Chapter 26: The Sisters-in-Law Arrive on Earth.
.....
Anna Yanami utterly failed to back up her own bold declarations. The moment she lunged forward and pinned Kihara to the ground, her mind instantly became flooded with highly pixelated, rose-tinted fantasies. For a long, agonizing moment, she remained frozen on all fours, her hands bracing against the floorboards as her face flushed a deep crimson while she stared blankly ahead.
Kihara stared back at her completely deadpan, sighing in the privacy of his own mind.
'Look, I haven't said a single word, and I haven't done a single thing yet. What on earth are you blushing like a boiling kettle for?!'
After what felt like an eternity, Anna finally snapped out of her trance. Hurriedly wiping the corners of her mouth—where absolutely nothing was leaking—she looked up, only to lock eyes with Sanae and Lala. The two were currently peeking out from behind the doorframes of the kitchen and the front hallway respectively, quietly observing the entire scene.
'S-Since when have they been watching?!'
In that microsecond, she felt infinitely grateful that her brain had short-circuited before she could actually do anything scandalous to Kihara. Otherwise, she probably would have dissolved into thin air out of sheer embarrassment.
Abandoning any attempt to read their expressions, Anna lowered her head until her chin was practically buried in her collarbone. Crimson-faced, she bolted from the house like a escaping fugitive.
Hovering in her flying plush toy mode, Peke whispered softly into Lala's ear, "Princess Lala, I still strongly suspect that Anna-sama harbors romantic feelings for Master Kihara..."
"But Anna told me herself that she doesn't, and you heard her too."
"Hmm... Could this be a form of emotional expression unique to Earthlings?"
"Who knows? I think I'll just head back upstairs to continue working on my new invention. You don't need to call me down for things like this next time."
"Understood, Princess Lala."
...
Within the boundless, deep expanse of outer space, a sleek, silver, oval-shaped starship suddenly dropped out of a wormhole. Its thrusters gradually decelerated until the vessel came to a complete standstill.
Momo gazed out at the vibrant, azure planet teeming with life before them. Cross-referencing it with the coordinates she had extracted from the database, she turned around and flashed a delighted smile at her sister. "Nana, we've successfully arrived at Earth!"
"Then what are we waiting for? Let's hurry up and find Big Sister!"
"Hold on!" Momo blocked Nana's right hand just as it reached for the control lever, asking in sheer astonishment, "Are you seriously planning to just march straight up to Big Sister right now?!"
Nana blinked, completely bewildered by the question. "Well, yeah? Didn't we come to Earth specifically to hang out with her?"
"Did you completely forget our mission to evaluate her fiancé?"
"O-Of course not!"
Judging by how well she knew her twin, Momo could guarantee with one hundred percent certainty that Nana had completely spaced out on that front. Her single-threaded, simplistic brain had been entirely occupied by the phrase "hang out with sister."
'As expected, I'm definitely the mature Big sister here, aren't I?'
Sighing internally for the umpteenth time, Momo patiently laid out the plan she had engineered. "Before we snuck out, I had Miss Mimic Grass transform into the two of us to stay behind at the palace. If we rashly show up by Big Sister's side right now, the royal guard assigned to protect her will notice us instantly."
Hearing this, Nana finally connected the dots, her eyes widening. "If we run into Zastin, our grand escape plan is completely doomed!!"
"Exactly. So our primary objective right now is to stealthily slip onto Earth, infiltrate the perimeter around Big Sister and her fiancé, and observe them covertly. If necessary, we can use our classic method to put him to the test!"
"The classic method... You mean that Hero's Quest Illusion Matrix?"
"Precisely!"
"That is indeed a solid plan. But how are we supposed to breach Earth's atmosphere? Going by your logic, Zastin and his crew must have stationed escort vessels nearby, constantly scanning for foreign spacecraft with their radar, right?"
"Fufu~ That is exactly why we have Miss Peashooter here to help us out!"
Momo whipped out her clamshell Teleportation Phone and tapped the screen a few times. A moment later, a goofy-looking, two-meter-tall Peashooter materialized inside the cabin, swaying rhythmically back and forth.
"You don't mean..." Nana's eyelid twitched violently as she pointed a trembling finger at the plant in absolute disbelief. "You're planning to use that thing to fire us into Earth like a pair of cannonballs?!"
"How could we possibly do that? Setting accuracy issues aside, if the escort vessels mistake us for a kinetic explosive weapon and open fire with their plasma lasers, we're finished. Neither of us possesses the ridiculous physical constitution of Father or Big Sister."
Even though the three sisters shared the same parents, their innate abilities varied drastically.
Lala, being the eldest, had fundamentally inherited their father's absurd, combat-ready physical resilience. Nana and Momo, on the other hand, leaned heavily toward their mother's side, possessing the specialized abilities to converse with animals and plants respectively.
Precisely because their abilities leaned toward the mage or summoner archetype, their physical stats were nowhere near Lala's level. Surviving a naked re-entry into a planet's atmosphere from outer space completely unscathed was an impossible feat for them.
Thus, Nana's mindless question made Momo roll her eyes continuously. She genuinely wished she could write a letter to their mother, begging her to officially swap their birth order.
'How can an Big sister be this dense?'
Despite her internal critiques, Momo maintained her patience as she explained the mechanics to Nana, sparing them from any further superficial questions.
"The seed projectiles spat out by Miss Peashooter contain a specialized sap within their core that can blind radar tracking. We just need to harvest a sufficient amount of the sap and feed it into the ship's automatic paint-spraying system. That way, we can completely evade radar detection."
Nana fell silent for a moment, casting a suspicious glance around the console. "If I remember correctly, this ship is a combat model. Why on earth does it have an automatic paint-spraying system?"
"Who knows? Big Sister always builds bizarre little features into the ships she designs. As long as it helps us infiltrate Earth, there's no need to overthink it. Instead of letting your mind wander, hurry up and help me harvest the sap."
"Coming!"
The two spent a grueling half-hour gathering enough sap to completely coat the starship's outer hull. By the time Momo teleported the Peashooter back, Nana couldn't help but notice that the plant looked significantly emaciated.
With that hurdle cleared, they successfully breached Earth's defenses and touched down safely in the rural outskirts of the city where Kihara and the others lived.
Stepping out of the spacecraft, Nana immediately grumbled, "Why did you park so far away? It's going to take us at least two hours just to walk into town."
"There's no place in the city that can accommodate a starship of this size. Besides, I need a little time to cultivate the Camouflage Grass. Naturally, I had to choose the wilderness; otherwise, I wouldn't even have a patch of soil to plant the seeds."
As Momo spoke, she scattered two translucent seeds into the soil. With a soft murmur of "Grow up quickly," the seeds sprouted into green shoots within the span of a few breaths, breaking through the dirt.
Before long, they matured into straight, waist-high stalks topped with amber leaves featuring serrated edges. This was the Camouflage Grass Momo had mentioned.
By simply keeping one of these amber leaves on one's person, the light-bending properties of the plant would render the user completely invisible to onlookers, including electronic surveillance cameras.
However, individuals carrying the leaves could still see each other perfectly well. Due to its highly specific growing conditions, this plant was practically extinct throughout the universe; a substantial supply existed only within the personal garden of the third princess of the Galactic Empire.
"The invisibility effect lasts for three days. Let's go. We have three whole days to give this fiancé of hers a thorough inspection~"
....
(T/N: Update schedule is a mess these days.)
Thank you for reading