That was the end of the charade — completely, irrevocably blown.
Her eyes darted every which way, landing on the Magic Stone lamp overhead, then dropping to her own feet, anywhere but Haimer's face.
And before Hanasaka Warabi even had a chance to recover, two small figures had already closed in on her.
It was Aihara Enju, dragging Hiruko Kohina along with her — both pairs of big eyes shining with utterly genuine warmth.
"Thank you, Warabi-nee-san!"
Aihara Enju and Hiruko Kohina said it in perfect unison, their voices bright and clear as bells.
Enju in particular gave the orange hoodie she was now wearing a deliberate little tug, beaming a smile that showed every one of her small white teeth.
"And it smells so nice too! Enju loves it so much! Warabi-nee-san is the best!"
Even Hiruko Kohina followed suit — she gave a small nod of agreement, then reached up to touch the beret sitting on her head, and added in her quiet way:
"Hat. Like."
It was an absolute critical hit.
Hanasaka Warabi had no defense against this whatsoever. She froze completely. Because in their usual dynamic, everyone gave as good as they got — even affection came wrapped in barbs and bickering.
She had no idea how to handle a point-blank, no-tricks-attached assault of pure sincerity like this.
Haimer watched the whole thing unfold with a deep, quiet warmth spreading through his chest.
It looked like these two new little ones would get along just fine with Warabi.
Actually, if he had to be honest.
"Get along just fine" was probably an understatement.
The more likely outcome was that these two would have Hanasaka Warabi completely wrapped around their little fingers.
Then again, that was what happened when you pitted blunt sincerity against a tsundere. It was a natural predator-prey relationship.
But that was fine. It was more than fine.
Because when it came to the whole Familia —
the ones who needed the most looking after were precisely these children, each carrying their own wounds, each so acutely, painfully sensitive.
A good beginning meant everything.
It was worth more than almost anything else.
"Alright."
Haimer clapped his hands once, drawing everyone's attention back to him.
"Since you're all so happy with the clothes, save your thank-yous for later — there'll be plenty of time for that."
"For now, it's not early anymore. Let's get the important business out of the way first."
He gestured toward the staircase.
"There are plenty of empty rooms on the second and third floors. Go pick one you like and settle in."
"Bedding and daily necessities are already stocked in the cabinets. If anything's missing, ask Ryu or Maria — they manage the household."
"Once you've settled in, come to my room."
"I'll be waiting for you there."
And so.
Some time later.
Second floor. The master bedroom.
The spacious room was bathed in the soft, amber glow of Magic Stone lamps.
Heavy curtains had been drawn tight across the windows, shutting out every eye from the outside world.
The massive obsidian round table had been pushed to one side, clearing a wide, open space in the center of the room.
Haimer sat in the single armchair beside the bed, turning a long, slender silver needle idly between his fingers.
The very tool used to pierce the fingertip and coax the Divine Blood to flow.
Before him, the four newest members — the Holy Emperor, Tendou Kisara, Aihara Enju, and Hiruko Kohina — stood in a line, visibly ill at ease.
Onigawara Rin, Kikakujou Mary, Nomura Satori, Hanasaka Warabi, Inaba Tsukuyo, and Amou Kirukiru had all crowded in as well.
Fortunately, the master bedroom was large enough.
Even with this many people packed inside, it didn't feel cramped — if anything, all the warmth and noise only made the room feel more alive.
As for Hestia —
she had been deeply mindful of the fact that the Grace ritual was a core secret of the Haimer Familia, and had very graciously taken herself off to sprawl on the soft sofa in the first-floor hall.
And so.
Looking at the four newcomers, whose bodies were clearly taut with nerves, Haimer spoke in a gentle, unhurried tone.
"There's no need to be so tense." "It's just a ritual."
"It'll be over quickly, and there won't be any pain at all."
"Think of it like a mosquito bite — you might not even feel it."
"All that will happen is that I'll use my blood to inscribe my mark on your back. That mark is the key that opens the door to your potential — the door locked inside your own body."
"Nothing more than that."
At that, Haimer leaned forward slightly, his gaze moving from one face to the next.
"So then. Who'd like to go first?"
"Me!"
The words had barely left his mouth.
"Kohina goes first!"
A bright, clear voice rang out immediately.
Hiruko Kohina had already darted forward, shooting her small hand straight up into the air.
"Kohina wants to get stronger!"
"Kohina wants to cut — wait, that's not — ah, no, that's wrong!"
Apparently realizing she'd said something she shouldn't, Hiruko Kohina went slightly frantic.
Which made it clear — this child.
Still couldn't quite break that particular habit.
Haimer shook his head helplessly, but without any real reproach — if anything, he found himself stifling a laugh at Kohina's flustered little panic.
"Alright."
"Kohina goes first, then."
Permission granted.
Hiruko Kohina immediately let out a small cheer, then bounced lightly up onto the large, soft bed with the easy agility of a cat.
Every movement was quick and clean.
Not a trace of hesitation.
Not a scrap of the self-consciousness you might expect from a young girl.
She reached straight up and grabbed the shoulder strap of her deep blue pinafore dress.
"Swish —"
One firm tug.
Then the knit top underneath followed.
Without Haimer even having to say a word, the girl had stripped her upper body bare in three efficient motions, revealing a small, slender frame.
The skin was pale — but covered, from shoulder to hip, in scars of every shape and size.
Knife wounds. Burns. Countless old marks, long since healed over.
Those scars crossed and overlapped one another like a vicious net, draped over a back that should have been smooth and unblemished.
And scattered among them, a few fresh bruises — clearly left not long ago at all.
At the sight of it, the air in the room seemed to solidify for a brief, heavy moment.
The Holy Emperor pressed her hand to her mouth, her eyes filling with pain.
As someone who had grown up surrounded by peace, she couldn't begin to fathom what a ten-year-old girl must have lived through to have earned a body like that.
Even Onigawara Rin — brash, unflappable Onigawara Rin — had gone quiet, her expression complicated.
She was a warrior herself. She had her own scars.
But compared to this —
there was simply no comparison.
Her own wounds were nothing.
But Hiruko Kohina herself paid the stares no mind whatsoever.
She picked up the clothes she'd just taken off and, with somewhat clumsy but careful hands, folded them neatly and set them to one side.
Then she flopped down flat onto the bed.
"Thwump" —
Face-down, that small, slender spine looking even more delicate against the softness of the sheets.
Hiruko Kohina grabbed hold of the pillow with both hands and buried her face into it, giving it a contented little nuzzle — she seemed to like the soft texture enormously.
Then she turned her head to the side and fixed Haimer with those bright, shining eyes — eyes that held not even a shadow of shame or self-consciousness about the scars covering her body.
"Okay, Kami-sama, hurry up, hurry up!"
"Kohina is ready!"
Haimer nodded, rose from the armchair, and walked to the bedside.
He didn't say anything about the scars. There was no need. Those scars already existed — what he could give her now was the strength to make sure no new ones were added.
He raised the silver needle, ready to begin the ritual as he always did.
Pierce his own fingertip first.
Let the Divine Blood emerge.
However.
Before Haimer could even begin —
Hiruko Kohina, lying face-down on the bed, suddenly looked up at him with an expression of genuine puzzlement, as though she'd just remembered something important.
And asked a question that made the entire room go dead silent.
"Kami-sama."
"Don't you need to sit on Kohina's bottom?"
The moment those words landed —
instant chaos.
Kikakujou Mary, who had been mid-sip from a cup of water, made a sound like a burst pipe and sprayed it everywhere, then dissolved into a coughing fit.
Hanasaka Warabi's eyes went saucer-wide, her face screaming "what in the world did this child just say."
And the hand Haimer was holding the silver needle with froze completely in mid-air.
He looked at Hiruko Kohina — utterly innocent, not the faintest clue that she'd just said something jaw-dropping — and felt a vein in his temple begin to throb.
"...Who told you that?"
Haimer drew a slow breath and made every effort to keep his voice calm.
"Satori-nee-san!"
Without a moment's hesitation, Hiruko Kohina sold her source out completely.
That small finger pointed straight as an arrow toward the corner of the room.
There was Nomura Satori, pressed into the shadows, apparently attempting to make herself invisible — but the grin plastered across her face refused to cooperate, and she even had the audacity to wink in their direction.
"Satori-nee-san told me!"
"She said that when everyone gets their Grace for the first time, Kami-sama always does it by sitting on their back!"
"And that it's to help the Grace flow in better!"
"She said you have to press right up close, or the effect gets cut in half!"
The more Hiruko Kohina spoke, the more earnest she became — her voice had actually taken on the tone of someone presenting an academic argument. To prove she hadn't misremembered, she gave that bony little backside of hers an illustrative wiggle upward.
"So, Kami-sama, come on up!"
"Kohina doesn't mind at all!"
Mystery solved.
Haimer pressed his fingers to the bridge of his nose with a pained sigh, then turned his gaze with slow, deliberate precision toward Nomura Satori in the corner.
The green-haired little cat — a born agent of chaos if there ever was one.
So this was her doing.
Caught under Haimer's stare, Nomura Satori poked her head out from the shadows, stuck out her tongue, and arranged her face into a picture of perfect innocence.
"But what Little Satori said is technically true~"
"Kami-sama really did do it that way back then~"
"That feeling of skin against skin... even now, thinking back on it, Little Satori gets a little flustered~"
Indeed.
The faces of Onigawara Rin and the others had gone red as well.
Because.
Back then.
Their god had, in fact, used exactly that posture — straddling their backs, using his own body to hold them steady.
That sensation of skin pressed against skin —
and the feeling of the god's presence settling over them like a warm, sheltering weight —
Looking back on it now.
It really had been almost unbearably intimate.
The temperature in the room seemed to climb several degrees.
"You..."
"Don't listen to her nonsense."
"You're still too young."
"That kind of position — wait until you're older."
Haimer shot Nomura Satori a withering look, then turned back to Hiruko Kohina, who was lying on the bed wearing an expression that said quite clearly "oh, so it's not needed after all?" — faint disappointment written all over her face.
He reached out and gave her small head a gentle pat.
"Mm..."
Hiruko Kohina puffed out her cheeks slightly. She clearly found it a little unsatisfying — as if skipping a step meant something was missing — but she was obedient all the same. She settled back down, tucked her face into the pillow.
"Okay."
"Kohina understands, Kami-sama."
"Then I'll begin."
Haimer said no more.
His expression shifted — becoming focused, serious, entirely present.
The silver needle pricked his own fingertip with a delicate sting, and a single bead of blood welled up.
A red that was almost unearthly — faintly shot through with threads of gold light.
Divine Blood.
The key that could break open the door of potential locked deep within any mortal body.
The bond that would tie Familia and god together, inseparably, for as long as they both lived.
Haimer's gaze dropped to the small figure before him.
He did not hesitate.
A slight turn of his wrist.
That single drop of blood obeyed gravity and fell straight down —
passing through the air, landing at the very center of Hiruko Kohina's small, scar-covered back.
"Hmmmm —"
A pulse of red light burst outward from the point of contact, blazing like a field of red spider lilies blooming all at once.
That light swept across Hiruko Kohina's entire back in an instant.
The sight of it made every girl in the room —
the Holy Emperor, Tendou Kisara,
Onigawara Rin, Kikakujou Mary, every last one of them —
hold their breath.
They pressed forward, leaning in, desperate to witness this miracle unfolding right before their eyes.
Terrified that if they blinked, they'd miss something.
Was this... what a divine miracle looked like?
The Holy Emperor's eyes were wide open, her body tilting forward, trying to make out every detail of those sacred characters as they formed and took shape.
Tendou Kisara's breath had gone slightly quick.
This was it.
The miracle that could bring her parents back to life...
At that thought, the fire in Tendou Kisara's eyes burned hotter than ever.
And so.
Guided by Haimer's Divine Power —
a sequence of sacred script and a unique emblem — the mark of the Haimer Familia — rose slowly into being, inscribed deep into Hiruko Kohina's back.
Gradually, it surfaced into view.
[Name]: Hiruko Kohina
[Race]: Human
[Level]: Lv.1
[Stats]: Strength: I-0 | Endurance: I-0 | Dexterity: I-0 | Agility: I-0 | Magic: I-0
[Development Abilities]: —
[Magic]: —
[Skills]: 『Crimson Bane Factor』 『Twin-Moon Death Wheels』 『Preying Mantis』
It had to be said.
Hiruko Kohina's innate talent was formidable.
Just like Inaba Tsukuyo before her —
under the [Skills] column,
Hiruko Kohina also had three skills.
Skills:
『Crimson Bane Factor』:
A gift of blood from the lineage of the Cursed Children — and the brand burned into them by the world itself. Toxin Resistance. Growth rate of all base stats receives a significant boost. When emotions surge to an extreme, all base stats receive a temporary explosive increase.
『Crimson Bane Factor』.
The moment Haimer saw it, the answer came to him at once.
In the rules that governed the Lower World,
certain bloodlines carried a trait shared across an entire group — a characteristic so fundamental that all members of that group possessed it, a common skill born from that innate quality.
Just as the members of the Crozzo family — who had once saved an elf and been blessed with elven power in return — upon receiving God's Grace, could awaken the skill for forging magic swords.
『Magic Sword Bloodline』.
In the same way, this 『Crimson Bane Factor』 —
must be the common skill that manifested when those Cursed Children, who carried the Gastrea virus factor within their bodies, received the [God's Grace].
Ordinarily, this skill would have come with a severe drawback.
But refined by his own Divine Power, that drawback had vanished entirely.
In a way, he had personally crafted a cheat code, just for these Cursed Children.
As for the other two skills —
those were the direct manifestation of Hiruko Kohina herself: her body, her abilities, her nature, her history, and the deepest yearning of her soul.
『Twin-Moon Death Wheels』:
Dual-blade mastery. When wielding two bladed weapons, [Dexterity] and [Agility] receive a significant bonus. High offensive drive grants a bonus to [Attack Speed]. Greatly amplifies the combat technique [Spinning Slash], and when spinning at high speed, allows the user to cut down projectiles from targets of equal or lower level.
『Preying Mantis』:
The ultimate manifestation of the Mantis Factor. Against all targets within the field of vision that are in a [Back Turned] or [Combat-Averse] state, damage dealt is doubled. After successfully killing a target, body functions are briefly refreshed and [Movement Speed] receives an explosive burst of acceleration, with duration scaling according to the strength of the defeated target.
____
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