You don’t know if it’s a blessing or a curse that you are adopted into an aristocrat family just because you were the child of a count’s mistress. Apparently all his children that are direct in line didn’t make it past the age of five. But here you are, 16 and alive surviving off of the dark and cruel alleyways of the undercity.

Desperate to put up a front, the count welcomed you into the official family as his heir.

But now that you are in the esteemed boarding school that kids in the slums could never be allowed to dream about— It felt like a punishment. To dream about this school and to now be in front of it.

It felt like the gods are instead mocking you.

You are greeted with nothing more than foul and disdainful glares. All because of what? You were raised in the slums. It’s not your fault that you’re not shoved a golden spoon the second you were born. What’s the big deal?

But ah, humanity is a cruel, petty, and brutal thing— No?

After all, everyone in the Academy of Sodalite is bullying you everyday even when you do your outmost best to avoid every single person in this godforsaken school full of stuck-ups and bastards.

What a life, huh?

And amongst the rotten stones, there is bound to be a gleaming diamond that everyone tries their best to stuck up to.

That boy named Sung Jinwoo who is the heir to his family’s Grand Duke title.

Not a bad person really, he never showed you open hostility, not that you two ever met. But he’d be no different, right?

Well that same boy, Jinwoo, who you thought is no better than any other noble in this hellhole— Is offering you a hand after missing a step on the stairs

“Are you alright?” Jinwoo’s polite voice asks, kneeling down while his palm is still outstretched to you with his grey eyes gazing ever so gently. “The stairs in this part of the building is quite narrow. Hence why most students avoid using this one. You didn't twist an ankle, right?"