S-Rank Class

After leaving the staff lounge, I stopped by the resource room on the first floor to pick up my essential supplies.

They had every conceivable thing in there. Not that I couldn't afford any of it, of course.

The room was cluttered with items I couldn't even identify, so sorting out what I actually needed took longer than expected. Worried about how much time I'd burned, I quickened my pace.

"Huh? Teacher, you've got your supplies already?"

And right on cue, as I exited with everything in hand, I ran into Yoo Jinchae in the hallway.

"Ah, yes. It seemed like more of a hassle to keep going back and forth to the third floor."

The Dolphin Class, my assigned homeroom, was on the third floor. Judging by the most efficient route, it made sense to carry everything up while I was down here.

Plus, honestly, I was using that as an excuse to escape that suffocating room from earlier.

Watching Teacher Park Edeun struggle all alone to smooth over something that wasn't even his to explain had been rather painful to witness.

"Wow~ You're a real go-getter. No wonder you graduated with a degree in early childhood education—people like you really are built different. Oh, right, you do know this, don't you? The only person at this kindergarten who could genuinely be called a preschool teacher is you."

Even though her words sounded like sarcasm if you took them at face value, I didn't feel offended.

If anything, I was closer to stunned disbelief.

……She's insane. That review was actually true.

The JobCOSMOS review claiming that D-rank and above Awakeners could be hired as kindergarten teachers without any actual teaching certification appeared to be no lie.

Is this what a tenant feels like, standing in front of an apartment mid-renovation?

I had no idea where I should even begin to worry.

"And you've read the manual, right? I don't care about anyone else, but Teacher Hwiyeon absolutely has to know it inside and out~"

Yoo Jinchae clapped her palms together with a sharp smack, and my attention snapped back to her.

The manual—you mean the thing I did receive.

If that bizarre, nearly incomprehensible document was the manual she was talking about.

Emergency Response Protocols—a yellow booklet, with everything detailed right down to the illustrations.

"I did read it. Though something about it seemed... off."

Kwon Haeseong had handed it to me, so I'd taken it and given it a read—well, skimmed it before closing the cover.

Setting aside how hard it was to digest the content in the first place...

It wasn't even ghost-story material. The content itself was just strange.

Apart from a few pages laying out brief profiles of the entire student body and points of caution, I could barely make sense of anything in there.

"Ah~ I suppose it could feel unfamiliar ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠on a first read."

Unfamiliar. Didn't that single word fall short of describing it?

When I'd read that manual, quite a few more thoughts had occurred to me.

"......Well."

On its surface, the manual was explicitly framed as a guide for 'protection' and 'safety.'

But if you looked at it with even a little scrutiny, the oddness became impossible to miss.

The objects of that 'protection' and 'safety' were left vague, and most of the manual's content dealt with what to do after an incident had already occurred.

"As you know, every child at Bada Kindergarten is an Awakener. They're too young to control their abilities properly, so it's less a place built to raise them well and more a place built to control them well, if that makes sense?"

"To... control them."

Naturally, this wasn't news to me, so I didn't panic.

Baek Cheonhyeong had told me on interview day.

……Right after I finished signing the employment contract, mind you.

In that very moment, I'd remembered his insufferably smug face.

'That's the reason they only hire teachers who are D-rank Awakeners or higher,' wasn't it?

So I understood exactly what Yoo Jinchae was saying.

In other words, our job was to 'expertly' prevent young Awakeners from causing accidents through clumsy ability use when no guardian was around.

And the manual I'd received had been prepared for exactly those situations.

But even so, I mean—

"I'm not so sure about that."

I really wasn't sure.

"Sure, they call it a manual for everyone's safety, but a lot of the emergency measures in there don't seem appropriate to use on unstable children."

- If containment of the subject fails, apply a Control Collar. (At this time, use any means necessary.)+ Lower your guard and you're the one who gets hurt.- Proceed by danger level, in order: Control Collar application (1st priority) / psychological exposure (2nd) / request backup (3rd) / request Hunter support (4th).None of that matters. Just get a collar on them ASAP.

Passages like that, mostly.

The content, along with those curt little comments tacked onto the end, treated the children like nothing more than wild animals.

"......"

Ah.

I'd said way too much.

'He might think the new guy is overstepping.'

I instantly regretted the words that had slipped out. I hurriedly added to Yoo Jinchae, who was now regarding me with an odd expression.

"I just meant that, if it were me, I'd focus less on following the emergency manual and more on preventing emergencies from happening in the first place. That seems better for the kids—and for me.... Um, anyway, I should head upstairs."

The air turned awkward again, and I swiftly made my escape up the stairs to the second floor.

"Hey, Teacher, did you know?"

Yoo Jinchae's voice came suddenly from behind me, and I paused mid-step to look back.

Unlike a moment ago, she was smiling so widely that dimples dug deep into her cheeks.

"Sorry, what?"

"The fact that your class is called the S-class."

"......S? As in, some kind of elite class?"

Faced with such an abrupt question, I offered what I thought was a plausible guess. But what was with that expression?

She looked like she was witnessing someone hopelessly naive...

"Nooo~ I mean the difficulty is S-rank."

I'm sorry?

'Did I mishear that?'

Most likely my face had gone a bit stiff as I turned her cryptic words over and over in my head.

Don't tell me this was another form of workplace hazing?

And just as I opened my mouth to ask what she actually meant—

BOOM!!!

A deafening roar split the air, and the entire building shuddered.

"......!"

I grabbed the stair railing and immediately ducked down.

In the same instant, my eyes locked with Yoo Jinchae's, who was already flattened against the floor.

'What was that sound?''Stay put. For now.'

After this wordless exchange of glances, once things seemed to settle, I was the first to speak.

"What on earth was that?"

Judging by Yoo Jinchae's demeanor, she didn't seem particularly fazed.

If anything, the lively brown eyes that had sparkled throughout our entire conversation were now as lifeless as a dead lightbulb.

"I honestly hate to say this, but—you'd better hurry up and go see."

Yoo Jinchae furrowed her brow as if the whole thing were a tiresome chore, sprang up from where she crouched, and immediately started running toward the far end of the hallway.

Watching her go, I hung half off the stair railing and shouted after her, running in exactly the opposite direction of the noise.

"Teacher! Where are you going?!"

"To grab the Control Collars! Just get upstairs, fast! I think your class's kids have gone and caused another accident!!"

Watching Yoo Jinchae's long legs devour the distance without a hint of hesitation, I started taking the stairs three at a time. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠ 'I have no idea what's going on.'

Our class kids caused an accident, she said?

But there was only the twins in the class right now.

Sure, those kids could apparently commit every sin imaginable in the blink of an unsupervised eye.

'I've only been gone for, what, twenty minutes?'

......No, wait.

'Twenty minutes is plenty of time for anything.'

Sure enough, the moment I stepped onto the third floor, there stood Kwon Haeseong and Kang Sagwa in front of the Dolphin Class.

The two of them appeared to be conferring about something, looking perfectly calm.

"Teacher Haeseong! Teacher Sagwa!"

At my shout, Kwon Haeseong turned to look at me and simultaneously pointed at the tightly sealed Dolphin Class door. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠ "Seoro and Seora are right now—"

I brushed past the two of them and flung the door open.

Given the roar and the tremor, it was impossible to guess what had happened.

Had someone fallen from a height? Gotten hurt playing?

"Kids!!"

Imagining every possible disaster that might await, I threw open the door—and then I simply...

stopped.

What am I even looking at right now?

The sliding door swept aside effortlessly, catching on nothing.

And the instant it opened, I felt it—something was wrong.

'Something's burning?'CRASH!!

The round table at the center of the classroom smashed through the window and shot outside at a terrifying speed.

"......?!"

"They're fighting.... the two of them."

Kwon Haeseong had come up beside me and added the explanation in little more than a whisper.

......If my eyes weren't deceiving me.

The person who had just flung that table was, unmistakably, Lee Seoro, all the way across the room.

He sent a table flying with a single flick of his finger?

"Don't mess with me, Lee Seoro!"

Not to be outdone, Seora retaliated with a booming yell, flames blazing to life in both her hands.

The fire shifted from red to a vivid blue as it roared fiercely.

In that moment, the brief profiles of the children from the first page of the manual flashed through my mind.

An A-rank psychokinetic and an A-rank Elementalist.

'Neither their ranks nor their abilities are anything to scoff at.'

I knew almost nothing about offensive abilities like these.

The only reason I even had fragmentary knowledge at all was from those short videos floating around WeTube about 'known types of awakened abilities.'

Whether that even counted as information was anyone's guess.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠"How long have those two been fighting?"

I steadied my shock and asked calmly.

"About ten minutes now...."

"Twenty-two minutes. At first it looked like simple bickering, but then Seora must have snapped, because she lit her flame and Seoro started charging right at her."

At Kwon Haeseong's words, Kang Sagwa corrected him while glancing at the digital watch on her wrist.

'"Her flame" meaning the fire Seora created, I assume.'

So, to summarize: twenty-two minutes into the fight.

Seora threw the first punch, and the battle began.

"Do you know why they're fighting?"

I needed to know the reason before I could mediate, after all. Under normal circumstances I'd have jumped in the moment I assessed the situation, using my body as a shield if I had to.

But rushing in blindly now was a perfect recipe for taking a flying piece of furniture to the head and blacking out.

"Is it wrong to call a dummy a dummy? You are a dummy, Lee Seora."

"Am not! I'm not a dummy! You're a dummy, Lee Seoro, you big fat idiot!"

"Oh yeah? Then what's seven plus one?"

"......Why would I have to answer that?"

"You don't know, do you? See? Lee Seora's a dummy."

"Am not! Sev......eleven? Right!"

"Turns out the big fat idiot was you, not me."

The conversation drifting over from the two children answered my question. Kwon Haeseong pointed at the twins with his index finger and said,

"As you can see, it's a matter of whether she's a dummy or not...."

I shot him a sidelong glance and turned back to the twins.

'I don't think I've ever taken a kids' fight this seriously before....'

To be, or not to be a dummy.

That was the question.

A question it certainly was—for them, anyway.

"Aigoo, and Seora wins the argument again."

Park Edeun appeared out of nowhere, wearing a pained expression.

I hurriedly asked him,

"Does this kind of thing happen often?"

"Eh, about once a week?"

"......That often?"

"It'd be boring if they didn't."

Dammit. No wonder everyone except me looked so serene.

The cold reality actually chilled my head, strangely enough.

Shoving down the sudden urge to quit on the spot, I came to a decision.

'Break it up. Break it up however I have to.'

Big deal—if furniture came flying, I'd dodge it. If something caught fire, I'd put it out. Simple.

Having settled on a plan, I stepped into the classroom without a moment's hesitation.

......But this carefree line of thinking would be completely turned on its head before long.

Is this hell?