Chapter 79: Chapter 78 - Suspicious Male Student

Minami Asakura was facing a huge problem.

Kuro Kurogane’s was a huge problem.

Minami Asakura was a teacher who had a huge issue yesterday and is now trying to work on an entirely different issue.

She was grading students at her desk.

Generally speaking, this would be a normal occurrence for a teacher at this time of the day.

Instead, her attention was focused on one student.

He was friendly.

He had high marks.

There was no behavioral history.

He helped his classmates.

Most of his teachers thought he was a great student.

So on paper, he was.

This was exactly what made him a suspect.

Minami’s eyes narrowed.

She had enough experience working in schools to know that you can’t always trust a child’s appearance.

Sometimes kids that have been the biggest problem are often those that are most innocent looking.

What bothered Minami more than anything, was her memory from yesterday.

Four girls (Aoi Tachibana, Akari Tachibana, Mina Fujikawa, and Rika Saionji) with one boy (Kuro).

Four plus one were way too many to be a coincidence.

Very suspicious.

Extremely suspicious.

After closing the student file from her desk, she got up from her desk and decided to investigate today as a teacher.

Of course.

Meanwhile, Kuro was having a very normal morning.

As in, Akari was having a very normal morning, which means Akari may be having a very abnormal morning.

"Husband" said Akari.

Kuro almost dropped his shoe, "No".

"You responded too fast".

"We discussed this before".

"Numerous times".

"Exactly".

Aoi came into the hallway carrying her book bag and said,

"...Good Morning".

Kuro almost dropped his shoe.

Then he said, "No."

Akari said he was too quick with his answer because they had talked about it so many times before.

When Aoi walked into the hallway carrying her school bag she said, "...good morning."

Unlike Akari’s greeting, Aoi’s was more relaxed; she walked right up to Kuro like it was the most normal thing for her to do.

Akari asked Kuro to "see?" He said he didn’t know what she was talking about and she told him Aoi was being "sneaky."

Kuro sighed and thought "just another normal day."

Unfortunately for Kuro, Minami was watching from the second-floor teachers’ lounge.

She was watching the three of them enter the school. Her eyes narrowed as she thought to herself, "this is interesting."

Both of the girls seemed so relaxed around Kuro; they were too close for comfort and neither girl appeared embarrassed in the least.

Minami adjusted her glasses as her suspicions of Kuro’s relationship with both girls continued to grow.

Minami made her first observation during lunch when she had planned on eating her lunch but then saw Kuro and stopped.

She was watching him for roughly 12 seconds as he was sitting under a tree by himself; then Aoi arrived and walked over and sat down next to him like it was the most natural thing in the world for her to do.

No doubting it.

No awkward length of time.

No issue with being there.

Minami moved in behind a nearby pillar.

For the sole purpose of observation.

Aoi handed Kuro a drink.

Kuro took the drink from Aoi and they ate lunch, peacefully and comfortably.

The atmosphere felt oddly intimate.

There was one moment, when Aoi brushed a piece of her hair behind her ear and smiled at Kuro, that made Minami freeze.

That smile...

That is not a smile that any ordinary classmate would give to another ordinary classmate.

No...

Then she noticed how Aoi’s eyes seemed to be constantly on Kuro.

Even though there were other people in the same class they were having conversations with, she focused on Kuro, his every reaction, every small motion and expression.

Minami continued to document mentally, making many extensive mental notes.

The documentation grew, continuously.

Meanwhile, Kuro is completely oblivious to this.

"Aoi..."

"Yes."

"There was someone behind that pillar."

(She glanced toward the pillar first but then looked away.)

"Oh..."

"You saw her?"

"Yeah..."

"...Should we be concerned?"

Aoi took a bite of her lunch before answering.

"No..."

That caused Kuro to blink.

"No."

"Akari once followed us around for 3 hours just because she was bored."

"That doesn’t mean it’s normal."

"It is normal in our family."

Kuro could not argue with that at all.

Later on that afternoon, Minami again saw incident number 2.

It continued to make things worse.

Class ended.

Students were leaving their respective classes in very slow motion.

As Minami was organizing attendance sheets, she became aware of Mina Fujikawa conversing with Kuro just outside the school’s courtyard area.

They appeared to be having a personal conversation.

Minami was immediately suspicious.

Quietly moving her location so she could observe from the window nearby.

This would be an educational observation.

Nothing more.

Mina appeared to be very anxious.

Very anxious.

She was constantly playing with her hair and unable to maintain eye contact.

Then, when her courage would allow it, she would talk with Kuro again.

These are classic symptoms.

Minami had observed this type of behavior hundreds of times before.

The signs were definitely there.

When a girl has feelings for someone else.

Meanwhile, Kuro patiently waited while Mina started to blush.

When Kuro spoke again, Mina smiled.

It was a very real smile.

One that was difficult to fake.

Minami could not take her eyes off them.

This was her third finding today.

Three girls and they all weren’t even through their last period yet.

On the other hand Mina was looking for assistance regarding the English assignment about her upcoming literature project.

This was not at all an emotional thing.

Unfortunately, Minami never heard the real reason for Mina’s anxiousness.

The only thing that she could see was Mina’s blushing.

Which allowed her to continue building her own negative theories.

At that point, the situation appeared to become more dangerous.

As Minami arrived home that day—

Or should I say tried to arrive home?

She ended up missing her train stop due to her thoughts of Kuro.

All of those professional thoughts that she was having.

Definitely.

After getting home, she changed into comfortable night clothes and prepared instant noodles for dinner, as usual.

While she finished eating, she opened her computer.

Teachers need to have a good understanding of their students.

This is especially important.

That is why she accidentally took 20 minutes exploring the social media pages of her students for educational purposes.

Then she found it.

She found a screenshot of a group chat.

And there, right there in the middle of the screen, was Kuro.

Once again.

As she looked, several other students were communicating in the group chat.

Then her heart just dropped.

The next person to catch her eye was Rika Saionji.

The girl had sent multiple messages to Kuro after school.

And there was nothing inappropriate - mostly just talking about manga.

What caught her most off guard was how often they were talking, so they had obviously established an ongoing conversation and seemed very comfortable talking with each other.

Then another message appeared on the screen...

Then another...

Then another...

Minami put her chopsticks down.

No!

No way!

This was the fourth girl.

Fourth girl!?

The number was increasing.

This was becoming a statistic that would be alarming.

The next day, things only got worse for Minami.

Every time she looked at Kuro, he had a girl with him.

Before school, Aoi was talking with him.

After school, Akari was pulling him somewhere with her.

During breaks, Mina was approaching him.

Rika was texting him.

On top of it all, none of the girls appeared to know anything about each other - or maybe they did.

Which may have turned out to be much more dangerous.

Minami’s imagination was conjuring the wildest of circumstances.

Covert competitions between students.

Variations of romance. 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

Love triangles.

Love squares.

Possible emotional disasters.

Parental conferences.

Counseling for students.

Declined grades.

Drama in college.

Every one of these factors led to chaos in some way.

Kuro stood in the middle of it all.

Unbelievably innocent.

Thus, he had every reason to be suspicious of Kuro.

—

Days later, Minami reached her decision.

Alone in the faculty office after school she sat.

The office was quiet.

Sun was shining through the windows.

Minami’s notebook was sitting properly on the desk.

It was a special notebook.

She used it to keep track of students that she needed to provide extra support.

Prior to writing a note in this notebook, most of her notes were about academic issues, attendance issues and student behavior issues.

Nothing unusual.

Minami started with a blank page.

Then thought she was overanalyzing.

Maybe Kuro was innocent.

Maybe?

But she thought of:

Aoi’s smile.

Minami’s blush.

Rika’s texts.

Akari’s complete disregard of personal space.

No.

The evidence outweighed the odds against Kuro.

Her pen touched the page.

Slowly.

Carefully.

She wrote:

Kuro Kurogane.

Underneath she added:

Status: Very Suspicious.

She stopped;

Thought for a moment.

And then wrote:

Possible Playboy Tendencies.

Once again, she paused.

Then she added:

Surrounded by Numerous Women (aka, Female Students).

Once again, she paused.

Then added needs to be Watched.

Minami stared at the finished entry.

Happy.

Professional.

Professional.

Correct.

Everything that any good educator should be doing.

However, unknown to Kuro, he was currently being under surveillance .

And at home, he couldn’t help but sneeze while doing some homework.

Akari promptly pointed at him in order to draw his attention to her.

Someone is talking about you.

Hopefully it’s something nice.

That’s never happened.

Fair point.

Aoi quietly passes Kuro the box of tissues.

And somewhere far across town, Minami Asakura was closing her planner with a serious expression, determined, convinced.

Each day she felt more sure she had discovered a fact.

Kuro Kurogane is a dangerous guy,

not because he breaks the rules,

not because he creates problems,

but because, he has a magical ability to attract women to him wherever he happens to be.

And as a responsible educator, she is going to find out how.

Unfortunately for her, Minami’s assignment mission is only going to complicate things for her even more.