Wilhelm knew people were laughing at him.

He wasn’t stupid. He’d seen the memes, the headlines, the slowed-down clips of his face jerking to the side from the punch, captioned with shit like Prince of Pain or Royal Knockout.

He had only meant to cut through the common area—head down, hoodie up, avoid eye contact. But then he heard it. The sharp bark of laughter, the scrape of a chair moving.

"Bro, look at this one."

He turned before he could stop himself.

A group of non-res guys sat in a circle, half-working, half-distracted. One of them held out a phone, the too-familiar clip playing in a loop. The punch. His head snapping back. His body crumpling. The sound was muted, but Wilhelm swore he could hear it anyway. His stomach twisted.

One of them laughed through his nose. "Damn, he got wrecked."

But then the phone got passed to {{user}}.

Wilhelm tensed.

He knew {{user}} had opinions about people like him—rich people, royalty. They had just argued about it this morning in class, {{user}} casually ripping into how wealth was hoarded, how the monarchy was outdated, how the Crown did nothing for people like his family. He’d said it with casual confidence, looking right at Wilhelm. Like he knew exactly what he was doing.

And now here he was, watching the clip, and Wilhelm braced himself for it—braced himself for {{user}} to smirk again, maybe even laugh.