Chapter 41

Here's a fun fact. My and Yu Ha-neul's homeroom teacher is bald. He was supposedly a famous instructor at some academy once, but since I'd never even heard of anything like internet lectures in this world, all I saw was an older guy with a gut and a hair situation he'd clearly given up on. He was also the teacher who made Yu Ha-neul redo a math problem over and over during first period.

The school ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠storage room had a small ladder in it. Surprisingly, it wasn't locked. Maybe they figured none of the rich kids here would have a reason to steal from it? Then again, there were a few CCTV cameras around the storage area, so maybe they didn't feel the need to lock the door.

Did that mean the person caught on those cameras, me, was being treated like an invisible woman? Probably. So I walked right into the storage room, stole the ladder, and walked out. Honestly, "stole" might not be the right word. It was more like I openly carried it out in plain sight.

I'd originally gone looking for a spare chair, but this was better. School chairs don't fold. Plus, carrying one around in Ye Sa-ra's body would've been a bit heavy. The ladder, on the other hand, was manageable if I folded it and carried it that way. Still heavy, sure, but it wasn't awkward and unwieldy like a chair.

So there I was, small ladder in hand, wandering from classroom to classroom looking for my homeroom teacher while he was teaching.

Before long, I spotted it through a window: a gleaming, shiny-smooth bald head practically sparkling in the sunlight.

Over the past two periods, I'd run around pulling all sorts of nonsense, and I'd confirmed beyond any doubt that no one reacted to me. So this time, I confidently yanked the classroom's front door open.

The teacher, who'd been writing something on the board, flinched in surprise and looked at me.

His face went deathly pale.

Well, yeah. After what happened to him in first period, I could see why he'd look like that.

Too bad for him.

His teacherly authority still had a long way left to fall.

Or should I call it basic human decency?

Ignoring someone is denying their very existence as a person. And this was a grown adult doing it. A teacher, no less—ignoring a student.

Does a person like that really deserve to have his authority or dignity respected?

I strode over and planted the ladder next to the lectern with ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠a brisk clack.

Then I climbed up it.

Compared to the average male height, Ye Sa-ra was fairly short, but from up on this ladder, that gleaming head was right in full view.

The teacher stared up at me with an expression that said, What the hell is she about to pull now? In response, I pulled out one more item I'd brought from the storage room.

A spray bottle.

The kind you use to mist flowerpots, or fill with cleaning solution and spritz while cleaning.

Since I'd be spraying a person, I'd filled it with plain tap water instead of cleaner, naturally.

And then, I spritzed it right over the teacher's head. Mist, mist.

"Grow little sprouts, grow little sprouts~"

Singing completely off-key and off-beat the whole time.

!!!!!!

Above every single person's head in that classroom, a giant invisible exclamation mark went off. At least, that's how it looked to my eyes.

Sure, maybe not many kids in this class actually paid attention, but in a country built on Confucian values, spraying water on a teacher's head, and on top of that, mocking his hair loss, was the kind of thing no one could even imagine.

No matter how you slice it, the teachers at this school still grade exams and hand out scores. If you want to keep your grades at the bare minimum needed for college, you have to observe at least some basic courtesy.

I had no such need. I was invisible to them anyway.

But that didn't mean I could just pretend nothing was happening and take the ladder down, either.

Ignoring me was permitted. Harassing me or hurting me, on the other hand, was a different story.

Reading Ye Sa-ra's note had made one thing absolutely clear. Whatever Ye Sa-ra did, the people around her consistently did only one thing: they ignored her. There ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠was never any description of anyone trying to physically restrain her or forcibly overpower her.

That meant orders to that effect must have been given. Physically subduing an elementary schooler would've been easy enough, and yet they had never done it.

The Chairwoman had been extremely wary of showing Ye Sa-ra any attention, but by the same token, she was also extremely averse to letting Ye Sa-ra get hurt.

So as long as I was up on this ladder, and as long as no one could move both the ladder and me at the same time without risking me falling and getting injured, there was no one in this ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠classroom who could take this ladder away from me.

A few students in the very front row were trembling, their heads bowed deeply, desperately fighting back laughter.

And the teacher? Astonishingly, his face had flushed bright red, but he kept right on teaching.

Truly a miraculous display of professional dedication.

...Or not. Considering how he'd ignored a student, I'm not sure "professional dedication" is the right phrase.

He was ignoring me even now, in this very moment.

Well, let's see how long he could keep ignoring me so cleanly.

*

In the end, with truly miraculous patience, the teacher managed to ignore me the entire class. The students, however, did not. No one laughed out loud, but more than a few were clutching their stomachs and making stifled choking sounds.

Even while spraying water, I was careful not to let any splatter onto the students. I wasn't exactly trying to draw attention, but earning everyone's complete hostility wasn't my goal either. In the original story, Ye Sa-ra had rampaged around smashing everything in sight and ended up a public enemy with zero sympathy. But I'm not the Ye Sa-ra of this world.

I was going to make it impossible for them to ignore me, but also impossible for them to harass me without serious consequences.

And to do that, I needed at least a few allies—people who viewed me "positively."

...I didn't love the idea of having to put even minimal effort into winning over kids who'd participated in abusing Ye Sa-ra over the past several years, but by that logic, I'd have to shun Lee Su-a too. Lee Su-a had also been a child who changed her heart at the end and became my ally.

As long as a kid could recognize what they'd done wrong and feel remorse for it, I was willing to pull them onto my side.

Maybe the teacher realized this. Or maybe he just wanted to get away from me at any cost. He moved in among the students. Naturally, I couldn't spray water through a crowd of kids. And since I was standing on a ladder, keeping up with him while maintaining that height was difficult anyway.

Still, I'd expected him to try running.

I pulled a handkerchief from my pocket, quickly climbed down the ladder, and followed right behind him.

The teacher and I had a height difference, but if I reached my hand up, I was just barely able to touch the top of his head.

I caught up to him in a flash and started vigorously rubbing his head with the handkerchief.

"Gotta get it nice and squeaky clean!"

!!!!!!

Once again, invisible exclamation marks rose above the heads of the students nearby. I could see some kids visibly clenching their abs to keep from losing it.

Everyone was trying so hard to ignore me.

The teacher scrambled away from me in a fluster, but we were confined to the classroom. I chased right after him.

Honestly, though.

In the end, the teacher did ignore me for the entire class period, but I'm not sure you could really call it "ignoring" at that point. He did spend the whole time frantically running from me, after all.

Well, at this level, I'd call it a resounding success for my first day.

I left the teacher looking like a drowned rat from the spray bottle and the ladder sitting next to the lectern, and walked out of the classroom. Class was nearly over. I needed to get back to Yu Ha-neul soon.

As for cleaning up the classroom... well.

Wasn't that the job of the people who were "visible"?

*

And so, third period ended.

"You're leaving again?"

I'd slipped back into the classroom just barely before class ended. Now, as soon as break was over, I stood up to leave again, and Yu Ha-neul asked. This was fourth period, which meant if I skipped this class too, I'd have missed every single morning class. Attendance would probably still count, but Yu Ha-neul was clearly worried about my grades.

Or maybe it wasn't my grades so much as my basic duties as a student. Yu Ha-neul was a diligent protagonist, after all.

"Yeah. Still got something I need to do."

Yes. There was still something I needed to do.

I'd gone to Lee Su-a's classroom and made Lee Su-a and the students laugh, disrupting class in the process.

I'd tracked down the homeroom teacher who'd indirectly given Yu Ha-neul a hard time that morning and humiliated him spectacularly.

But even after all that, there was still one thing left.

"I'll be back before class ends, don't worry."

"No, that's not what I'm worried about..."

Still, Yu Ha-neul didn't try to stop me any further. She probably understood how firmly I'd made up my mind.

I saw the next period's teacher enter the classroom looking extremely tense. I gave Yu Ha-neul a small smile and immediately stepped out into the hallway.

*

This time, my destination wasn't another class's room. I was planning to finally search for the person I'd made up my mind to find.

The person who'd been helping Ye Sa-ra from outside.

I didn't expect that person to actually be at the school right now, of course. But I figured she'd at least have some means of contacting Ye Sa-ra. The middle school and high school were in different locations, and I didn't know what that contact method was, so the odds of actually finding her were practically zero.

Still, if we'd been out of touch for quite a while, wouldn't she try to find some way to reach me?

If she realized I was alone, wouldn't she approach me from her side first?

I was grasping at those kinds of faint, almost futile possibilities.

Anyway, if the Ye Sa-ra from before I arrived had been communicating with her inside the school, wouldn't the other party have set up something like a direct line to the high school too?

And that thought of mine—

"Miss Ye Sa-ra?"

—seemed to have been right on the mark.

After wandering diligently around the school grounds, I'd ended up not inside a building but outside, in a park-like area that was still within the school perimeter. And there, sitting on a bench, was an adult woman.

The moment she saw my face, her expression brightened and she rose from her seat to speak to me.

She wore a women's suit with a thin coat over it, and she gave off a slightly youthful impression. Her hair was neatly gathered back and wound into a round bun. With an appearance that practically screamed "I'm an office worker," she looked just a little out of place inside a school.

...Actually, before that—could someone who so obviously looked like an outsider just walk onto school grounds?

The woman placed a hand over her chest and let out a somewhat exaggerated sigh of relief.

"Hah, I really thought something terrible had happened. I thought our client had cut ties with us completely."

"......."

This certainly seemed to be the "outsider" I'd been looking for.

Seemed to be, but...

.......

Wasn't this a little too easy? Almost unnaturally so?