“Close relationship…hehe”
Seeing Avier start to daydream, Yuriko pressed her advantage:
“So, this matter is a little secret between you two, a secret only close friends can share. Teacher, you mustn’t tell anyone else, okay”
“I understand. I won’t tell anyone. I’ll keep this secret for the rest of my life!”
“Mm-hmm, that’s right!”
With just a few words, Yuriko had completely hoodwinked Avier.
She felt her future had gained a glimmer of hope.
It took a while for Avier to snap out of her lovesick daze and remember why she had called Yuriko.
“Ah, I almost forgot the main thing.”
Avier took out a student card from her desk and handed it to Yuriko.
“This is your student card. You can use it as a pass in certain places. Besides that, it’s to prove your student identity. You also need to swipe it to unlock free meals in the cafeteria. Keep it safe.”
“Mm, I’ll take good care of it.”
After giving the student card to Yuriko, Avier spoke to her earnestly:
“I don’t know if Yun Jianlan told you, but Shengxiu Academy has never had a privileged transfer student like this since its founding. Someone suddenly entering fifth grade is unheard of.”
“Yun Jianlan didn’t tell me what price she paid to sway the Dean and get you enrolled. But all your actions will be linked to her. If you perform poorly or even get expelled, it will inevitably affect your sister’s future and become a stain on her life.”
“So, whether as her friend or as your teacher, I hope you can do your best to earn everyone’s recognition. That would be good for her and for you.”
The atmosphere suddenly became a bit heavy.
Yuriko didn’t expect even this seemingly unreliable teacher to give her such a serious reminder.
‘Phantom, what do you think my cheap sister did to get the Dean to agree?’
‘I don’t know what the current Dean thinks, but at least during the time the Saint was alive, even offering an entire kingdom wouldn’t earn the Saint’s favor.’
‘That powerful? She didn’t sell herself to the Dean, did she?’
‘Can’t you be serious for once?’
‘What are you thinking? I mean selling herself to the Dean as a slave.’
‘… I’m ignoring you now, meow.’
Even while joking with Phantom, Yuriko knew that her cheap sister had paid a considerable price.
She suddenly felt the burden on her shoulders grow heavier.
Maybe she didn’t need to pay an entire kingdom, but the price was surely beyond what Yuriko could imagine.
She was just a street-smart mafia boss without much grand experience.
Just a relative she hadn’t seen for years—Yuriko didn’t even have any memories of her.
Was it necessary to go this far for her?
While deep in thought, Yuriko suddenly felt a pain in her palm.
Phantom had somehow bitten her hand.
‘Hiss, why did you bite me!’
If Yuriko weren’t used to pain from fighting, she would have let out a high-pitched scream.
‘You’re the one who touched my tail without permission again, meow!’
Only then did Yuriko notice that she had unknowingly grabbed Phantom’s tail.
Phantom never liked having her tail touched, nor her belly or butt.
She only occasionally let Yuriko pet her head and back.
‘Sorry, I was spacing out.’
Coming back to herself, Yuriko took a deep breath.
Regardless, as long as she could successfully win the “Star of the Academy,” all of this would be worth it, right?
Yuriko looked up and met Avier’s gaze.
Her resolve had not been shaken by the conversation.
“Thank you for the reminder, Teacher Simon. But there’s one thing I want to tell you: regardless of your reminder, my purpose in coming to this Academy is to become the Star of the Academy.”
Avier saw no trace of deceit in her eyes.
Yuriko spoke with full confidence, just like Yun Jianlan had said to Avier many years ago.
“Yun Jianlan said something similar back then.”
“She also said she wanted to become the Star of the Academy?”
“Yes, your sister was the most recent recipient of the Star of the Academy. Her deeds are still talked about in the Academy.”
So that’s it.
No wonder her cheap sister demanded that she become the Star of the Academy—it was because she herself had achieved it, so she thought Yuriko could too?
As she spoke, Avier raised her wrist and glanced at her watch.
She noticed it was almost time for class.
“Ah, class starts in one minute! Let’s stop chatting. I’ll take you to the classroom first!”
Yuriko followed Avier out of the office and hurried to the classroom.
Fortunately, the classroom was not far from Avier’s office.
As the class bell rang, Avier and Yuriko arrived just outside the classroom.
“Phew, we made it. Can’t be late on the first day of the new semester~”
Avier patted her chest, catching her breath and calming her breathing.
“To help you integrate into the class quickly, you’ll need to introduce yourself at the podium. Prepare here for a moment, and come in when I call you.”
“Okay, I’ll wait here.”
Avier entered the classroom holding her lesson plan and shouted for quiet, silencing the somewhat noisy room.
“Everyone, please quiet down. I know it’s a new school year, and I understand you’re excited, but we still need to maintain classroom order during class.”
“Little Avier, what courses are we taking this year?” someone from the audience asked.
“You’ll all know about that later. But before today’s homeroom begins, I’d like to introduce a new classmate.”
“Huh?!”
The classroom immediately turned into a chaotic mess.
After all, in the hundreds of years since Shengxiu Academy was founded, there had never been a transfer student.
A transfer student suddenly coming into an upper grade was unprecedented.
“What’s going on? Did I just hear that right?”
“Little Avier must be joking, right? Can we really have a new classmate here?”
“Maybe she transferred from Class B?”
Questions, shock, curiosity—a mix of emotions made it impossible to calm the classroom.
Avier shouted for quiet several times, but it didn’t work at all.
Finally, a blonde girl sitting in the front row stood up and called out to the other students:
“Everyone, please calm down. You’re making things difficult for Teacher Avier.”
After she spoke, the entire classroom immediately fell silent.
No one said another word.
Looking at the now-quiet students, Avier breathed a sigh of relief, but also felt a bit troubled.
As a teacher, having less authority than a student—that was too embarrassing!
“Teacher Avier, please continue.”
The blonde girl sat down.
“Phew, thank you, Wyndham.”
Avier turned to look at Yuriko outside the door and said to her,
“Ruri, please come in.”
At Avier’s call, Yuriko entered the classroom and came to stand beside Avier.
Facing the group in the classroom, the first thing she noticed was the blonde girl who had just helped Avier out.
She had bright golden hair.
Even in the standard Academy uniform, she exuded an aristocratic aura.
Combined with her delicate face that held a hint of heroic spirit, she gave Yuriko the illusion of glowing.
And after Yuriko entered the classroom, the students also observed this unprecedented transfer student.
“Ruri, introduce yourself to everyone.”
With Avier’s lead, Yuriko turned and wrote her name on the blackboard.
“Ruri Yuriko”
“Good morning, everyone. I am Ruri Yuriko, entering this year. From now on, we’ll be classmates. I hope to get along well with all of you.”
With her proper posture, deliberately softened elegant tone, plus her pretty face and proud figure, Yuriko’s entrance successfully elicited cheers from the class.
Most of the cheers came from the boys.
Amidst the cheers, someone took the opportunity to ask:
“Ruri, are you from Pilgrim City?”
“More or less. I’ve lived here since I can remember.”
“Do you have a boyfriend?”
“Not yet~”
“That cat on your shoulder is so cute!”
While the class atmosphere was heating up, a little loli secretly took out a snack and took a bite when no one was looking.
However, her supposedly stealthy move was fully visible to Avier on the podium.
“Tiamat, this is class time. No snacking, please.”
The little loli, upon being called out, immediately looked up and swallowed the snack in her mouth.
“I-I wasn’t sneaking a bite…”
Even as she said this, the oil stains at the corners of her mouth made her words utterly unconvincing.
Yuriko also noticed the little loli.
She took note of the pair of fierce horns on her head and the large red tail swaying restlessly behind her.
A dragon girl?
‘She’s a Red Dragon species. Her bloodline purity looks very high.’
Phantom said in Yuriko’s mind.
So they even have dragons here.
As expected of an academy that gathers geniuses from around the world.
“Before you say that, you should at least wipe your mouth first. There are still snack crumbs on your lips.”
The dragon-girl loli named Tiamat covered her mouth with her hand, as if that would erase the evidence.
The class erupted in laughter.
But they seemed used to this, and no one mocked the dragon-girl loli.
‘Looks like things are going smoothly. No one is giving me a hard time for being a transfer student.’
Just as she thought that, a petite girl in the front row slammed the table and stood up, pointing at Yuriko’s nose:
“Hmph, I won’t accept someone with an unknown background joining us! Someone like you is unworthy to be in the same class as my Elder Sister!”
Great.
What did she just say?
Just when she thought things were going well, someone had to cause trouble.
‘Pfft.’
‘What are you laughing at? I’m being picked on here!’
‘This is karma for touching my tail without permission, meow.’
Yuriko mentally rolled her eyes at Phantom and then turned her gaze to the girl who was causing trouble.
Shorter than her, even shorter than Avier—probably under 1.5 meters.
She had twin white pigtails and a very slender build.
Her face was cute, so why was her personality so nasty?
But compared to the vulgar language she heard in the mafia, this white-haired girl’s words sounded like a spoiled child.
Seeing Yuriko being targeted, Avier said somewhat flustered, “Kipling, you’ll be classmates from now on. Don’t make things difficult for Ruri.”
The white-haired girl wasn’t buying it at all.
She shouted at Avier:
“Why can she just join our class directly? I’ve never heard of Shengxiu Academy having such a backdoor. Teacher, you should give us an explanation!”
This stumped Avier as well.
Her stress tolerance was clearly low.
Being pressured by a student actually made her flustered.
“Well, this is the Academy’s decision…” she stammered.
“Has the Academy become so corrupt that any Tom, Dick, or Harry can be brought in?!”
“Eh, Kipling, please calm down…”
Yuriko looked at Avier, who didn’t know how to explain.
She knew she couldn’t count on her.
It was time for her to take action.
Even though she was being targeted, to maintain her good-girl persona in class, Yuriko couldn’t fight back now.
She should use gentler words, like playing tai chi, and defuse the other’s attack with soft methods.
So Yuriko stepped forward to shield Avier from the pressure.
“You’re called Kipling, right?”
Seeing Yuriko approach, the white-haired girl instinctively shrank back, then mustered her courage and stood firm, saying defiantly:
“What, coming so close? You want to fight? Don’t think I’m scared just because you have big boobs!”
“Big boobs”
Yuriko looked down at her own 36E melons, then at the white-haired girl’s chest that was as flat as a playground.
For a split second, she felt an urge to laugh.
No, she couldn’t laugh. If she did, her persona would collapse.
Yuriko shook her head and subtly puffed out her chest.
She said to the white-haired girl,
“Of course not, Kipling. I completely understand how you feel.”
“Everyone here has passed through rounds of selection to enter Shengxiu Academy, passed every year’s trials, and finally become the elite promoted to fifth grade. You’ve put in so much effort; it’s only natural for you to question me.”
“However, Teacher Simon is innocent. Please don’t project your dissatisfaction with me onto her. If you, Kipling, and everyone else here are dissatisfied with me and think I’m not worthy of being in this classroom, I will use my actions to prove my worth as Ruri Yuriko. So, I hope you’ll save your doubts for after class. How about that?”
The classroom fell silent.
Everyone listened quietly to Yuriko’s words.
After she finished, a classmate posed a question:
“Who is Teacher Simon?”
Yuriko: “…”
Not cool, man.
I talk for so long, and all you ask is “Who is Teacher Simon?”
Don’t you even know your own homeroom teacher?
Avier angrily slammed the podium and shouted, “It’s me! After all this time, at least remember your teacher’s surname!”
“So Little Avier’s surname is Simon? I had no idea.”
“It’s all because you keep calling me ‘Little Avier’ all day. Just call me Teacher, you idiots!”
The class burst into laughter, seemingly rejecting Avier’s protest.
Yuriko felt a second of sympathy for Avier in her heart, then continued looking at the white-haired girl.
“It seems everyone else has no objections. So, Kipling, can you grant me this selfish request?”
The white-haired girl wanted to say more, but the blonde girl beside her—the same Wyndham who had helped Avier earlier—called her name softly.
“Nomily, sit down for now.”
“Ugh, Elder Sister!”
Nomily wanted to argue, but Wyndham just shook her head.
Finally, Nomily left a harsh remark:
“Don’t think I’ll accept you just because of this!”
After saying that, she sat down angrily.
Having resolved this trouble, Yuriko stepped back to the podium.
‘Sigh, I never thought I’d have to use my brain one day. It’s easier to just use fists. A brat like her would behave after a good beating.’
‘Good work.’
Phantom gently patted Yuriko’s head with her little cat paw.
After the self-introduction, Avier glanced at the classroom layout and said to Yuriko, “Ruri, sit in the seat next to Carmilla for now.”
“Okay.”
Yuriko walked down from the podium and sat in the empty seat next to Carmilla.
As soon as she sat down, Carmilla secretly waved at her:
“We meet again~”
Looking at the gentle Carmilla, Yuriko felt her mood lift considerably, and she smiled again.
“Mm, we meet again.”
After she sat down, a classmate behind her tapped her shoulder, and then a silvery voice came:
“Ruri, you’re amazing. You kept your cool in that situation~”
Yuriko turned around.
Behind her was a blue-haired girl, slightly taller than Avier.
“Actually, I was very nervous too. After all, it was my first time speaking in front of so many people.”
It wasn’t really the first time—she had made threats in front of entire mafia gangs before—but the situation was completely different, so she was a bit nervous for real.
“Hehe~ Is that so?”
The blue-haired girl’s face showed a mischievous smile.
As if casually, she said, “Oh my, when Nomily was picking on you, I was so scared. I was afraid you’d get angry and beat her up with a mace~”
The smile on Yuriko’s face froze.
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