Episode 144

At my words, Teddy bear threw both arms up in excitement and shouted.

“Yay…! I finally have friends to play with…!”

Maybe because he was so much bigger now, his voice came out slow and heavy.

Then, resting a paw under his chin, he began seriously pondering.

“Should I squish them from above, or crush them from the sides?”

“I-it’s just a figure of speech! I didn’t mean actually kill them!”

I turned pale and screamed in panic.

“Tch.”

Teddy bear clicked his tongue in disappointment.

‘Seriously, you can’t joke about anything around him.’

The sheer menace coming off the now-giant bear made even me feel a chill.

Just then—

“Whoa. What is this? Some kind of magic toy?”

Hans Campbell looked up at the giant teddy bear with amused curiosity.

“Figures a rich kid would have something crazy like this. Looks like it’d make a decent punching bag.”

“Yaaah—!”

It happened in a flash.

With a weird screeching noise, Danvers Campbell, who’d been lurking near Joshua and me, suddenly ran up and kicked Teddy bear’s thick leg.

“Pfft, it’s nothing special!”

Maybe trying to show off for his friends and older brother, Danvers kept kicking the giant teddy bear.

“See? It’s huge but it’s just a useless lump—”

“Ugh…”

Watching the fool show off, Joshua shook his head with a pale face.

And at that moment—

Whoosh, THUD—!

A huge shadow slammed down over Danvers’s head at terrifying speed.

There was a heavy, brutal thud — and after a brief moment, the sight that greeted us was—

“Uh, uh…?”

Danvers stood there, eyes wide, his head practically buried into his shoulders under Teddy bear’s giant paw.

It had all happened so fast he didn’t even seem to realize what had hit him.

His neck had disappeared like a turtle retracting its head, and his dumbstruck face made it all the more ridiculous.

With a casual motion, Teddy bear lifted his massive paw — a paw easily twice the size of Danvers’s head.

Boom…

Danvers, still stuck in his turtle-like pose, toppled over backward.

He passed out on the spot — eyes wide open.

“Hah.”

“Hrk…”

Maybe now the rest of them were starting to realize the situation.

In the dead silence that followed, Danvers’s gang sucked in panicked breaths, frozen in terror.

Joshua, his face stiff with fear, urgently asked Teddy bear,

“…He’s not dead, right?”

“Applying delicate force control — induced mild concussion without spinal fracture. Subject is currently in shock mode.”

Teddy bear answered like a robotic butler.

I clapped my hands in admiration.

“Nice.”

At that exact moment, Hans Campbell, who had been frozen stiff, finally snapped out of it and shouted.

“Danvers!”

“You crazy little—!”

Without another word, he moved surprisingly fast for his size and charged at Teddy bear.

“You wanna die, you freak?! I’ll tear your stuffing out until there’s not a scrap left!”

Roaring in rage, Hans drove a punch right into Teddy bear’s lower belly.

Thunk!

For a shot from a shot put prodigy, the punch sounded impressively sharp.

But a teddy bear made of pure stuffing wasn’t going to feel a thing.

Thunk—

Teddy bear, with his squishy body, bounced Hans Campbell’s punch off like it was nothing and immediately raised his fluffy, stubby paw high.

“Wait, don’t knock that one out right away! That’s the main tin can!”

Worried that Teddy bear might flatten Hans just like he did Danvers, I shouted urgently.

“Command input complete.”

Whoosh!

Just as Teddy bear’s giant fist was about to come crashing down on Hans’s head, it sharply changed direction mid-air and slammed into his torso instead.

Thud!

Unfortunately for Hans Campbell, he didn’t even manage a proper scream.

The moment Teddy Bear’s punch connected, he was launched across the junkyard like a sack of potatoes and crashed straight into a pile of stacked wooden crates.

Crash!

“Urgh—!”

Hans, sprawled helplessly atop the shattered debris, clutched his side and coughed violently.

His face turned a furious shade of red as he wheezed, clearly in absolute agony.

‘Reliable, as expected.’

Even in that split second, Teddy bear had understood my order perfectly, holding back just enough to not knock him out. I felt a deep, satisfying pride in my loyal bodyguard.

“Alright, friends!”

Clapping his paws together to grab everyone’s attention, Teddy Bear suddenly began to hum a little tune.

“Who’s the next little mouse~? Let’s catch the mouse, catch the mouse, squeak squeak squeak~!”

As he sang, the massive teddy bear cupped his hands together and mimicked a mouse — looking less like a cuddly toy and more like a demonic spirit.

‘…Cancel that feeling of reliability.’

If even I, the owner, was getting goosebumps, it was no wonder that the reactions of a bunch of kids around twelve or thirteen years old were absolutely explosive.

“Aaaaaah! S-somebody save me!”

“Mooommyyy! Waaahhh!”

“O Goddess, please deliver me from this evil—!”

“Catch the mouse, catch the mouse, squeak squeak squeak!”

A symphony of screams and Teddy bear’s humming filled the junkyard, until the whole place fell silent with a final series of heavy thuds.

* * *

Thunk, thud! Thunk—!

With the steady sounds of punches serving as a pleasant background noise, I carefully checked Joshua’s forehead.

“Let me see.”

His forehead was swollen and bruised, a painful purple-blue color even at a glance.

Thankfully, the tiny beads of blood from earlier weren’t flowing anymore.

It was a small moment where all the healing and effort I had put into Joshua’s health paid off, but… it wasn’t exactly the kind of situation to feel happy about.

“God, that bastard.”

Overcome with anger, I clenched my fist and turned around—only for Joshua to hurriedly grab me.

“Let it go, sis. He’s already getting beat up…”

“I’m just upset, that’s all. Your skin’s always been sensitive too.”

“You’re gonna heal me anyway,” Joshua mumbled, pouting exactly like he used to when he was little.

As he said that, I gently placed my fingertips on his forehead and let the holy power flow.

Flash—!

A short burst of light later, and Joshua’s forehead was completely healed, not even a trace of the bruise left.

“You’re not dizzy anymore?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

Joshua shook his head, then glanced nervously over my shoulder.

“Is it okay to just… leave it like that? What if he dies?”

Only then did I turn my head to check on the situation behind me.

Thud, smack!

“Twenty-five little mice! Twenty-six little mice! Ah! No, not yet, buddy! You can’t pass out till you hit thirty!”

“Ugh! Agh! P-please… no more…!”

Teddy bear, who had been smacking Hans Campbell at perfectly timed intervals, was now holding him upright, refusing to let him collapse.

He was supposed to flatten him like a crushed tin can, but honestly, Hans’s body looked more like a battered old pallet — all bent, torn, and pitiful.

To be honest, my anger still wasn’t completely gone…

But looking at Joshua’s perfectly healed forehead, I calmly gave my order.

“Teddy-teddy bear.”

“Twenty-eigh—!”

Just as Teddy bear was about to slam another punch into Hans’s already devastated face, he froze and turned around to look at me.

Click click click.

No matter how many times I saw it over the years, I never got used to that terrifying 180-degree head turn.

Ignoring the horror movie vibes, my ever-loyal guard tilted his head brightly and asked,

“Did you call for me, Master?”

“Yeah. How’s he holding up?”

“Fractures in the nasal bone, right arm, and left ribs, with some minor bleeding,” Teddy bear reported smoothly, like some AI diagnostics system.

I nodded with a satisfied smile.

“Good. That’s enough now.”

At that, Teddy bear’s eyebrows drooped into a sad little arch.

In a sulky voice, he asked,

“…Can’t I play a little longer, Belze?”

“No. You’ve played enough.”

“Tch. You never let me eat them or kill them…”

As time went on, Teddy Bear’s language skills had grown surprisingly well — although, most of what he learned was grumbling.

“Cannibalism is still a no.”

I flatly refused him, like always.

But as a small concession, I added,

“But I’ll consider letting you kill someone soon.”

“Heheh! Really?”

“Yeah. Now, doll mode!”

Puff!

Teddy bear, looking thrilled at being humored for once, immediately shrank down and reverted to his stuffed animal form in one swift move.

Maybe he was satisfied after playing so wildly with the kids for the first time in a long while.

Thud.

The bear, now back to the size of my upper body, plopped onto the ground just as Hans Campbell, who had been leaning against the wall, slumped and collapsed to the floor.

Step, step.

I casually walked over to him.

Bending down, I picked up the dusty teddy bear lying at his feet, gently brushed it off, and hugged it close to my chest.

When I straightened back up, I saw Hans Campbell — his face swollen and bruised, with twin streams of nosebleed running down as he gasped for breath.

“So, how does it feel being a punching bag?”

Remembering how Hans had sneered about using Teddy bear as a punching bag earlier, I gave him a sweet smile.

“Think you were worth it?”

“You little son of a b—”

Hans growled back at me, his face twisting in rage.

“You think you’re gonna walk away from this? You think our parents and theirs will just sit back and—!”

“What did I even do?”

I widened my eyes innocently, looking as if I truly didn’t understand.

“I didn’t do anything, senior.”

“…What?”

“This was all you. You were the one who suddenly started beating up Danvers and the others for not listening to you, weren’t you?”

At my shameless words, Hans’s eyes went wide with disbelief.

“W-what the hell…”

“Just wait and see.”

I leaned in close to him.

And whispered softly into his ear,

“Starting tomorrow, your life at the academy’s going to get very, very difficult.”

Actually, I’d make sure he couldn’t even step foot in there again.

Even as confusion clouded his battered face, I could see fear creeping into his dull, bloodshot eyes.

Looking down at him, I bared my teeth and gave him a wide, wicked grin.

Perfectly — just like a villain who had finished their revenge.