I Don’t Want to be an Ojakgyo (123)

I turned my head to stare at who had recommended that particular plan. It was Isabel, who I had fought with once because of the thing with Hestia. Isabel glanced at me once before winking.

What, what was she doing? This was…what.

As soon as Isabel presented that idea, everybody began to voice their assents.

“Wow, that would be some great advertisement.”
“Shuraina doesn’t look very kind, but she looks super cool when she’s swinging her sword. That’d be really cool.”

All of the kids showering me with praise had an expression that reeked of ‘I’m free!’ on their faces.

At the sudden avalanche of issues that had poured onto me, I frowned and was just about to reject it when the swordsmanship teacher paused for a moment before speaking.

“If you try your best and win, do you know that the particular class will receive prize money?”

The teacher said with a face full of relief.

Then, I heard something that I shouldn’t have heard.

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“So, are you going to be performing at the festival?”
“…..”

Hylli asked during our basic strength training. Swanhaden, Hylli, and I were doing push-ups side by side when the subject suddenly shifted to the festival.

He seemed awed, as if he couldn’t believe that I would go into the public eye to do something. I was having a bit of a hard time with my muscle training, so I took a few moments to catch my breath before responding.

“No, well, first…”
“Are you really going to do a sword dance? As a representative?”
“…..yes.”
“You are?”
“…..I’m going to, so stop asking.”

It was hard for me to even respond because I was huffing for breath. I frowned. Hylli was so full of energy that he didn’t seem even a bit winded as he exercised. He grew quiet for a moment, as if thinking about something.

“The prize money, you know that the teacher lied about it, don’t you?”

At Hylli’s confused look and his question, I nodded again.

The teacher had lied to throw the performance my way last time. He knew my weakness well. First, I went to the teacher after class to talk to them after class about the performance. I was a bit surprised at the prize money. The academy didn’t even give clubs prize money during the festival, so there was no way that they would give money for classes.

Just as I had thought, it wasn’t prize money but just extra credit. Extra credit wasn’t tempting enough for me to present in front of the school.

But I had said that I would present in front of the entire class, and my name was already on the roster. I couldn’t help but huff out a hollow laugh after seeing how the teacher and students rushed as one to act, and next I felt pushed to a corner.

Well, even if my name was on the roster, if I decidedly said that I wouldn’t do it, then that would’ve been enough. There would’ve been a few students who would’ve complained about me going against my words, but I could just ignore it.

But there had been a reason why I didn’t give up. When I went up to the teacher, slightly angry, about what had happened and for him to take my name off the roster, he smiled apologetically and promised that he would give me the sword that he used as an apprentice back in the day.

At first, I had vehemently rejected it and tried to rip the roster in half, but the teacher explained that his sword was something that he had purchased when he had been full of himself and wanted to show off, so it was incredibly pricey and full of bling. Like, jewels encrusted on it and stuff.

I said that I would do it for now, and it was a hassle to take my name off because of the people who had rushed to throw this job at me. When I asked Yves to take my name down, Yves, someone who had never pushed a single task aside in his life, told me that he had forgotten do to so. Like ten or more times. I scowled because it was obvious that he didn’t want to take my name down. Yves told me that giving up would be for the best. He looked like he was having a lot of fun.

I sighed, heart heavy because of the presentation, when I suddenly remembered something that Hylli had said to me in the DuBois residence last time.

“Anyway, there’s been something that I kept on forgetting.”
“What is it.”
“You said, when we were at Cory’s place last time. That you have something to say to me when we go back to school.”

At my question, Hylli tilted his head in confusion before frowning and thinking. But it seemed like he soon remembered what he wanted to say. He let out a “Oh,” with a bright expression.

“Something to say?”

Swanhaden, who had been quietly listening to our conversation, scowled as he turned to glare at Hylli.

Swanhaden, who had been quietly lying on his stomach on the ground because he didn’t want to train, suddenly sat up straight. Hylli glanced at Swanhaden, who was glaring at him with death in his eyes for no particular reason, before speaking again.

“Yes. When I was looking around the Augran mountain last time, I found a ripped sheet of paper with weird letters on it.”

A ripped sheet of paper with weird letters on it in the Augran mountain? I didn’t know what it was, but it sounded suspicious. Swanhaden also seemed intrigued by the paper–he stopped looking murderous and focused on his words.

“But I don’t have it on me right now. I left it in my dorm. I’ll show it to you later.”

I nodded at Hylli’s words and flopped down onto the training grounds. I was finally done with today’s exercise. I had been so focused on muscle training these days that I didn’t have any muscle aches anymore. It was still hard work, though.

I stretched my hand to grab at the water bottle next to me and gulped down my water. I wiped down the sweat on my neck and face with a dry towel when I felt someone staring at me.

When I turned my head to check where the gaze was coming from, the owner of the gaze was none other than the new transfer student, Eric. I happened to meet eyes with him.

He was a normal but generally handsome boy with bright green hair and yellow eyes. I didn’t remember it too well, but I knew him from a long time ago. A long, long time ago. Even if it was a long time ago, I wasn’t that old, so it was a few years ago. It was from before I entered the academy. It was a long time ago for me.

When he smiled and waved at me, I waved back. I probably looked incredibly awkward right now. Hylli, who had finished his training, approached me and asked.

“Do you know the transfer student?”

At his question, Swanhaden pretended not to be interested as he walked closer.

“He was my first love when I was still a snotty brat.”

It was when I was so young that it was more of an interest than a first love. It was embarrassing to use the word ‘love’ for this. I was just interested in him. You know, how you just like someone without knowing anything about the world. That was it. I internally changed ‘love’ to ‘interest’ in my heart.

He was a kid I had liked before my past life’s memories came back and had an interest in after.

His family, the Baron Crieweitch family, was close with our family, the Baron West family. We had met often in our mothers’ tea parties. He looked reliable and honest, and had seemed interested in me, and I had liked him back. But I didn’t know that he had approached me for Hestia and had been rejected when I confessed.

It was the first time that anyone had seemed interested in me, so I had reciprocated immediately.

I had been such a brat back then, so I had forgotten all about it. They were all memories. It had been embarrassing and disappointing back then, but it was just a funny tale now. It was something that I could laugh about when I talked about my childhood.

This is something that I noticed, but Hylli’s and Swanhaden’s faces looked grim as they stared at me. Hylli spit out his water as soon as he heard.

“You’ve liked someone before?”
“….of course. I’ve liked someone before.”

Swanhaden looked shocked. He didn’t say a word. He seemed to be in complete shock.

His reaction seemed out of the ordinary. I felt like my memories were a bit embarrassing, so I changed the subject.

“It was a joke that I liked him. We were just kind of close.”

It sounded like a bad excuse even as I said it, so I just laughed it off. Man, I shouldn’t have said that I liked him. I thought we were just going to laugh it off, but I felt like they were going to dig into this. Both of them seemed serious, so I felt like I had to look serious too.

I grabbed their shirts and dragged them to the cafeteria.

---

There were a lot of things that happened when you lived in an academy full of students.

Moreover, if it was a school with a dormitory, most of those things could happen because of ‘words’. When you lived together in a large group, it was easy for rumors to spread from one corner of the campus to the next in an instant.

Rumors spread like wildfire. Like the color of red class Patrick’s underwear, and the rumors from the juniors.

I heard that our Karim worked on a project with a boy named Jeanbeaux and had amazing results on their most recent project, and that Viedielle was aiming for Karim with fire in her eyes. The reason why everything had to do with Karim was because I wasn’t interested in listening to anything that didn’t talk about him.

Viedielle had always been an active, prideful student always aiming to improve herself, but she became even more outspoken after that incident.

That particular incident became the match that lit the fire within Viedielle to follow her dreams, whatever they may be. And it looked like Karim was a part of those dreams.

The rumors went that Viedielle chased after Karim with such intensity that it was almost scary, but I had thought that they were just rumors.

“Kariiiiiiiim!”
“Euuuuuuuuuhhhh.”

Viedielle was chasing after Karim. She had a grotesque, black lump in her hand. This month was the month of lovers, so I assumed that Viedielle had made chocolate…but it didn’t look tempting at all.

Karim was running when he noticed me, and he said, “Nuna! Hold this for me for a bit, please!” and handed me the books that he had in his hands. It looked like he was trying to run faster.

Viedielle watched as Karim gave me his books and said, “I’ll give these to Karim!” and took the book from my hand. Viedielle was still incredibly quick as she ran with those heavy tomes in her hand. Karim watched as Viedielle took his books from her and yelled, “Why would you?!” and ran as hard as he could.

Karim, running with an exasperated, aggrieved expression on his face and Viedielle, chasing after him with complete affection in her face. It was such a cute sight that I couldn’t help but cheer for Viedielle.

The rumors might have been a bit exaggerated, but it looked like the rumors about Viedielle chasing after Karim seemed to be true.

Seeing Viedielle be so passionate made me kind of jealous. It looked like her efforts were paying off, too. Karim had mentioned Viedielle and explained that she was terrifying but a good person as his ears turned red.

He still looked like he liked Hestia, but it looked like Viedielle had a chance. I wanted to applaud her for creating something out of nothing.

I felt like I wanted to give all of my affection to a single person, just like that. If I ever dated someone, I felt like I would give the person everything I could, which both scared and excited me. I was just kind of curious. It’s not like I wanted to date.

My main job was work, and dating was a side job. If, if I received a confession, though, I would probably accept, though. It was just that nobody would want to confess to me.

Yes, I was sure that there was nobody who would confess to me. That’s what I thought.

Until the transfer student, Eric, who I thought would have nothing to do with me, confessed to me.

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T/N: eric idc who you are or where you came from but get away from our shushu before i get dream swanhaden to kill you dead

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