Chapter 231
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 231
Chapter Title: Lesson 45. Founding Festival Preparations - 6
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Thursday afternoon, in the student council room.
The room buzzed with the rustling of papers being shuffled here and there. Ban Yu-won had just finished his stack and stretched languidly with a yawn.
"Ughhh, if I'd known there'd be office worker drudgery like this, I never would've joined the student council!"
"Kyahahaha! Thanks to our planning director, we're moving at a pace that blows last year out of the water!"
Shati grinned with a rotten smile, looking like she was about to say just as planned.
But when Ban Yu-won made a face like he wanted to argue, she hurriedly added an excuse, as if she'd anticipated it.
"Don't worry, planning director. The student council only gets this busy around the Founding Festival."
"With all the tournaments and events connecting us to every dimension imaginable, the related work piles up. Sorry to burden you when you just joined..."
"No, it's fine."
"J-Juniorrrr!"
He could've messed around with Shati, but not with Graham.
As Ban Yu-won waved it off, Rika, the external activities director, came rushing over with tears welling up and a new stack of documents clutched in her hands.
"Help me with this, please! I have no idea what any of it says!"
"You're a fourth-year, right, senior?"
Ban Yu-won had thought so from the start—she really was like the student council's mascot, not all that skilled with the actual work...
Still, honestly speaking, he'd somewhat romanticized this kind of ordinary student council busywork, like something out of any old Earth school, so he wasn't in a bad mood about it.
Anything written in language was his specialty, after all. With a wry smile, he gladly took the papers from her.
"Thanks, junior!"
"Hah, you'd think we recruited Yu-won just for paperwork from the way you're acting."
Mira snorted at Shati's words and replied in her stead.
Flip. At the leisurely sound of turning pages, Ban Yu-won glanced down at his lap.
In other words, she was lying there with her head pillowed on his knee.
Because of this woman, he was doing his work on the communal sofa instead of at his own desk in the student council room.
If someone had told him back when they first met that this would happen, he never would've believed it...
Ban Yu-won gazed at her with a distant expression.
"So, Mira, how long are you planning to stay like that?"
"Until my grudge is satisfied."
The reason for Mira's provocative behavior was simple.
She didn't like that Ban Yu-won had gone on a date with Dokgo Yeon yesterday and grown closer.
And with a mere fellow climber who wasn't even officially dating him—no footage shot, just pure personal time together—she was showing absurd jealousy.
Even now, if he tried to shift away even a little, she'd smack his thigh and cling on, pressing her head down firmly. It was just like a cat that only got clingy when he was trying to work.
"No flirting in the workplace, Mira?"
Rika shot her a glance, her face tinged with a hint of envy, but Mira shot back firmly.
"I'm doing my work properly. If you're jealous, make a boyfriend in the student council too, Rika."
"A boyfriend? The only single guys we have right now are..."
"...External activities director, what's with that look? Don't tell me I'm not your type?"
As Rika narrowed her eyes and turned, Treasurer Beegan Delawalker looked utterly baffled at the gaze.
Rika appraised him head to toe like she was sizing him up, then made a subtle hmm face.
"The specs aren't bad... but compared to our Yu-won junior, a bit."
"I get a say in this too. I'd appreciate it if you didn't evaluate me on your own."
"What? Are you dissatisfied with me?!"
"Obviously. Your work performance is a total disaster to begin with!"
The two started growling at each other, but it seemed like a common occurrence in this student council—Graham didn't even intervene.
They were different years but bantered casually, and there was this subtle vibe between just the two of them. Maybe they'd end up together on their own before long... Ban Yu-won thought so, but saying it out loud would just make things more exhausting, so he left them be.
One thing was clear: if they kept bickering like that, Beegan's work would drag on too.
"The date—I was curious about it too."
Ban Yu-won turned at the sudden voice from elsewhere. Aire, sitting in the vice president's seat, was staring straight at him.
"It didn't go up on the Rebellion channel."
"Of course not. It's already blowing up that I'm dating Lucelle and Mira. Can't exactly throw more fuel on the fire."
"Hmm, is that really the only reason?"
Just because Aire brought it up, now Mira was joining the attack!
Ban Yu-won did feel a bit guilty, so he didn't argue back and just turned his eyes to the papers.
"Normally, you'd upload an edited version for the view count explosion."
"I've got plenty of attention already. That's the narrow thinking of a YouTuber stuck in a rut."
"Really? It wasn't that you just didn't want to show it to anyone?"
Squish. Mira, annoyed for no reason, pressed her head down harder, but her small, light head didn't hurt much even with force.
"Don't try to fool me. You treat that girl special."
"Special... Yeah, she's strong, for sure. In our age group, she's probably the only one I can't guarantee victory against."
Aire nodded in agreement, but in a weird direction, as Mira hit right at his inner thoughts.
Ban Yu-won thought he might gloss over it by agreeing with Aire, but Mira wouldn't let him escape.
"You treat only her with such courtesy. It's not just because she's strong—it's more than that..."
"She's my master—that's all."
In the end, Ban Yu-won decided to reveal a bit of his true feelings.
"She had the talent but didn't know how to fight properly. Then she taught me real martial arts for the first time, which let me adapt. It's the foundation of my current abilities. The courtesy you mentioned? Yeah, it's because I respect Yeon."
"Yeon..."
"Ah."
This idiot—why'd he have to do it now of all times!
Mira's eyes gleamed with fierce intensity, enough to crumble Babel Tower, as she placed a hand on his thigh.
"Sounds like you two got real close in one day, huh? Calling her name so intimately."
From his experience with her, he knew that any lie would send that hand from his thigh straight to his crotch.
No way could he stage an R-rated scene in the student council room, so he answered her interrogation honestly.
"...Yeah, she told me to call her by name now."
"That ghost of a girl?!"
Even Shati was now leaning in with an excited look.
Aire sat across the sofa, Rika subtly scooted her butt next to her, and Beegan sensed that work was done for the day and started brewing tea on his own.
"Whoa, I can't believe it. She told you to call her by name herself?!"
"Yeah, she said it felt cumbersome... Wait, why are you all making such a fuss? You haven't even talked to Yeon directly."
"What are you talking about? Everything you do gets uploaded to the Rebellion channel! Not just us—most students at this academy know your personalities!"
Indeed, another downside of the Rebellion channel.
Of course, he'd wanted some familiarity from students when starting it... but the effect had been a bit too much.
"Well, it feels more intimate than with close same-year friends."
"Some people get the thrill of vicarious dating watching you and Miss Lucelle on dates."
"Is that you, Beegan? Kinda creepy."
"External activities director, you really wanna fight me?"
Ban Yu-won took the teacup Beegan offered after shooing Rika away and sat down, letting out a sigh.
Apparently, Aire and Mira weren't the only ones hung up on those two dates.
"Whew, life sure is tough."
Student council duties finally over, Ban Yu-won sighed deeply as he headed to the meeting spot.
Maybe accepting this world's polygamy system had been a mistake?
If he'd just focused on deepening things with Lucelle, the first to whom he'd given himself, maybe he wouldn't have to worry about Mira or Dokgo Yeon...
As he thought that, a red hickey—a kiss mark—clung to the side of his neck.
Mira, pissed that Ban Yu-won harbored special feelings for Dokgo Yeon, had snapped when she heard he was off to meet yet another woman after duties. Unable to hold back, she'd left her mark on him.
And the other woman was Ulrike Prominence, whom Mira hated more than anyone right now.
That woman knew he was taken and still flirted with him shamelessly, so even knowing it wouldn't work as a warning, Mira had done it as her own provocation.
'Not that it feels bad...'
Ban Yu-won had no intention of playing nice with Ulrike Prominence.
From the moment she'd attacked Earth, she was his mortal enemy.
He didn't know if her head was full of flowers, thinking they could get along, but he had zero plans to even pretend.
'Soon enough, at the masked ball, we'll both lay our cards on the table. No need for pointless theater.'
If she actually misunderstood because of that, it'd only give him more headaches.
He couldn't forget her brazen attitude at that first assembly led by the student council.
Showing her the obvious mark of intimacy with another woman on his neck—what reaction would she have? He was a little curious.
'...Is my head rotten too?'
Even as he pondered that seriously, he climbed the spiral stairs.
Ulrike had told him there were plenty of academy spots off-limits to regular students, places even full professors couldn't enter without special access. She wanted to meet secretly there.
Wanting secrecy was already suspicious as hell, but confident he could handle any situation calmly, he'd agreed.
...What if she comes at me naked?
"Ah, this must be it."
Ban Yu-won arrived at a door with a small nameplate.
True to Ulrike's word that no one could enter without permission, complex linguistic concepts swirled around it.
As the owner of the All-Reading Eyes and now Yu-won-gong's master, Ban Yu-won could easily dispel the barrier...
But he politely raised his hand to knock...
—Come in.
Hm?
Ban Yu-won frowned.
It wasn't Ulrike's voice as he knew it.
But the door was already opening on its own... Wait, he hadn't even knocked yet.
"This is my first time seeing you in person. Welcome, Student Ban Yu-won."
"...Huh?"
The figure who appeared inside was a mummy.
Not fairy Mira.
A mummy unearthed from a pyramid.
And, additionally.
It wasn't their first meeting either.