“Then I’ll trouble you to watch over the class for me, Class Rep.”
Shiye’s voice was just right—not too loud or too soft—so that the students in the front row could hear her. Calling her “Class Rep” carried a bit of flattering undertone.
She was appointing Kesu Su as class rep partly to divert her attention, but her real goal was to keep her inside the classroom.
After saying this, she patted the blueberry-scented child’s head and let her sit in her own chair.
“When I get back, I’ll treat you to a meal,” Shiye added.
“Really? Yay!”
Kesu Su’s attention seemed to have been completely captured. Her two tender legs pressed together, hands resting on her thighs, sitting upright and proper like the very picture of a model student.
Seeing her like this, Shiye felt reassured. She gave a warning look to the students peeking up for gossip, then turned and left the classroom.
As the sound of little leather shoes tapping over the threshold—“pat, pat, pat”—faded down the corridor, Kesu Su, the good student, turned her face to gaze in the direction where Shiye had disappeared. Her rosy tongue flicked across her lips, her eyes brimming with unreadable emotion. Black-purple tentacle tips slid along her smooth calves, burrowing under her skirt. A flush of color soon appeared on her face.
The office door wasn’t fully closed. Shiye pushed it open and entered. Next to her desk, Huang Xiaoyi was quietly seated, just like she had been that morning in the central courtyard, writing and sketching in a notebook.
Hearing the movement, Huang Xiaoyi lifted her head, closed the notebook, placed both hands on the cover, and blinked her emotionless eyes as she spoke:
“Teacher.”
Strictly speaking, the sentence should be “Teacher, you’re back,” but Huang Xiaoyi was likely the type to find even a single extra word bothersome, so it came out as just a brief address.
“Mm, thanks for waiting. Give me a moment.”
Shiye sat down in her chair, hugging the stack of forms to her chest. She began flipping through them one by one, all the while discreetly observing the girl beside her.
Just as she’d expected, as soon as she noticed Shiye flipping through the forms, Huang Xiaoyi’s brows knit ever so slightly, and her small hands gently clenched. But the moment their gazes met, those emotions vanished like drops of water dissolving into the sea.
So, her guess was right.
Shiye continued leafing through the forms at an unhurried pace until she reached the internship forms for Huang Xiaoyi and Kesu Su. The two of them were desk-mates, so their forms were right after one another, and the two blank sheets stood out starkly among the others, all neatly filled in.
Just as expected…
She pulled out the two sheets and slid them across the table toward Huang Xiaoyi, fixing her with a pair of bright crimson eyes, saying nothing.
When even the sound of rustling paper died away, the silence was so complete that the mere sound of breathing felt deafening.
Shiye had no intention of asking questions—she meant to use her gaze to make the girl speak, just as her own homeroom teacher had done to her when she made mistakes:
If your teacher simply asks, it means there’s still room to maneuver. But when your teacher stares at you with eyes full of oppressive authority, it means you’re already halfway buried.
Not to mention, Shiye’s eyes were already red—call them “rubies” if you want to be kind, “blood-red” if not. When she stared straight at someone, the pressure was overwhelming.
The two of them locked into this stalemate for a good while. If it were Kesu Su, she’d probably be showing her belly by now, but Huang Xiaoyi held out, though her expression gradually shifted from calm indifference to growing anxiety. Her pink lips pressed together, and her fingertips kept picking at the edge of her notebook.
Pretty good composure.
Shiye silently praised her in her heart but showed no change in expression as she slowly spoke:
“…Are you going to say it, or should I?”
The teacher’s ultimate move: “If you confess, I might show mercy. If I have to say it, who knows what’ll happen?”
This pressure was the final fireball spell to crush the evil god. Huang Xiaoyi lowered her head and muttered softly:
“I’ll say it.”
Her voice was soft, like a breeze through the forest.
Shiye rested her chin in her hand, tilting her head, her fingers tapping rhythmically on the table—a ticking clock, quietly urging her to continue.
“…We haven’t decided what we want to do.”
When Huang Xiaoyi looked up again, her shoulders had relaxed a little, and much of the anxiety in her eyes had faded. Clearly, she thought this explanation was enough to convince her teacher.
“Heh heh…” Shiye gave a devilish smile.
What a pity, what a pity—if I hadn’t seen what you did last night with my own eyes, you might have fooled me, Huang Xiaoyi.
Of course, she couldn’t say that, or her cover as a top double agent would be blown. Instead, she tapped her heel lightly on the ground, and her rolling chair slid a bit closer to Huang Xiaoyi.
“Is that so?” Shiye asked.
“Y-yes… that’s right.”
Huang Xiaoyi’s hesitation was obvious. Shiye’s reaction didn’t look convinced at all—if anything, she was more aggressive, fueling new doubts and anxiety inside Huang Xiaoyi.
She tilted her head slightly, dropped her gaze, trying to avoid eye contact to keep her lie from being exposed.
“That’s a lie.”
Shiye suddenly felt like being dramatic, intoning her words theatrically as she leaned in. The distance between them shrank until her breath fell warm on Huang Xiaoyi’s cheek.
Startled by the sudden move, Huang Xiaoyi looked up, but her head still drooped from guilt—like a little deer trembling in the corner, trapped by a hungry wolf.
“The reason you and Susu didn’t fill out the forms isn’t because you don’t know…”
Shiye deliberately slowed her speech for maximum torment.
“—it’s because you didn’t want to.”
She delivered her final judgment, savoring the sight of Huang Xiaoyi, caught in her lie, suddenly looking up with beautiful golden eyes wide in shock and confusion.
Huang Xiaoyi, oh, Huang Xiaoyi… This is exactly the face I wanted to see!
So cocky when you teased me yesterday—where’s all that nerve now? Not so brave anymore, are you?
The mean but irresistible satisfaction spread through Shiye’s heart. She knew bullying her students was wrong, but it felt so good!
Besides, the girl in front of her was once an evil god who wrought havoc on countless lives. When you think about it, what’s wrong with this?
Nothing at all.
With her lie exposed, Huang Xiaoyi quickly reined in her panic. She knew she couldn’t show weakness now, so she replied coolly:
“Yeah, we just don’t want to.”
“Reason?” Shiye raised an eyebrow.
“No reason. We just don’t want to.”
Huang Xiaoyi’s tone was as flat as ever, putting on the air of a deep-sea dweller unafraid of boiling water. She’d done her research—the so-called internship wasn’t actually mandatory, and they could make up the credits with other activities. If they didn’t want to participate, Shiye couldn’t force them.
“We’re not short on credits, so we don’t plan to do the internship,” Huang Xiaoyi stated her stance.
Just as she thought Shiye would let her off and prepared to get up, the black-haired girl spoke softly:
“No, you will participate.”