Chapter 55: (47) Your move

 Our meal is promptly underway by this point. We ordered the tasting menu, which translated to common speech means various courses of small portions.

 ‘Well… More like they ordered that, and I followed, not really used to fine dining restaurants.’

 The closest thing I had was a company meal where I was more occupied with buttering up my superiors than eating. Suffice it to say, I didn’t have many friends in the company.

 I must’ve had a weird look on my face or something because Haruna suddenly perks up and asks. “Is everything OK Yuumi? You look like you're remembering something.”

 I turn to her and with a shrug, admit. “Yeah, you’re right.” I continue, looking off to the side. “Sorry, but please don’t ask about it.”

 “We weren’t going to Yuumi. We know you have a lot of baggage to deal with.” Haruna reassures.

 “Thanks girls.” I say to them with a light smile.

 A waiter walks into our private room with another dish, and we quickly leave that topic behind.

---

 “That was a big meal…” I trail off, almost ballooning at the sides.

 Never underestimate gourmet restaurants by their portion size, sure you’d be left hungry if it was the usual soup, main, desert meal. But when the portions are small, the number of courses is high.

 “Good, too.” Nanako adds. “Haven’t had a meal like that since starting this year at the academy.”

 I raise an eyebrow and ask. “Really? Don’t they have these types of restaurants by the blue dorm?”

 “Nope, the logistics of running a fine dining restaurant don’t work when your supplies only come in once a week. The restaurants in the academy take a lot of shortcuts.”

 I tilt my head in confusion at Nanako’s ‘Supply problem’ theory.

 “Hmm, Nana, I think you just confused her more.” Haruna comments.

 “Space.” Naeko adds.

 “Ohhhh. Yeah…” She tilts her head up before shrugging. “I don’t know how they do it here. Probably more effort. They have actual clients to feed, not just students with limited options.”

 While that answer doesn’t completely satisfy me, I’m letting this go on account of the waiter walking in with the bill.

 ‘Oh, boy, here comes the damage.’ I think to myself. More out of habit than actual worry.

 Haruna grabs the bill from the waitress and suggests a way to resolve the problem of who pays. “How about a game Guess the Stats?”

 “What’s that?” I ask.

 She takes out her deck and explains. “It’s simple. We take out a monster from our extra decks, then call high or low. The person who drew the monster with the lowest combined stats and called high has to split the bill with the one who drew the monster with the highest combined stats and called low. If everyone’s call was unanimous, the same rules apply, but the loser pays the bill in full.”

 I take a peek at the bill and shudder when I see

 ‘Hmm, well, the most likely outcome is I pay half.’

 “Sure, let’s do that.” I accept the game, taking out my extra deck and putting it on the table.

 Nanako and Naeko do the same.

 “As the one who suggested this game, I go first.” Haruna declares. “HIGH!”

 She places down a card.

 “Oh, crud.” She lets out after seeing the card.

 “Ahahahahahah!” Naeko openly laughs, then places down her own card, calling high.

 She celebrates by raising her arms in the air and shouting. “YES!! That’s how you do it.”

 I let out a chuckle and say. “Well, it’s my turn now. High.”

 ‘Oh hi fucker, could’ve used you in that last duel I almost lost.’

 Though that was my fault, so I don’t know why I’m blaming the card.

 ‘Right, celebration time.’

“Yeah, baby! That’s what I’m waiting for!” I yell, while raising my arms up in the air.

This makes the three laugh, not that they know I’m just copying this from a youtuber…

“I’m really going to pay this in full, aren’t I?” Haruna comments, brooding.

“Looks like it, my turn.” Nanako teases before calling high and placing a card down.

 ….

 ….

 ….

 We stood there in shock, looking at Haruna’s card for a good minute before the waiter reminded us we still had a bill to pay.

 Nanako did so, reluctantly.

---

14/SEP/35MT

 It’s late at night, the cheerleaders decided it was a good idea to go out drinking the night before the game… Yeah; I stayed behind. They were disappointed I wouldn’t join them but let it go, with little bother. The tournament starts after 1PM tomorrow and I am still a light drinker here. I’m not sure I’d be looking presentable.

 ‘Seriously, my handovers are nuclear.’

 Right now, it’s 11PM, so not too late, and I’m on my phone laying in bed in my jammies. They just went out a minute or two ago. I’m not exactly feeling horny enough to take advantage of this opportunity for that, with what’s at stake tomorrow and all.

 I find it kind of weird how much my libido has diminished. When I was a guy I had to do it practically daily but now, I don’t even think about that unless I see a hot girl pass by… Or Haruna flashes me again.

 ‘You can slice the sexual tension in the practices with a knife…’

 Surprise, surprise, leave four hot girls (yes I’m considering myself hot deal with it) with bendy sexual preferences alone doing dances for hours on end, getting sweaty and touching each other close to inappropriate places and you get a shit ton of sexual tension between the four.

 ‘It isn’t even only Haruna, the other two also constantly try to get me horny. Not to the point I have to call a timeout to discuss it, but regular enough for me to lock the bathroom door when I get back from practice… Just thinking about it is getting me wet… Shit.’

 “Tch.” I click my tongue and place my phone down.

 I start slowly drifting my hand down to my pajama bottoms, under the sheets. I’m bitting my lower lip and looking off the side.

 But before I can start reliving myself, I hear a whisper from an out-of-place shadow in the room's corner.

 “Greetings my lady.” It says in a uniform, unnatural voice.

 Pulling my hand back right away, I look around the room rapidly, turning from corner to corner, trying to find who just said that.

 Not finding the culprit, I lunge to the nightside table and grab my duel disk, putting it on in a swift motion, something I had already practiced before just for this very occasion.

 “Come out!” I demand, enabling the personal physical defence force field of the duel disk and extending its dueling blade, ready to strike at whoever intruded on me.

 A shadow in the corner of the room moves forward, like the darkness itself is moving.

 I jump out of bed and ready myself to defend against it.

 The shadow stops two meters in front of me and suddenly morphs into the shape of a female figure covered in pitch black bandages from head to toe. The figure kneels in front of me and greets.

 “Greeting my lady, I have a message from the master, your father.” it says, still in a deformed voice.

 Hearing this, I recoil before my face scrunches up in disgust.

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 ‘How dare he call himself my father!?’

 More important right now, I try to find what this… Ninja, for a lack of a better word, is. And I soon find a match in Yuumi’s memories. These were the elite assassins that my fathe— Fuck it, he’s my biological dad here. I’ll just call him father for simplicity’s sake. Anyway, they’re the elite assassins that my father trained. The cream of the crop of the complex assassination operation, he managed.

 ‘Which means I have to be careful with this woman.’

 I compose myself and respond. “How dare he call himself my father? After what he did to me, the only thing I would call him is a disgrace!”

 The assassin shudders and says. “My lady, it would do you good to not refer to your father in that manner, for he has given you a chance to recover the birthright he took from you.”

 “Oh, my! Such an opportunity!” I sarcastically state before pulling a card of each of the five extra deck summoning methods from my duel disk and showcasing them to the assassin, “I wonder what made him change his mind!?”

 The shadow stops kneeling and stands up.

 I take a step back, hovering the card of the physically smallest monster I took out from my deck, D/D/D Oracle King D’Arc, close to the duel blade. “Don’t try anything, I don’t see a duel disk on you and I’m not too keen on shotting the messenger.”

 The bandages covering the shadow’s head move organically, revealing the face of a woman with long, tailbone length bright blond hair and green eyes with a black face mask covering her mouth and nose.

 ‘Huh, she looks like G.B. Hunter got turned into a ninja. But she’s… Strangely familiar.’ I comment in my mind.

 It only takes me a second to recognize this woman.

 “Sonia?” I call out.

 She nods. “Yes, my lady.”

 ‘If Yuumi’s memories are correct, this is my… well, my personal maid since I was a little girl… What is she doing here? And as an elite assassin, no less.’

 I ask that question exactly and she closes her eyes in what I assume to be a smile before replying. “I have been trying to get the master to rethink his decision from back then, but I had to join the elite corp so he wouldn’t throw me out.” She says in a breathy voice.

 She then moves in closer and holds out her hand, placing it on my shoulder.

 I let her do it. There is no way they could’ve brainwashed her to where she’d be willing to kill me.

 We essentially grew up together. She was a real orphan, which my father recruited off the streets at only seven years of age. His reasons were selfish, like always. I was also seven at the time and he thought it would be a good idea for me to have someone my age serving as my personal maid.

 “You look so different since I last saw you, my lady.” She reminisces.

 “Well, it’s been… 3 years? No 4, right?” I struggle to remember when exactly my father threw me out.

 “Yes, my lady, 4 long years. And now he wants you to return to the estate.”

 “What was his message exactly? Just that?”

 Sonia takes a step back and knells once again. “This was his message.” She says, passing me a black sheet of paper with white ink on top.

 [Yuumi, my love, I know I was hasty with my decision, and in these four years since you’ve left, I’ve come to regret that deeply. I learned through my channels you have been recruited at a certain dueling academy. Judging by their decision to cast you as a mere cheerleader in such an important event, I can’t help but worry what sort of sub-standard institute got their hands on you. Nevertheless, I realize this has been your dream ever since that fateful day and I promise to right this wrong as soon as you return home. So, my lovely daughter, if you still harbour some love for your old man, return to the Katayama estate after this propaganda piece of a tournament is over. Your mother and I will be waiting.]

 

 …

 

 …

 

 ‘What a manipulative piece of shit!’ are my exact thoughts after reading this joke of a letter.

 I try my best not to punch a wall and say to Sonia. “Sonia, as much as I hate telling you this, I’m not returning to the estate. I have my own life now, and this letter tells me exactly what he thinks of his own daughter.”

 She stands up once again, and, not saying anything else, passes me another letter.

 I tilt my head in confusion, but begrudgingly grab it and start reading it.

 [

 DRAGOON CITY COUNCIL OFFICAL CALL TO ACTION.

• Due to activities at the border between 'Doraquen City' and ‘Cy City’, our sister city, we of the Dragoon City War council call every current and previously government dependent person (Including those outside of the City Welfare Care Program) between the ages of 18 and 35 to present themselves to an official recruiting station.

• Under article 27SB62, we hereby summon the subject with the registered name “Yuumi Matsunaga”, holder of the DCID Number 1768 4294 3160 ZW, to DCW HQ to be inducted into the 1st SV Training platoon, no later than 2nd of November 35MT.
• Failure to abide by these terms will result in the indefinite incarceration of the subject for the duration of the conflict and a prison sentence up to 30 years with a fine equal to 10 years of the subjects reported annual income.

 We took care of you. It’s time to repay your city.

 ]

 

...

 

...

 

  I chuckle after reading this, putting the latter down and sitting on the bed. 'This has to be a parody, "We took care of you?" HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAH! WHEN!?'

 “So this is their move, huh? Try to get me back by making me choose between the military and them?” I say in a downward tone of voice, my face stuck in a deranged grin.

 Sonia sits down next to me and responds. “Your father isn’t the one sending you a draft letter, my lady. The city council is. He’s just trying to give you an option here. Go back to him and get your record changed to Katayama once again, or take part in what’ll probably be the bloodiest conflict in the last 100 years.”

 I lower my head while closing my eyes tightly and breathing through my nose. “THOSE IDIOTS!” I suddenly yell. “Don’t they see the only thing that this is making me do is consider getting the fuck out of this godforsaken city?!”

 I was in a space station millions of miles from any government or landmass and there isn’t a single government or organisation that wouldn’t risk accepting me as a refugee. There is literally no better time for me to run away than now. I would question the sanity of the council, but drawing from examples from back home, I wasn’t ever too hopeful they’d be smart enough to see that doing something like this would only make me resent them.

 “Hell, why are they even trying to get me!? I’m way more valuable as a propaganda piece!”

 “You have two choices, my lady. And I hope you make the right one.” Sonia insists.

 Turning to her with a stern expression, I maintain. “Two choices? No, I have more than two choices here.” I lean back and start listing them off. “I could simply bring this up with the NWDA’s director, and if that doesn’t work, then I could defect.”

 “My lady, please be mindful of the words you say. I will have to report this conversation back to your father, and while I will be able to omit some aspects, he will get suspicious if there are too many exclusions.” She informs.

 I shake my head. “There’s no need for you to put yourself in danger by lying to him. You can just report this conversation truthfully… Maybe omit the last thing you said… And this part too.”

 She chuckles, hovering her hand over her already covered mouth. “It’s good to see that my lady hasn’t lost her sense of humor, even in these trying times.”

 “Well, I admit, I do often cope with humor. But in this case, it’s something else entirely.”

 Sonia tilts her head to one side. “And what is that, my lady?”

 I drag my lips into a deep smile. “Do you ever feel like the whole world’s out to get you? Because that’s what this feels like.”

 She tilts her head to the side in a inquisitive manner and says. “Sometimes that’s… just… life, my lady.”

 I turn to the duel disk I grabbed when Sonia revealed herself. “The thing is, there’s something else I’m feeling.” I place the card I was ready to summon to defend myself against the ‘Assassin’, making a female knight clad in silver armour appear in front of me.

 I stand up and turn to Sonia, who was shocked by the monster in front of her. “The entire world might me out to get me, but for the first time, I feel like I can take it on.”

 Sonia stays there frozen for a moment before standing up herself and showing me a mischievous grin. “Just like old the times then, my lady?”

 I simply nod.

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