She strained backward, craning her head away, trying to escape the damp warmth of Kujou Iruka's breath.
She was going to cry—
Su Yuzu really was going to cry.
What was seeping out of her skin wasn't cold sweat anymore, and her voice had gone so small and wretched that she sounded like a little cat bullied within an inch of its life.
But there was no chance Kujou Iruka would let Su Yuzu slip away that easily.
The hand cupping Su Yuzu's small face.
The wings folded shut around Su Yuzu's body.
Kujou Iruka had all but pinned Su Yuzu flat against the wall.
Su Yuzu was dodging with everything she had, and still... still Kujou Iruka leaned in close, close enough that it felt like she meant to catch Su Yuzu's ear between her teeth.
All Su Yuzu could do was watch, helpless, while this woman plucked at a string inside her that had almost never been touched, back and forth, back and forth, until the very tip of her heart trembled.
Her lower back ached. Her legs went soft.
Even her toes curled tight, as if they could no longer hold her upright.
So it was true... Kujou Iruka had come for Kujou Katora after all?
From the way she talked, she had been watching Kujou Katora for quite a while now.
What a terrifying sister.
Even after falling into the Edge of Aberration, she had never once stopped keeping watch over her Little Sister.
It was a perfectly ordinary human sentiment — but... but... if the price of it was Su Yuzu getting bullied, bullied to pieces, she still wanted to grab a pillow, twist the bedsheets, and complain at length.
But... when?
When exactly had Kujou Iruka started watching her and Kujou Katora?
After Saint Michael's radiant power flickered and went out?
Maybe—
Maybe was as far as she could take it.
After all, the Tokyo metropolitan area's defenses had always been a sieve.
In practice they only strained out small fry — that, and Kujou Iruka, who had been the principal target of Saint Michael's Word of Command.
So had Kujou Iruka only entered the Tokyo metropolitan area after Saint Michael's radiant power vanished?
That was reasonable. That was normal.
But... Su Yuzu had the nagging feeling that wasn't how it had gone.
In the game, Kujou Iruka had only marched her endless armies down on them after something happened to Kujou Katora.
Which meant Kujou Iruka had been keeping tabs on the Tokyo metropolitan area and its surroundings all along.
And if... if Kujou Iruka had been watching her and Kujou Katora even before Saint Michael's radiant power disappeared—
Then... the things she had done to Kujou Katora.
The things she had stuffed into Kujou Katora.
Su Yuzu could already see it coming: she was not going to live to see tomorrow's sun.
Of course—
That didn't mean Kujou Iruka was going to kill her.
If Kujou Iruka went easy on her — soft heart, soft hands — she might still have the strength left to watch a sunset.
Su Yuzu stared into those brilliant eyes that seemed to brim with laughter, and all that came out was a small, forced, pitiful voice. "Sister Kujou..."
"Nngh!"
"Sister Iruka..."
"Ah!"
"What is Sister Iruka even talking about."
"Raptor and I... what's between me and Raptor, it's just an ordinary friendship."
"No, wrong—"
"It's a very, very close friendship."
"Sister Iruka must have misun— nngh — misunderstood."
Kujou Iruka rolled a fine, soft strand of hair hanging by Su Yuzu's brow between her fingers.
She watched the girl squirm so pitifully in front of her.
No wonder—
No wonder that incompetent, spineless, stupid Little Sister of hers had fallen for a girl like this.
She tasted even sweeter than the things she said.
Still—
"The things you've said,"
"the things you've done..."
"you won't admit to any of it?"
Kujou Iruka's output remained perfectly steady.
Su Yuzu's scalp was about to detonate. How could there be an infuriating older sister like this, one who insisted on pressing right up against her ear to whisper every single word?
And of all things... of all things, that was exactly what Su Yuzu could least withstand.
If Kujou Iruka had already been Recruited, fine, she could have written the whole thing off as a heaven-sent device for drifting off to sleep.
But... the problem right now was that Kujou Iruka had not been Recruited.
Su Yuzu could practically see her own tragic ending laid out in front of her.
So—
Exactly how long had Kujou Iruka been spying on her and Kujou Katora, and how much did she understand about what went on between them?
With every one of those answers unknown, Su Yuzu didn't even have the means to mount a last-ditch counterattack.
She had no idea how to slip out from under Kujou Iruka's hands, let alone how to turn the tables and bring Kujou Iruka down.
Su Yuzu suspected that even waking the "Seat of Evil" wouldn't be a good move.
If the "Seat of Evil" and Kujou Iruka squared off inside the academy—
Su Yuzu couldn't begin to imagine that scene, or what would be left afterward.
For now all she could do was play dumb. "Sister Iruka... mm... what are you talking about?"
"Raptor and I really are close, really, really close."
"Raptor likes me a lot."
"And I like Raptor."
"That's... all it is."
Kujou Iruka's dark golden vertical pupils blinked once, slowly, as she studied the stubborn girl in front of her.
"Is that so?"
"Mm-mm-mm-mm—" Su Yuzu nodded over and over.
"How wonderful, then." The corner of Kujou Iruka's mouth curled with amusement — a pity that in the near-total blackness Su Yuzu couldn't see her mouth at all.
The darkness filling Su Yuzu's dorm room wasn't because Kujou Iruka had killed the lights and drawn the curtains.
It was Kujou Iruka's domain.
Kujou Iruka's power.
That terrifying erosion domain that had scarcely ever switched off.
Kujou Iruka's strength went far beyond anything Su Yuzu had imagined. She could control her own erosion domain so finely that it flowed only within the walls of Su Yuzu's dorm room.
To the world outside—
even to the "Seat of Evil", who lived directly across from Su Yuzu—
not a single scrap of information about Kujou Iruka's erosion domain could be caught.
The only thing any of them could learn was that the moment Su Yuzu stepped through her dormitory door, everything about her vanished from this world.
Kujou Iruka looked at how pitiful, how adorable Su Yuzu was.
"Me, though—"
"my favorite thing in the world is taking away whatever that weak, stupid Little Sister of mine likes."
Su Yuzu's face couldn't have gone any more sour if she tried.
What kind of wicked sister was this?
Somebody ought to tie her up, and then make Kujou Katora watch while Su Yuzu stuffed Combat Records into her.
And of course... right at that moment, Su Yuzu's phone rang.
Kujou Iruka glanced at the hot pants discarded off to one side.
By the light of Kujou Iruka's eyes, Su Yuzu could just make out the woman tilting her head. "S-Sister Iruka."
"You can just ignore it."
The last thing she wanted was to hand this woman leverage over her while she was on a call.
"Now, how would that do~" Kujou Iruka looked positively wicked. The darkness itself drew the girl's phone out of the hot pants, and Kujou Iruka took an interested look at the name saved for the incoming call — "Ms. Unohana". An old acquaintance.
"What if it's something important?"
Beep—
Kujou Iruka accepted the call.
Cradling Su Yuzu in her arms, she brought the phone up to Su Yuzu's ear, saying nothing, her eyes brimming with laughter.
"M-Ms. Unohana!!!" Su Yuzu had the sudden sense that every debt she had ever run up had finally come due.
"It's so late... is something the matter?"
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