Envy


The fall semester just started at the Velder University and the members of the El Gang find themselves taking a Creative Writing class together. The first two weeks were spent introducing the students to each other and the course. But once October rolled around, the class was given their first creative writing task.

Write a short story based on one of the seven deadly sins.

Since there were around thirty students in the class, at least three people were going to have the same theme. Because of this, the professor decided that the best work for all seven themes would receive a small extra credit bonus. That got the class riled up, and whispers could be heard among the crowd until the professor silenced them with a wave of her hand.

A hat was passed around. Each student reached in and picked out a piece of paper before passing it on. Whatever was written on that piece of paper was the theme they were writing for.

A certain redhead named Elsword drew from the hat, huffing when he saw the word "Envy" on the piece of paper. Beside him, a young woman with purple hair named Aisha drew out the word "Sloth".

"What did you get?" Elsword asked, turning to Aisha.

"Sloth. This is gonna be hard… You?"

"I got envy," he replied.

"You got envy? That's so easy!" Aisha whined.

"Maybe for you," Elsword shrugged. "I'm not much of a writer."

"Oh come on, Elsword! Even you could come up with something for this!"

"What's that supposed to mean?" He argued back.

"Excuse me!" The professor snapped, hushing them both. The two of them ceased their arguing, and the class was once again silent. Except for a strange noise that Elsword could hear to his left. He turned to see a petite young woman with lavender hair drooling over her piece of paper.

"Uhh, Lu?" Elsword asked. "What you got there?"

"Lust! I can't believe it, I get to write lust!" The woman muttered excitedly, turning to Elsword with stars in her eyes. "Ohohoho!"

"I see. You have fun with that," Elsword said, awkwardly nodding his head and turning away. He was willing to put up with Aisha's constant bickering, but not with that. Whatever the hell that was.

Once the hat was passed out and everyone got their themes, the professor made one final announcement.

"Hope you are satisfied with your themes! Remember, what you get is what you get. Also! No explicit content."

"H-Huh!?" Lu objected. The professor gave her an incredulous stare, as did the rest of the class.

"It's school policy, and it's also for my mental health," the professor answered. "Please don't send me anything that would make my stomach turn. If you have further questions on this matter, please don't hesitate to shoot me an email or see me after class. And with that being said, I'll see you on Monday!"

The class was adjourned, and the students filed out of the class to their respective dorms.


Elsword decided to hang around Aisha's dorm for the day. They were brainstorming ideas for their prompt, sitting on the floor, and hanging around the coffee table with cups of tea steaming next to their open notebooks.

Aisha had already written out several ideas, which she'd crossed out. Meanwhile, Elsword's page was squeaky clean, not a pencil stroke in sight.

And that infuriated her.

"Ugh, I'm struggling for ideas here," Aisha rubbed her temples as she took a sip of her tea.

"Same here," Elsword chimed back as he leaned against the sofa.

"What are you talking about? You haven't even written anything down!" Aisha snapped.

"I want to think of something good first before writing it down!" Elsword retorted.

"Ugh, I can't believe you. You get such an easy prompt and you're drawing blanks?"

"What, do you have any ideas?"

"A lot, actually! What about some guy who's really good friends with this girl, which makes this other girl who has feelings for him jealous! There you go!"

"You want me to write some cheesy romance plot?" Elsword scrunched his face at her.

"It doesn't have to be cheesy," Aisha shrugged. "It can be a horror story! Like the girl is so consumed with envy, she kills everyone that the guy knows and takes her for himself."

"…So you want me to write a generic yandere plot?"

Aisha thought about it for a moment, before nodding her head in agreement. "That is generic…"

"See? It isn't as easy as you think!"

"But it's a lot easier than sloth!" Aisha shot back. "Do you have any ideas for sloth!?"

"Look at me," Elsword told her as he laid back against the couch, wiggling his torso. "See this? I'm sure you can think of something if you keep looking."

"Ugh, now you're making me not want to look at you," Aisha turned away in disgust.

"Well, it's either that or no ideas," Elsword teased her.

"I'd rather have no ideas, thanks."

"Fine," Elsword huffed. "As for me, I think I finally came up with something."

Aisha raised a brow. "Oh?"

"Yeah, this one's gonna be good…" Elsword said to himself as he got out his laptop and started writing. Aisha tried to see what he was writing, but every time she tried to peek at his screen, Elsword shooed her away.

"Seriously?" Aisha fumed after the fifth time.

"Yes!" Elsword shot back. "Can you let me write? I'll let you see after I'm done."

Aisha huffed. "You mean to tell me that you'll get this done today?"

"Yeah!" Elsword answered confidently. "Matter of fact…"

He turned around his laptop and gestured for her to read it. She leaned in and began reading. The story was about a group of college students taking a creative writing class. They were given an assignment by the professor with the theme "Seven Deadly Sins", where each student was given one out of the seven sins as a theme.

"Wait a minute…" Aisha narrowed her eyes. This was sounding awfully similar. She kept reading.

The story continues with a boy and a girl bickering over their prompts. The boy had gotten "Envy," while the girl had gotten "Sloth." The girl was awfully like Aisha, and the boy had an uncanny resemblance to Elsword.

Full of indignant rage, the purple-haired woman slammed her hands on the coffee table, causing the teacups to stumble, but thankfully not fall.

"You motherf-"

+ The End! +


Author's Endnote

I know exactly who this is going to piss off. To her I say: Please don't kill me, thanks!

R&R, I guess.