"What are you looking at me for? Is the answer written on my face?"
"Eyes on your textbook, now!"
From the lectern came Su Tang's bellowing.
"Teacher is so strict when he teaches," Reze stole a glance at Su Tang and cautiously leaned over to whisper to Denko.
With a pen clenched between her teeth and utterly stumped by the arithmetic in front of her, Denko nodded in heartfelt agreement. Hunched over, she whispered back, "You don't know—Mr. Su Tang has never been this fierce at home. Not even when Power took a dump and didn't flush, blocking the toilet for a whole day."
"Power is the fiend you told me about? She can work at Public Safety too?" Reze looked very intrigued.
"Yeah, yeah. But I heard that lousy woman was personally brought in by Miss Makima. Right now she's Mr. Su Tang's slave."
"Slave? What kind of slave?" Reze snickered, making a circle with the thumb and forefinger of her left hand and sliding the forefinger of her right in and out. "This kind?"
"Heh-heh." The topic clearly hit Denko's sweet spot; like a cat that had just stolen a fish, she said excitedly, "Of course not… though you could say that too, technically—I heard from Miss Himeno that, in theory, whatever Mr. Su Tang tells Power to do, she has to do. But Mr. Su Tang is kind—he doesn't do that sort of thing to that idiot."
As she spoke, she sneaked a look at Su Tang on the lectern and tittered with Reze. "You know what I mean."
"I know, I know." They both lay on the desk, shoulders shaking, clearly struggling not to laugh.
"Right, do you know about that black-robed person the other day?" Reze suddenly remembered something and asked Denko.
"The black-robed person? Oh! You mean the Bat Devil incident."
"Yeah. The papers kept going on about how heroic that black-robed person was, but I don't think so. I actually found the one fighting it before the black-robed person showed up a lot more interesting—the one with the chainsaw for a head. I heard she wore a Public Safety uniform. Have you seen her?"
"Ah-ha! You mean Chainsaw Man! I—"
Denko's eyes went wide—finally someone had noticed her. In her excitement she'd just started to speak when a sharp bark came from the lectern: "Denko!"
"M—Mr. Su Tang."
Denko stiffened, then sat bolt upright, posture perfect.
"I told you—right now don't call me Mr. Su Tang. Call me Teacher."
"Yes, sir."
"You…"
Standing at the lectern, Su Tang rubbed the bridge of his nose in exasperation.
He glanced at the clock at the back of the classroom—8:30 p.m. Though Tokyo in summer had only just slipped into nightlife, he didn't want Denko staying up late.
"Another hour and we'll head back. Hurry and finish the problems I just assigned; I'll go over them for you."
"Right away." Denko buried her head and answered readily—but she was already wearing the mask of pain.
Awkward. When Mr. Su Tang was lecturing just now, she had only bent down to pick up an eraser—and when she looked up again, she couldn't understand a thing.
So weird.
Staring at the numbers crawling and twisting on the page, Denko sighed.
She turned her body, keeping one eye on Su Tang, and whispered to Reze, "Old wom… Reze, that Teacher Devil you mentioned—what's the deal? Public Safety never took it out?"
"It's just a rumor," Reze stopped her pen and shook her head. "But I heard it's real—and the Teacher Devil was deliberately let loose by the First Academy."
"Deliberately?" Denko's eyes brightened with interest.
She thought school was awesome; whispering under the teacher's nose felt both thrilling and exciting—especially since the teacher was her Mr. Su Tang. It had this… mm… forbidden flavor?
"Right. Supposedly the Teacher Devil doesn't hurt people, but if it touches you, it drags you off to do problems…"
"Drags you off to do problems!"
Denko shuddered, and in her surprise let her voice rise a few notches.
Uh-oh.
Her heart lurched. She carefully looked up—and sure enough, met Su Tang's expressionless face.
"Heh-heh… heh-heh, we were… um, discussing the problem."
Denko made a last, tiny struggle.
Su Tang stayed expressionless.
Having once been a student himself, of course he knew exactly what Denko was thinking—she figured if she kept her head down and whispered, the teacher couldn't see. But standing up here, a teacher can see everything below, crystal clear.
All the more so with Su Tang's enhanced eyesight.
He stepped down from the lectern. With each footfall, Denko's heart trembled once.
He stopped beside her.
"Let me see your work."
Facing Su Tang's outstretched hand, Denko didn't dare breathe loudly. She handed over the worksheet, mumbling, "Um… it's not finished…"
"…"
Lowering his head to the page—only one problem answered—blue veins began to pulse on Su Tang's forehead.
He'd always thought he had a good temperament. Teaching, though, really tested it.
2 + 4 = 24!
It's 6.
Look at that—is that an answer a human could get!
Even if you counted on your fingers, you wouldn't write something this ridiculous.
"You're doing extra practice at home," he said darkly. "At the very least, finish two full booklets of mental arithmetic before I teach you the next unit."
"Oh…" Denko answered meekly, then looked up in disgruntlement. "That's not fair. The old woman was talking too—why not make her practice?"
"Because she finished." Su Tang sighed, held up Reze's page—covered top to bottom—and said helplessly, "You didn't know anything and started talking to her. In the end you didn't do a single problem; she did all of them—and got them all right."
"I did do one," Denko muttered, then suddenly realized—she whipped her head toward Reze, eyes wide. "Old woman, you did it on purpose to trip me up!"
Damn it—fell for her again.
In her mind, Denko sentenced the old woman to a hundred squats.
Then reality returned—she had to face Su Tang's appraising gaze.
"Forget it—take a break. Class dismissed for now."
Rubbing his brow, Su Tang began to wonder if his method was wrong.
Think of Master Kong's "teaching according to aptitude," think of Master Shifu from Kung Fu Panda.
Maybe… Denko wasn't dumb; maybe, like Po, she just lacked enough motivation?
So thinking, he found an empty seat against the wall and sat down.
A book lay on the desk, the owner's name on the cover:
"Asa Mitaka."
He glanced at it—it was a dry, encyclopedic volume. As expected of the First Academy—your average student here could gnaw through this hard a text.
"Teacher, Denko—have you heard the story of the country mouse and the city mouse?"
Denko was busy curiously peering around the corners of the classroom when Reze spoke. Denko turned, baffled. "Mice? What mice?"
"It's from Aesop's Fables," Su Tang looked up, answered Denko's question, then turned to Reze. "What made you think of that?"
She didn't answer right away.
She gazed out the window—night deep, moonlight like water—
and spoke softly: "The country mouse is poor but happy, free, and unafraid; the city mouse is rich and eats well, but lives in fear every day. If you had to choose, which would you pick?"
"City mouse, of course," Denko answered without thinking. "Good food and drink—basically paradise."
"Mm…" Reze nodded in silence and said no more.
She looked to Su Tang.
"Uh… if I had to choose, maybe the country mouse," he closed the book, shaking his head. "But honestly, I don't want either."
"Don't want either?" Reze repeated.
"Yeah. Why be a mouse at all?" Su Tang said. "The story divides people into two kinds by default, but reality isn't that black and white. If you have the ability, why not try living in the city without being a mouse—be a real person."
"Of course, that's if you have the ability. At the very least you need a skill," he rubbed his chin. "Otherwise, better to mind your own patch."
"Ability… ability…"
Reze chewed the word.
"Simply put, either the ability to resist them—or the means to become one of them." Su Tang thought, then smiled and offered an analogy: "Like Jerry in Tom and Jerry—still a mouse, but can play the cat to a draw. Ha."
"I think I get it," light gradually returned to Reze's eyes. Then she closed them, breathing easy. "No rush, no rush. There's time—let me think more."
"Why are you tangled up in this?" Su Tang asked, puzzled. "Do you feel like the city mouse right now? Do you instinctively feel unsafe? Directionless?"
This, too, was a facet of "big-city syndrome," common in first-tier cities in fast-growth economies.
Before crossing over, he'd treated this kind of patient the most—though in 1997 it was still milder.
"Mm…" Reze nodded slowly.
"Then you must not have relaxed in a long time," Su Tang smiled. "Maybe take time to go to the outskirts—see the scenery, swim, climb a mountain. It'll help."
"Will you go with me, Teacher?" Reze looked at him with a hopeful gaze.
"I want to go too! Me too!"
Denko waved her hand and shouted.
He looked at Denko, then at Reze, thought a moment, and smiled. "All right. Fieldwork is an important part of teaching too. When the time's right, I'll take you to have fun—uh, to study."
"Mm. As for when the time is right… when you, Reze, finish trigonometry—and you, Denko, finish linear equations in one variable."
"Okay, no problem!" Reze's brows curved, green eyes brimming with mirth.
"Same for me," Denko chimed in at once.
"Good, then we—"
Su Tang nodded—he felt he'd probably found the right direction for teaching. But just as he moved to stand and teach more, his vision blurred.
Denko and Reze were gone.
This was…
Frowning, he saw a… devil appear atop the lectern.
Roughly matchstick-shaped, human-sized; its trunk and limbs were thick, chalk-like lines.
Its head… looked a lot like Koro-sensei's face from Assassination Classroom.
All told, not particularly horrifying—much better than the devils he'd met earlier.
"Oh, human—are you here to challenge me, the Teacher Devil?!"
"Challenge?"
"Ha-ha! Lingering in the classroom after night classes—that's to challenge me and improve yourself!" The Teacher Devil seemed used to this. "My ability is to set ten questions based on the test-taker's highest academic level. Only by getting them all right can you leave this illusion."
"Since you were holding math problems just now—tonight we do a math challenge! Ha-ha—begin!"
As it finished, a test sheet appeared on Su Tang's desk.
His heart sank.
Wait—the highest level… math?
He looked down. Sure enough, ten questions crammed with bizarre symbols; he could barely recognize alpha and beta…
Scratching his head, he sighed.
He had studied calculus, sure—but only because it was required. All he really remembered was L'Hôpital's rule—felt like any "L'Hôpital-whatever" might do—but graduate-level math? He knew nothing.
Couldn't even read the problems—how to solve them?
Simple.
He stood, walked toward the Teacher Devil, and a cyan hue crept along his arm.
Meanwhile, in Reze's illusion—
"Ha-ha, let me see your highest academic level… uh—none?"
The Teacher Devil's mind stuttered. It scratched its head with chalk and thought, then said, "Then we'll do addition and subtraction within ten! Listen carefully—5 + 5 = ?"
Reze sighed. She had been in a great exchange with Su Tang, only to be cut off by this thing.
Tilting her head, she said casually:
"Ten."
"Congratulations, correct! Next question—2 + 3 = ?"
"Nine."
"Wrong! If you can't answer all ten, you'll be trapped in the illusion until dawn."
"Eight."
"I haven't asked yet!"
"Seven."
…
Su Tang flicked his wrist and watched the scene peel back, skin reknitting over his arm.
Just then, his body jolted.
No—the whole building seemed to jolt!
From the void thundered a sound—that was…
"BOOM!!!"
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