Ch.31Taking Off Your Glasses Doesn’t Exactly Make You a Hottie (6)

“Hey, drink some cold water and get yourself together.”

“Ah, thanks.”

I plugged up Hamin’s nose with tissues from beside Dad’s laptop.

Hamin took the cup I offered and drank urgently.

Maybe I should have floated a leaf in it or something.

“Are you coming to your senses?”

“Y-yeah…”

“What kind of man faints at the sight of a woman’s chest?”

“…Well, it should be fine between girls, right?”

Fortunately, Hamin regained consciousness quickly after collapsing.

He didn’t completely pass out, just seemed to have a mild case of anemia.

He’s been losing blood quite frequently lately, regardless of his own will.

“I apologize, young man. My daughter is quite immature.”

“N-no, I’m fine…”

“I hear you’re in the same class as my daughter. I thought I knew all of Doyoung’s friends, but there are still faces I don’t recognize.”

“Ah, hello. I’m Do Hamin. Um… I’m new to the school in this neighborhood, so you probably didn’t know me. I only met her at the entrance ceremony.”

“I see. Doyoung, you should have told me beforehand when a friend was coming to the dojang.”

“How was I supposed to know he’d come?”

Hamin’s visit to the dojang wasn’t part of my plan at all.

If I had known this guy would come here on his own, I wouldn’t have been so upset about choosing self-study over spending time with Ban Doyoung.

“She wasn’t this bad before. Somehow she’s getting more immature by the day, that one.”

“No matter how much her maturity drops, it can’t be worse than someone who just had a nosebleed and collapsed.”

“Stop talking nonsense. Are you wearing proper clothes?”

“Want to see? I’m wearing a sports bra and shorts instead of a nude-colored bra.”

“Stop being cheeky and tie your straps properly. Your shoulder straps are showing.”

“Yes, yes.”

While Dad was finishing the first aid for Hamin who had lost consciousness,

I went upstairs to change the underwear I was wearing under my uniform, unable to bear Dad’s nagging.

From my father’s perspective, he’d want to avoid the embarrassment of his daughter in her prime showing her sweat-soaked underwear to just anyone.

Especially if that someone is a male classmate.

“Dad, give us some space to talk alone.”

“You’re not planning to do something weird to him, are you? Like hitting him on the head with a bamboo sword, claiming you’ll erase what he just saw from his memory. Hitting a kid with glasses is attempted murder. I don’t want my daughter to become a criminal. And I don’t have money to pay compensation.”

“Ugh, what do you think of your own child? Besides, if we’re alone, wouldn’t he be the one doing weird things after getting a nosebleed from seeing a girl’s chest?”

“I-I never thought of such things!”

We’re talking about the future here.

Eventually, you’ll be after Ban Doyoung’s virginity.

No, not just after it, but taking it.

“If you were going to do something weird, you could just do what you were doing alone earlier. ‘Kamusa-ri~!’ You were having so much fun.”

“T-that’s unfair, bringing up what I was doing alone! Anyway, just go sit in the office and wait for the pizza!”

“Yes, yes.”

Dad glanced at me and Hamin, then went back to the office with a smirk.

“The discrimination against the second child in a multi-child family is this severe.”

“U-um… I don’t have siblings so I don’t know what it feels like, but you must have it tough in your own way.”

“Actually, I don’t really know either.”

“Huh?”

“So, why did you come here? Looking for an exercise to do in the evening? Are you some office worker concerned about work-life balance?”

I asked why Hamin had come to this dojang on his own.

The fact that he was here at this hour was something I couldn’t easily accept.

From what I’d seen, he didn’t seem to particularly enjoy physical activities.

“I thought I should build up my stamina a bit for future studies.”

“There it is again, the model student move. Ugh, I hate hearing that.”

So it’s about studying again.

Heroes don’t study, you know.

Some protagonist of a youth romance webtoon not doing the romance he’s supposed to do.

“W-well, a student’s duty is to study. I’m already worried because we’re not progressing as fast as I expected.”

“How considerate of you. Then wouldn’t it be better to invest all your stamina-building time into studying? Why put stat points into strength when you could use them for intelligence? Such a waste.”

“…If you think of it as HP rather than just strength, it’s not such a bad investment. Besides, marking my workbook with blood twice is a bit much.”

“What? Don’t tell me you had another nosebleed during self-study?”

Upon hearing that he had a nosebleed yesterday just like today, I unconsciously reached out to touch Hamin’s face.

It wasn’t out of a desire to fulfill the role of a heroine.

It wasn’t concern as the opposite sex, nor was it maternal instinct like worrying about a child by the water.

Rather, it was closer to the feeling of a senior soldier looking after a troublesome junior who gets into accidents or comes back broken every day.

Yes, that’s a more accurate description.

The mindset of “if you mess up, I’ll be screwed too, so behave yourself.”

That’s about the level of emotion I was feeling.

As I stroked his nose to check if the bleeding had stopped properly,

Hamin’s clumsy and awkward face filled my vision.

“Y-yesterday’s already in the past, so I’m fine today. The blood lost from a nosebleed gets replenished quickly within a day.”

“You talk a good game. Sheesh. Why do something when your body is screaming that it can’t handle it?”

Looking at his silly face with broken glasses held together with tape that he was stubbornly wearing, I couldn’t help but sigh deeply.

“So, whose chest were you looking at when you got a nosebleed yesterday? An Sungkyung from self-study?”

“I told you that’s not why it happened…!”

“Heheh, pretending to be a gentleman.”

Hamin covered his face with both hands, hiding his reddened eyes.

Indeed, it’s fun to tease a troublesome junior just enough without going too far.

“Y-you’re teasing me again.”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“You’ve seemed upset with me lately… You stopped joking around like you used to, and I was wondering if I’d done something wrong.”

“…Oh. Well, I’ve worked through that on my own, so don’t worry about it.”

“You’re not denying that I did something wrong.”

“Of course not, you jerk. Acting like a model student and running off to self-study. If I had a knife, you’d be dead.”

I said this to Hamin while holding the bamboo sword.

My anger at him choosing self-study over Ban Doyoung had been somewhat relieved through kendo practice.

Thanks to smashing the training dummy’s head about 50 times while calling out Hamin’s name.

“Anyway, you came here because you don’t want to look pathetic, right? I guess it stings when someone says your stamina is lacking? That’s why you’re looking for a place to exercise even at this hour.”

“…Yeah.”

“What, are you planning to defeat someone like Jung-gyu with kendo if he comes looking for trouble? Isn’t that thinking too much like a webtoon protagonist?”

“I-I haven’t thought that far ahead.”

“Then what sudden wind blew you here?”

“Just… I don’t like being called weak by you.”

“…Oh.”

This guy.

Suddenly pulling a protagonist move here.

“Being called weak, being called soft. I’ve heard it all before, and I thought it wouldn’t bother me if I heard it again in the future, but hearing it from you… Yeah. It definitely seems to stick in my memory longer.”

“Huhu. Did I scratch our model student’s complex too hard?”

“Maybe. I do tend to shout without realizing it when we talk.”

“Or is it that you’re more afraid of me than someone like Jung-gyu?”

“That could definitely be true too. The week we spent without proper conversation felt much scarier than when Jung-gyu grabbed me by the collar.”

“Hey, if you agree with everything, I end up looking like a total bitch.”

Hamin nodded with an awkward smile at all my probing questions.

While the conversation might be going well, the result wasn’t good.

For Hamin, the current Ban Doyoung had become a trauma-inducing presence,

stimulating his complexes and instilling more fear than a male bully.

“But after talking to the master, it seems difficult for me to attend here. The only time I’m available is when the dojang doesn’t hold classes at all.”

“Hmm.”

“And considering the tuition fee, I think I’d be better off just running around the school.”

“Then how about I teach you kendo?”

“…Huh?”

“Even if Dad can’t make time, I can. Besides, I don’t do self-study.”

“But even if the time works, the money…”

-Grumble!

Just then, Dad came in from the office carrying the delivered pizza.

“Ah, seriously. I can’t order from Papa Katz Pizza anymore. I ordered two pizzas, and they don’t even give complimentary cola? What kind of place is this?”

“Pfft, perfect timing.”

-Tap

“Hey, get up.”

I tapped Hamin’s shoulder with the bamboo sword and made him stand up.

“Go buy some cola. Zero Lime flavor.”

“…Huh?”

“I’ll count that as your tuition fee.”