46 School Maelstrom 3 (1/2)

The next day, yesterday's event became everyone's common gossip material.

Sofony Mendez' sister was bullied, the elder sister slapped the bully to death. Then everyone involved was scolded severely by the teachers and guidance counseling staffs.

It was made into a big issue due to the involved parties... Students were talking about how it all started between a lackey of a campus goddess and a sister of another campus goddess. The matter had been exaggerated in just a few verbal renditions.

Out of concern, Wendy scolded Sofony from morning to after school. She repeatedly stressed that Sofony could have just left the slapping part to her since her image had always been that of a straightforward fierce queen capable of slapping people to death with words and violence. Wendy really grilled Sofony over the fire. Meanwhile, Clea spearheaded the gossipmongers fighting the other side. Apparently, there were people twisting the story to their convenience and their new friend, Clea - as a witness, thus someone indirectly involved - helped out by putting those people in their place .

Throughout this, Sofony could only smile since her new post was to receive the scolding and not talk back, or else Wendy would choke her to death. Her best friend was too much in treating her like a kid who doesn't know how the world rotates.

She could only justify herself within.

What else could she do? Her heart felt so heavy when she saw Steffy bullied like that. Reasons disappeared out of the blue. Consumed by the guilt and anger of not being able to protect the person she vowed to protect, she stepped out and did what she had just done. She didn't think she was that bad, though. She had a reason. As a sister, it was not that wrong to avenge her wronged and beaten up little sibling.

In the first place, that Vienna was the one who started everything, the one not content even after receiving an apology.

Now, everyone else must be scolding and scorning her in their mind. Wendy and friends did out of concern, the rest out of contempt.

'People must be thinking that I am so fake. Well, in a way, it's true... It's just that, why is it so easy for people to judge and jump into conclusions?'

A gloomy sighed escaped from Sofony. Maybe she was just being hypocrite again, praying for people not to think bad of her even after all she had done. It's different today though. Most mouths only care about the slapping part, not the boring reason.

If it were before, all the badmouthing and hurtful criticisms would have driven her already to commit suicide, as her previous self was very concerned about what people think and say about her.

She would be crying all night, musing whether she had been wrong, or heartless. All the thinking would probably make her skip classes and even meals for a week or so.

That's how she used to be, truly weak-hearted.

Sofony shook her head as she entered her apartment with Steffy.

She could already imagine that the coming days would be like this.

'If Gio heard what I did at school...'

As if all oxygen vanished from their house, Sofony couldn't breathe. In actual, she just unknowingly held her breath when this thought dawn on her. For some reason she couldn't name, Sofony didn't want Gio to think of her as a violent and unreasonable girl.

'What if he hates her because what he wanted is a pure and innocent girl?'

'Will he hate me?'

'Are there ways to not let him know how I managed to send someone to the hospital due to my slaps?'

<System: Brain is offline again. So great that you didn't think about this yesterday. And why even bother wondering how he'd react? He's just a sugar-daddy. Do sugar-daddies care what their mistresses or pets do at school? You're overthinking. You're not even seeing him as a romantic interest, but a convenient living and bedding partner. So why care? Are you that mindful of having an innocent and harmless image in his eyes?>

In her mind, she seemed to see something rolling its eyes at her.

Seconds passed. A trembling school girl stood in the middle of the living room without answering the question of the thing in her mind. The atmosphere in the apartment turned inexplicably weird.

Steffy was dropping her bag on the sofa at that time. Her arm and leg wrapped with bandages. She had her back on Sofony's direction and this was the reason why she didn't notice her sister's expression.

Then out of a sudden, a loud scream many decibels higher than a normal shriek came from behind, stunning the heck out of the innocent girl and some neighbors who were quietly enjoying the late afternoon dramas on their TVs.

When Steffy looked back, she was more stunned to see a girl crazily messing with her own hair. Steffy didn't notice that she unknowingly crouched down on the sofa to hide. The poor girl was secretly pondering over if the incident stemming from her made her older sister crazily concerned. She wondered if Sofony was the type of person to worry unhealthily about everyone's opinion.

.....

In the middle of the night, Golden Residences. A man whose body was covered by a long black coat wordlessly stepped out of the elevator. In his left hand was a silver-colored suitcase, his other hand clutching on the phone to his right ear. His authoritative and irritated voice sounded.