"Thank you so much for your help, Hikigaya-kun! I will definitely repay you properly!"
It wasn't that she didn't want to pay back the money, it was just that she hadn't been working for long and really didn't have that much.
Now that she knew she could earn the money by working hard, the bewildered feeling vanished at once.
'No wonder not only Kotomi, but even Shizuka trusts Hikigaya-kun so much. Hikigaya-kun really is reliable.'
Seeing the problem resolved, Hiratsuka Shizuka also showed a relieved smile. She did think Hachiman was considerate; otherwise she wouldn't have troubled him specially.
But this favor she owed him now was big. Getting Hikigaya to settle the delinquent girls at school and having Hikigaya protect a teacher being chased by debt collectors were two different things. In the small view she was emotionally blackmailing him, in the large view she was abusing power for gain.
Now Hikigaya came to the student guidance room acting so arrogant, not putting her in his sights at all.
If she ran into Hikigaya guiding students in the student guidance room from now on, she didn't know what she would do.
"You don't need to repay me. Ebihara-sensei, just do the maid work. Tsubaki's personal maid, Shion, will tell you the specific duties."
Hachiman watched Ebihara Urara, who had already shown great sincerity with actions to repay him, patted the head of Hanamori Kotomi beside him, and dialed Nishikigi Chisato's number on his phone.
"As for finding your missing fiance, Urara, I can try to help, but, I need to make a phone call first."
Although Ebihara Urara hadn't asked him to find her fiance, and so far Urara didn't know about the cult, she only knew her fiance had run off because of debt and thought he was still working hard to get back on his feet, he intended to destroy any cult that ruined princess-style long black-haired girls' lives.
He remembered that this cult series did not only involve kind gentle Ebihara Urara being trapped by her fiance into a cult, but also a pair of Ichinose sisters might similarly be trapped.
He didn't know whether this pair of Ichinose sisters had blood relation to Ayano, Honami, but the Ichinose household could gain new members.
[A/N: Considering the plot, this book will adjust the original timeline a bit; the same applies later to facilitate the story. In the next chapter Chisato and Takina, a great duo, will appear to join the package. o(*≧▽≦)ツ┏━┓]
———
[Streets near Sobu High]
Two beautiful girls wearing the same style of school uniform strolled through the area.
The golden-blonde short-haired girl in the red uniform had an energetic smile on her face, while the black long-haired girl in the navy uniform kept a blank, cold expression.
Although their emotions were completely different, both of their gazes casually scanned the pedestrians on the street, searching for suspicious mission clues.
Nishikigi Chisato and Inoue Takina were Lycoris agents and normally did not attend school, so their appearance here was undoubtedly mission-related.
They currently had two missions. One was that a cult with manipulative influence was active in Chiba; find the cult's base and eliminate the cult. This required finding clues about the cult organization and then gathering Lycoris agents to mop them up.
The other was a mission Takina had accepted before coming to Chiba: someone was researching very dangerous automatos technology, and she needed to retrieve that tech and bring it back to headquarters to destroy it.
Today they had received intel from other Lycoris agents that two girls who looked very similar to them but were not registered in the database had been spotted here.
They suspected someone had used automatos tech to create AI replicas modeled on their appearances, so they immediately came to investigate the suspicious clue.
Judging only by appearances, two high-school-girl lookalikes carrying schoolbags and aimlessly wandering the streets looked more suspicious.
"Takina, wait a moment, I have a call."
Nishikigi Chisato suddenly felt a faint vibration in the small pocket of her skirt, hurriedly called out to Inoue Takina who was about to check the alley for mission clues, unzipped, and fished out her phone.
Inoue Takina could only stop and stare expressionlessly at the unreliable Chisato.
'Is this the punishment for failing a mission and being expelled from headquarters?'
'Partnering with such an unreliable oddball on missions, when will we ever be allowed back to HQ?'
["Hello, is this Nishikigi-san?"]
"Eh, yes, it's me. May I ask who this is?"
Hearing a somewhat familiar voice on the phone, Nishikigi Chisato blinked and wondered who this stranger was.
["This is Hikigaya Hachiman. We met once at the cafe when I had dinner with Seika-neesan and the others, and we bumped into each other at the aquarium too."]
"Oh! I remember now! Mr. Hikigaya, what can I do for you? If you need help just say the word!"
At Hachiman's mention, Nishikigi Chisato immediately remembered him. Before Hachiman could explain why he was calling, she beat her chest and promised to help.
Not only was he the only boy among so many girls who left an impression on her, but when protecting the mermaid idol's concert, Hikigaya's protection level had been higher than the mermaid idol's.
Although she and Takina had not been authorized to go inside the concert and were on duty outside, that didn't matter.
Since Hikigaya had somehow gotten her contact and was calling, he must need her help.
["Uh, thanks... it's like this. I have someone missing because of debt, he's gone missing and I suspect he might have been kidnapped. Nishikigi-san, could you come help me find him? I know Lycoris is good at this."]
On the other end of the phone, Hachiman's words surprised Nishikigi Chisato with her enthusiasm, but he stuck to his plan and asked her to come help.
He knew Nishikigi liked to help others, but what he wanted Nishikigi to do might involve killing. It was better to first reveal Lycoris's identity.
He didn't know whether Nishikigi still didn't want to kill, but even if she didn't, having her call other Lycoris agents to help clean up afterwards would be fine.
"Indeed you know us, Mr. Hikigaya. Okay, no problem! Are you currently at Sobu High?"
Hearing Hikigaya mention her identity, Nishikigi Chisato was surprised for a moment, but didn't hesitate and asked.
["Yes, I'm at Sobu High right now. Nishikigi-san, when are you available—"]
"I'm right nearby with Takina. We'll be there now! Mr. Hikigaya, wait for us," Nishikigi Chisato agreed as soon as she realized Hikigaya was at Sobu High, hung up, and dragged Inoue Takina toward the direction of the school.
"Let's go, Takina, let's check out the high school. I heard Sobu High is the top school in Chiba with the highest deviation value. Lots of excellent students there."
"We're still on a mission? Chisato, how can you just drop it and go help someone else?"
Inoue Takina, watching Chisato instantly abandon their mission, was being driven mad by this partner.
Usually Chisato's unreliability might be forgivable; going to help at someone's store could be seen as making money or building a channel for intelligence. But this is an active mission.
"We haven't found clues here. Let's go to Sobu High and see. If the two girls suspected of being AI replicas resemble us that much, they could very well be attending Sobu High."
Nishikigi Chisato turned to Takina with a smile.
"Mr. Hikigaya is so close with the mermaid idol and knows our identity. Maybe he can give us a lead."
"If necessary we can ask the mermaid idol to use her song to hypnotize people and find hidden ones in the crowd... uh, that's too extreme, probably not okay."
"I really want to learn magic... but seems we don't have much aptitude"
"The system database has no records of those two girls. They're definitely not registered students at Sobu High. Still, hiding inside Sobu High is possible."
Seeing Chisato make a bunch of excuses to go to Sobu High, and even toy with the idea of using the mermaid idol, Inoue Takina had no choice but to pick up her multi-function weapon bag disguised as a schoolbag and follow Chisato.
They had already searched the nearby streets and other Lycoris agents had looked for clues here before. If there were no key leads, going to a big school like Sobu High made sense.
Sobu High had a large campus with many abandoned classrooms. After school, when it was closed, it would be easy to hide there.
But Nishikigi Chisato wasn't really going to Sobu High for that reason; she was simply using the high school as an excuse to go have a look.
Although they usually wore high school uniforms and were the right age, they had in fact never attended high school.
Of course, if you only consider places where everyone trained together, they did have such places.
A communal dorm for sleeping, a medical building for physicals and treating injuries, a training hall to improve shooting skills, indoor combat training rooms and killing booths.
———
[Student Guidance Room]
"Just nearby Sobu High? What a coincidence."
Hachiman looked at his phone showing the call had ended and was a bit surprised that Nishikigi Chisato was nearby.
Because the cult might be related to the Ichinose family's Ichinose sisters, he had thought to ask the Ichinose councilman whether anyone had gone missing recently and to have the Rurikawa and Ichinose families join to handle the cult.
Taking down a cult would be a good political achievement for Councilman Ichinose.
But then he thought the Ichinose Councilman couldn't help much.
For a politician, using connections or hiring bodyguards might work against ordinary people, but it wasn't easy to deal with a large cult with brainwashed followers.
Same for the Rurikawa family. Once they were in decline like before they couldn't possibly have secret private forces. Not to mention combat maids hiding explosives in skirts and killer maids.
That's why before coming he specifically asked Ijichi Natsu for Nishikigi Chisato's contact. For dealing with such cult forces you needed professionals. He wanted to contact Nishikigi and Takina to see whether he could poach Lycoris agents.
But Nishikigi's coincidence of being right near Sobu High, could she be here because of the cult too?
In the original work, the strongest AI managing DA secrets was often hacked and leaked, pretty worthless.
But Lycoris were agents everywhere. If such a big cult operated in the dark with no trace found, then Lycoris operatives would be out of a job.
"Um... Mr. Hikigaya, was Takayuki kidnapped?"
While Hikigaya pondered, Ebihara Urara, who had just sat down, couldn't help but stand up again and nervously looked at Hikigaya.
She hadn't reacted when Hikigaya called for help earlier, but the moment she heard he suspected her fiance had been kidnapped, she couldn't sit still.
"Don't misunderstand, Ebihara-sensei. I don't know where your fiance is. I just said I would call someone to help."
Hachiman shook his head and reassured the anxious Ebihara Urara.
"I see... thank you, Mr. Hikigaya. If you can help find Takayuki, I will be ever grateful."
Hearing Hikigaya say that, Ebihara Urara breathed a sigh of relief, thanked him again for being willing to help and then sat down.
He was willing to shelter her and even to advance money to repay the debt so she could slowly pay him back later.
No wonder Kotomi and the others trusted Mr. Hikigaya so much.
"No need to thank me. We can thank later once we find your fiance."
"Wait until Nishikigi and the others arrive. Don't say anything; let me explain. They're more professional than us and can help us find your fiance faster."
Looking at Ebihara Urara across from him, burdened by heavy debt, threatened by yakuza, forced to take on part-time maid work at students' homes yet still worrying about her missing fiance, Hachiman sighed inwardly.
Ayano had told him that recently Councilman Ichinose wanted to recruit pretty girls from the Ichinose household.
So it was unlikely those Ichinose sisters would be victimized by the cult.
But Ebihara Urara was being chased by debt collectors and forced to consider teaching at the disreputable Kokutetsu Academy.
Her fiance, who ran off, had undoubtedly joined a cult and was enjoying himself among the cultists.
It was even very likely he had told the cult there was a beautiful fiancee, prompting the cult to pull his fiancee into the abyss as well.
He didn't know whether he should let Ebihara Urara know that truth.
Urara was so devoted in love, yet she had become burdened by huge debts and was being targeted for cult entanglement by a scumbag fiance.
Knock! Knock! Knock~
"Come in."
Before long, someone knocked on the student guidance room door.
The door opened and a blonde, pointed-eared elf wearing the Sobu High uniform walked in, followed by Nishikigi Chisato and Inoue Takina carrying brown schoolbags and wearing different uniforms.
"Sylpha? You came across them by chance?"
Hachiman had thought he would go to the school gate to pick up Nishikigi and Takina, but Sylpha had brought them all the way here.
"Yes, Master Savior. These two girls just tried to illegally enter the campus, but they said they were looking for you, so I brought them here."
Sylpha bowed slightly in front of Hachiman and explained respectfully.
"Uh... yes, Mr. Hikigaya asked for us. I hurried and pulled Takina to climb the wall, but I didn't expect Sylpha to misunderstand us."
Hearing Sylpha's casual description of the "chance encounter," Nishikigi Chisato felt slightly embarrassed.
She and Takina weren't students at Sobu High. After arriving outside the school she tried to climb the wall.
Who would have thought that Sobu High, which looked like an ordinary high school, secretly had an elf patrolling.
If she hadn't ducked quickly and explained why they were there, Sylpha might not have just shot an arrow at her.
Inoue Takina silently stared at Hachiman and the elf Sylpha who was so respectful toward him.
This elf, she knew, was one of the elves around the Elf Princess, said to rank just below the princess and her personal guards.
Lycoris knew well the openly legitimate demi-humans in this area; when they needed help they also stepped in so the demi-humans felt their government's sincerity.
But an elf near the Elf Princess showing such deference to an ordinary human was surprising.
And recalling the mermaid idol concert where his protection level had been higher than the protagonist mermaid idol's protection...
This Mr. Hikigaya Chisato talked about might be an identity higher than she had imagined, perhaps a powerful demi-human disguised as an ordinary human.
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