“Hello everyone, I’m Mr. Tachibana and I’m glad you made it this far into the book,” I give a light bow. “Thank you very much.”

“And to everyone who just skipped through the pages to get straight to the epilogue and didn’t even read the book completely,” I give another light bow. “Thank you for your money.”

“Um, Mr. Tachibana who are you talking to?”

I could hear the voice of one of my students calling for my attention. His name was Nomaru.

“I was just talking to the readers.”

“Readers?” The class's confusion was all in sync.

“That’s not important,” I turn to the blackboard behind me. “What is important is the lesson that I’ll be teaching you all today.”

With a piece of chalk, I wrote down the lesson of the day…

“How to make a good light novel and light novel anime adaptation!”

The class read what I had written down in unison.

“That’s correct,” I said, right before lighting the cigarette I placed in my mouth.

“Mr. Tachibana,” a female student with a piercing glare stood up from her desk to speak. “It’s against school rules for anyone, especially a teacher, to smoke on the premises, please refrain from doing so.” This was Reina.

“Okay, great point there missy. That’ll be my first question I’ll ask you all.”

“Huh?”

“Tell me class, why am I purposely smoking when it’s obviously against school rules?”

“Cause you learned that your pathetic life was a mistake and now want to kill yourself slowly.”

“Good deduction there detective, but incorrect.”

“Does it taste like candy?” another one of my female students, Dizz, asked a question instead of answering the question.

“No, that is also incorrect.”

“Really, cause if it tastes like candy, I would understand why you’d risk your job for it.”

“…” My reasoning behind why I’m doing this action was smart, but hers was just plain stupid.

“Does anyone else want to give it a try?”

The class stayed silent.

I let out a sign, which helped the cigarette smoke escape my mouth, “We got a long ways to go.”

I pulled out my cigarette, holding it in my hand, giving it a break, “The reason I’m smoking a cigarette when I know damn well it’s against the school rules, is so I can be a more relatable adult character.”

“Adult character?” confusion could be seen on Dizz's face.

“But Mr. Tachibana, aren’t you sixteen just like the rest of us?” Nomaru came in with a hard hitting question.

“Wait, what are you talking about,” I began rubbing my chin. “Don’t you see that I have facial hair unlike the rest of you?”

“Ha,” A loud mouth girl with dyed blonde hair joined the conversation.“You call that patch of peach fuzz facial hair? I thought that your pubic hair started growing in the wrong spot.” Her name was Ann.

“Hey! I’m your teacher little missy, you shouldn’t talk about a man’s facial and pubic hair in the same sentence.”

“Stop it with calling us girls 'little missy'. You sound like an old pervert.”

“What!”

“And how can you be our teacher anyways, it makes no sense, since you’re the same age as us.”

When Ann shot this question at me, my eyes fell to my side in a panic. Sweat drenched from off my face.

Damn it! I stopped shaving for a whole month to grow this facial hair out, it’s not my fault that I’m a late bloomer. Wait, that’s not really the issue here, the real issue is how am I going to respond to her question. I can’t seriously tell her that I whacked her real teacher in the back of the head and shoved him in the closet right behind them. I got to think of how to get the attention off of me…

At that moment, I brought my eyes back up, only to see my way out of this mess. It was devious, it was horrible, and it was vile for a teacher to do this, but I had no other choose. It was eat or be eaten.

“Hey! Kid in the back of the room, why the hell are you picking in your nose!”

Shinji, another one of my students, was the nerdy, awkward type of kid who sat in the back of the room. He was picking his nose in secret, hoping that no one could see. I understand his struggle, sometimes you have that booger that you’d rather just pick out rather than it just hanging there by a strand of a single nose hair saying “Hello!” to everyone you face. But, I had to use him as a scapegoat for myself.

“Ew! That’s like totally gross!”

“I can’t believe someone would do something so disgusting in public.”

“I bet he’ll never get married.”

The girls in the class were raining bullets of degrading words onto the poor kid. I know that I’m the one who pointed him out, but I still felt bad.

As if to cleanse the snooty situation, Dizz went to console Shinji, “Listen, I know how it feels to wonder if your boogers taste like candy, but the truth is…” she got close to whisper in his ear... ”They don’t.”

“I know that already!”

“Well, you don’t need to get snappy with me.”

“None of that matters you idiots, just go into the closet and grab some tissues to wipe your nose!” Reina exclaimed.

“Huh..” shock had covered my face.

“Yeah, okay…” Shinji listened to the queens command and acted.

You got to be kidding me. I didn’t expect that my plan would completely backfire on me like that. I guess it’s karma trying to punish me for my bad deed. I need to hurry and fix this.

The thump of chalk bouncing off someone’s skull echoed throughout the classroom.

“What the hell! What kind of teacher throws chalk at their student's head?!”

“The kind of teacher that’s trying to relive his glory days of being a professional baseball star.”

“But you’re only sixteen.”

“Who cares about that, the real issue is don’t you dare go into that closet.”

“Huh, but I need to wipe my nose.”

“Don’t lie to me, I used to be at your age…”

“Wait, aren’t you still our age?”

“And the only thing a young man at the ripe age of puberty needs tissues for is to masturbate.”

“That’s stupid! We’re in the middle of school, why would I masturbate at a time like this?”

“So you admit that you like the thrill of masturbating in a public area. You god damn animal.”

“I never said anything like that, you're twisting my words.”

“Besides, there are absolutely no tissues inside that closet, so wipe your snot on your sleeves.”

“But that’s disgusting!”

“Not as disgusting as touching yourself. Now do it.”

Shinji, feeling dejected, drag his loser of a body back to his seat, wiping the snout of his nose with his school uniform sleeves.

I clench my fist in victory. Homerun!

“How gross can you get?”

“He’s nothing but a booger eating loser.”

“I’m going to make fun of him for this until the day he dies.”

After, getting his second bullet storm of insults, Shinji laid his head on the desk in defeat, covering up his shame.

“Okay now that all interrupts have subsided, let’s get back to the lesson. So I want to talk to you guys about-“

“My mom told me that people who smoke cigarettes are losers.” Dizz couldn’t help but add another one of her weird inserts.

“…why did you have to interrupt me for that?”

“Because I don’t want to see my dear teacher growing up to be some degenerate scum of the earth.” She pulled a small box out,” That’s why I use this instead.”

“Is that…”

“Yep, candy cigarettes,” she grabbed one of the candy cigarettes, placing it in her mouth. “Aren’t I cool boss?”

“No, you actually look more like a child.”

“Excuse me, but your lack of coolness is the least of your problem,” Reina's now firing at me.

“I really can’t get this lesson started now can I?”

“As we have established, you are only sixteen. Which means, you are actively supporting underage smoking.”

“Wait what? But, that wasn’t my intention.”

As if being triggered, Reina leans forward slamming her palm against her desk, “It doesn’t matter whether it was intentionally or not, you are still setting a bad example for your students.”

“Um…”

“If any of us followed your example, we would become the rejects of society, we’ll fall into depravity. I can see it now, I’ll first start by smoking too young, which in turn will cause me to lose all the beauty that I have gained thus far. No man would be willing to accept my now raisined face, so I’ll have to resort to becoming a street worker to find any hint of love. But, that love would soon be seen as fake, once I get knocked up by a man that goes by the name of “Big Joe” who left me to take care of Little Susie all alone. Do you want me to grow up like that Mr.Tachibana?!”

When did this become all about her? And who the hell is Big Joe?

“Of course I don’t want you to grow up to become that, but if for some reason that does happen, I’ll help take care of Little Susie.”

Reina jolted back in a blush, “Would you really do that Mr.Tachibana, even with my raisin face?”

“Of course I would, I would never leave my students out to dry.”

With my word of reassurance, she calmed back down,”You have convinced me, I’ll start smoking by tomorrow.”

“Wait, wait, wait, I never said to start doing that!”

Wait, I might’ve put my foot in my mouth. Why did I agree to something so absurd? I didn’t think she’d go this route. I can barely wipe my own ass, let alone Little Susie’s. No, the bigger problem is what if Big Joe finds out and beats me up. Wait...WHO IS BIG JOE!?

“Mr. Tachibana.”

With his hand raised, the only person who could wake me from this nightmare was Nomaru.

“Ye…Yes?”

“Aren’t you supposed to teach us about Adult Characters in light novels?”

“Oh…of course, I got kind of side tracked.”

With Nomaru's words, my head cleared up. Nomaru reminded me of my purpose in life, my purpose for being in this chapter. It was to help my students, and the readers learn more about light novels.

I was a man, no…

I was a teacher.

I was their teacher.

With a smile, I was ready to start all over with joy, “Now class, the first thing you should know is-“

The ring of the school bell signaled the end of class.

“You got to be kidding me!”

The sound of desks moving and shuffling filled the room as my students prepared to leave.

“That was a different experience.”

“I can’t wait to learn the wonders of underage smoking.”

“Hey booger boy, hurry it up.”

“I should just kill myself.”

All my students played me no mind as they walked out of the classroom. I felt like a fool.

“Mr. Tachibana.”

“Huh…”

The one that paid me any attention was again Nomaru. “I didn’t really understand some of the things you were saying but, isn’t this supposed to be an Epilogue?”

“What…”

“Which means, aren’t you supposed to bring closure to the book.”

HE’S RIGHT!

I face the readers, YOU! And I give a light bow, “And they lived happily ever after.”

“Wait, that’s it!?”

“Also, please buy Volume Two.”

“Wait, there’s going to be a Volume Two!?”