Re:life with Karmic Gacha (Modern Family)-Chapter 335 - : Teaching Mishap.

[General POV]

"I wonder how many people are going to the gym today," Edward muttered, sipping his coffee as Annie set up her laptop.

"Annie, what's your New Year's resolution?" he asked casually, sitting next to her on a kitchen island stool.

"Um, I haven't had time to think about it," Annie replied, a slight blush creeping onto her cheeks as her eyes briefly wandered to Edward's muscular torso in his black tank top.

"Liar," Edward teased, catching her off guard.

"There's no way you don't have a New Year's resolution list. I bet the only reason you won't tell me is that it's filled with embarrassing stuff," he added with a playful smirk.

Annie let out a burst of laughter, shaking her head in disbelief as she turned her gaze back to her laptop. "I really didn't write anything down."

"Alright, I won't push it," Edward said with a mischievous smile, pretending to let it go. "Just make sure you didn't put it in your laptop, because you know I'll be able to see that."

As Annie opened her notes, her heart raced. There were nearly 40 resolutions listed. She scrolled down, feeling a mix of excitement and trepidation. Just as Edward leaned in closer, she quickly closed the app before he could read the last resolution.

"You're going hard at it, Annie. It seems like you're planning to completely reinvent yourself," Edward remarked, genuinely impressed but respecting her privacy.

Annie smiled shyly. "No. I'm not just planning; I'm going to do it for sure."

"But why? I think you're already pretty awesome," Edward replied, his casual compliment making her heart flutter.

Edward suddenly shifted his focus back to the laptop. "We should start. I think we can wrap this up in an hour and a half. Then, I'm going to take a nap."

Annie's face flushed with guilt. "I'm really sorry—I wasn't thinking about your rest time. It's too early for me to be here. You can sleep; I'll just stay here and watch. I mean, I can wait."

Edward noticed her slip of the tongue, chuckling softly. "Nonsense. We're going to get this done now."

"Can you please choose another word other than 'bang'? It made my mind confused for a bit," Annie said, trying to mask her embarrassment.

Just then, Abed walked into the kitchen and headed straight for the coffee. "Pound it out?" Edward suggested, confused.

"No," Abed replied casually, which only made Annie more shy.

Edward turned to Abed. "You're not going to sleep?"

"I can't with all this noise and the smell of lust. I'm going to edit the movie from last night," Abed replied nonchalantly.

Annie frowned. "Abed! Go to sleep! You're tired!"

"I already had my coffee. This is great, by the way. Where can I get this?" Abed asked, his attention fully on the coffee.

Annie looked at him incredulously, pursing her lips in anger, but Abed, oblivious, continued chatting.

"Oh, I roasted them myself," Edward said with a grin. "I'm not giving you any to take home," he added teasingly.

As Abed set up his laptop at the edge of the kitchen island next to Annie, Edward asked, "Abed, do you have a New Year's resolution?"

"Yes. Be a movie director," Abed replied simply.

Edward paused, then asked in confusion, "That's it?"

"That's the only thing I care about," Abed said, prompting Edward to fall into deep thought.

Abed then turned to Annie. "I can't believe you still need to learn, even after taking several classes and an online course about the program."

"Shh! SHHH!" Annie quickly shushed Abed, alarmed at his revelation.

"Hmm? What?" Edward zoned out, his fatigue causing him to miss Abed's exposure.

"Nothing! Abed's just being Abed. We should start now," Annie insisted, eager to redirect the conversation.

"Okay, sure. Let me text someone first, then we can continue," Edward said, standing up to pull out his phone. "What do you guys want to eat? I'm ordering breakfast."

"Oh, I want–" Before Annie could answer, Edward shouted loudly, "MAGGIE! LOCH NESS! WHAT DO YOU WANT TO EAT!?"

Maggie shouted back from her bedroom, "SHUT UP! I'M TRYING TO SLEEP!"

"DON'T CALL ME LOCH NESS MONSTER!" Vanessa shouted too, her voice coming from the same direction as Maggie.

A few hours later, at a gym bustling with people eager to keep their New Year's resolutions, Mitchell bumped into Claire as she was running on the treadmill.

Mitchell laughed slightly and said, "I had a feeling you were going to be here this year too."

Claire, however, didn't match his energy and continued running; her skin glistened with sweat. Her hair was tied in a ponytail, and her blue sweater was already drenched.

Mitchell waited awkwardly for a while before he gave up and took the treadmill next to her. "Something on your mind?" he asked as he stretched his arms and started up the machine.

"Hey! Quit bothering her, you clown-haired creep!" a blue-haired girl suddenly shouted at Mitchell. Flabbergasted, Mitchell turned to her. He quickly said, "This is my sister."

"Oh." The girl exclaimed slightly before walking away. Mitchell saw that people were looking at him, pointing their fingers while whispering, and he became self-conscious.

"Um, Claire, please say something. People are staring at me and judging me," Mitchell begged.

Claire rolled her eyes and waved to the crowd to dismiss them. "Go on. Mind your own business," she said sternly. Mitchell was finally relieved and started to run along with Claire.

As they were running, Claire finally opened up. "After we said goodbyes last night, Edward 'allegedly' punched a man backstage."

Mitchell was shocked, and he almost tripped on the treadmill. "Because he got rejected? He doesn't seem like a violent guy."

Claire replied without looking at Mitchell, "No, it's because of something else. That guy tried to hurt his cat. But I'm thinking that if the earlier rejection doesn't happen, maybe the outcome will be different."

Mitchell connected the dots. "So you think that the rejection pushed him to the brink, and then he lashed out at the guy? For me, I think it's a valid outburst. He tried to hurt his family member. I don't think it has anything to do with Haley at all."

"Maybe it has something to do with it," Claire argued, confident that she was right in her guess.

"Let's say that you're right. So do you think stopping them from becoming a couple is a mistake, or are you sticking by it?"

"Obviously they shouldn't be a couple. Edward is really nice, but he's too..." Claire trailed off, which made Mitchell finish her sentence. "Amazing? Handsome? Thoughtful? Family-oriented?"

"I was going to say busy." Claire gave Mitchell a bombastic side-eye before she continued. "I love Haley. But I don't think she can keep up with him. It'll really be a blow to her self-confidence when she realizes that."

"They live in two completely different worlds. Edward made the front page of the news every week. He managed a billion-dollar company at 15 years old. He's a scientist, he's an inventor, he's a world-class artist. Not only Haley, but I don't think that there's any girl on the entire planet who can keep up with him—not unless she discovers the cure for cancer."

"Well, only if he didn't find it first," Mitchell joked. Claire sighed, as she thought that possibility was high.

"Let's switch up that thinking. You're only seeing him through rose-colored glasses right now. You're only focusing on the good stuff. What about the bad stuff? Maybe that can balance it all out."

Claire thought about it for a while and said, "Well, he's violent at times."

Mitchell exclaimed, flabbergasted, "He's not violent."

"I said at times!"

"It still sounds awful. He's a sweet dude," Mitchell defended Edward. "Maybe he can be a little hot-tempered at times. Like, only specific times when his family or friends are in danger." He helped Claire find the right words.

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"That made him seem heroic! You told me to find the bad stuff!" Claire glared at Mitchell with disbelief.

"Yeah, sorry. I'll—I'll think with you," Mitchell said, and then both of them thought in silence. After five minutes, Claire asked Mitchell, "Do you find anything yet?"

"No," Mitchell replied with a sigh. "The only bad thing I can think of is that he's nosy at times. But he has good intentions, so it cancels each other out."

"Damn it," Claire mumbled.

...

Haley put on some blush on her cheeks and checked her makeup in the mirror again. Her hair tied up in a sideway ponytail and she wore a simple floral yellow dress with a deep cut.

However, as she was excitedly preparing herself to sneak into her boyfriend's house, Phil stood behind her with an exasperated expression.

"You're really going on a date with someone else?! You just broke Edward's heart. At the very least, wait until he goes to Japan!" Phil exclaimed beggarly.

Haley smiled mischievously and said, "He's fine. He's already moving on too. We're both fine with it."

Alex walked into the basement bedroom, clutching her phone in her hand. "Um, what's with the yelling?" she asked.

"Your sister is being so inconsiderate of other people's feelings," Phil tattled to Alex. "Honestly, it's very disheartening to watch."

Haley scrunched her eyebrows as she looked at Phil with disbelief. "I'm not being inconsiderate. And also, why would I need to be considerate of Edward's feelings?"

"Not him! Mine!" Phil corrected Haley's assumption.

"She's going on a date with Brian," Phil tattled to Alex again.

Taken aback, Alex muttered with an incomprehensible expression, "You're going on a date with Foot Fetish Brian?!"

"Foot Fetish Brian?" Phil was horrified. "Why do you call him that?" he asked hurriedly.

Alex was exasperated and said, "'Cause he likes feet. He kept commenting on girls from the school's posts, asking if their feet were sweaty and if they could send him a picture of their toes."

"But he's kinda cute though," Haley pretended to be oblivious, which made Phil gag.

Phil suddenly held Haley's shoulders and said seriously, "Honey, you didn't send him any pictures of your feet, right?"

Taken aback, Haley grinned and replied, "Not for free. I made 5000 bucks from the sales alone."

"NO– Wait, 5000 bucks?!" Phil almost melted down before his mind focused on the numbers instead. Haley rolled her eyes in disdain and said, "That was a joke. I'm joking."

"So you're not going out on a date?" Phil asked, his eyes hopeful. Haley smiled sadly and said, "I'm going out with Tara. There will be boys there."

"Alright. I don't want to have to resort to this." Phil suddenly changed his tone and said assertively, "Haley, you're grounded for a week!"

"WHAT!?" Haley widened her eyes in disbelief. "WHY!?" she asked.

"Um, try not answering your phone for the entire day yesterday," Phil said sternly. Alex smirked in satisfaction as she saw Haley's troubled expression and added to the flame, "Mom was worried sick. You could've at least sent us a text."

"I DID!" Haley was frazzled by the accusation and defended herself hurriedly. Realizing that she would just dig a deeper hole for herself by continuing, Haley changed her strategy.

She took a deep breath, made her voice shaky, and her eyes forlorn before turning to Phil and said, "Dad, I just need some time to myself. That's all. Possibly a place away from this house... because, you know, there are a lot of memories of me and Edward here... I just need to escape for a bit. There aren't any boys; I'm just kidding with that."

"Aww..." Phil immediately became relieved and hugged Haley affectionately. "Of course, hun. I'm just worried because you weren't reacting normally. I thought you were really moving on, and that scares me a little."

"Why does that scare you?" Alex asked, interrupting the moment between the two. Phil replied without releasing his embrace, "Because then my daughter will be a sociopath. Don't worry, even if you really turned out to be one, I'll still love you guys with all of my heart."

"What if she's killing puppies?" Alex asked teasingly.

"I'll grab a shovel, and we will dig a hole together." Phil said casually, then his tone turned serious, "Then, we'll plant some endangered plants on top of the soil to prevent anyone from digging up the spot. We'll move to Miami, where I teach you how to live life with a code. You'll become a blood spatter analysis expert while hiding your true self behind a well-crafted mask that I made–"

"Isn't that from the Dexter TV Show?" Haley asked, fully confused by her father's plan.

Alex cackled loudly and then commented to herself, "I guess Haley's fine, but Edward needs to learn how to live by the code." She thought that if Haley wasn't a sociopath, then maybe Edward was.

"Hmm? What do you mean?" Haley asked, curious.

Alex laughed slightly and revealed, "Well, he's already having a hot girl over. That girl Annie that he went on a date with in Colorado. She's over at his house right now."

"WHAT THE FUCK!?" Haley cursed out loud, not even caring that her father was right beside her. "Honey, language," Phil scolded her. "Sorry," Haley apologized. Then Phil reacted to the news, "WHAT THE HECK!?"

Jacob told everyone in the group chat after he woke up at around 10 a.m. He shared it using Edward's phone because he was dejected that his mother wanted to disown him after he snuck out of the house to go back to the party last night.

He couldn't even go back home for now because his father wouldn't let him. He was being punished by his parents, which made him really depressed. Only after Edward told him that he would drive him back himself and help him apologize to his parents did he cheer up a little bit.

After some discussions, Phil decided to leave the matter to Ted, unaware that his daughter had already snuck out of the house during his phone call. Haley rang the doorbell furiously as she arrived at Edward's house, crossing her arms as she tapped her fingers in irritation.

As Edward opened the door, he beamed with a smile as he saw her face. "Hi. What are you doing here so early? We promised to meet at noon. There's still half an hour left..."

"Busting you!" Haley said before she entered the house in a hurry. Edward laughed obliviously and said, "Mind your words; there are still some people inside my house. You can make me bust later—oh, that's not what you meant." He finally noticed her angry expression.

Haley, however, turned incredibly frazzled when she walked to the living room. Annie was lying on the couch with some tissues up her nose, stained red from a nosebleed. Abed lay down sideways in a fetal position, rocking himself slightly as he mumbled some nondescript words.

Jacob's eyes were unfocused, and he kept smiling and talking to the air like a mentally ill person.

"What happened here?" Haley asked in shock. Edward ignored her question, eyed her up and down, and then complimented her sweetly, "You look really cute."

Haley blushed a bit, almost forgetting about the tragic scene in front of her, then she heard Abed shouting, "I can see it even when I close my eyes! THE CODES! THE CODESS!!!! They are drilling themselves into my brain!!"

"What the fuck is happening—" Haley grumbled and pouted slightly as she glanced at Edward. "Explain it."

"Well, it all started with teaching Annie some simple Excel shortcuts... Autosum and other functions to help her with her remote job." Edward took Haley's hand and led her away from all of the crazies.

" It only took her 30 minutes to learn everything, which shocked her and me. I guess I'm a really good teacher... So I started to teach her more..." Edward scratched his cheek in embarrassment as he continued his story.

"I started to teach her C++, the programming language. She was doing really well, and I became even more confident. 'Maybe Annie is just smart and has a knack for programming,' I thought. So I made Jacob and Abed learn it too because I wanted to have a bigger sample size," Edward trailed off slightly.

"After two hours, they turned out like this." Edward pointed at them casually. Annie raised her hand weakly and said, "I can still continue..."

Edward's [Teacher's Aura] from his karmic gacha made it possible for him to teach his students at an elevated rate. The skills promised a 300% increase in comprehension ability when Edward taught them personally.

An ordinary student's comprehension level when they are focusing was around 30% to 60%. However, with Edward, their brains started to overclock. Not because of the skills, but he kept hammering down knowledge into their brains to test the limits of the skills.

As he was excited, he didn't realise that he was slowly melting their brain– figuratively. Overall, they will be fine after resting for a short while.

"Oh," Haley exclaimed simply and her eyebrows ceased to crease. "You're training her on computer stuff.."

Edward inched closer to her, asking suggestively, "Why? Did you think that there's something else going on? Is that why you marched over here?"

"N–No..." Haley couldn't meet his eyes and she lowered her head in embarrassment.

[Haley's commentary]

"It hasn't even been one day, and I'm already acting like a crazy, jealous bitch..." She muttered with some disappointment. Then, she smiled happily and said, "Still... he said I'm cute. I knew that dress was the right choice."

[Commentary ends]

(A/N: Don't expect a healthy relationship between them. It'll be more of a teenage love mess.)

Annie and Abed left soon after, and Edward went to Jacob's house to help him face his parents. Haley went back home for a bit and returned after Edward made sure the house was empty—which meant that he kicked out Vanessa and Maggie too.

There was some biting silence as they sat on the couch together. Haley suddenly turned to Edward and asked, "So, Annie's pretty. Don't you think she's pretty?"

"So, is this how we're going to start our first day as a couple? We're going to fight?" Edward said playfully as he turned to her.

"No, we're not going to fight. You did ask her out on a date. So you must've thought she was attractive too," Haley said, looking a little sulky.

Edward hesitated for a bit before he sighed and said, "She's a little bit pretty—"

"I KNEW IT!" Haley stood up and immediately became annoyed. "Who do you think is prettier? Me or her?" she asked dramatically.

Edward smirked slightly, holding back his laughter as he saw Haley's lips curling upwards. She stopped herself from smiling, trying to keep the facade of the jealous girlfriend.

"Hmm... It's quite hard to compare. Try to make a cute pose," Edward said as he placed his finger on his chin, pretending that he was thinking about it.

Flabbergasted by his reaction, Haley placed her hands on her cheeks. "Like this?"

Instantly, Edward's hand moved, and he snapped a picture of her as she was doing the pose. Haley smiled as she gasped in elation, asking, "Wait. Did you do that on purpose? Let me see that picture!"

"Wait, I need to set it as my lock screen first," Edward said casually. His gesture made Haley swoon, and she just stared at him, stunned. Edward grinned as he showed her the photo, and also his lock screen.

"Isn't she cute? That's my girlfriend," he said, pretending that she was a stranger.

"Oh, you smooth bastard." Haley immediately jumped on his lap and gave him kisses after he did that.