How to Redeem a Trashy Side Villain

Chapter 86: Introduction

[???'s POV]

Saying goodbye to my family was hard, even for a cold-hearted demon like myself but I had to do what I had to do.

Anything for the king.

With the help of an inside man who was already in the human realm, I was able to make my way over to the other side along with my subordinates who quickly entered my shadow to reemerge later.

"It's a pleasure to meet you," he said, giving me a bow.

For a human, he sure doesn't care about the consequences of what his actions will do to mankind.

"Where am I?" I asked, looking around, seeing nothing but trees and grass.

"You are a couple of miles away from the city. I didn't want to risk getting either of us exposed beforehand so sorry about the inconvenience," he apologized.

I grabbed the human by the neck and squeezed it. He was flailing about in the air and I told him, "Next time, unless I explicitly tell you to do something, don't go around making decisions on your own."

"...Yes," he responded.

Releasing his neck, he dropped down to the floor and got up, pretending as though nothing happened.

Professional.

"The city is over in that—"

"No. I don't need your help. I know where it is," I said, feeling the density of mana of the city even from where I was.

That must be the headmistress. No wonder the demon king told me to be cautious of her. That's more mana than most demons have.

She didn't have the lifespan that demons have because, at most, a powerful human could live up to a few hundred years while we demons could live up to our thousands naturally and tens of thousands for the powerful.

Despite that, her mana reserve was monstrously large.

"Get the headmistress out of the city," I told the human.

He nodded his head, grabbed his phone, and began texting his partners.

"Are you sure that she'll leave the academy?" I asked.

"Yes. I guarantee it."

"Guarantee is a dangerous word, human. Don't throw that around so carelessly," I warned him.

"Humans are emotional people. We like to convince ourselves that we are rational but emotions drive our every decision. She'll leave."

"Alright. Remember, don't kill the niece. That's not part of the plans. Just use her to distract the headmistress long enough for me to finish my mission."

He nodded his head.

The niece is more useful alive than dead. She could be used again later as a hostage for a future demon to use just like how I did.

If I had her killed today, it'd do nothing more than anger the headmistress who would lose her mind and focus all her attention on getting revenge.

Transforming myself into my movement-based form, I began moving towards the city.

Along the way, I encountered a mother and daughter pair that was fishing at the small bridge I was crossing.

"Mommy, look, a floating head with tentacles," the little girl said, pointing at me.

"Tess, what are you talking about? There's no such thing as—"

The mother turned to me and was unable to complete her sentence.

She grabbed her daughter by the arm and yelled, "Run, Tess!"

I zoomed past them, turned around, and transformed back to my normal form. Before they could even react, the mother had fallen to the ground, her body split in half.

"...Mommy?" the confused kid uttered, looking down at her fallen parent.

I walked over to the girl and said, "Hey kid, what's your name?"

"...My mommy said not to talk to strangers."

What a smart human child. Almost makes me not want to kill her.

"Very good," I complimented her as I grabbed her by the head and crushed it. Brain, skull, flesh, and blood splattered everywhere.

.

.

.

[Bell's POV]

"He's a First Class student?"

"Woah... why don't I recognize him?"

"How come nobody knew he was First Class? Did you know?"

"No."

"But I thought you knew all of them?"

The reason why everyone was reacting like this was because, in the academy, First Class students were practically micro-celebrities.

Everyone knew their names and their faces and was jealous of them.

The fact that nobody knew that there was a First Class student named Arthurr Dragonpen was a surprise that took the entire class by storm.

But that was only because they didn't know he was a transfer student since no one thought that was a possibility since a transfer in the middle of a school year never happened before.

This was the first and it would also be the only time this ever happened.

Nobody even cared about the fact that Dominick had just pissed his pants like a child.

That's how big of a deal that a First Class student is.

After all, in an academy where each grade had thousands of students, there were only roughly sixty or so First Class students.

And despite their number or lack of, they had more courses dedicated to them than the rest of the other students.

The academy was a hierarchy and the top of the pyramid was where everyone wanted to be.

I watched from a distance as Arthurr was being bombarded by questions from the three girls.

I was waiting for the conversation to be wrapped up before introducing myself to him because that was when the novel skipped ahead in time to his next class.

As I said, I was going to let what happened in the novel play out the way it was meant to while inserting myself into the timeframes that weren't mentioned or detailed by the shitty god.

Ms. Morgan had called a janitor over to clean up the mess, which included Dominick who was still terrified out of his mind, never to be mentioned in the story again.

The tragic life of a cannon fodder. Better luck in your next life. Or... if you're lucky, someone like me will come along and steal your body to help redeem you.

Walking over to Arthurr who had just finished the last bit of the conversation that was explicitly written in the novel, I inserted myself into their group while the class was walking back to the classroom.

"Hey, Arthurr, that was very impressive."

He turned to me and thanked me.

"What's your name?" he asked.

"That's Bell Agnus," Grace answered for me.

"He's the richest person at this school," Zuri chimed in.

Only the richest? Ouch. There's more to me than that.

Liona in a fit of rage told me, 'Master, how dare they? You're not only the richest. You're also the most handsome, the strongest, sexiest, smartest, best actor, and... and... and...'

Alright, Liona. I get it. Thank you for defending me.

'No problem, master.'

"Yep. What the two of them said. I'm Bell... the so-called richest," I said as I offered a hand which Arthurr shook.

"Nice to meet you, Bell Agnus. Hmm... where have I heard that name before?" asked Arthurr, one of his eyebrows raised.

Grace and Persephone looked at each other in confusion.

"Arthurr, have you been living under a rock this entire time?" asked Zuri.

"No. I lived in a house with my family for sixteen years and now I live in a pretty nice home that teach—"

He must've forgotten that he wasn't allowed to reveal his relationship with the teacher who helped him out because he almost blurted out their name.

"That was an idiom Arthurr," Grace explained to him. "It means that you're unaware of something that is common knowledge or just... you know, widely spoken amongst people."

"Have you not read the news?" asked Zuri. "He's been on the news quite a few times. The first time for... never mind."

She looked at me, apologizing to me with her facial expression.

She almost spoke about the "falsely accused" sexual assault case in front of the person who was negatively impacted by it.

How insensitive can a human be?

Hahaha.

"Did you not hear about the baron who was slayed?" asked Persephone. "That was Bell who did it. He's been labeled as a young hero by the masses because of it."

"What baron?" asked Arthurr.

The three girls looked at each other and shook their heads.

"Arthurr, where did you transfer from?" asked Grace.

"I came to this city from my village," he answered.

"Village? Did you actually come from a village? As in a rural village?" asked Zuri.

The reason why they were so shocked by this revelation was that it was a stereotype that rural villages were eons behind in technology and they never produced anyone noticeable.

"Yeah," Arthurr nodded, confused about the others' confusion.

A collective gasp was made.

"Arthurr, do you have a mobile phone by any chance?" Zuri asked him.

He nodded his hand, reached into his pocket, and pulled out a phone that was produced twenty years ago. it still had buttons.

It felt like looking at a group of humans discovering that there was a monkey amongst themselves.

Grace did me a favor and explained to Arthurr who I was and the accomplishments that I had achieved in the past couple of months.

Seeing the glimmer of admiration in Arthurr's eyes, it felt nice knowing that the place I had in his heart had jumped a million steps ahead.

"Bell, can you do me the honor of being my friend?" he asked, looking up at me like a fan, and both of his hands were extended forward. One of them for the handshake and the other supporting the wrist.

"Of course Arthurr," I said, shaking his hand again.

"Wow," said Zuri, sarcastically rolling her eyes. "I can't believe you want to be friends with him just because he's rich but not with any of us three. Just say you hate broke people."

"Wait... no," he said in a panic. "That's not what I—"

He stopped talking as the girls began laughing.

"That was just a joke, haha. Very funny," he said.

Turning to them, he asked them the same question and shook their hands one by one.

We returned to class and spent the final few minutes we had working on the assignment. Before we left, Ms. Morgan told us to take it home and finish it.

Dominick and Arthurr had to stay back after class for their punishments but Dominick was in the nurse's room getting a change of pants so it was only Arthurr.

The punishment he was going to receive was a flogging. His entire back would turn red before he was allowed to head to his next class.

Ouch.