Feeling a little bored, Shirakawa Miwa still took the initiative to strike up a conversation with Hikari.

"Hikari-kun, Kyoko-chan actually didn't come to school this afternoon, that's really rare."

"As someone from her class, did Kyoko-chan say anything specific to your classmates about what happened?"

Hikari, fully focused, was looking through the roster, recording each name on it one by one, while casually replying, "I'm not really sure either."

Hearing this, Shirakawa Miwa asked in confusion, "Isn't she your homeroom teacher? I think you still have your class with her later, right? She didn't inform you? And didn't you say earlier that you were looking for Kyoko for something? Why do you seem like you're not in a hurry anymore?"

Hearing Shirakawa Miwa's series of questions, Hikari finally snapped out of it and realized that Tsukishima Kyoko's sudden disappearance this afternoon had caught her attention.

"Uh...", Faced with Shirakawa Miwa's questions, Hikari was actually at a loss for words.

After all, he couldn't exactly tell Shirakawa Miwa that the matter he had with Tsukishima Kyoko had already been completely resolved.

Moreover, something unexpected had even happened, he had stir-fried Tsukishima Kyoko once, leaving her bedridden at home for rest.

Looking at Shirakawa Miwa's large, curious eyes staring straight at him, Hikari had no choice but to open his mouth slightly.

"I think I ran into Teacher Kyoko just before class. She said she wasn't feeling well and went home to rest, and she asked me to tell you and help take a leave of absence for her this afternoon," Hikari thought for a moment and said this to Shirakawa Miwa.

"So Kyoko isn't feeling well and had to take a leave. You! Why didn't you say so earlier! You got asked to do something so important and still forgot, almost made Kyoko miss attendance. When she gets back to school, she's going to scold you to death!", Shirakawa Miwa rolled her eyes at Hikari.

"Hehe...", Hikari gave a helpless smile.

Originally, he didn't want to meddle in this matter. Just as Tsukishima Kyoko had said, it was better to act like nothing happened.

But hearing Shirakawa Miwa's words, it seemed Tsukishima Kyoko had a class this afternoon, then just left without coming to school, without telling anyone or taking official leave.

Thinking about it, Hikari could understand.

After all, something like that unexpectedly happened today, and Tsukishima Kyoko was tormented by him quite a bit.

Now she was probably hurting all over like she was falling apart. Even though her body looked ripe like a mature peach and she was a married woman, Tsukishima Kyoko was severely inexperienced, no different from a maiden.

As a direct participant, he still bore a bit of responsibility.

So Hikari figured it was better to help Tsukishima Kyoko take the leave.

Just as Shirakawa Miwa had said, with Tsukishima Kyoko's usual stern and rigid personality, suddenly disappearing without a word would surely raise suspicion.

And after hearing what Hikari said, Shirakawa Miwa also helped report Tsukishima Kyoko's leave of absence.

She even took out her phone and made a call.

"Hello? Kyoko-chan, why didn't you come to school this afternoon?", The phone rang a few times before connecting, and after hearing the prompt tone, Shirakawa Miwa immediately asked her close friend with concern.

["Uh..."], On the other end of the phone, Tsukishima Kyoko seemed momentarily speechless upon hearing Shirakawa Miwa's voice.

"Why is your voice so hoarse? Like you've been singing karaoke for hours. Are you feeling unwell? Is it very painful?" Shirakawa Miwa asked.

["Miwa... how do you know I'm... not feeling well?"], Tsukishima Kyoko's hoarse voice rasped through the phone.

"Eh, Hikari-kun said so. Didn't you ask him to tell me? He just told me you asked him to pass the message and help take leave for you. Are you so sick you're confused? Should I take a leave too and come take care of you?", Shirakawa Miwa asked with concern and confusion.

["No no!"], Tsukishima Kyoko quickly rejected her close friend's proposal.

["My body's not too bad. I remember now, it was me who asked Hikari-kun to tell you, I understand,"] While rejecting her, Tsukishima Kyoko also replied to Shirakawa Miwa.

Although she hadn't said anything to Hikari earlier, after hearing Shirakawa Miwa's words, Tsukishima Kyoko quickly figured out the situation on the other end of the phone.

After that incident with Hikari in the warehouse today, she was physically and mentally exhausted, her body felt like it was falling apart, and her heart was a chaotic mess.

So she didn't feel like attending class, even forgot to apply for leave.

Originally, skipping school for a day wasn't a big deal.

But she didn't expect Hikari to be so thoughtful.

Despite being exhausted like an old ox plowing fields under the blazing sun for several days, he still saw her to the car, and even remembered to help her ask for leave.

That was... just too considerate.

'Hikari-kun...', Softly murmuring, a warm feeling rose in Tsukishima Kyoko's heart, along with an indescribable emotion.

'Being taken care of by my own student... I'm really failing as a teacher,' Shaking her slightly blushed face, Tsukishima Kyoko's hand again reached into the deep cleavage of her full chest and gently pinched the protective charm Hikari had given her.

"Kyoko-chan, what are you muttering about?", Shirakawa Miwa asked curiously, "Are you really okay?"

["No problem no problem! Help me thank Hikari-kun, thank him... for passing on the message today,"] Tsukishima Kyoko said with a hoarse voice.

"Mhm mhm, got it. Hikari, did you hear that? Your homeroom teacher is thanking you, hehe," Hearing her best friend praise Hikari, Shirakawa Miwa smiled proudly and winked at him.

Hikari, who had been watching the two of them on the phone the whole time, had a strange expression. Especially seeing Shirakawa Miwa's current wink-wink behavior, he really didn't know what to say, he could only show a weird smile.

"Since you're fine, Kyoko, I'm relieved. I'll ask the new math teacher from the neighboring class to substitute for you. That guy's got a bad temper, so if he gives me attitude, Kyoko-chan, you owe me a meal, okay?"

["Okay, thank you, Miwa...",] Tsukishima Kyoko replied with a tone laced with subtle guilt.

After Tsukishima Kyoko agreed, Shirakawa Miwa hung up the call with a happy smile.

After chatting with her best friend, Shirakawa Miwa quietly glanced at Hikari's handsome yet slightly youthful face. Still unaware that someone had beaten her to it, she was just happy her best friend wasn't seriously ill.

"All done?", Shirakawa Miwa asked Hikari with a smile.

"Mm," Hikari nodded and closed the roster in his hand.

After Shirakawa Miwa finished her call, Hikari had finished checking the names of students from all three grades at Osaka High School's upper division. Among them, he found many familiar names, which could be considered some gain.

But among them, he didn't seem to find his original target, the one called Tanaka Hajime.

He didn't know whether that guy hadn't come to school yet, was a student of a different student, or had changed his name.

Oh well, there were too many possibilities. Anything could happen in this world, and he couldn't figure it out for now.

Hikari shook his head and didn't keep dwelling on such useless uncertainties.

Anyway, he had already bound the main heroines related to Tanaka Hajime with pure love warning paper cranes.

If anything happened, he'd quickly find out.

More importantly, just as he walked out of the office, Hikari suddenly remembered something he seemed to have forgotten recently.

It was because he had just seen the names of Miyajima Sakura and Kurashiki Reina in the roster that it occurred to him.

Previously, he had made an appointment with Miss Mira to return home early for dinner, but he ended up being late because of an alert from the abandoned school building behind the school.

When he went to check, he found that Hanako of the Toilet, a rumored urban legend, Hanako, tried to harm Kurashiki Reina.

Although he saved Kurashiki Reina at the time, she was still slightly injured by the vengeful spirit Hanako, and her body was filled with a lot of resentful spirit energy.

Hikari had promised back then that he would help purify Kurashiki Reina later.

But afterward, he only helped her once and didn't completely purify her.

And then he forgot all about it. After all, he had so many things to deal with every day.

Not only did he have to beat up all kinds of minotaur men and uphold the spirit of pure love, but he also had to have deep interactions with many agreed-upon beautiful girls.

Like going to see Yukino and check in on Natsuha on Mondays, visiting Akane on Tuesdays, bringing Ruri and the three gyaru girls home on Wednesdays, escorting the twin princesses of the Sakuramiya sisters on Thursdays to prevent their fights, and on Fridays dragging Yukino, Natsuha, Akane, and the three gyarus into a 3-on-3 match to see who's stronger and more in sync, etc.

Besides that, he had to go back to the Tsubakibara residence every day or every other day to eat with Miss Mira or help stretch with her and bathe together.

All in all, Hikari was extremely busy and fulfilled. Since he wasn't too familiar with Kurashiki Reina and didn't have a great first impression, if she didn't take the initiative, he wasn't very motivated to go to her.

"Wonder how that girl's doing physically now," Hikari pondered.

Although he had removed most of the resentful spirit energy from Kurashiki Reina the first time, that stuff was like a bone-attached tumor, hard to eliminate completely and would always leave some residue. The remaining vengeful spirit energy absolutely wouldn't be fatal.

But for ordinary people, even if it was just a trace of vengeful spirit energy attached to the body, it would easily make people fall ill, catch colds, have fevers, and so on.

Logically speaking, these few days Kurashiki Reina should have been feeling pretty terrible.

But Reina seemed to never have proactively called him to help remove the vengeful spirit energy, and he didn't know why.

Did she find another solution?

In Japan there seemed to be quite a few monks, onmyoji, exorcists and such, and although Kurashiki Reina's family was a single-parent household, it seemed her mother was quite rich.

Because she didn't leave a phone number, Hikari thought for a moment, and casually opened the LINE chat he had with Kurashiki Reina.

After opening the chat with Kurashiki Reina, Hikari then discovered, Kurashiki Reina had actually sent him quite a few messages.

[Monday]

Kurashiki Reina: [Hikari-kun, I finish class a bit early this afternoon. Do you have time to help me exorcise evil and dispel energy? (🫣)]

Hikari: [No time.]

[Tuesday]

Kurashiki Reina: [Hikari-kun, I'm eating lunch at school today. Do you have time to help me exorcise evil and dispel energy? I brought extra bento, can we eat together? (🫣)]

[Wednesday]

Kurashiki Reina: [Hikari-kun, why are you not in class again. Do you have time today? Anytime you're free, I'm fine. Can you help me exorcise evil and dispel energy? (😅)]

Kurashiki Reina: [Hikari-kun...]

Hikari scrolled through these messages one by one, raised his hand to cover his forehead, a bit speechless.

Good grief.

So it wasn't that Kurashiki Reina hadn't contacted him to remove the vengeful spirit energy, but that he himself hadn't noticed.

Aside from the first time he replied to Kurashiki Reina, and later found time to take her to an empty classroom for one session of removing vengeful spirit energy, Hikari hadn't paid her any more attention.

Actually, Hikari really didn't do it on purpose.

It was just that he had met too many girls in the past few weeks.

Because he was previously hunting minotaurs, he had joined too many clubs. Due to his looks, many girls in those clubs frequently harassed him.

Not just the main ones he focused on, like archery club, kendo club, etc. Even some departments he hadn't even participated in had girls har*ssing him, like girls' field hockey club, beach volleyball girls' club, tea ceremony club, game development research club, and even some girls who claimed to be in the "go-home" club came to chat with him.

So aside from important messages from girls he knew well, like Natsuha, Akane and so on, Hikari had ignored many other messages.

And from Natsuha to Yukino to Akane to the Sakuramiya sisters to the three gyaru girls, plus several high school girls at Seika Girls' Academy who needed emotional and physical counseling, he was really busy.

Women, after all, always loved to chat. Even if Hikari talked with just a few a day, it was still very time-consuming, each person chatting a little would take a lot of time, and those chat windows constantly refreshed.

In addition, messages from people like Miss Mira and Yukino were pinned, and later when Natsuha got jealous, Hikari in fairness also pinned the conversations of those beautiful girls with whom he had deep exchanges and romantic bonds, so in a moment of carelessness, he had indeed missed Kurashiki Reina's messages.

Just as Hikari was pondering whether to reply to Kurashiki Reina, she just so happened to send a new message.

Kurashiki Reina: [Hikari-kun, are you free today? I've already had a cold for several days now. Lately I've been feeling really cold, sob sob sob, please help me exorcise evil and dispel energy, I'll do anything, I'm begging you! (😭😭)]

Hikari: [Okay]

———

At this moment, sitting in the classroom, having already been ignored for several days without a response, and unable to find Hikari anywhere, Kurashiki Reina, who was starting to feel numb, had just habitually sent a casual message.

But what she didn't expect was, Hikari actually replied.

Even though Hikari's reply was extremely brief, like gold being worth a thousand words, not even containing punctuation.

But it still made the usually extremely proud, almost disdainful of all the boys in the entire school, queen-like Kurashiki Reina feel ecstatic.

Looking at Kurashiki Reina, who was wearing long sleeves and pants in the middle of a scorching day, even wrapped in a jacket, holding her phone with a silly giggle, her best friend Tsushima Rina couldn't help but ask, "Reina, what are you laughing at?"

"Why are you smiling so disgustingly? You look just like those girls who've fallen in love and are secretly crushing on a boy."

Right now, in a great mood, Kurashiki Reina didn't bother arguing with her bestie's trash talk. Hugging her phone, she smiled and said, "Hikari-kun finally replied to me just now!"

"Hm? You're that happy just because a guy replied to your message? Is it that serious?", Tsushima Rina stared at Kurashiki Reina in disbelief.

She knew her best friend's personality very well, Kurashiki Reina's personality was totally queen-like.

Although she was extremely beautiful, with a perfect figure and face, the type that could work as a part-time model and be a school goddess.



But her personality was terrible, not only did she have queen-like arrogance, she also looked down on men extremely.

She had long said that no guy in the whole school was worthy of her attention, and being with such guys would only ruin her temperament, and so on.

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