Unreasonable

The moment Sheng Jiu stepped into the classroom, he felt countless eyes turn toward him. They belonged to his classmates; apart from him, the entire class was made up of girls.

"H-hello?" Feeling a little embarrassed under the girls' gaze, Sheng Jiu waved at them.

"Wow, there's a handsome guy!"

"Little brother, come sit by your big sister~" "The headmistress didn't lie to us—he really is a boy!" After a fraction of a second of silence, the girls erupted into enthusiastic cheers. Standing in the doorway at the front of the classroom, Sheng Jiu's ears instantly turned bright red.

"Hey, Sheng Jiu—over here!" Sheng Jiu spotted Yae Sakura waving to him from nearby, so he hurried over like he'd found a lifeline.

Yae Sakura cheerfully led him to his seat. To his surprise, his deskmate was none other than Kiana. He and Kiana sat in the last row, with two familiar faces, Bronya and Yae Sakura, seated in front of them. Sheng Jiu felt relieved to find that all the people around him were familiar. Just after he sat down, a bespectacled middle-aged man walked in carrying a stack of books. "Hey, I heard St. Freya Academy doesn't accept boys. So why is that teacher a man?" Sheng Jiu whispered to Kiana beside him.

"'A man'—give me a break! St. Freya Academy only used to refuse male students. It never said it wouldn't hire male teachers or staff. If the whole academy were girls, wouldn't that make you happy?" Kiana whispered back.

"Fu Hua, could you hand out everyone's homework in a moment? Thanks."

"Of course, Mr. Walter."

"Now, let's begin today's lesson on the Second Honkai Outbreak..."

"Mr. Walter? Is he our history teacher?" While the man lectured, Sheng Jiu quietly asked Kiana, looking at him at the front of the class. But when no answer came, he turned and saw that Kiana was already nodding off. "Wake up. Don't sleep." Seizing his chance, Sheng Jiu gave her arm a gentle pinch. The pain quickly roused Kiana.

Kiana glared at Sheng Jiu through clenched teeth. "What are you doing? If you hurt me, you'll be in trouble!"

"But you were sleeping!"

"This stuff is so easy, I already know it all. Why would I need to listen? You're so annoying! You're always ruining things for me. If only I'd done better on the last exam, I could've sat with Yae Sakura!"

"...I think your skin's thick enough to rival Homi's."

"Y-you... You're Homi! You're so shameless, you're just like Hoola!" Kiana suddenly realized that this guy seemed every bit as good at trash talk as she was. She perked right up, her white ahoge standing on end as she prepared for a proper verbal showdown with Sheng Jiu.

"I think you're more thick-skinned than Homi, Hoola, and Hmei combined!" Sheng Jiu laughed at Kiana's feeble retort.

"What are you laughing at?"

"You said I was Homi, right?"

"Yeah. So what?"

"Homi isn't as big as Huma. So Huma's skin is thicker, which means yours is thicker..."

After a 0.3-second delay, Kiana finally realized that he'd tricked her again. Enraged, she forgot that she and Sheng Jiu were whispering during class and yelled at him, "Unbelievable! You're impossible!"

As soon as she shouted, she realized they were in class. She nervously raised her head and saw the entire class staring at her in astonishment. Bronya and Yae Sakura, in the row ahead, both sighed and covered their faces in exasperation.

Walter pushed his glasses up his nose, speechless. Calmly, he told Kiana and Sheng Jiu, "You two, stand at the back."

And so, red-faced Kiana and Sheng Jiu, desperately suppressing his laughter, got up and moved to the back of the classroom. The moment he stood, two slender fingers pinched a bit of flesh at his waist and slowly twisted it a hundred and eighty degrees...