Keep the Mask, It Goes With Your Costume

(Bonus) ~Chapter Twenty-Five: The (second) Party~

You asked, I delivered. Last chapter was going to be the last chapter but by popular demand I added this one! This is how I envisioned the reaction of Marinette's return//read til the end for a surprise :)

~

The two walked hand in hand toward their classroom, second period had already started and when Adrien peaked into the room, the class was full. Ms. Mendeleiev saw Adrien and immediately moved her attention to him rather than her lesson.

"Mr. Agreste, you had better have a good excuse for showing up to my class late and coming in to interrupt everyone during our lesson if you don't want to spend your day in the principals office" she said harshly. Adrien made a cocky smile.

"Sorry Ms. Mendeleiev I got a little distracted." He said, and he could faintly hear Marinette giggle from where she was still hiding behind the door.

"Well then, if it was so important that you missed the first 10 minutes of class because of it, why don't you share with the class what was 'distracting' you" she said, clearly perturbed and trying to wipe the ridiculous grin off his face.

"Oh it was nothing just that, uh, Marinette came back." He said beaming, and as his words came out the dark-haired girl walked sort of sheepishly into the room.

Without a moment pause Alya stood up and screamed "MARINETTE!!?!?" and ran toward her at full force, hugging her and leading both girls to fall onto the ground crying with joy. It didn't take a second after that for the entire class to get up and surround Marinette, screaming and cheering her name, yelling how much they loved and missed her, most of them crying at her return, still not even believing she was back. Everyone was happy, except of course Lila, who only pretended to be excited. Ms. Mendeleiev wasn't super excited about her class becoming completely dysfunctional, but even she was smiling to see again Marinette's face.

It was so much commotion that other classrooms started to flood out with teenagers wanting to see what was going on, immediately surrounding their returned classmate. Kids she didn't even know came up and hugged her, crying. Soon enough the word got out to the city, and there were news cameras and reporters shoved in her face, she had forgotten how big the search for her was. Within the first minute she must have been asked "where were you?!" at least 50 times by different people, but since there was so much noise it wasn't hard for her to pretend she didn't hear them. Her parents knew everyone would be excited when she went back today, so they had baked a cake in advance to bring for when everyone was hyped up by her return.

They brought it to the school and the celebration began, when it was on the news there was a cake, people started showing up with confetti, streamers, and some even with gifts! The police showed up with a banner saying her name, and the mayor made an official statement letting school out for the whole day and letting those working in the city have the afternoon off. Marinette didn't even know most the people who showed up, but they clearly knew her! She was giving so many hugs and shaking so many hands, she hadn't realized how popular she'd become since she left! The school became the center for the biggest party since, well, since the party for Ladybug just the night before. The only difference was that this time, everyone who showed up was happy, they all seemed to have completely forgotten about the disappointment the night before.

After an hour there was a table filled with presents and enough food had been brought to feed all of Paris, it was like a huge birthday party but it wasn't even her birthday! She realized that people cared just as much about Marinette as they did Ladybug. Everyone dropped whatever they had been doing that day to come celebrate her, even those who didn't know her well. Everyone just seemed to happy to be in her presence or just to know she was still alive.

After a some short but amazing hours, everything slowed down and people starting leaving to get home for the evening, Marinette stayed back with just those who were in her class to clean up afterwards. Alya was still so excited that Marinette was back and would go up and give her surprise hugs at least twice a minute. Every time they would try to ask where she was she would just tell them she didn't wanna talk about it, which wasn't a lie. Overall they didn't seem to mind, everyone was just glad that she was back. Marinette felt like this was the last thing she needed to finally put the past behind her and start her new, old life again. No more heroes, no more secret identities, no more villains. Just Marinette Dupain-Cheng surrounded by everyone who loves her.

At least that's what she expected.

But the 'no more villains' part might get interrupted sooner that she expected.

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Okay I know this is big, but I have decided I'm 99% sure gonna write a sequel book for this story :)
It's likely gonna be shorter that this story since idk how many of my fans are actually gonna interested, but I feel like this story did leave alot of loose ends I wanna tie up and I have a bunch of great ideas how to do so with a new book!

That being said, I do want a sort of short break, so it might be a some months before I release it. I'll be announcing the Title of it and the Story Description on my message board on my profile probably within the next couple months so make sure you follow me to get that update. I'm also writing a short story about Lukanette that should be released within the next week so check for updates on that as well.  (Edit: that short story is now up on my profile! It's called "The Duel" and you can go read all chapters now!)

Again, love you all so much and thank you for being on the journey of writing this story with me! Stay safe and healthy <33

Edit: the sequel has started!!! You can find it on my profile titled "The Peacocks Revenge," hope you enjoy! And expect more updates to it soon :))