The First Encounter with the Students
Ah, Yeon-ssam!
As I opened the door to Class 2-F, the first thing that caught my eye was the bright red hair bouncing around among the four students seated at the desks. They were waving their hands frantically, shouting “Here! Over here!”
She was that energetic girl with dog ears who had accidentally kicked the ball at me on the track field earlier…
“Her name is Kang Hee-ji, right?”
For some reason, when I asked her grade, she refused to answer and just dashed off on her own. I guess she figured out my new teacher story and decided to play a prank by not answering to surprise me.
I quietly waved back at the adorable girl, then forced a smile and stood in front of the podium. Even though it had only been an hour since I met her, having a familiar face in the class made me feel much more at ease.
I raised my voice with a small flutter in my heart and greeted them. “Hello, everyone.”
…It was silent.
Kang Hee-ji was giggling quietly while watching me, and the others looked completely uninterested no matter whether I spoke or not. In the middle of that dead silence, the warmth I had just felt in my heart turned ice-cold.
“I-I’m fine…”
Even though the kids looked incredibly uncooperative, I couldn’t just back down and leave. I clenched my trembling hands and turned to face the blackboard.
…How do I even write this?
While I was carefully examining every corner of the blackboard where a brand-new monitor sat like a piece of junk, someone came trotting up beside me. “Here, this button turns it on.”
“Ah, thanks…”
Kang Hee-ji, who had helped me, casually wrapped her arm around my waist and winked encouragingly before returning to her seat. She was like an angel disguised as a dog. “Alright, I’ll try my best.”
I wrote my name in a cute way on the blackboard with a touch pen, then turned to face the students. “I am Teacher Woo Yeo-eun. Although I’ve only been here since the middle of the semester, I really want to get to know Class F well. Even as a beginner teacher, there are many things I’m lacking, but…”
Squeak—squeak—
Suddenly I heard a sound and glanced over. On the desk was a pink-haired cow beastwoman with a band-aid on her nose, proudly propping her legs up and reading a manga. She showed zero interest in my speech. “Hmph, uh, please take care of me from now on.”
Keeping my gaze fixed on Kang Hee-ji as much as possible, I somehow managed to wrap up the greeting. Just as she started clapping alone, the golden-ponytailed puppy beastwoman by the window suddenly clapped in surprise.
And the last one, the black-haired wolf with a blank and pale face, was staring straight at me silently. It was like she was observing who I really was.
One kind puppy who thinks about her teacher, one who likes to space out by the window, one delinquent cow reading manga, and one wolf staring at people like a predator… My head was already starting to hurt.
“…Let’s just do roll call.”
According to Jung Si-young’s advice, the first step in leading the students well was leaving the right first impression. Even if their spirit was high, don’t get flustered—show them that you are properly doing the teacher’s job. That would clearly mark my existence in their minds as “Teacher.”
And right now, while facing the students and appealing as myself, it was time to execute that lesson.
I cleared my throat with a steady expression and opened the attendance book.
“Let’s see… There are only five students in the 2-F class I’m responsible for.”
It was more like a club than a real class, but that was probably because the academy wanted us to give the fewer kids extra personal attention. And now I slowly said the first name I had to care for. “Kang Hee-ji.”
“Here!”
Short red hair, green eyes, tomboy style. Her proportions were great even though she was tall for a girl—fitting to be called a prince at Lily Academy. She even seemed to have amazing soccer talent… but on the paper it said she wanted to be a police officer. She looked like she would make a good cop, given how much she helped people. “Go Yeon-hee… Go Yeon-hee?”
“Yoon-hee isn’t here yet, Teacher.”
“…Okay, thank you.”
I guess there was an empty seat. I rubbed my throbbing forehead and marked a circle under Go Yeon-hee’s name. “Next is Yang Hye-in? Yang Hye-in.”
“Huh? Ah, here…”
The soft golden-ponytailed girl who had been staring out the window the whole time. Her horse ears matched her athletic specialty written on the paper. Though her build looked ordinary, those perfectly toned, snow-white legs under her skirt were impossible to ignore. “And Woo Ha-neul.”
“……Here.”
The owner of the cold, low voice with a blunt expression staring straight at me… the black-haired blue-eyed girl. As a wolf beastwoman, she held the heavy position of Disciplinary Committee President. In an ordinary school that wouldn’t be special, but at Lily Academy where all the elite girls gathered, it carried much more weight. …Well, it wasn’t like I had to be extra careful just because I was the teacher. She didn’t match her slender model-like figure, yet martial arts was her specialty… did Lily Academy teach martial arts too? Anyway, her posture alone looked different from the rest. “And last… Jung So-hye.”
The pink-haired cow beastwoman who had been reading manga simply raised her hand without a word. Unlike her delinquent look, she surprisingly specialized in fashion and design, despite her shirt buttons being popped open to show off her enormous bust. I would have to figure out how to handle this one later. “Anyway, it looks like our class only has pretty girls.”
And they were all tall. Excluding the slightly shorter Yang Hye-in—Kang Hee-ji was a bit taller than me, and Woo Ha-neul and Jung So-hye were so tall I had to look up. “If I had my original body, I would be…” No, forget it. I shook my head to shake off the weird thought. “Right now I am Woo Yeo-eun.”
“From now on I will occasionally visit your classes to observe how you’re learning and check if there’s any discomfort. And soon we’ll have one-on-one counseling sessions. If you want to request one earlier than that, just come anytime—even late at night.”
I wrote my phone number on the blackboard and turned back to the students. While everyone else showed no interest, Kang Hee-ji was the only one who cheerfully pulled out her phone and entered my number. “And… anyone have questions?”
“Me!”
Kang Hee-ji was the one who quickly raised her hand. “How old is Teacher?”
“I’m 25 this year. Next question…”
“Where do you live?”
“I started living in the staff dormitory today. Next que—”
“I want to hear about first love!”
While watching Kang Hee-ji continue speaking without even lowering her hand, I gave an awkward smile. “I’ve never had a first love. I had to earn money since I was little, and I was busy taking care of my little sister.”
“Eh, wasn’t there anyone you saw at work? Ah, right—what’s Teacher’s ideal type?”
“One question at a time, please.”
Even though Kang Hee-ji’s question didn’t seem to grab the other girls’ interest, Yang Hye-in who had been staring out the window and Jung So-hye who had been reading manga both glanced at me. It seemed I had no choice but to answer. I rested my chin on my hand and thought deeply. “My ideal type… I haven’t really thought about it deeply. Just a normally pretty person? Ideally younger and positive in personality. Someone who would hug me when I’m having a hard time and comfort me. Honestly, if they just take good care of the last thing, I wouldn’t mind the rest.”
After I finished, the students’ eyes looked a little strange. Even Kang Hee-ji who had asked the question was blinking rapidly with a flustered expression. …Was it because I answered too seriously? “Um, no more questions?”
Kang Hee-ji, the only one who had questioned me, slowly lowered her hand. No more questions came out. There was a slight weird atmosphere, but the homeroom period was ending, so I’d stop here. “Good, then the Q&A is over. As I said, I’ll start visiting your classes from today. Don’t be too surprised if Teacher shows up. Understood?”
“Yes, yes…”
“Well, everyone prepare for your lessons. We’ll see each other later.”
I gathered the attendance book and gave Kang Hee-ji, who had been helping me from the start, a grateful wink. Her face immediately turned bright red. “What was that reaction? …I should ask what’s going on?”
While I hesitated for a moment, I decided it was nothing and left the classroom. I planned to return to the staff room with the attendance book and then start visiting the kids’ classes right away. Before looking for the hint with the cat-ear starfish, I also wanted to clear up the negative image teachers had of me—but before that, I couldn’t leave the important time of the kids entrusted to me unaddressed. As a lacking teacher, I had to work harder so they wouldn’t feel my shortcomings. And someday we would become close, play together without hesitation, and after exams we’d throw a party to say we suffered through it… “The last two seem impossible.”
I quickly erased the image of the uncooperative kids from my mind and hurried my steps. My steps now carried an energy I hadn’t felt back when I was drinking alone.
“Ah, really…”
I was running hard while hugging my uncomfortably large breasts with my arms. I had stopped by the staff room and ended up being grilled with questions by the suddenly returned vice-principal, so to leave the best impression I had smiled kindly for ten full minutes. “Hah, ha, haa…”
Moving my body which lacked stamina compared to when I was male, I crossed the quiet academy grounds. Finally, panting, I arrived at the track field. Female students in athletic wear were stretching and training in the hot sun. “Yumi, your condition today is okay, right? Can you keep up with me? I feel bad if I’m the only one ahead.”
“Condition…? It’s tough but that’s exactly the level for keeping up with you.”
“Tch.”
At the same time as the sound of a starting gun, two girls began sprinting from the starting line. They were running at a completely different speed from my panicked run, kicking up dust clouds as they raced down the track. It was like cheetahs and gazelles crossing the grassland. “Oh, not now.”
I stood on tiptoe by the edge of the field and searched for the golden-ponytailed girl. But after scanning every student on the field, Yang Hye-in was nowhere to be seen. “Excuse me. I’m the 2-F homeroom teacher. Do you know where Hye-in is?”
“Yang Hye-in from 2-F? …She fell earlier and went to the infirmary.”
“Ah, thank you.”
I bowed my head to the teacher with a cold tone and hurried to the infirmary. If she was seriously injured… if she was seriously injured, she would have gone to the hospital, not the infirmary. My heart tightened as I arrived at the infirmary on my first day, but she wasn’t there either. “She hasn’t come in?”
“Yes. I’ve been here the whole time today. If she had come, I would have known.”
I made my second wrong turn out of the infirmary and narrowed my eyes. “…Then the only possibility is…”
Is school really school? Even at a place like Lily Academy, could kids skip class? Now that I was an adult, it wasn’t hard to think of a place where a student could hide comfortably. The back of the gym storage, a shady spot near the wall… “So she’s challenging Teacher by skipping class on the first day?”
I rolled up my sleeves and searched every corner of the academy with blazing eyes. Gym storage, cafeteria, garden, up a tree, under the wall… As my feet hurt, I spotted the “No Entry” sign on the old school building. Compared to the shiny marble buildings around it, it was a bit old and plain, but it had a strange charm. It was an abandoned place with no people… “Hmm…”
Feeling a hunch, I lifted the chain blocking the entrance and carefully stepped inside. And there, under the classroom window of the old school building. “…Hye-in?”
“T-Teacher?!”
I found Yang Hye-in crouching against the wall. Her knees covered in dirt had scrapes, and she was looking up at me with slightly swollen eyes.