First Impressions:
Chapter Title? (
No title given in raw, so just start with content)
First impressions of others almost occupy the entire stage of a relationship from stranger to friend. Perhaps it’s related to human physiology, or maybe to certain psychological mechanisms—
In any case, from the mountain of true and false descriptions the Waga Waga Helmet Gang gave him yesterday, Sensei remembered only one thing:
Defense Room Chief Buzhihuo Huaye was someone who hated evil as if it were her enemy, she almost equally despised everyone who disrupted the order built by the Student Council President in Kivotos, whether students or other residents.
Her magnanimity yesterday was shocking, but in the end it could barely be explained as Hua Ye letting the Helmet Gang off the hook out of respect for his face and the gang’s contributions. But…
Buzhihuo Huaye recruited the Helmet Gang as the Defense Room’s guard squad? Really?
From yesterday until now, Sensei’s impression of Hua Ye was: assertive, capable, self-respecting and confident, a child who stubbornly clung to her own principles most of the time. But now it seemed his view was still somewhat one-sided:
Although he didn’t know how Hua Ye had managed to persuade the Helmet Gang Leader, who had been pointing a gun at her just minutes ago, to show outward respect and calm—
Somewhat surprised, Sensei’s gaze moved between Hua Ye, whose body was covered in bruises, whose expression was unfriendly and full of disgust, yet who was still shaking the other’s hand, and the Helmet Gang Leader, whose eyes sparkled, who was rubbing her forehead, and who kept calling Hua Ye “Big Sis” in an eager tone.
The smell of gunpowder still lingered at the mouth of the alley. Piles of golden bullet casings on the ground looked like grains of wheat, giving a strange feeling of abundance, and the coldly gleaming magazines mixed in among them were like stones in a field—
Hard and ruthless. The straight alley was not deep, revealing everything inside openly, including two girls with an especially strange and “heated” atmosphere, and one adult whose expression had become inexplicably focused.
“Sis Hua Ye! I didn’t know my place before, please don’t hold it against me!”
The Helmet Gang Leader shook Hua Ye’s slightly scraped right hand with sincere, almost naive eyes. The Defense Room Chief Buzhihuo Huaye, stared at with such earnest eyes, kept a cold expression with her mouth twitching slightly, as if enduring something, and she forced out a sentence with difficulty.
“It’s fine. I don’t care about any of that. I just need you and your men to perform well as my guard squad on the upcoming Abydos trip. I won’t pursue the matter of you shooting me fifty-six times earlier.”
When the Helmet Gang girl heard this, her face lit up even more. In the cool morning breeze, she instantly stood at attention, straightened up, saluted, and shouted in a crisp, focused voice:
“Yes, Chief!”
When Hua Ye heard the other girl’s arbitrary shout of “Chief,” her expression twisted and became unnatural, but the next moment she suppressed it again, maintaining a gentle but cold smile without saying a word.
Even her eyes were hidden behind squinted lids, impossible to read. Watching Hua Ye’s various blue and purple bruises, the involuntary little twitches of her body when shaken, and the strange look on her face when called “Chief,” Sensei immediately understood.
‘Hua Ye is suffering from her injuries, but to maintain an outward “elegance” or “dignity,” she chooses to endure the pain and internal dissatisfaction. And as for the Helmet Gang’s form of address, she is most likely very dissatisfied or even angry, but she chooses to suppress it.’
‘Is it because she is the Defense Room Chief, and yet she is still trading with the Helmet Gang she hates most?’
Faced with Hua Ye’s reaction, he suddenly felt a faint sadness in his heart. He knew exactly what he was sad about—
It was simply that he felt children shouldn’t have to expend effort to disguise themselves, to act overly worldly and repressed like adults.
Yet he immediately felt clumsy and ridiculous—
After all, wasn’t it because of his reasons that Hua Ye had to face off with the Helmet Gang?
Wasn’t her first reaction to run away?
It was because of his dawdling that she ended up in this situation…
But that feeling still permeated his heart, like a fog shrouding his emotions.
His gaze wandered between Hua Ye’s uniform skirt, slightly disheveled from the bullets, and the bruises on her hands and neck—
‘No matter how you look at it, it seems like Hua Ye got beaten up… Sure, compared to the “recruitment” Hua Ye mentioned, I’m more concerned about Hua Ye’s injuries! The specific recruitment process isn’t the key point right now! As long as Hua Ye is safe now, that’s enough. We can talk about the rest after her body gets better!’
He decisively turned off the Shittim Chest’s protective function, asked Ersi Hemo, who was always online, on Momotalk, got the answer he wanted, and decisively sent a message to the Valkyrie Police Department’s first aid squad. While doing this so decisively, he mocked himself with a self-deprecating complaint:
‘When it comes to my students getting hurt, I really can’t respect their own wishes after all… I’m so inconsistent in word and deed…’
But he did not regret his decision, even if it might make Hua Ye angry right now. Because from his perspective, rather than expecting this child, who would work overtime and go on field missions until she nearly collapsed, to postpone her work schedule to treat her injuries, it was better for him to be the bad guy.
Maybe there were other ways? Like waiting for Hua Ye to cool down before persuading her to get treated? Like slowly guiding her afterward not to be too angry? But Sensei, looking at Hua Ye’s expression twisted by the suppression of her inner pain and anger—
an expression that, because of those squinted eyes, couldn’t be seen by the child in front of her—
silently made a decision even he thought was foolish.
‘Compared to the student’s goodwill toward me, her mental and physical health are more important… Rather than letting her be tormented by this anger for a while, suppressing her heart for work, traveling to Abydos with people she detests, enduring the pain of the conflict between her beliefs and reality, it’s more appropriate for me to actively provoke her, let her vent first, then slowly persuade and heal her…’
Buzhihuo Huaye waved her hand, using words like “maintenance” and “mission preparation” to dismiss the Helmet Gang Leader, as if perfunctorily or as if enduring.
The latter, convinced and excited, picked up her gun that had been thrown on the ground, skipped past Sensei with cheerful little steps, politely greeted him, and rushed out of the alley. After the Helmet Gang Leader disappeared at the other end of the street, Sensei said softly to Buzhihuo Huaye, whose body was trembling along with her halo as she faced the inside of the alley:
“Hua Ye, I called the first aid squad. They’ll be here soon…”
Buzhihuo Huaye, who had been groaning and moaning, stiffened. Her halo, as if stimulated, suddenly emitted a strong light. Her eyes flew wide open, the calm on her face slowly crumbled, and finally, as if unable to bear it any longer, she broke into a twisted expression of gnashing hatred. She turned her head and shot Sensei a vicious glare with her emerald eyes full of pain and anger, speaking sharply in a chillingly cold tone:
“When did I tell you to do that?! Advisor, don’t you get too pushy! You outsider! Remember, I am the Defense Room Chief! You’ve only been here a few days, what do you know about Kivotos?!”
Then, her whole body trembling, her face contorted, she closed her eyes, took a shaky deep breath as if about to explode, then forcibly twisted her expression back to the calm she had used when negotiating with the Helmet Gang. Then she strode toward the advisor standing at the alley entrance, bathed in morning light. Squinting, she looked up at him coldly and forced out between clenched teeth:
“There won’t be a next time, Advisor. I can forgive your boring offense this time, but next time, I’ll consider whether I need to tell the Student Council President how important you are to me, and whether Kivotos needs you.”
Standing in the midst of scattered bullets and magazines, Buzhihuo Huaye deliberately restrained her expression and tone, acting as if she were merely a slighted chief reprimanding and forgiving a subordinate or colleague. However, her flushed cheeks and involuntarily trembling body showed that she was still suppressing her anger.
‘She’s just a child. She shouldn’t have to sacrifice her own heart and suppress her pain for some so-called greater good and duty…’
But Sensei only laughed inwardly, half satisfied and half troubled. Then, unexpectedly for Buzhihuo Huaye, he slowly crouched down, looked into Hua Ye’s eyes—she barely reached his chest—with his clear but slightly tired eyes, and said:
“Chief Hua Ye… no, Hua Ye, I’m not speaking to you as an advisor, but as a teacher.”
Her halo trembled continuously. Among the four crosses that guarded the golden ring, one had somehow already revealed a crack at its center—
That was one of the poles at the leftmost end of the ring.
Symmetrically, at the rightmost pole of the ring, the cross also showed a faint crack. The slightly shattered cross remained silent, not saying a word about the halo’s strange movement, while the crosses at the upper and lower poles trembled madly in sync with the halo.
Buzhihuo Huaye, who had barely managed to suppress her anger a moment ago, jolted. First, disbelief shone in her eyes. Then her mouth twitched, the carefully donned outer layer on her face slowly tore open a crack, revealing what had been deliberately restrained inside:
“I don’t need a useless piece of trash like you to guide me! Don’t put that condescending attitude on me! I look pretty pathetic right now, don’t I?! It’s hilarious, isn’t it, that I have to cooperate with those damned Helmet Gang, forced to give up the Defense Room’s money and staff, to give those wastes, trash, and thugs a reason not to keep beating me up, isn’t it?!”
She wore an expression of extreme anger and disgust, gritting her teeth fiercely. Her emerald green eyes seemed to blaze. Her fists were clenched so tightly her nails seemed to dig into her palms. In a sharp tone that she tried to restrain but couldn’t hide her inner fury, she stamped her feet continuously at Sensei, who was looking straight at her, venting the malice and anger she had just suppressed:
“You look down on me too, don’t you?! Damn it! Damn it!!! A piece of trash like you can naturally empathize with that kind of trash! Because you’re all unworthy! If I were a superperson, I could definitely use my ability to throw all this trash into the garbage heap, let them rot and stink! Instead of scurrying around like a mouse in a hail of 5.56mm bullets, and finally, laughably, despite not being able to endure the pain, forcing myself to stand in front of them while they reload and can’t attack, to negotiate and bargain! Damn it! So shameful!!! Shameful! If this goes on, how can I have the face to stand beside the superperson! How can I share her worries!!!”
Finally, with horizontal pupils that seemed to reveal a murderous twisted malice and anger, she half shouted, half screamed, almost full of hatred, tears of shame in her eyes:
“I will definitely…”
But that incompletely spoken anger and humiliation, that self-hatred and pain activated by her own shameful compromise, were interrupted by a warm, broad, and slightly apologetic embrace.
“Hua Ye, I’m sorry.”
In the unprecedented warmth, Buzhihuo Huaye froze. Even her halo fell silent at that moment.
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