“Done! See that? This is power. I don’t even have to lift a finger; someone else will take care of them for me!”
“Big Sister is awesome!”
After resolving the matter, Yuriko turned to her underlings and asked, “You all know why I’m going to the Academy, right?”
“We know! It’s to realize our goal of ruling over all of Pilgrim City!”
Yuriko interlocked her ten fingers under her chin, pretending to be profound as she spoke.
“On the road to success, some things must be sacrificed. Although your boss has successfully conquered many people at the Academy, it’s not yet time for the big reveal. Therefore, I cannot expose the fact that I am part of the Mafia.”
“Big Sister, you mean…?”
“I’m bringing a classmate over tomorrow. You are not allowed to blow my cover in front of her, otherwise all my efforts will go down the drain.”
Yuriko suddenly stood up on the sofa and began directing her subordinates to clean.
“Put away all those tools over there. Lao San, go sweep the floor. Tear down those posters on the wall and replace them with ordinary slogans!”
“That’s right, don’t miss any corners either. Get everything tidy. Lao Si, Lao Wu, go dye your hair black. With those heads of yellow hair, anyone can tell you’re not good people at a glance!”
“Anyone with tattoos better hide them well. If anyone dares to show them tomorrow, I’ll break their legs!”
Chaos immediately erupted throughout the building.
Under Yuriko’s direction, the originally dim and dingy rooms soon became much cleaner.
“Hmm, it looks a bit more normal this way.”
Yuriko nodded and then looked at her underlings.
Her gaze fell on their aggressive outfits; there was no way she could let them keep dressing like people who clearly weren’t normal.
“Do you have anything more normal in your closets?”
“Big Sister, I think my clothes are pretty normal.”
Yuriko looked at their outfits: floral shirts in red and black color schemes, exposing two arms covered in tattoos, paired with either ripped jeans or American-style jogger cargos.
They had black bandanas tied around their foreheads and jackets with gang logos over everything.
“Normal, my foot! Get out and buy a set of normal clothes. You’re not allowed to show a hint of thuggery. At the very least, don’t blow my cover tomorrow!”
“Ow, don’t kick me, Big Sister! We’re going right now, we’re going!”
The underlings clutched their backsides and scrambled away.
Yuriko then looked at Sanmei and said, “You’re the most normal one here. Go keep an eye on them so they don’t pick out anything ridiculous.”
“Yes, Big Sister. Do I need to change as well?”
“Yes. Although your outfit isn’t too over the top, you should still change into something more innocent and pure.”
Before Sanmei left, Yuriko added one last instruction, “You can buy two sets if you want. We’ll need them anyway once we go legit.”
After a busy night, the place was finally set up.
“Perfect. As long as you don’t say anything stupid tomorrow, we definitely won’t be exposed!”
Yuriko nodded with satisfaction as she looked at her underlings, now dressed in ordinary plaid shirts and trousers, and her little sister, who had changed into a light blue printed dress.
Returning to her own room, she tucked away any items related to the Mafia, and she was finally finished.
Everything was ready; she just had to wait for tomorrow.
—
The day of the exam.
With Phantom’s help, Yuriko finished all the questions early.
Phantom was the one answering, while she was merely a soulless writing machine.
“Today’s questions were a bit difficult. I only finished with two minutes to spare.”
After the exam, Carmilla slumped over her desk, her mind still dwelling on the problems.
Yuriko remained noncommittal. She didn’t actually know the specific difficulty level.
Regardless, Phantom worked quickly, so the time Yuriko took to finish depended entirely on her hand speed.
“Classmate Yuriko, I saw that you finished so early. You must be very confident. Are you planning to take the throne for first place in the Cultural Class this time?”
“I’m just giving it my all,” Yuriko said without blushing or her heart skipping a beat.
Phantom was inseparable from her and could be treated as the same person.
Therefore, Phantom doing the questions was the same as her doing them.
This meant Yuriko had completed the exam herself.
‘No problem!’
“Elder Sister will definitely get a perfect score this time. No matter how high your score is, it’s useless.”
Nomily had snuck over at some point and overheard their conversation.
“Ho ho, running over the moment class ends… Classmate Nomily really does like Classmate Yuriko, doesn’t she?”
“That’s not it! I just heard someone overestimating themselves by trying to challenge Elder Sister, so I came over to take a look!”
Nomily and Yuri started bickering.
Every time, Yuri would manage to make Nomily turn red with just a few words, leading to Nomily losing her temper.
After all this time, Yuriko had grown used to it.
She packed up her desk and spoke to Carmilla.
“Carmilla, let’s go.”
“Okay.”
Carmilla quickly gathered her textbooks and followed Yuriko out of the classroom.
Yuri, who was busy teasing Nomily, noticed this and stopped their playful argument.
“Huh, do Yuriko and Carmilla seem a bit different today?”
“Ugh, what’s different? Don’t they always act like that?”
Nomily, who was on the verge of overheating, regained some of her composure upon hearing Yuriko’s name.
Yuri glanced at Nomily, her lips curling into a playful arc.
“Don’t you think the atmosphere between Yuriko and Carmilla is a bit ambiguous today? It’s as if they have an appointment to do something together.”
“Now that you mention it, it does seem a little…”
“In my opinion, there’s an eighty percent chance they’re going on a date!”
“A date?!”
Nomily cried out in surprise before quickly covering her mouth.
She looked left and right guiltily before lowering her voice.
“That’s unlikely, right? Think about it, they’re both girls. And I heard Carmilla is very pure; she’s never accepted a confession from anyone…”
“My dear Nomily, have you never wondered why Carmilla has rejected so many boys?”
“The reason?”
“Don’t you think it’s possible she likes girls, which is why she never accepted those boys? Now that such an outstanding girl is standing right in front of her, how could she not be moved?”
“What!”
Nomily thought about it carefully; it really was a possibility.
She used her hands to gesture in front of her chest, tracing an arc the size of a watermelon.
‘Does Yuriko like girls with big chests?’
On the other side, Yuriko was leading Carmilla toward the North District.
“So this is the North District? I’ve never been here before,” Carmilla said, observing the unfamiliar street scenery.
“You’re a local, Carmilla. You’ve really never been here?”
“I rarely go out to have fun, after all.”
Yuriko remembered Carmilla’s family situation.
Her father clearly wasn’t the type to take her out to play.
“It’s okay. I’ll show you a good time today. Once we’ve had our fill of fun, I’ll take you to a restaurant near my house for dinner. I’m telling you, the business at those shops near my place is incredibly popular. Normally, people have to book one day in advance…”