WebNovels

Chapter 16 - Wow, Teacher?

Just then, a quiet clatter echoed as an extremely sharply sharpened HB pencil rolled accurately to a stop right by Hawk's shoe.

A delicate hand with clearly defined knuckles and smooth skin reached down to pick it up.

"Sorry," the voice was cool and clear, carrying a slight Asian lilt.

The owner of the hand stood up. She was an East Asian girl. A cascade of lustrous black hair fell to her waist, framing a face as fine as porcelain. Her figure was perfectly proportioned, draped in a well-tailored dark green knitted dress that showed off smooth, subtle curves. It wasn't ostentatious, yet it exuded a reserved but deadly allure. Her eyes were large, slightly upturned at the corners, with pupils of deep amber. They were focused on Hawk, her long lashes resting like butterfly wings—a look of breathless innocence mixed with curiosity.

"It's fine." Hawk's gaze lingered on her face for a moment, then he politely stepped aside, giving her room to pass through the narrow aisle.

The girl nodded slightly, a nearly imperceptible curve playing on her lips. "I'm Miu, Kobayashi Miu. I'm new." Her voice remained cool, but the final syllable held a faint, almost teasing hook. As she bent to retrieve the pencil, her soft hair slid like silk, and a faint, sweet scent of gardenia drifted to Hawk's nose.

"Hello, Miu. Welcome to Columbia," Hawk offered a polite smile.

"Hello, Hawk-san. Could you take a look at this model for me? I thought your understanding of liquidity was super cool." Miyu picked up the pencil and rubbed her hands nervously in front of her, her eyes holding just the right amount of intellectual curiosity and a trace of subtle probing.

Hawk raised an eyebrow at her. "'Super cool'? That's a new review. But liquidity itself isn't cool; the key is how you make it flow for you." He chuckled, looking at an economic model on Miyu's laptop screen, and began to explain it.

The rest of the morning, Hawk felt like he'd stumbled into a garden of "campus beauties."

Around a corner in the hallway, he "ran into" Samantha, a Black girl with healthy, tanned skin and a figure as fiery as a Victoria's Secret angel. She looked up, her face strikingly beautiful, her smile highly infectious. She confidently engaged Hawk in a discussion about the potential of emerging markets. Hawk patiently responded, but his distant attitude left Samantha visibly disappointed. She was certainly beautiful, but sadly, there weren't many Black girls who could make Hawk raise his head, unless there was no other choice.

On the stone steps, a tall, red-haired girl in tight jeans and knee-high boots—Abby—struggled to carry a heavy box full of thick economics textbooks. The exaggerated curves outlined by her strained jeans and the full bosom that nearly popped her shirt buttons jiggled with her "effort," exuding an undisguised, raw allure.

The ever-helpful Hawk naturally assisted Abby by carrying her heavy box of books all the way to her dorm. He then spent two hours explaining classical German economics to her. As he left, Abby gave him a look of ecstatic bliss and murmured, "Hawk… classical economics… you really delve deep into it…"

After avoiding everyone to leave the women's dormitory, he passed an outdoor seating area at a coffee shop.

A mature woman with a sharp, mysterious air, wearing a tailored trench coat, cast a strange, appraising, and interested look at him over her coffee cup. She was entirely encased in a perfectly cut black trench coat, revealing only a sliver of a slender, pale ankle. Deep chestnut curls tumbled casually over her shoulders, obscuring half her face and leaving visible only a perfectly sculpted jawline and a pair of cold, gray-blue eyes like an icy lake. She held a slender cigarette between her fingers, the smoke blurring her outline but adding a layer of mysterious danger.

As Hawk passed, her ice-lake eyes lazily lifted. "Hawk?"

Hawk stopped, turning to meet her gaze. His eyes widened slightly in surprise. Isn't this Mera, the Queen of the Sea? The one who defecated in the bed?

"Hello, may I ask who you are?" Hawk was inwardly bewildered but outwardly polite.

"Vivian. I'm the new Actuarial Science instructor. You're the most famous student in the Economics Department—and perhaps the whole of Columbia—so of course I had to pay a visit." Vivian gave him a charming smile.

"Wow, Actuarial Science?" Hawk exclaimed, though his internal thought was: Wow, teacher? What incredible arrangement is this from some secret agency? They understand me completely!

Hawk subtly assessed the woman who called herself the "Actuarial Science instructor," Vivian. She was saturated with a lazy yet dangerous aura.

Hawk laughed. "I assumed your first stop would be the Dean's office."

Vivian exhaled a wisp of smoke, her gray-blue eyes flickering behind the rising mist. "The Dean is dreadfully dull. I was more interested in meeting the 'legend' himself first." She paused, tapping her fingers lightly on the coffee cup. "Especially the person who can turn Bates Capital from a 'financial giant' into a 'bankruptcy case study' in less than a month."

Hawk shrugged. "The market is never short of surprises. I just happened to stand on the right side of the trade."

"The 'right' side?" Vivian chuckled, her voice low and husky. "Or did you employ some special methods?"

The air instantly froze for a second. Hawk's expression didn't waver. He leaned forward slightly, lowering his voice. "Professor Vivian, if that's a professional question, I suggest you choose a different case study—after all, carelessly accusing a student isn't good teaching practice."

Vivian didn't immediately reply. Instead, she deliberately extinguished her cigarette and stood up, the hem of her trench coat swaying slightly to reveal the subtle lines of her long legs.

"Don't worry, I'm only hypothesizing." She took a step closer, her red lips almost brushing Hawk's earlobe, her warm breath carrying a faint scent of tobacco. "I'm just curious… how long your 'luck' will last."

With that, she took a half-step back, flashed a knowing smile, and turned to leave, tossing over her shoulder, "You're welcome to attend my class." Her high heels clicked a crisp rhythm on the stone pavement until her figure vanished around the corner.

Hawk stood still, unconsciously rubbing the earlobe that her breath had just touched.

Five people. Hawk silently counted in his mind.

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