— — — — — —
After giving the students a thorough beating, Kazuma walked into the classroom and found Oyama lying sprawled across the floor.
"Kazuma, help me! Help me!"
"Those bastards, those trash actually dared lay a hand on me. I'm going to the principal right now. I'll have them all expelled! Every last one of them! Those sewer rats don't deserve to be in a school!"
Seeing Kazuma felt like seeing a savior. Oyama struggled to speak, desperate for Kazuma to drag him out of there.
Bam!
Kazuma stepped forward and kicked him straight out of the classroom. He smashed through the window and crashed onto the courtyard outside.
"Your blood's getting all over my classroom. I really don't like that."
Kazuma hopped out the window and walked toward him, one step at a time, looking down at him from above.
"Kazuma, I'm sorry, I'm really sorry. I shouldn't have acted like that before. It was my fault, all my fault. Please don't take it to heart. We're colleagues, aren't we?"
Oyama lowered his head, gritting his teeth. He was furious, but he forced himself to hold it in. Once he got out of this school, he was going to make sure those students got expelled. And Kazuma would never teach again. He knew some yakuza outside—he'd definitely have them teach this bastard a lesson.
"You think you're worthy of being my colleague? Just now you called those students trash. Sewer rats. But right now I think you look more like trash. A worm crawling on the ground."
Kazuma kicked him again, sending him skidding all the way to the front gate. He followed at an unhurried pace.
"Cough… cough!"
Oyama spat blood. Hearing Kazuma's footsteps getting closer, fear finally set in. He wanted to run.
"No, that guy isn't a teacher. Not at all. He's worse than a delinquent. Worse than a monster. I have to get away or… or he's going to kill me."
He couldn't stand up anymore. His whole body squirmed as he tried to crawl away, looking exactly like a worm trying to flee.
"The kids in this school are trash, delinquents, thugs, idiots. Sure. But they're also students of this school."
"And I'm their teacher. My students. I can yell at them. I can beat them. But you can't. You don't deserve to."
Kazuma stopped beside him. "Didn't you want to go? I'll send you off."
"Once you're out that gate, it's over. But if I ever see you near here again, I'll cut off your head and hang it over the school entrance. Got that?"
Kazuma grabbed him by the hair and hauled him up. A glint of red flickered deep in his eyes.
"Y-yes! I got it, I got it!"
Oyama pissed himself on the spot. He finally understood what killing intent really was. He'd always thought it was just a metaphor—but now he felt it. Cold like falling into an icy abyss, his blood freezing up. His body wouldn't move, his soul was shaking, and every instinct screamed that he was going to die.
"Then get the fuck out of here."
Kazuma threw him past the school gate. Then he turned to the students inside and raised his voice. "If any of you ever see him near this school again, string him up at the gate. Understood?"
"Yes, Kazuma-sensei!"
The students who could still move dragged themselves to their feet and gathered around him. In that moment, they submitted completely.
Kazuma had completely broken them in. At this moment, he became the school's one and only boss—no, its one and only teacher.
Outside the gate, Oyama looked up at the school's sign: Ishiyama High. The "Devil High" suddenly felt painfully more fitting.
And the school itself looked dark and ominous now. In the center stood Kazuma, radiating a terrifying presence. He looked like a demon king ruling over his horde of delinquent demons.
"H-horrifying…"
Whatever lingering thoughts of resistance Oyama had evaporated. His will was swallowed whole by fear.
Kazuma's Haki left an imprint deep in his mind. Today's terror would haunt him for life. A year, ten years, decades later, remembering it would still make him break out in a cold sweat.
Right now he only wanted to get as far away from this place as possible. Forever.
Pushed by sheer survival instinct, he somehow managed to crawl away. Adrenaline really is something.
"Dadadada!"
Baby Beel watched the crawling Oyama and his excitement spiked. His fighting spirit surged. He couldn't hold his magic back anymore.
"Waaah!"
He burst into loud crying, and lightning exploded out of him. This blast was stronger than anything he'd released before.
Electricity flooded the entire school. Students who had been lying on the ground shot to their feet, twitching violently.
"Aaawoo!!"
Beel cried harder. Kanna, happy as ever, opened her mouth wide and started devouring the lightning straight off him.
"Mmm, tasty!" Her face lit up. Magic-packed lightning was the best. Beel was amazing.
"Master released that much magic on his own? That shouldn't be possible. In the human world, he can only use magic through his contractor—his foster father!"
Hilda was stunned. She rushed to Kazuma and checked him over repeatedly, finding no symbol of a demon contract anywhere.
"Don't tell me you never signed a contract with him?"
She could hardly believe it. That would mean Beel had been following Kazuma just because he liked him.
"What contract? No one told me anything about signing a contract."
Kazuma blinked. He vaguely remembered something about signing one after adopting Beel so he could use Beel's magic.
But he'd never needed it, and he'd completely forgotten. If Hilda hadn't brought it up, he probably never would've remembered.
"You really are a monster…"
Hilda watched the baby demon leap onto Kazuma after releasing all that magic. She sighed. At this point, a contract barely mattered. Even if someone else tried to sign one with Beel, this demon baby would never agree.
"Umm... Looks like every student in the school just got wiped out. I guess they won't be attending class anytime soon." Tohru glanced at the defeated masses of Ishiyama High.
"Call an ambulance to pick them up. Oh, wait, the principal is down too. Ah… my bad."
Kazuma spotted the principal twitching on the ground and walked over. "Principal, you're not dead, right?"
"Ka… Kazuma-san, plea… please…"
"What? You can't hold on? Don't worry, I'll take over as principal for now. Just focus on your recovery. The school's in good hands."
He could already guess what the principal wanted to say, so he cut him off with a reassuring look—well, "reassuring" from his perspective.
"You… you… I—ugh!"
The principal passed out right there, unable to withstand Kazuma casually stealing his job.
Before long, the ambulances arrived. It was a huge job: practically every student was carried away on stretchers, principal included.
"So… what do we do now?" Tohru asked, standing beside him. Teachers kind of needed students. With none left, what were they supposed to teach?
"Vacation. Do whatever you want. I'm acting principal now, so I make the rules."
Kazuma declared an indefinite break for himself. Until the students were discharged from the hospital, he was free.
"Great. I'm going to binge some dramas. Actually, I'll go rent a few more DVDs while I'm at it," Hilda said, eyes sparkling. Soap-opera marathons were truly her natural habitat as a demon maid.
"Dadadada!"
Beel danced in circles, feeling light as air after releasing that huge burst of magic.
"Hey, school looks fun. Can Kanna go too?" Kanna tugged Kazuma's shirt, her eyes bright with curiosity. School seemed interesting, and she wanted in.
"Sure, but looking like that you can only get into elementary school. I'll find a way to get you some paperwork."
"Yay! Kazuma is the best!" Kanna threw her arms up in celebration.
Right then, Tojo Hidetora finally arrived, late from his part-time job. He froze as he saw all the students being carted away.
"Kazuma-san…"
Boom!
"Add this idiot to the load too."
Kazuma didn't give Tojo a chance to speak. One punch sent him flying, and the medics scrambled to lift him onto a stretcher. They didn't dare refuse; one wrong word and they'd be the next ones lying down.
Just like that, Ishiyama High was completely wiped out.
"Tojo's really tough. And… is it just me, or does he feel stronger than before?" Tohru tilted her head. Tojo's aura was noticeably more intense, but Kazuma still downed him with a single punch. If anything, Kazuma seemed to be putting in less effort now.
"This kid's like a wild beast. Ever heard of those monkeys from that Dragon Ball series? The more you knock them down, the stronger they get."
"Tojo is the same. His body learns better than his brain does. Every time he gets beaten, his muscles remember the power and adapt."
"And his instincts let him pick up new fighting skills mid-battle. That's just how he is. You don't need to train him. Just toss him somewhere dangerous and he'll grow on his own."
Kazuma shrugged.
"Then how'd he still get flattened in one punch? Didn't you use full strength last time? Shouldn't he be able to handle it now if he got stronger?" Hilda asked. Of course, she knew Kazuma was only using his body strength, not magic.
"Because I'm getting stronger faster than he is."
Kazuma smiled. With every fight he grew more precise, able to draw out far more from the same strength. And after discovering the limits of his own body, he'd been hard at work reinforcing it.
"If Tojo is a monster, then Kazuma is something beyond that. Even demons can't do what he does," Hilda muttered. Neither of them was remotely normal. Something about this place was seriously off.
They joked and chatted as the hospital bustled around them. Everyone looked strangely optimistic about the future.
---
Later that afternoon, an elderly man strolled up to Ishiyama High's gate, peering inside.
"That surge of power earlier must've come from here. Ishiyama High… isn't this where Aoi goes?"
"If that's the case, I can't ignore it. Better head in and see what kind of demon caused all that chaos."
This old man was Aoi Kunieda's grandfather, Ittosai Kunieda, head of the Shingetsu sword style. In the human world, he was a powerhouse rivaled only by Behemoth, the former Demon World army commander.
Ittosai entered the school grounds, wandering around.
"Strange. Not a single student anywhere. Break? No… it shouldn't be break time."
He searched for a long while, finding no one, until he reached the back of the school near a tree.
Not far from him—
"Hmm..." Kanna stared at a cicada, then chomped it down.
"Kanna, don't just eat random things. Even if it won't upset your stomach, you still shouldn't do that," Tohru said while sweeping the ground. With nothing better to do, she'd decided to pass time by cleaning.
"Okay. I won't eat things randomly," Kanna nodded. She'd think before eating next time—and if she thought about it first, it didn't count as "random."
"Dragons. A dragon's aura? And… more than one? There are dragons in this school on top of demons? Itto-sai immediately hid before Tohru could spot him. He felt more and more alarmed. He'd expected only a demon. But dragons? Two of them? Why weren't these creatures staying in their own world?
"Wait… were they just cleaning?" He peeked again and saw Tohru and Kanna sweeping the grounds.
"This school… isn't normal. They've got dragons doing housekeeping?"
His shock doubled, but before he could retreat—
"Hello, sir! Do you need something from us? Don't tell me you're a student here too?" Tohru was suddenly at his side, smiling as she addressed the sneaking old man.
.
.
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