## Chapter 10 – How to Survive in a Flower Bed
I had been watching Vivian for so long, completely lost in thought, that I belatedly realized the area around me had become quite noisy.
I am a tentacle monster whose true nature I haven’t even fully grasped yet.
And I am currently located in a moderately sized flower bed within the grounds of Saint Flansina Academy.
‘How to Survive in a Flower Bed, Chapter 1: [Move Unpredictably.]’
If I don’t give those humans outside any reason to predict my actions, the world will likely continue turning without them ever knowing I exist.
With that in mind, I was about to quickly bend my stem to hide among the other flowers when—
“Wow!! That flower is so pretty!!”
“Should we take a picture?”
“Move back, move back!! Okay!! One! Two! Three! Kyaa! So pretty!!”
“Do I look like a goddess today?”
“Kyaa!! You crazy girl!!”
A chill ran down my spine.
The flower bed, now boasting a large, sunflower-like bloom that had appeared overnight, had unknowingly become a hotspot for female students taking their “shot of a lifetime.”
‘Okay… okay… it’s too early to panic…
Girls are approaching often, so it’s actually… good…?
There’s a next step, so it’ll be fine…!!’
‘How to Survive in a Flower Bed, Chapter 2: [Don’t Judge an Enemy by its Appearance.]’
I had to remind myself that the giggling girls in front of me were not to be underestimated.
According to the information contained in the woman’s memories, Saint Flansina Academy was the top academy in the Kingdom of Groden, located in the center of the Verdini Continent.
Since the Kingdom of Groden was at the heart of the continent, it was not only a hub for knowledge and technology from surrounding countries but also a place where these things were taught.
As such, it was filled with not only nobles from the kingdom but also talented individuals from other countries who came to study abroad.
If there were people with various talents in the world, it was said that only the most talented of them gathered here.
‘Well, half of that is probably nonsense.’
Saying they only gather the best is easier said than done; exceptions always exist.
If you think about it, Vivian was probably the best of those delinquents, which is why she was the boss, but she was still defeated by a newborn tentacle monster like me.
She was forced to drink the nutrient fluid coming from the tentacle stuck in her throat, preventing her from dying, and her whole body became as sensitive as if she were drugged, thanks to the fluid’s effects.
Even now, if I just lightly stroked her nipple with a tentacle, she would convulse and tremble her thighs as if she were going crazy, easily showing an orgasmic reaction.
‘Wait, did I only catch her because it was me…? What’s going on…?
There has always been a basic formula that women are weak to the pleasure given by tentacles, so it can’t be helped that I’m getting confused.
Anyway, back to the main point: these girls in front of me, holding crystal balls and pretending to be pretty and cute, might actually be incredibly powerful.
They might be mages who could turn the flower bed, and even the entire academy, into a sea of fire, or swordsmen who could slice up a tentacle like me in five seconds and mince it into paper-thin slices.
‘I guess I have no choice…’
In that case, there was only one option I could choose.
‘She looks great on camera! The leaves look so good!!’
How to Survive in a Flower Bed, Chapter 3: [Deceive the Opponent Skillfully.]
‘I am a flower… I am a flower…’
Fortunately, because a large and beautiful flower bloomed, like a sunflower, I now looked like a decent flower that could be called ornamental.
“You guys!! You need to get inside!!”
“Hey!! It’s the dean!!”
“We’re going in soon~”
And after a long time of acting like a flower swaying in the breeze, what saved me from the agoraphobia of being surrounded by people, especially girls, was a handsome man who looked to be in his thirties.
Judging from what the girls said, he seemed to be the academy’s dean.
He was apparently on his way back from managing attendance, as he was herding the female students who were still wandering outside back into the building like sheep.
“Why do girls like carrying around crystal balls so much…
Come to think of it, was there a flower like this here…?”
After driving the girls away, he chuckled softly to himself and suddenly began to look up at my towering flower. I flinched and desperately tried to act like a harmless flower.
“The groundskeeper must have brought in a new one.
Ah, Professor Eloise. Good morning.”
At that moment, a figure appeared behind him, and I watched as the man greeted her with a particularly bright expression. Soon after, I heard a mature voice and turned my gaze in that direction.
The woman named Eloise, who had a slightly different feel from the ‘woman’ but looked benevolent in many other ways, gently brushed her gray hair behind her ear as she responded to the man’s greeting.
“Good morning, Dean Edward.
Were you looking at the flower?”
“The girls seemed to like it, so I was just taking a look.
They were taking… pictures.”
But no matter how I thought about it, the atmosphere between these two was quite strange. Why couldn’t they make eye contact and why were they stuttering?
“Oh my… perhaps… with me too… a picture…?”
“O-of course… Hahaha… S-sure…?”
Eloise had taken out a crystal ball from her handbag that looked almost identical to the ones the female students had been carrying earlier.
I was struck by the thought that the fax machine inside the academy’s faculty room would soon be faxing around the neighborhood that those two were dating.
Was it because I had always been an invincible solo soldier who had to watch colleagues engage in office romance without any reaction?
Seeing them acting like that in front of me made me feel strangely twisted.
“Oh my…!! If we get too close, the students will see…”
“I sent them all back, so it should be fine now…
Haha… L-let’s take it quickly, shall we?”
“Ugh… I-I will… take it…? One… Two…”
With a *patsut* sound effect, Eloise quickly put the crystal ball, which flashed with a light less bright than a flash, back into her handbag.
Then, she pursed her lips and looked around, before quickly leaning in and kissing Edward on the cheek as if saying, “Oh well,” and running back towards the building.
Edward, left behind, chuckled softly and followed her, slowly walking towards the building.
‘Why don’t you just brag to the whole neighborhood…’
That’s what I thought, but still, young faculty members in love.
I wanted to cheer on such a sight if possible.
I had always thought so, but that was probably because I thought that if the people around me were in good relationships, I might find a partner someday too.
‘Just a silly thought, though…’
But in the end, the result was that I became a squashed tomato stuck to the asphalt, proving that no matter what I did for others, nothing would come back to me.
Just as I confirmed that the noisy morning routine had finally passed safely and was about to return to my lair to experiment with things I still needed to figure out—
‘Whoa!! You scared me!!’
The girl’s bright lavender eyes, which seemed to hold depth and countless thoughts, and the sorrowful look emanating from them.
The sight of the girl, gently tucking her lavender hair, which suited her eyes, behind her ear as she stood in front of the flower bed and looked towards the building, startled me so much that I almost dropped my leaves.
‘Anne?’
The image of the girl being bullied by the delinquent girls last night came to mind, but her body, which had been so cruelly tormented, no longer showed any major injuries or swelling.
‘It definitely seems like she’s been healed…’
In particular, the disappearance of the bruises and scratches on her cheeks made it impossible not to feel it even more.
“Teacher…”
But most importantly, this scene felt strangely familiar.
It felt like I had seen it somewhere before.
It was like seeing another female colleague who secretly liked the company colleague, watching the well-matched company colleague and his girlfriend with sad eyes.
‘I’ve heard that girls that age sometimes do that…
Does she like that teacher…?’
Anne, who had been looking down at the ground and seemed to be thinking about something for a moment, suddenly turned to look at the flower bed.
‘Eek!!’
When her slightly dark eyes fell on the flower bed where she had collapsed, I nervously twitched my petals and began to carefully observe her actions.
As I watched her become increasingly filled with questions about last night, as if she were recalling what had happened, I also felt a chill run down my spine.
‘Could she have been awake last night…?’
I had definitely seen Anne lower her head, but could she have witnessed me grabbing Vivian, who was trying to kill her, and swallowing her whole?
Should I grab Anne as well? I hesitated because I wasn’t sure, but I was able to breathe a sigh of relief as she turned back and headed towards the building.
‘I need to be careful for a while…’
And so, the large sunflower, which was indoctrinating a female student with a confused consciousness beneath its roots, spent the morning dripping with a liquid that was hard to tell whether it was sweat or dew.
