Classroom of the Elite: Standing Firm in Class A — Chapter 75

Chapter 75: Despicable Wildcat

“I won’t resist anymore! Put me down!”

Ibuki Mio finally broke, her voice betraying a slight, furious tremble.

Her fierce pride lay utterly shattered in the dirt.

The sheer humiliation of being suspended upside down and disciplined like an unruly child burned far worse than any physical pain she had endured.

“That’s more like it. If you had just cooperated from the start, we could have avoided all this trouble, right?”

Kaedehara Tetsu’s lips curved into a satisfied smile when he heard her surrender.

To keep her from face-planting into the soil, he methodically adjusted his grip.

He lowered himself into a slow squat, bringing her upper body closer to the earth.

“Support yourself with your hands on the ground. I’m going to let go of your ankles.”

Ibuki refused to give him the satisfaction of a verbal reply, but she still followed his instructions, bracing her palms against the rough grass.

Only then did Tetsu release the iron grip clamping her legs together.

The moment her body regained its freedom, she twisted her center of gravity, scrambling out of that humiliating, inverted state.

However, just as she planted her feet to stand completely upright, a feral instinct took over.

She suddenly turned her head, lunged forward, and snapped her jaws shut right over the hand that had just released her.

“Hiss…”

Tetsu drew in a sharp breath of pain.

In a flash of reflex, his free hand swung down.

The strike was heavier than any of the previous ones, landing squarely on her rear with a sharp crack.

Ibuki let out a muffled groan, the sudden, stinging impact forcing her jaw open to release her bite.

She stumbled back, finally finding her footing, and spun around to glare at him.

“You really are a wildcat, biting people out of nowhere,” Tetsu remarked dryly.

He shook his injured hand, inspecting the neat, reddened row of teeth marks sinking into his skin.

“Who fights like that?!”

Ibuki furiously wiped the corner of her mouth with the back of her hand, her amber eyes burning with unyielding defiance.

“What do you mean, ‘fights like that’?” Tetsu countered, his tone perfectly level. “What exactly do you call that stunt just now? A sneak attack?”

“Sneak attack my ass! That was a counterattack!” she shrieked. “You absolute pervert! Who touches someone’s butt in the middle of a fight? And you kept hitting it! Do you think you’re training a pet or something?!”

“Training a pet?”

Tetsu raised a single, amused eyebrow. “That analogy is surprisingly apt. After all, disobedient small animals do require appropriate discipline to learn their place.”

“You…”

Ibuki trembled from head to toe, her knuckles turning white as she clenched her fists. “You bastard! I’ll fight you to the death!”

“Hold on.”

Tetsu waved a dismissive hand, entirely unbothered by her murderous aura. “Didn’t you just say you wouldn’t resist? Why are we back to fighting to the death?”

“That’s because you pulled that perverted crap!”

Ibuki’s cheeks were flushed a deep, furious crimson, a volatile mix of absolute rage and lingering embarrassment. “Who grabs their opponent’s butt in a normal street fight?! You weren’t fighting at all; you were just acting like a complete creep!”

“A creep?”

Tetsu seemed genuinely intrigued by the accusation. “I simply used every available avenue to subdue a hostile opponent. In the real world, this is known as psychological warfare.”

“Psychological warfare my foot!”

Ibuki was on the verge of tearing her own hair out at his twisted logic. “What kind of psychological warfare involves spanking someone?! Do you think I’m a three-year-old?!”

“It was a strike, not a grope. And the effect was obvious, wasn’t it? You did, in fact, stop resisting.”

Tetsu corrected her phrasing with a perfectly straight face. His clinical, academic demeanor only poured gasoline on the fire of her temper.

“Judging by the results, the tactic was a complete success.”

“Success my ass!”

Ibuki finally exploded, her patience snapping like a dry twig. “You shameless bastard! Today, I’m going to beat you until you’re spitting teeth all over the floor!”

She dropped back into a martial arts stance, shifting her weight. But this time, beneath the blazing anger, her eyes held a sharp, calculating vigilance.

The brief, humiliating exchange had forced a harsh truth upon her: the man standing casually before her possessed a physical prowess far beyond anything she had anticipated.

“Are we really continuing this?”

Tetsu looked at her readied posture, a faint sigh escaping his lips.

“I assumed the lesson I just provided was thorough enough to make you understand the sheer gap in our abilities.”

“Shut up! I won’t be careless this time!”

Ibuki gritted her teeth, her muscles coiling like a spring. “I just underestimated you before. Now, I’m taking you seriously!”

“Seriously?”

“Then you had better be careful. If you lunge at me again, I can’t guarantee I’ll go as easy on you as I just did.”

“Go easy on me?”

Ibuki couldn’t believe her own ears. “You call hanging me upside down and hitting me going easy?!”

“Naturally. Think about it. With you suspended in the air, completely immobilized, what else do you think a man could have done to you in that position?”

Tetsu’s quiet, deliberate words caused Ibuki’s face to flush an entirely new shade of red.

The terrifying reality of his statement crashed into her. She had been completely at his mercy, her body entirely controlled, leaving her in a deeply vulnerable state.

And yet, this man had merely delivered a few humiliating slaps to her rear, crossing no further lines.

“Y-You… you absolute pervert!” she stammered, taking a defensive half-step back.

“A pervert? I consider myself quite the gentleman,” Tetsu replied, his tone dripping with mock innocence. “You were the one who insisted on ambushing me. I merely engaged in self-defense.”

“Pervert!”

“Wildcat.”

“Stop calling me a wildcat, you degenerate!”

“Only wildcats resort to scratching and biting when they lose.”

“That’s because you made the first move and acted like a total creep!”

“It was a tactical strike. And for the record, you initiated the hostility.”

“That was supposed to be a fair and square duel! What you did was a dirty, underhanded trick!”

“In a real fight, as long as it secures victory, any method is a legitimate tactic.”

“Twisted logic! You’re just a pervert trying to justify your twisted logic!”

Amidst the shadows of the small grove, the intense physical confrontation had completely dissolved into an incredibly childish shouting match.

Tetsu maintained his calm, composed facade, parrying her verbal jabs effortlessly, but the endless back-and-forth was beginning to leave his throat dry.

Deciding he had humored her enough, he unilaterally cut the meaningless argument short.

“We’re done here. I’m thirsty. Let’s go get something to drink.”

Without waiting for her permission, he waved a dismissive hand, turned his back on her, and strolled out of the trees.

“Hey! Stop right there! We haven’t decided the winner yet!”

Ibuki snatched her discarded jacket from the grass and hurried after him, unwilling to let him have the last word.

Tetsu ignored her protests, walking at a leisurely pace toward the dormitory building looming in the near distance.

Approaching a glowing row of vending machines, he pulled his student ID terminal from his pocket and tapped it against the sensor pad.

He tapped the screen, selecting a standard bottle of mineral water.

With a heavy thud, the plastic bottle dropped into the retrieval slot.

He bent down, retrieved the drink, twisted the cap off with a sharp crack, and tilted his head back, taking a long, refreshing gulp.

Ibuki stood a few paces away, her chest still heaving slightly as she watched him drink.

Her own throat felt like sandpaper, parched from the exertion and the yelling, but her damned, stubborn pride chained her to the spot. She refused to mimic the man who had just humiliated her.

Tetsu lowered the bottle, casually screwed the cap back on, and cast a sidelong glance in her direction.

“Not buying anything? You look like you’re about to drop dead from dehydration.”

Ibuki let out a cold, haughty snort and sharply turned her head away, refusing to meet his eyes.

Tetsu didn’t press the issue. He simply leaned his shoulder against the humming machine, his dark gaze drifting toward the empty, moonlit path in the distance as if admiring the quiet campus scenery.

A few agonizing minutes ticked by. Ultimately, Ibuki’s physiological limits won out over her ego.

She marched over to the adjacent vending machine, whipped out her own terminal, and aggressively purchased a bottle of cold oolong tea.

Clunk.

She snatched the heavy bottle from the slot, twisted the cap off in silence, and leaned her back against the cool metal chassis of the machine, drinking deeply to soothe her burning throat.

They stood barely two meters apart in the quiet night, neither of them speaking a word.

The heavy, aggressive tension from their fight slowly morphed into something far more subtle, a quiet, strange equilibrium.

Despite her best efforts, Ibuki’s gaze uncontrollably darted toward the man standing beside her.

He just leaned there, his profile cast in the pale glow of the streetlamps, his indifferent face betraying absolutely zero emotion.

Yet, beneath that deceptively slender, unassuming exterior lay a terrifying physical strength, a strength that had just suppressed her with humiliating ease.

Her pride still burned; she simply couldn’t accept such a crushing defeat.

Taking a few more sips of the bitter tea to fully moisten her throat, Ibuki finally made her decision.

She pushed off the machine, standing up straight, and turned to face him directly.

“Give me your contact information.”

Her tone carried the sharp edge of a command rather than a request.

“Oh?” Tetsu slowly turned his head, a faint, teasing smirk playing at the corners of his lips. “You lost, you’re unsatisfied, and now you’re planning to approach me from a different angle?”

He let the silence stretch for a beat before drawing out his words. “Could it be… you’ve actually fallen for me?”

“Huh?! Are you out of your damn mind?!”

Ibuki bristled instantly, her reaction as explosive as a stray cat getting its tail stepped on. “Who would ever fall for a pervert like you! Don’t flatter yourself!”

“Then why demand my contact info?” Tetsu asked, his tone laced with dry amusement. “You aren’t planning to invite me out for afternoon tea and a pleasant chat, are you?”

“I… I’m…”

Ibuki stammered, temporarily choked by his flawless counter.

“I want it so I can track you down faster the next time I challenge you! That way, you can’t just run off and hide where I can’t find you!”

“Just for fighting?” Tetsu pressed, raising an eyebrow.

“O-Of course! What the hell else would it be for?!”

Ibuki’s voice spiked a few octaves higher, practically shouting to emphasize the absolute truthfulness of her excuse.

“Alright.”

To her immense surprise, Tetsu didn’t push the issue any further.

He simply nodded, pulled his terminal back out, and pulled up his profile’s QR code. “Scan it.”

Ibuki blinked, momentarily stunned. She hadn’t expected him to be so straightforward after all that teasing.

Recovering quickly, she brought up her own screen and scanned the code, sending the friend request.

Tetsu’s terminal chimed, and he instantly accepted the verification.

Tapping her screen with aggressive, rapid strikes, Ibuki immediately changed his display name in her contacts. She typed out two words: Perverted Bastard.

Satisfied with her petty revenge, she shoved the device back into her pocket.

“Alright, just you wait,” she sneered, pointing a finger at his chest. “Next time… next time I’ll definitely beat you until you’re spitting teeth!”

Having laid down her final, harsh threat, she grabbed her half-finished bottle of oolong tea, spun on her heel, and stormed off into the night.

Tetsu stood by the vending machines, quietly watching her fierce, retreating silhouette disappear down the path.

Once she was out of sight, he looked down at the newly added contact glowing on his screen.

With a few casual taps, he changed her display name to a single word.

Wildcat.

A faint smile touched his lips. He slipped the terminal away, drained the last drop of water from his bottle, and tossed it. The plastic spun through the air, landing perfectly in the recycling bin a few meters away with a hollow, satisfying clatter.