"This is stupid! You guys aren't even appreciating my work here. Instead you are just pulling the trigger on your totally out of place guns. Shame on you!"
Rara continued deflecting all incoming projectiles with a warm hum creating a field of vibrations around her. Her annoyance by no means meant that she could not keep this up. Lucy on the other hand was not too fond of stretching this fight any longer than necessary.
"If you surrender your life could be spared. It is my understanding that you have no deeper connect to the elves other than convenience."
"Oh, she talks… Well, I will have you know that I'd rather die than surrender to the likes of you! You are my audience and nothing more. Making demands about how and if I perform is truly the pinnacle of ludicrity. While I'm at it, you guys haven't even paid for tickets or anything. Who do you think I am, a begger on the streets you only pay after listen if you feel like it? Think again! I am a star! And as such, deserve exclusivity, status, and respect! If you think for a second that you will get away with forcing your way through life with your guns you will soon pay the price of what can only be called terrorism!"
"A no would have also done it…"
"You want a simple answer? Here you have it… NOOOOOO!"
She screamed into her microphone, her voice being loud enough to physically push them back, but that was about it. Which clearly surprised Rara, who thought the attack to be lethal or inflicting severe damage at least.
However, what she did not know was that Lucy, as well as her entire squad were equipped with plates that have anti-magical effects. By analyzing the walls of the cave in which Yuki and Yamato found the prophecy, where no magic could be used, Yuki was able to replicate the effect to a certain extent in combination with the concept of storing spells and working them into armor. A breakthrough which she had planned to use for a number of things, such as the modification of the Absolute Citadel, as well as project Stemu.
But what is project Stemu, and how does it correlate to Operation 4-2 and where did this elite squad lead by Lucy even come from?
At the battle of Vancia, Yamato was momentarily kidnapped and held captive by a group of individuals send by Natsumi. The group was highly religious, but Yamato was able to turn them against their beliefs by exploiting the doubts they had regarding Natsumi, who out of desperation rushed her explanation and connection with the believers due to running out of time back then. After Natsumi's eventual defeat at that battle, these individuals were brought back to the Absolute Citadel, where they were trained in modern military tactics alongside Lucy, who was already undergoing this training overseen by Yuki personally. As this was done in secret, originally planned to serve as a royal guard in case Yuki was otherwise occupied, another originally separate idea emerged within the Absolute Church.
First spoken of by Carina, Deficient Believers are individuals that do need fit the requirements for efficient indoctrination, and must therefore be removed from their environment to avoid having a negative impact on those who do qualify as active members of the Absolute Church. This addressed a real problem within the growing empire after the battle of Vancia, and so, the elite force of Lucy was repurposed to be given another primary duty, though they would always be somewhat flexible.
Carina was given special recourses for her idea, to enforce the removal of these "DB's" in form of the S.T.E.M.U (or just Stemu). The Special-Tactical-Enforcement-Magical-Unit was lead by Lucy and only answered directly to Yamato, Yuki and Carina. To serve their purpose as the most elite force in the empire, they are equipped with special experimental equipment to deal with both expert level mages and non-magical threats. Stemu has general authorization to use lethal force if necessary, unless specifically prohibited by one of the three previous figures of authority they answer to.
Yamato is not completely convinced such a force is necessary, but this test serves to demonstrate the efficiency they can deliver. Operation 4-2 is a basic alphabetical based encryption of the code name DB.
Lucy put a lot of work into this and takes a bit of pride in her squad, and thus really can not allow Rara to destroy that with her entitlement. Rara is therefore now considered a DB, even though she was already ordered to be eliminated, capturing her was a viable option until now too. But Lucy has had it with this star, and made herself ready to shoot it out of the sky.
"Shoot when in range!"
Lucy grabbed a small cylinder from her backpack, and threw it into the air right above Rara, who looked at it curiously, until it was shot at by one of the Stemu soldiers and went up into a large cloud of pink smoke.
Just as Rara was about to sing it away, Lucy yelled over to her.
"Isn't that what you wanted? A stage?"
"You… Did that for me…?"
The smoke did look nice, now that she thought about it. It reminded her of the smoke shows of popular concerts, though a bit more simplistic of course.
"Hey, that is pretty nice! Thank you! I knew you weren't all that bad right the moment I first saw you! Y'know, I'm usually a solo performer, but maybe I'll do a group segment where I will consider you—"
Rara's monologue was interrupted by a sudden heavy caugh, accompanied by her eyes tearing up and her skin irritating. She grabbed onto her throat gasping for air, as she tumbled around in the air. Not wasting any time, Lucy dashed forward, pulling out a knife and slicing Rara's throat right next to where she was holding it already.
Tear gas was useful in many situations. Though here, it was just the first approach out of many that Lucy would have been willing to try. Luckily, distracting Rara worked just as intended, and she inhaled the small dust particles that make up the toxic effects.
While Rara dropped down into the battle below, she spend her last moments thinking about her past life. And how the group she had formed in this world was ironically always destined to fail and end like this, as she just now fully realized that everyone besides her, Tokio and Shizuka, had already died, leaving her alone in this world.
The three had not been stranger until the met in the afterlife. They actually went to the same school, shared classes, and even briefly interacted, though be it only on certain occasions. Except Rara and Shizuka, who had an awkward toxic relationship, where Shizuka, who was seen as a weird social outcast that played with death insects behind the schol, was openly bullied by Rara, the more popular counterpart to her. Tokio on the other hand was almost invisible, not popular enough to be liked or have any friends, and not weird enough to be bullied by Rara and her friends. Eventually however, Rara noticed him during a group project, since she and Shizuka were assigned alongside him to hold a science presentation. Tokio had little interest in the project, and told himself it was beneath him, though his mediocre grades in the subject led Rara to belief he was just coping. Shizuka on the other hand was quite gifted in that regard, which of course meant she would do all the work, and Rara would later on claim to have helped her and done the majority of the complicated stuff. Tokio would just have to wait and see what credit was left at the end for him to take, since socially he could not compete with Rara. Her popularity did not only come from her looks and cute personality, but also from her rising popularity in the singing industry. While she did her best to always be seen as the cute and friendly idol girl, Tokio learned a different side of her during their time in the group project as a mean and self centered bully. While he himself only ever watched Shizuka be demeaned by Rara, that did not stop him from feeling superior to Shizuka and viewing her as pathetic and worthy of pity. While Shizuka's view of him was almost nonexistent, her view of Rara was surprisingly positive, as she viewed her as her only friend, and the person closest to her. She did not even realize she was being bullied by Rara, and instead viewed only Rara's other friends as bad people. If anything, they bullied Rara as well, a delusion which she used to bond with Rara and make them seem equal. Near the end of the project, as another day passed with Rara on the phone, Tokio reading a book, and Shizuka working on the project by herself, the three left school together. Shizuka carrying her own and Rara's backpack, meaning she would also have to accompany her home because otherwise Rara would have to carry her backpack for too long by herself. And Rara and Tokio coincidentally were also neighbors, though they never interacted, meaning they had the exact same way home. On said way however, while walking on a side walk next to a road going over a bridge, a car crashed was caused by a bird flying into the windshield of a car, which caused that car to swirl off the road and into the fence at the edge of the brige. All three being in between the fence and car, and being pushed off the bridge along with the piece of fence and car. After landing in the water, the already wounded Shizuka, who had tried to shield Rara, was already unconscious and drifting into the depths, whereas Rara did have enough strength to swim back up, but was entangled by her backpack to Shizuka, and thus also ended up being pulled down while being conscious. Tokio on the other hand was mostly not harmed, and merely pulled down alongside the others instead of being hit directly. So when he swam up to the surface, he was at first releived and thought he would make it. Until of course, the car which had remained on the edge of the bridge, fell down after the drive hastly jumped out just in time, leaving the empty car to fall right onto Tokio.
Though Rara was, that time too, the last of them conscious, and the last to die. Which is why she found it oddly funny, when she swirled through the air and hit the ground, knowing she would not be reincarnated into another world a second time.