Chapter 25

                                    

                                          
Tzuyu's POV
"What were you thinking! Fighting in the middle of the school hallways during lesson time? That is uncalled for, especially from you, Tzuyu," the school's principal, Park Jihyo, exasperated. Her eyebrows scrunched in frustration.
Jihyo was my older cousin by 15 years on my mother's side. Despite our large age gap, we were close, or at least as close as a young adult can be with a child. Whenever her mother came to visit, Jihyo tagged along and played along with my antics. Jihyo was someone I secretly looked up to as a child and still do, not that I would ever admit it to her face. She was impartial and fair, which were likely some of the reasons why mother decided to appoint Jihyo as the Head of the school, right as I started attending Seoul High School after she bought out the largest share of the school.
The previous largest shareholder, who was also the ex-principal, was embezzling funds from the school to fund his gambling addiction. His addiction spiralled out of control, causing him to go into debt. He even went so far as to borrow money from shady money launderers, which he promptly lost. In a last-ditch effort to get the money launderers off his back, he sold all his shares for a price lower than market share to mother, whose contact he somehow had despite never meeting her before.
Mother was apprehensive at first, but decided to buy his shares. She completely uprooted any remaining underlying corruption in the school. In the process of her deep cleaning of the remaining embezzling pests, she had to kick out a few shareholders, through not-so-savory methods she never disclosed to me.
All corruption and negative press were kept on the low, away from the media. Mother didn't want to have a whole PR nightmare after all she had done to clean the money-grubbing pests. Seoul High School was only at its highly prestigious level due to mother's efforts.
I remained silent, my head down as I nervously looked at my fingers clasped together, feeling my palms getting clammy with sweat. I was in the principal's office with the guy I fought, whose name I found out was Yuta, when Jihyo said his name while reprimanding him. 
"She was the one who punched me first!" Yuta defended, his words were muffled due to his neck brace and several missing teeth that I may have knocked out. 
Yuta was barely recognisable, his face covered in bandages, barely any skin was visible on his face and there were small holes cut for his eyes, nose and mouth. His right arm was also in a sling that looped around his neck brace.
It was a sight I wasn't particularly proud of causing.
"He started it first! He was talking shit about my mother, Ms Minatozaki and Ms Kim!" I defended back, my head whipping around to glare at him.
"It doesn't matter who started it first. What matters is that the two of you got into a physical altercation and even knocked out a teacher in the process!" She slammed her hands onto the table, looking enraged as she burst up from her seat, glaring at us like we killed her dog or something.
I wasn't one to cower in the presence of higher authority, especially Jihyo, who was always nothing but smiles ever since I've known her.
But this Jihyo was not the same Jihyo who gave me piggyback rides around the living room as I pretended I was an airplane when I was 4.
As much as she scared and intimidated me right now, I was also slightly happy that she didn't care about our family ties or my social status and didn't give me any preferential treatment. She treated me like a regular student and didn't put me on a high pedestal like most of my teachers would. Only a few teachers treated me like a normal student and that included Ms Minatozaki.
I wonder how she's feeling. 
According to Chaeyoung, Ms Minatozaki hadn't been in class ever since the fight, leaving Ms Kim to take over. I wanted to reach out to Ms Minatozaki first, to apologise and check on her wellbeing.