episode_0297

“Screech! Why did they do that?!”

The idea our Violets came up with, if it were a game, would be an event yielding at most ‘Research Power +1’.

However, whatever happened in the lab, Bernike had completely taken control of Mister Yurik.

“She’s a witch! A witch!”

As a result of the terrible master-servant reversal, Mister Yurik (the Doctor) had been re-assigned to Mister Yurik (the Slave).

Because of this terrifying incident, our Violets had to suffer.

“Uwaaang! That old maid is looking at us suspiciously!”

Let’s think about Ennis, who we captured before.

That woman was a good, obedient slave, and not just that?

She also made us all sorts of interesting magic staffs.

But that old maid witch kept spouting nonsense at the drop of a hat.

“I said, let’s open your head, okay? You said it was a clone! You said you wouldn’t die?!”

“No!”

Turning that crazy woman into a slave was a reckless choice.

Realizing our mistake, we quickly decided to get rid of her from the lab.

“Can I come again? Even remotely?”

“Oh, forget it, just do your work first!”

I don’t know why I ever thought of such a strange idea. I must have been crazy.

What we needed to do now was handle the various cleanup tasks before the Professor began long-term research.

As soon as we entered the Western District, we frequently felt suspicious gazes.

“Someone keeps following us!”

“Isn’t that perception distortion? That person’s features are indistinct! Something’s strange.”

Perception distortion magic is tricky to break through if you don’t know how to counter it.

To avoid causing any sense of incongruity—and to avoid being caught by CCTV or surveillance devices—it’s a complex camouflage system that scatters highly sophisticated light spectrum distortion, strange white noise, and weak ether waves that subtly affect the mind.

That’s why the Federation truly hated it, and even among the clans, only those who colluded due to its danger would sell it.

Even our Violets found it difficult to obtain unless it was smuggled.

Of course, there’s a breakthrough. Our Violets are numerous, and if we search where perception gaps occur, something will turn up.

Perception distortion is half-broken the moment its distorting effect is perceived.

Those who have used it a lot can see through it even faster.

That’s why the gazes directed at our Violets were unusual. Fortunately, they weren’t hostile.

“Anyway, ma’am. When do you have to finish?”

Bernike, who was sipping the coffee I gave her, answered gruffly.

“Excluding the university, this is the last place. Since it’s already been undergoing liquidation for several months, after a few more handover procedures, I won’t have anything to do with you anymore.”

“It’s rather small for a research lab.”

Drawing on the experience of us Violets, who are research lab experts, this place is modest.

Compared to Raplaxia’s secret lab or Magnabyss’s large-scale research facility with rows of human brains, this place is on the level of a university club.

“Correct. They say even a broken clock is right twice a day; they must have been talking about you.”

“No, is it really a university club?”

“I took in a pathetic fool who earned his doctorate but couldn’t get a job and was being exploited as an intern.”

Bernike was unexpectedly resourceful. I thought she was just a professor who only did research.

At this rate, she was no different from a businesswoman. Perhaps because she was an older woman, she had taken on many different ventures throughout her life.

“It’s efficient. I get to keep my money, and the fresh graduates get a title like CEO, lab director, or team leader, so it’s a win-win for everyone. It’s even better because I can treat it as an extension of graduate school!”

In short, Professor Bernike’s business model was to continuously exploit her graduated students. She was truly nothing short of a wicked witch.

“So, I have a lot to do. When I go back to the university this time, I’ll have to handle those fatties’ theses, and also look into the research lab side of things. Understood? Don’t move so slowly.”

Perhaps because of that, our Violets were needlessly subjected to nagging, and there were so many things we had to do. I have no idea how much more of this we have to endure.

“That’s enough for today. Next, we’ll go there.”

“Alright, ma’am.”

“…”

She would shut her mouth every time the word “ma’am” came out.

“Just a moment, I’ll go send those guys away.”

Suspicious individuals would often follow us.

Roughly two or three types of people clung to us: one group presumed to be Federation agents, and the other sent by Restraid.

Identifying them was simple; after a few initial encounters, the Federation guys and Restraid would cautiously contact our anonymous network line, inform us of the Professor’s key schedule, and send a semi-threatening message telling us to cooperate nicely.

This time too, men in suits, openly wearing armbands with the Restraid logo, approached us.

Judging by their build and level of armament, I’d say they were armored knights without their full armor.

“There’s no time, Professor-nim. When will the cleanup be finished? You need to participate in the project quickly. We’ll escort you instead.”

“Forget it. Where were you guys when Cascadia saved me? I have my own bodyguards, so I don’t need your help yet.”

As the Professor replied according to our pre-arranged script, the knights roughly nodded. If they’re sending knights directly, not just support units, it seems she’s definitely being treated as an important person.

Especially seeing as those knights were being so polite.

“We did as Seijis instructed, but I’m uneasy.”

It certainly was unsettling. It felt like being in the middle of a spy movie.

“Our disguise should be fine, right?”

“I don’t know, we changed our clothes and used silicone masks, but… should we increase the intensity of the perception distortion device?”

Still, these two were fine from a Violet-objective perspective. They contacted us first before revealing themselves. At least their goal of escorting the Doctor aligned with ours.

The problem was the third group.

“Ugh! My vision is going dark!”

“Emergency! Emergency! Unit 1442 has been hit!”

Unit 1442, who was taking over after taking the Professor to the hotel, fainted. Relying on my senses, which pointed to the clone, and the Violet tactical map, I rushed in one direction.

It was unknown assailants who took Unit 1442.

Five minutes later, the individuals dressed as pizza delivery drivers, whom we encountered in the alley, were extracting something from Unit 1442’s body.

“Uwaaang! I’m dead! Why am I dead? Someone tell me!”

“What? Are you the Federation? Or Restraid? Who are you?!”

“Tsk, we’ve been discovered…”

The pizza delivery guys sneered as if they had nothing to lose and took up combat stances. Silenced submachine guns and daggers were drawn from their pockets.

“If you don’t reveal your identities, you won’t make it out alive!”

“Doesn’t matter. We’ve secured the sample. Now… what? Why are there so many?!”

“Uwaaaaaah!”

The suspicious pizza delivery guys were grabbed limb by limb by the Violets who rushed them from all directions.

“Who are you? You! Aren’t you going to tell us?”

When we tapped their heads lightly with a hammer, just enough not to kill them, their expressions changed.

“This won’t do! Use *that*!”

“Huh? Ugh?!”

The pizza delivery guys’ arms began to grotesquely twist and mutate.

A sharpness reminiscent of a praying mantis’s arms! We were thrown back by the sudden monstrous strength.

“That, I feel like I’ve seen that somewhere before?”

A scene flashed before my eyes: Raplaxia’s mercenaries, whom Rigel had summoned to the year-end party.

In a flash, they had completely transformed into human beasts resembling insects.

“They transformed! They’ve transformed! Gregor Samsa!”

“No! That’s a Kamen Rider!”

“Are you Raplaxia?”

“Grooooowl!”

The creatures swung their arms as if denying my question. What a truly hideous sight; such wicked Kamen Rider fakes must be defeated.

Coincidentally, there was a magic spell I could use. I should try the spell I learned for testing this time.

“Vision Memory Chip Deploy!”

Unit 5032 raised its staff. From the tip of the staff, thin beams of light shot out one by one, intertwining to form a massive lightning bolt. Unit 5032 swung it.

-Crack!

As the enormous lightning whip struck the enemies, the human beasts were burnt black and sprawled on the ground.

What we had just used was Adriana’s Lightning Whip.

It was a powerful close-range intermediate attack spell, a preliminary step to the Flashstorm magic.

It was something Lera used, and indeed, its destructive power was unparalleled.

“It’s incredibly strong!”

The next moment, the creatures trembled. Steam suddenly rose from them. Was it due to the lightning?

“Oh, what? Their bodies!”

The creatures suddenly emitted steam and melted away. Only a black liquid, once human, remained on the floor.

“Did they use a concealment method?”

“That possibility is high.”

We had a hunch, but it was a shame we couldn’t find more clues.

After finishing the remaining work, we took the Professor back to the Central District.

In a few days, we would take her to the Southern District and hand her over to Restraid.

**

On the first weekend of April, Violet encountered unexpected news.

“The project has been delayed? After all the trouble I went through to organize everything, what a nuisance.”

Bernike grumbled upon hearing the situation. Key personnel who were supposed to participate, besides herself, had suddenly fallen ill or were injured, reducing the need to head west by one to two weeks.

Of course, she wasn’t too disappointed. She had obtained research material as enormous as an apostle.

She had gained the honor of participating in the early stages of a massive project that would overturn the world, something unique in the entire world, so perhaps it was even better than an apostle.

“Well, it doesn’t matter. We have plenty of time anyway, so I can just observe you more. Today, it’s an ultrasound examination and simple nerve stimulation observation.”

Little Broca slid out from behind her back. Violet flinched away from the disgusting mechanical tentacles and backed away.

“What? No way. Want a taste of electric shock?”

“Calm down and put that down. Of course, it’s not free.”

Bernike didn’t feel the need to further provoke the annoyed girl in front of her. She had a more rational and effective way to persuade this girl, Violet, after spending a considerable amount of time with her.

“Instead, I’ll buy you anything for dinner tonight. How about that?”

Bernike pulled out her trump card. For a moment, Violet rolled her eyes, contemplating. The Professor in front of her not only had a lot of money but also had a knack for gourmet food.

Seeing her hesitate, Bernike chuckled inwardly.

Over the past time, she had been able to grasp the tendencies of this one-person army known as Violet.

She had a stubborn side that was almost simple-minded, but precisely because of that, there were big loopholes. If you knew the loopholes, it was easy to exploit them.

“Hmm… alright. But it only has to be for an hour! And I’m going to eat something super expensive! Like a buffet!”

“A buffet, huh? Not really my preference, but I know a good place. Then let’s begin.”

Bernike smiled, watching Violet, who was delighted.

For now, it was all non-destructive testing, but perhaps someday, she could conduct various experiments, starting with dissection.

“Ma’am, you’re not thinking bad thoughts, are you?”

“Do I look like I am?”

Seeing Bernike, who seemed unusually cheerful lately, Violet, who had been lost in thoughts of the buffet, suddenly snapped back to reality.

After hearing about the concept of the Violet Network, this woman went berserk and actively insisted on dissecting her.

“You said ‘Violet,’ didn’t you? Professor Albert, researching in the current manner is just scratching the surface. Time is precious, so let’s extract the brain.”

“What?! Professor, I hope I misheard you.”

“If I rent surgical equipment from a lab I know and mobilize Eckhart University’s supercomputers, I can cleanly separate the brain and nervous system from this child’s clone while she’s still alive, connect them to life support, and construct a connectome. Not only that, but we could also precisely measure and simulate neuron-ether activity. Pereira. What do you think? Don’t you think it’s necessary?”

“U-uh, Professor-nim. That’s wrong, but…”

“Wrong? That child won’t die.”

Violet thought. If Professor Albert hadn’t tried to stop her, and if Violet’s military capabilities hadn’t been sufficient to reliably suppress Bernike’s rampage…

Bernike would have already snatched one of the dormant Violets and run off to dissect its brain and spinal cord.

“Are you crazy?! Violet isn’t a lab rat! She’s my student! Do you even know what that child went through in that damned lab to be saying such things?!”

It wasn’t until Professor Albert furiously deployed a fusion ray spell right in front of her that the Professor finally took a step back.

“…It’s something that must be done someday, Professor Albert.”

“Go get permission from the individual herself first. Until then, don’t ever bring that topic up in front of me again!”

Violet thought that thanks to Professor-nim, a big problem had been avoided.

However, that wasn’t the only troublesome matter Violet had to face.

While preoccupied with the Professor, the problem lay elsewhere.

“Uh, how do I teach studying?”

“Oops, it’s hard!”

That was the problem of tutoring her prospective junior, which she had thoughtlessly taken on.

**

Our Violet was the genius girl of Aegis Academy. She got every problem right, and her practical skills, from swordsmanship to various close-combat techniques, shooting, and magic, were all perfect.

Not only that, but she possessed the best unique ability, and had combat experience of life and death that even graduates, let alone her peers, wouldn’t have.

“There’s no one in this world who has died more times than us!”

“And no one who has killed more either!”

If there was a student who had killed more people than us, they definitely wouldn’t be a student. They would clearly be a wicked communist terrorist threatening democracy.

Anyway, thanks to this experience, our Violets always maintained top grades.

The treasure of Aegis Academy, even acknowledged by Principal Brecht.

However, our Violet faced a limit in front of Ariel, who was asking questions.

“Unnie, I don’t understand. Why is this problem like this?”

“That’s… hmm…”

We were straight-A students, the top of the entire school, but teaching others was a different domain than solving problems.

When we first started teaching, we only dealt with easy problems, but once we made some progress, we struggled with how to teach the more difficult ones.

“That’s strange…”

The teaching problems weren’t limited to theory.

From the rooftop garden inside the hospital, I taught Ariel about mana problems.

“Alright, like this, like this! Put strength into your arm! And move your mana! Then a sword aura will appear!”

“…I don’t know.”

Ariel couldn’t understand our mana control lessons.

“Ariel! Concentrate on what Unnie is saying. Like this! Like this! If you move your mana!”

“…It’s not working.”

Ugh, at first I thought Ariel was stupid. But that wasn’t the problem.

“Unnie, I think the solution to the formula you explained is wrong?”

“Huh? Really?”

“If you re-check the equation, a different solution appears. See, here, if you do this with this function… do you see?”

“Ahaha… right, Unnie must have made a mistake.”

“Violet Unnie…?”

Seeing Ariel looking at us with increasingly suspicious eyes, we got a headache.

It seemed we Violets had to admit we had no talent for teaching.

What should we do about this?

“Should we ask our friends for help?”

Irene was too busy with clan matters, so she was dismissed. Kalia’s grades were average, so she was dismissed.

Daphne was also smart, but she studied a lot normally, so she was busy and dismissed.

We didn’t know who else among the people we knew could help.

“Should we ask Instructor Frederick for help with practical training?”

“That’s not a bad idea.”

Indeed, unlike Mister Yurik, that crazy woman, and Professor Albert who were always doing something, Instructor Frederick had nothing to do other than watching my sparring and training.

As we were discussing various things, one Violet came up with a good idea.

“Wait! There’s someone who’s good at studying! Someone nearby!”

“You’re right! They haven’t been doing anything lately, have they?”

The solution was close at hand.

“Violet Command orders! Implement Violet Emergency Mobilization!”

Violet Emergency Mobilization, a trump card administrative technique for rapidly moving resources for important tasks.

It instantly moves important personnel and resources through coercive administrative procedures.

The power of emergency mobilization is invincible.

Thus, it didn’t even take an hour for us to drag Lucian to Ariel’s hospital room.

“Ariel! I brought you a new tutor!”

“Violet! You crazy brat! Let go of me!”

Ariel, looking at the dragged-in Lucian, quietly uttered a single sentence.

“Who is this Oppa?”

“He’s someone who will be your senior! My friend from Aegis Academy!”

“Senior, what nonsense are you-”

Ariel, who had been observing the situation, glanced at Lucian for a moment, then murmured with a slightly surprised expression.

“Wow, he’s a handsome Oppa…”

Lucian, who had been grumbling and trying to shake us off and escape, paused for an instant.

“Alright, Lucian. This is your prospective junior! See? Her name is Ariel!”

Lucian, letting out a sigh, asked.

“…So, Violet. What do you want me to do?”

“Tutor her! She’s preparing for Aegis Academy entrance!”

“Fine, I’ll give it a shot.”

Thus, the problem was solved. Good!