Ren noticed the vehicle first.

It was parked outside the East Annex when he arrived the next morning — a sleek black hover car with tinted windows and a small silver crest on the door panel. Expensive. The kind of vehicle that came with a driver who sat in the front seat with perfect posture and a face that said I am paid to wait and I am very good at it.

Ren had seen cars like that in the nicer parts of Orien. They usually belonged to noble families. You didn’t buy a vehicle like that because you needed transportation. You bought it because you wanted everyone who saw it parked outside a building to know that someone important was inside.

He walked past it without slowing down and headed into the annex.

— • —

The first thing he noticed inside was the staff. Two school administrators he had never seen in the East Annex before were standing near the entrance to the main corridor, talking in low voices. They stopped when Ren walked past and gave him polite, blank smiles — the kind adults use when they want a student to keep moving without asking questions.

The second thing he noticed was Selene. She was standing outside Room 3-C with her arms folded, looking toward the far end of the corridor with an expression Ren hadn’t seen on her face before. It took him a moment to place it.

Annoyance. Controlled, professional annoyance, but real.

She noticed Ren and her expression reset to its usual calm. "Wait inside," she said. "We’re starting late today."

"Everything okay?" Ren asked.

"Inside," she repeated.

He went inside.

Cassian was already at his usual seat, feet up on the desk, looking bored. Lyra was reading something on her student band. Iris was sitting perfectly still, watching the door like she was expecting something.

"Did you see the car outside?" Cassian said when Ren sat down.

"Yeah."

"Voss family crest on the door. I recognized it." Cassian tilted his chair back. "Someone’s parents are checking in."

Ren looked toward Kaelen’s desk. It was empty.

Iris spoke without turning her head. "He was called to the principal’s office twenty minutes ago. Along with whoever arrived in that car."

Of course she knew. Iris always knew.

— • —

They waited for nearly forty minutes. Nobody said much. Lyra tried to start a conversation about the group test scores, but it died quickly. The energy in the room was off — the kind of awkward tension that fills a space when everyone knows something is happening nearby and nobody has enough information to talk about it properly.

Ren used the time to think. A Voss family representative showing up the morning after the near-clash with Kaelen was not a coincidence. House Voss was a Marquis family — old, powerful, connected. When their heir nearly got into a fight with another student in a sealed classroom, they would want answers. And probably someone to blame.

’They’re here about yesterday,’ Ren thought. ’And I’m the other half of yesterday.’

He should have been worried. A noble house putting pressure on a school about a student with no family backing, no political protection, and a name most people had forgotten — that was the kind of situation that usually ended badly for the student with no backing.

But something about it didn’t feel right. The administrators at the entrance hadn’t looked nervous. Selene had looked annoyed, not concerned. And the whole annex felt managed, the same way it had felt since the first day Ren walked in.

Like someone above the school had things under control.

— • —

Kaelen came back at the end of the forty minutes. He walked into Room 3-C without looking at anyone, sat down at his desk, and stared straight ahead. His face was perfectly composed, but his jaw was tight and his hands were flat on the desk in the way they got when he was holding something back.

Whoever he had talked to, it hadn’t gone the way he’d expected.

Selene arrived two minutes later and started the session as if nothing had happened. No explanation. No acknowledgment of the delay. Just: "Open your training manuals. Page forty-six."

Ren opened his manual and pretended to read.

But on the way in, he had caught something. Just a glimpse, through the window at the end of the corridor, as the black hover car pulled away from the annex.

A man was walking back into the main school building from the parking area. Young-looking, dark hair, the kind of easy confidence that made you think he was someone’s older brother rather than a school principal. He was smiling — the relaxed, unhurried smile of a person who had just finished a conversation that went exactly the way he wanted it to.

Caelan Veyr.

Ren had only seen the principal once or twice in passing, but you didn’t forget a face like that. Handsome, calm, slightly lazy-looking, with an undercurrent of something much sharper underneath. 𝕗𝐫𝐞𝕖𝕨𝐞𝗯𝚗𝕠𝘃𝐞𝚕.𝐜𝗼𝚖

He had just walked a Voss family representative to their car. And he had been smiling.

— • —

’That’s interesting,’ Ren thought.

A Marquis house sends someone to the school. The principal handles it personally. The representative leaves. Kaelen comes back looking frustrated. And the principal is smiling.

That was not how it usually worked. When noble families leaned on schools, schools bent. Principals apologized. Students got reassigned or disciplined. The family got what they wanted, because that was how power worked in Rose Country.

But Caelan Veyr had walked House Voss to their car with a smile on his face. Which meant either he didn’t understand what a Marquis family could do to a school principal’s career, or he understood perfectly and didn’t care.

Ren was starting to think it was the second one.

And that raised a question he couldn’t answer yet: why? Why would a school principal have the pull to turn away a noble house? What kind of authority did Caelan Veyr actually have? And why did Ren keep getting the feeling that someone, somewhere above his line of sight, was quietly keeping the worst of the pressure away from him?

He didn’t have answers. But the feeling was getting stronger with every passing day. The sealed annex. The Alliance-grade wards. A Peak Stage 4 BPL assigned to teach seven students. And now a principal who smiled while showing House Voss the door.

Someone was managing this. All of it. And Ren was starting to think that whatever they were managing it for, it had something to do with him.

He turned back to page forty-six and kept reading.

Kaia pulsed once. Quiet. Warm. As if she thought so too

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Thank you so much for reading "Bloodline Plant Lord."

I truly appreciate everyone who has taken the time to start this story and follow Ren’s journey. This is only the beginning, and there is still a much bigger world, deeper mysteries, stronger enemies, and many powerful bloodline plants waiting to be revealed.

If you enjoyed this Chapter, please consider adding the story to your library, leaving a comment, and supporting it with Power Stones. Every comment, vote, and bit of support really helps the story grow, reach more readers, and motivates me to keep improving with each Chapter.

I would also love to hear your thoughts about the story so far — what you liked, what made you curious, and what you want to see more of in future Chapters.

Thank you again for your support.

See you in the next Chapter — Ren’s journey has only just begun.