Chapter 27: Mashu Kyrielight #1

Mashu Kyrielight thought she should be dead. She had knowledge about her set life-span, how she was created from artificial fertilization and genetic editing, not dissimilar to a homunculus and as a result given eighteen years to live. But her eighteenth birthday came and passed and it was like any other normal day and somehow she didn't die. She couldn't believe her luck. Perhaps it was her destiny to always remain as a failed project, something which didn't even had the proper manner to die out when it's time came. She was not a human, not really, and neither was she a proper servant. If anything she was just a burden.

"So, I read your name from the files." A voice said. "What kind of a name is Mashu Kyrielight?"

Mashu Kyrielight was a young woman with short lilac hair, lavender eyes and fair skin. She wore a pair of rectangular framed glasses, a grey hoodie over a black vest over a white-collar shirt, a red tie, a black skirt and tights with brown shoes.

She expected the campus guidance counselor to comment on her choice of clothing. After all, wasn't she here because her demi-servant outfit had been deemed 'highly inadequate' to be worn around on campus. Mashu couldn't really fault the administrators. The skin-tight black and purple armor did resemble an extremely short-mini dress that exposed her butt, emphasized her breast and revealed her panties.

She expected the guidance councilor, someone named Shizuka Hiratsuka to make a joke about how if she wore her current outfit to the field, she wouldn't be in this mess in the first place. But from the looks of it, she wasn't available at the moment and in her stead was this man with the scary looking eyes, which reminded her oddly of Kadoc Zemlupus.

But, lost in thought, Mashu Kyrielight forgot that the stranger had asked her a question. What kind of a name is Mashu Kyrielight, he asked. Huh, she had never really thought about it.

"I don't know how to answer that, senpai."

She didn't know why, but he didn't look like he was in her year, perhaps a year older, a second year university student. He definitely wasn't a teacher that much she could tell.

"I guess, I could have worded that better." He rubbed his chin in thought. "I was just wondering whether you were from abroad, a foreign student for example. You are a student aren't you?" He pointed at a blonde woman who was to his right by the door of the student counseling room. "Believe it or not, this woman right here is not a student."

Mashu Kyrielight looked at the woman and for a moment it felt like her blood had turned to ice. Fear, fear and dread she couldn't quite explain seized her. Her voice came out in a stutter.

"S-Saber?"

The blonde woman looked at her with an expressionless expression. "No. My name is Violet Evergarden."

The man with the scary eyes, black hair, with a single strand sticking out the top of his head looked at Mashu Kyrielight with a newly found interest. But before she could ask him what he was staring at, he turned to the blonde woman who had introduced herself as Violet Evergarden, having a striking resemblance to Saber, but definitely not Saber and blinked a couple of times, as if he was seeing her in a new light.

"Now that you mention it, she does look similar to Saber." Mashu could see the exact moment when he got an idea. His scary looking dark eyes twinkled brightly. "Evergarden-san, repeat after me."

"I think not, Hikigaya-san." Violet Evergarden said.

"No, no, this is for educational purposes." Hikigaya looked at her. "Kyrielight-san, you want to know right? You are hungry for knowledge yes?"

"Yeah, I guess." Mashu Kyrielight said, uncertainly.

"Well there you have it, Evergarden-san." Hikigaya said looking rather pleased with himself. "Kyrielight is with me. She is curious." He for some reason shuddered horribly when he said that word. Then to her astonishment he started mumbling to himself, ignoring the two other people in the room. "Is this thing highly infectious like some sort of disease? I should really stop hanging around near Chitanda."

Violet Evergarden kept to herself, with an ancient looking, but seemed to be highly functional type writer of all things. Mashu Kyrielight couldn't remember the last time she had seen such a relic of the past. But she was confused by something else altogether.

What this Hikigaya person was saying had all her attention.

"What is highly infectious?" she asked. "And who is Chitanda?"

"Well, Chitanda is a club mate of mine. And the thing that seems to be highly infectious is curiosity. I seemed to have caught it recently." He shrugged. "Though I can't really blame anyone except myself for being curious. Humans are curious by nature. We can't help ourselves, can we?"

He looked at her as if he wanted her to agree to that particular point. However in that fixed moment of time she lost her voice. There was a part of her, subdued, wary, suffering from all kinds of inferiority that didn't find the strength to voice out her agreement. After all she was not really human. A demi-servant, not even a real servant, who couldn't even help her master in his time of need. A burden, always a burden, that was she, who couldn't even die when her time was up.

"Hey, what's wrong?"

Mashu Kyrielight looked up and saw a glimmer of worry flash across Hikigaya-senpai's face. He seemed to be a keen observer, because she was certain of the fact, that she hadn't let her inner turmoil be shown across her face. But in a second, she realized that unconsciously, she had hunched forward in her seat, her hair covering both her eyes from sight, the glasses being an obstruction to the view with a lucky bit of reflection. He must have caught on to it.

"I'm fine, senpai." She said in a normal voice.

"Yeah, your body language says otherwise." He said swiftly.

"Body language?"

"Hunched shoulders for instance."

She hadn't realized that. Now that she paid attention, it seemed to be true. Rather a bit quickly she tried to straighten her posture. Having been caught at this moment of vulnerability, she blushed out of embarrassment. Hikigaya-senpai seemed to be unaware of that fact. Or more likely, he chose not to comment on it.

"I'm sorry, senpai. Who are you exactly?" Mashu Kyrielight hoped that didn't come out as something rude.

"I'm Hachiman Hikigaya. A second year student."

At least she knew his full name. Wait, the name Hachiman seemed a bit more familiar. Aha, that's right. She knew it.

"Are you Hachiman, the ancient Shinto God or Kami of war, divination and culture?" She didn't stop, there as memories of his tale flooded in. "You are famously credited with sending the kamikaze or 'divine wind' which twice dispersed the invading fleets of Mongol ruler Kublai Khan in the 13th century CE. That earned you the title of protector of Japan! "

He looked at her and blinked slowly.

"…Kyrielight-san, do you suffer from Chuunibyou?"

Mashu Kyrielight blinked as well.

"W-what?"

"Because that would explain why you are here at the guidance counseling room, waiting for Hiratsuka-sensei to show up from who knows where -"

"She is currently engaged in a meeting with Eikichi Onizuka sensei." Violet Evergarden supplied.

"Is that what we call it nowadays instead of a well deserved beatdown?" Hachiman Hikigaya huffed. "Seriously, I thought, I was late to this little intervention."

"You were." Violet said.

"Then how do you explain, Hiratsuka-sensei's tardiness."

He said the last word with a bit more emphasis, perhaps trying to do an accent. Mashu Kyrielight thought maybe he was trying to mimic the wordings and phrasings of Violet Evergarden. However, the blonde haired woman didn't seem to bat an eye at such immature behavior.

Instead she replied in her own, sullen, inflectionless way.

"It's a teacher's prerogative."

"To be late?" Hachiman persisted.

"That's what I was told." Violet Evergarden said without a trace of humour in her voice.

It was rather eerie how she talked, but Mashu wasn't worried about it too much. At least she wasn't Saber. That single thought provided her with a silver lining which could last the entire duration of the meeting, as and when, Shizuka Hiratsuka-sensei arrived.

Till then, she would like to keep her curiosity to the minimum and not look too much at the senpai, who wasn't all that scary, but definitely weird and strange, who to her eternal shame was not the Hachiman of legend.

Seriously what made her think of him as a heroic spirit.

Mashu Kyrielight tried not to blush a dark shade of crimson out of embarrassment at what she had assumed his identity to be just a few moments ago. However this time around, Hikigaya-senpai didn't seem to let her have the courtesy to remain willfully ignorant.

He smirked at her.

Mashu Kyrielight to her horror blushed even more.

A/N: Okay, this chapter had a tinge of seriousness which might continue if you pick the continuance option.

With that said here are the options for the next chapter:

Option 1: Mashu Kyrielight (Continued…)

Option 2: Chizuru Ichinose (Rent-a-Girlfriend)

Option 3: Moka (Rosario + Vampire)

Option 4: Kurumu (Rosario + Vampire)

Option 5: Itsuki Nakano (Quintessential Quintuplets)

Please pick any of the above options,

Or suggest a voter list in the review section.

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Won't betray your dreams.