Chapter 7: Just an Ordinary Person
***
“Achoo—”
In the rest area of the training ground, a pink-haired girl wearing a tight training vest suddenly sneezed.
She had a feeling that someone was talking about her.
Not far away, Ato, with his left eye somewhat bruised and his body still wrapped in bandages, couldn’t help but complain:
“You really hit hard enough, Elysia.”
Obviously, his injuries were Elysia’s handiwork, or rather, Jiang Qiao’s at this moment.
According to the examination results from the doctor, aside from the bruises and swelling on his face, his ribs had nearly been broken.
“Ah… haha, I didn’t hold back properly.”
Sensing that resentful gaze, Jiang Qiao laughed awkwardly.
He hadn’t fought in so many years that his old skills had become rusty. Combined with Elysia’s terrifyingly strong physical capabilities, various factors led to poor control of his strength.
Ato sighed, then said with some confusion:
“Whatever, I brought this on myself. But Elysia, your fighting style today was quite different from before.”
He had sparred with Elysia before. Her fighting style, even in close combat, was mainly based on entanglement and evasion, like a nimble fairy that was very difficult to catch.
But today’s Elysia had a fighting style that was somewhat… aggressive, the type that maximized offensive power, making Ato wonder if he had stumbled upon some special day.
Jiang Qiao felt somewhat embarrassed. How would he know how Elysia fought?
Being able to win against Ato using his old skills and Elysia’s powerful physical abilities was already quite good.
“Hmm… I’m trying out a new combat style?”
Fortunately, Ato seemed to believe this reason and nodded with admiration:
“A new combat style, amazing. You really are the fastest-improving newcomer in the organization.”
After all, with his demonstration of Shenzhou martial arts as backup, trying new fighting styles fit well with Elysia’s character.
“Teach me sometime too. It’s quite impressive. I’ve only seen Shenzhou martial arts in documentaries before.”
“Hmm, sometime later.”
Jiang Qiao casually agreed, not paying much attention to this matter.
The two soon parted ways, and he focused on the chat group in his mind.
Jiang Qiao: “How’s it going?”
Elysia: “Mm-hmm～ I’ve already entered Raiden Mei’s house～”
Seeing the reply, Jiang Qiao breathed a sigh of relief.
It seemed everything was still in time.
However, as expected of the Elysian Realm’s resident lesbian, how long had it been and she had already infiltrated the cooking girl’s house?
— Although this was indeed the case, Elysia’s method of infiltrating the cooking girl’s house was obviously somewhat different from what Jiang Qiao had imagined.
The Raiden residence.
Although most of the Raiden family’s assets had been frozen due to Ryoma’s imprisonment, at least Mei’s house was still fine.
However, in the vast house, only she remained.
Of course, now there was also an unfamiliar male.
Several dishes with typical Far East regional home cooking style were placed on the dining table, looking quite good from their appearance.
“Wow～ I didn’t expect Mei to be not only beautiful but also have such good cooking skills～ I can hardly wait~”
The famished Elysia looked at these dishes with gleaming eyes, though it looked strange no matter how you viewed it with Jiang Qiao’s appearance.
However, the next moment, Elysia’s expression froze after putting a spoonful of sweet pepper curry in her mouth.
So, so salty!
“What’s wrong? Is the taste not right?”
Seeing this reaction, Mei was somewhat puzzled and also tried a spoonful, then immediately fell silent.
She lowered her head apologetically:
“Sorry, I’m not very good at cooking. I messed up the seasoning.”
“Mmm… it’s nothing, it’s delicious. I just like saltier food!”
Seeing Raiden Mei’s dejected appearance, Elysia quickly comforted her while beginning to eat heartily.
— The result was drinking lots of water afterward.
She also expressed her dissatisfaction in the chat group.
Elysia: “You lied to me, Mei can’t cook at all!”
During their earlier conversation about Raiden Mei, Jiang Qiao had mentioned that Raiden Mei’s cooking skills were excellent, which made Miss Elf look forward to it tremendously before tasting Mei’s cooking.
The result was being thoroughly deceived.
Jiang Qiao: ?
Seeing this message, Jiang Qiao’s mind was full of question marks.
You must have encountered a fake cooking girl. Don’t you know how the cooking girl got her nickname? Even that self-reliant white-haired fluffball was raised to be a life-incompetent person!
Wait—
Jiang Qiao suddenly remembered something.
It seemed that the cooking girl’s culinary skills weren’t very good early on. After all, coming from a privileged background, she didn’t need to cook for herself. Her ability to cook was thanks to the Far East region’s home economics classes, but don’t expect it to be very good.
Her dramatic improvement in cooking skills seemed to start after she adopted that tuna.
A problem with minor details caused Elysia to suffer unnecessarily.
Fortunately, she didn’t mind much. After all, creatures like pink elves are quite easy to care for.
Having traveled the world in her youth, Elysia could totally handle food with excessive alkaline content!
“Glug glug～”
Elysia, who had drunk a belly full of water, put down her glass with a refreshed expression. “Ah, I’m alive again～”
The feeling of being full and satisfied really made one feel incredibly good!
“Well then, it’s time to talk about serious matters!”
Facing Elysia’s suddenly serious expression, Mei became somewhat nervous.
…
Massive Electric — abbreviated as ME Corp, this electronic machinery industry leader ostensibly controlled by Ryoma, secretly harbored hidden depths.
Behind it was Anti-Entropy, one of the world’s two major organizations fighting against the Honkai.
Beneath the ME Corp building was a massive mechanical factory that also served as a secret base.
However, control of this base had changed hands following ME Corp president Ryoma’s imprisonment.
The blonde woman in military uniform standing before the display platform was none other than the culprit behind the Third Eruption — Anti-Entropy Executor Cocolia.
The giant display screen before her showed not only live footage from various locations in Nagazora City but also complex data.
To implement Project-Mei, Cocolia needed to spread Honkai energy throughout Nagazora City. However, to prevent the Anti-Entropy moderates and even Schicksal itself from noticing, this process required a great deal of time to proceed slowly.
Currently, the Honkai energy spread had reached 37% of the planned target. It was estimated that it would take nearly half a month more to reach the critical point for triggering a Honkai eruption.
A girl with silver hair, distinctive Roman curls, and a petite stature of less than 1.5 meters approached behind Cocolia and reported expressionlessly:
“Mama, a suspicious person has appeared around the subject.”
“What kind of person?”
Cocolia asked casually without turning around.
“Appears to be an ordinary person with extremely low assessed danger level.”
“An ordinary person, heh… no need to worry about it.”
She sneered coldly.
For a moment she thought it might be those two idiots from the conservative faction or that Schicksal had discovered something, which would make things very troublesome.
But since it was just an ordinary person, there was nothing to worry about.
Could a mere ordinary person interfere with her plans?
“Bronya, handle such trivial matters yourself. No need to report to me.”
“…Yes.”