Chapter 292
Chapter 292
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Translator: uly
Chapter: 292
Chapter Title: How to Steal the Protagonist's Woman
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"Wait a minute. Professor, this... all the answers Suho has written... they seem fundamentally correct?"
Louis froze for a split second at those words, turning his head slowly to see who had dared to speak before letting out a sharp sigh of relief as he identified the speaker. He shook his head dismissively, his mind filling with increasingly rude and condescending thoughts about Sonya.
‘Still trying to help him even in a hopeless situation like this? You really are a pathetic idiot, Professor...’
Even if she was someone he had once felt a significant amount of fondness and respect for, Louis could no longer muster any lingering positive emotions toward a woman who had so publicly humiliated and rejected him. His body might still instinctively draw his gaze to her impressive figure, but his heart had gone cold toward her a long time ago.
‘What the hell does she even see in a lowlife commoner like that...?’
Seeing her continue to shower that detestable guy with kindness only served to turn his coldness into outright, visceral disgust. Louis shot Sonya a harsh, warning glare but chose to keep his mouth shut for the moment.
‘I truly hope that idiot crashes and burns right alongside her when the truth finally comes out.’
Even as he was silently hurling insult after insult at her in the privacy of his mind, the senior professors gathered around Sonya and began to scan the problems in the notebook with renewed intensity. Louis shook his head at the sight of their frantic effort and whispered just loud enough for Seong Suho to hear his venom.
"Professor Sonya's got it rough, doesn't she? She's basically torturing you with false hope at this point. Right?"
"Hey... you should really watch your mouth when speaking about your superiors."
Louis felt a sudden, intoxicating rush of satisfaction seeing Seong Suho—who had always brushed off his provocations with annoying indifference—finally show a flicker of genuine irritation. Until this very moment, the successful provocations had always come from Seong Suho's side. This was the first time Louis had landed a solid, painful counter-attack, and it filled him with an indescribable sense of joy. Insulting Luna was still unthinkable for him, but trash-talking Sonya? He felt he could spin that web of malice endlessly.
Just as he was gearing up to unleash even more venom, a series of urgent murmurs rose from the cluster of professors. The faculty didn't think Louis or Seong Suho were all that impressive just because they had performed at a high student level; if they had taken over thirty minutes to solve a standard written exam, it would have been a humiliating scandal they'd be mocked for eternally. But they had solved everything in mere seconds and were now whispering frantically among themselves.
(This logic... it can't be...)
(We're not all collectively going senile, are we...? The numbers don't lie.)
(Quick, someone get the dean's attention immediately...)
Louis sensed the ominous and sudden shift in the atmosphere and glanced toward the professors with a mounting sense of dread. Finally, they handed his notebook over to the dean and the head professor, their voices sounding strained.
"Uh... Dean, the problems in this notebook..."
"Hm? What is it?"
The dean and the head professor began skimming the contents of the exam together. They managed to confirm the logic of each problem in under ten seconds, their eyes flying through the pages with supernatural speed. Having verified the test results, the dean let out a short, hollow chuckle, while Magerta furrowed her brow—displaying a mix of sternness and about five percent genuine pity—and turned her eyes toward Louis.
‘What? Why are they all acting like that toward me?’
Only then did Louis truly catch the weird, heavy vibe in the room and peered desperately at the notebook still held in the dean's hands. The dean, clearly reading the confusion on his face, approached him and handed the book back.
"I suggest you take a very proper and thorough look at your own work, young man."
"...What exactly do you mean by that, sir?"
"I mean that you'll have to solve the problems you wrote yourself to understand the situation."
"No, the exam problems... I definitely... I stayed up all night crafting them..."
Unable to finish his sentence, Louis snatched the notebook and began to frantically scan the pages. Even problems that the professors had solved in a flash took him significant mental effort, since he lacked their decades of specialized experience. But even from his perspective, the truth was undeniable. Louis began to calculate mentally at a speed unmatched by any of his peers, breezing through the first few pages.
The first four problems matched exactly what he remembered: they were correct. But from the fifth problem onward, something felt fundamentally off. Even though it was written in his own unmistakable handwriting, the logic felt alien, as if someone else had solved them while he wasn't looking. And when he finally reached the calculated answer for the fifth problem—boom. A sharp, physical ringing erupted in his ears, feeling as if his head had been smashed with a heavy sledgehammer.
It was wrong. It wasn't Seong Suho's answer that was incorrect. It was his own memorized answer that was proven false.
"N-No way! This is impossible!"
Louis tore through the next few problems, one after another, his eyes bulging. Every single one followed the same pattern: Seong Suho's answers were proven right by the logic on the page, while his own assumptions were utterly false.
"No... this simply can't be happening..."
Facing the final, most complex problem, Louis found himself trembling too hard to even read the text. If he had botched the toughest one as well, it would turn his public humiliation into a literal living hell for the rest of his school life. His face drained of all color, and his hands shook so violently that the notebook rattled; he just stood there staring blankly at the page instead of attempting to solve it.
The dean approached him with a neutral expression. "Well? Have you figured it out yet?"
"N-No! Th-The problems themselves are wrong! Someone sabotaged them!"
"Hahaha, and how exactly would that be possible, Student Louis?"
"S-Someone must have... secretly changed the numbers while I was distracted..."
"Heh..." The dean shook his head slowly. "Anyone can see that you were the one who made these. There are absolutely no physical traces of tampering on the paper. And even if they were edited precisely, how could someone achieve that in such a short amount of time under our watch?"
"B-But... sir..."
Louis whipped around, frantically scanning the auditorium. The massive crowd of students watched him with rapt attention, slowly piecing together the drama.
(What is going on? Look at his face.)
(Does this mean Seong Suho wasn't wrong—did Louis actually mess up his own problems?)
(It makes sense. Even if they were modified from the originals, they weren't exactly student-easy.)
(Now he just looks like a normal kid who made a mistake.)
(I guess second place really got salty and rushed it, huh.)
Most of the students had warmed to Louis before this, so there was no immediate, harsh backlash. But to his sensitive ears, their quiet chatter rang like a hellish funeral dirge as his reputation began to plummet.
(Whoa, so are you saying Seong Suho got more of them right?)
(Did he get all of them?)
(Nah, no way... the problems Louis slaved over were supposedly brutal.)
(We don't know the final tally yet. Just wait.)
The earlier sympathy for Louis made them secretly hope that even his mistake would somehow still pin a cheating charge on Seong Suho. Their reasoning was simple: if Suho fell, they would all climb the ranks, erasing their own guilt. The few students who had initially defended Suho now began to speak up much louder.
(He's right, stealing tests is absurdly difficult, just like the dean said.)
(Yeah. And how would you explain him taking first in the practical then?)
As the murmurs swelled into a dull roar, the dean stepped forward to the edge of the podium.
"Seong Suho has solved Louis's problems with perfect precision. His answers are spot-on, and I have determined that no cheating was possible in this environment. Isn't that right, Student Louis?"
"B-But... Professor... I was definitely..."
"Heh... and I think you all have overlooked one very important detail."
"...?"
Hundreds of heads tilted in confusion as the dean offered a small, knowing smile.
"Those of you who were in my supervised classroom for the attribute tests already know the truth: I personally watched Seong Suho solve every problem from directly behind him."
"...Huh?"
Louis looked completely blindsided; the students began to buzz with excitement, finally remembering the dean's presence in the hall.
"Professor Magerta had to step out unavoidably that day, so I decided to fill in. I had heard rumors about an exceptionally fast solver, so I got curious—and I watched his progress from start to finish."
"B-But! What about the practical exam? Something must have happened there..."
"The same rule applied for the practical exam as well."
"...Huh?"
"Out of simple curiosity, I decided to peek into his assigned practical room during the session."
The students gaped in shock, their eyes alternating between Seong Suho and the dean. It was a shocking revelation for them: during a pivotal exam, the dean himself had been lurking? Very few students would have been able to perform under that kind of pressure. Yet Seong Suho had managed to take the top spot in the practicals regardless. The auditorium erupted in a frenzy of chatter; the minority views of Suho's defenders now swelled to become the dominant opinion.
"Haa... haa... this is impossible... this is a nightmare..."
Pure despair filled Louis's eyes as two specific figures entered his vision. Seong Suho. Luna. They were watching him from separate spots, but in his fractured mind, they merged into one singular scene of rejection. His legs began to weaken, and Louis staggered where he stood.
Professor Magerta approached him with a firm look. "The incident is now officially closed. Please follow me."
"Hnn... Yes, Professor..."
He just wanted to get out of the hall now, his basic survival impulses pounding against his heart. Students, professors, the dean, Seong Suho, Sonya... and Luna. Every single gaze felt like it was burning into his skin; he felt he would kill for a way to escape them all. As Louis bolted for the side exit, a man reached out and patted his shoulder, halting his progress. He turned, his face ashen; the man leaned in and whispered.
"The bet is officially on. You're not the type to just ignore a debt of honor, right?"
"You absolute bastard..."
Shame, humiliation, disgrace, and mortification. Seong Suho's smug, close-up face fueled a desire for murder in his veins. But his ingrained family honor steadied him; suppressing the urge to scream, he forced out the words.
"I... Louis Brandt Rup... always keep my word."
"Good, very good. I'm truly looking forward to our time together."
Grind...
Gnashing his teeth at Seong Suho's grin, Louis turned away. Wrath and humiliation surged within him; tears finally began to well in his eyes unbidden as he scurried after Magerta like a beaten dog.
‘Man, that worked exactly like a charm!’
‘From his perspective, there is simply no other explanation but his own catastrophic screw-up.’
A noble like Louis would have recognized his own handwriting on the page, so he inevitably chalked it up to his own error in the heat of the moment. No one in their right mind would suspect that someone could modify a problem right under the professors' noses.
‘But that is exactly what I did.’
I had used my Enel reserves to alter his paper flawlessly, turning Louis into the undisputed fool of the century. The students he had stirred up into a frenzy were still defending him somewhat, out of habit. And even after being dragged off, I knew he wouldn't face a truly severe punishment; he could just claim he was representing the collective concerns of the students.
‘I just hope he has enough sense left not to try anything even stupider.’
I grinned to myself, already anticipating his return in tatters. The dean approached me then, patting my shoulder with a genuine smile.
"You did well today, Suho. We have cleared all suspicions—it is quite a fortunate outcome for everyone."
"Thank you, sir."
He nodded toward me and began directing the rest of the professors to disperse. Students and faculty began filing out of the hall; soon, only Luna and I remained in the vast space. Luna approached me, her expression a mix of relief and bittersweet sadness.
"... "
"... "
There were no words from her, and I found myself unable to speak as well. The silence between us stung. Luna could have easily been pissed at Louis's antics, but she was still trying to treat him with some level of decency. And I felt a twinge of guilt—I knew that for my own goals, I needed her to fully ditch him for me someday. Without my intervention, she would never have had to face such a painful dilemma.
"I'm sorry, Luna."
"...What are you sorry for?"
She lifted her head slightly at my sudden apology, her eyes looking puzzled. I decided to speak from the heart.
"If I hadn't appeared in your life... you wouldn't be suffering through this kind of drama right now."
"...I don't think I would like the version of me that didn't know you, Suho."
She let out a long, deep sigh.
"This is just part of life—we have to accept it. They say water and fire don't mix, but you can't just erase one element from the world entirely."
"... "
"And besides..." She reached out and intertwined our fingers, letting out an even larger sigh. "Please don't ever say 'if you hadn't appeared' again. To me, that is the deepest wound of all."
"...I got it. I'm sorry."
I gripped her hand tight, leaning in to brush a soft, reassuring kiss against her lips.