"Professor Norris."
The Student Council members immediately recognized Norris.
Sloane was the first to call out to him.
Norris recognized Sloane as well.
As Vice President Sterling's daughter, she was famous throughout the medical faculty.
She had even performed at several university galas.
It was perfectly normal for a social butterfly like her to mingle with professors from other departments.
However, Norris personally found her a bit too calculating and had kept his distance.
Sloane, on the other hand, was quite taken with Norris.
When she first heard rumors of a strikingly handsome professor in the math department, she had been highly intrigued.
She and her friends had even sneaked into one of his lectures.
While most people despised math and found formulas incredibly dry,
having such a gorgeous man writing them on the board made the subject downright fascinating.
In fact, the entire female student body considered his classes a visual feast.
Unfortunately, Norris never gave her any special treatment just because she was Lawrence Sterling's daughter.
Since Sloane was always surrounded by male admirers anyway, she didn't obsess over him.
She simply treated him as a fleeting, unattainable fantasy.
Norris remained completely oblivious to Sloane's hidden infatuation.
His entire focus was locked on Claire.
"Sloane, what exactly is going on here? Why the massive crowd?"
"There's just a small misunderstanding between Claire and Levi," Sloane replied hesitantly, unsure of how to spin the narrative.
The entire mess was directly tied back to her.
She was terrified of ruining her pristine image in front of Norris.
"What kind of misunderstanding leads to a brawl?" Though Norris addressed Sloane, his eyes never left Claire.
Seeing that Claire was completely unharmed while the guy across from her was dripping with soup, he finally let out a silent breath of relief.
As long as she hadn't been bullied, he could take his time interrogating everyone involved.
"It wasn't a brawl, just a minor disagreement. It's just that Claire..."
Sloane shot a pitiful glance at Claire.
Was she seriously trying to shift the blame right now?
Claire refused to indulge Sloane's victim act for a second.
Turning directly to Norris, she announced, "There was no brawl. I just single- handedly took Levi down."
Norris was briefly speechless. She sounded so proud of herself was she actually looking for a gold star?
He cleared his throat. "Right. And why exactly did you hit him, Claire?"
The crowd was too absorbed in the drama to notice the easy familiarity between Norris and Claire.
Claire let out a soft scoff. "He was spreading vicious rumors about me. Doesn't that deserve a beating?"
"I was actually about to call the cops. But since you're here, Professor, why don't you do the honors and dial 911?"
Norris frowned sharply. "Rumors?"
He leveled a dark glare at Levi. "Care to explain yourself?"
Sloane stepped forward, desperate to pass it off as a misunderstanding,
buttaire.immediately launched into
a rapid-fire, brutally honest summary of the entire incident.
By the time she finished, Norris's expression had turned freezing cold.
He stared down at Levi in disgust.
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"As a senior student, is this how you treat the freshme
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malicious fres?"
"This is out of my jurisdiction. I'm taking you all to the administrative staff of your department."
"Call both of your academic counselors immediately."
Norris wanted to get them out of the cafeteria before the crowd turned into a full- blown riot.
With so many people packed together for the spectacle, things could easily spiral out of control.
Furthermore, Levi was backed by the Student Council. Claire only had a few roommates with her, leaving her vulnerable to retaliation if numbers came into play.
And Norris would absolutely not allow anyone to gang up on Claire.
Claire obediently followed Norris, pulling out her phone to call her counselor and demand he come 'bail her out.'
Across campus, her counselor rubbed his temples, having never met a student so prone to chaos.
Using words like 'bail out' meant she had undoubtedly triggered an apocalyptic disaster.