Transmigrated into Eroge as the Simp, but I Refuse This Fate-Chapter 196: Langley

"You wound me…."

he said, quieter this time. "Do you really think I do this to anyone?"

She didn't answer, but her glare didn't falter.

He leaned back slightly, eyes still on hers, no smirk now—just something cool, level. "Did you ever see me around others? Even once? Laughing with girls? Touching them like this? Sitting beside them like I sit beside you?"

Isabelle's jaw tightened.

Because no, she hadn't.

He kept to himself more often than not. And if he was talking to someone, it was sharp, transactional, or a rare moment of consequence. He wasn't social. He wasn't flirtatious.

He wasn't like that.

Damien watched her expression shift, just slightly.

Then added, softly, "No. You didn't."

He let the silence hang, then leaned forward once more, picking up another bite of food like nothing had happened.

Damien chewed slowly, swallowed, and let the next words fall into the quiet between them.

"See," he said, voice calm—measured, almost gentler than before, "I'm not hiding anything, Rep. I've shown you my intentions. Pretty clearly, I think."

His eyes didn't move from her. There was no smile this time. No teasing inflection.

"At this point, it's not about what I want anymore. It's about whether you have the courage to look at it… and decide what you want to do with it."

Isabelle froze.

For a long second, her mind scrambled for ground to stand on. She could feel it—her heart thudding louder than it should've been, her grip tightening around the chopsticks she hadn't touched in minutes. There was too much pressure in the room. In her chest.

And he said it so plainly. As if it wasn't even a big deal. As if declaring feelings—intentions—was just another part of lunch.

So she did the only thing she could think to do.

She changed the subject. Abruptly.

"Well," she said, tone clipped and sharp, "I hope you don't make it."

Damien raised a brow, but said nothing.

"I really don't want to deal with this more than I already have," she added, straightening her posture, eyes fixed somewhere deliberately away from him. "So you'd better lose. And when you do, I'll make sure you pay for talking like this."

There was a pause.

Then—

"Oh…" Damien said, drawing the syllable out like a sigh. "How cold."

Isabelle didn't look at him.

Because she knew what her voice sounded like just then. Knew it was too crisp, too forced. Her words were all wrong. Mismatched with the heat rising in her cheeks and the strange, shaky twist low in her stomach.

Because deep down, she knew the truth.

She didn't want him to lose.

Not really.

****

The sun had shifted angles by the time the students returned, casting long bars of afternoon light across the polished floor of Class 4-A. The bell had rung five minutes ago, but no one looked worried—not about tardiness, not about the teacher's absence.

They knew what this period was.

The final class before the week closed out with P.E.

And more importantly, they knew why the air was suddenly heavy again.

The door was open, but the podium remained empty.

No teacher.

Not yet.

Students trickled in, one by one. Some in small clusters. Others alone, quieter than usual. The earlier drama hadn't vanished—it had just buried itself under the surface, waiting. You could feel it in the way voices were muted, glances a little sharper. The usual post-lunch fatigue had been replaced with a different kind of tension.

The kind that came before judgment.

Moren entered next, stiff and clipped, his shoes hitting the tile just a little too hard.

His eyes locked immediately onto Damien—already seated, already settled, one leg crossed loosely over the other, staring out the window like the rest of the world didn't exist.

Moren didn't speak.

He just glared.

Long. Hard.

But it landed like a gust of wind against stone.

Damien didn't even blink.

Didn't shift.

Didn't care.

He didn't need to.

'Staring won't give you a spine,' Damien thought absently, resting his cheek against his knuckles.

The seats slowly filled. A few whispered speculations passed between students, but no one reached for their notebooks. No one asked if they were supposed to start without a teacher.

They all knew better.

It was only a matter of time.

And then—

The door slid open.

Every head turned.

He entered without urgency. Not with swagger, either—just a calm, measured presence that needed no announcement.

The faculty robe, deep slate-gray and lightly creased from the midday heat, caught slightly at his boots. He moved with the kind of authority that didn't come from volume but from inevitability.

In his hand—

A sealed folder.

Thick.

Stiff-backed.

And unmistakably marked with the academy's crest, gold-pressed at the corners.

The results.

The classroom fell into complete silence. Not forced. Not awkward.

Just the hush of students who knew what came next.

Their scores from this morning's exams were in his hand.

And the last period of the week had just become something else entirely.

The teacher stepped forward without a word, his footsteps echoing softly against the tile.

He didn't move with ceremony. He didn't pause to speak.

Just walked to the desk, placed the folder down, and unfastened the seal with the care of someone who had done this a hundred times before.

The flap peeled open with a dry crack.

Then he lifted the stack—thick, neatly clipped results packets—and began moving row by row.

No names called.

No commentary.

Just quiet paper against desk as he dropped each individual report before its respective student, eyes sharp, mouth sealed.

Damien leaned back slightly, watching him move.

One by one, each student received their score.

And with it, the weight.

The packet wasn't just a number. The front page bore your percentile rank, but it was the rest that hit harder. Page after page of analysis—detailed breakdowns of each section, the questions you missed, what answers you picked, what answers you should have picked, with system-calibrated annotations explaining why.

It was surgical.

You couldn't bluff your way through this.

Every gap in knowledge was spotlighted.

Every guess exposed.

The literature section, especially, was brutal—each option accompanied by rationales that made you realize just how close the traps were. Reading through it felt less like feedback and more like being shown the blueprint of your own failure.

Damien's packet dropped onto his desk with a soft thud.

He didn't reach for it right away.

Around him, chairs creaked as pages were flipped, groans muffled behind tense silence. Some students immediately scanned for their overall score—others dove straight into the problem sections.

Whispers followed, low and uneasy.

"…I was sure I got that question right…"

"They marked me off for using that phrasing?"

"Wait, wait—B was the answer? Not C? But…"

Across the room, you could feel the pride peeling away.

Layer by layer.

Moren stared at his own sheet, jaw clenched, eyes darting back and forth like he was trying to will the score higher just by glaring at it.

The girls who'd been smug earlier?

Now deadly quiet.

All three hunched over their packets like they were dissecting their own autopsy.

And Damien?

Still hadn't moved.

He let the paper sit in front of him, untouched.

Not out of fear.

Just timing.

Damien leaned back in his chair just a little more, letting the silence thicken around him before finally shifting his gaze to the side.

Isabelle.

She was looking at him.

Her expression wasn't icy—not exactly. It wasn't neutral either. Just… quietly expectant. As if she was trying not to care, but her eyes betrayed her.

Heh…

A slow, amused smirk tugged at his lips.

She wanted to see.

Not the paper. Not the answers.

Him.

She wanted to know if everything he'd said—everything he claimed, everything she felt but couldn't admit—was real. If he could back it up. If he was the kind of person who could stand at the center of the room and not flinch when judgment came.

Damien shifted his gaze slightly further.

Another pair of eyes.

Victoria.

'Oh, Langley. Are you curious too?'

Of course she was.

After all, she had handed him her notes under pressure. Not exactly blackmail, but close. A dance between favor and threat, edged with leverage. She'd told herself it meant nothing, just a strategy, just self-preservation.

But now?

Now she was watching, same as Isabelle.

Waiting to see what kind of monster she helped sharpen.

Damien didn't move.

Didn't reach for the packet yet.

Let them wait.

Then—Bzzt.

His phone lit up with a soft buzz against the desk.