Chapter 11.2

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Lisa groaned, covering her face while sitting at her circular desk. She had just returned from the fields, everyone calming down and no longer trying to fight each other to the death. She winces at the chaotic morning she had, remembering all the students yelling and shouting, even some teachers as well.

She also remembers the fearful look Jean had this morning, pale as a ghost as she approached the school. Lisa knew something was wrong, but she wasn’t sure what. Usually Jean was easy to read, despite her stone-like nature.
Lisa sighs, flipping between the pages of a random book she had nearby, a habit she does unconsciously when thinking.

“Why is the high school moving?” Lisa thought, not entirely believing in the vague reason Jean gave out. The school had been in Stone Gate of Liyue for many years, no conflict has arisen.

The location was never usually a problem for the nations since the school wasn’t nearby any Liyue military bases.

When it came to nations joining and sending students to Genshin District, it was on their behalf.

“Natlan still is in a civil war, Fontaine has extremely complex laws in certain aspects, Snezhnaya has too difficult of a time transporting student and prefers for them all to go into the military eventually, and Sumeru refuses to allow other educations taint what they claim is their superior form of education” Lisa recalls, remembering the one year at the annual Teyvat union meeting where a Sumerian representative went into a lengthy speech calling the Genshin District trash.

None of the reasons listed would require moving to a different location to allow other nations to join, if anything it would be more of a problem if the school moved to the Archipelago, making it harder to send students.

“So why in the tarnation is Jean doing this?” Lisa asks herself, frustrated. It sucked even more than the teachers were surprised as well, no one saw the news coming, not even herself, Jean’s fiancée.

“Years of being together and she’s keeping secrets again,” Lisa mentally says, remembering how hard it was to get Jean to open up to her, treading past swamps of trust issues and climbing walls of emotional security.

So at the moment, Lisa felt betrayed, her work being useless and as if she made no progress, the worst feeling in her opinion. Then in the distance, she hears a few students’ voices.

“G-guys I don’t think I’ll be able to come,” a student says, hiccupping. Lisa leaned over her counter, seeing a forgettable face crying, while two other friends comfort him. Lisa gulped, fearing this would happen as well with the move.

“My family sacrificed a lot already to come here and now having to move again, I-I don’t think it is going to happen,” the male student says, covering his face while small sobs erupt out of him. The two friends hug him, silently sobbing as well.

Lisa’s heart clenched, truly upset by the sight. When she heard that the transition wouldn’t be compensated, she knew right away that it was going to take out a chunk of the school. Moving to the district was expensive enough, a small supply of housing and resources to feed entire families available in the place meant for the high school.

Lisa has been at the school for many years has seen hungry students and low-income families wishing their child to have a bright future struggle by every day. It was tragic and she wished something would change about it.

Being the fiancée of Jean did have its perks at the very least. During the many years the two have been together, Lisa had developed an ability to input an idea into Jean, making her think it was her idea.

It was how she got free lunches for the school and allowed for students to rent out textbooks or special objects to enhance their learning rather than buying them.

Yet now her progress was also being run as the lower-income students were about to get wiped out and chopped off, sent back to their home countries after risking it all to come to Genshin District. Lisa could still hear the sobs of the student, feeling mad. She decided she wanted to confront Jean about it, get some answers.

She closed her book that she kept randomly flipping pages around in and began to head out of her circular desk and down the hallways. Power walking her way down the hall, she hears panicky voices of other students, some calling their families to explain the situation.

“I’m scared, I can’t go back, we have nothing left in Liyue Harbor,” a student’s voice exclaims.

“I was finally able to leave Inazuma after the lockdown, my little sister seeing the outside world but now, I’m about to get cooped up again,” another voice says.

“M-mommy, I don’t want to leave,” a third voice whimper, on the phone.
Lisa’s chest tightened, frustrated at this.

The pain and devasting effect of this move were so obvious yet Jean wasn’t seeing it. The librarian reached her way to the school office, where a bunch of teachers was crowding around, wanting answers as well. Lisa had a feeling that school wasn’t going to continue as normal today.

“Jean answer us now!” one teacher exclaims.

“Jean, if this is for real, I will get my vengeance on you!” Eula shouts out aggressively. Lisa rolls her eyes, finding the statement overused for Eula to mean it.

Lisa crawls her way to the front of the crowd, and pounds on the door. “Jean it's me,” Lisa says, softly. Immediately she hears a click and Lisa rushes in, doing her best to avoid other people crawling their way to Jean.

Once inside, Jean hugs Lisa, her head resting on the crook of Lisa’s neck. Lisa felt her heartbeat rise, surprised to see the woman quickly affectionate.

“I- thank you for coming,” Jean says, whimpering a bit. Lisa blushes, even more, surprised to see the moment of weakness that Jean was in. Jean rarely had these moments, usually strong-willed and keeping her emotions. So, when it happened, it was no joke. Lisa wrapped her arms around Jean, squeezing the principal.

“Of course, sweetie,” Lisa whispers, patting Jean’s head. Lisa decided to pause a bit, comfort a clearly distressed Jean before dealing with the prominent issues outside. They stood like that, Jean resting her head on Lisa’s neck and Lisa gently patting Jean’s head. Lisa wished it could stay like that for all of eternity, but she knew those good things have to come to an end.

“Jean,” Lisa whispers, breaking the hug and holding Jean by her shoulders, a serious look cast in her eyes. Jean gulps, knowing what is about to happen. “Why is the town moving, w-what’s happening?” Lisa asks, very confused.

Jean pauses a bit, before finally responding, “There will be an email that will explain it all,”. Lisa suddenly felt her heart twinged; pain inflicted from the words.

“I’m not waiting for an email, you’re my fiancée, I want to hear about it from you,” Lisa says, gripping Jean’s shoulder harder. She refused to get locked out again, not wanting to go through the hard emotional labor of breaking apart walls.

“I-I think it's better if you just read the email when it happens,” Jean deflects, making Lisa more hurt.

Anger rose, mad at Jean for locking her out again, for not telling things to her face, and just expecting her to not be there for her. "I thought we were closer than an email,” Lisa says bitterly, leaving the office.

“W-wait Lisa,” Jean says but Lisa dashes out, not wanting to hear it. Lisa hurries out of the school office and walks slowly to her library, hoping that Jean would follow. But she never does.

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