Chapter 28

They had produced and uploaded various videos for firefighter applicants. One of them compared good and bad examples for interview preparation...

"He said exactly the same things?"

"Yes."

Seeing the chief nod, Wilkins laughed incredulously and said.

"What a guy with no sense. Maybe it's because he's a rich young master, but no one would think to copy that exactly."

"That's right."

The chief agreed, but what he wanted to say came next.

"But my point is, it's a problem because he copied everything down to the finger gestures."

Wilkins blinked while his smiling face remained frozen.

"...What?"

At his stupid question, the chief snapped back several times faster than his usual tone.

"Not just the answers, but he copied the video exactly - expressions, fingers, even the direction his eyes moved when he cleared his throat in the middle! He did that for all the questions in the video!"

At these unexpected words, Wilkins could only feel dumbfounded. There were often people who watched the video and memorized it, but at most they would memorize the answers. But he copied even the gestures?

"B-but you must have asked questions that weren't in the video... right?"

"Of course. But he must have seen those somewhere in other videos and copied them exactly too. I didn't check, but I can be certain."

Seeing Wilkins at a loss for words, the chief pressed him roughly.

"Do you understand now? That bastard is a psychopath. So before anything happens, just leave him alone, don't touch him at all! You never know what he might do. Greyson Miller is definitely an extreme Alpha gone mad from pheromones, he's not in his right mind!"

Wilkins could only say, "I understand." Amid the confusion, regret suddenly welled up in his heart for having done something unnecessary.

* * *

"To today's winner, cheers!"

At Valentina's shout, the gathered women raised their beer glasses with a "Woah!" cheer. Among them, as they all toasted and emptied their glasses, Greyson, the only man, sat smiling.

"We end up here after all."

At Rivet's words, another employee said.

"Familiar places are the best. It's also suitable for gathering as a group."

There were only a few places that could accommodate this many people. That's why they naturally came to this bar whenever they had company dinners or gatherings. It was the very place where they had held the welcome party when Greyson arrived.

"The men could have joined us too, they didn't have to."

When Valentina glanced to one side while putting French fries in her mouth, everyone's gaze moved in the same direction at once. At two large tables placed side by side sat employees who had started from the same place but divided into separate groups. More precisely, Greyson and the female employees, and Wilkins and the male employees. The atmosphere flowing at the tables was as contrasting as the gender ratio.

At the clearly audible voice, DeAndre spat out roughly.

"Don't get on our nerves, we don't want to be treated by that bastard like you do."

"We decided to drink just among men. Thanks, but we'll pass."

Wilkins quickly stepped in and politely declined. The chief's warning was still fresh in his ears. For a brief moment, Wilkins imagined a fight breaking out between the two tables, with an enraged Greyson flipping the table and then smashing DeAndre's head with a beer bottle while smiling. The chief's words that not Miller but Greyson himself was the problem were true.

Ahem, as he cleared his throat and pretended to drink beer while avoiding their gaze, the women promptly turned their heads as if to say do as you please and surrounded Greyson. In truth, they didn't care at all about their male colleagues' wounded pride. Their recent behavior had even seemed quite pathetic. The men silently gulped down their beer while listening to the sounds of laughter and chatter from the other table.

If they had gone to a different place, it wouldn't have been this miserable. They had impulsively decided to go out when Greyson said he would buy drinks, but the problem was they had overlooked the fact that there was no other suitable place to go. Trying to drink while sitting next to such a cheerful table completely killed their mood.

"Hey, did you all come to a funeral? Why are you all so down?"

When DeAndre, unable to stand it anymore, whispered loudly, Ezra answered.

"There's nothing... particularly fun, is there...?"

Seeing the guys nodding in agreement, DeAndre bulged his eyes in frustration.

"Are we going to be visibly depressed like this? Look over there, we can't lose either! Everyone smile, I said smile!"

The colleagues, who had been watching each other's reactions, reluctantly made laughing sounds, "Haha." DeAndre laughed loudly as if to show them, slapping his thigh.

"Wahaha, hahahaha! Wahahaha!"

"Ah... haha, hahaha."

"Haha, haha, hahaha."

The other guys laughed along, following DeAndre's lead. Even in the midst of this, they glanced at the next table, but the women showed no interest in them at all. Wasn't raising your voice deliberately to get the attention of a girl you like something you did in elementary school?

"Stop it, you look even more pathetic."

At Ezra's restraint, everyone including DeAndre quieted down. How had things turned out like this? As they were just drinking in the gloomy atmosphere again, Wilkins, who had emptied his beer, put down his empty glass and suddenly spoke up.

"Losing a match, okay, that can happen. But there's something I just can't understand."

When everyone looked at him at these unexpected words, Wilkins fixed his gaze on Dane and asked.

"What exactly happened? I'll accept that you came late, but there's no way you just came late, right? Something must have happened, what do you all think? Am I right?"

"That's right. Dane, we're dying of curiosity. How did that bastard beat you?"

DeAndre asked in a rapid tone. Receiving gazes mixed with curiosity and anxiety, Dane answered indifferently.

"Nothing special. We just exchanged a few blows, that's all."

"You fought? Why?"

"Suddenly?"

Everyone was surprised and asked for the reason, but Dane didn't answer. Only DeAndre anxiously gulped down his beer. Dane spoke without even looking at him.

"Just because I wanted to hit him."

What did that mean? Everyone looked at each other in confusion, but his words weren't completely out of place. Ezra also nodded in agreement.

"That's true, I'm also constantly restraining myself from throwing punches."

"Like right now?"

When one person agreed, confessions poured out in succession.

"I've thought about dragging him to the storage room and locking him up more than once or twice."

"I was thinking about puncturing the tires of that precious Jaguar of his."

"Anyway, I'd have no regrets if I could just hit that precious face of his once."

"That's not right, you should use your wish for something more important. I'd go for the Powerball jackpot."

"This bastard?"

After a round of punishment for the traitor, the conversation continued.

"Fighting is one thing, but why were you late?"

At Ezra's question, Dane paused briefly before saying.

"While we were fighting, we accidentally rolled and almost fell off a cliff..."

"What? A cliff?"

"The one at the end of that slope? Wow, that was really dangerous!"

To their surprised exclamations, Dane responded indifferently.

"No need to react like that, nothing actually happened."

It was half truth and half lie. Luckily, they didn't fall off the precipice, but they found themselves in a situation where they had to climb up a steep cliff. They had been beating and fighting each other until just before, but now wasn't the time for that. Finding a way to climb up the wall for survival was the priority. And they both discovered the spot almost simultaneously. And then...

Dane casually added as he brought the beer glass to his mouth.

"We almost fell, but anyway we climbed up, Miller was faster than me, and that's all."

After he drastically summarized reality, one of the guys who had been looking at each other half-believing asked.

"But be honest, you could have won, right? Huh?"