Stepping into the hallway, I immediately noticed that every window was shattered.
The ss had been intact before I entered the reception room, so it must have been the monsters'' doing, probably when the Theater Troupe Actor called them into the school.
I carefully led Nina-chan away from the broken shards scattered on the floor. Just as we started to head back toward the ssroom, a sharp, stinging smell filled the air, stinging my nose.
"Ugh, that''s a terrible smell," Ninamented.
"Yeah… but what is it?" I replied tersely. It was a strange smell, a hint of something burning.
No, not just burning—something was scorched.
"Could it be a fire?"
"If it were, someone should have pulled one of those red things," I replied, referring to the fire rms. They had a switch you could press to make the entire school echo with a loud rm.
At least once a year, someone would pull the rm as a prank, causing a huge fuss. It wasst tested six months ago, so I doubt it''s broken. If there really were a fire caused by the monsters, someone should have noticed and triggered it.
As I ran toward the smell with Nina-chan, a unicorn came racing down the hall from the opposite direction.
A unicorn. You know, the kind with one horn on its head.
"T-tiny children! Sizes S and SS!"
But two strange things caught my attention immediately. First, the unicorn''s body was made of stic. It looked just like one of those carousel animals, galloping straight toward us.
"Is your life… on the right track?"
And the second oddity? The stic unicorn was covered in puppet strings, tangled around it as it moved its legs, charging at us.
"
Homura Bachi!
"
It could have been one of the monsters the Pixies missed, but there was no time to deal with it properly. A well-practiced fire spell easily obliterated it, shattering the stic into ck mist.
Stepping over the remnants of that monster, we made our way to the stairs, only to find that the source of the smell wasing from further up.
We couldn''t get up the stairs just yet, though. A ck, amoeba-like monster had taken over, spreading its sticky body across the staircase like a spider web.
Its gtinous surface was covered in eyes, all shifting around to focus on us.
"You… didn''t you say not to turn off the lights?"
Nina-chan gripped my hand tightly as we endured the monster''s intense gaze. It was hard to tell where the voice wasing from—monsters were always like this.
"I-I hate the dark! Hate it, hate it, hate it!"
"
Kamaitachi!
"
Bzzz!
The monster split in two with a satisfying crack, the air sliced by my spell. The remnants dissolved into a dark mist, only for two enormous eyes to drop down the stairs from above.
Each was about the size of arge watermelon. They fell toward us, wide open, with ck pupils that spread apart to reveal enormous mouths.
"
Ama Ugachi!
"
Using two threads of
Doushi
, I skewered the monster before it could fall on us. It flopped down the stairs with a wet thud before slowly dissolving into mist.
"This is way too many," Nina muttered.
"The Pixies should be handling most of them," I agreed, but I could feel her frustration too.
Maybe I needed more Pixies. I pped my hands and summoned a new batch, sending them off to cover more ground in the school.
As I turned back toward the stairwell, I saw one of the Pixies get caught by what looked like a tentacle, pulled with startling speed around the corner.
"...What?"
"Hey, this tastes good… It''s sweet… and so spicy…"
Then, a massive face emerged from around the corner. I could see the dangling leg of my Pixie sticking out of its mouth as the monster swallowed it whole, like a frog gulping down a bug.
The rest of the monster emerged from around the corner—it was a giant grasshopper. Or rather, a grasshopper with a human face stuck to its head. The sight was as grotesque as it was surreal, and I couldn''t tell if the Theater Troupe Actor was just twisted or if it was a bizarre coincidence.
"Can… can monsters even eat fairies?" I asked, shocked.
"This is a first for me…" Nina-chan responded, looking just as unnerved.
But it exined why the monsters seemed to be multiplying faster than the Pixies could exorcise them.
"Looks like I''ll need to summon fairies that can''t be eaten."
I pped my hands again, and this time, my shadow stretched, separating and splitting off into smaller figures.
These
Shadow Fairies
slipped into the monster''s shadow, grabbing hold of its head and dragging it down.
"Drowning! I''m drowning! There''s no bottom here… bottomless… Wait, I''m not a man. I''m a bug! No, I… am I… athlete''s foot?"
Athlete''s foot?
Though its words made no sense, the Shadow Fairies pulled its face down, and the remaining Pixies took advantage to seize its body, banishing it to mist.
"If you find other monsters eating fairies, save them," I instructed the Shadows, and they vanished into thin air, scattering to continue their mission.
Finally, Nina and I ascended the stairs to the upper floor. The stench wasing from ssroom 1-3, and the door was ajar, with smoke wafting from inside.
Peering in, I found the ssroom deserted, even though lunch had ended. There was no sign of students or teachers, but oddly, a cake sat on every single desk.
"...Why?"
Not your typical school lunch cake, either. Each was a full-sized, creamy, white cake topped with bright red strawberries. They even had chocte ques and burning candles, each one sizzling as it melted slightly.
"Hey, Itsuki. Look…" Nina pointed to the ckboard.
Until now, the cakes had grabbed all of my attention, but a peculiar chalk drawing covered the entire board. Arrows, big and small, pointed straight up.
In the middle of the board, as if drawn by a child, was a messily scrawled message in English:
"Come to the rooftop!"
A haphazard smiley face apanied the text, directing us upward. While it was clear we were being invited somewhere, the location wasn''t exactly straightforward.
"Uh, Nina-chan, what does this mean?" I asked.
"It says… ''Come to the rooftop,'' I think."