proud with their positions and continue to enrich themselves while the others, especially poor ones, had to suffer until they die without proper justice.

Seconds after Kenneth had done reading the message and locating the place that had been stated by his customer, he first turned off his phone, putting it inside his pocket. With a serious face, he stood up and turned off the lamp on his desk and went outside his study room, and strolled to his main room to reach out the door. Before he hurried outside his room, there was a little part where his peripheral vision on his below had bothered him so he glanced on the floor to see what's with the thing getting in the way. He saw the tray of bread and juice his older brother had prepared for him. Instead of receiving it or being thankful for it, he didn't bother an inch to move it or do something with it. He just stepped on the floor, at the side of the tray, and making sure not to spill or destroy the food preparation. Kenneth gave no attention to it at all. He just thought it was a bother.

Upon clutching the doorknob to close it, he gazed down at his father holding a newspaper with a strict face, taking steps upstairs towards his direction, or elsewhere, since his room was located at the end above their staircase, so he assumed.

Looking at his father passing him by, as if ignored, Kenneth had decided to ask permission upon planning to go outside. But before he could ask him, his older brother, Kent, had also appeared outside in his room holding two plastic bags full of food and snacks inside (Kent wanted to share some of them with Kenneth), closing the door on his behind while witnessing Kenneth, his little brother, looking at their father slowly going to his room.

"Dad, I will go to the nearest convenience store for a moment to buy someth—"

"I don't care." Klent, their father, cut him off with just three simple yet hurtful words without hearing his son's full sentence, and just continued walking towards his room, which was beside Kenneth's room.

His father had just brushed him off. It was pretty unusual for someone so strict as him to actually ignore his son's permission but that made Kenneth quite appalled and nervous. And Kenneth thought, "Why did I even bother asking him when it's just like this? I see no problem with me asking him permission? Was it my voice? Was it the way I'm asking? Was I not polite enough? Or was it because I lied? Well, the convenience store is the easiest excuse but very likely to be doubted about." He had thought maybe his father wouldn't care about him going outside for some business. But oh well, whether Klent would go against it or not, now Kenneth could get the price he requested from his customers.

Kent, on the other hand, witnessed the sudden interaction between the two and immediately went after Kenneth, opening the medium plastic bags he was carrying with a concerned face, "H-Hey, there's no need for you to buy there. If you want, I'm sharing with you some of mine since dad bought a lot a while ago."

"No need," Kenneth had rejected Kent's offer, "It's really okay." But the truth he had in his thought, "I will not be getting anything from your filthy hands." And trudged downstairs to his lair to review once again the central quandaries of his life.

"Are you sure?" Kent glanced at his brother stepping downstairs, then at his back to glimpse at his father who had just closed the door upon getting inside his room. When he saw the umbrella hanging at the steel section on the handrail of their staircase, he instantly grabbed it and gazed back at Kenneth who was now at the bottom of the staircase. "T-Then, bring this umbrella. It might rai—"

Without a single word or anything, Kenneth had shut the door close and just ignored Kent who was just taking the initiative to take care of him with a concerned face. The three of them in the household seemed to be complicated as well; Klent wouldn't care about Kenneth, but only to Kent, Kenneth wouldn't care about any one of them, but only to philosophy, economics, and politics, and Kent would care about the two of them unconditionally.

With hands inside his pockets, Kenneth walked from their house (near the park) to the convenience store (which he impulsively had made as an excuse) to the silent alley in their area. Since it was already midnight, of course, everything, and wherever else he'd go, had fallen asleep, even the houses, the streets, and the roads. The only thing left awake was him, and for him, it felt good to be strolling around while staring at the skies, the stars and the streetlights which he had thought were awake during these hours.

If only he could be with his mother, Carmella, right now, what would he say to her? For sure, it would be how he's being tormented by his father about pursuing what he had no desire for rather than something he had always liked. Kenneth had lost his way about picking choices, he wanted some company. He had long been wanting freedom from his father. But what should be the right choice to make? Everything had gone out of hand ever since he made that unforgettable mistake when he was young. Kenneth used to be an athlete, in fact, he won many awards from it. But as time goes by, he got intrigued by something new, which Klent had opposed so much— philosophy— and it made Kenneth quit joining athlete competitions and transferred to mind competitions involving humanity and social sciences. With that in mind, since Carmella had become supportive enough as a mother for what her son had desired, she went abroad to continue working in her business. But that made everything hopeless as well. Being outside the country had never helped in reaching her family whom she had left. Carmella and Kenneth had grown distant from one another since Klent, who pushed his son to choose science rather than politics, forced his son to limit himself to talking to his mother through the phone, in that way, Kenneth would never start relying on his mother and need her support ever again, and so to continue to focus on his studies as well.

Whenever Carmella would have to call her family at home, never once in many chances that she had never asked about Kenneth's health, his present state, or his studies. Even recently, when days ago she called them at home, she asked how was Kenneth since they hadn't been talking to each other since. She would ask if Kenneth had already taken his breakfast, his lunch, had he been taking vitamins to nourish his cells and energy, or had he been taking any medicine if he were to be sick, or had he been eating snacks good for his health. But she had never once received a response since after all, even in messages, Kenneth wouldn't reply to her. The only people she would be able to get to reach out to and talk to were Klent and Kent. Klent would always respond to her that Kenneth had been studying in his room so hard that there was no way he could reply at any moment. Kent had also thought that what his father had said might be suspicious since Kenneth and Carmella were so close before he went abroad as mother and son. But understanding Kenneth's situation, Kent just let it slide since he had also no idea what was going on, even as his older brother. And after they would have talked about Kenneth as their topic, Klent would try to change the topic later on back to business or anything else as long as it's not about Kenneth.

Back in recent times, when Kenneth had almost reached his destination, which was the lone or rather abandoned-like store twenty meters in distance, he saw two familiar faces at the left intersection street, stumbling their way towards him. Kenneth then thought why were the both of them here? They should be at their homes now.

"Oh, Kenneth?" asked Samantha to Kenneth while carrying the not-so-sobber friend, Emily, on her shoulders, "Why are you here? It's pretty late."

Kenneth glanced at them with a disgusted face, "Look for yourselves first before you ask."

"Oh," Samantha snapped from his words and stared worriedly at her tripping friend, then glanced back at Kenneth, "we were just partying."

"How about you? Where are you off to?" Emily asked even though she was a bit tipsy and not in her right state.

"None of your business." With a rested face, Kenneth slowly started stepping ahead. But before he forgot, he turned at them again and said, "Both of you better get home or else you will be abused by your parents again. For sure you don't want to go to school covered with bruises, right? If you're going to be absent because of your bruises, then you're dragging the class down. We will lose a lot of credits and we will be forced to withdraw at the end. Know that a lot of you were maintaining absences for some nasty reasons. If you don't want to transfer to another school, then go home and wake up early later. You have to go to school."

The one who knew a lot about them was Kenneth himself. He had always an idea why they were being like this; partying at random clubs, coming home late at night, and anything else just to have some fun. Before he wasn't part of Class 11-5 yet, he examined the next candidates who shall be their next classmates. And fortunately, he had known them all even their backgrounds, as to why they were being discriminated against, their weaknesses, their strengths, and such. He had been using all of his knowledge to have his way manipulate the class. There was no sympathy and action needed in order to understand and control them, only critical thinking and mindset should be enough for them to bow down and follow him.

"You speak too much. Fine then. Fucker," Samantha frowned and walked, dragging Emily with her. And they parted ways with Kenneth.

Although all of them may possibly hate him, Kenneth would rather choose this than just do nothing. They may hate him, throw tantrums at him, may curse at him. But with his mind and power to control them, he had the patience to endure them since the important thing he was busy fixing about their influence on their classroom to the other sections. He had to take necessary measures to avoid demerit points from the school. If they were to break one rule from the directions the school had given them, their demerit points will be then added. And if their demerit points would reach a certain limit, then they would have no choice but to receive their specified penalties and transfer schools. And transferring from one school to another would take a lot of time, not to mention it should require too much work, so in the end, they're just left with no choice but to follow the school with all their might otherwise they will be punished.

"Oh, hey! My dear students!"

Another familiar voice they had heard came from no other than their teacher, Travis. He excitedly ran towards his students whom he had just witnessed having serious fights or rather a debate or whatever. But as a teacher, he had thought maybe hanging out with them would be a lot of fun.

"Oh shit. It's him!"

Emily and Samantha started to walk way faster than before just to avoid Travis reaching them. As for Kenneth, he avoided gaze with any of them and began to march as fast as he could to reach his destination.

"Why the fuck is he here?" Emily had become sober after seeing Travis coming at them. Travis was already twenty-four inches away from them but even if Samantha and Emily tried to amble as fast as they could, Travis now finally surpassed them and was now currently at their behind.

"It's pretty late and yet you're still outside, huh." Travis went ahead and faced in front of them, putting his hands behind his back like some soldier.

"Eek!" Samantha and Emily were so left aghast and couldn't move to their spots due to too much pressure Travis had set out for them, even if that pressure they had felt was just a walking race or whatever.

"Well, wanna join me for tonight? It's pretty late but let's spend the rest of the night altogether, okay?" He made the two of them step backward and be back to where they were standing before. Right before they had conversed with Kenneth.

"And you as well, dear Kenneth, my beloved student." Travis, although Kenneth had almost gone hurriedly into the lone store, still managed to catch him without any harm. "Come and join us." As for Kenneth, he was pretty dumbfounded as to why Travis was so fast to get him, and the same as with the girls, Kenneth was left at loss for words. He was once an athlete and now that it had come to this, there's no way he could regain back his strength as before.