Kazuki stood before the Queen's council chamber, arms crossed, a rolled parchment tucked under one arm.
"I want to open a school," he said.
"A school," Lord Halvest sneered. "For mopping?"
Kazuki unfurled the parchment. Inside was a blueprint, hastily drawn, but unmistakable: towers shaped like soap bars, courtyards shaped like mop heads, and a training arena labeled Stain Simulation Chamber.
"Not just for mopping," Kazuki said. "For purification. For disease prevention. For defensive hygiene. For magical sanitation arts."
He paused.
"And… maybe a workshop for enchanted vacuum testing."
Three weeks later, with reluctant royal funding and even more reluctant noble approval, the gates of the Viremont Academy of Magical Hygiene & Sanitary Arts opened.
The sign out front was modest:
🧼 Welcome to the Purification Academy – Cleanliness is Power 🧼
Inside: chaos.
Dozens of wide-eyed recruits (mostly second-born nobles, failed alchemists, and overly curious orphans) lined up for orientation.
Kazuki stood atop a barrel, flanked by Lila the soapmistress and Brant, a former blacksmith now obsessed with scrub-brush metallurgy.
"Listen up!" Kazuki barked. "You're not here to clean. You're here to defend civilization from microbial doom."
He tossed a sponge to a scrawny boy in the front row.
"That is your sword. Use it like one."
The curriculum was... unusual:
Mop Combat 101 – led by Kazuki himself, featuring broom katas and how to disarm an enemy using lemon oil.
Advanced Pathogen Theory – taught by a druid who once lived inside a mushroom.
Soapcraft & Alchemical Lathers – mixing herbs, oils, and a pinch of divine magic.
Rot Identification – required weekly field trips to the city slums (hazard pay included).
Emergency Decontamination Drills – because spores wait for no one.
The school motto was painted above the mess hall in gleaming silver:
"Through Suds, We Rise."
One week in, disaster struck.
During a mop demonstration, a student's [Overcharged Purify Touch] accidentally cleansed the floor too well, turning it into frictionless polished glass. Half the dormitory slipped for hours.
Kazuki nodded in approval. "That's initiative."
But not all mishaps were harmless.
One evening, during night inspection, Kazuki and Lila found black slime oozing from the library walls. The bookshelves groaned. The spines of ancient grimoires split with squelching sounds.
Kazuki's broom glowed instinctively.
"The Rot Cult's testing us," he said grimly. "They see the Academy as a threat."
The next day, five students found molded coins in their shoes—rot-carved with whispers that made them itch.
It was clear: the war on filth was escalating.
Kazuki responded by creating a student task force:
The Sanitation Vanguard.
Led by top students (and one suspiciously intelligent raccoon named Soapy), the team took on missions across the city: purging cursed basements, disinfecting relics, even exorcising a mold-possessed baker who had refused to wash his hands since the Frost Harvest of Year 119.
They wore white cloaks with gold trim. Their crest? A crossed mop and bar of soap.
The people began to cheer when they walked by.
But late one night, as Kazuki stood on the tower balcony of the Academy, a strange wind blew through the city.
It smelled like sulfur, mildew, and... burned honey?
Kazuki squinted into the distance.
A black fog crept from the city's far gate.
And in its wake, a voice—low and wet—whispered on the wind:
"Your students won't save you.
Let the filth in."
Kazuki turned to sound the alarm.
Because now... the Academy was the battleground.