Call her his master? At that, Juniper blinked, her pretty face a mask of sincerity. “Oh, I don''t know... wouldn''t that be a little awkward?"


    The math teacher choked, sputtering in anger. Did she really think she could pull it off?


    "Pfft—” Before the math teacher could recover, a sharpugh echoed through the


    room.


    Everyone turned to see the physics teacher, Keith, sitting on the sofa with his arms crossed and his eyes closed, a wide grin on his face.


    “Keith, what''s so funny?" the math teacher demanded, his face dark with confusion. Was his deration that ridiculous?


    "Nothing, nothing," Keith said, opening his eyes and waving his hands dismissively. But a secondter, he let out another snort ofughter. The image of the math teacher calling Juniper his master was just too much to resist.


    The math teacher was silent. So were the other teachers. Juniper''s expression was one of wide-eyed innocence.


    "Keith,” the Dean interjected with a frown, “be serious. This is a serious situation."


    "Right." Keith immediately wiped the smile off his face and closed his eyes again. The situation was serious, sure. Whether the matter at hand was, he wasn''t so certain.


    "You im you earned this score yourself. Can you prove it?" the Dean asked coldly. It wasn''t just the perfect score. It was the fact that she had finished each exam in about an hour. He refused to believe such a prodigy existed.


    The other teachers nodded in agreement. They didn''t believe it either.


    "This problem here," the math teacher said, pointing to the second part of a major question. “Tell me how you solved it." It was a tricky question, with several twists that required some effort.


    Juniper nced down, not even bothering to look at the original question on the paper beforeunching into her exnation. “Assuming x equals 3 and y equals 4, then..."


    Her voice was soft and her words were clear, without a single hesitation.


    The math teacher was stunned. The steps were all correct. But he quickly recovered. If she''d seen the answer key beforehand, of course she''d know the solution.


    "What about this one?" he pressed, pointing directly to the final problem. was them most difficult on the test, requiring abination of high schootend even some college level concepts. Queenie hadn''t scored a single point on it. It had taken him nearly an hour to solve it himself the day before.


    "For that, need a pen." Juniper didn''t look at the question or her answer sheet; she had already memorized it. It had been a bit challenging, after allt had taken her a whole two minutes.


    “Here.” The math teacher pulled a pen from his shirt pocket, waiting to see what trick she would pull.


    "Thank you." Juniper took it, grabbed a nk sheet of paper, and began to write. The math teacher gave her a second look, frowning. She was surprisingly polite. The Dean and the other teachers gathered around to watch her "solve the problem live."


    Juniper wrote slowly, detailing every step.


    "There''s another way to solve it?" the math teacher thought, scratching his head. Just as he was about to ask a question, she filled the page and flipped it over to continue.


    Five minutester, theplete solution wasid out on the paper, dense with calctions that made the other subject teachers'' heads swim.


    "Let me check this..." The math teacher eagerly took the paper and reviewed it several times. The steps were detailed, and the answer was entirely correct.


    "But this one problem took you five minutes, one teacher pointed out. "How could you have finished the entire exam in an hour? The other problems required just as much work."


    "I was afraid if I simplified it too much, you wouldn''t understand."