"No way!" Taehyung exclaimed, "we're not in the same class, look, you're in 1-D class and I'm in A!"

Seokjin wasn't surprised, Mr. and Mrs. Kim probably had to get the two separated to allow Taehyung to get away from Seokjin. They found themselves with a sea of ​​over-excited, scared or just tired first-year middle school students trying to find out what class they were in so that they could go to join their ranks where their homeroom teacher would pick them up when the time came.

"It's okay Tae, it's a chance to meet new friends," Seokjin told him kindly, letting go of his hand that he was holding.

It was better if the other kids didn't see him holding Taehyung's hand at school. They weren't little kids anymore, they were entering middle school after all.

"But I don't want to," Taehyung complained, taking his hand back, "I just wanted to be friends with you and be in the same class as you! I will ask if I can change."

"I don't think that's a good idea," Seokjin protested sharply.

"Why, don't you want to be with me?" Taehyung pouted.

"Yes I want to, but it's not us who decide. Don't worry, we'll see each other during the breaks," Seokjin assured him as he again tried to let go of Taehyung's hand but this time it was the other one who held him tightly.

"Okay," Taehyung grumbled. Sighing in displeasure, he finally agreed to let go of Seokjin to allow him to join his class.

However, he didn't give up on the plan to ask his parents to change his class to be with Seokjin because he had imagined it and expected it so much that he was very disappointed now.

"See you later!" Seokjin told him, giving him a final wave before walking away to join the row of the class D.

Taehyung followed him with his eyes. The row was silent because each student seemed impressed by the place, so majestic compared to the primary school, and filled with anguish in front of this novelty which presented itself to them. But no sooner had Seokjin joined the rank of his class than he started talking animatedly with a boy from the back of the class, and soon other students were talking happily with him and shaking his hand as they introduced themselves one after another, all smiles.

Seokjin really had a gift for breaking the ice between people, his natural good nature made him particularly friendly and attracted others to him. Fear seemed to have left them all, and the 1-D class was soon the most animated of the four first-year classes, with the other classes looking curiously at this class that seemed to be the coolest.

Taehyung was also watching Seokjin from afar. It was the first time he saw him with other children than him and Namjoon and he was immediately jealous: it was with him that Seokjin was supposed to laugh and have fun at that time, not with the others. But he was also jealous of his sociable character which allowed him to become friends so quickly with people he didn't even know.

"Hey, Taehyung!" called a singsong and high-pitched voice that made him turn away from Seokjin.

"Oh, Jimin," Taehyung wondered, turning to the boy who was coming to meet him.

He knew Park Jimin for having seen him several times at his house lately because their fathers had become partners and invited each other and their families to the receptions they organized.

"I didn't know you would go to this school, you live quite far from here, don't you?" Taehyung asked.

"Yes, but I can't help it, my dad wanted me to go to the same school as you, and he told me to watch over you. I'm also in class 1-A, I guess our parents made sure we stayed together," Jimin said with a shrug, not very happy to have to get up earlier than necessary to go to a school too far from his home.

"I don't need to be watched over, and you weren't the one I wanted to have in my class," Taehyung grumbled, turning back to Seokjin.

"Who is he?" Jimin asked curiously, wrapping an arm around Taehyung's shoulders to lean on him and following his gaze. "His family must be very wealthy to have others hovering around him like that," he surmises, though the infatuation around him seems sincere and not fake. The boy was unknown to him but he already seemed very popular, although it was only their first day.

"It's none of your business," Taehyung said pulling Jimin's hand away and joining their class.

"He seems nice anyway, I would like to be friends with him."

Taehyung glared at him and Jimin, who had understood that this annoyed him to the highest degree, continued unabashedly, following Taehyung on his trail, as a dog would have done with its master:

"They seem to be having a good time in Class D," Jimin continued as he followed him.

"We're not here to have fun, we're here to study," Taehyung replied gloomily, "and it shows that D-class is a loser class so stop envying them."

He was certain from observing his own class that Class A was the elite class of this private school and Class D was its opposite, and he was already thinking of a way to get Seokjin transferred to Class A.

"Wow, okay boss," Jimin scoffed, amused by his attitude. He promised himself to explore the bond between Taehyung and Seokjin in order to take advantage of it if he could.

"Don't call me that," Taehyung growled.

"Okay, don't get mad, I just want us to be friends."

"Because your dad asked you to?" Taehyung asked  suspiciously.

"Yeah," Jimin admitted without even trying to lie.

He didn't find Taehyung likeable enough to willingly be his friend .

"Then you better do whatever I ask you to do and never disobey me," Taehyung warned him imperiously.

Jimin nodded obediently, not losing his bright smile which didn't seem to reflect his true feelings towards Taehyung and seemed to make him look snarky. That was what his father asked him telling him that he was preparing for the future, so he would do it, no matter if Taehyung was unsympathetic and probably detestable. Satisfied, Taehyung completely lost interest in Seokjin to speak with Jimin and explain how he saw their long-term friendship.

Seokjin loved his class, the other kids became his friends very quickly and he felt that they were all very friendly and he was looking forward to getting to know them more. His homeroom teacher was a very strict-looking woman named Mrs Chung but seeing him so beaming, she couldn't help but give Seokjin a kind smile and make him the provisional class delegate before the future elections.

Seokjin was honored with this distinction and presented himself in front of all of his class.

"My name is Kim Seokjin, I will do my best to always help you!"

He bowed and his whole class warmly applauded him. Returning to his place, his table companion had bowed in a whisper.

"I'm Choi Seung, can we be friends?"

"Of course, with great pleasure!" Seokjin whispered, happy to make his first friend in middle school.

Seung quickly became a very good friend with whom he spent the whole morning of the start of the school year. Contrary to what Seokjin had thought, they didn't have a break that would have allowed him to go find Taehyung because in addition to presenting them with all the functioning of the school in a very strict way by insisting on the need for excellence which fell to all the students of this school, they were also made to visit the whole school.

When noon struck, Seokjin went to the school canteen with Seung with whom he continued to talk animatedly after sitting at an empty table.

"I'm thinking of joining the school football club, how about you?" Seung asked referring to the after-school clubs Mrs. Chung spoke about.

Seokjin looked at his new friend with adoring eyes.

"ME TOO!" he exclaimed, grabbing his hand and squeezing it between his two hands, "so you like football too?"

"I don't like it, I love it!" Seung replied, smiling at Seokjin's ingenuous excitement.

"ME TOO!" Seokjin exclaimed again making Seung laugh, "Oh wow, it was fate that brought us together, I'm so happy!"

"Is that why you didn't wait for me to come eat?" Taehyung interjected, grabbing Seokjin's hands to pull them away from Seung's.

"Tae, you are here!" Seokjin exclaimed, flashing him a bright smile, glad to see Taehyung but not realizing that he had completely forgotten about him since he started chatting with Seung. "I'm sorry I couldn't come find you because we didn't have a break this morning. This is Choi Seung, my new friend."

Taehyung royally ignored Seung, which confused Seokjin a bit. He pulled the chair next to Seokjin and let himself fall into it, letting Jimin see behind him, who was barely carrying their two meal trays which he put down on the table with relief.

"Tae, it's not right to have your stuff carried by others," Seokjin protested as Jimin sat down next to Seung.

Jimin shot Seokjin a surprised look, wondering how he could dare to speak to Taehyung like that since the nickname he called him by showed that he knew him very well. Was he higher than Taehyung in the social ladder? or did he know a facet of Taehyung's personality that Taehyung was hiding from others?

He expected Taehyung to make Seokjin immediately pay for this affront with a scathing retort he had the secret to because he was getting to know him well after spending the whole morning with him and hearing him boast about the power of his family. However, much to his surprise, Taehyung didn't.

"He offered to do it, I wasn't going to refuse," Taehyung lied, shrugging and starting to eat.

Seokjin looked at him disapprovingly before turning to Jimin.

"My name is Kim Seokjin, but you can call me Jin," he introduced himself, extending his hand to him in a friendly manner. "Tae's friends are my friends and so you can trust me if I tell you that Tae is perfectly capable of carrying his tray on his own, you don't have to worry about him like that. You will know for next time."

Jimin almost burst out laughing and he only held back because Taehyung's menacing gaze dared him to do so.

"Oh okay, I will remember that, thank you, Jin. I'm Park Jimin," Jimin smiled, gladly shaking the hand Seokjin extended to him and ignoring the glare Taehyung was giving him, before also shaking the one Seung offered him.

Seung then extended his hand towards Taehyung but Taehyung royally ignored him again. Seeing this, Seokjin hastened to intervene:

"His name is Kim Taehyung, he's a bit shy with people he doesn't know, that's all." It wasn't a lie, it was the conclusion he had come to.

"I am not shy!" Taehyung immediately replied, feeling ashamed and unhappy, as Jimin couldn't help but giggle this time around.

"Then you must just be a badly brought up boor," Seung replied who pulled his hand away.

"What did you just say?" Taehyung asked brutally.

Seokjin felt Taehyung's anger flare up and the same way he had tried to defend Taehyung in Seung's eyes, he rushed to rescue Seung placing a hand on Taehyung's arm to calm him down:

"I think Seung was a bit clumsy in the way he talked, and he didn't mean it, Tae! He only meant that you've ignored him twice and that's a bit of a sad way to introduce you two. Isn't it Seung?"

Jimin gave Seung a discreet kick on the table to make him understand that he had to take the helping hand that Seokjin gave him in a wise way, and to tell him not to repeat what he had just said to Taehyung. But much to the despair of Seokjin, the 1-D student decided that he wasn't going to be walked on by someone as obnoxious as Taehyung during the first day of school.

"Jin is wrong, it was you who understood correctly, Tae," he denied, deliberately using the nickname Seokjin had given Taehyung rather than his full name. Then he repeated defiantly: "I said you're a boor."

Without warning and without Seokjin being able to do anything to stop him despite the hand on his arm, Taehyung grabbed a spoonful of his still-scorching tofu stew and threw it on Seung's face, who immediately let out a howl of pain and caught the attention of everyone in the canteen.

"SEUNG!" Seokjin cried as he got up hastily and walked around the table to check if he wasn't badly burned. "Oh my God, Seung, are you okay?!" he said, stressed because he couldn't see well under the hand that Seung was holding firmly against his face, writhing in pain, but he could only imagine the pain he was feeling.

The poor boy, after screaming, was now whining in pain under Taehyung's cold gaze.

"I hope this will be a lesson to you, TO ALL OF YOU!" Taehyung spat, as the people around, students and adults alike, dared not approach, having mostly recognized Taehyung as one oh the heirs to the Kim group. "So try to insult me ​​like he just did, if you dare!"

But Seokjin was unaware of the fearful respect others suddenly showed Taehyung. Indeed, in his eyes, Taehyung was just his friend. Moreover, he didn't know Taehyung outside the house and he didn't understand this attitude : why did he want people to be afraid of him? Thus, an arm around Seung's shoulders who was still moaning in pain, Seokjin did not hesitate to shout at him, under the stunned gaze of those around them who had just heard Taehyung warn them:

"Tae, why did you do that?! It's dangerous and mean of you!"

"He disrespected me," Taehyung retorted, red with anger, glaring at Seung who was clutching his right cheek and had tears in his eyes. "I am Kim Taehyung!" he thundered, "He doesn't have to talk to me like that, no one has to disrespect me!"

Jimin looked amused seeing that Taehyung had no reaction to hearing Seokjin call him mean. Seokjin therefore definitely benefited from preferential treatment.

Shocked at Taehyung's tyrant attitude, Seokjin refrained from answering. He didn't want to argue with him now. He made Seung stand up and started to walk away from the table, supporting him.

"Where are you going? You haven't eaten," Taehyung said in a softened voice that once again surprised Jimin who was watching the scene in silence, unwilling to get a hot portion of Taehyung's meal smack in his face as well.

"I can't keep eating and talk like it's nothing Tae, I'm taking Seung to the infirmary. We need to treat his wound before it gets worse," Seokjin explained, dragging the poor boy with him, whose burned cheek was becoming covered in ugly blisters. He was sadly thinking that Taehyung had just ruined his friend's middle school first day.

"Taehyung, who is Seokjin to you?" Jimin finally asked, even more curious than in the morning and unable to contain himself, as around the other spectators at the stage turned respectfully away from Taehyung.

There was no doubt now that Taehyung was indeed superior to Seokjin in the social hierarchy. However, the relationship between the two seemed inexplicable to him. Seokjin was a nice boy but obviously very naive and didn't realize the advantageous position he was in that allowed him to tell Taehyung what he was thinking without restriction. Jimin wondered if Taehyung was aware of this himself.

"It's none of your business," Taehyung replied and proceeded to gulp down his high-end meal, prepared by renowned chefs.

"You already said that earlier," Jimin said, starting to eat too.

"Then don't make me repeat."

After a silence, Jimin nevertheless continued:

"You two look really close to get you to accept him lecturing you. Because of that his friend thought he could talk to you the same way, just because you didn't tell anything to Seokjin, do you realize that?"

"Are you deaf and blind?" the wealthy heir replied. "It seems to me that I made it clear to him that I will not accept that he speaks to me like that. He will remember it every day looking in the mirror for the next few weeks, and he will regret it."

Jimin gave him a wry look.

"Taehyung, you don't understand, do you? The problem will arise with other people, not just Seung because if others see that you accept this disrespectful behavior from Seokjin, they will believe that they can do it too."

Taehyung suddenly seemed to seriously think about it.

"The question everyone will ask is why Seokjin gets special treatment and will seek to find out who he is. What if they think that he is more powerful than you? Then you will not have the influence you want to have in this school."

"Jin will never be more powerful than me, I have nothing to fear from that side," Taehyung replied with confidence.

"It's no better if he's less powerful than you but has the upper hand over you, you know. You are going to look ridiculous."

"He doesn't have the upper hand over me, stop pissing me off now, or you'll regret it," the Kim heir growled.

"Okay, it's up to you,"Jimin said while admitting defeat, "but I feel like everyone already likes him, I like him too, I can't help myself" he added, thinking that Seokjin's personality that seemed to attract everyone was probably what also allowed him to curry favor with Taehyung. "And if you don't assert yourself quickly in your relationship at school, he is the one who is likely to attract the most attention, not you. It's going to be a battle of influence and you risk losing it."

"I won't loose any battle and I will not fight against Jin," Taehyung replied.

"As you wish. But in this case, make sure he is always with you otherwise the others will feel like they have to choose between you two and I think without being too mistaken that they will rather choose the nice and funny boy rather than the one who sulks and throws hot stew on others."

Taehyung glared at him then glared at everyone around him who was quietly looking at him with concern as they had seen what had happened. There were only first-year middle school students because they had entered the school a day before the other students to facilitate their discovery of the middle school. Jimin was probably right, Taehyung thought, it was better for him to impose himself as quickly as possible on the first-year students to be able to establish a lasting influence without sharing.

His father had told him that school was a preparation for the world of adults. It was a place of power struggle. He should not let anyone crush him and for that, he was the one who had to crush others. He had to be ruthless. But he didn't think he could be with Seokjin. Or rather, he didn't want to. Seokjin didn't have the support of a wealthy family anyway, if he got caught up in a power struggle, he didn't stand a chance, he would be crushed by others and would be unhappy. It was anything but what Taehyung wanted.

"I'll speak with Jin," he decided.

"If you say so," Jimin said without much conviction.

He still burned so much to know who Seokjin was to be able to make things difficult for Teahyung so much on their first day. If Taehyung refused to reveal it to him, Jimin would find out for himself and gleefully use it against Taehyung.

"Taehyung is my friend, he's not usually like that I promise you. I don't know what got into him today, he must be stressed because of our first day of school. I'm so sorry," Seokjin apologized to Seung.

They were back in class and waiting for their teacher for the rest of the day's program.

"Don't apologize for him, it's not you who hurt me. But Jin, your friend isn't just stressed, there's something really wrong with him, and it's weird that you never notice ! A normal person doesn't do this kind of thing, so I assume he must be mentally ill!" said Seung who wore a large bandage on his cheek after being treated.

"Please don't say that about Tae," pouted Seokjin who stubbornly wanted to defend his best friend's reputation. "He's not ill, he was just angry because of what you told him. Of course, that does not excuse him but I'm sure he regrets what he did."

"I'm sure he doesn't," Seung replied. "Nevertheless, you can tell him that I am waiting for his apologies."

"Yes, I will tell him. I really hope you can become good friends soon," Seokjin said with such hope that Seung dared not tell him that he had no desire to be friend with someone like Taehyung.

"You are really nice Jin, but unfortunately your friend isn't like you at all," Seung lamented, "in fact, I don't even understand you and him being friends, you have nothing in common!"

"Are you talking about Kim Taehyung?" asked Yoona, a girl in their class, curiously.

Together with her friend Ha-Neul, they had grown closer to Seokjin and Seung during that day because, like the others, they were very attracted to Seokjin's personality and wanted nothing more than to hang out with him.

"Yes, we are talking about that jerk Kim Taehyung," Seung agreed.

"Seung!" Seokjin exclaimed.

"Sorry Jin, but that's what he will be for me until he apologizes," Seung said.

"I dare not say it out loud but Seokjin, I believe that Seung is not wrong. He's the one who did this to Seung, we saw it all," Ha-Neul said, pointing at Seung's face, "and before he walked out of the dining hall with his buddy Park Jimin, he made a scandal, saying how important his dad was and that if we didn't obey him, he'd have us kicked out of school. And then. as he walked out, he made some poor guys he found too disrespectful in his eyes bow to him. He really thinks he's a king or something."

"Eh?!" Seokjin asked with wide eyes, shocked and refusing to believe it, before eagerly correcting himself, "I mean, I beg your pardon?"

The girls and Seung laughed at his way of self-correcting.

"Yeah, he did that," Ha-Neul nodded, "he's really not nice, I wonder how you can be friends with him. Seung is right, you are not like him at all, you are very nice!"

"Besides, you're cute, I hope I'm the first to tell you that," Yoona chimed in, grabbing and hugging Seokjin's arm to her chest with emerging shapes.

"T-thank you," Seokjin said, blushing ear to ear.

Yoona's smile widened seeing Seokjin's shy reaction. Although he was sociable, his experience with girls was visibly close to nil.

"You already have plenty of female admirers, I'm jealous," Seung whispered to him, nudging him before complaining out loud, "I'm the one in pain and in need of attention!"

"You can dream!" Ha-Neul laughed.

"I suspected so," Seung grumbled, making Seokjin laugh and he completely forgot about Taehyung for the second time that day.