Kays Translations

Chapter 18: The Gremlin Engineering Professor and His Story

Sakunosuke Handa, one of the first students enrolled in Tokyo Magic University’s one-year curriculum, originally lived in Saitama City, Saitama Prefecture.

Saitama City was one of many regions where public order completely collapsed due to gremlin-related disasters. Areas not fortunate enough to have witches or wizards to protect them invariably met tragic ends. With no one to stand against the unrelenting onslaught of monsters, chaos ensued with massacres and looting becoming the norm. Even when the military or police managed to delay the collapse of order, they were quickly overwhelmed as soon as their ammunition ran out.

The weak—whether physically frail, mentally slow, or simply lacking initiative—were the first to die, regardless of age or gender. In less than a month, Saitama City’s population plummeted.

Though exact population statistics were never reliably recorded, it was estimated that survival rates in areas with witches or wizards averaged 20%. In areas without them, survival rates were a mere 0.1% to 5%. Saitama City was no exception.

Handa, who was in his mid-thirties and working at a waterworks company, lost his entire family in the immediate aftermath of the disaster. There was no time to mourn as he was swept up in the rapid collapse of society. His survival was nothing short of sheer luck.

For about a year, Handa eked out an existence in monster-infested Saitama City, resorting to looting to survive. Eventually, he grew tired of it all, abandoned his hideout, and began traveling south in search of a utopia.

Even if he were killed by monsters along the way, it would be better than continuing to rob dying elders or orphaned children of their meager belongings. There were rumors of witches in Tokyo who used the power of monsters to protect people and distribute food. Clinging to hope, Handa followed the Arakawa River toward Tokyo.

In a world where communication networks had ceased to function, there was no way to verify the truth of such rumors. Many similar tales existed, most of which were nothing more than fantasies born from the faint wish for salvation. Yet, something about the stories of witches felt oddly credible.

Perhaps Handa simply wanted to believe. In the end, however, his gamble paid off.

Handa was accepted into Tokyo as a refugee from outside the city. After a series of interviews, he was assigned to an area under the governance of the “Flower Witch,” which spanned parts of Arakawa and Taitō wards.

His new life began.

Handa was astonished to be treated as a human being. It had been so long since he’d encountered people who showed such respect for strangers.

He was even more surprised to be assigned a settlement based on clear regulations.

Unbelievably, Tokyo had maintained order.

There was structure. There was governance.

What had once been a given before the disaster now felt as foreign as encountering an entirely different culture.

The long-time residents of the Flower Witch’s district greeted Handa with pity.

They explained that among the various witches who governed Tokyo, those assigned to the Flower Witch’s district were considered unlucky. While it wasn’t the worst district, dying peacefully was unlikely…

The most distinctive feature of the Flower Witch’s district was that the bodies of deceased residents were used as her nourishment. Those who tried to flee the district to avoid this fate were not permitted to leave.

There were no graves for the Flower Witch’s citizens. Upon death, the roots of her plants would drag their bodies into the earth, feeding her. The Flower Witch, nourished by these remains, would bloom into an unparalleled beauty that seemed almost otherworldly.

However, that was the extent of the “disadvantages.”

Thanks to the Flower Witch’s magic of abundance, residents received three meals a day consisting of grains, vegetables, and fruit.

The sprawling roots beneath the district instantly eliminated any monsters that appeared. While flying monsters required intervention from security teams or assistance from witches in other districts, the absence of land-based threats made life far easier.

The Flower Witch imposed only basic laws: don’t steal, don’t kill, don’t deceive. Beyond that, she refrained from excessive interference with her people’s lives.

While some residents spoke of her corpse-eating nature with disgust, Handa didn’t mind.

“Worrying about what happens to your body after death… Tokyo really must be peaceful.” 

He thought, almost impressed.

After all, it wasn’t as though the Flower Witch actively sought to create corpses for her nourishment. There was no reason to feel troubled.

After several months of peaceful living under the Flower Witch’s roots, Handa began to heal, both physically and mentally.

One day, he encountered a wizard for the first time.

The man, calling himself a Seer of the Future, appeared to be around Handa’s age. Dressed in a worn-out suit, he seemed like an ordinary middle-aged man. Yet he fearlessly negotiated with the Flower Witch, struck some kind of deal, and left unscathed.

(Handa later learned that the wizard had paid a price to learn the Flower Witch’s magic of abundance.)

Watching this wizard, who came from the outside world and left unharmed, opened Handa’s eyes.

The Flower Witch fed on the bodies of her deceased citizens. She forbade them from leaving, as she didn’t want her nourishment to escape.

But apparently, that wasn’t an absolute rule.

If you had power, if you had status, if you could negotiate, you didn’t have to spend the rest of your life confined to this district.

For a few months, Handa lived a life of peace incomparable to the turbulent year before, and soon found himself feeling greedy. He wanted to see other districts of Tokyo.

His current life was good, but if there was a chance of a better one in another district, he wanted to take it.

First, Handa gathered materials from the debris in the city—progress on clearing it was slow because heavy machinery was out of commission. He crafted artificial flowers and pressed flowers, offering them to the Flower Witch as gifts to curry favor. He praised her beauty with lines so saccharine that only his late wife had ever heard anything similar, steadily raising her impression of him.

Taking advantage of a recruitment campaign for Tokyo Magic University, he asked for permission to study abroad outside the district.

“I promise to return. I’ll bring back knowledge, skills, and magic that will be of use to you.”

The Flower Witch listened to his plea, smiling gracefully, and whispered into his ear.

“If I send you off from here, you won’t return even after you graduate, will you? It seems the university is such a pleasant place.”

“!”

Handa turned pale, dimly grasping the nature of the deal between the Flower Witch and the Foresight Mage. Surely, if the Foresight Mage had offered a sacrifice in exchange for their deal, it must have been their greatest asset—the power of foresight.

Handa braced himself, expecting his limbs to be seized and torn apart by her roots, but unexpectedly, the Flower Witch stepped back and, chuckling softly, seemed amused by his reaction.

“Very well. I’ll allow it. It’s not a bad thing to establish ties with the university. Once you’re there, do send a letter every now and then, will you, Sakunosuke Handa?”

Handa left the Flower Witch’s presence, feeling as though he had just narrowly escaped death. It wasn’t until after he attended the university’s entrance ceremony that he realized she remembered his name.

Tokyo Magic University currently had only one department, “Magic Linguistics,” so Handa naturally enrolled in it.

Expecting an awkward second round of university life surrounded by peers more than a decade younger, Handa was surprised to find that his classmates spanned a wide range of ages. There was a man close to sixty, while another classmate seemed no older than a middle school girl.

Though he’d heard that the university didn’t select students based on age, he had assumed that, in practice, younger candidates would be prioritized. He hadn’t expected this much diversity.

Handa had joined the university more to sightsee around Tokyo than to actually study magic. He attended his classes moderately well but spent most of his free time wandering around the university’s home district, Bunkyo.

The first thing that surprised him was the absence of corpses.

In Saitama City, corpses were left unburied, picked apart by animals and monsters, and displayed in grisly scenes of death.

In the Flower Witch’s district, corpses were consumed as her nourishment, so their absence there made sense.

But the Foresight Mage, who governed Bunkyo, wasn’t the kind to consume corpses. If 80% of Bunkyo’s population had died in the Gremlin Disaster, that would mean over 180,000 bodies. Could they all have been disposed of?

It must have been an enormous effort. You’d expect to find piles of corpses or massive burial pits somewhere, yet Bunkyo’s streets were pristine. There were no signs of bodies, nor the stench of decay.

Curious, Handa asked a classmate who’d lived in Bunkyo throughout the disaster. The answer he received was entirely unexpected.

Apparently, during the height of the chaos caused by the Gremlin Disaster, a “Zombie Witch” roamed Tokyo, transforming corpses into zombies and taking them away one by one.

Thus, there were no bodies left in Tokyo.

Handa was impressed.

“Indeed, if the bodies could move on their own, it would certainly save a lot of cleanup effort.”

As he nodded in agreement, his classmate furrowed their brows in disgust and subtly distanced themselves from him.

In reality, if Tokyo, with its population density, had left mountains of corpses, it would have attracted flesh-eating monsters and wild animals. Swarms of flies would have bred, and the contamination of soil and water would have caused outbreaks of disease.

Even if it desecrated the dignity of the dead, turning them into zombies to clean up the remains served a significant purpose in protecting the living.

Hanada was infuriated by the disrespectful attitude toward the immense achievements of the Zombie Witch, but a few days later, he heard the details of the situation from another source and understood.

Apparently, the Zombie Witch had chosen the better-looking zombies from among those she collected and surrounded herself with them, indulging in what could only be described as a “corpse reverse harem.”

Even Hanada, whose sensibilities had grown skewed and unorthodox after a year of extreme living, found himself deeply unsettled by this revelation. While his own sense of normalcy was far removed from the average person’s, he simply could not comprehend the witches’ bizarre sense of aesthetics.

Bunkyo Ward, where Hanada now resided, lacked corpses and was exceptionally comfortable to live in. Hanada quickly grew fond of the area.

The Flower Witch’s territory had good security, but after experiencing life in Bunkyo, he came to understand why her citizens had complained. While traces of the apocalyptic catastrophe were still evident, the hope of rebuilding shone in the eyes of the residents, who lived with vibrancy and determination.

At the end of every month, a barter market was held in Bunkyo, drawing supplies from across Tokyo. Since currency had lost its value, everything was traded. There were even eccentric individuals offering rare liquor in exchange for pre-collapse high-value trading cards, making the market fascinating to observe.

The food distribution was stable and varied in color. While the portions were small, the meals were nutritionally balanced, reminiscent of modest school lunches.

As for the issue of monster attacks, the response was impressively swift. Hanada once witnessed the Seer Mage hurry to a manhole, pocket watch in hand. Just as a giant frog, the size of a small calf, leaped out of the manhole, the mage struck it cleanly on the head, killing it instantly before rushing off again. While not all monster appearances could be predicted, seeing firsthand how the Seer Mage pre-emptively prevented damage left Hanada deeply reassured.

Another highlight was the public bathhouse that opened on Sundays. It had apparently been suggested by the medical team shortly after Hanada’s enrolment. Despite the significant consumption of water and fuel, the team had passionately argued that maintaining public hygiene brought immense long-term benefits, and their proposal was approved.

Even though the baths were packed to the brim like sardines, being able to bathe weekly was a major comfort for Hanada. It was worlds apart from merely wiping down with a damp towel.

In Bunkyo, everything progressed efficiently and in an orderly manner. This was likely due to the Seer Mage’s magic. While this was an incredible blessing for the ward’s residents, Hanada couldn’t help but notice that the Seer Mage seemed more and more worn down every time he saw him.

With such capable leadership, Hanada understood why Bunkyo Ward’s recovery efforts were far ahead of others. The Seer Mage was undeniably the pillar supporting the ward in both name and reality. However, Hanada also feared that, should the Seer Mage disappear, the ward would quickly plunge into chaos—just as Minato Ward had fallen into ruin and its residents scattered after the death of the Vampire Mage.

It was with this in mind that Ohinata-sensei gave a brief speech before class: 

“The Tokyo Magic University exists to cultivate the knowledge and talents needed to ensure such disasters do not happen.”

By now fully settled into life in Bunkyo, Hanada found those words deeply moving.

As he grew fonder of Bunkyo, he also developed an attachment to the university and its classes. Though he was currently only benefiting from the ward’s resources, he began to think about how he could give back.

One day, after the chaos of a general-purpose magic staff retrieval operation, Hanada was in his dorm room examining his newly returned staff, which had been upgraded. According to Ohinata-sensei, the staff now had a built-in magic-backflow prevention mechanism in its handle. Earlier that day, they had attended a lecture on the proper handling of wands and the principles of the mechanism.

While Hanada had found the handling part simple, the mechanism’s principles were far beyond his ability to replicate. (After all, who had access to things like blast furnaces?) Still, he was fascinated by the explanation.

Having worked for many years at a plumbing repair shop, Hanada had been taught a variety of useful and less-than-useful bits of knowledge by his boss, and he knew a fair amount about fluid dynamics. The explanation of the reversal prevention mechanism brought long-forgotten knowledge rushing back to him.

The mechanism, it seemed, relied on the loss of magic energy that occurred when reverse magic flowed through the molten-reconsolidated gremlin core inside the staff.

In other words, magic flowed through the core as if through a pipe.

While Hanada thought the logic sounded full of holes, he couldn’t help but imagine it like water flowing through a pipe. This sparked a new idea: why not change the shape of the core to improve its functionality?

Hanada decided to test his theory by disassembling his staff—despite the fact that it was strictly prohibited. The staff was university property, only lent to students until graduation, at which point it would officially become theirs. It was to be handled with care, and disassembly was out of the question. But Hanada’s curiosity got the better of him.

In Hanada’s theory, replacing the straight-core design of the molten-reconsolidated gremlin with a Tesla valve shape would enhance its function. Backflowing magic would naturally travel in a straight, forceful line. By altering the core’s shape to create turbulence and vortices within the flow, he believed it would significantly reduce the momentum of the reverse flow, greatly improving the wand’s reversal-prevention efficiency.

Of course, this assumption hinged on whether backflowing magic behaved like fluid within the gremlin core. As Hanada wasn’t a mage and couldn’t perceive the flow of magic, the only way to test his hypothesis was to try it.

He wasn’t attempting anything as extreme as the incomprehensibly intricate modifications of Professor Ohinata’s beloved wand, Aleister, a dodecahedral fractal-type wand. All Hanada wanted to do was shave down a straight rod slightly to test its texture. He figured his modest skills were enough for that.

However, just seconds into the process, Hanada managed to shatter the molten-reconsolidated gremlin into several large and small fragments. On his very first cut, he had felt confident in his grip. But as he tried to replicate the technique on the second cut, a strange crack appeared. In an instant, the crack spread throughout the core, and it broke apart entirely.

Handa turned pale.

He had done it now.

This wasn’t just a small chip—it was a catastrophic break, impossible to explain away.

Although he knew in theory that the material was difficult to work with, he hadn’t realized it was this delicate. Apparently, he had accidentally concentrated the force right on an especially weak cleavage plane of the Gremlin material.

Handa sat on his bed for over an hour, clutching his head, cycling through excuses and ways to cover it up. But in the end, he grabbed the broken wand and headed to the principal’s office to come clean.

If the principal had been someone older, Handa might have opted to hide what he’d done. But the thought of trying to cover up his mistake in front of a 13-year-old girl made him feel far too ashamed. As an adult, it felt pathetic. And though apologizing was also humiliating, it seemed like the lesser evil.

When Handa explained the situation to Ohinata-sensei in the principal’s office, her beast-like ears drooped, and her tail sagged dejectedly. Arms crossed, she frowned with a troubled expression anyone could read.

“Well, this is quite a problem.” 

She said.

“I’m so sorry…”

“Oh, it’s fine. I’ll figure something out. After all, this wasn’t a prank but rather an act of academic curiosity and experimentation, right? Punishing that would go against everything a school stands for.”

“… Excuse me, but are you really 13?”

“Yes, I am.” 

She replied.

Her tilted head and innocent demeanor were perfectly age-appropriate, but her words and attitude were those of a seasoned educator. Handa couldn’t help but feel even more ashamed of himself.

After some time spent deliberating with arms folded, Ohinata-sensei clapped her hands together and spoke brightly.

“Alright, here’s an idea, Handa-san.”

“Yes?”

“How about becoming the professor for our newly established Gremlin Engineering department next year?”

“… Pardon?”

Thinking he must have misheard, Handa asked again, but Professor Ohinata repeated the same words with a warm, friendly smile.

He hadn’t misheard.

“Your idea is a theoretical breakthrough that even professional staff craftsmen haven’t considered. Besides, you managed to carve it on your first try, even with makeshift tools, didn’t you? That’s truly, truly remarkable! None of the candidates we’ve interviewed for the Gremlin Engineering position so far have been able to accomplish something like that. You could practically call yourself second-best in the world!”

“I-I see. But it was only the first time, purely by chance. You’re praising me way too much.”

“Even if the carving was a fluke, the idea itself is real. Handa-san, you’re far more capable than you think. I’d love for you to teach what you know at our university.”

“Well, even if you say that, I’m just someone who used to work at a plumbing shop. This time, I just happened to draw on some knowledge I picked up there, purely by coincidence…”

He had come prepared to accept expulsion, but the conversation was taking a wildly unexpected turn.

As Handa hesitated and tried to decline, Professor Ohinata clasped both his hands in hers, her sparkling eyes brimming with enthusiasm.

“I understand you’re not currently an expert on Gremlins. I’m not asking you to deliver perfect lectures or be the perfect mentor from day one. But someone has to blaze the trail for Gremlin Engineering. We can’t keep relying on the extraordinary talents of a select few; we need to develop knowledge and techniques that anyone with some dedication or passion can replicate. In other words, we need to establish Gremlin Engineering as an academic discipline that can be studied, taught, and shared. And if anyone can do that, it’s you, Handa-san. I’m convinced of it.”

“B-but I’m not cut out to be a university professor…”

“You’ll be fine! Our university doesn’t have much history. We’re practically newborn. Think of it as growing together with the school, starting from scratch. Take it easy, and if it really doesn’t work out, you can always step down. What do you say?”

“U-uh…”

“Please?”

“F-fine. I’ll give it a try. But don’t get your hopes up, okay?”

“Thank you so much! If you don’t want me to get my hopes up, I won’t—but I will trust you. I’ve already seen how you went from being indifferent to your classes to taking them seriously and putting your heart into them. I believe the same will happen with this job.”

“Haha…”

Under normal circumstances, her words might have sounded like empty flattery, but when Professor Ohinata said them, they came across as nothing but pure, heartfelt honesty.

When someone trusts you, it makes you want to live up to that trust. Especially in a world where trust is a rare commodity.

And so, Handa Sakunosuke became the professor of Gremlin Engineering at Tokyo Magic University.

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