I Was Supposed to Attack the Hockey Captain, Then He Cried in My Arms Chapter 01

I Was Supposed to Attack the Hockey Captain, Then He Cried in My Arms Chapter 01

The day I bound myself to the Attack Caelan Thorpe System, I was pushing him to turn in our group project.

The guy was sprawled across the desk without even lifting his head. His voice came out irritated.

“Didn’t do it.”

The system egged me on in my ear.

[Smack the back of his head. Two thousand dollars for one slap.]

I looked down at my washed-out sneakers.

Two thousand dollars was enough to cover half a month of my mom’s medical bills.

Smack.

The lecture hall fell silent.

The system cheered.

[Humiliation Points plus three. Damn, little girl. You’re vicious. Gym Queen, here you come.]

I couldn’t respond anymore.

Because in that dead silence, Caelan lifted a hand to the back of his head in disbelief, then slowly raised his head.

The look he gave me was like a bayonet.

Cold. Sharp. Vicious.

“Since when did Ashworth change its rules? You don’t turn in homework, you get hit now?”

Someone laughed at his joke, a low snort breaking the silence.

My legs, meanwhile, had gone weak.

Caelan Thorpe was the new transfer student this semester.

Not long after arriving, he had taken over as captain of Ashworth University’s NCAA Division I ice hockey team with brutal skill.

He was tall, muscular, tattooed, and so insanely good-looking it was almost offensive.

But the rumors about him could fuel the entire campus forum for a semester.

Some said he became famous on his first day after fighting twenty guys at once at a fraternity party.

Some said his background was untouchable, that his father was a major donor to the university’s hockey program and a former NHL player.

By the time the rumors had been passed around enough, no one dared mess with him.

Even professors turned a blind eye when he slept through class.

“Talk. Why’d you hit me?”

Seeing me in a daze, he rubbed the back of his head and repeated the question.

It looked like I really had hit him a little too hard.

“I… I did it out of habit. When my little brother doesn’t do his homework at home, I hit him like that. Sorry.”

The Humiliation Points had already come in.

So had the two thousand dollars.

I apologized immediately.

I blocked every possible comeback in his throat. He could not curse me, and he could not lose his temper either.

In the end, he rubbed the back of his head again, turned around in a huff, and went back to sleep.

The system was thrilled.

[Brave girl, my KPI this year depends on you. OMG, don’t screw it up.]

Then, before I could react, it spoke again.

[This is my first client after six months as an intern, so I specially applied for extra permissions. To make it easier for you to torment him, I moved your assigned seat right next to Caelan.]

O.M.G.

I was sure I wouldn’t survive until tomorrow.

Sure enough, Caelan slept until afternoon. When he woke up and saw me, he was clearly startled.

But the cool guy had excellent control over his face. The corner of his mouth only twitched once before he returned to normal.

“Who let you sit next to me?”

Caelan’s voice was still a little hoarse from sleep.

If his icy stare had not been so terrifying, paired with that face, it might even have sounded sexy.

“The professor assigned it.”

I was so guilty I did not dare meet his eyes.

I was afraid the moody hockey captain would jump up and body-check me across the room. (Body-checking is a legal hip or shoulder hit in hockey, but still.)

Caelan did not believe me at all.

He gave a light scoff.

“A professor assigned a nerd like you as my seat partner?”

He shifted onto his side into a new sleeping position.

“Move before the professor notices.”

But when he realized every professor and classmate seemed to accept that we were seat partners now, Caelan stopped sleeping.

He propped his chin on his hand and stared at me curiously for an entire class.

When class ended, he seemed tired of looking.

He tapped the desk with one finger and said, “El…”

“Elara Vance.”

I turned and gave him a flattering smile.

Caelan nodded.

“Get up. I’m going out.”

He stood and was about to step over in front of me.

The system suddenly spoke.

[Stick out your leg. Trip him.]

I looked at the marble floor.

I was genuinely afraid Caelan would fall and chip his front teeth.

[Relax, he won’t. Stick out your leg.]

I squeezed my eyes shut.

Just as Caelan’s other leg was about to step past the seat, I kicked out hard.

Crash.