He wouldn't stop staring at her. Emery wasn't sure what to make of the emperor. His eyes never wavered from her face. He was too serious.

But what to do? When she had realized her student handbook was gone, it had already been missing a few days. She didn't use the student card all that often as she always packed her own lunch. No one had turned it into the office, so Emery had resigned herself to paying for the replacement fee. The emperor probably had kept her student handbook after he learned her secret so he could decide the best thing to extort from her.

The only problem being, she didn't have anything of value.

He surprised her by asking instead why she hid her power. Though she supposed anyone would be curious.

Emery sighed. "I'm not really trying to hide my power..."

"You never use it." He didn't look at her with accusation. He was merely stating a fact.

"I don't need to."

At this the emperor's face turned incredulous. "Don't need to?"

Emery nodded. She didn't feel the need to elaborate. She could explain it all to him, but she didn't know the emperor.

"That arrogance proves you deserve your S rating." The emperor's lips showed a slight smile. The ice-cold emperor was... smiling? The emperor who was famous for never looking happy or pleased, that emperor? She felt herself growing a little flustered. He was handsome to begin with, but when he smiled, she thought even she might become one of his fans.

"What do you mean?" Emery didn't consider herself arrogant. She thought she was pretty humble, in fact. Even when the other students called her trash for never using her power, she didn't argue at all. She reminded herself to sound a little angry, though she was distracted by his sudden smile.

"If a mouse bites a tiger, would the tiger care?"

Emery waited for him to continue before realizing he wanted her answer. "No."

The emperor nodded. "No matter how the mouse tries, it will never kill the tiger. But the tiger can kill the mouse without any effort." The emperor pointed at her. "You are the tiger." He gestured towards the school below them. "They are the mice."

She knew his "they" probably referred to the students who bullied her. When he put it that way, she really did seem arrogant. Emery didn't like this weird conversation. She wasn't sure where it was going.

"What do you want from me?" She caught herself glaring at him. If Alora knew she had glared at the emperor, she would faint.

The emperor's face didn't change at all. "I want you."

Emery felt her entire body freeze. "T-That, could you please explain?"

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"The emperor confessed to you?"

Emery slapped her hand over Alora's mouth and glanced around. Luckily no one seemed to notice them. The class was supposed to be doing a self study period, but this was class 6. The teacher had long left for the staff room.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

"I don't think he was confessing."

"We're talking about the emperor right? That emperor? The great emperor?" Alora's eyes were bigger than saucers. Emery kept shaking her head helplessly.

"Emperor?" Alora and Emery both jerked their heads around at the sound of Ivan's voice. "Are you talking about Jun Park?"

So his name is Jun... Though she hadn't had occasion to say his name, Emery knew she couldn't keep thinking of him as "emperor" and she definitely couldn't call him that to his face.

"Right, that emperor." Alora turned back to Emery.

Emery sighed. "Like I said, I don't think that's what he meant."

"But he definitely said it."

"Said what?" Ivan looked between Emery and Alora, who made a shooing motion at him.

"This is girl talk."

"No it isn't." Emery turned to Ivan. "The emperor... I mean, Jun called me out to talk during lunch."

"THAT top student Jun?"

Emery nodded. "Yes."

"Why would the top student look for the lowest student?"

"That's what I want to know!" Alora and Ivan shared a look. Emery gestured for them to come in close. They lowered their heads together.

"I think he's trying to blackmail me," Emery whispered.

Alora and Ivan looked at each other before they both burst out laughing.

"That's even more impossible than him confessing," Alora gasped between laughs.

"C-Confessing?" Ivan sobered and jerked his head at Emery. "What did you and Jun talk about?"

"I'm being serious..." Emery pouted. "He found out one of my secrets and then he said, 'I want you'."

Alora placed one of her hands on Emery's shoulder. "He wants you for your body."

"I didn't think our top student would also realize our flower's charm..." Ivan muttered. Alora hit him on the shoulder.

"What realizing her charm? He's probably wanting to use her for his practice."

Emery nodded. "That's what I'm afraid of."

"P-Practice?" Ivan's hair was beginning to let off a wisp of steam. Alora jabbed him with her pencil.

"A human punching bag, pervert!"

"I'm supposed to meet him after school." Emery dropped her head onto her desk.

"You can't!" Alora grabbed Emery's arm and shook her slightly.

"But I already told him I would meet him. In my jersey."

Ivan and Alora exchanged looks.

"What secret of yours did he get ahold of?" Alora blushed lightly. "...Does he have an embarrassing picture of you?"

Emery shook her head. "It's nothing bad. It's just something inconvenient."

"More inconvenient than being the emperor's personal punching bag?"

Ivan smoothed his hand over Emery's hair. "I'll come with you."

She raised her head and smiled. "Thanks, Ivan. But I don't want you to get caught as a punching bag, too. I'll just have to convince him I'm useless and make him let me go!"

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"How is rank in the school decided?"

Roy could practically feel the tears welling in his eyes. Jun sat across from him with his body leaned back and his arms folded. Completely the stance of someone who was making himself comfortable and had no plans of moving.

It was self study right now, but this was class 1. The teacher trusted the students to be self-disciplined and had long left for the staff room. So then why was Jun sitting across from Roy when he was supposed to be helping the cute girls in his class learn the points from last class? His precious classmates were shooting nervous glances his way. See? See? They were all too nervous of this great being to approach. Roy didn't want to teach another guy!

"Why do you want to know about ranks?"

"They don't make sense."

"Huh?" Roy blinked uncomprehendingly at Jun. "How do they not make sense? You're ranked number one because of 「CROW」. You're the strongest."

Jun shook his head. "What if I'm not?"

Roy stared at Jun. Was he having a crisis? Did he need to absolutely and completely defeat someone every week so he remembered how overwhelmingly strong he was?

"You are, without a doubt, the strongest student in this school. That is how you are rank number one."

"But who decides the ranks?"

Roy tried to contain his tears. He wasn't getting rid of this guy anytime soon. Goodbye, my precious study time!

"It's a board comprised of a handful of teachers, two student representatives, and the principal. I'm one of the student reps, so I know quite a bit about the process, but normally-"

"Tell me."

Roy clenched his teeth. "I can't tell you everything that goes into it for privacy reasons, but we look at everything from the student's academics, physical fitness test results, rating from the power association, to the student's individual powers themselves."

"But what if someone didn't have a power at all?" Jun asked.

"They would immediately be ranked at the bottom." Roy finally started to understand what Jun really wanted to know about. "This is about that girl?"

Jun nodded.

"She doesn't have a power." Roy shrugged. "Regardless of what her records show, as far as the school is concerned, she's powerless."

"But she's not." Jun showed a rare smile.

Roy heard some of his female classmates let out little 'kyaa's at the sight of Jun's smile. He felt his tears turning to blood. After all the work he had done to win them over to his side... Goodbye, my cute classmates!