4. Profession (1/2)

good day to you all! this is lord purple heart! i would like to thank you for reading this series of oneshots so far, and i sincerely wish for you to enjoy yourself!

i'm here to make a point: each oneshot in this series of chapters is unrelated to the other oneshots unless otherwise stated or specified. in other words, this isn't necessarily related to strawberry milk or english project, so please keep that in mind as you read onward. the next chapter of english project will be released at a later time, so please wait patiently.

also, i would like to apologize for the delays in my work. i am in the middle of my fourth year in highschool as student council president and an actor in a musical, so i have a lot of my time being absorbed by other things.

now, without further ado, you may scroll down for the next oneshot of green and blue! i hope you enjoy it!

profession

"come in, come in!" koro-sensei said cheerily, sipping a cup of steaming hot green tea that had been prepared moments ago. he could detect the presence of someone standing outside the door, and he knew who it was. the silhouette that shone in the door made it all too obvious.

"alright!" a green-haired girl slid the door aside with a very wide, cheerful smile and skipped into the room. closing the door lightly with her foot, she wasted no time in making her way over to the table and sitting in the chair opposite her homeroom teacher.

the octopoid let out a chuckle and nodded once in approval at seeing his jolly student humming to herself. "i see you're doing quite well. have you thought out your career path already?"

"actually, i don't have any ideas."

koro-sensei simply chuckled at his student as he poured another cup of tea. "well, well. this is a bit of a surprise…but i guess i should have expected at least one student to give me this answer. here, your tea." he slid the cup gently over to kayano until it was directly in front of her.

"ah, thank you, teacher." kayano said politely with a bow before picking it up and taking a sip, and she let out a sigh when she felt the sensation of the warm liquid caress her throat soothingly. the faint taste of ginger mixed with honey seductively assaulted her taste buds. she turned to her teacher and grinned, gesturing to the cup. "this is really good!"

"i am glad to hear that." the teacher replied happily as he leaned back into the chair. "so, let's start from the ground up, shall we? what do you think your talents are?" he asked with a wag of his finger.

confronted with the question, kayano immediately crossed her arms over her chest and closed her eyes, trying to submerge herself into deep thought as quickly as she could. several of silence passed before kayano let out a groan and exclaimed "i can eat lots!" with the sincerest smile she could muster on her face.

"certainly a talent of yours, and one that most cannot hope to compete with!" koro-sensei applauded with a chuckle.

"except for hara." kayano replied, suddenly glumly, as she rested her chin on her palm and looked at her teacher. "she can outeat the whole class if she wanted to."

"that's true, i guess." koro-sensei said with a quieter chuckle, secretly praying that the mentioned girl couldn't and wouldn't hear their conversation. "but let's not talk about hara. this is about y-"

koro-sensei was left at a loss for words when he noticed that kayano was sending slightly worried glances at the wall in the direction of the classroom. and when he saw her look back to him with a slightly embarassed smile, koro-sensei just chuckled when it clicked. "kayano, i certainly hope you know what your talent is. it shall be crucial for deciding what you'll be doing as an upstanding, mature member of society."

"my talent?" kayano parroted, tilting her head in mild confusion. "i dunno."

"it's simple." if koro-sensei's smile could change, it would have gone from a normal, everyday grin to a warm, gentle smile that expressed something almost like a family member's. "your ability to care for others."

"but that's not a talent." kayano replied, frowning in her bewilderment. "that's something that you'd hear in movies, or read from a manga. it's not really a talent."

koro-sensei laughed knowingly, his fingers touching tips in front of his face. "is that truly what you think, kayano? the sweet girl that cares about everyone else more than anyone else?" his leg-tentacles crossed one another, his right tentacle on top of the left. "tell me. who was on your mind just now?"

kayano smiled out of embarrassment, but it was tinged with concern. "after he came out and back to the classroom, nagisa's been looking really troubled." her expression changed to one of playful suspicion, and she pointed a finger at koro-sensei. "i sure hope that you didn't say something to him."

koro-sensei waved his hands in reply. "of course not! i would never to do anything to intentionally harm my own student!" he cleared his throat to reset the situation. "but you see now, right?"

"well…i guess." kayano replied, scratching the back of her head. "but how does that talent help me in my future?"

"you'll see that caring for others isn't something that everyone can do easily." koro-sensei said, a small hint of sadness in his voice. "so it is my duty as your teacher to hone that talent as early as now."

"how do you hone a talent for caring for other people?" kayano asked.

"…we will talk about your talent another time, kayano." koro-sensei suddenly said, standing up and reaching with his tentacles for the door; he slid it open with ease, the sound of wood resounding as it knocked against the wall.

"um…okay." kayano said, slightly confused but deciding to let the issue go at the prospect of being allowed to go home already.

a talent to care about others…how does someone use that for their future? and how does someone train something like that?

my talent is to kill…i'm suited to being an assassin…right?

nagisa thought to himself with a smile he himself didn't understand as he gazed out at the view from the window of the classroom. the clear blue sky that stretched across the intangible ceiling of the world was welcoming and

ight, marred only by the occasional cloud and the sight of the moon.

well, around 30% of what the moon used to be.

the blue-haired middle-schooler let out a sigh and closed his eyes, letting the

eeze carry away his anxiety. it was already past school hours and everyone else had already gone home with much on their minds after their teacher had given them a little help on their academic track. nakamura had gone home with an expression that everyone else had interpreted as one with many conflicting emotions, while karma on the other hand looked as confident and calm as he usually did.

but with nagisa, things hadn't gone as smoothly as he would have preferred.

"…what am i supposed to do with a talent to kill?" he let out a quiet, frustrated groan as he leaned onto the window frame and blinked slowly. "this is a talent that karma could put to better use."

"don't think that way, nagisa."

the familiar voice of his unique teacher compelled the boy to turn around, and he was faced with the slightly-under-three-meters-tall superbeing that resembled an octopus with a hat. "koro-sensei." nagisa acknowledged his teacher with a tone of slight surprise. "i thought you'd gone home already."

"i came back because i knew you'd be here." koro-sensei replied warmly, his ever-present smile filling the middle-school student with ease. the yellow-colored teacher reached out with a tentacle and patted nagisa on the head like a man would do to his son. "having troubled thoughts, o student of mine?"

"well…yeah." nagisa admitted, his eyes downcast and fixed to the floorboards like it'd been duct-taped there. "i…i don't really know what to do with this talent of mine."

"now, now. don't get so down over it." koro-sensei said comfortingly as his tentacle reached out and maneuvered under the teacher's desk a few meters away before it came back holding a small cooler. he opened it effortlessly with a single finger before reaching inside and displaying the contents, which was entirely full to the

im with ice pops still in their plastic wrappers. flavor after flavor was present, and it was clear that he had every single one imaginable. "here, would you like some ice cream?"

"oh. thanks, but i only need one." nagisa accepted with a smile and reached out, plucking one of the plastic wrappers from his teacher's delicate hands and cleanly tearing the indicated end to expose the chilly delicacy to the air. he had these?

"keep the other one. i have more, anyway. besides, the other flavor is a rare one that i would like someone to try. it's blackberry!" koro-sensei replied with a grin and placed the second popsicle onto the nearest table, which is where kayano sits. he returned the cooler to its initial position under the desk and then crossed his tentacles over his chest. "so? what troubles you, beloved student of mine?"

"…it's about our talk." nagisa said, taking a short lick of his popsicle stick and taking a very short moment to admire the sweet, freezing taste of cola that tingled on his tongue before he continued. "…it's bothering me. i don't really know what i want to do in the future. and i have a talent for killing and assassination." koro-sensei just nodded as the blue-haired boy continued to speak his mind and heart. "i…don't know if i want my future to be stained with blood. but i also don't know what i want to do."

"mm. i see." koro-sensei said in acknowledgement, nodding as well. "that certainly seems like a problem, doesn't it?"

nagisa didn't know what to say to that. he just looked away, the light of the sun that was slowly beginning to near the edge of the horizon no longer

ight enough to force his eyelids to close. the glare was gone, and all he could see was a large, yellow-orange circle in the sky that looked like it was a piece of orange paper painted with neon paint and glued to the sky.

…would koro-sensei even understand this kind of thing? nagisa wondered as he continued to do nothing but gaze out the window.

koro-sensei was not human. nagisa nor any of his classmates knew what he was really thinking, or the way he understood and thought about the world was similar to the middle-school students in class e in any way. and while it was easy to see that he had shown some sort of understanding and ability to relate to them on a personal level, it only served to wrap the superbeing's identity in even more mystery.

"well, nagisa, i hate to leave one of my student's in a time of deep thought, but the supermarket that i frequent is having a 50% sale off of the majority of their items." koro-sensei suddenly interrupted nagisa's thoughts as the yellow teacher walked towards the window. he looked at nagisa, his smile still present. "you should be fine, though. i have faith you'll think of something, one way or another. you aren't alone, after all."

with that, the octopus let loose his signature laugh before soaring at supersonic speed out the window with an explosion of sound. the wind rattled the entire classroom, leaving the sliding door slightly ajar and the chairs slightly disorganized. nagisa had already

aced himself for it when koro-sensei had been walking towards the window, so it was only his hair that had been mussed slightly by the air.