Koro-sensei looked at Selena as he asked his question.
"Why this world? Why my classroom?"
Selena went silent for a while. Then she took a deep breath.
"Because what Akira needs right now is a teacher."
Koro-sensei's round face frowned. He pointed a tentacle at himself.
"A teacher… Me?"
Selena smiled.
"Of course. You're one of the greatest teachers in the multiverse. There are so many fans of yours in our world."
Green rings appeared on his yellow face, and he looked rather proud.
"Really? Nuruhuhuhuhu! Of course I'm a great teacher. It's only natural that I have so many fans…"
He soon calmed down.
"But I'm sure there are other great teachers in the multiverse, right? So why me?"
Selena didn't answer directly. Instead, she asked a question of her own.
"Koro-sensei, what do you think of my brother as a student?"
Koro-sensei thought for a moment.
"Akira-kun, huh? He's a very interesting student. He's intelligent, observant, powerful, and capable of things that would surprise just about anyone. He can be mischievous, too, and sometimes acts like a child when things don't go his way. But he can get serious when the situation calls for it, and he's a reliable ally to his friends."
Selena listened attentively before asking another question.
"How does he get along with his classmates?"
Koro-sensei answered seriously.
"Akira-kun gets along with his classmates just fine. He's friendly to everyone and never gets into fights with them. When someone asks for help, he helps them. He participates in class activities, too, though he sometimes slacks off. He jokes around and gets along with the other students… but I sometimes feel that he keeps himself apart from everyone else. There's a certain distance he doesn't let anyone cross, except for Erika-san. He doesn't have any other close friends, though he does get along with Ritsu-san."
Selena calmly continued.
"Good. What about people outside his class? Other students from the main campus, teachers, government officials, even assassins?"
Koro-sensei was beginning to feel as though this really was a parent-teacher meeting.
"He usually ignores them. Though he's not rude to anyone unless they're his enemies. In that case, he'll verbally roast them or beat them up if things get worse. Other than that, he's doing fine."
Selena smiled, but her expression soon turned serious.
"That's good. But what about everyone else? People he doesn't interact with, like the general public?"
Koro-sensei grew serious and thought for a while.
"That's… mostly indifference—"
Selena finished the sentence for him.
"They don't even register in his gaze. To him, they're just background noise in his world. Like NPCs. He won't go out of his way to talk to them, though he'll respond if someone approaches him. Is that accurate?"
Koro-sensei stared at her.
"That's a bit harsh. I mean, most people are like that, right? They're mostly indifferent toward random strangers."
Selena smiled.
"That's true, too. But Akira's indifference isn't like the indifference one human feels toward another. It's more like the indifference a human feels toward an ant."
Koro-sensei fell silent. He didn't say anything.
Selena leaned back.
"Relax, Koro-sensei. It's not necessarily a bad thing. Just as some humans care about ants, not everyone treats them as worthless. But most people generally don't care, right? If an ant colony dies because of rain or something, some people might try to save it, but most wouldn't care. And even if the people trying to save it failed, they'd probably forget about it pretty quickly, wouldn't they?"
Koro-sensei remained silent. He had occasionally noticed that same indifference in Akira, though he had never quite understood what it meant.
Selena sighed.
"Koro-sensei, I'm not saying Akira is a bad person or that he looks down on others. In fact, he's kinder than he thinks, even if he refuses to admit it… But he's fundamentally different from humans, and he knows it. He might grow closer to some humans and even come to love some of them, but toward everyone else, it's mostly indifference. It's bad enough that he can't even talk to them normally."
Her expression grew more serious.
"Koro-sensei, I can't reveal everything about Akira's past to you. One day, he might tell you himself. But you should know that he only recently started to understand his own emotions, and they're still unstable. This is an important stage for him. What he learns now might become part of his very foundation. So I want him to overcome that indifference, or rather, learn to see beyond it. I want someone to guide him toward that understanding. Not by making him overly sentimental or anything. That would be bad, too."
Koro-sensei looked at her seriously.
"Then what exactly do you mean, Selena-san?"
Selena looked straight at him.
"I want you to teach him to see. To truly look at the people before him and respect them as equal human beings. Not to leave them as just another background NPC. I want you to teach him what you learned from Yukimura Aguri. Can you do that, Koro-sensei?"
She looked at him sincerely, not as someone trying to protect the universe, but as an older sister worried about her younger brother.
Koro-sensei returned to the present and looked at Akira, who was currently being yelled at for using a beer glass to serve the bald man his Malört. Akira had nearly reached the point of pouring the entire thing over the man's head.
In fact, he had just done exactly that.
He poured it all on the bald guy's head and bolted before anyone could react. Then he hid beside Koro-sensei.
"Koro-sensei. Mission accomplished."
Koro-sensei looked at the bald man, who was roaring furiously, then turned to Akira.
"How?"
Akira looked rather proud of himself.
"Well, when I poured it over his head, I made sure some of it went into his mouth. See? He's already rushing to the toilet."
Just as he said that, the bald man rushed toward the restroom, clutching his pants.
No matter how unusual his method was, Akira had achieved his objective.
But as Koro-sensei looked at the boy, he was reminded of his former self.
Not the one who hated the world.
But the one who couldn't fully understand his fellow human beings.
The one who needed someone to guide him.
I see. So that's what you wanted me to teach him, Selena-san.
He looked at Akira again.
I'll teach you what I learned from her, Akira-kun. Slowly, one step at a time. But first, I'll teach you to become a great assassin. That can be the first step.
Akira smiled back at him.
"See, see? I told you it would work! Now, how was that for an assassination?"
Koro-sensei looked at him without saying a word. He only thought,
Seems like this is going to be a long step.