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The job of an educator was a tough and uphill battle. Daniel finally understood how much of a nuisance he (and his friends) had been, back when they had been students. Of course, he didn't regret any of it; all his experiences had shaped him into the person he was now, and all the memories, some good, some bad, some painful, and some excruciatingly embarrassing, had a special flavor of nostalgia, waiting for him to unpack them when he wanted to reminisce. Regardless, Daniel had to admit, being a teacher was no walk in the park.
However, this uphill battle was by no means without any rewards. With every step fighting against the obstacles, he was met with the shining eyes of his students. People said he could've done better, gotten a better, more well paying job, but Daniel knew that what he had currently was priceless. The feeling he got when he stopped yet another ignorant student from straying down the wrong path was euphoric. Those dark days when he had been bullied and beaten, when he had felt wronged about the unfairness of it all, he had prayed for just one person to hold out a hand and help him up again. Now, as a teacher helping the children who desperately needed the support, he had an illusion of breaking through the fogs of time and extending a hand to his beaten self.
As they say, the climb up a mountain might be tiring, but the scenery at the top made everything worth it. Daniel, now on his way to the top, one step at a time, felt this much more clearly than anybody else.
The first day of teaching had gone painfully slow. The first week was somewhat manageable, which is why it surprised Daniel to no end that the next few weeks had whizzed by so fast he could barely recall what happened.
It had been an entire month since he joined J High as the teacher of morals and ethics, and he still could not believe just how much (and how little) the world had changed. Nothing made you feel older than working with a bunch of children; a fact that Daniel was intimately (and excruciatingly) aware of nowadays.
If he talked about how much the world had changed, he could no longer understand half the words that came out of his students’ mouths. Endless references and new slangs. It made him wonder if he'd accidentally served a decade in the military instead of the three years he'd actually served. His students were also…. Notably unhinged. He absolutely refused to believe that his classmates had been insane in the same way. (At least, none of them had ever shared their willingness to lick the limbs of a teacher)
If he talked about how little the world had changed, it was because regardless of which era he was in, joining gangs and challenging others to a fight on a hair trigger was always considered “cool”.
Honestly, he could see the appeal. How could he not, when he moonlighted as the leader of one of the communities that these kids wanted to join so bad? Sparring was fun. Sometimes, when you felt tired of everything happening in life, letting your fist have a friendly talk instead was therapeutic. From his experiences, a fight or a challenge was a great way to make lifelong friends who would go through thick and thin with you.
However, there was a line somewhere that most of these kids crossed without understanding what they were doing. Sparring was fine. Bullying was not. There was a difference between fighting a worthy opponent and beating a victim one sidedly. There was a difference between joining a gang, committing crimes because it was ‘cool’, and running away from an abusive environment and trying to survive by joining a group that could protect you.
Daniel admitted that he probably wasn't setting a great example by secretly acting as the leader of the Allied at night while teaching students about morals and ethics during the day. He also accepted the fact that his moral compass leaned more towards gray than a pure blinding white. However, his circumstances also gave him a unique perspective and an opportunity to save more lives.
And sometimes, unfortunately, saving lives included beating the shit out of your wayward students.
This is also why he'd asked his friends to keep an eye out for his children. As the ancients say, a teacher for a day, a father for a lifetime.
……And fatherly love was often painful.
A small group of boys gathered in a dark, barely lit alley. There was spit and graffiti on the walls, and garbage overflowing the trash cans in the corner. It was not a place one would like to find themselves in, especially at night.
“Min-ah, A-are you sure it's here?” Tae Soo asked his friend cautiously.
“Of course! They'd sent me the location a few hours ago.” Min-ah said confidently.
“Um. Are they trustworthy, though? What if it's an MLM scheme or a new cult?” Another boy questioned with distrust.
“Don't worry, they are very trustworthy. The leader of this gang is said to have exchanged blows with the Boss of Big Deal and escaped with just a single broken bone.” Min-ah seemed to be very proud of this leader.
“Huh? He ran away with a broken bone and he still has the guts to lead a gang?” The one who said this immediately got a hard knock on his head from Min-ah.
“You don't know anything!” One of the other boys spoke with shining eyes akin to that of a fanboy, “The Boss of Big Deal is literally a Big Deal. There are few people who can win against the Boss of Big Deal. He fights like a god. He's a King!” Considering that the boy was getting more and more worked up as he talked about his idol, his friends decided to change the topic before they started regretting it.
“But why are they not here? They told us to meet here if we wanted to join their gang!” The bunch of teenagers were getting pretty impatient. However, Min-ah had unwavering faith over his gangster hyungs.
“Maybe this is a test? After all, how can it be so easy to join one of the strongest gangs in the Seoul Underworld?”
“‘One of the strongest gangs in the Seoul Underworld’? And it's accepting members? Wow, I only went abroad for a few days, and I returned to find my backyard filled with new weeds!” A lazy voice suddenly interrupted the boys. The bunch of teens jumped in surprise and then turned towards the offending person who dared to eavesdrop on the (self proclaimed) future great gangsters of Seoul.
The person who had spoken was a handsome man who seemed to be in his late twenties. He wore a three piece suit and had a pair of sunglasses perched on his nose bridge. He looked like an elite executive of some company, seemingly incongruent with his surroundings, but if you looked carefully at his expensive leather shoes, you'd find a few splotches that looked suspiciously like smattered blood stains. Accompanying the somewhat intimidating man was another handsome blond of similar age decked in a formal shirt with his sleeves rolled up and black suit pants that looked expensive at a glance. The gold rimmed glasses he wore would've made him look like an intellectual, but the shit-eating grin he sported on his face broke the illusion.
“Who are you?! How dare you eavesdrop on us?! And you're so old, aren't you ashamed of pretending to be cool by wearing sunglasses at night?” Once they got over their shock, the boys immediately started digging their own graves. Not that they knew what they were doing.
The blond man broke into hysterical laughter. “Hahahahaha I told you somebody was gonna point it out someday! Hahahaha and they called you old! I think I can feel some fondness bubbling up for these twerps!” The man clutched his stomach with one hand, doubling over due to his laughter. His free hand scrambled to find a support lest he faceplant all over the dirty ground.
The other man resolutely shook off the hand that was trying to seek purchase by holding his shoulder. He told himself repeatedly that beating up kids a decade younger than him wasn't very mature of him. He took one look at the idiot laughing his head off and the unrepentant boys standing haughtily, and sighed to himself. Today was yet another day he had to set the new generation right. Is this how Daniel felt?
“Kids these days are getting ruder. As a law abiding citizen and a morally upright adult, I can't let this moral degradation continue,” he finally decided aloud.
“Hey old man, have you lost your marbles? How did you even wander into this place?” The younger generation continued digging a deeper grave.
“HAHAHAHAHAHAHA” The irritating laughter intensified. “Watch out Gun, you might twist your waist trying to straighten out these kids hahahaha!”
Gun had no idea what irritated him more; the disrespectful children, getting called an old man when he hadn't even reached his thirties, or Goo’s atrociously bad puns.
“We are the same age, Goo,” he deadpanned.
“But I'm not the one wearing sunglasses at night hahahahaha!” Goo replied.
Gun did not warn Goo to stop laughing. He knew from experience that it was a waste of time and energy. He would, of course, get his revenge later.
He ignored his companion in favor of observing the kids in front of him. They seemed to be highschoolers at most. This reminded him of a certain dongsaeng and student who was supposed to be a teacher in one of the high schools nearby.
Once upon a time, he'd specifically selected teenagers to work for him. Now, as an older man doing his part and paying his taxes (or evading them, at least), he realized just how young these children really were.
Beating them up wouldn't be as fun anymore, especially since all of them looked as if they'd been grown in a glass greenhouse or something. So naive and ignorant.
“What are you looking at? Huh? Wanna fight? Can you even see with those dark glasses? Huh? Huuuuh?”
And idiotic. Very idiotic. The next generation was doomed.
Gun sighed and loosened his tie in preparation of delivering a one sided beating. Nobody stop him, he was going to contribute to education today.
Before he could advise the children to come at him together, he heard the sounds of laughter and footsteps.
“Ho ho, did you wait long? We got into a fight with a different gang today. Of course, they lost! So you want to join—huh?” A fat bald man with tattoos all over his scalp stopped short, gazing at Gun warily. He felt a weird feeling that was akin to a small beast accidentally encountering a predator. He looked around, trying to find the reason, but he only found the bunch of kids he'd planned to scam into joining his gang and two young men who, although tall, didn't seem like much to him.
“Hyung? Why did you stop?” Baldy’s little brother asked, completely ignoring the two men.
Gun crossed his arms in contemplation. “Are you the ones trying to recruit children into your so-called gang?”
His words prompted two sets of offended ‘Hey’s from the group of teenagers and the gangsters.
“What do you mean by children? We are in highschool! We are old enough!”
“What do you mean by ‘so-called gang’? We're the great Black Mamba gang! If we claim to be second, nobody would claim to be the first!”
Gun rolled his eyes, not that anybody could tell. “Old enough? Can you drink? Can you drive? Do you have a job? A degree? And black mamba gang? Goo, how many multicolored mamba gangs have we come across so far? Are you mamba or rats? There's one so-and-so mamba gang everywhere!”
“Do you think I count? Why don't we do what we normally do when we encounter these gangs? Oh wait, you're a law abiding citizen now. Heh.” Goo scoffed.
The tattooed gang members had had enough.
“How dare you disrespect us?!”
“How dare you be so ugly? Man, I'm so glad I've got sunglasses.”
“So it's true? You really couldn't see with those sunglasses on! No wonder you tripped on air while walking!”
“I know for a fact that it was your foot I almost tripped on. You think I couldn't see it?” Gun retorted.
The gang members, who'd been reduced to a joke at best and a background piece at worst, eyed the highschoolers who were looking at them with shining eyes and decided they were going to teach these men a lesson.
“You'll regret it!” Like any self respecting back alley leader of a gang, he sent a few minions to punish the duo.
‘They should be eno—’ He hadn't even had the time to complete this thought. His minions lay cursing on the floor. The man they had attacked stood leisurely at his previous spot, not a hair out of place. The first wave of unease slowly trickled up his spine, but he was the leader! He couldn't shy away from a fight like this!
“Heh, you have some skills, too bad—”
Thunk
It only took a single punch to send baldy back to his rightful place; the overflowing trash bin at the corner.
“Noooo! Bosss!” The little brothers of the baldy couldn't accept this outcome. “You, how dare you?! We'll kill you!”
With a loud battle cry, all of them attacked at once.
Gun easily sidestepped the clumsy punches and counteracted with a kick. The person he kicked flew and knocked a few others like a bowling ball.
“Bingo!” Exclaimed Goo, snacking on melon seeds that he had ‘borrowed’ from one of the boys as he spectated leisurely.
Gun ignored him as usual, twisting his torso to dodge the hand with the knife. He grabbed the knife, and with the mentality of sharing weal and woes with a friend, threw it towards Goo. Unfortunately for the blond, the owner of the knife was still attached to it.
“No, why are you attacking meee! Attack him! We're not together!” Goo whined as he kicked the person back like a football.
“How can you disown your best friend? We've even shared the same pair of pants together!” Gun retorted peacefully, apparently feeling no psychological burden over his friend’s betrayal of their ‘friendship’.
The crazed and beaten gangsters ran to fight both the men. One of them managed to get a few melon seeds right in his eyes.
“My melon seeds! You punks wasted my melon seeds!” Heartbroken over the loss of three of his precious melon seeds, Goo entered the fray in search of revenge.
Unfortunately, even with both of them only hitting those people lightly, all of them were incapacitated within a scant few minutes.
Goo looked at the thirty odd beaten gangsters piled next to the trash-can and then sighed to himself. He didn't even get to have any fun. And he lost his melon seeds too. Three of them. He stared at the boy he'd ‘borrowed' the melon seeds from.
The boy gulped and pointed towards Gun.
The man in sunglasses held a small packet of melon seeds in his hands, waiting for something. The moment he felt Goo’s gaze on him, he downed the entire packet into his mouth, chewed it expressionlessly and then swallowed everything, peels included. Then, since he was a law abiding citizen of the country, he aimed and accurately threw the crumpled packet into the open mouth of baldy who'd been ‘sleeping’ involuntarily in the trash can.
“Bingo,” he said, staring down at Goo.
Yes, he was petty.
“I'll kill you one of these days,” Goo warned with gritted teeth.
“You've been trying…. And failing so far,” Gun replied serenely. Then he turned towards the group of highschoolers who were huddled together in one spot, trying to minimize their presence by acting invisible.
Gun considered his options. He could beat them up, but after fighting good opponents like Daniel, DK and Goo, he was leery of bestowing a one sided beating on these trembling quails with noodle arms. Also, he was supposed to be a law abiding citizen, a mature adult…..
…And didn't they just call him an old man? Well, he couldn't bear to disappoint these punks now, could he? Staring at the shivering group, the corners of his lips curled up into a rather evil smirk.
“Call your guardian and give me the phone.”
Daniel wore his eye mask and happily tucked himself into the blanket. Teacher Daniel was finally going offline for the day! Of course, he'd still wake up in his other body, but it was a body solely reserved for his other identity. However, it was a weekend, so Teacher Daniel could finally catch a much needed break!
…..or so he had thought, until a harsh ringtone shattered the fragile silence and his hopes for a peaceful night with it.
“Hello?” He asked, hoping that it wasn't one of his colleagues asking him to take up some of their workload as a favor. He found it hard to say no, but he had plans for the next day.
“Is this Min-ah’s guardian?” The smooth, lazy voice that came from the other side was way too familiar. Daniel checked the number and realized it was one of his students. It definitely wasn't him.
“Ah, I'm his teacher. May I ask what happened?” Daniel spoke politely.
After listening to the entire story, he closed his eyes and sighed. It couldn't be helped.
“.......I am grateful that you saved the children from harm,” he said, gritting his teeth. He really was grateful. After all, he wouldn't be able to teach a good lesson to the kids who'd already been beaten and bruised. “May I know where they are currently? After all, they must be so scared. I should comfort them and send them home. It's only my duty as their teacher.”
After getting the location, he softly thanked the caller again and ended the call.
He sighed and looked at the sleeping Daniel 2.0. At least one of them was enjoying the warm and comfortable bed.
When Gun dialed the number, he felt that it looked vaguely familiar.
“Are you sure this is your guardian?” He asked the owner of the phone.
“Y-yes,” the boy stuttered, not looking into Gun’s eyes. This wasn't very promising.
“Hello?”
The voice on the other side was very familiar.
“Doesn't he sound like him ?” Goo, who seemed to have gotten over his lost melon seeds and the subsequent betrayal by Gun, commented casually.
“Is this Min-ah’s guardian?” Gun asked suspiciously.
“Ah, I'm his teacher. May I ask what happened?” The person on the other side seemed very polite and gentle.
“Ha! He can't be that punk. When has he ever talked to us so politely? I can't even imagine him acting this polite towards me. If it really is him, I must've died and gone to hell to hear something this pretentious.” Goo continued with his useless commentary.
“Your kids came to the slums to join a gang and got involved in a group fight. They seem to be traumatized. Fortunately, they encountered me. You better come and rescue them before they start crying.” Gun’s voice was so polite that Goo pretended to gag.
“Oh my god he's being so weird!” He muttered. The highschoolers huddled together nodded in agreement. Even though Gun’s words were technically correct, they were also so far from the truth that they couldn't get more wrong.
If Gun could hear their thoughts, he'd scoff and proudly say, ‘This is the power of a degree in business. We can twist the truth so hard it would be worse than an outright lie!’
This was a man who was proud of his hard earned degree.
“Um…. What does he do for a living?” One of the boys asked, feeling that there was a high chance the man in sunglasses worked full time as a con man.
“He's a businessman,” Goo replied offhandedly.
The kids nodded in understanding. Close enough.
“These kids are so lucky to have a teacher as caring as you,” Gun flattered the man on the call, “Sure, I'm sending you the location. You can take your time. Your children are safe with me.” He smiled widely at the teenagers after disconnecting the call, making them shudder.
“Say, what's the name of this teacher you want to trap?”
As a man who'd been a part of this society for so long, how could he not see that these kids wanted to embarrass their teacher? Which self respecting teenager would want their guardians to come after being caught doing something shameful? There was no protest, no pleading, they just handed him a phone the moment he asked to talk to their guardian? And this guardian was their teacher?
If he couldn't feel something was fishy then he might as well change his name to Goo and dye his hair blond.
The fact that these high schoolers seemed to be filled with schadenfreude instead of embarrassment was such a blatant giveaway! This poor teacher who cared about his students enough to run to a suspicious place to save them so late at night was such a pitiful soul.
These kids really deserved some tough lessons.
“H-his name is Daniel Park. And we're not trapping him! He's coming out of his own choice! You told us to call our guardian. A teacher counts as a guardian.” Min-ah argued adamantly, forgetting his fear for a moment.
“..ho? Does he teach you ethics and morals?” Goo asked with a complex expression on his face.
The kids were shocked. “How did you know that?”
Gun couldn't hold his happy laughter. He actually managed to hit the bulls eye while randomly firing an arrow? This was so interesting!
For the first time since meeting them, he could feel some fondness for the younger generation.
Some fondness, mostly pity.
They didn't have to wait for long. Of course, the boys would like to claim otherwise. The half an hour they had spent in the company of the two lunatics was the longest one they had ever experienced so far in their short lives.
Their teacher walked in with hurried footsteps, unaware that he was falling into a ‘trap’. Some of the boys felt a few short stabs in their conscience. The man they'd considered to be a weak pretty boy actually came to save them, regardless of the time and place. Ah, it really wasn't easy to be a teacher.
“Thanks for wait— huh?” Their teacher stopped short, staring at the two men ‘watching over’ them. His shock slowly morphed into….. irritation? And he changed his way of speaking.
“Huh? Why are you here? I knew something was wrong!” Daniel’s politeness had taken wings and flown away into the netherworld.
“I'm hurt! How could you talk to me like that?” Gun clutched his heart in mock distress. “I didn't even know it was you! You've been avoiding me ever since that night… Did you not enjoy it too?” They had fought to their heart’s content, forgetting all inhibitions and without holding back for the fear of killing their opponents.
Somebody choked. It was Min-ah. The students looked at the two men with wide eyes. They accidentally came across something so explosive?
“I've been busy, you know. I have a new job and I still need some time to get used to everything. I do enjoy our time together, but you tire me out way too much,” Daniel sighed, ignorant of his students' dropped jaws. Even after almost a decade of getting along with Gun and Goo, he never found anything wrong with how they talked. Instead, he actually got used to it.
It was unknown whether it was because Daniel was too pure for this world that he couldn't get the innuendos, or that he simply didn't care, but the sheer amount of misunderstandings the three of them had managed to produce together was not something that could be cleared up with a single talk.
The teenagers listening in paled. This…. Wasn't this too much? Were they allowed to witness this? Will they be silenced later? They silently turned towards their teacher, looking at him in a different light.
At the same time, they realized that they had gravely misunderstood their teacher. When he smiled and talked with the girls, it definitely wasn't because he was flirting with them! He clearly had a significant other! Thank goodness they hadn't done anything irreversible yet.
“Come on, you gotta let off some steam every now and then. Besides, you left me alone and ran away with Goo for three years.” Gun crossed his arms while frowning. Well, to be completely honest, neither of them had had a choice. As citizens of Korea, they had to serve in the military for a few years regardless of their own willingness to do so. Of course, he, who never bothered to apply for Korean nationality and was technically a citizen of Japan, was exempted from this mandatory enlistment. This fact, however, did not stop him from taunting his two friends.
The students looked at the bickering duo in interest. Oooh there was a story!
“You were the one who fled abroad leaving us together. Do you even know how hard it was to handle him?” Daniel scrunched up his face, as if remembering something terrible.
The audience turned towards the third person, eyeing him critically. So….. he was a homewrecker?
“What do you mean?!” Goo sounded very offended. “I’m excellent company, thank you very much!”
“You outed me in front of everybody! Do you know how hard it was for me to hide and pretend to be like everybody else?” Daniel did not want to remember those dark times when he'd done everything he could to seem mediocre so that he could finish his service in the shortest possible time.
The teens swiveled their heads towards their teacher again, this time, filled with sympathy. Ah, forcibly getting dragged out of the closet, wasn't he so miserable?
“Did you forget I'm the one who taught you everything you know? Why is Goo getting so much attention?” Gun felt like he'd been wronged. Obviously, both of them had decided to have their own ‘friends’. Why was Goo always trying to pry into his corner? And why was Daniel just going along with it?
“It's not me, it's Goo! He's the one who always pounces on me, trying to catch me off guard.” Daniel grit his teeth every time he thought back to that fateful day. He'd been taking a break on his own when suddenly, he was caught off guard by Goo, who attacked him out of nowhere. Unfortunately, Daniel’s instincts were faster than he was, and he fought Goo for a few rounds, right in front of a large audience that consisted of his fellow comrades and a special forces instructor who had come for a visit. It was only later that he came to know that Goo had been ‘selected’ to serve in the special forces and he just didn't want to suffer through this alone.
The audience was very displeased with Goo. Chasing a man who already had a partner and forcing him into a relationship? Was there any law in this world?
“Hey hey hey, what's this, you clearly enjoy it as much as I do!” The blond spluttered indignantly.
“Once we start, it's hard to stop. It's all because of the two of you! You're way too good at it.” Sparring with them made his blood sing in a way that nothing else could. It was peak entertainment. The relaxation and peace he felt after fighting a few rounds with them was worth the sore muscles and the bruises he had to deal with later. “It's not that I don't want to meet the two of you, it's just that I'd be too sore and bruised after we're done. Neither of you ever hold back, and I have work to do, you know?”
The kids scrunched their faces as if they'd swallowed a lemon. Too much information. They really could have lived their entire lives happily without being privy to these details. Also, t-two? T-together? Wasn't this scale too big? No wonder their teacher wanted to avoid them! But why did he seem a bit like a scumbag? Tsk tsk. This Gun guy suddenly felt a bit sympathetic. No wonder he wore sunglasses at night! It was probably to hide the pain in his eyes….. They shouldn't have called him an old man.
By the time the bickering men had slowed down enough to spare some attention to them, the students had already composed a long story of sadomasochistic love with a hundred twists and turns in their minds.
“We can have our discussion later, but can anybody tell me what the hell happened here?” Daniel asked, pointing towards the formerly ignored pile of unconscious gangsters near the trash-can.
It had been a long day for the high schoolers. Not only did they come to know some shocking (and unwanted) details about their teacher’s love life, they also witnessed this gentle man curse for the first time since they'd met him.
“They are the gangsters your precious students had followed into this alley. If we'd gotten a little late, the red cobra gang would've gained a few new little brothers to exploit,” Gun said casually.
“I-it’s Black Mamba,” a small voice croaked from the pile of unconscious gangsters. Would you look at it, this person was loyal enough that he'd woken up right in time to correct Gun. He got rewarded with a shoe to the face for his unwavering bravery and hurtled back into blissful unconsciousness.
“Anyway, so as law abiding citizens, we took care of this gang and successfully stopped your kids from doing something they'd regret later. Though I personally think they're regretting it plenty already, right?” The man smiled at the kids who nodded frantically.
“I see, I guess you deserve a thanks,” Daniel seemed way too reluctant to say this for someone who was genuinely grateful.
“Are you hurt anywhere?” This question was aimed at his students. The boys felt emotional. Even after everything, their teacher didn't stop caring for them. They shook their heads in unison.
“Well,” Daniel smiled sharply, “you're about to be.”
“What?” This was not in the script!
“You have two options. First, I call your parents and explain everything to them. Second, you fight me.” The supposedly gentle teacher made a beckoning gesture with his hands.
“H-How can we hit our teacher?”
Their teacher raised an eyebrow. “Didn't you want me to be beat up when you called me here?” The students lowered their heads. So he knew. This was so embarrassing.
“Don't worry, I keep my promises. Even if you hit me, I won't tattle on you,” Daniel reassured them. “If I win, you must not think about doing illegal things in the future. If you win, you can walk out of here without consequences.”
The bunch of high schoolers with big and mighty dreams looked at each other and shuffled their feet indecisively. They no longer wanted to beat their teacher, but these terms were way too good.
“It’s getting late and I'm tired. You can come at me together. I don't have the time to beat you one by one.”
The boys made up their minds, but they felt a bit apologetic. ‘Don’t worry, we won't hit too hard,’ they thought, as they ran towards Daniel. They never even considered that they would lose. They firmly believed that there was strength in numbers. It was dishonorable, but they couldn't just wait for their teacher to call their parents one by one and explain everything to them, right? One against ten wasn't fair, but when has the world ever been fair?
The world really was unfair. Why the hell was their feeble teacher able to thrash them like they were ears of wheat in a farmer's hand? The treatment they underwent under the ‘loving’ hands of their teacher made them feel less like humans and more like a pile of dirty clothes in desperate need of washing.
Kicking, dodging, punching and using their own weight, force and numbers to counteract them; was this something a human should be capable of doing? Did this man have eyes at the back of his head? And, And, why was this not ending?
This one sided thrashing felt like it was taking forever. They were like flies being swatted by a human. They had given up five minutes ago, but this man kept forcing them to get up and fight again with a smile on his face.
Devil. He was the devil.
“Five minutes and thirty two seconds. He really brought out corporal punishment. Isn't that deemed illegal nowadays?” Goo observed, noisily chewing a chewing gum that he'd gotten from somewhere.
“Heh,” Gun scoffed, lightly nudging a fallen student with his shoes, as if he was playing with a puppy, “What do you know? It's less of a teacher punishing his students and more of the leader of the Allies teaching them a lesson. How can it be the same? I personally think he's being too soft.”
“Hmm…. Maybe being a teacher mellowed him out?”
Goo’s comment was drowned by the pained howls of the students who were undergoing the same treatment that a punching bag normally did.
The punishment ended and Daniel employed the help of his two friends to lug the teenagers into his car and deliver them back home safely one by one. The shocked parents of the children were told about how their kids tried to join a gang and were beaten up by gangsters. The shocked parents wanted to beat up their sons again but Daniel mediated and pointed at how thoroughly scrapped up the boys were.
“Puberty is not an easy time for these kids. Of course they will want to rebel. Being hot blooded is just a phase. I think they learnt their lesson this time. They won't do it again, right?” Daniel smiled so angelically that Gun and Goo, who had been following him to watch the drama were overcome with a sudden coughing fit.
The boys, who had been thoroughly baptized by the ‘gentle thoughtfulness’ of their teacher, nodded frantically, biting back their painful groans.
The parents were very touched and thankful for a teacher like Daniel who cared so much for his students.
It wasn't everyday that you had the pleasure of meeting a man like Daniel Park.
A few new rumors starring a certain handsome young teacher had made their way into J High school. Some said he was gay, and in a polyamoric relationship with two gangsters. Others said he was a pitiful young man, coveted and forced by the mafia boss. There were even some who claimed he had a sugar daddy.
Among these rumors, there was one that had been discarded as soon as it reached the people's ears. These rumors claimed that Daniel Park was actually the secret boss of an underworld organization, and had a connection with all the other big bosses of the underworld. Of course, nobody believed in it. The ones who did, only had to take one look at their sweet, gentle and somewhat nerdy teacher to stamp those budding suspicions as fake and useless.
Had it involved a different member of the faculty, Principal Gordon Park would've laughed it all off as the creativity of kids, but unfortunately, the object of these rumors was Daniel Park. He was sure these rumors had some basis. This was the student he'd taught himself. This was the troublemaker he'd caught indulging in underage drinking, acting as a male host, fighting in the hallways, fighting in the canteen, fighting in the school grounds and fighting outside it. There was no smoke without fire. He reckoned that at least some of these rumors were true.
“Hmmm, I have to keep an eye on that boy,” he sighed, rubbing his throbbing temples.
‘That boy’, who was at the eye of the metaphorical storm, peacefully spent his days teaching and following his passion.
Yes, the job of an educator might be tough, but it was a rewarding one.