Early in the morning, the Parisian sky had just begun to lighten with the first hint of dawn, and the morning mist had not yet completely dispersed. At the entrance of François Dupont High School, a lone, hesitant figure already stood.
Marinette tightly clutched the strap of her pink school bag, her knuckles slightly white from the excessive force.
She looked at the familiar school gate, which she passed through every day. At this moment, in her eyes, that gate resembled the entrance to a court of judgment, filled with an invisible, suffocating pressure.
She didn't dare to go in.
Last night, Tikki, despite its small body, erupted with immense energy, forcefully pulling her back from the brink of collapse.
Just now, it had even acted like an experienced life mentor, giving her several 'precautionary shots'.
"Listen, Marinette! You must go to school as usual today! I already have a plan. As long as today's Akumatized Person appears, your life will return to normal!
And the more you act guilty, the more likely you are to arouse suspicion! Remember, you are Marinette, an ordinary, even somewhat clumsy high school student!
They have no evidence! You just need to be yourself! Understand?!"
She understood the reasoning.
However, as she truly stood there, thinking of the scrutinizing and suspicious eyes she was about to face, and imagining that Jaden might be observing her with a new gaze she couldn't fathom, her legs felt as heavy as lead, unable to take another step forward.
Just as she was about to be swallowed by the surging fear in her heart and turn to flee, a gentle voice, warm like the first ray of morning sun, sounded behind her.
"Marinette? Why aren't you going in?"
Marinette's body suddenly stiffened!
It was Jaden!
She didn't even dare to turn around, only using all her strength to barely manage a smile that was uglier than crying and incredibly stiff, stammering in response: "Ah... Ji... Jaden... Good morning. I... I just... suddenly remembered something, um, something..."
Her stiff smile, almost reaching her ears, looked worse than crying.
Jaden looked at her like this and smiled helplessly and indulgently.
He seemed completely oblivious to her abnormality, merely speaking in an extremely natural tone, as if discussing the weather: "I told you, Alya was just joking. That was just her guess. None of us took it seriously."
His voice was sincere and gentle, every word like a tranquilizer, slowly injecting into Marinette's wildly beating heart.
As he spoke, he naturally reached out, gently yet irresistibly, taking her cold, slightly trembling wrist, which was shaking from nervousness.
"Let's go, class is about to start."
"—!!!"
In that instant, Marinette felt her entire world stop.
All the surrounding noises—the laughter and chatter of her classmates, the distant honking of cars, the rustling of wind through the leaves—all vanished.
All she could feel was the constant, reassuring warmth emanating from their clasped hands. All she could see was his broad back, walking in front of her.
She lowered her head, her gaze fixated on the hand he held tightly.
His hand was large, his fingers long and strong, completely enveloping her small, soft hand in his palm.
The strength from that hand was steady and firm, as if silently telling her: Don't be afraid, I'm here.
Marinette's heart, at that moment, felt as if it had been steeped in warm honey water, both bittersweet and so sweet it was about to melt.
All the fear and anxiety of the entire previous night were, in this moment, washed away by this sudden, gentle protection.
From the school gate to the teaching building, and then to the long corridor leading to the classroom.
Marinette's mind was blank. Her world seemed to have been muted, the laughter and playful shouts of her classmates all becoming a blurred background noise.
All her senses were focused solely on the hand he held firmly. She kept her head down, her blue eyes, which usually sparkled with lively light, now like they were under a spell, staring fixedly, without blinking, at their clasped hands.
His hand... so big, so warm... Her cheeks were so hot they could fry an egg. She could clearly hear her uncooperative heart, like a pile driver, pounding "Thump! Thump!" wildly against her chest, as if it would leap out of her throat the next second.
The moment he let go, Marinette's palm still retained his lingering warmth. She returned to her seat somewhat disoriented, feeling as if she were walking on clouds, light and airy.
However, this sweet, unreal sense of happiness did not last long.
The moment she sat down, she felt her breath, which she had held due to extreme tension, finally release.
She gasped for air, feeling like a suffocating fish just thrown back into the water.
Jaden, meanwhile, acted as if nothing had happened, returning to his seat in the last row and settling down leisurely.
When the class bell rang and Teacher Caline walked into the classroom, she immediately felt an... an indescribable atmosphere, full of strange observation!
She could feel the gazes from all directions behind her, like countless fine, invisible threads, tightly enveloping her whole being!
She could feel Alya next to her, pretending to read, but her eyes, sparkling behind those black-rimmed glasses, were secretly observing her.
She could feel Chloé, diagonally behind her, looking her up and down with an expression full of disdain and contempt.
She could even feel that almost all the classmates were, from time to time, glancing in her direction with seemingly casual but actually scrutinizing eyes. She dared not turn around, only keeping her back perfectly straight, pretending to listen attentively to the lesson.
But she felt like a specimen placed under a microscope, every subtle movement, every unintentional breath, being meticulously observed and analyzed.
This feeling made her feel like she was sitting on pins and needles, with thorns in her back.
Finally, class ended with great difficulty.
"Uh... Teacher, I'm going to the restroom!" Marinette stood up from her seat the instant the dismissal bell rang, making an excuse, wanting to escape this 'observation room' that was suffocating her.
However, she had only walked a few steps out of the classroom door—
"Marinette! Wait for me! I'm going too!" The first to follow was Alya. With a brilliant smile on her face, she intimately hooked Marinette's arm, as if they were just ordinary friends walking together.
"Oh! Marinette, your new hair clip is so pretty! Where did you buy it?" Close behind was the always sweet and cute Rose.
"..." Juleka, dressed in gothic style, silently followed behind them, like a quiet, dark shadow.
"Uh... Marinette... You... your complexion today looks... not so good..." The timid Mylène also quietly followed.
Suddenly, a 'companion squad' composed of four girls from the class thus 'naturally' formed.
Along the way, they chattered about all sorts of topics. From the latest fashion magazines to movies showing over the weekend, and new dishes in the school cafeteria... Everything seemed so normal, so harmonious.
But Marinette felt as if every step she took was on the sharp edge of a knife!
She knew! She knew everything!
Alya's seemingly unintentional glance that swept over her earlobe!
Rose's seemingly casual gaze, yet always trying to observe her walking posture!
Juleka's silent, yet scrutinizing stare!
They... they were all doing it on purpose!
Marinette felt like she was going crazy! Now, more than ever before, she desperately awaited the appearance of an Akumatized Person!
Come on! Hawk Moth! Just akumatize anyone! Even a primary school student crying because they didn't finish their homework would do!
Hurry! Appear quickly! As long as an Akumatized Person appears, as long as Tikki's... plan works, then she can be completely freed from this terrifying, suffocating surveillance!
And after they left, the classroom also had its own undercurrents.
Chloé, almost the instant Marinette left, immediately moved from her own seat to the empty one next to Jaden. She unceremoniously wrapped her arms tightly around Jaden's arm, resting her head intimately on his shoulder, speaking in a coquettish tone filled with grievance and lingering fear:
"Jaden~~" She shook Jaden's arm gently with a cloyingly sweet, coquettish voice, almost pressing her entire body against him, "Do you know? A few days ago, when you were frozen by that crazy woman, I... I was really so scared!"
As she spoke, she exaggeratedly dabbed at the corners of her tearless eyes with a handkerchief, her face showing a pitiful, almost-crying expression.
"I was thinking at the time, if anything happened to you, I... I wouldn't know what to do..."
Jaden looked at her slightly exaggerated performance, finding it somewhat amusing, but his face still maintained that gentle, reassuring expression.
He reached out and gently patted the back of her hand, which was clutching his arm.
"It's okay, it's all over," he gently comforted, "See, I'm fine now, aren't I?"
Receiving such gentle treatment from him, Chloé's lips immediately curved into a triumphant, smug smile, like a victor.
Behind her, Sabrina watched it all with eyes full of envy.
Not far away, Adrien watched Chloé's exquisite 'performance,' comparable to an Oscar-winning actress, and couldn't help but twitch his lips slightly.
He had actually tried to sound out Plagg last night.
"Hey, Plagg. You say... Ladybug, who could she possibly be?"
At that time, Plagg was sprawled out on a large camembert cheese, eating with her mouth greasy. It couldn't even bother to lift its eyelids, only vaguely replying: "I don't know... How would I know such a thing... Don't bother me... Let me enjoy my cheese..."
Adrien knew it was lying.
Kwamis cannot hide their owners' true identities from each other.
It didn't say because it was a secret that absolutely could not be revealed.
But this also indirectly confirmed his suspicion. Ladybug was among them. And, there was a high probability that it was... Marinette.
So at this moment, looking at Chloé embracing Jaden in 'heartbroken' despair, and thinking of Marinette, who was being monitored by the entire class and enduring immense pressure, Adrien's mood became incredibly complex.
Kim, on the other hand, looked utterly disheartened. He watched his 'goddess' cling to another man's arm like an octopus, and his heart also 'shattered' along with Chloé's 'performance'.
"Bro, stop looking," Max patted his shoulder, calmly analyzing, "From a genetic and social class perspective, you and she are not from the same world. Give up."
"Yo! Exactly!" Nino also patted his shoulder, comforting him, "There are plenty of fish in the sea! Why pine for just one flower! Check it out!"
Kim thought about it. It seemed… that was indeed the logic. His broken heart, miraculously, seemed to heal a little.
Meanwhile, Nathan and Marc walked together to Jaden's desk.
"Um… Jaden," the gentle Nathan asked with some uncertainty, "Do you think… our 'tracking' like this… will really work?"
Jaden looked up, glanced at them, and a gentle, inscrutable smile appeared on his face.
"I'm not sure either," he said slowly, his voice not loud, but clearly reaching the ears of everyone eavesdropping in the classroom, "But we can make a simple assumption, can't we?"
"If, the next time an Akumatized Person appears…"
"Marinette is still with us. Then it proves that she is not Ladybug.
Alya's guess will also be completely disproven."
Just as Jaden's words, like a final judgment, fell, putting a temporary, suspenseful pause to this "campus hearing" about Marinette's identity—
"Coo—coo—"
A familiar, gentle yet strangely penetrating pigeon coo suddenly came from outside the window.
The sound wasn't loud, but it seemed to have magic, instantly overriding all the noise on campus, clearly drilling into everyone's ears.
Everyone's movements froze at this moment, slowly, almost numbly turning to look out the window.
They saw a surreal and absurd scene unfolding above the school courtyard: Mr. Pigeon, also known as the familiar "Mr. Pigeon," sat on a "living throne" made of hundreds of pigeons tightly arranged.
The pigeons' feathers shimmered with iridescence in the sunlight, their wings vibrated at high speed, and their flight path was as stable as if precisely programmed, steadily holding their beloved "king" suspended in mid-air.
Unlike his aggressive, domineering appearance during his last Akumatization, this time he didn't utter a single threat, nor did he command his "subjects" to cause destruction; he just floated there quietly.
His eyes, always a bit neurotic, looked through the classroom window at Jaden in the back row with anticipation and pleading.
His appearance was less like a crisis alert and more like a carefully choreographed, slightly comical plea for help ritual.
After that thrilling Akumatization a few weeks ago, Mr. Pigeon initially thought he would become the laughingstock of all Paris, condemned by everyone.
But when he nervously watched the live stream recording online, the comment section was surprisingly full of "So cool!"
"The voice of the Abyss Knight is awesome!" praises.
Consequently, people's malice and controversy towards his pigeons also inexplicably decreased significantly.
What made him even more ecstatic was that Mayor Bourgeois, whether to appease him or genuinely believing he had the talent, actually gave him a job—a formal bird keeper in the park.
He finally had a stable income, and his pigeons had a warm, legal home.
But good times didn't last. Recently, Akumatized Persons appeared more and more frequently, and people's strained nerves became fragile again. Fear and disgust for all "abnormalities" once again shifted to the ubiquitous pigeons.
Chasing, cursing, even malicious harm… Mr. Pigeon's already sensitive and fragile heart cracked open again amidst the daily negative emotions.
And Hawk Moth, like the most patient vulture, accurately captured this negative energy full of grievance and helplessness.
"Hello, we meet again, Mr. Pigeon," Hawk Moth's voice, like a venomous snake, echoed in his mind again, "Your subjects are once again suffering injustice. That young man once spoke for you, earning you respect.
Now, go find him, let him help you again, to get justice for you and your subjects."
Hawk Moth restrained all aggression. He knew he couldn't use force against Jaden; he needed an "inducement," a sufficiently peaceful, "reasonable" excuse to lure Jaden out of the safe campus full of observers.
At this moment, Mr. Pigeon's appearance was like a stone thrown into the already turbulent lake of the classroom, instantly stirring up ripples.
The moment Adrien saw the scene outside the window, his eyes narrowed. He almost immediately found a clumsy excuse of "I need to go to the infirmary" and quickly left the classroom.
But at this point, everyone's attention was on the strange sight outside the window and on Jaden, so no one noticed where he went.
"Oh, my goodness, it's him again!" Chloé, clutching Jaden's arm, let out an exaggerated and disgusted groan, not even bothering to look up, burying her face deeper into Jaden's shoulder, "This feathered freak is back again! How many times has this been?
He pulls this stunt every few days these past few weeks, is there something wrong with him! I really want Daddy to issue a mayoral decree right now to kick him and those dirty birds out of Paris!" Her voice was full of the unique arrogance of a young lady, tolerating no rebuttal.
"Exactly, exactly!" Her "loyal follower" Sabrina, beside her, immediately nodded frantically in agreement like a pecking chick, "So annoying! Every time he disturbs the peace of the school!"
The others in the classroom had long lost the tension and fear they felt the first time they saw an Akumatized Person.
After several weeks of "baptism," Mr. Pigeon's regular visits had long ceased to be a sudden crisis, becoming a well-known, peaceful "performance art."
"Yo! Record-breaking challenge, opening again!" Nino whistled, teasing in a rap-like tone, "I bet Ladybug and Cat Noir can handle him in five minutes this time! Anyone placing bets?"
"Your calculation model is wrong, Nino."
Max next to him pushed up his black-rimmed glasses and calmly analyzed, "According to the data from the previous three times, their average solution time was seven minutes and twenty-three seconds.
Considering Mr. Pigeon's 'demands' are different each time, I think this time will be extended by about fifteen percent."
Kim, with a tone of enjoying the spectacle, winked at Jaden: "Hey, Jaden, want to bet this time how many minutes Ladybug and Cat Noir will need to take him down? I guess three minutes!"
"He's here for you again, Jaden." Nathan looked out the window, then at Jaden, who was tightly hugged by Chloé, and said somewhat helplessly, "He seems… to really treat you as some kind of savior."
"This is just like a recurring plot in comics," Marc continued his words, "a recurring, morally ambiguous character who always appears when the protagonist is in trouble or contemplating life, to drive the plot forward."
And Chloé hugged Jaden's arm even tighter, as if it were a priceless treasure, afraid of it being snatched away by the "wild pigeon" outside.
Jaden listened to Chloé's possessive complaints in his ear, and the teasing discussions of his classmates around him, then looked at Mr. Pigeon floating outside the window, gazing at him "affectionately," and felt a deep sense of speechlessness.
Did Mr. Pigeon really cause any substantial disturbance to his life? Not really.
Every time this guy came, he just "cooed" a few words about his recent troubles, then waited for the heroes to purify him.
But this kind of "visit" every few days, like clocking in for work, really made him laugh and cry at the same time.
If this continued, the number of times he was "visited" by Mr. Pigeon would probably exceed the total number of Akumatized Persons released by Hawk Moth, setting a new Paris record.
He raised his other hand with a troubled expression, rubbing his throbbing temples. Seeing his appearance, everyone knew he had no way to deal with this "loyal fan," so they just exchanged smiles and said no more.
And in the girls' restroom on the other side of the teaching building, that extremely penetrating "coo-coo" sound also clearly came in.
Juleka, pretending to wash her hands; Rose, pretending to touch up her makeup; Alya, pretending to fix her hair; Mylène, pretending to have a stomachache—their movements instantly froze!
They were like robots on pause, then simultaneously, they all cast their gaze towards the closed, sole cubicle door at the very end of the corridor—inside, was their "key surveillance target" for today, Marinette, who was "using the restroom."
And at this moment, Marinette in the cubicle, the moment she heard that sound, her blue eyes, which had dimmed due to anxiety, suddenly brightened!
In them, an unprecedented light of excitement burst forth, as if seeing the savior descend!
He's here! He's finally here!
She felt she had never been so excited, so grateful for the appearance of an Akumatized Person!
She even wanted to award Hawk Moth, far across the city, a "Best Assist Award" in her heart!
Thank you! Hawk Moth! You are practically my second parents!
She was so excited she almost jumped on the spot! She quickly covered her mouth, suppressing the cheer that was about to escape, and then, she cast her gaze towards Tikki, who was quietly flying out of her satchel.
She asked with her eyes: What is your plan? Is it now?
Tikki nodded at her, firmly and emphatically.
Meanwhile, in another unoccupied storage room in the teaching building, Adrien was leaning against the wall. His face lacked the usual excitement for battle, instead filled with distress, his mind a tangled mess.
That kiss… Ladybug actually kissed Jaden… Although he later learned through various channels that it seemed to be just an accident, that scene, like a slow-motion replay, played repeatedly and mercilessly in his mind.
His Lady, kissed his best friend.
Jaden was the first and most important friend he made after coming to this school.
It was Jaden who, in a gentle and natural way, helped him integrate into this group that once made him feel out of place; in his life, Jaden was an irreplaceable presence.
And Ladybug, he fell in love with her at first sight the day he became Cat Noir. She was his motivation for fighting, the light he yearned for.
His first friend, and the first girl he might fall in love with.
These two emotions, which should have been beautiful and pure, were now intertwined into a painful, insoluble knot in his heart because of that accidental kiss.
"Ugh…" He irritably ran his fingers through his fluffy, unruly blonde hair.
"I say, are you still bothered by such a small matter?" Plagg's lazy, slightly disdainful voice from the side, "With this time, you might as well think about where to find the best camembert cheese after the battle."
"That's not a small matter, Plagg!" Adrien retorted, "You don't understand!"
"Of course I don't understand your human's complex emotions," Plagg yawned, "I only know that there's an annoying pigeon outside waiting for you to purify it.
So stop overthinking, my hero, dealing with that pigeon first is what you should be doing now."
Plagg's words, though simple and blunt, also enlightened him.
Yes, now was not the time for wild thoughts.
Plagg, transform me!
Cat Noir took a deep breath, forcibly suppressed the chaotic thoughts in his mind, and his eyes once again became sharp and firm.
He agilely leaped from the storage room window, his metal staff instantly extended, supporting him as he swung towards the "Pigeon Throne" circling in the air.