"Stop following me."
Seele marched briskly down a street in Berlin.
She had already hidden her trusty metal pipe and hooded cloak beneath a water tower on the roof of a small building.
Her secret hideout.
Right now, at least on the surface, she looked like nothing more than an ordinary, incredibly pretty teenage girl.
She probably would have drawn even more attention if the impatient glare on her face did not look so murderous.
Though, to be fair...
The tail following right behind her was drawing plenty of attention all on her own.
And Seele just could not shake her off.
The girl trailing after her had a rather unusual set of drill-like...
Ahem.
Spiral curls.
Her face was just as striking.
But what really caught people's eyes was the heavy exoskeleton wrapped around her legs.
A petite girl wearing heavy mechanical armor was already a strange contrast.
Naturally, it drew even more stares.
But Seele absolutely hated drawing attention.
Finally, she ducked into another narrow alley.
The moment Bronya followed her inside...
Thud.
She was pinned against the wall.
Seele slammed one hand against the brickwork, trapping Bronya with her back pressed flat against the dead end.
Nowhere to run.
"I told you."
"Stop following me."
Seele spat the words viciously.
Her free hand dropped to her waist, then snapped back up.
A sharp pocket knife was now pressed directly against Bronya's throat.
"Listen carefully."
"I am not in a good mood right now."
Seele narrowed her eyes.
"Don't mess with me."
"..."
Bronya stared at that familiar face, now twisted into such an unfamiliar expression.
No.
Wait.
In terms of personality, there actually was something faintly familiar about it.
The girl standing before her was very much like the other Seele in her memories.
Covered in thorns.
Unstable.
Sharp-tongued.
Absolutely impossible to deal with.
But...
"Bronya has something she needs your help with."
She paid no attention at all to the blade resting against her neck.
Honestly, the Seele standing before her was a complete amateur.
Her grip on the knife was painfully unrefined.
Bronya was entirely confident she could disarm her in a split second and pin her to the ground without any effort.
And yet...
"Hah? You want my help?"
Seele scoffed as if she had just heard a terrible joke.
"Hilarious."
"What the hell could I possibly do for you?"
She leaned in closer.
"And for the sake of argument, even if I did have a way to help... why would I?"
Bronya did not miss a beat.
"Bronya can tell that something is troubling you."
She met Seele's hostile gaze without flinching.
"Bronya can help you resolve it."
"In exchange, you will help Bronya afterward."
"Based on the fragments you let slip earlier, there is a black-market human trafficking ring operating in this city."
"And someone you know got caught up in it."
"Correct?"
"Bronya can help you find them."
She laid out her deduction in one quick, seamless breath.
Faced with that...
"..."
The Seele standing before her finally fell silent.
But that silence did not last long.
"Bronya this, Bronya that."
"So annoying."
"Using your own name in the third person... what are you, a toddler?"
Seele's retort was sharp.
"I don't believe a word of it."
The sharp blade pressed against Bronya's throat did not move an inch.
Instead, the alley girl kept going.
"We only just met, and you're already throwing yourself at me this eagerly?"
"And how do you even know my name?"
"Have you been stalking me?"
With every word, her grip tightened.
The edge of the knife pressed harder against Bronya's skin.
But those were exactly the questions Bronya did not know how to answer.
What was she supposed to tell the Seele standing in front of her?
You look exactly like someone Bronya knows, and you even share the exact same name?
It was the truth.
Yes.
But it was still an incredibly hard pill to swallow.
Because the reality behind that truth involved time travel.
A gap of more than fifty thousand years, at that.
Even if it was the absolute truth...
So what?
At the very least, the short-haired girl in front of her would only scoff at it.
Bronya knew for a fact that saying it out loud would only backfire spectacularly.
So...
"Bronya does not want to lie to you."
Bronya looked straight into this Seele's eyes, emphasizing every word.
"But there are some things Bronya cannot say."
"Huh?"
Extreme annoyance twisted Seele's face.
A long beat passed.
"You refuse to tell me anything, and you expect me to just trust you?"
"Are you screwed in the head?"
Spitting out the blunt insult, she looked Bronya up and down.
Her gaze lingered for an extra second on the exoskeleton wrapped around Bronya's legs.
Then...
"You said you could do me a favor, and in exchange, I help you."
"Fine."
Seele flashed a wicked smirk.
"I'm definitely not letting you get involved in the stuff you just mentioned, though."
"But you can do me a different favor."
She narrowed her eyes.
"Call it a commission fee."
"How about you hand over some cash?"
"Let's start with a hundred and eighty thousand."
"Though the more, the better, obviously."
"..."
Bronya did not reply.
The person standing before her really was not Seele.
Seele would never wear such a greedy, mercenary expression.
But even so...
"Bronya has no money."
The gray-haired girl shook her head.
"Then we're done here."
Looking thoroughly disgusted, Seele put away her weapon and turned her back on her.
She figured she had just wasted her time entirely.
However...
Even though she had clearly noticed that the stranger's exoskeleton had to be worth an absolute fortune, she did not try to snatch it.
That lingering sliver of decency led her to make the right choice.
After all, even though the current Bronya was no longer the Herrscher of Reason who wielded her predecessor's legacy, her raw combat prowess was still lightyears beyond any normal person.
Even without deploying the quantum robot, Project Bunny 19C, she was more than capable of wiping out an entire special ops unit single-handedly.
And that was in a direct frontal assault.
If she resorted to assassination...
"Bronya is indeed broke right now."
She called out, stopping Seele just as she was about to walk away.
"But Bronya has a way to get a lot of money."
Seele froze in her tracks.
Then she slowly turned around and eyed Bronya with naked suspicion.
"What way?"
Seeing that she had caught her interest, Bronya closed the distance between them.
"Before Bronya tells you, can you tell Bronya exactly how much you need?"
"And..."
She met Seele's gaze head-on.
"Even without an exact number, Bronya can tell you need a massive amount."
"And you need it fast."
"So... why the rush for so much cash?"
"..."
"That should not be a secret you cannot share, right?"
Bronya had been watching Seele's face closely.
She knew exactly what she was doing by pressing the issue.
Sure enough...
"Fine."
"I'll just chalk it up to my rotten luck today."
Seele let out a long sigh, then crooked a finger at Bronya.
"Come with me."
"Where to?" Bronya asked.
"Where I'm about to drop a fortune, obviously."
Seele did not wait for a reply.
She turned on her heel and led the way without looking back.
Bronya hurried after her.
Watching that familiar back, with whatever expression the girl was making hidden from view, the resemblance was uncanny.
For a brief, quiet moment, the knot in Bronya's chest loosened.
She finally relaxed.
But letting your guard down at the wrong time was never a good idea.
Because right then...
"Target confirmed."
"Evacuate the civilian perimeter immediately."
A heavily armed special ops unit was already in position.
A spotter had set up on the roof of a nearby high-rise, their scope locking onto Bronya.
Or rather, onto the figure of Seele walking beside her.
Truth be told, if Bronya had not just dropped her guard, her anti-reconnaissance instincts would have pinged the strike team in a heartbeat.
But that brief lapse of nostalgia had created a disastrously timed blind spot.
And these operatives were ready to exploit it.
"Prepare for capture."
"Target: the Sixth Herrscher!"