The Top Student Hides Her Regression
Chapter 14
Chapter 14
The Top Ranker Hides Her Regression
It had been ten minutes since the bell rang, but the teacher still hadn’t shown up.
In college, class would be automatically canceled in a situation like this, but in high school?
“Should someone go get him?”
“What if we cross paths on the way?”
“Just check the Teachers’ Room, and if he’s not there, come right back.”
“He’s a psycho, though. If he comes in and you’re not in your seat, he’ll dock your points.”
“No way.”
“Seriously. That happened back in our first year.”
“Then what are we supposed to do, just sit here and wait?”
“He’ll throw a fit over that, too. Screaming about why we just sat there when the teacher didn’t show.”
“Wait, isn’t this entirely the teacher’s fault?”
The kids, quiet at first, began to raise their voices.
I don’t think a teacher ever skipped out on class before my regression. Is this what they call the butterfly effect?
I checked the timetable with a dubious expression.
’Of all subjects, it had to be Geography.’
A male teacher in his fifties, infamous for blatantly favoring Woo Do-yeon.
What was his name again?
I couldn’t recall his name, only that he had a terrible personality.
He was the type to constantly rap kids on the head with his knuckles, humiliating them at the drop of a hat…
‘Everyone who didn’t do their homework, stand up. Rank 1s, sit down. The rest of you, stay on your feet until class ends.’ He ran things like that.
He was practically part of the last generation of teachers who could act like that and still keep their jobs.
“Ah, let’s just stay put. He’ll be here soon.”
“If the whole class gets penalty points for that, are you going to take responsibility?”
“Kang Da-hye, shouldn’t you go get him?”
Huh? Me?
I turned toward the voice.
It was Sein’s desk partner.
Do Hajun.
The very guy who ran a popularity poll on the girls in our grade last year.
If he had been even a little smarter, he would have created something like Chasebook ages ago to rate girls on their looks with star ratings.
Gogogo High School’s very own Mark Zuckerberg leaned back, looking at me as he spoke.
Singled out so suddenly, I blinked.
“Why me…?”
Do Hajun retorted as if dumbfounded.
“You’re the temporary class president.”
“…Me?”
Come to think of it, I might have briefly taken on that role at the start of the semester purely because my grades were good…
It was only a temporary duty until the class elections, and another kid had been elected during the actual vote, so I had completely forgotten about it.
While I was briefly lost in the past, the other kids chimed in one by one as if they had found their answer.
“Yeah, Kang Da-hye, you go.”
“Just go to the Teachers’ Room, ask the teachers, and if they say Geography went upstairs, come right back.”
“You won’t get in trouble anyway. You’re Rank 1, Kang Da-hye.”
I mean, I was going to go anyway.
But being pushed into it like this didn’t feel great.
Looking around, a few specific kids were leading the charge.
They were the ones who had been visibly ignoring and mocking Do-yeon. The ones who hated both Geography and Woo Do-yeon.
Presumably, they didn’t like me either now that I was helping Do-yeon.
Do Hajun sneered in a thin voice.
“Or Woo Do-yeon can go. Geography adores her anyway.”
“Hey, I’ll just go myself, so shut up.”
I stood up from my seat with a sigh.
Right then.
“Ah, shut the fuck up. So damn loud.”
Seo Jae-gyeom, who had been sleeping with his head down regardless of the noise, sat up with a scowl.
Looking around with an utterly irritated expression, Seo Jae-gyeom spoke up.
“You’re all trying so hard to dump what you don’t want to do onto Kang Da-hye. Over bringing back one teacher. Are there zombies roaming outside the classroom or something?”
At his blatant reprimand, the chattering kids clamped their mouths shut all at once.
Pushing his chair back with a scrape, Seo Jae-gyeom stood up and took out the phone tucked in his pants pocket.
“Seo Jae-gyeom, what’s up?”
“I’m heading out too.”
“? Forget it. Why do two people need to go just to call one teacher?”
“Everyone here is acting like an idiot. I can’t stand being around them.”
“Ah.”
Well, if that’s the case.
Wait.
“Jeong Eun-seong, why are you getting up?”
Over Seo Jae-gyeom’s shoulder, I cast a bewildered glance at Jeong Eun-seong, who was standing blankly by his seat.
“Are you coming too?”
Three people going really felt like overkill.
Meeting my eyes, Jeong Eun-seong answered nonchalantly.
“Going to the bathroom.”
“…Right now?”
Did you not just hear what they said? I told you Geography has a terrible temper.
“Hold it in for thirty-eight minutes.”
“Got it.”
‘Why did he even stand up?’
He suddenly got up saying he had to go to the bathroom, so I thought it was an emergency.
Still, because Seo Jae-gyeom was already walking out of the classroom with his phone in hand, I couldn’t dwell on the question for long.
Why is he being so prickly today of all days?
“Find a partner, one will be A, the other B…”
“How laughable, is my spirit not dead…”
In the hallway during class hours, there was only Seo Jae-gyeom and me.
Only the teachers’ voices and the rhythmic tapping of chalk against blackboards leaked outside from time to time, while laughter from some distant classroom echoed down the hall.
Motes of dust floating in the air sparkled in the sunlight streaming through the windows.
Seo Jae-gyeom remained quiet.
He strode forward with long steps, looking at his phone with one hand. He walked slightly ahead of me, showing no intention of matching my pace.
I didn’t particularly intend to match Seo Jae-gyeom’s speed or strike up a conversation either, so I just peeked into the neighboring classrooms as we passed.
Classrooms, school uniforms, sunlight. A teenage youth that could never return.
The kids in the classrooms looked bored to death, while I was the only one indulging in bittersweet nostalgia…☆
My brief sentimentality came to an abrupt end when Seo Jae-gyeom didn’t stop at the second floor where the Teachers’ Room was, but kept heading further down.
“Seo Jae-gyeom, where are you going? The Teachers’ Room is this way.”
“The snack bar.”
“Huh?”
You’re going to the snack bar? I asked back, but Seo Jae-gyeom didn’t even reply, his eyes glued to his phone.
“Hey, come on, that’s not right. It’s class time.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
Cutting me off as if exhausted, Seo Jae-gyeom disappeared toward the first floor.
“What is his problem?”
Shaking my head in disbelief, I turned around.
I was heading toward the Teachers’ Room in front of me… when.
“What the, you!”
I ran right into the Geography Teacher coming out of the Staff Restroom.
“Why are you wandering around during class time! What grade and class are you in!”
“I was on my way to fetch you, Teacher. Class started, but you hadn’t arrived.”
Narrowing my eyes, I looked back and forth between the restroom he had just exited and his face.
Looks like your constipation was pretty severe.
“Ahem, is that so?”
“Yes.”
“You should have come sooner! It’s already been fifteen minutes. You kids are getting way too slack.”
Checking his watch, the Geography Teacher hurried back to the Teachers’ Room to grab his textbook.
‘I didn’t expect to find Geography this quickly.’
What about Seo Jae-gyeom? Glancing toward the stairs leading down to the snack bar, I tagged along behind the Geography Teacher.
“You’re Class 2 of the 2nd Grade, right? Do-yeon’s class?”
“Yes.”
“Are you the class president?”
“Temporary class president.”
“Ah, are you Kang Da-hye? You’re close with Han Ji-su in Class 1 too, right?”
“Yes.”
“Seo Jae-gyeom!”
Suddenly, the Geography Teacher barked out a shout.
I saw Seo Jae-gyeom coming up from the opposite staircase, looking over this way with an expressionless face.
Of all places, they ran right into each other from opposite ends of the hallway.
“Seo Jae-gyeom, you punk! Where are you coming back from!”
Oh boy.
“Teacher, that’s not it. Seo Jae-gyeom came out with me to look for you…”
“If you came out together, why is he coming from that direction? Wait, isn’t that a phone in his hand?”
“……”
“You little punk…”
Since no one wants to hear the rambling tirade of an agitated middle-aged man, I will omit the Geography Teacher’s subsequent words.
Long story short, Seo Jae-gyeom was made to stay after school for punishment.
The absurd part was that I was punished too, under the pretext that ‘even though you’re the class president, you failed to stop Seo Jae-gyeom.’
“Just try running off. I’ll call your parents immediately.”
After school.
Having issued his threat, the Geography Teacher shoved me and Seo Jae-gyeom into the Counseling Room next to the Teachers’ Room.
On the six-person table topped with a flat pane of glass, stacks of test papers printed on gray recycled paper sat piled high.
“You remember, right? The Geography pop quiz from the first period. The two of you will stay behind and finish grading all of these before you leave. Organize them by class and student number, and next to any incorrect questions, write down the reason it’s wrong along with the correct answer. In red pen.”
“……”
All of this, right now?
Having dumped his own work onto us using punishment as an excuse, the Geography Teacher emphasized once more that ‘if you run off, I’m contacting your parents right away,’ and then clocked out for the day.
From Class 1 to Class 10. I stared in utter despair at the tabletop, which held nearly three hundred test sheets and a single Geography textbook.
“……”
Right. Whatever, I forgot all the geography material anyway.
Let’s just consider it study time.
Sighing, I sat down and pulled the mountain of test papers toward me.
‘Honestly, kids have their pride—is it even okay to make their classmates grade these?’
However, Seo Jae-gyeom wasn’t sitting down.
I turned to look at Seo Jae-gyeom, who was standing there stock-still.
“What’s wrong?”
