Meet The Teacher.

Tod stared up in terror at the monstrosity in front of him.

It had to be at least four stories high. Monstrously fat, the demon's black eyes were fixed ravenously on the helpless boy before it. Countless pointed teeth opened inside a lipless mouth, revealing the forked tongue that dwelt within. As the demon licked the jagged edges of its mouth Tod couldn't help but stare into its maw. Foul slime glistened on its red, veiny skin, the colour of ochre clay.

Atop its head three crests of reddened skin slowly moulted, just barely showing the points of three cruel, twisting horns. They were tall enough to impale a bus.

It advanced on Tod. He'd twisted his ankle trying to flee from the beast. Now he could only watch in terror as terrible hooked feet strode lazily towards him. It slowly uncurled two massive, oversized fists, cruel claws extending out slowly from its squat, malformed fingers.

He tried to scream, but he couldn't. Tod's voice caught in his mouth. As the monster reached down to pick him up, he closed his eyes and prepared to meet the Gods…

Thump.

Then suddenly he was rolling away across the ground. To safety.

He had rolled… no, something had pushed him, out of the way of the monster. Strangely unhurt, Tod landed harmlessly on his front, his head turned away from the monster.

Starting, he jumped to his feet…

...only to promptly collapse with a scream as he forgot about his twisted ankle.

As Tod lay there on the floor, panic began to overwhelm him. The beast would surely be upon him soon. Trembling in fear and pain he managed to steal a glance towards his assailant.

Surely this was the end!

It wasn't. The demon had taken a confused step back.

It was staring at its hand, a pained, confused look evident upon its monstrous features. As dark red blood began to flow from between its massive fingers, droplets large enough to create puddles, it turned its shocked attention towards…

…a lone woman?

There was nothing about this woman's appearance to suggest she was anything extraordinary. She was wearing a smart blue jacket and mauve skirt, which was all Tod could make out from this angle. Black, wavy hair poured down her back, which was probably her most striking characteristic.

Her most striking characteristic, perhaps, except for the massive steel lance she wielded like a sword.

This lance wasn't normal. It was more like an incredibly long sword that's point carried on for way longer than was practical. Even Tod could see it wasn't a duelling weapon. This… lance… sword… whatever it was, it wasn't meant for fighting other weapons. It had a more specific purpose. The flat, double sided blade curved inwards, holding an edge for what had to be a good six feet before extending into a point that must have continued for another three. There wasn't anything more elaborate to its design and it was obviously built with a specific practicality in mind.

The demon seemed to be nursing its hand, cradling its great claw like an injured child. As blood trickled out from its fingers, Tod stared in disbelief.

Then, slowly, terribly, the monster turned away from its injury.

Pain turned to fury as it bore down on the lonely figure.

Tod stared on helplessly at what had to be this heroine's last moments. Before the monster could make another move however, she extended her fingers...

The demon screamed, a hideous guttural wail that could be heard across the city. It reeled back, shrieking as it covered its eyes.

Tod ducked his head and covered his ears, shaking even more than the earth beneath him.

It was understandable that he lost track of his surroundings for a while.

Yukari Tanizaki charged.

She had no particular plan, other than to get higher. An ogre was a danger to the entire neighbourhood. These monsters were ravenous, gorging their relentless appetite with hundreds of pounds of meat before retiring to their own hellish dimension. The boy she'd saved had only been an appetiser, a warm-up for the rampage to come.

If she didn't kill it now, hundreds of people might die before help could arrive.

Yukari threw herself up as high as she could. Yelling, she stabbed her lance as far into the ogre's leg as it would go. Viscous blood was soon running down the blade of the lance.

The ogre screamed in agony. Moaning in pain, forced away from its blinded eyes to the searing pain in its leg, it lifted its violated limb up off the ground.

It took its assailant into the air with it. Yukari clung on for dear life, fighting to stay conscious as she was shaken to the core by the sheer volume of her foe's cries.

The beast stumbled around and tried to shake the foreign object clear, but all that achieved was a deeper wound. After its fruitless and self-destructive struggle it reached down and tried to pull the cruelly barbed weapon out.

That was Yukari's opening. Unsheathing a knife, she swung herself down the lance and plunged the weapon into the ogre's hand.

The demon roared. Panicking internally, Yukari felt herself being lifted skywards, her arms wrenched painfully by her own weight. As she swung upwards she braced herself to let go before the ogre threw her into the ground… only to keep going upwards.

The ogre had thrown her clear into the sky!

Calling on her training, Yukari quickly orientated herself in the sky. Flipping her body one hundred and eighty degrees around, she righted herself in the air. She scanned the world as it rushed up towards her, trying to judge where she would land… and whether or not it was safe to do so.

By sheer luck the ogre had thrown her directly above its head. Yukari grinned internally, though her stunned face hadn't quite caught up yet.

She projected air magic, pushing herself sideways to avoid an incoming claw. Pushing herself back with the same magic to slow her impact, she braced for impact…

Thump! She was on the beast's head, positioned perfectly between the three horns. As the monster groaned from the impact and prepared to swat the murderous fly off, Yukari drew her magnum.

This was a good gun. .50 calibre bullets coated in deadly neurotoxin with enough punch to dent an armoured car. As the monster raised its fist, Yukari wrapped her legs around a horn. With her hands free, she braced for the recoil.

Yukari delivered three point blank shots directly into the ogre's skull.

The monster howled and furiously pounded its own head. Its own natural defences worked against it however and instead of crushing Yukari it impaled its hands repeatedly upon its own horns. This only caused it to scream louder and it shook itself wildly, blinded by agony and, now, fear.

Yukari winced and clung on for dear life, her legs screaming under the effort of clinging onto the flailing colossus. A horn cracked... the bones wouldn't protect her for much longer!

Time… she needed time. The neurotoxin had to do its work…

Slowly, it did. The monster's flailing weakened. Blood loss and the fast-acting, paralysing poison began to take their toll.

Eventually, its arms dropped to its side… and it began to stumble.

Sideways. Towards the houses.

That wouldn't do at all.

Tod looked on in utter astonishment as he saw this woman, this strange knight in smart, azure armour, grasp the demon firmly by the horns. Despite her tiny frame, she seemed to weigh the demon down, as if she'd gained five hundred pounds in a moment. Tod watched in astonishment as she leaned forward and pulled the monster down…

…down towards him.

Oh crap.

Tod screamed at the top of his lungs and waited to be crushed to death.

Instead, he was covered in dust and physically flung a foot into the air as the monster's massive shoulder landed centimetres away from him. Vaguely, he registered an angry scream and the sound of someone being deposited onto the ground by the impact.

The dust settled...

For a full ten seconds he lay there, not moving a muscle.

Slowly, some small resemblance of consciousness returned.

As Tod's mind began to process what had just happened to him, he rolled over.

He'd almost been killed by a thirty-foot tall monstrosity. Said monstrosity had just fallen, almost crushing him in the process. The woman who was responsible for that had…

Oh Gods. Is she ok?

Tod leapt heroically to his feet… and had to hold back a scream as he jumped on his ankle for the second time that day.

This time, he steadied himself, biting his lip as the pain climaxed. He had to force himself to act. If she died and there was something he could have done...

Grimly, Tod used the demon's sweating, stinking corpse as his support, shuddering as he worked his way round its enormous head. Blankly, he registered that this thing had been seconds from murdering him a… minute? Hour? Some time ago. Tod numbly looked at his watch.

7:54. He wasn't even late for school yet. The whole debacle had taken less than five minutes. That included time spent running away, twisting his ankle and being stalked. His saviour's entrance must have concluded in under a minute.

Shaking violently, Tod worked the rest of the way round the monster's head. He was almost in sight of where the woman surely lay.

Then he hesitated.

Was she still alive? Could she be alive? She'd just fallen thirty feet. Tod could barely breathe as he finally stepped round the monster and the rest of the street came into view.

Nothing. No one was there. Tod numbly registered that the woman who had saved his life had already departed in the time it had taken him to work up the courage to reveal himself. It wasn't a good feeling.

Who was she? Would he see her again? It was his first day of high school. As Tod gingerly tested his ankle and began to stumble towards his bike, he swore he would not rest until he found that woman and th-

…

Where was his bike?

Crumpled on the ground was a small paper note. As Tod limped over to it, his muscles tightened in fear and dread. Could this be a ransom note? Had the dark ones abducted his saviour, demanding he feed them a thousand innocent souls in exchange for her life? This was the beginning of his epic test, the rise of the great hero Tojo Ibarazaki! He opened the note with shaking hands.

"Late for school, borrowed bike. Ieyasu High, go there for pick up. Monster-related experiences on the way to school do not excuse you from class. Tanizaki Yukari.

Tod swore he would not rest until he found that woman and made her pay.

His ankle hurt...

Yukari Tanizaki stumbled into the tenth grade hallways.

She'd made it. On time. Without anyone noticing she was out of breath. Good.

The bloodstains that caked her jacket and blouse weren't ideal, but striking terror into the hearts of your students was a useful classroom management technique. It was one thing to talk about being a famous demon hunter, another to have fresh evidence

As Yukari composed herself, she considered that she should probably have waited for the clean-up crews, or at least the second responders, before leaving the scene of a demonic incursion. She also probably shouldn't have stolen her student's bike. Oh well, there wasn't much chance of him being in her class anyway. He was an eleventh grader, right?

Yukari straightened herself up and marched down the hall, sliding naturally into teacher mode. She mentally rehearsed the words she'd prepared in her head, knowing that this first impression would set the tone for the rest of the year. This class was a special class and Yukari knew there would be a lot of tension so it was very important to get things off on the right-

-oh Gods, why was there an elementary school student running down the hall towards her? Why was she crying? And why, why caffeine-depriving God, why was she screaming about a fight in class three?

Yukari's class. As the girl inevitably beelined towards the only authority figure in sight, Yukari lifted her fingers to her temple and tried to block out all the different, colourful waves of red-hot, seething anger. Anger at her life, the world and all of the Gods fluffy cute creatures.

It was going to be a long first day. Why couldn't Nyamo have gotten the little monsters? The literal little monsters...