An Operator she could Recruit?
Su Yuzu studied the Aberrant girl in front of her — the girl who was letting her sit in her lap without the slightest protest.
Even with this much skin pressed against skin, the Aberrant girl still didn't react at all.
She simply sat there.
Arms around Su Yuzu's waist.
As though she herself were nothing more than a 'chair.'
The hot spring water rose just high enough to lap at the girl's collarbones.
Through the curling white steam, the Aberrant girl's slender, snow-white throat emerged; her skin was so pale and fine that faint blue-green veins traced beneath it, half-hidden in the haze.
A clean, crisp sweetness clung to the doll-like girl.
Lian only watched Su Yuzu, calm as still water.
Su Yuzu had always been quite a bit taller than Lian.
Earlier, when Su Yuzu had fainted and lay nestled against the Aberrant girl, it hadn't been so apparent. But now — sitting squarely in the Aberrant girl's lap — every line of her tall, straight figure was on full display.
Su Yuzu was still turning the Recruit over in her mind.
Honestly, on any ordinary day, Recruiting a girl like this — exquisite, beautiful, obedient-looking, a silent doll of a girl — would have been a guaranteed bargain, no risk at all.
But today felt a little different.
Her real target was, without question, the higher-rarity Kujou Iruka.
Recruiting an Aberrant girl here felt, to Su Yuzu, like clearing an event stage in a game.
Along with the exalted six-star limited unit sitting in the banner pool,
the event always tossed in a low-star also-ran for free.
The Aberrant girl in front of her was exactly that low-star also-ran.
And free was free. Turning it down would be a waste.
Besides, this was a little different from a game.
With something this warm, soft and sweet-scented already in her arms, who could bring herself to say no?
Still… Su Yuzu looked at the Aberrant girl in front of her, then stole a glance at Kujou Iruka.
She didn't know this Aberrant girl's name, but one thing was certain: the girl was one of Kujou Iruka's subordinates.
And judging from the post she'd been assigned to, guarding Su Yuzu,
and from how serenely unbothered she'd looked while Su Yuzu and Kujou Iruka tore the whole place apart,
she was probably one of the subordinates Kujou Iruka prized most.
Recruiting her subordinate right in front of Kujou Iruka's face.
Wasn't that basically pulling an NTR on her, in broad daylight?
The thought made the hand already hovering over 'Confirm Recruit' come down faster and steadier than ever.
She just loved poaching from Kujou Iruka.
"Not only did I, Su Yuzu, poach your Little Sister — now I, Su Yuzu, am taking your subordinate too."
"That's what you get for strutting around like that earlier."
If Su Yuzu could actually win in a fight against Kujou Iruka, she'd have put on a whole performance for her.
Su Yuzu tapped Recruit.
The girl who had sat as still and docile as a puppet this entire time finally lifted a hand, caught Su Yuzu's right hand, and moved it away.
But at that same moment—
[Ding ding ding ding ding—!!!]
Exactly as Su Yuzu had predicted.
The 'Summer Event' Operator was, as always, a five-star.
[Congratulations! You have successfully Recruited the Operator — Lian.]
[★★★★★]
Listening to the familiar female voice of the Nano-machines in her ear, Su Yuzu went rigid.
Wait… wait!???
This silent Aberrant girl's name was… Lian!??
Su Yuzu knew that name far too well.
Because… that was the name of the cat Unohana Chiyo kept at her house.
Su Yuzu still remembered that cat.
A calico with a stubby, bobbed tail.
A little on the plump side, but eerily good at reading people.
She was forever pacing slowly down the hallway of Unohana Chiyo's house, tail held high, like a proud king surveying her domain.
Her beautiful green eyes were like well-cut gemstones.
And whenever she padded up to Su Yuzu's feet, she'd flop down right there and bare her soft belly.
For a cat, Lian was already very old.
Unohana Chiyo had said… she'd picked Lian up off a battlefield, and since she couldn't think of what to call her, she'd casually settled on the name 'Lian.'
Looking at things now, that 'casually' of hers might not have been so casual after all.
Su Yuzu wondered what sort of face Unohana Chiyo would make if she ever laid eyes on the Lian sitting in front of her.
As with every Recruit Su Yuzu performed,
the world dimmed in an instant into a gray backdrop.
Only the small handspan of space around the hot spring was washed in warm color.
[Ding ding ding ding ding—]
[★★★★★]
As the black stars marking an Abyss-side Operator surfaced, the girl's character portrait locked into place.
A girl in a black yukata sat at the edge of a hot spring, face tilted up toward the sky.
Her hair was still styled in that cute, meticulous hime cut.
The bangs across her forehead trimmed level with her brows.
The sidelocks hanging past her ears falling evenly to her chin.
The damp steam rising off the spring made them cling faintly to the edges of her face.
It only made her already small, delicate features look softer, cuter.
In the character portrait, a bead of water could just be made out sliding down from the girl's neck.
Whether it was sweat or condensed steam, there was no telling.
But it set Su Yuzu imagining that single droplet tracing across the girl's skin, drawing out every lovely line of her.
Lian sat beside the hot spring, slender legs swinging gently.
Her soft, pale toes brushed the steaming surface of the water, sending ripples spreading out.
"Mm…"
"Your will—"
"…"
"My past?"
"I think I've forgotten it."
"…"
"Walk on toward the land of dreams—"
"and die in the place fate has appointed."
"…"
"I will protect you."
Even her Recruitment voice lines came out flat and cold.
Su Yuzu looked at Lian and swiped open her Operator stats as fast as she possibly could.
The girl she was sitting on, face still blank, pressed Su Yuzu's swiping hand back down beneath the water.
[Operator: Lian]
[★★★★★]
[Level.52 — Death Contract Aberrant]
[Talent: Godslayer]
[Inherent Ability: Fate Stripping]
[...]
The corner of Su Yuzu's eye twitched.
She'd already guessed that Lian, as Kujou Iruka's right hand, would be a capable fighter.
What she hadn't guessed was just how capable.
What did a Level.52 Aberrant mean?
It meant that as long as beings on the order of Senior Tsukiyomi Fuya kept out of it, Lian could swagger through the entire Tokyo metropolitan area unopposed.
But the strangest part, to Su Yuzu, was this — someone this powerful,
and yet she had never appeared during the 'Kujou Iruka Interception Battle.'
Not even when Kujou Iruka had been beaten down so pitifully that she ended up kneeling in the water putting on a fanservice show. Even then, Lian hadn't shown.
And besides… [Godslayer]?
[Fate Stripping]?
For a standard-tier five-star Operator, Lian's stat entries came to only two 'plain and simple' lines.
But those two lines… entries so outrageously, blindingly cool they practically bled off the panel. Su Yuzu had the growing sense that Kujou Iruka leaving Lian behind was not nearly as simple as it looked.
Of course—
there was one more thing, and it mattered most of all.
Su Yuzu dragged Lian's stat panel further down.
[Once a weapon cultivated by The Empire for use against Aberrants.]
[Later captured by Kujou Iruka in a campaign, then forcibly corrupted and made to fall, becoming an Aberrant herself.]
[But even now, as a blade in an Aberrant's hand, the girl named "Lian" seems never to have forgotten her mission as a weapon.]
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