The black-and-white domain shattered with a thunderous crack.
Soga Yura stood over Zero — the nearly bare girl crumpled on the ground before Yuzu — and rested the Sword of Erasure lightly against Zero's slender throat.
A single, lazy flick of her wrist would be all it took.
She could send Zero back to the Edge of Aberration right here and now.
Tilting her head, Soga Yura glanced at what remained of the laboratory's broadcast circuits and network systems.
With nothing more than a thought, those circuits and systems erupted in a cascade of sparks — pop, pop, pop — and lost all capacity to monitor.
Every screen dissolved into static snow.
And yet the bullet comments kept drifting past, line after line.
[「Nooooo!! 」]
[「Why did it cut out… wuwuwu, I need my snuggles.」]
[「I'm literally dying without my snuggles to watch.」]
[「Protest! PROTEST! The sugar content this episode is severely lacking compared to before.」]
[「…」]
Soga Yura couldn't see them, of course. And she certainly didn't care.
Otherwise — when certain people started saying that sisters snuggling wasn't as cute as that Aberrant girl from before — Soga Yura would probably have already shown up at their doors to deliver some personal warmth.
The sword edge rested against Zero's throat. Soga Yura gave it a light, precise tilt.
Click.
The restraint device around Zero's neck was sliced clean off.
Freed from the device that had been controlling her, the girl lost all support in an instant and slumped softly to the ground.
Soga Yura looked down at that pathetic, pitiable Aberrant girl.
Then she gently loosened her hold on Su Yuzu — only enough to nuzzle her chin against the soft, tender skin of Yuzu's neck.
The wordless understanding between Soga Yura and Su Yuzu was such that Su Yuzu grasped her meaning in an instant.
Yuzu squeezed Soga Yura's hand, then let go.
She stepped forward and gathered Zero into her arms, checking on the little cat's condition.
At a moment of crisis like this, simply checking the [Operator System] wasn't enough to settle Su Yuzu's nerves. She picked up one of her own robes from the floor and carefully wrapped it around Zero's frail, pale body.
And then — as she looked at the [Operator System] — Su Yuzu froze.
Among all her Operators, the one in the worst condition right now was not Sister Mai, who had taken blow after blow from friendly fire and collapsed.
It was Soga Yura — whose stamina bar had gone completely red.
Su Yuzu whipped around and saw the Sword of Erasure still in Soga Yura's hand.
Even if you forcibly 「Dominated」 the Sword of Erasure — the cost of actually swinging it wasn't something you could simply erase.
With stamina as pathetically poor as Soga Yura's, the world was already spinning violently around her. She could barely make out Yuzu's face anymore.
Clang.
The Sword of Erasure hit the ground, lost its last flicker of support, and vanished entirely.
And the girl who had stood just moments ago like a sovereign empress lording over all the world — Soga Yura — toppled forward in a graceless heap.
Su Yuzu quickly set the little cat down on a scattered pile of bedding nearby, then rushed forward and caught Soga Yura, pulling her into her arms.
How can she still be such a complete idiot?!
Free from the aftermath and worries of any mental storm, Soga Yura settled contentedly against Su Yuzu's chest and surrendered her full weight entirely to Yuzu.
She breathed in Yuzu's scent — that warmth she had been starved of for so long.
Consciousness blurring at the edges, she burrowed her head further into Yuzu's embrace, nuzzling against the softness she adored, and clutched the lapels of Yuzu's bathrobe with the quiet, settled certainty of someone who had found their home.
"Let me…"
"Let me sleep a little."
"I'm so sleepy…"
The corners of the girl's mouth curved up, little by little.
She wasn't an idiot at all.
One measly little cat?
How could a cat possibly matter more than herself?
Yuzu~ The most important person in Yuzu's heart… was her.
"Okay~" Su Yuzu eased herself down into a kneeling sit as gently as she could, adjusting Soga Yura's body into the most comfortable angle she could manage.
She pressed a near-doting kiss to the girl's forehead.
"Sleep well~"
"When you wake up… tomorrow we'll go soak in the hot springs together."
—
—
Clear, pristine moonlight fell over the land of Tsukimisato.
The Superintendents from the Investigation Bureau's police station and the personnel of the Investigation Bureau's Fourth Action Division had already secured the area.
The crater left in the centre of Tsukimisato from the girls' battle with the Aberrant was enormous and deep.
Helicopter rotors thundered as they descended.
The rotor wash from the helicopter landing at the bottom of the crater sent a great swirl of colourful, pastel-hued bedding and — girls' clothing — flying through the air.
Looking at all the things she had flung out without a second thought during the fall — anything that could cushion the impact — Su Yuzu felt her cheeks and the tips of her ears grow distinctly warm.
While waiting for rescue, she had already gathered up most of the things that were unfit to be seen or would expose her identity.
But… there had been so much scattered around.
And she hadn't wanted to wake Soga Yura, so more than a few odd items had inevitably been left behind.
For instance — Ms. Unohana Chiyo, who had scrambled down in the helicopter at breakneck speed, came face to face with one such item lying on the ground: a pale lavender… alluring cut-out nightgown with a mature style and a high slit.
Why did it… look so strangely familiar?
Like the one she herself couldn't find anywhere.
Though, to be fair, it had been ordered online.
Even if it was an affordable-luxury style, the design was shameless enough that Unohana Chiyo wouldn't have bought it for any reason other than to treat herself… but still. This was Tsukimisato.
A hot-spring resort hotel.
Finding the same item here was… perfectly normal? Probably.
At Su Yuzu's call, Unohana Chiyo quickly stepped forward and lifted Sakura Mai off the ground in a bridal carry, carrying her up into the helicopter.
Su Yuzu looked at the spot Unohana Chiyo had just been staring at.
A… straggler. One that had slipped through the net.
Su Yuzu's cheeks flushed faintly warm.
That was close.
But as long as she denied it to her dying breath, no one could say for certain — these things belonged to her.
Maybe they'd just been left behind by one of Tsukimisato's girls. That was entirely plausible.
Su Yuzu pulled Soga Yura tighter in her arms.
Right. Exactly. That's how it was.
The girl who had nearly been forgotten aboard the Behemoth was also recovered and taken away for treatment.
The curtain seemed to fall at last on the Tsukimisato Aberrant attack event.
For Su Yuzu, the greatest reward from this whole incident was not the 「Second Sequence Promotion Emblem」 she had received when the mission was settled.
Nor was it those 「Intermediate Combat Records.」
It was this — she gently stroked Soga Yura's hair at her temple, watching the girl curled up obediently in her arms.
She had finally, once again, earned the right to hold Soga Yura whenever she wished — no prosthetic limb required.
For Su Yuzu and Soga Yura both, nothing in the world could matter more than that.
—
Elsewhere.
Sakura Renxin sat soaking in the hot spring pool, staring at the surface of the water — and the empty space where a certain girl had been, and was no longer.
She shivered, stood up, water droplets tracing the curves of her figure as they slid away.
"F-freezing… absolutely freezing…"
"It was a fake hot spring all along."
After all the Tsukimisato staff had been herded away to safety under Soga Yura's control, the water temperature had gradually dropped.
The woman hopped on one foot trying to get her slippers on, but still — she cast one deeply wary glance at the spot where the girl had vanished.
Inside her head, it was as though that girl's voice was still echoing — that bewitching, maddening voice casually evaluating whether a trilobite might taste good as a hotpot ingredient.
"That girl… just who in the world is she?"
____
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