Blacking out inside the power Kujou Iruka had unleashed turned out to be a rather nice experience.
She was always Feeding other girls under the pretty name of the "Blessing." Today, at last, it was Su Yuzu's turn to be watered.
Honestly speaking—
Su Yuzu was a little insatiable.
Compared with the hollow feeling the "Combat Records" left her with — as if some beast that could never be filled lived inside her and had chewed the "Combat Records" clean away in a few crunching bites.
Her power kept climbing. Her chest stayed empty.
What Kujou Iruka's power gave her was… still something small. Honey clinging to a girl's fingertips, sweetness blooming across her lips, a faint satisfaction gone the instant it arrived.
Su Yuzu's thoughts had drifted elsewhere.
Raising up others — so that was an ability every "Throne" shared?
It was only in her case that it took the shape of "Combat Records" — or rather, of the "Blessing."
Then what about the true "Blessing"?
What exactly was that?
The rumored "Goddess of Fate's Blessing."
The "Blessing" Kujou Iruka had once hunted for like a woman gone mad.
Could it be the same arrangement as hers and Kujou Iruka's — some homebody shut-in girl linked to every last person in the world, the way Su Yuzu secretly kept an eye on the little rabbit and Sakai Miho through "Operator Development" — and whenever one of the children she happened to like did something praiseworthy, she'd just slip her a "Blessing" like that?
Su Yuzu decided she was probably overthinking things.
After all… she had never received a true "Goddess of Fate's Blessing" herself.
Or rather—
Like Kujou Iruka, from the day Su Yuzu fell into the Abyss, she had lost the right to receive any Blessing or benediction at all.
Maybe she'd just ask Saint Michael about it next time.
As the former Lady Saintess of the "Holy Royal Court," Saint Michael seemed rather experienced in this particular field.
And while she was there, she could slip in another "Combat Records" as a control experiment.
Let the Lady Saintess savor it properly~
Exactly what difference was there between the Blessing counterfeited by her "Combat Records" and the true "Blessing" bestowed by the god the Saintess worshipped?
Huh~~~
Why did that sound suspiciously like persecuting the Lady Saintess on purpose?
An illusion~
Definitely an illusion.
Amid such tangled thoughts, Su Yuzu sank slowly into the dark.
Her whole body had gone warm all at once, as though she were soaking in a hot spring.
Which was exactly the case.
The girl carrying Su Yuzu bridal-style — the one Kujou Iruka called "Lian" — had brought her to a hot spring.
The place had apparently been a rather famous bathhouse once.
But after the power of Catastrophe descended upon the world it had gone slowly to ruin, and only the steps chiseled into the volcanic rock at the edge of the bath still sketched the faint traces of humans who had lived here.
Now… it had become Kujou Iruka's private bath.
The expressionless girl looked down at the Su Yuzu in her arms.
Kujou Iruka had flown here long before she arrived. At this moment she lay draped over the rim of the spring like a slacker.
No way into the Tokyo metropolitan area.
No way to obtain the Goddess of Fate's Blessing.
Not even one "person" beside her with a mind fully her own.
Kujou Iruka's life across the past twenty years could fairly be described as boring.
Aside from going to enormous lengths to spy on her Little Sister from a great distance.
All that was left was living like a middle-aged retiree who'd clocked out early: wandering around when she had nothing to do, putting a scare into that pack of incompetents in the Tokyo metropolitan area, or soaking in the spring and sunning herself.
And say what you like~~~
Inside Kujou Iruka's seemingly eternal, undying domain of deepest darkness, you could sunbathe without fear of photodermatitis, without worrying about pigmentation or burns.
The doll-like Aberrant girl made short work of freeing Su Yuzu from the kimono that had been reduced to rags in her "brawl" with Kujou Iruka.
Even through the filter of Kujou Iruka's domain of deepest darkness, the girl's soft, adorable shape remained a lovely thing to look at.
The girl Kujou Iruka called Lian glanced at her immediate superior.
Kujou Iruka, who had been lounging lazily at the spring's edge, had lifted her head at some point and was staring fixedly in her direction, as though she couldn't bear to drag her eyes away.
Lian stood a touch shorter than Su Yuzu.
Carrying her bridal-style was fine, but propping Su Yuzu upright meant hooking her arms beneath Su Yuzu's armpits.
Watching her superior sit there unable to look away, Lian simply turned and held Su Yuzu up, presenting her to Kujou Iruka in full and open view.
Kujou Iruka, who had only meant to sneak a look, ran straight into the girl's inorganic stare.
To Kujou Iruka, those utterly still dark golden vertical pupils of the Aberrant girl seemed brimming with contempt.
As if in the next second the girl would launch into a long string of insults in that flat, emotionless voice.
"Lian!!!" Kujou Iruka gestured at the Aberrant girl to get on with the actual business.
But… the Aberrant girl only looked at her.
She said nothing, and yet that gaze plainly declared: 'Isn't this what you wanted to see—'
'What you wanted to do?'
"As if I'd ever want to see that!"
Kujou Iruka glared at Lian.
"Some little cat baring her claws and fangs… what's so worth looking at about that!"
The silent Aberrant girl, a life-sized doll in every way, held Kujou Iruka's gaze — and in the end obeyed her order all the same, carrying Su Yuzu slowly down into the hot spring.
Her ink-black kimono fanned out across the water.
The Aberrant girl cradled Su Yuzu with painstaking care.
That garment had never been mere clothing; it was armament formed from an Aberrant's Catastrophe Crystals.
High-tier Aberrants already possessed the ability to don or dismiss such armament purely by will.
Kujou Iruka sprawled not far from the two girls.
This was one of the main reasons Kujou Iruka always felt so bored and so lonely — lonely enough to simply carry Su Yuzu off.
The highest-tier Aberrant at her side was Lian.
But… even Lian was nothing more than a puppet who could only follow instructions.
She didn't grasp it at all — that sometimes when Kujou Iruka said "do it" she meant "don't," and sometimes when she said "no" she meant "go ahead."
Like just now.
Sure, she'd said to hurry up and get Little Yuzu into the water, but… playing around a little, a little, a little, a hundred million times more wouldn't have hurt anyone, would it?
Still, both Kujou Iruka's and Lian's eyes stayed fixed on Yuzu.
The unconscious girl lay bare, soaking in the spring.
The picture of her leaning helplessly into the arms of another exquisite, adorable girl was, all in all, quite moving.
Of course—
If only Lian's face carried a little more expression, even just a shade more bashfulness, Kujou Iruka would have called the entire painted scroll perfect.
Ahem!
Wounded by the charms of Yuzu, and see how haggard it has left me.
Kujou Iruka went back to watching the "main show."
She watched Yuzu, who had dropped out of her Aberrant form the instant she passed out — meek and sweet, about as sweet as her own Little Sister. Mm. As sweet as her Little Sister used to be, back when she was still adorable.
Her expression turned complicated.
Su Yuzu—
was a special girl.
Her Aberration seemed no more than a magical girl's costume change: one press to suit up, one press to strip it all away again.
One second ago she'd been an Aberrant little cat with claws and fangs bared; now she was so docile and sweet that nothing set her apart from an ordinary human girl.
Even Kujou Iruka, a fellow "Throne," couldn't catch the faintest Aberrant aura on Su Yuzu.
She'd probably have to savor her slowly and carefully to make out even a hint of it.
She had no idea what principle lay behind it.
But honestly — she was a little envious.
If — if her own Aberration worked the same way, then Katora wouldn't be somebody's "pet" right now… wouldn't hate her quite so bitterly.
And in Lian's arms.
The spring water, a touch too hot, drew a small tremor out of Su Yuzu's fingertips.
Slowly… blearily… she opened her eyes.
Dark golden vertical pupils, dazzling inside that domain of deepest darkness, hung right in front of her.
So close that when Su Yuzu blinked, her lashes nearly swept the girl's cheek.
The girl was, in truth, a striking beauty with clean, even features.
Ink-black hair fell in lovely lines to her waist, the bangs across her forehead trimmed perfectly straight.
Her face was small and finely made, pretty as a doll's.
Especially those dark golden vertical pupils — inorganic slits set above that blank little face, deepening the doll-like impression all the more.
And yet… the way the girl felt to hold was so undeniably real.
"No."
Perhaps not to hold. To be held.
As her awareness gathered itself back and her body answered her again, Su Yuzu found that she was sitting squarely in someone's lap.
Except… not Kujou Iruka's.
It belonged to the Aberrant girl she'd found blocking her doorway when she woke that morning.
For a heartbeat, something almost bashful surfaced on Su Yuzu's face.
She had no prior experience of being held, perfectly straight-faced, in the arms of a silent girl like this.
And at that very moment, the mechanical woman, who had gone quiet the moment Su Yuzu blacked out, made her presence known once more.
[Recruitable Operator detected.]
[Recruit this Operator?]
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