Neru sighed deeply as she looked around. Then, thud, she collapsed onto the sofa in the play lounge break area.
The teacher, who had arrived first, glanced at her. Judging by her trembling eyebrows and shaky eyes, it was clear that something was about to happen.
‘3… 2… 1…’
The moment the teacher mentally counted to three,
“Ugh, seriously! That jerk Baek-to is one thing, but Mika, you shouldn’t be doing this to me too!”
“Umm…”
“You said you practically live in the play lounge, but what do you mean by ‘live’ when you can’t even see your face around here? Are you kidding me?!”
“Umm…”
“Head, please calm down for a moment. Since things have turned out this way, how about changing the plan to the existing operation?”
Hearing Akane’s suggestion, Neru sighed heavily with her eyes closed. After taking a deep breath, Neru reluctantly nodded.
“Fine, whatever. By the way, I was wondering where that Baek-to guy was pouring his money into. Was it just because he was obsessed with that ridiculous lottery? I can’t even… what a joke.”
Neru’s thoughts echoed what everyone in the room agreed upon.
Having looked around the play lounge and listened to the lounge guide explain how this place operated, the group easily figured out where Koyuki was wasting her money.
The operation of Golden Fleece, which divided services into grades from D to A and offered them differently, was incredibly ruthless. The method of luring people in with an S-rank that might not even exist was even more disgraceful.
Neru had a lot to say to Koyuki, who had fallen for such shady business, but they all knew it would be meaningless.
Was Koyuki the type to listen to others?
Neru was sure she wouldn’t, no matter what.
‘…Speaking of which. Mika’s guest room looked pretty nice at a glance. Is that the A-rank service?’
Knowing that Mika had loads of money, it didn’t surprise Neru much. She was a little shocked that they had trespassed into Mika’s room, but that was it.
Being quite financially secure herself, Neru considered getting such a room and taking a vacation soon, as handling tedious tasks in place of Rion was exhausting in many ways.
*
In the end, C&C and the teacher decided to stick with their original plan to infiltrate the system room. During the process, countless bunny girl guards fell victim to Neru’s violence, meeting a brutal end.
Through this process, Neru complained that things were too easy, noting that the guards were just too dazed to provide any challenge. It was clear that it would be far more satisfying to be facing off against Aris in an intense game at the arcade.
Neru thought it would be better to sweep them all out and force Baek-to to come with them, but… of course, this idea was shot down by Karin and the teacher.
“Akane, are you okay with taking control of the system?”
While Neru sat on top of a fainted bunny girl guard, sighing heavily, Karin asked her question.
“Hehe, of course. I’m already installing it.”
Akane confidently replied with a bright smile.
“Good to have you. That’s so characteristic of you, Akane.”
“Oh my… Thank you, teacher. To receive praise from you during a mission… This definitely makes this operation different in many ways.”
“Baek-to… just wait until you get caught. I’ll make you cry your eyes out.”
“Even if we don’t do it, I think the seminar accounts will handle that first…”
Hearing Karin mumbled, the teacher couldn’t help but recall when Yuuka had asked her for help with this situation.
It wasn’t anything serious; just a lengthy speech about how to make Koyuki repent once they caught her… but the teacher decided to pray for Koyuki, whom she hadn’t even seen yet.
After all, it seemed like there were quite a few people targeting her.
After some casual chatter, Akane finally spoke up.
“Everyone, now that the installation is complete, can you gather around? Due to the structure, it’s a bit high over there~. Everyone, please come this way…”
At that moment, both the teacher and Karin sensed that something was going strangely.
“Let’s press the button—”
That sense turned into a full-blown panic when they heard Akane add, having pressed something.
“Phew! It’s all done now. Just wait exactly one minute and thirty seconds.”
“…?”
Akane’s incomprehensible words—more precisely, her desire not to understand—struck them hard.
“Wait. Akane, waiting one minute thirty seconds? What does that mean?”
Tick. Tick. Tick.
“…Akane, exactly what did you install?”
Hearing the countdown sound, the teacher asked Akane.
“Hm? This? Well, it’s just something I usually use. It’s C4 that I disguised well to bring along…?”
“Ah, I see. C4… Wait, why would you bring that here to the system room…?”
“…? Of course, to blow this place up, right?”
“I wasn’t asking that! My question is whether we really need to blow this place up…”
“…What? Oh no, did I make a mistake? But we have to blow this place up so the guards can’t monitor us, right?”
“That’s not wrong, but…!”
The teacher felt like wrinkles were forming on her face in real-time as she clapped her hands.
“Sorry for interrupting while we were talking, but how about moving those kids to safety before the bomb goes off?”
Saying that, the teacher picked up one of the fainted bunny girl guards but hesitated. The students’ outfits were so strict that she felt reluctant to touch them.
“Uh, oh yes…! We’ll do it.”
Glancing at the timer, Akane quickly moved to lift the bunny girl guard the teacher had tried to carry. Neru swiftly grabbed one guard per hand, moving them to a safe spot.
And then…
Kuaaaang—!!!
The C4 exploded.
*
As expected, the explosion in the system room alerted Golden Fleece of a state of emergency. Thanks to the ‘Bunny 2’ alert, countless bunny girl guards scattered across the ship hurried to subdue the terrorists.
Fortunately for the teacher’s group, due to the destruction of the system room, they couldn’t gather accurate information.
“I’m sorry, teacher. I made a big mistake… It ended up advertising that there were intruders on board. I’m so sorry…”
As they took a breath after barely escaping the accident site, Akane awkwardly apologized with a smile.
Of course, the teacher, who had grown accustomed to similar incidents, didn’t scold her. When you’re with students, you end up experiencing all kinds of bizarre situations.
“It’s alright, Akane. They say people usually learn from mistakes. Although things seem a bit troublesome, um… by the way, where should we go now?”
At the teacher’s question, everyone began to brainstorm. Just then, they heard footsteps approaching.
“…Huh? You guys, Bunny 2 was issued, so what are you doing gathered here? And who’s that guy over there… cough!”
Neru, who quickly subdued the suddenly appearing bunny girl guard, grimaced as she heard more footsteps.
This time, there were multiple. Witnessing this situation was troublesome, and getting caught here was just as bad. Even though having many people didn’t take much time to suppress, requesting support over the radio would instantly reveal their location.
But who did Neru think she was? Naturally…
“Hey, why don’t we just have a go with those guys? I mean, Aris said last time that if there are no witnesses, it’s assassination, right?”
She was not the type to back down in this situation.
“Oh, that game. But why is that story coming up now…?”
“Ha. It’s because if there are no witnesses, that’s what we mean by infiltration, teacher. I don’t understand why we have to waste time on this when we could easily sweep everything out. I feel like I’m acting like a high school girl running away because of these pathetic folks.”
“…Neru, you’re not a high school girl?!”
“Teacher, seriously…!”
As the teacher teased Neru lightly to lighten the mood, just then, Akane suddenly proposed something.
“…Then how about returning to a stronghold for now?”
“A stronghold…?”
Karin blinked, asking back. The teacher quickly realized that the stronghold Akane was referring to was Mika’s guest room and sighed.
“Akane, we shouldn’t impose more trouble on Mika than we already have…”
“Huh? Didn’t we all agree that was the plan?”
“…What do you mean by that, Akane?”
Not understanding, Akane adjusted her glasses, then put her hand between her cleavage and smoothly pulled something out.
“Well, we left those tied-up guards there, right? So I thought we had agreed to use that place as a stronghold… I also brought the key card.”
“…?!”
The moment everyone saw the key card in Akane’s hand, they gasped. Even Neru looked stunned, mouth agape.
“…Akane, I think that’s a bigger blunder than blowing up the system room.”
Karin uttered the core of the situation.
“…Did I mess up big time?”
“You’ve completely messed up.”
And with that, Neru hammered home the point.
