Following the ordeal with the cupcake delivery, it was time to call it a day, but as the sun sunk lower and the shadows longer, the dark-dweller felt a sense of rejuvenation. The streets were teeming with people, but only for a little while longer, all of those souls were probably rushing home after a long day at work, some maybe with a fresh supply of groceries to prepare a delicious meal... Akira's stomach growled softly, betraying hunger. it reminded her hunger as she thought of food. Although she did crave something salty, the more efficient choice was to just nibble into the various desserts Tsuru had collected.

Idly, she flicked open a small box from the heap and picked out the cupcake, while scouring the streets for something to do, she nibbled on the treat. Among a row of small connected buildings, marking the perimeter of a large ground, she noticed a few rooms were lit up, those windows stood out starkly against the others. It seemed odd, she scanned the exterior for a clue to what this place was. The large arches over the high locked gates should have given it up, it was a school.

Softly, she echoed the name she read it 'Allendale High... Why the hell are the lights on? School time was over...' she looked at her watch, it was nearly dinner time. '...at least three hours ago, the gates are locked too, I think some kids either sneaked in or stayed back to cause trouble, I'm going to go find out.' Without much ado, the girl used dissolve to melt into the shadows and slipped through the gates with ease, reappearing on the other side. 'Stay here, I'll let you know if I need help.' Finally, this was something that felt like work.  

300/1000

Haru was walking down the lanes of Magnolia chirpily with his partner by the side. While Akira had one cupcake, the sweet-tooth probably had half a dozen. Despite the tiring day, all the sugar he ingested was keeping him hyperactive. He was completely lost in the delicious treats he was pushing down his throat that he did not notice Akira stop by the school building. He had walked on for at least ten feet before realizing he was no longer hearing his partner’s footsteps behind him. He turned around to find her missing; Haru panicked. He jerked his head left and right to see where she could have disappeared to, and finally spotted her on the other side of the school gates. “How did you-” he asked looking at the locked gates. And that’s when he spotted the lights inside. “Nevermind… Find a way to open the door. Don’t go in there alone,” Haru said, his expression instantly changing from puzzled to serious.

However, it didn’t seem like Akira was going to listen to him. He watched as his black-haired partner walked into the building, while he was left waiting outside. He did not think there were students in there; it was too late. Probably vandalising delinquents. He was not in a mood to let his partner handle such a situation alone. So, after she was out of his vicinity, Haru looked around for a shorter wall that he can jump over. About twenty meters away from the main gate, there was a small portion of the wall that was under renovation. Perfect! Haru quickly ran to the point, held his bags of food between his teeth and slammed his palms together. The next second he was high up on the air and then inside the school, thanks to his Feather-Light spell.

302/1000

Her heart fluttered in anticipation as she neared the room. She clenched her fist, just like apprehension seemed to grip her insides. Maybe she should have stuck to the shadows to attempt sneaking up on whoever was inside the room, there was the possibility that it wasn't just a bunch of students... That thought hadn't occurred to her until she was already slinking across the grounds and now, she didn't want to be the coward that returned with her tail between her legs, especially if it involved going back on her word and asking Tsuru for accompaniment. No, you said you'd scout ahead... her mind screamed at her, protesting already, even though she had barely begun debating the idea.

A soft sound behind her, interrupted her train of thought, it startled the girl, her ear twitched and her eyes went wide with shock. Almost out of habit, but more out of panic, her hands flew above her and sharply she brought them, while dashing backwards towards the source of the sound, a sphere of darkness bloomed from her location as she released her devastate spell, by the time she turned and Tsuru's face swam into her view, it was already too late. Luckily for him though, the spell stopped from making any contact with him.

With a sigh, she released the spell as her hands fell to her side. 'Fine then.' in the deeper realms of her mind, she felt safer that he had her back and that gave her the courage to sprint across the field. Once closer to the light, it was apparent, that the room, in fact, was just filled with a bunch of students... Not just that, they were also supervised by a very tired looking teacher. All the commotion had attracted the attention of the kids at the teacher, who looked at the Knight duo, shocked. 'Oh damn.' she whispered and turned back, Tsuru was definitely better with explanations than she was.

627/1000

Haru landed on the other side of the wall and began running towards Akira. He wanted to call out to her to say he was behind her, but decided against it because he didn’t want to warn those inside the building of their arrival. However, this was a bad decision, as Akira assumed she was being ambushed and dashed towards him with an attack. Luckily for Haru, she and her meddlesome spell stopped just about half a foot away from him, while he stood there, frozen rigid out of shock. And all this had warned whoever was inside the school.

Fortunately, it wasn’t some goons who were inside the school. It was in fact filled with children and a teacher, and they were all staring at the duo through the window, wide-eyed. The teacher hurried out and started questioning them rather impatiently. “What do you think you two are doing? You can’t trespass into school premises,” she bellowed, as if we too were her students whom she had to discipline. Haru took a step forward and began apologizing. “We are sorry, ma’am. The two of us are Rune Knights. We saw that the lights were on in the school building and considering how late it was, we assumed there were some vandals in here. We didn’t mean to cause any trouble,” he said.

Thankfully, the teacher wasn’t suspicious and believed him immediately. “Oh! Sorry about my tone. I… had a long day,” she responded, blushing out of embarrassment. Haru was amused at how quickly her demeanour changed. “Not at all. Thank you for your passionate service. Please let us know if there is anything we can do to help,” Haru replied. The teacher looked away for a second, contemplating if whatever she was going to ask would be considered appropriate, but finally managed to blurt out the words. “I would be extremely grateful if you two could help the students pay attention to my class. I know it’s hard for them, but they have an exam coming up and these students are really falling behind,” she said, speaking so fast Haru barely caught all the words. “Of- Of course ma’am,” Haru said before following the teacher into the class. He would turn to Akira and make his usual thumbs-up and the grin. “Great choice of mission,” he would say, with no hint of sarcasm in there.

698/1000

He accurately articulated what happened, with the right note of apologetic and cheerful to quickly dissolve the tension. Akira just lurked in the background and nodded sagely. The girl even tried to look empathetic when the woman said she had had a long day, probably pulled it off too since the Shimada did share the sentiment, the two Rune Knights had had their hands full ever since orientation in fact... She was about to reach out and tug Tsuru away from the premises as he assured the teacher that there was no beef between them. 'All good... all good, we should probably not dis-' she echoed, but her drone was much softer than his enthusiastic offer... There he was, all willing to aid... again.

Akira hoped, that out of the goodness of the heart the teacher would have the sense to conduct her job on her own and not request anything of them, but she looked so worn that the girl already knew it was unlikely. So now the two were tasked with keeping the groaning kids vigilant and Tsuru was so thrilled. A long sigh escaped her lip as from the corner of the eye, she noticed a kid in the back row with his head cradled in the crook of his elbow and a bit of drool handing from the corner of his mouth.

Target practice she thought, as she crumpled the butter paper that had contained her cupcake and swiftly threw it at the kid, so it landed on the back of his head and startled the poor boy. The student shook himself awake, waving one arm above his head and wiping the drool away with the other... 'Good enough?' she confirmed, eyeing the teacher warily, who chuckled nervously and responded 'So long as you stick to throwing crumpled paper, I guess... Keep an eye out for that one, Shikamaru is likely to fall asleep again.'

946/1000

The task had begun before even the duo entered the classroom, with Akira waking up the kid on the last bench. Before resuming the class, the teacher introduced the two Rune Knights to the students, explaining why they were there. The Shikamaru kid looked up at the two and spoke with zero tact. “Rune Knights?! Losers… Not good enough to join a proper guild?” he asked. Haru frowned for a second, but quickly turned it into a grin. Miss Sandine retaliated immediately on their behalf. “Shut up, Shikamaru. Haven’t I taught you to respect your elders?” she asked, fuming in anger. “It’s quite alright ma’am,” Haru said, waving off the comment.

With that out of the way, the session resumed. The sudden presence of two grown-ups in the class apart from their teacher kept some of the kids awake for a while. Some even looked genuinely scared and started paying attention. However, it wasn’t long before the effect wore off and the kids began to doze off again. As effective as it might be, Haru wasn’t big on throwing stuff at kids to wake them up. So, instead, he thought it would be better to offer them one of the treats he got from Olly’s cake shop to keep them awake. He began handing out cookies and cupcakes, secretly, to every kid that he found napping. This surely woke them up, but whether their attention was on the lesson or the treat was a debatable question.

Believing that Haru has been doing his job right, he sat down at an empty seat at the back of the class. He thought he would keep an eye on everyone from there. However, having started the day very early, spent half the day travelling and the other half doing missions, he began to feel the tiredness. The sugar rush from all the sweets he had been eating was keeping him going, but that wouldn’t last for long. In less than minute, he had his head resting on the table with his eyes closed and mouth wide open, just like the Shikamaru kid sitting next to him.

1051/1000
-Exit-

That Shikamaru sure knew how to wound with his tongue. Akira was a firm believer of what he just said, and the alleged truth of it was perhaps why it almost served to pierce through her calm demeanor. It wasn't just the words, but especially the fact that they were coming from a kid in Magnolia, the land of Fairy Tail, they felt a lot bigger in magnitude. Clearly, they chaffed her far more that Tsuru, who remained quite impassive and indifferent. Her fists clenched again and her breathing got deeper, it took a fair bit of self control to not lash out at the student, but he'd just made an enemy out of her. She slunk behind him slowly... 'Considering you need evening classes, I doubt even Rune Knights would take you...' she muttered savagely and softly as she leaned against the wall directly behind the boy.

She kept an eye out for the sleeping children, now with a bag full of all the paper from the cupcakes Tsuru had consumed, unwilling to litter, the healer had carefully collected them in search of a dustbin... Now they proved to be good ammunition. While she practiced aiming, her partner distributed goodies among the kids... she smacked her forehead with her palm. If she cared enough, she would have protested, but she wasn't really bothered about how much the students retained. Her partner took a seat next to that Shikamaru boy, who had the most number of crumpled papers next to him, ever since Akira took a special liking to him, or dislike rather. The Shimada even threw a couple even when he wasn't asleep... The teacher seemed to turn a blind eye to their little feud.

As the class drew to a close two sleepy heads decorated the back bench and Akira just sighed. The teacher walked up to her and smiled, as she prodded the student gently. 'Class is over, get outta here.' the woman said, almost fondly, despite everything. 'His heart is in the right place... I have another favor to ask you, could you please teach the kids tomorrow? I never skip classes but I really have to be somewhere, I will pay you double of this...[/color]' she said holding out a sizable pouch of money '... which is for today... They kids are better in the day too...' Akira heaved another long sigh before nodding, narrowing her eyes towards Tsuru she accepted, the lady's request. 'Since my partner is so well rested, I'm sure he could turn up and handle the bunch tomorrow and I'll keep an eye out...' the dark-dweller offered, before grabbing Tsuru by the ear and tugging him out. 'Oi we're done here... off we go.'

~~Exit~~
1399/1000