Five minutes after waking up, Ange was half-leaning against the headboard, clutching her phone tightly, her face plastered with a smile that was an awkward mix of embarrassment, guilt, and attempted flattery— even though the person on the other end of the call couldn’t see her at all.
“Yes, yes, yes… Lady Rita, you’re absolutely right… It’s my fault, my fault, all my fault!”
She kept apologizing to the other end of the call, her tone utterly humble.
“Last night… um, I couldn’t sleep. Yes, insomnia! So I didn’t get up this morning… Alarm? Ahaha, maybe… maybe it ran out of battery?”
Even through the phone, the voice of Rita, Academy’s Chief Strategy Officer and Dean of Teaching, held a teasing and knowing tone that couldn’t be disguised.
“Oh~? Insomnia? Was it because you’re too excited to lead the newly established Special Operations Squad? Or is it… certain personal issues keeping you up at night? Teacher Ange~”
Ange’s cheeks flushed bright red, and she stammered out a defense.
“No! No! Just normal insomnia! I promise! This won’t happen again! No! Absolutely never again!”
“All right, all right, I’ll let it slide this time.”
Rita’s voice was laced with laughter, as if she really didn’t mind at all.
“After all, Teacher Ange is so busy every day, it’s understandable to be a bit overworked now and then. But this is the last time, all right? Next time, I’ll dock your——————————————————salary~”
“Yes, yes, yes! Thank you, Lady Rita, for your mercy!” Ange replied as if she’d been granted amnesty, hurrying to accept.
After hanging up, she let out a long sigh of relief, finally ready to face the three pairs of eyes in her room again—Ingrid’s filled with worry, Huayin’s face a look of “I knew it,” and as for Sakika… she was already walking straight toward the attached bathroom.
“Teacher, I’ll borrow your shampoo.” Sakika’s voice remained as calm as ever. She finished speaking, pushed the door open, and went in, closing it behind her.
Ange didn’t have time to respond, so she could only shout toward the closed bathroom door.
“Ah… okay, go ahead and use it.”
Being surrounded by her students as they watched her in her just-woken-up state made Ange feel oddly like a hospital patient, being visited by a group of concerned relatives—awkward, yet somehow… warm?
If she could just ignore Huayin’s stabbing gaze.
The moment Ange finished her call, Ingrid immediately stepped forward, her hands nervously clasped in front of her, her beautiful face full of guilt and apology.
“I’m so sorry, Teacher Ange! It’s all my fault! I woke up early this morning and should have come to wake you! If I had, then you wouldn’t have…”
Listening to Ingrid’s apology—so sincere it bordered on reverence—Ange didn’t feel comforted at all. In fact, she wanted to find a hole in the ground to crawl into.
To be so doted on by her students that even getting up required someone to wake her—it was like the words “useless instructor” were stamped right across her face.
She could only force out a smile that looked worse than crying, and dryly replied.
“No… it’s not your fault, Ingrid. It’s my own problem…”
At this point, Huayin finally seized the chance to speak. She put down the thick “Demon History” in her hands, her red lips curving into a mockingly sarcastic smile.
“Yo, you’re up? Did you sleep well this morning? The three of us were stuck in an empty classroom, so bored we had to tell each other lame jokes just to pass the time. If the end-of-class bell hadn’t finally rung, we’d have gone stir-crazy—maybe we would’ve just started a little friendly sparring match right then and there.”
She deliberately drew out her words, her gaze pointedly sweeping over Ange.
“If someone lost control and set the classroom on fire… would you be responsible for that, Teach—er—?”
Ange’s mouth twitched. She felt her blood pressure, which had just started to drop, shoot right back up again.
She knew it—this firebird would never pass up a chance to peck at her. Ange took a deep breath, ready to fire back, even if it was just a feeble excuse…
Suddenly!
A wave of searing heat and emptiness—so familiar, so terrifying—shot up from the Magic Mark on her lower abdomen like a venomous serpent that had been lying in wait, instantly flooding her entire body.
It was as if her blood began boiling, and the dam of her reason groaned under unbearable strain.
No! Not now, of all times?!
Ange’s face changed drastically, her body starting to tremble uncontrollably.
She instinctively looked toward her only refuge—the bathroom.
But through the frosted glass door, she could just make out Sakika’s black hair moving around. Inside, there was the sound of running water and the scent of shampoo.
Sakika was still washing her hair!
Despair clamped around Ange’s heart. She was doomed! Her only escape was blocked!
At that moment, Ingrid, who’d been watching Ange closely, immediately noticed her strange state and moved closer in concern.
“Teacher? What’s wrong? Your face is so red! And you’re… trembling? Are you sick?”
“No! No, I’m not!”
Ange nearly screamed her denial, her voice sharp and distorted from the desperate effort to suppress her desire.
She scrambled to her feet and, in an attempt to cover up her abnormality, made an exaggerated stretching motion so stiff it looked downright ridiculous.
“I—I’m just stretching! Yes! Stretching! Slept too long, and my body’s a bit stiff!”
It was such a blatant attempt at covering up that even she didn’t believe it.
No! I have to get to the bathroom right now! If not, I’m going to lose control in front of my students!
In desperation, she clung to one last strand of hope—she grabbed her phone from the bed, her fingers trembling as she opened her chat with Huayin, frantically typing.
Only Huayin knew her secret, and only Huayin might help her!
Ange: Huayin! Bathroom! Let me in! I… it’s happening! I can’t hold on much longer!
She hit send full of hope, then looked urgently at Huayin, signaling madly with her eyes for her to check her phone.
Yet to Ange’s deepening despair, Huayin seemed completely absorbed in her Demon History book!
Her slender fingers turned another page, her brows slightly furrowed, as if she’d come across something interesting.
She didn’t bring her phone?!
Ange didn’t know. She only knew that the burning from her Magic Mark was devouring her reason faster than ever, every second of delay feeling like dancing on a knife’s edge.
Ingrid’s worried gaze was like a spotlight, Sakika’s unhurried water sounds from the bathroom were a death knell, and the only one who understood her predicament—Huayin—was now shut off from the world!
What do I do?! What am I supposed to do?!
Ange stood frozen, face flushed red, body trembling, caught between the flood of desire and the brink of total social death, trapped in a crisis greater than she had ever faced before.