Kays Translations

Chapter25: Monster Panic

As I stepped into the hallway, I noticed that all the windows had been shattered. They weren’t broken before I entered the reception room, so it was likely the work of the monsters.

I think the monsters broke the windows when the actor from the troupe summoned them to this school.

I carefully kept Nina-chan away from the broken glass shards to avoid any injuries and started to make my way back to the classroom. However, at that moment, a pungent odor pierced my nostrils.

“There’s a strange smell.”

“Yeah… What could it be?”

Nina-chan remarked, and I responded briefly. Indeed, there was an odd smell, something burning.

No, it was the smell of something scorched.

“If it’s a fire…”

“Then, I think someone should have triggered that red thing.”

By “that red thing,” Nina-chan was referring to the emergency bell, the switch that, when pressed, would set off the school-wide alarm. It was something that mischievous individuals occasionally pressed for pranks, becoming a problem. There was a similar incident about half a year ago, so it shouldn’t be broken. Moreover, if there were a fire caused by the monsters, the fire itself should be visible, even if the monsters weren’t.

Hence, it wouldn’t be unusual for someone to ring the bell. While thinking about that, Nina-chan and I ran toward the source of the smell. A unicorn suddenly came charging from the end of the corridor.

By unicorn, I mean the type with a single horn on its head.

“Tsk, Tsk, little kids! Size is S! SS!”

However, two strange things stood out. First, the unicorn’s body was made of plastic, the kind you often see on merry-go-rounds. That thing was running towards us.

“Ji, Rail for Life. Are you pulling the rails in your life?

And, the second thing…

Strings, like puppet strings, were entwined around the plastic unicorn’s body. These strings were moving its legs as it ran towards us.

“Flame Bee Homurabachi.”

I shot it down with a familiar spell, even if it was an opponent that the “Fairies” had missed. A burning spear appeared, shattering the plastic body into pieces and turning it into black mist.

After overcoming such a monster, we reached the stairs. However, the source of the foul smell wasn’t on the stairs. The smell was coming from above, drifting down from the upper floors. Nonetheless, we couldn’t immediately ascend the stairs. A black amoeba-like monster had occupied the stairs, stretching its slimy body to block them like a spider’s web. This strange monster had several fish-eye-like eyeballs scattered across its body, all of which looked at us simultaneously.

“Hey, didn’t I say not to turn off the lights?”

Nina-chan, unable to withstand the pressure of those gazes, tightly held my hand. We couldn’t tell where the monster’s voice was coming from.

“I… I hate the dark, I hate it, I hate it!”

“Wind Blade [Kamaitachi]”

Buzz!!!

With a loud buzz, the powerful wind blades sliced through the monster’s body. But at that moment, two eyeballs fell from the top of the stairs.

It’s as big as a watermelon at first glance, but it’s pretty big. It’s falling towards us, and…

“It’s falling. Falling. Freefall.”

“I’m going to die. I’m going to die. Exorcists are going to die.”

 As the bottom pupils dilated, a large mouth appeared from below.

“Heavenly Armor.'”

Through the extended two “guiding threads,” the monster was pierced.

Having lost its direction, the monster fell onto the stairs, making a thudding sound.

Then, it slowly turned into mist.

“There are way too many of them.”

“But the fairies should be exorcising them, right?”

Nina-chan muttered quietly. However, I agreed with her.

Perhaps the number of “Faries” wasn’t sufficient. I needed to summon more. I clapped my hands and summoned more fairies, asking them to spread out inside the school.

During that time, as we approached the source of the smell, a fairy that had gone ahead was caught by something that looked like tentacles. It was caught and forcefully pulled towards it.

“…Huh?”

“Hey, this tastes good. It’s sweet. Very spicy.”

Then, from around the corner, a large face appeared.

However, I could see the legs of the fairy I had created earlier in its mouth. The monster swallowed the fairy like a frog swallowing a bug and then revealed its full body.

The monster that emerged looked like a locust.

A locust, which meant it was an insect, but with a human face attached. Whether it was the actor from the troupe’s twisted sense of humor or just a coincidence, it wasn’t a pleasant sight at all.

Actually, more than that…

“…Can fairies be eaten?”

“This is the first time I’ve seen it…”

I asked Nina-chan, and she hesitantly explained.

But with this, I somehow understood why there were so many monsters even though we released the fairies.

“So, we have to release fairies that can’t be eaten.”

I clapped my hands in realization. In that moment, my shadow stretched like rubber and tore apart.

Then, the created “Shadows” slipped into the shadow of the locust and grabbed its head, pulling it out of the shadow.

“Oh, I’m drowning! I’m drowning! This is bottomless. An endless swamp. A dripping good guy. Guy? No, I’m a bug. No, athlete’s foot…”

Athlete’s foot?

I didn’t understand the meaning, but as soon as its face sank, other fairies grabbed the monster’s body and extinguished it.

“If you see a monster that eats fairies like the one earlier, help them.”

When I spoke to the Shadows like that, they disappeared in an instant. They went to search for monsters that ate fairies in a similar way.

I waved them off and finally climbed the stairs. At the top, the door to Classroom 1-3 was open, and a strange smell was wafting out from there.

I peeked into the classroom and found that, despite lunchtime being over, there were no students or teachers inside. Instead, cakes were placed on every desk.

“Why?”

Moreover, these were not the kind of cakes served for school lunch. They were large whole cakes with pure white cream and bright red strawberries on top, just like the ones you’d see on birthdays. They were placed on every desk, and there were even chocolate plates and lit candles.

The candles were crackling as they gradually burned shorter.

“Hey, Itsuki… look.”

“Nn…”

Nina-chan tugged at my hand and pointed to the blackboard.

The impact of the cakes had been so strong that I hadn’t paid any attention to it, but the blackboard was covered in chalk art.

There were various-sized arrows drawn on it, all pointing straight up. In the middle, in childlike English handwriting, it said:

“Come To The Rooftop!”

There was even a hastily drawn smiley face next to it.

It seemed like an invitation to go somewhere, but I had no idea where to go. Since I didn’t know, I decided to ask Nina-chan, who was standing next to me.

“Hey, Nina-chan, what does this mean?”

“…’Come to the rooftop,’ I think.”

Previous chapter | TOC | Next chapter