Chapter 3
“Teacher… do you maybe have a minute?”
“Yeah. I was just about to talk to you, actually.”
Si-hyeon only came to me after school was over.
All day long, she’d trailed after me without saying a word.
So for now, I led her to the Counseling Room.
For the record, the Counseling Room was a special private space belonging solely to the teacher who served as the protagonist of True Teacher.
Apparently, because he was an Ethics teacher, the school had provided him with a counseling room.
Didn’t schools normally have a separate counselor on staff?
Well, whatever.
“Want some juice? Do you like anything in particular?”
“……Th-then, orange, please.”
I sat Si-hyeon down in the Counseling Room and prepared snacks and drinks.
I don’t know what this is about, but I really hope it isn’t anything huge.
She had definitely been crying yesterday.
...And then she ran away, which somehow made it feel like I’d been the one who made her cry.
Why had she been crying, anyway?
In cases like this, the first things that came to mind were usually family problems…
Was one of her parents sick?
“The truth is… I read the final volume of the manga….”
“Huh?”
The manga was the problem.
That was the answer that came out of Si-hyeon’s mouth after she took a few sips of orange juice.
She’d just come right out and said it.
“...So you were crying because of that?”
“Yes. It was such a sad ending….”
“...Well, that is… unfortunate.”
All the possibilities I’d spun up in my head were suddenly useless.
Still, there had been a clue.
The manga section….
So?
She’d spent the entire day following me around because of that?
Was she embarrassed that she’d cried over a manga?
I couldn’t tell whether to call that adorable or completely unhinged….
But then.
According to what Si-hyeon said next, that wasn’t it at all.
“P-please keep it a secret…!”
“A secret?”
“Please…, I’m begging you….”
“Haha, you mean you’re worried I’ll tell your friends?”
“No, not my friends….”
Si-hyeon fidgeted with the cup of juice for a moment, thinking hard.
Then she cautiously glanced at me and spoke.
“If my parents find out that I was reading manga…, it’ll be a problem….”
“……”
Ah. So that kind of thing.
I got it.
From the looks of it, Si-hyeon seemed to have grown up in a pretty affluent family.
They probably considered manga to be subversive trash and forbade it at home.
A classic, really.
And then.
Ping!
There it was.
What’s that supposed to mean? Let’s go have a parent meeting right now.
Heh heh. If I keep this secret, what can you do for me?
Do you like reading manga, Si-hyeon?
The scenery in my peripheral vision slowed, and the way Si-hyeon had been hesitating in front of me came to a stop.
A set of choices had appeared.
Guess it’s simple since this is the first one.
Once I picked a choice, I couldn’t take it back.
Now that the game had possessed reality itself, I probably had no choice but to act exactly as I selected.
Thankfully, the answer was obvious right away.
Do you like reading manga, Si-hyeon?
“You read all the way to the final volume, so it looks like you like manga. Am I wrong?”
“Huh?”
The moment I chose, time began flowing again, and the words came out of my mouth automatically.
At my question, Si-hyeon hesitated as if trying to gauge my intent.
Then she slowly nodded.
“I like it… yes.”
“Haha. Being honest is a good thing. And reading manga isn’t a bad thing, either.”
“...Isn’t it?”
“Of course not. You’re in high school too, so you’re old enough to know that by now.”
“……”
My casual answer seemed to relax her a little.
I could feel the tension in her shoulders easing.
“Yes. The truth is, I…, really like manga….”
“You must go to that bookstore a lot, then?”
“……Yes. It’s somewhere the kids from school don’t go, so I use it a lot.”
“Ah, so that’s why….”
No wonder it had seemed strange to find her in a bookstore near where I lived.
She really seemed to hate the idea of anyone finding out she read manga.
“Teacher, you said something on the first day of the semester….”
“Hmm?”
“……About freedom.”
“Ah, that?”
“Yes….”
Si-hyeon looked down at the still surface of her orange juice and continued, as if remembering that day.
“...Is it really okay for a high school student to do things freely?”
Would freedom be okay for a high school student?
Si-hyeon’s question was, well….
I have no idea.
I’d just used the line from the walkthrough verbatim, hadn’t I?
But I couldn’t exactly tell her I didn’t know that.
I had to be the right kind of teacher for her.
That said, dragging out some life philosophy would just be boring and pretentious….
Right, this was Si-hyeon’s first event.
There was no need to hit her with some earth-shattering life lesson and a grand revelation.
It had been the same way when I played the game before.
So….
“If you’re okay with it, Si-hyeon.”
“Yes?”
“...I have a good suggestion for you.”
“……What is it?”
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
It had already been a day since I’d grabbed the teacher and confessed my manga hobby to him.
After that, Si-hyeon went home without any trouble.
And the next day.
When school was over, she stood in front of the Counseling Room once again.
But this time, things were different.
She hadn’t come because she had some specific errand.
“……”
Click.
She put the key in the doorknob and unlocked the door.
“Excuse me….”
Then she carefully stepped into the empty Counseling Room.
It was very quiet inside.
Like a library meant for silence.
No—since there wasn’t a single person there, it was even quieter than that.
“Waaah….”
A small smile spread across Si-hyeon’s lips.
At the same time, she remembered the conversation she’d had with the teacher yesterday.
“You can use it comfortably.”
“Huh…? Th-this Counseling Room…?”
“Of course. I’ll give you a spare key, so feel free to come whenever you want—during break, lunch, after school, whatever. Rest here as much as you like.”
“...Are you sure that’s okay?”
That question—was it really okay?
Well, giving a student a room like this could be a problem.
And at that, the teacher had smiled brightly and answered in a teasing voice.
“Of course it isn’t okay!”
That cheerful smile kept floating through her mind for some reason.
“So relaxing….”
Si-hyeon sat in the chair inside the Counseling Room and murmured while looking around the space.
A space all to herself, with no one else around.
A place where she could read manga freely.
Even in her own room at home, her parents came and went so often that she couldn’t even dream of keeping manga books there.
“Waaah…! My Dress-Up Darling…! He really prepared it…!”
Si-hyeon walked over to the bookshelf, checked the manga lined up there, and beamed like a little kid as she pulled one out.
“What? So you’ve just been buying them, reading them, and throwing them away? You don’t even keep them?”
“Mmngh…, yes….”
“That won’t do! If you buy manga, you’re supposed to collect it! No, hold on—what series do you want to read most right now? I’ll get it ready for you by tomorrow, at the latest!”
“Huh? Th-that’s a bit too much….”
“What’s the big deal? I can just say the manga in the Counseling Room is for student counseling. I can write it off as office supplies anyway.”
He’d really bought and prepared the series she’d wanted to read most.
Every single volume, up to the latest release.
“I’m so happy….”
And since he’d told her she could eat the snacks and drink the juice freely too.
Si-hyeon set out the orange juice and stick snacks, then began to read.
That was when the joy of freedom, something she was feeling for the first time, swept over her.
Without worrying about anyone catching her.
She could focus on her favorite manga and read to her heart’s content.
With delicious snacks beside her, too.
All of it was thanks to the teacher.
“Heheh, the main couple is so cute….”
Before she knew it, time had flown by.
Her promised hour was already over.
Realizing the time, Si-hyeon quickly gathered her things and left the Counseling Room.
Clack.
She locked the door and headed out of the school.
Tomorrow, too… this feels like a dream….
Her steps on the way home felt light.
Whenever she secretly read at the bookstore before, she had been too busy rushing through the pages.
And throwing away the books she’d bought had always felt like a waste of money.
It feels just like borrowing manga from those rental shops I used to go to when I was little…!
No—this was even better than a rental shop.
The rental shop she’d loved as a child was gone now, nowhere to be found, and she’d always been sad about that.
But now Si-hyeon had found something even better.
Because the teacher had been so considerate.
“Hehe.”
In a good mood, Si-hyeon took out her smartphone on the way home and started looking for manga to read next.
She couldn’t actually read manga on her phone, since it was checked too.
Still, she could look for titles.
While browsing all sorts of different manga, one title suddenly caught her eye.
“……”
It was a manga about a teacher who stars as he instructs students.
The teacher in the manga had blond hair and looked like a delinquent.
Yet for some reason, Si-hyeon found herself thinking of her homeroom teacher as she looked at it.
Teacher… seems like a good person.
With that thought, she saved the manga in her memory.
For next time.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
“Heh. That should’ve been a decent choice.”
The day after my counseling session with Si-hyeon, after school, I sat in my seat in the teachers’ office and wrapped up my work, thinking of Si-hyeon, who was probably in the Counseling Room by now.
You want to read manga?
Then just let her read it, right?
After all, the Counseling Room was my private space, granted to me as a game perk.
No one ever came in or out, and no one could interfere with it.
Besides, as soon as I finished work, I was heading straight to exercise anyway.
It was basically an unused room.
So I’d just lend it to Si-hyeon.
With that, I could satisfy what she wanted right away without creating any weird connection between us.
I still wasn’t sure how I should guide her after that.
But if she was troubled because she couldn’t read manga, then I’d just let her read as much as she wanted.
This should raise Respect a bit, right? As for Favorability, well, we don’t have any real contact, so that shouldn’t be a problem.
And yet.
Ping!
“Oh? Respect?”
Student No. 31, Hong Si-hyeon’s Favorability has increased by 1.
Student No. 31, Hong Si-hyeon’s Favorability has increased by 1.
Student No. 31, Hong Si-hyeon’s Favorability has increased by 1.
Student No. 31, Hong Si-hyeon’s Favorability has increased by 1.
Student No. 31, Hong Si-hyeon’s Favorability has increased by 1.
“W-wait, wait, wait, wait—!!”
Student No. 31, Hong Si-hyeon’s Respect has increased by 1.
Student No. 31, Hong Si-hyeon’s Respect has increased by 1.
Student No. 31, Hong Si-hyeon’s Favorability has increased by 1.
Student No. 31, Hong Si-hyeon’s Favorability has increased by 1.
Student No. 31, Hong Si-hyeon’s Favorability has increased by 1.
“Scary, scary, scary, scary!!!”
Favorability was going up from dot damage.
...Why?
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