Ch.22. Suspicion

After the brief commotion had settled, I sat at my desk, staring blankly out the window.

Beyond the frosted glass was a field covered with artificial turf.

Good heavens, are schools these days really this well-equipped? This was unimaginable in my time.

The high school I attended during my school days didn’t even have grass—just a dangerous sandy field full of deep holes that constituted the entirety of our athletic facilities.

But a turf field? The sight made me doubt my own eyes, giving me a profound sense of how times had changed.

“Sigh.”

What could I do? My body might be young, but my mental age remained the same. At my actual age, I couldn’t possibly mingle with kids my apparent age. I’d probably die of embarrassment.

No… regardless of that, fitting in seemed impossible from the start. If I had to guess, Han Siwoo’s reputation had likely been rock-bottom since the moment he enrolled.

Any sensible person wouldn’t approach a dangerous element trailing all sorts of nasty rumors. That’s normal. I would probably have done the same.

In reality, my classmates in Class A wouldn’t even make eye contact with me. If our gazes happened to meet, they’d quickly look away as if they’d seen some kind of monster.

With such blatant disregard, I felt beyond offended—the whole situation was simply absurd.

Han Siwoo was a well-known third-generation chaebol heir with family wealth that went without saying, and naturally, his personal resources would be in a completely different league from other students.

In other words, just as flies are drawn to rotten food, it wouldn’t be strange at all to have students trying to cozy up to Han Siwoo for some crumbs of his wealth.

But contrary to my concerns about such parasites, there were none.

Not only were there no such students, but there was simply no one who would speak to me at all. On the first day of school, when students with similar interests were forming groups, I just stared blankly out the window.

I had somewhat expected this, but seeing it actually unfold was quite shocking.

Isn’t it normal to at least say hello to a familiar face in your class? I didn’t expect model students to approach me, but even the students who looked like troublemakers seemed to avoid me, Han Siwoo.

This was outright outsider treatment. Middle school Han Siwoo must have been quite the troublemaker.

Before the first day of the new semester had even ended, I was already branded as Class A’s outcast, or something similar.

As I was seriously contemplating how to spend my school days without a single friend, the classroom’s front door suddenly opened.

The person who slid the door open was a petite woman. Judging by her casual clothes rather than a uniform, she was clearly a teacher.

And since the first period was designated for homeroom teachers, this teacher would be in charge of Class A for the next year.

“Hello everyone!”

Perhaps due to the still chilly weather, the woman greeted us with a slightly nasal voice as she stood in front of the podium. The students’ reactions were twofold: the boys cheered for the cute homeroom teacher, while the girls jeered at the immature boys.

Seeing them make such a fuss over nothing, I thought how nice it must be to be so young. I just quietly observed the situation with my chin resting on my hand.

“First of all, congratulations on your admission to Chungha Highschool. Some of you are external applicants, and some are internal, right?”

Only then did I recall something I’d forgotten. This didn’t apply to internal students from Chungha Middle School.

Chungha Highschool, where Han Siwoo was enrolled, required external applicants from other middle schools to pass separate exams and interviews to be admitted.

“Internal students must have worked hard to maintain their grades, and external students must have struggled to pass the exams and interviews.”

Chungha Highschool, classified as a specialized high school, naturally had much stricter admission requirements than regular high schools. The teacher was acknowledging that effort.

Whether internal or external, students needed a certain level of academic achievement to advance, and beyond that, their conduct and school records were thoroughly examined. External applicants also had to take exams and interviews as part of Chungha Highschool’s admission requirements.

In other words, even the students in my sight who looked like troublemakers were actually good at studying. This is why you shouldn’t judge people by their appearance.

And at this point, I started wondering about something.

So how exactly did Han Siwoo get admitted to Chungha Highschool with such strict requirements?

“…”

The answer was surprisingly simple. Donation-based admission, of course. In Korea, money can solve almost anything.

“Anyway, you all did well. Now, shall we introduce ourselves? I’m Jin Jiyu, Class A’s homeroom teacher. Easy to remember, right?”

The teacher wrote her name clearly on the blackboard.

Jin Jiyu. As she said, it was a name that would be harder to forget than remember. I already knew it from the book, of course.

“Does anyone have any questions?”

“Me! Tell us about your first love!”

The classroom erupted in laughter at the overly spirited female student’s fresh question. Indeed, this is the standard question for homeroom teachers on the first day of a new semester. Some things never change, it seems.

“Oh, my first love?”

The teacher’s gaze wandered aimlessly. A natural reaction.

Of course, this person has never dated before. You can’t expect someone who’s never been in a relationship to share romantic experiences.

“Isn’t there anything else you’re curious about?”

“No! Please tell us about your first love!”

“Yes! That’s what we want to know most!”

Before long, the entire class had united in demanding first love stories, and the teacher, experiencing such mischievous student pranks for the first time, was at a loss.

She couldn’t honestly admit her lack of experience without losing her dignity as a teacher, but her pride wouldn’t let her lie about having dated. In this dilemma, it’s the protagonist’s role to rescue the teacher.

Yes, Jin Jiyu is a rare heroine in the teacher position. The key event of this “self-introduction” time is for the protagonist to naturally change the subject and make the teacher aware of his existence while she’s in a difficult situation.

Or at least, that’s how it should have been.

For some reason, the protagonist who should have been helping Jin Jiyu in her crisis was looking at me instead of the podium.

Not at Jin Jiyu.

At me.

Something felt off. Was this described in the original work? I couldn’t quite remember, so I pondered it deeply for a moment.

And I quickly concluded: there was no mention of the protagonist staring intently at Han Siwoo.

So why is that guy looking at me?

“…?”

How would I know? Only then did my half-absent mind return to its place.

“Teacher, are you perhaps single?”

“No way, how could that be? She’s so pretty!”

“Well, um…”

The teacher looked around with a half-embarrassed, half-perplexed expression. Her uncertainty about how to respond was plainly visible.

By this point, even the students who had been demanding romantic stories began to sense that something was amiss with the teacher.

Though they were young students, they weren’t completely tactless, and they knew it would be impolite to probe further.

“Um… Teacher?”

I had no intention of getting involved in this situation, and the protagonist who should have been taking action was still watching me.

Consequently, an untimely silence fell over the classroom that should have been lively on the first day of the new semester.

It was so chilly that I momentarily thought someone had opened a window. What are we going to do about this atmosphere? I looked back at the protagonist, who was responsible for creating this classroom environment.

In response, he naturally turned his head away as if he’d been waiting for me to look, avoiding my gaze. My plan to question him with just my eyes failed. The interrogation was unsuccessful.

The one who broke the silence in the classroom, which felt like an unseasonable cold snap, was the homeroom teacher.

“…Does anyone else have any questions?”

***

After the first period with the homeroom teacher ended.

Time passed, and it was now afternoon.

“Ugh.”

I tried stretching, twisting my stiff body as if wringing it out. I wasn’t used to keeping my head bowed for hours on end after such a long time.

After finishing that simple stretch, I organized the writing utensils I had used and put them in my backpack. I wondered what kind of school gives exams on the first day, but when they say do it, you do it—what choice do you have?

“Ah, why do we have to take another diagnostic test? So annoying.”

“I know. Other schools finished in the morning.”

“Hey, how did you do on the test?”

“Don’t know, we’ll have to wait for the results.”

Ignoring the chatter from the neighboring seats, I mentally reviewed the content of the test I had just taken.

Chungha Highschool, as mentioned in the story, is undoubtedly in the top 1% nationwide.

Naturally, the proportion of high achievers is high, and the school’s overall standards are correspondingly high. So I was tense, expecting the test to be equally difficult.

But it wasn’t as hard as I had anticipated. I managed to solve everything. As for the score, well, I don’t know yet. Like my classmate said, we’ll have to wait for the results.

“Well, thank you all for your hard work on the test, and I’ll see everyone tomorrow.”

The homeroom teacher’s farewell concluded the end-of-day meeting. The students of Class A began to disperse in small groups, and just as most students had left, it happened.

The homeroom teacher suddenly called my name.

“Um, Siwoo?”

For a moment, I thought she wasn’t calling me. But I was the only one named Siwoo in Class A. So the teacher was indeed calling for me.

“Yes?”

“Could you come here for a moment?”

I couldn’t ignore her call, so I went to the front of the classroom and stood facing the teacher.

“What is it?”

“Well, Siwoo. Please don’t misunderstand what I’m about to say, okay?”

The teacher’s expression suddenly turned serious. Even though she asked me not to misunderstand, her face made it impossible not to. I couldn’t fathom what she was about to say with such a grave expression.

“Just in case, I’m asking this just in case. Did you cheat on this test, Siwoo?”

What kind of out-of-nowhere accusation is this? Completely unaware, I unconsciously frowned.

“What? Cheating?”

“Seeing your reaction, it doesn’t seem like it… but you really didn’t cheat, right?”

“No. Why would I cheat?”

“Really? That’s a relief…”

“Who said I cheated?”

“No, nobody said that. It’s just, I’m not sure if I should say this, but your grades weren’t very good in middle school, right? But your score on this diagnostic test is so high…”

The teacher trailed off, but I could guess what she was about to say. And I realized why such a misunderstanding had occurred.

Come to think of it, it would be stranger not to be suspicious. Han Siwoo had clearly neglected his studies, so suddenly getting good grades might naturally raise suspicions of cheating.

Han Siwoo’s grades would have been mid-to-low tier at best, and even if I did well on the test, I should only reach the upper-middle range. No matter how much improvement there was, it shouldn’t warrant such a direct accusation.

But just how much had my score improved to raise suspicions of cheating? Not knowing Han Siwoo’s detailed middle school grades, I was simply perplexed.

“Wait a minute. What score did I get?”

“Well, you ranked first in the entire first-year class.”

“…”

I can understand the suspicion now.