Selene Metronome stared at her with dark brown eyes. Her skin was really dark, which made Gabrielle think of chocolate cake, which consequently made her kind of hungry. Selene worked in a bakery, too, so she could totally get her some cake. Like everyone else, Selene was wearing the Atreyu Academy uniform. Gabrielle thought the colors complimented her friend’s dark skin and hair.
“Ho?” Someone came up behind Gabrielle and cupped her boobs. Blinking, Gabrielle looked over her shoulder as a face suddenly appeared in her field of vision. It was Ryoko. “So you’re now attending Atreyu Academy? That’s interesting. Very unexpected. However, I do like the idea of being able to feel these sweater stuffers whenever I want.”
“Right?” another girl, Serah, agreed as she knelt before Gabrielle and rubbed her thighs. It kind of tickled. “These wonderful thighs are so amazing. So supple but so strong. I’ve never met another girl who has such a perfect pair of thighs, and now I get to touch them whenever I want!”
Gabrielle tilted her head as the two continued to fondle her. “Are my thighs really that great?”
“Of course they are!”
The two touching her were Ryoko and Serah, a pair of best friends who couldn’t have looked more different but were the same on the inside. Ryoko’s dark skin was several shades lighter than Selene. She had yellow-ish eyes that must have been from extraterrestrial blood. Serah had pale skin. Really pale skin. She also had brown hair and hazel eyes, and her face was a little plain. Honestly, if it weren’t for her personality, Gabrielle thought she might forget this girl’s name.
“Would you two stop groping Gabrielle!” Kazekiri shouted as she marched up to their level. She stopped two steps down and pointed at them. “Quit your shameless behavior this instant! You’re going to kill the moral backbone of this school with your blatant perversion!”
“Oh, great. It’s Rule Book,” Ryoko grumbled as she and Serah let go of Gabrielle. “You really need to lighten up. It’s just some friendly skinship.”
“Friendly skinship?” Kazekiri narrowed her eyes. “That’s not what it seemed like to me, you molester!”
“Now those are fighting words,” Ryoko said while Serah watched on. The two girls, Ryoko and Kazekiri, were literally glaring each other down, practically nose to nose. It reminded her of how her sisters would argue. However, this felt a lot more serious.
Not sure what she should do, Gabrielle wandered over to Selene.
“Do those three not like each other?” she asked.
Selene sent her a pained smile. “Ryoko and Serah have never gotten along with Kazekiri. Since the moment those three met, they’ve been at each other’s throats. Kazekiri is a stickler for the rules, while Serah and Ryoko tend to do whatever they want, and as I’m sure you’ve noticed, they have a habit of inappropriately touching girls, which causes Kazekiri to get mad at them.” She looked back at the argument. “It’s caused a lot of friction. Actually, Serah and Ryoko played a really cruel joke on Kazekiri a few years back. It’s made her hate them even more… not that I can necessarily blame her.”
Gabrielle didn’t know what Selene meant when she said “inappropriately touching” but understood the rest well enough. She looked back at the three as they argued. While her sisters fought a lot, she knew they loved each other, but there didn’t seem to be any of that here.
“Oh… that’s really sad.”
Ryoko and Serah were her friends, but Kazekiri was also a good friend. Kazekiri had even helped rescue all of them (her, Ryoko, Selene, Jasmine, Alice, Ariel, and Michelle) from MacArt just a few days ago.
Of course, neither Ryoko nor Selene knew what had happened. It seemed the trauma from having the Parasyte—a device used to control people—forcefully inserted into the bodies had caused enough mental stress that they had a minor case of amnesia. Fortunately, it wouldn’t cause them any lasting harm.
All that said, Kazekiri was a great person, and Alex had confessed that he had a great deal of respect for her. It made Gabrielle want to befriend her, and if possible, she’d like it if Ryoko and Serah could befriend the girl, too.
Is there any way I could help these two understand each other and become friends? I must have an invention that I can—Oh! I know!
Gabrielle swiped her finger through the air and summoned one of her devices.
“Mr. Adhesive! I choose you!”
What appeared in her hand looked like a tiny green sphere. It was very innocuous. However, when Gabrielle squeezed it, a ripple passed over the ball. She tossed it between Ryoko and Kazekiri. The two barely had time to study the object before it suddenly elongated into two tendrils. Each tendril latched onto their hands, sticking to their palms, and then pulling their respective left and right hands together.
“W-what is this?!” Kazekiri shouted as she tried to pull her hand away from Ryoko’s.
“The hell?!” Ryoko added while attempting to do the same thing. However, no matter how hard either of them tried to pull themselves apart, Mr. Adhesive refused to let them separate.
Gabrielle crossed her arms and pouted at the two. “Fighting is bad. Since you two are fighting, I’m going to have you stay together until you learn to understand one another.”
“Why would you do this to me?!” asked Ryoko, her voice practically a loud shriek.
Kazekiri was much calmer. “Gabrielle, I think I understand what you are trying to do, but while I appreciate that you want us to get along, I do not believe this is the right way to go about it. Please undo this… whatever it is, so we can both go free.”
“I can’t.”
Kazekiri was taken aback. “Excuse me?”
“Mr. Adhesive is an adhesive that works on the principles of Particulate Relativity. It hasn’t stuck you two together. It’s temporarily melded your hands together by rearranging the particles that make up your skin. Of course, it has a time limit, so your hands will eventually return to normal. However, your hands won’t separate until twenty-four hours have passed.”
“WHAT?!” Kazekiri and Ryoko shouted at the same time.
2
Alex grunted as he leapt backward, avoiding a giant ball and chain that Nyx had created from a boulder she had transmuted with her alchemy. The massive ball with spikes all over it slammed into the ground. He winced as the earth broke apart, cracking, denting, breaking. That could have been his head.
Alchemists were a huge threat in combat. They didn’t need to carry weapons. They could create weapons from anything. What’s more, Nyx was a trained assassin who excelled at using a variety of different weapons. Alex had seen her make everything from swords and sentient whips to spears, sickles, and that massive ball and chain she’d thrown at him just down.
And that wasn’t the only thing she could do with alchemy.
Clapping her hands together, Nyx slammed her hands onto the ground. Alex barely had time to blink before the earth rose up on all sides, formed into nearly half a dozen hands, and tried to squash him flat.
“Hgggnnn!!”
Alex called upon his Aura of Creation and generated a shield. He pictured a dome surrounding him, protecting him. The hands came in, slammed against the silvery blue dome, and bounced off, though that didn’t stop their assault. Rather than be discouraged, the hands formed into fists and began punching his dome as though attempting to break it with brute force.
“I’m pleased that you can create shields now,” Voice Number Two opined. “However, a shield is the most basic form of protection you can make. Try expanding it to turn your defense into a strong offense.”
“Che! Do you really think this brat can do that? Look at him. He’s barely holding on as it is,” Voice Number One said. “You know if you used my powers, you could easily overpower this little girl.”
I’m not… gonna use… your power!
Alex screamed as though doing so would somehow give him strength. He strained his mind and imagined the dome surrounding him expanding, pictured it pushing the hands away—no, he pictured it destroying the hands.
Sadly, it was not to be.
A crack appeared in his barrier. More cracks spread from the one, expanding outward and multiplying until they covered the entire dome. Alex fell to his knees. There was a loud groan, like metal squealing when too much stress was placed on it. Barely a second later, a loud shattering sound echoed around him, and then the hands came down.
Darkness.
When Alex woke up again, he was lying on his back. Soft grass was underneath him, and his head was resting on a soft pair of thighs, which he recognized belonged to Nyx. They were firm but soft. The moment he opened his eyes, Nyx’s modest chest, beautiful facial features, and emotionless crimson eyes were practically in his face. The only features he couldn’t see were her chin and mouth.
“I died again,” he sighed.
“You did indeed.”
“You got your ass kicked, you fucking pussy.”
Shut up…
“I wish you would fuck some pussy.”
I said shut up!
“You lasted longer this time,” Nyx said, and Alex didn’t know if she was complimenting him or being condescending. He knew she wasn’t the type, but his own feelings of inferiority made her words sound more mocking than complimentary. “The last time we fought, you only lasted five minutes. You lasted ten minutes this time.”
Alex sparred with Nyx every day. Of course, they’d only known each other for about two and a half weeks now, but he had already learned a lot from her. Unlike King Lucifer, who was all power, and Azazel, who used brute strength, Nyx was a finesse fighter. She relied less on power and more on tactics designed to deceive her opponents.
That wasn’t to say she couldn’t just overpower him, because she could, and she did sometimes. Nyx had created tidal waves of earth that crushed him, built giant walls that suddenly shot spikes to impale him, and had even transmuted a miniature sun by creating plasma with her alchemy and dropped it on his head. She had power in spades. She just preferred not to use it.
I guess that’s an assassin for you.
“You are still too reckless, however,” Nyx added. “You’re very smart, but you always try to attack me head on. You rarely use any feints or tactics meant to deceive, which is what you should be doing when faced with an opponent you can’t overwhelm through power alone.”
“Ugh… I know.”
“You also don’t ever counter my attacks,” Nyx continued. “I’ve noticed it before, but it seems you have problems getting the timing of my attacks down. If you can’t learn to read my movements, you’ll never be able to time my attacks, which means you won’t be able to counter me, and if you can’t counterattack, then you’ll be stuck playing reactionary defense.”
Alex had noticed it before, but Nyx, who rarely ever talked, had a lot to say on the matter of his combat abilities, or his lack thereof. It was interesting. Nyx barely said two sentences at any other time. However, after they finished fighting, she could lecture him for an hour or longer, depending on how many flaws she found in his combat abilities.
Nyx frowned at him. “Are you listening to me?”
“Of course I am.” Alex smiled from his position on her lap. “Thank you, Nyx. Your advice is always helpful. It’s because of you that I lasted five minutes longer than last time.”
Nyx’s eyes widened as she looked away. “S-so long as you’re taking my advice to heart, you’ll continue to grow stronger.”
“I know. Thanks again.”
Since their battle was over, Alex shut off the simulator. The area around them, an alpine prairie with numerous holes, pockmarks, scars, and trenches, undulated and wavered before slowly vanishing like it was a holographic image. What replaced the prairie was a large room made of white cube-shaped tiles.
This was the simulator, named Mr. Simulator by Gabrielle, which relied on dimensional transphasing technology to create realistic simulations of various locations across the galaxy. Alex wasn’t sure how it worked yet. Gabrielle had explained it to him, but she used a lot of terms that he had never heard of. However, he was studying up on the various theories and principles behind dimension-based technology, so he would hopefully be able to recreate it at some point.
“You can take a shower first,” Alex said to Nyx as they left the simulator.
Nyx nodded, paused, and then said, “You’d better not peep on me.”
“Don’t worry. I would never do something like that.”
“I mean it, don’t peep on me.”
“I won’t. I promise.”
Nyx frowned, then slowly nodded, and then left the laboratory. Alex watched her go before deciding to work on some of his experiments. He had a few that Gabrielle didn’t know about because he was hoping to surprise her. As he sat down at the workbench he and Gabrielle spent so many hours at, he grabbed a hydrospanner, a screwdriver with several configurations, a welder, several wrenches, and an object that looked like a sphere that was at least 24 centimeters in circumference.
I wonder if I can finally make that D-sphere work properly…
3
Classes were surprisingly boring. Gabrielle hadn’t realized how easy they would be, but thinking about it logically, perhaps she should have. The humans in this solar system didn’t have a very high level of math or science. All of their classes taught subjects that she could do in her sleep. On the other hand, she did have a history class, which was actually kind of interesting, but she’d never been a big fan of history, so listening to their teacher lecture was hard on her ears.
It was lunch time now, and Gabrielle was eating alongside Selene, Serah, and the still stuck together Kazekiri and Ryoko.
“Damn it! I can’t eat with only one hand!”
“Stop swearing! It’s vulgar and is a corrupting influence on today’s youth!”
“Shut up, you damn Rule Book!”
“Don’t call me Rule Book!”
Kazekiri and Ryoko were arguing as they tried to eat their lunch, but because they were arguing so much, it looked like they had forgotten about their food. They reminded Gabrielle of her sisters. Sadly, unlike Ariel and Michelle, Gabrielle couldn’t make them get along by getting them both angry at her instead. That was why she used Mr. Adhesive. Extreme measures would be required to make these two become friends.
I’d like it if all my friends could get along.
Speaking of getting along…
“Selene, Kazekiri, Ryoko,” Gabrielle said suddenly. “I wanted to apologize to you for what happened the other day.”
“The other day?” Selene blinked.
“You mean when we were kidnapped by that alien?” asked Ryoko.
“Yes.” Gabrielle nodded before pausing. “Wait. Do you remember what happened?”
Ryoko shook her head. “No, we don’t actually remember what happened, but Karen Kanzaki told us all about it. She said that an extraterrestrial kidnapped us and controlled our bodies using some kind of machine.” She shuddered. “To be honest, it gives me the creeps thinking about how somebody was controlling me and I didn’t even know it.”
“I’m sorry.” As though a weight were pressing down on her, Gabrielle’s shoulders slumped. “That was all my fault.”
She didn’t know how much Karen had told these three, so Gabrielle decided to simply tell them everything, about how she was the princess of Angelisia, how her father controlled the galaxy, how Alex was her fiancée, and how he was fighting against her marriage candidates to prove himself. She told them everything. They were her friends. It was only right.
“Whoa,” Ryoko murmured. “I had no idea that’s what was going on. So Alex is a candidate to becoming the Emperor of the Galaxy? That’s crazy.”
“Somehow… I’m not as surprised as I feel I should be,” Selene added with a sigh. “This sounds exactly like something that reckless idiot would do.”
Kazekiri frowned. “So, Alex… he’s marrying you?”
“Yes!” Gabrielle beamed. “Alex and I are engaged!”
She still had to work on getting Alex
to confess his feelings to her, but she knew that he loved her, that he wasn’t just protecting her because of altruistic reasons anymore. Fortunately, she had Michelle with her now. Her sister said she was going to find a way to make Alex confess his feelings. She trusted Michelle on this matter.
“I… see…” Kazekiri looked away. “I had heard about all this the other day when I was rescuing Alex from the Mars Penitentiary, but I guess this confirms it.”
“You seem awfully depressed, Rule Book.” Ryoko leaned over and grinned. “Were you hoping to have Alex for yourself? Don’t tell me you’re secretly in love with Alex? You were always complaining about how he kept breaking the rules back when he went to Primary with us.”
“T-that’s not it at all!” Kazekiri shouted. “I don’t love Alex! He’s just… he’s just a friend, okay?!”
“Still, it is pretty depressing,” Ryoko mused. “I kinda had the hots for Alex myself, but it seems he’s already taken, and by a sexy alien princess to boot! I can’t compete with that.”
“You like Alex?” Gabrielle asked. “In that case, why don’t you just join us?”
“Excuse me?” asked Serah, frowning.
“Yeah!” Gabrielle brightened as another idea came to her. “You and Kazekiri can both marry Alex with me! Then we can become one big family!”
Ryoko laughed. “That’s quite the joke. You’re a pretty funny girl.”
Gabrielle crossed her arms and pouted. “I’m not joking. Why does everyone always think I’m joking?”
“Because polygamy is illegal,” Kazekiri said. “It corrupts the moral backbone of our society!”
“I don’t know what polygamy is,” Gabrielle confessed, “but it’s perfectly acceptable for a man or a woman to have more than one spouse where I come from.”
Everyone froze at her words. They stared at her with eyes so wide Gabrielle thought their eyeballs might simply roll out of their sockets. Had she said something wrong?
“You mean polygamy is legal in the rest of the galaxy?” asked Serah, her voice trembling. “A woman can have her own harem?”
“Harem?” Gabrielle tilted her head.
A Most Unlikely Hero, Vol 6 Page 3
