Absence of Sense

[Akinai]

The Netherworld- home to many creatures who love to bring terror and carnage to all those around them. In this universe, demons fight among one another for the title of Overlord, the highest title one can obtain. To become the Overlord means to rule over all.

There are many Netherworlds, each more varied than the other.

In this particular setting, the residing Overlord is dealing with a crisis. This Netherworld, Evil Academy, is dealing with a shortage of activity. Demons are growing bored with their normal tasks of skipping classes, wasting perfectly good food, and desecrating the halls with graffiti. There are even whispers that some students are planning to attend classes in order to try something new. Not wishing to deal with such acts of delinquency, the teachers have appealed to the Overlord, also known as the Dean for the Academy.

It is here that our story begins...


~*~

“Everyone, listen up! We teachers have no desire to deal with snot-nosed brats!”

The Dean's office, if anything, looked more like an overgrown child's room than one belonging to the head of the Academy. Assorted comic books littered the red-carpeted floor, some of them with the covers ripped off in a fit of rage. The far wall had a lone painting of the previous Dean; a formidable demon cloaked in full shadow, just like a proper Overlord. The painting was covered in swords, obviously used for target practice. The remaining stone walls were decorated with posters of video game characters, the lower ones donning ink mustaches- courtesy of the butlers.

The room's owner was currently present, doing his best to ignore the two teachers that were trying to get his attention. A short figure was hunched in his recliner, his white hair barely visible over the heavy wooden desk in front of him. Cursed muttering could be heard as he furiously pressed buttons on his handheld game device; a Slaystation Vita, the most current toy on the market. One could even mistake him to be a mere boy, if it wasn't for the red eyes he sported behind his large wire-framed glasses.

“I will not tolerate having to teach these students anything!” the voice continued, his tone nearly shrieking. The owner was a Wood Golem, a tree spirit twisted by darkness. Currently his large, bark-like hands were raised to the ceiling in frustration. “I am only here to be paid, there was nothing in my contract to do anything else!”

“Kotter Sensei, you shame us all,” the second demon replied, toning her voice to make it sound as alluring as possible. This one was a Succubus, a teacher known for her more... personal classes. “At least you didn't try teaching them something useful! One of my students asked to learn algebra, of all things. Why, with a body like his-”

“Almost to the final level,” the Dean muttered, keeping his eyes glued to the tiny screen in his hands. It was clear that whatever the two teachers were saying, it was not getting to him. “I better Save my progress, maybe level up a little bit more...”

“Are you even listening to us!?” Kotter Sensei shrieked, looking ready to demolish the Dean. “This school is being deemed a failure!”

The office's doors opened, revealing three new visitors. In the lead was a young Succubus, though she looked closer to the Dean's age than the current teacher in the room. She also wore the uniform short black dress and leggings that matched the dress code of Evil Academy. In other words, she was a model delinquent. Behind her were two humans, both of them sporting opposite expressions; one looked terrified to be in the room with powerful demons, while the other looked merely curious. The young delinquent looked directly at the Dean, her mouth pursed in annoyance. “Mao, you should listen to them. If students start attending classes, I'll lose my title as a real bad-ass!”

The Dean, revealed to be Mao, finally looked up from his device. “Sounds like it's a job for you then, right, Raspberyl?” he replied back, using the fellow demon's full name to signify his irritation. “All of you, go away! Only bug me if the Academy is about to be sucked into a black hole or something.”

The two teachers made their way out of the office, clearly sulking. The Succubus gave Beryl a long-suffering gaze, as if ashamed to see her brethren dressing so reserved. The wooden door slammed behind them with a resounding thud, clearly due to Kotter Sensei.

~*~

“Maybe this isn't such a bad thing?” one of the humans replied, looking fearfully back towards the door. A large crack had appeared in the frame due to the force of the slam. Almaz had been tricked to become Mao's servant over a year ago when he had entered the Netherworld, which was plenty of time know just how demons normally acted. “It would be a lot more quieter around here, if they all acted like normal students.”

“You have no idea, Hero,” Beryl said with a groan. Even though Almaz's days at playing a Hero were over, the name still stuck. “It's a demon's nature to act freely! If they all start acting like delinquents, it will go against their very being!”

“Well, I think it will be fun.” Sapphire, the second human, piped in cheerfully. Her eyes glinted in a malicious light. “It's been so quiet around here lately! Maybe I can test out my hell-strike on them.”

“Princess... there's no need for you to fight them!” Almaz interjected, his voice taking a panicked tone. “I'll protect you from anything, let's just go back to the human world where it's a whole lot safer!”

“Awww... but it's so boring there!”

As the two bickered, Beryl looked to be reaching her wit's end, tugging at her short pink hair in frustration. It was bad enough that over a century of hard-worked delinquency was about to go down the drain, but the two newlywed humans arguing loudly was not helping her nerves either. Her bad-ass intuition screamed that she should help the Hero and Sapphire make up, but... “Mao, help me out here!”

“No need.” Mao waved off the three, clearly absorbed in his game. “Now, I just need to combine my team's attacks together! Muhahaha, Supreme Overlord Baal will be no match for me!”

“How about we settle this with a match, Almaz?” Sapphire called out sweetly. She reached for her holster, where a deadly-looking pistol hung at her hip. Retrieving the firearm, the princess tossed the object from hand to hand, giving a wide grin the entire time. “The winner decides where we go next. If I win, we stay here! Otherwise, we'll go home.”

“That's not sane at all!” Almaz sputtered out, backing up as his arms flailed wildly. “You know I can't hurt you Princess, I'd rather die than do that,” he pleaded feebly.

“You'd rather die then?” Sapphire's voice took a darker tone as she looked over at her husband. “If you are a Hero, fight for what you believe in!” She took aim, straight at Almaz. “Besides, we can always get patched up at the Nurse's Office. Now, let's do this!”

“Gah, please, no!” Almaz drew his sword at the last second, barely managing to deflect a bullet that was aimed at his head. He then danced about the room, barely managing to dodge another stream of bullets. His frantic dodges left him breathless, leaving him barely able to coherently speak as Almaz desperately tried to avoid his wife's wrath. “Idon'twantthislet'sjustgohome oh come on who leaves a toilet there!?”

As the couple thrashed about, Mao was oblivious to all save the game in his hands. After what felt like centuries of grinding, he was finally facing the final boss. His characters had the ultimate items, the main hero his final technique! This would be a battle for the ages- one that would go down in the history of gaming--

--only for a bullet hole to pierce through the device and straight towards his body. The near-useless pellet bounced harmlessly off his long red overcoat, unable to leave a mark on the Overlord. His Slaystation Vita, on the other hand, hardly fared better. The screen spidered from cracks, and the device shut off for a final time.

Mao's reaction was instantaneous. Acting as if was he himself that had been hurt, the young Overlord sank to his knees and gave a pained cry. “Raaaaagh! Who broke my Vita!?” He was panting in rage, and his red eyes seemed to almost glow as he scanned the room.

Almaz and Sapphire were frozen on the spot, the former looking as if his life was flashing before him. Sapphire, on the other hand, shrugged off Mao's anger. “Sorry about that! I was aiming for Almaz, and guess he sort of ran in front of you.”

“Don't 'sorry' me!” Mao shot back, his voice screeching. “I had four million hours of playtime! Do you know how long that took me to achieve!?”

“Wow, that's some dedication,” Almaz remarked, clearly impressed. “And you never beat it? That's sort of sad.”

“With a boring grindy game like that, no wonder,” Sapphire added, chuckling to herself as she reached for something in her pocket. Having reached it, she pulled out a shiny pink game device. “I'm only 100 hours in on this game, and I already have everything I want!”

Seeing a new handheld system, Mao's reaction was instant. “Give me that!” he said, swiping the system from the Princess's hands. Puzzling over the device, which opened up to reveal two screens, he tried to find the power button. “Two screens, what a completely useless design. What type of human game do you have in here, anyway?”

“Only the best one ever!” Sapphire's emerald eyes sparkled in happiness, clearly ecstatic to gush about her favorite game. “You get to catch these adorable little monsters, and raise them to be the cutest they can be! Far better than any SRPG, that's for sure.”

“Bite me! There's no way some pet-raising game can beat Makai Kingdom!” Mao stared at the pink object in his hands with newfound disgust. “You broke my Slaystation, so it's only fair that--”

“Oh geez, I know that look.” Almaz took a step back, ready to bolt. Mao's eyes had glazed over, as if he was reminiscing about something. The Ex-Hero know that look too well; it meant experiments were soon to follow. And for a mad scientist like Mao...

“As I was saying!” Mao shot a glare at Almaz, unhappy for being interrupted. “It's only fair that I use this human system for science! Princess, you said this game has monsters in it?”

“Oh, yes! There are enormous ones that can alter the world around them, but I prefer the small, cute ones that--”

Mao turned his back on Sapphire, heading towards another corner of the office. In this section, there were mechanical devices littering the room along with a secret door; likely leading to an area with Mao's more “private” experiments. “Don't care! I have decided: with this game, I will save the Academy!”

“That's the spirit!” Beryl piped in, a huge grin plastered on the young girl's face. “This is why you're my rival, Mao.”

“Miss Beryl, where were you when I was running for my life?” Almaz slumped over, dejected.

Beryl shrugged, clearly unworried. “Eh, you were fine. The scene didn't need me, so I took a break until I was relevant again.”

~*~

“Witness the results of a true evil genius at work!”

It had been several hours since Mao had gone off into his lab, laughing like a madman the entire time. Sapphire's game system was now nearly unrecognizable, with wires and cords being woven into the ports of the device. All of these were connected to a large switch, with its creator standing ready to flip it.

“Looks like he went way overboard. That's Mao for you.” Almaz mumbled into his scarf, knowing that no one would hear his words anyways unless there was some all-knowing narrator out there. With the state Sapphire's game system was now in, they would have to buy a brand new one whenever they returned home to the human world.

Seeing that everyone was now paying attention, Mao thrust down the switch. Lightning sparked all about the device, a few bolts straying close to the now-enraptured onlookers. As for the device itself, it began to glow in a blinding white light. If one dared to look long enough, one could swear that its outline was starting to shift as well.

“It's almost like it is evolving!” Sapphire cried out, awestruck at the sight.

“Princess, get down!” Almaz, seeing that the handheld was now pulsing dangerously, moved to tackle Sapphire down before the fireworks would start.

Oddly enough, no explosion followed. The light faded instantly, revealing something new entirely. In the device's place was a furred creature, its fur the same pink hue as Sapphire's prized game console. It almost looked like a bipedal feline, if it wasn't for the short folded ears that were tightly shot shut upon its head. The monster shakily got to its feet, opening eyes that were revealed to be a light rose hue.

“My Rutile!” Sapphire gave a girlish squeal, moving towards the creature to latch it into a tight hug. “She's so cute, and now I can actually touch her!”

“You named your gaming pet after our classmate?” Almaz stared at the squirming feline in Sapphire's arms, dumbstruck by the sight that Mao may have just created life.

“Why not? They both look so cuddly, and Rutile is a cat demon, so it fits!”

Mao could only be dumbstruck at the sight of such a small creation. “What the hell is this? Princess, I thought you said your game had powerful monsters in it. How in the Netherworld am I supposed to strike fear into the students with this furball?”

“Aw, but who would want one of those ugly monsters?” Sapphire replied, hugging on to the monster with a tighter grip. One could nearly hear the poor feline wheeze while stuck in the Princess's powerful grip. “Rutile here is the cutest, so why would I raise anything else?”

“I...you...what...” Mao, for once, was struck speechless.

Almaz wanted to reprimand Mao for stealing the Princess's game, or even make a joke on the demon's behalf. After all, it was hard to teach the Dean a lesson as is. Every time he went to open his mouth though, his gaze was always magnetically drawn back to the feline. Even though it moved about, clearly uncomfortable, the monster's wide-eyed gaze seemed frozen in place. Almost as if it could see everything...

“Whatever that thing is, it has obviously seen some shit,” Almaz muttered, giving a shudder.

“Don't call Rutile an 'it'!” Sapphire called out.

“Damn it!” refusing to turn back, Mao stormed off into his lab once more. Knowing the young demon, he was likely on his way to create blueprints before dissecting this latest experiment. “I refuse to accept this. Maybe I'll give it rocket arms, or better yet, laser eyes!”

“Princess, let's just get out of here.” Almaz, seeing that Mao was distracted, gently nudged Sapphire to the door. His wife gave no resistance, clearly happy to leave with her new pet.

As for the monster, newly christened Rutile, it simply let itself be smothered.

And stared.