The Fujiwara Residence, third floor, inside a bedroom decorated with extreme opulence.
The arrangement here was done entirely to the specifications of a European royal princess.
The soft velvet carpet was thick enough to swallow her ankles; the enormous floor-to-ceiling windows were hung with three layers of curtains in different fabrics; the four-poster bed with its lavish drapery looked as though it could devour anything; and a separate, enormous walk-in closet was already packed with the latest haute couture of the season.
Everything here was ten times more lavish than Kaguya's room back at the Shinomiya Main Family.
But this was also a prison from which there was no escape.
Kaguya, expressionless, allowed two unfamiliar maids to strip off her Shuchiin uniform and dress her in a lightweight, comfortable silk nightgown. Her eyes were hollow, and from the moment she had been carried up the stairs she had not spoken another word, as though her soul had been left behind in the living room downstairs.
After the maids finished their work, they bowed to her, then withdrew without a sound and gently locked the door from the outside.
A soft click. Like a judge's gavel falling, announcing the official beginning of her life as a prisoner.
Barefoot, Kaguya walked across the soft carpet, step by step, up to the enormous floor-to-ceiling window.
She reached out a hand, wanting to push the window open and breathe a mouthful of the fresh air outside.
But she quickly discovered that the window had been sealed shut from outside with some mechanism she did not recognize. No matter how hard she pushed, it would not budge a hair's breadth.
She was like a butterfly trapped inside a custom-made glass bottle, able to see the outside world clearly but never able to fly out.
An enormous helplessness and suffocating despair flooded over her like a tide and drowned her completely.
She could no longer hold herself up. She slid slowly down the cold glass wall to the floor, buried her face deep in her knees, and let out a stifled sob.
It was then that the door opened again.
Kaguya startled and lifted her head, and saw a familiar figure carrying a tray.
It was Ai Hayasaka.
She had changed out of the restrictive maid outfit, and was wearing the same silk nightgown as Kaguya. Clearly, this was her "new room" too. Or rather, it was the cage they shared.
Ai placed the tray on the table. On it was a cup of warm milk.
Then she walked up to Kaguya and crouched down hesitantly.
With no outsiders present, with that man's ever-present surveillance gone, the cracks finally appeared on Ai's numb face.
Her lips were trembling, and her eyes turned red in an instant at a visible pace.
"My lady..."
Trembling, she reached out a hand, wanting to touch Kaguya's cheek the way she used to, to comfort her, but the change in her station made her pull back in fear.
Hearing that long-absent form of address, Kaguya could no longer hold back the collapse inside her.
"Ai..."
She threw herself into Ai's arms, like a child who had been lost in a dark forest for a long time and had finally found a familiar place to lean on.
"Ai! Ai!"
She held her and cried out loud, turning all the fear, grievance, humiliation, and despair of the past few days into scalding tears that soaked Ai's shoulder without reservation.
"I'm sorry... my lady... I'm sorry..."
Ai held her tightly in return, her own tears bursting their banks and falling into Kaguya's black hair.
"It's my fault, I was useless... I was too naive... I couldn't protect you... I'm sorry... I'm sorry..."
Mistress and servant, in this magnificent cage cut off from the world, held each other and wept.
But they both understood. It was all over.
Their lives, their futures, everything they had once possessed had been sentenced to death the moment that man had decided to lock them up together.
From now on, they were no longer the eldest daughter of the Shinomiya Family and her all-capable maid.
They were only two collectibles locked away together in this residence.
...
Inside the study.
Seiji Fujiwara leisurely received the system's reward.
[Ding! Congratulations, Host, on successfully conquering 'Kaguya Shinomiya'.]
[Received second-stage conquest reward: passive skill [Emotional Insight].]
[Emotional Insight: You can now more keenly perceive female characters' emotional fluctuations and true inner thoughts, allowing you to grasp their hearts with greater precision, toy with their feelings, and appreciate the unique beauty that blossoms in their despair and dependence.]
Seiji slowly closed his eyes, feeling the changes brought by his new ability.
"A fine ability indeed."
He opened his eyes.
"Still... just watching them cry has gotten a little dull."
Yes. Dull.
When prey no longer struggled, when conquest lost its process, when everything became easy to reach, the thrill that came from the hunt itself faded fast, replaced by a kind of fatigue.
There were already enough collectibles in the residence.
The cold Princess Kaguya, the tamed stray cat, the numbed doll... all of them were beautiful, but their beauty all carried a heavy shadow called "despair."
Watch it too long, and even that turns tiresome.
"Perhaps... it's time for a different flavor." Seiji murmured to himself.
He needed a touch of... pure light.
An untouched, pristine, snow-white feather to ornament his ever-darker collection room.
It was then that there came a soft knock at the study door.
"Master, Tanaka requests an audience."
"Enter."
The door opened, and a middle-aged man in a haute couture suit and gold-rimmed glasses, with a sharp and capable air about him, came in respectfully.
His name was Tanaka, the very subordinate who had once delivered Kei Shirogane to Seiji through the method of "debt-driven hunting."
On the strength of that merit, he had leapt from a middle manager to one of Seiji's close subordinates, in charge of seeking out various "resources" for him.
Tanaka understood very well that within this vast business empire, traditional performance was no longer the sole standard for promotion.
Finding and presenting "treasures" that would please this boss was the shortcut to the peak of power.
"Master."
Tanaka bowed deeply, lifting an encrypted tablet with both hands. "Following your instructions, the 'candidate' database has completed its initial setup. These are the highest-priority S-class targets I've screened from across the globe. Please have a look."
Seiji did not take it. He merely lifted his chin lazily.
Tanaka understood and immediately projected the contents of the tablet into the air.
It was an extraordinarily well-produced report.
The first page of the report was a photograph of a girl.
The background was the school's cherry blossom avenue. Amid a sky full of drifting petals, the girl stood quietly beneath a tree in her crisp school uniform.
She had a head of soft, almost luminous flaxen hair, skin so pale it was nearly translucent, features as refined as if she were not of this world, and above all, those amber eyes, clear and pure, carrying a hint of detachment as though she did not belong to this mortal realm.
She was like an angel who had happened to descend to the human world, slightly puzzled and curious about everything around her.
[Name: Mahiru Shiina] [Age: 16] ...
"Oh?" A flicker of interest finally passed through Seiji's eyes.
Seeing this, Tanaka felt a swell of joy and hurriedly swiped to the next page of the report.
"Mahiru Shiina, currently attending Shuchiin. According to the modeling analysis we conducted using the school's internal network and social media data, she is universally acknowledged within the school as 'the angel,' the idol every boy yearns for but cannot reach."
"She has excellent grades and impeccable conduct, but her personality is reclusive. She has almost no friends and always keeps to herself."
On the screen appeared various candid photos of Mahiru Shiina at school.
The profile of her reading quietly in the library, her clumsy form running in P.E. class, her back as she ate lunch alone on the rooftop... every photo reinforced her image as a "lone-standing-apart-from-the-world" angel.
"Perfect." Seiji nodded and remarked.
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