“So, why am I here?”

I had already been by the teachers’ lounge and checked my schedule.

“What do you mean? You’re a teacher here right?”

After having finished in the lounge I decided to try and find the principal to ask what was going on.

“Am I though? I certainly don’t remember ever signing up to be one!” I responded, still a bit annoyed at Beaky from the kitchen.

“Oh, that’s what you mean!”

“What else could I mean!?”

I didn’t really like this principal, maybe I was still to agitated from Beaky but this guy is really good at getting on my nerves.

“I dunno, you could’ve meant anything.”

“...”

“...”

The principal resumed his paperwork.

“And…?”

“? And what?”

“I asked why I was here.”

“Well that’s because you’re a teacher aren’t you?”

“...”

“...”

The principal once again resumed his paperwork.

“Principal please, I never signed up to be a teacher here, so why am I a teacher here?” I said, trying to sum my question up in one sentence.

“Because that’s how this school works.”

“...”

“...”

“Is there anyone I can talk to that doesn’t have a five second memory?” I accidentally voiced my thoughts.

“That door.” Said the principal and pointed to a door in the corner of the room.

“What?”

“What?”

I start ignoring the principal and just walk to the door, the sound of paperwork resuming behind me.

*knock knock*

“Come in.” Responded the principal behind me as he looked up at the door leading to the corridor, however after a few seconds pass he once again looks down at his papers.

*sigh*

Not waiting for a response I simply open the door and enter.

“Hello?”

“Hello? Who’s there?” I heard from the principal’s office.

Once again ignoring the principal I entered the dark room, which is weird in and of itself since I can normally see pretty well in the dark.

With a *fwoosh* I cast a small fire spell to create some light, however the surroundings are still pitch black so I throw it to the side where it seems to hit a wall.

“OW! Don’t throw fire at the principal!”

Right there in the darkness was a floating soot stain, touching the stain and around it I could feel that the pitch black darkness around me were actually walls that were somehow coloured so that they looked like expansive darkness.

“...”

“...”

Despite waiting this so called principal did not say anything more.

‘Okay… I’m really too tired to care anymore…’

I create a large number of fireballs and throw them all over the room, in response all the walls seem to start jiggle like jelly, though it’s a bit hard to tell since I could only see it due to the soot, however there’s no other response.

‘Okay, so this place is alive and it seems to feel pain, then how about the old blackboard trick?’

I harden my claws once again after a long time and prepare to start scratching the walls, hoping for a reaction.

“Okay, nope!” Sounded the voice once more before the darkness covering the wall retracted into one point at the opposite side of the room to the door before taking the shape of a humanoid lizard and turning green.

“Fine, you did it, you win. This chameleon concedes to your superior intellect.” Said the self identified chameleon as they threw their arms upwards.

“That sounds good and all but I’m too tired of all of you being so over the top, please just answer my questions.”

“Alright, at least it’s better than what some people ask me to do, you wouldn’t imagine how many men I’ve had to fire due to sexual harassment.”

“Please just tell me how you knew I would be here today?”

“What, not even gonna ask my name?”

*sigh*

‘Okay Plush, you can at least put up with this much, this is still normal right?

“Alright, what’s your name?”

“Shouldn’t you tell your own name before asking someone else’s.”

“... I’m Plush, what’s your name?”

“Don’t feel like telling.” She says and shrugs her shoulders.

“Okay! That’s it! Fuck thi-”

“K’mill.”

“...What?”

“It’s my name, K’mill.”

“Kamille?”

She points to a nameplate that suddenly appeared on her chest where it said K’mill.

“Oh. And why did you call yourself the principal?”

“Because I am.”

“And that guy outside?”

“He’s the principal.”

*sigh*

Feeling too tired to even be angry sighing is the only thing I can do.

“So… you’re both the principal?” I ask, hoping for the answer to be this simple.

“Sort of, yeah. But enough about me, you didn’t even know I existed so you can’t have come just to ask about me.”

*sigh* “Alright then, why am I a teacher here? I never signed up for it, and for that matter how did you know I would even be here?”

“Well that’s just how this school works.”

“And that means?”

“Well what do you think it means?”

“... That you kidnap your teachers?”

“Sort of..”

‘...Well that took a turn.’

“Hang on, sort of?”

“Yeah. Normally we call the teachers about a week or so before they begin to discuss things like wages and if they even want to teach, you know, normal business practice and stuff.”

“Okay, then why didn’t you do that with me?”

“I dunno, we tried but we couldn’t.”

“You couldn’t?”

“Yeah, we’ve been trying to get you here for seven days with no luck.” She says and shrugs her shoulders.

“Okay…”

‘Could it have be for the same reason that revenant reconnaissance hasn’t been working?’

“Say, you wouldn’t happen to be calling people here by using their energy?”

K’mill’s eyes widen in surprise before she closes them and smiles.

“It’s been a while since anyone was able to guess that, and I don’t think we’ve had anyone do it this fast before either. Guess we chose well this time.”

Hearing this I felt a bit guilty, I mean, the other people they hired probably didn’t have my circumstances and came to their conclusion all on their own, so it’s kinda like being praised for doing well on a test that you cheated on.

“Speaking of, how did you choose me? I’ve never met any of you before.”

“Well that’s the beauty of it, we didn’t. We don’t choose our teachers, we only do the interviewing part.”

“Then wh-”

“Come on, surely you’ve noticed this house is a bit special. We don’t know how it does it but every so often some talented individual is just summoned to this area for a day, and if anyone is here about a week prior to the proper summoning they get told about it. That’s how we knew you were coming. If we decide that they’d be a good teacher we take over the summoning with our own magic since the link has already been established.”

“Okay?” I respond, having no idea what she’s talking about.

“Oh, and just so you know, we didn’t actually cause this random ‘talented people summoning’, that’s something that’s been happening here for long before this school was made, you should consider yourself lucky that this place wasn’t taken over by some militaristic nation or something.” She says and once again shrugs her shoulder. “God knows what a place like Norther would do if they got a steady supply of talented individuals.”

“I guess… By the way, where are we even? What with the living house, living snakeway and rainbow forest outside, can’t say I’ve ever seen anything like it.”

“Sorry, that’s a secret. Wouldn’t want the wrong people to find out.”

“Really? But how does a secret school get any students?”

“Oh the school isn’t a secret, in fact it’s pretty famous if I do say so myself, only the location is secret.”

“Then what about the town that I saw on the other side of the forest? Wouldn’t they know about you?”

“... Wow, I’m not sure what to think… On one hand you were able to tell how the summoning magic worked, but on the other you didn’t even consider a simple barrier or illusion… And didn’t one of the teachers say you even used an illusion at the assembly? I’m really not sure whether to think you’re smart or not…”

“...So it’s a barrier then?”

“Nope.”

*sigh*

“I was just a bit surprised that you didn’t even consider it is all. Really though that town is one we made for the students.”

“Why?”

“Why?”

“Yeah, I met one of the students before and they said you had dormitories, so why a town?”

“It’s a place where the students can go to get away from the school during the weekends and holidays, there’s shops and restaurants like in any normal town.”

“Okay…?” I say, both confused and slightly disappointing since I thought I was onto something.

“Now then, anything else? You smell of food so I’m starting to get hungry, I’ll have to go pay old Beaky a visit soon.”

“Yeah, you said you normally spoke to people early to discuss wages and stuff?”

*GROOOWL*

“... We’ll take that tomorrow, I’m too hungry.”

“...”

I take out a schnitzel from the small bag, K'mill’s eyes instantly lock on to it and I toss it to her, then while the schnitzel is still airborne she strikes at it with a tounge fitting of her chameleon body.

*crunch crunch*

‘I may not have much need for money but I’m not going to let something important like this slip’

Seeing K’mill’s blissful face I decided to take another schnitzel for myself as well

*crunch crunch*

‘I have to say, these turned out better than expected’

**gulp**

“...That was pretty good, might have to assign you to take care of your class’ cooking classes too.”

“Isn’t Beaky supposed to take care of that?”

“Oh he hardly has time to just cook for the cafeteria during lunch, if anything I think he’ll be happy to get some free time. He’s been extra grumpy ever since the students started wanting him as a teacher?”

“You mean he’s not normally that annoying? I don’t believe it.”

“Ha! Good one.”

“But there’s an important thing though, I have this book back home that would be perfect for the magic classes, is it possible to bring it along somehow?”

“Oh that’s easy, you just have to hold onto it when we summon you.”

“Okay, that brings two questions to mind.”

“?”

“Firstly: Really? Because I was laying in bed in my purple pajamas yet here I am, naked.”

‘I’ll just call the onesie pajamas.’

“That is odd, I’ll have to look into that later then. And your other question?”

“At first when I came here I thought it was due to one of my own skills that activates when I fall asleep, that would have explained why the others on the stage said I can only be here at night.”

“Yeah?”

“But you just said you summoned me, so why couldn’t you just have summoned me during the day?”

“We couldn’t.”

“... What?”

“We couldn’t. I said we’ve been trying to summon you for a week, that’s both during night and day, tonight is the first time we’ve succeeded so we thought maybe it has something to do with what you do while you’re not here.”

“And that’s why you decided to say I could only be here during night despite never having talked to me.”

“Yup. Thinking back on it it doesn’t make as much sense to me as it did back then anymore.”

“Well if I’m going to be a teacher here we’ll first have to discuss hours and wages.”

“Tch.”

“Did you just…?”

“Never mind that.”

Following that K’mill and I discussed how much my nightly wage would be as well as at what time I would have to go here.

It was then K’mill told me that whatever it is that summons people here also seems to be able to manipulate time by about four hours, this means that if I get summoned at midnight it would be eight in the evening here, and if I leave at four in the morning I would come back at midnight, in other words, even if I get summoned to hold classes while something important is happening I still wouldn’t miss it since I’d be back the moment I left.

Again, K’mill has no idea how this actually works.

What followed that revelation was us discussing my wages.

Like I said I didn’t really need the money, I just did this to get back at K’mill for all the stress Beaky, the guy in the other room and her have caused me.

It’s only fair no?

After a while we finally reached an agreement regarding my pay and I left the office of a downhearted chameleon before waking up back in my bed.

‘I would get up and make breakfast-’

*groan*

‘-but right now this bed is really comfortable’

And so I stayed in bed late for the first time in a very long time.