Luna Nova cafeteria
"Can anyone tell me what in the Nines' names is going on here?"
The whole cafeteria went silent as soon as Diana, flanked by Hannah and Barbara, showed up asking that.
"Kagari got into an argument with Dubois about Shiny Chariot." Avery, who was just hesitating to take her phone out to record the argument, summarized what happened to Diana. "And it kind of escalated from there."
"Shiny Chariot?" Diana raised her eyebrows upon hearing the name. "As in Chariot Du Nord, the performer and actress from France?"
Akko broke free of Sucy's hold after a few more seconds of struggling. "You know about Chariot?" She turned her attention to Diana. "Then tell this sorry excuse of a witch-" She then pointed at Chloe. "-how awesome Chariot is!"
Chloe didn't take Akko's insult kindly, especially not after taking a plate's worth of mashed potato to the face. The French bully had to be held back by her Coven mates so as to not resume the argument that Diana stopped.
"Kagari Atsuko, is it?" Diana directed her attention to Akko. "Pardon me for indirectly offending you, but I have always believed that Chariot Du Nord is a disgrace to witches and the concept of witchcraft, and nothing will change my opinion on it."
Akko rolled her eyes in reaction. "What...?"
"Magic is supposed to be an art steeped in tradition." Diana explained. "And Chariot's performances were none of it. In fact, she gave everyone the wrong impression in magic altogether."
As Akko widened her eyes at being told that, some of the students spectating the scene began to murmur to each other.
Diana then turned her attention on Chloe. "However, Dubois, I do disagree with the way you conveyed that message to Kagari. That is not the behavior an aristocrat from France, such as you, should have."
Chloe gritted her teeth. "Look who is talking! Aren't you a Scottish aristocrat yourself!"
Hannah and Barbara, who are standing by Diana's side, flinched at that statement, though they retained their smug expression.
Diana crossed her arms in response. "So? Heiresses such as us should never resort to such lowly bullying." She then fired back at Chloe.
Chloe gritted her teeth even more. "Why you- Hannah, Barbara, say something!"
Rather than defending their friend and fellow bully, Hannah and Barbara laughed at her the same way Avery and her Coven mates laughed at Akko back at the Leyline Terminal.
Chloe was at a loss of word on seeing her close friends' traitorous behavior. "Why...?"
"Why, you ask?" Hannah responded smugly. "Because Diana is so much better at everything than you, Chloe."
"She also does everything right on the first try." Barbara said, also smugly. "Especially in class."
"We have decided that we liked Diana better than you." Hannah added. "And so we decided to hang out with her from now on."
"Oh, don't worry, Chloe..." Barbara added in a mocking tone. "You still have your Coven mates, after all."
Akko, who was ignored by both Chloe and Diana, blinked in confusion to the sudden change of topic.
Diana silenced the smug duo by raising her left hand. "Enough, you two. We didn't come here to pick on someone." She told them. "Now, excuse me as I'm having another class in a few minutes..."
Saying that, Diana turned and left the cafeteria by herself.
"Live long and prosper~" Hannah mocked Chloe as she turned to leave the cafeteria.
"You can have fun with Little Lotte and the Chariot Fangirl as much as you want~" Barbara mocked as well. "Of course, you can always find us in our dorm if you liked~"
The smug duo both let out bitchy laughs as they headed for the cafeteria exit.
Chloe, who has all but forgotten about Akko, glared at her friends, or rather, her former friends, as they departed from the scene. The French bully became so enraged that her Coven Mates had to use all their strengths to restrain her.
"TRAITORS!" Chloe furiously yelled out at Hannah and Barbara, as she stomped on the marble floor hard enough to crack it and leave behind a crater. "HOW CAN YOU DO THIS TO ME?! YOU TRAITORS! YOU WILL REGRET THIS!"
The Red Coven, who were standing in the middle of it all, decided to quickly excuse themselves from the cafeteria before the situation with Chloe can become outright explosive.
...
The dormitories
Later that night...
Chloe had spent the rest of the day in the Beige Coven dorm, sobbing about how she lost both her friends and her status as Luna Nova's celebrity student within the first day of the semester. The only people comforting the French celebrity student are her Coven mates.
A crowd of students gathered right outside the Beige Coven dorm as they eavesdropped on the Beige Coven. Most of them were actually celebrating about how Chloe got "knocked down a peg"...
"She kind of deserved it, actually..." Commented Avery who has an ear pressed against the door of the Beige Coven's dorm. "Even if England and Parker were too harsh about it..."
"But now that Hannah and Barbara has ditched Chloe to side with Diana..." Mary expressed her thoughts. "Are they going to corrupt her into another bully? I hope not..."
"Like we have any rights to say that..." Blair reminded her Coven mates. "Remember when we teased Kagari at the Terminal three days ago? I actually felt bad about it afterwards..."
Avery and Mary glanced at Blair after that. The blonde Italian witch does have a point.
Meanwhile, Lotte, poking her head out of the Red Coven dorm, watched in silence the crowd gathered outside the Beige Coven dorm for a bit, before retreating back inside, closing the door silently after that.
"I don't know what's going on with Chloe..." The glasses girl told her Coven mates. "But from how everyone was talking about her right now, she seems to be depressed about what Hannah and Barbara said to her..."
Akko looked up from the Shiny Chariot magazine she is reading right now. "Even if she totally deserved it, I kind of felt bad for her about being betrayed by her friends." She said. "I would never do that, no matter what."
"Yeah. Even I was disgusted by those two." Sucy said, referring to Hannah and Barbara, as she kept her eyes pointed at the potions experiment she is conducting at the moment. "Those two...bitches...aren't even worth being lab rats..."
Akko closed the Shiny Chariot magazine and put it aside. "They actually made Bakugou from My Hero Academia look like a nice person in comparison. Who on earth would want to be friends with them?" She asked a rhetoric question.
The Red Coven's chat is interrupted when they heard the voice of an older woman right outside their dorm, telling the other student witches to get back to their dorms as it is past curfew time. It is followed by the sound of footsteps as the other students did as told.
"That doesn't sound like any one of the professors from today's classes, or even the headmistress..." Akko pointed out.
"But if not them, then who could it be?" Lotte wondered.
Sucy paid no attention as she fixated on her experiment.
That thought is immediately interrupted by the sound of someone knocking on their door. "Excuse me, but is Atsuko Kagari inside?"
Akko froze. Why is an adult woman, who is possibly a Luna Nova professor that she hasn't met yet, looking for her? Could she have gotten into trouble for something?
Lotte opened the door a little bit. "Yes, she's in..." She told whoever is standing outside.
"Then may I come in?" Asked the mystery woman.
"S-sure..." Lotte answered as she opened the door all the way, allowing the mystery woman to enter.
Standing right there is a bespectacled woman with blue hair, wearing the uniform of a Luna Nova professor.
"Did...did I do something wrong? Is it about what happened in the cafeteria at lunch?" Akko nervously asked the professor.
"You must be Atsuko Kagari." She said to Akko. "Don't worry, that isn't what I'm here for." She then joked.
Akko breathed a sigh of relief. As she put her attention on the blue-haired woman standing before her, she can't help but wonder why she seemed so familiar...
"My name is Ursula Callistis, and I will be teaching Fortune Telling classes this semester." The professor introduced herself.
"Ashura...Karisutisu...?" Akko repeated Professor Callistis' name, which came out mangled up by her Japanese accent. "And you teach... Fortune Telling?"
"Yes, of course." Professor Callistis confirmed. She also winced a bit at how her name was mangled up so much that it sounded like something else entirely.
"Um... Professor Callistis?" Lotte approached the blue-haired professor. "I don't recall ever seeing you in the previous semester..."
Professor Callistis turned to address Lotte. "Oh, that's because I just got transferred here." She answered. She then paused as something caught her eye. "Is that... the same staff that Chariot Du Nord used for her performances, such as those with Shiny Arc?"
Hearing the name of the unique staff caused Akko to perk up, as she went and grabbed it. "Yes, of course! It's Shiny Chariot's one and only Shiny Rod!"
As soon as Akko finishes saying that, the sound of a woman groaning can be heard, just like the one in the morning. Although the Japanese girl and her Coven mates missed it this time.
Professor Callistis, on the other hand, seemed to have heard the disembodied groan, and smiled in response to it. "I see..." She pretended to be reacting to Akko's excitement.
"Akko sure is a Shiny Chariot fan..." Lotte explained to the professor.
"Although..." Akko immediately noticed something else. "How did you know, at first glance, that this is the real Shiny Rod and not a licensed toy?"
That made Professor Callistis take a step back. In her fixation on having a conversation with Akko, she has forgotten to be discreet about her actual objective...
"Could it be that..." Akko trailed off, as she observed the professor a little bit closer.
Professor Callistis gulped, a behavior that Lotte, who noticed, found confusing.
"You're a Shiny Chariot fan too?!" Akko concluded excitedly.
What...? Professor Callistis thought as she stood there, motionless due to being amazed by the conclusion that the Japanese girl came to.
"It has to be!" Akko continued as she closed in on Professor Callistis. Too close for the professor's comfort, in fact. "Only a true Chariot fan can recognize the real Shiny Rod from convincing replicas with just a glance!"
Professor Callistis gently pushed Akko back to give herself some breathing space. "They do, huh? My si- *Ahem* Her sincerest fans must've had too much time on their hands, training themselves to do it. In any case, yes, I'm a fan of hers too..."
Akko jumped in joy upon hearing it. "Yay! I knew I'm not the only Chariot fan in Luna Nova! You've just proved Chloe wrong!"
Chloe, as in that girl from the prestigious Dubois family of France? Professor Callistis wondered.
Lotte walked up and put herself next to Professor Callistis and Akko. "Professor, why are you here, anyway?" She asked.
The professor paused for a bit before answering, "Well, to be honest, I heard rumors that one Atsuko Kagari is in possession of a Shiny Rod, so my curiosity made me come to verify it in person." There were brief pauses between some of her words, indicating that she may have came up with it on the fly (Akko didn't notice, while Lotte did but paid no attention to it). "Imagine my surprise to see the Shiny Rod right here." She finished, this time without any pauses.
That got the attention of, of all people, Sucy. "A professor took the effort to come see a student in person...just to confirm that said student has the same idol as she does?" The puce-haired girl scoffed. "I don't even know what to make of this..."
Akko ignored what Sucy said, as she maintained her focus on Professor Callistis. "And that, as I say, is a true Shiny Chariot fan!" She happily declared.
"Well, I guess that would be all, Atsuko..." Professor Callistis said as she turned to leave.
"You can call me Akko, professor." Akko told the professor.
"I'll remember that, Akko..." Professor Callistis acknowledged by signing OK with her left hand while she briefly turned back to Akko. "I'll see you again in Fortune Telling class tomorrow. And like Shiny Chariot used to say, a believing heart is your magic."
With that, the blue-haired professor walked out of the Red Coven's dorm, closing the door behind her.
"She's kind of... kind and timid for a Luna Nova professor..." Lotte remarked after that. "At least, compared to Professors Finneran and Badcock..."
It was only a handful of seconds later that the glasses girl found herself caught in yet another crushing hug by Akko.
"Isn't this great?!" Akko said excitedly. "Now I know I won't be the only Shiny Chariot fan in Luna Nova! This will be great! I can, and will definitely tell Chloe and Diana to... how do you westerners say it? Oh right. I will tell those two to stack it up!"
"It's actually 'stick it up'..." Lotte corrected Akko's mispronunciation.
"And once I get the Shiny Rod to work, I can then tell the same thing to Hannah and Barbara, and prove them wrong!" Akko continued her ramblings. "The perfect, just medicine for those two huge jerks!"
At the same time, Sucy went right back to her experiment, as she ignored her Coven mates for the rest of the night...
...
Professor Callistis stood right outside the Red Coven's dorm, with her back against the door.
The blue-haired professor looked down at her feet as she recalled the sight of the Shiny Rod being in Akko's possession.
"What did you see in her, my dear friend?"
OUCH! Even though Chloe just got struck by karma hard, I did it in such a way that'll make you feel sorry for her even if you hated her as much as Star Wars fans hated Jar Jar Binks...
And on top of that, I just made Hannah and Barbara so much worse here than they do in canon. Turns out they don't even care about actually being Chloe's friends, and they ditched her as soon as Diana demonstrated what she can do, and even casually kicked the dog like it was Tuesday for them. And on that note as well, did they side with Diana just for what she can do, with no intention of actually socializing with her? And does that mean they are going to ditch her like they did Chloe when they eventually meet someone better than Diana? Even I shudders at the thought of that...
And hooray for Best Mom's more proper introduction into the story. Of course, we all know who she really is... do we?
"Just remember, a believing heart is your magic..."
Afterwords end here.