Courtier pulled up to Soul international with Kyong in the passenger seat. There was a mob of excited students, and reporters to greet them. Courtier pulled into an empty parking space and switched off the engine, locking the doors before turning to Kyong. “You can do this. You have created apps for goodness sake.” A small smile started up Kyongs face. “You used to be an a-plus student. What happened, boy?” 

“My father happened.” His voice was weak and full of tell.

Courtier sighed, it’s not your fathers fault that your mother died. You know that right? She was sick. Please don't blame him for the rest of your life. He is a good man.” 

“That's debatable.” Kyong bit his lip. Hard. 

“I’ve known your father a long time.” Courier encouraged the conversation to continue, but when Kyong ignored him, he trailed off.

In an effort to change the sudden dark mood that was looming in the car, Courtier rolled down the window a little, to let the scream of the fans in. “They are all here for you. Enjoy them. But also, work hard. Show your father that you can do it. Deep down in there, is the next king. Dragon boy.”

Kyong's smile widened. 

“Between you and me, you would be a better king than your brother. You have spunk. He’s boring.” Courtier chuckled before becoming serious again. “If I hear you repeat that to anyone, I will deny it.”

“Noted.” Kyong saluted him. 

“Now get out there and greet your fans.” Courtier prompted the door of the Jaguar Land Rover to open, pushing Kyong out of it playfully.

Kyong looked back to Courtier. He was driving off now which meant Kyong was all alone to face the mob of people. He was used to it, but he hadn’t been outside in some time, so this was a bit confronting, if he was honest. He stiffened a little as he got closer and plastered on a smile. “It’s Kyong!” the voices grew louder as students pushed and pulled against each other to try and get to him. As he got closer, he looked around for refuge, but didn’t see any willing student ready to save him. Why couldn’t he have been enrolled into Louella’s school? 

He smiled and waved at the crowd enthusiastically, “Thank you all for your support of the royal family.” He greeted. 

“You’re so hot!” A girl yelled back. He tried to make out her face, but was pulled in the opposite direction.

“Hey!” He pulled against it, but saw an older woman, dressed in a suit with her hair pulled back into a tight bun. 

“Kim, Kyong, I’m your first teacher of the day. I thought I would save you from that mob of…” She paused, “Unruly girls.”

He stopped pulling against her and followed her lead. “Thank you.” He murmured. 

She pulled him into a quiet room and gestured for him to take a seat. She leaned against the desk across from where Kyong assumed the students would sit. He sat and looked up at her expectantly. 

“Mr Kim.” She started, narrowing her eyes. “Your father enrolled you rather urgently and we of course accepted, with him being the king.” She paused, her face screwing up like she was pondering how to say something unpleasant. “But we have heard some things. Stories…” 

“Agh.” Kyong nodded toward her, “I know what this is about.”

“Good.” She clasped her hands together, somewhat relieved. “Then I expect that you will be a good student and set a good example for the other students and give them an insight into the royal family.” 

“I intend to show them what the royal family is really like, don’t you worry, mrs…” Kyong looked at her, searching for the name that was not given in the meeting.

“Chae, Veronika.” She looked at him through narrowed eyes. 

“Well, thank you teacher, for this chat, and for saving me from my…” He cleared his throat, “fans.” 

“Agh, yes. No problem. Feel free to stay in this room, as it is now,” She looked at her watch, “Five minutes until the other students will be coming in.”

Kyong nodded, shifting slightly in his chair.

Five minutes later, students started piling in and filling up all of the seats around Kyong. Whispers started as they took him in. He rocked on his chair slightly to hear what they were saying. 

“Why is he even at this school? He's a prince…” one male student said.

“Maybe they couldn’t homeschool him because he’s too stupid.” A girl said in reply and they both laughed. 

Kyong couldn’t sit there listening to this and not defend himself, “I was sent to this peasant school to set an example to you commonors.” He sat back, impressed with his comeback, when the two students looked at eachother and started snickering. His jaw grinded back and forth as he fixed his eyes to the front.

Teacher started clapping her hands together, looking around the room. She wanted to get everyone’s attention. Her eyes were fixed on Kyong. Oh no. He thought, She was going to introduce him to the class. Usually he would be proud of people knowing who he was, but after the two gossiping students, he was less than thrilled. 

“Class, as you will all know by now, we have a royal amongst us. Prince Kim, Kyong. Everyone please welcome him.” The class went off on a whispering frenzy and Kyong sank lower in his chair. “Since your all so fascinated with him, how about we get all of the questions and introductions out of the way now, so that we can get on with the class.” 

Kyong tried to wave away the suggestion but Veronika didn’t even look his way. 

“Who’s first?” She said, as all hands shot up at once. Kyong groned inwardly. He was more about show than tell. What was this? a Q & A?

“Vlad,” Veronika picked a skinny teenager behind Kyong, with floppy hair and a kind smile. “Why our school?” Vlad asked, with his kind voice. It wasn’t mean or intrusive, just kind. So Kyong swung around to look at him, “Because my father picked this school.” He sighed. He decided to be honest - maybe he would make some friends out of it. He needed friends to remain popular after all. Vlad’s question seemed to spitfire numerous other questions in relation to Kyon’s answer. 

“Why did you father make you?”, “Did you do something bad?”, “why have you stopped making public appearances?”, “Why have you stopped doing brand deals?”, “Will you be my boyfriend?”

All questions came at once. The last one caught Kyongs attention. He scanned the room to see who it was that asked to be his girlfriend. His eyes landed on a girl with a sweet face, big eyes and two pigtails. She now seemed shy that he had actually heard her and let out a small giggle before hiding her face. Kyong decided to humour her, “You never know what the future holds.” he said, as the classroom shot into a fit of giggles and wolf whistles. 

“Ok, enough. That will be all the questions. Thank you Kyong for humouring the class.” Veronika looked mad as she narrowed her eyes. “If you have any more questions for Kyong, you can ask in your own time.” She crossed her arms across her body. “Everyone open your maths textbooks, we will start on Algebra.” 

Kyong flipped open the book in front of him. It had already been on the desk. There was no way he would have remembered to pack one himself. He scanned the page titled ‘Algebra’, and groaned. “This is worse than home-school.”