My name was Su Youzi.
I was seventeen years old.
A second-year student at Shiritsu Megumi Garden Academy.
Unmarried.
I had made a bet with Kujo Ryuko.
The bet was whether the girl who had previously been caught up in the Altered User incident—
Sakai Miho—could successfully advance to the First Sequence.
As for the wager... the loser would have to get down on all fours in front of the winner and act like a little dog.
Indeed—
Although a First Sequence Altered User really did have a chance of dispelling their anomalous state and returning to being an ordinary human girl,
but... just like protein denaturation, the distortion of an Ability User's abilities caused by an "anomalous state" was irreversible.
Put simply, after entering an "anomalous state," an Ability User's abilities would remain forever stuck at the level they had reached before the transformation.
Her growth had already been locked.
Her future had already been decided.
Dim and without light.
This was the consensus written in the textbooks of every Ability User Academy.
But... did that mean consensus could never be broken?
Not necessarily.
Legend had it that "Seat of Evil," a Seventh Sequence Ability User from the battlefield a thousand years ago, had once entered an "anomalous state."
His lover had erased his "anomalous state," allowing him to start over.
Since the previous Rule-based Ability User had been able to help someone who had once entered an "anomalous state" break through the shackles,
then as the seventh Rule-based Ability User, Su Youzi naturally could—
Not.
"Reverse Logic Hand" didn't seem to have that function.
However—
Su Youzi looked at her Material Slot.
That "First Sequence Promotion Emblem" was shining brightly.
[First Sequence Promotion Emblem: A material for advancing to the First Sequence. Advancement using this emblem is guaranteed to succeed.]
Since the "Combat Record" had allowed Su Youzi, whose abilities had once been locked at Level 0, to break through to Level 1,
Su Youzi had every reason to believe
that the "First Sequence Promotion Emblem" could help Sakai Miho break through to the First Sequence.
As for whether such a powerful emblem would be wasted...
Recalling the information she had uncovered about Sakai Miho,
a pitying smile rose at the corners of Su Youzi's lips. It definitely... definitely wouldn't be wasted.
She looked confidently at Kujo Ryuko.
"You're definitely going to win!"
Su Youzi understood Kujo Ryuko's personality.
Although Kujo Ryuko's personality was twisted, a girl's pride still remained deep in her heart.
Once she made a bet, she would definitely honor it.
Kujo Ryuko didn't like people—she liked dogs, and even treated everyone around her as dogs to order about. If she had to get down on all fours in front of Su Youzi to honor the bet, the humiliation she would feel inside could well be imagined!
Su Youzi was confident.
After this move,
Kujo Ryuko's favorability toward her would definitely freeze at rock bottom.
The fact that she didn't immediately swing Blood Saw and chop her into pieces would already count as a girl's pride and reserve.
After this, the relationship between Kujo Ryuko and herself would surely become that of strangers, locked in bitter opposition.
Compared to being liked and kept in the thoughts of Kujo Ryuko, a yandere sadistic dominatrix,
Su Youzi still felt it would be better for the two of them never to interact.
It would be even better if Kujo Ryuko avoided her whenever she saw her.
"That's settled!"
Her right hand clasped Kujo Ryuko's cold, lifeless right hand. Su Youzi's eyes were filled with confidence, as if victory were already hers.
As for what Kujo Ryuko was thinking, that was even simpler.
She found the thought of such a beautiful girl imitating a little dog and yapping in a babyish voice in front of her rather amusing.
Her favorability was practically about to rise by one.
As for losing?
How could she possibly lose?
Could a boiled egg come back to life and hatch into a chick?
What a joke.
She held the girl's hand. A hint of amusement rose in her scarlet eyes, and beneath the sunlight, the girl's almost crystalline lips curved upward.
Teacher Unohana Chiyo, standing nearby, was frantic with worry.
Still, she could only count herself lucky.
The punishment Kujo Ryuko had proposed wasn't making the girl chop off a hand or doing some other utterly deranged thing.
Soon—
Su Youzi and the others arrived at the inpatient department.
The smell of disinfectant lingering in the air instantly weighed heavily on Su Youzi's mood.
They passed through the spotless glass doors.
Su Youzi and the others saw Sakai Miho lying in the hospital bed.
The girl's small face retained the same childlike and delicate beauty Su Youzi had seen when she bent down to look at her, but... those beautiful pale-green eyes appeared so hollow, as though her soul had been lost.
Su Youzi felt a little sorry for her.
From Teacher Unohana Chiyo, she had learned about the heavy burden the girl before her carried.
Sakai Miho had been born into an ordinary family in Guangzheng District.
Her family wasn't wealthy, and she had a younger sister who was an ordinary person.
After covering the family's expenses, her parents' wages were only enough to send either Sakai Miho or her younger sister to school.
Training an Ability User was expensive.
Sakai Miho had even decided to give up.
She would let her younger sister go to school.
And then—
Hope had descended.
She had been admitted to Shiritsu Megumi Garden Academy as an outstanding student.
The academy's subsidy was enough for her to live, albeit rather frugally, and even send a little money home.
But... just as quickly as hope had arrived, it collapsed.
Clenching her fists,
Sakai Miho didn't even know how she was supposed to keep living.
Hearing the sound of the glass door opening, the girl's hollow gaze turned toward the entrance of the ward.
The instant she saw Su Youzi, Sakai Miho shrank her neck back somewhat timidly.
She still remembered Su Youzi.
But... it wasn't the sort of resentment so common in melodramas—
resentment at Su Youzi for taking everything from her, or anything like that.
Sakai Miho knew that she had nearly killed the beautiful girl with red eyes back then.
It was that girl who had saved her from her anomalous state.
The emotion brewing in Sakai Miho's heart was guilt.
She had no right to resent anyone.
The girl was kind.
She had also always been accustomed to seeing herself as extremely insignificant.
Raising an eyebrow, Kujo Ryuko stood at the ward entrance.
Since it was a bet, there naturally had to be a time limit.
Kujo Ryuko and Su Youzi had agreed that before she left Shiritsu Megumi Garden Academy—in other words, within one month—Sakai Miho would have to break through to the First Sequence.
Kujo Ryuko wasn't in a hurry.
She was a hunter.
A hunter should have patience.
Besides... let alone one month for Su Youzi.
What would it matter even if she were given a year?
Could a boiled egg really run away?
There was nothing interesting about simply acting like a little dog.
With just one word from her,
countless people would stick out their tongues and come over to be her dogs.
What Kujo Ryuko liked... was watching proud and noble girls slowly lower their heads before her in humiliation.
That was what she called interesting.
Kujo Ryuko exchanged a glance with Su Youzi, her teasing expression seeming to say, Please begin your performance.
The corners of Su Youzi's lips lifted.
The girl's smile was as refreshing as a spring breeze, causing Sakai Miho, lying in the hospital bed, to clench the hand gripping her blanket.
Why... was she still smiling?
Didn't she hate her?
She... had nearly killed her, after all.
Su Youzi stepped forward and sat down beside Sakai Miho's hospital bed, gently taking Sakai Miho's little hand.
Unlike Little Rabbit's excessively soft little hands,
Sakai Miho looked delicate and childlike, yet her palms were cracked and rough, etched with the marks of life.
Su Youzi's fingertips traced the calluses in the girl's palm.
A tingling sensation spread from her palm...
Looking at those gentle, limpid eyes and feeling the girl's soft, youthful hand—so utterly different from her own—
Sakai Miho panicked and tried to pull her hand back.
[Ding—] [An employable unit has been detected.] [Recruit?]
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