Chapter 137: Shut Up, You Depraved Old Hag!
Edward Newgate: Gurararara — all I did was let out a bit of Conqueror's Haki at the start, then spent the rest of the trip standing around doing absolutely nothing.
Edward Newgate: The whole thing was handled by Little Tornado and Lady Yukari.
Terrible Tornado: I was expecting more of a fight, honestly. Turned out he was just... pathetically weak.
Kaguya-sama: His body was barely holding together, and his only real trick was the worms — which Whitebeard-ojii-sama half-incapacitated before we even started.
Edward Newgate: Didn't expect him to fold that quickly! Gurararara!
Kaguya-sama: At least Whitebeard-ojii-sama technically contributed. I didn't do a single thing the entire time.
RawrSoFierce: ...Kaguya, I think you forgot about me. Your fellow benchwarmer. I said a few words and that was the sum of my involvement.
RawrSoFierce: The most useless person in the entire operation, by a significant margin.
"..."
Honestly, this had gone differently than Ryū expected. He'd watched enough of the Fate anime to have some vague idea of the setting, but the specifics had gone fuzzy over time, and he hadn't had a clear read on Zōken's actual combat strength. Add the concern about drawing Alaya and Gaia's attention, and he'd brought a full roster just in case.
As it turned out, they hadn't attracted any higher powers, and Zōken had been barely functional as an opponent.
Looking back, Kaguya alone could probably have leveled the Matou household without much difficulty. She was training in One Piece's physical discipline — close-range specialist, high attack, high endurance, high speed. Against magi, who universally had appalling close-quarters ability, that combination was practically a cheat code. A strong magus who let her inside their reach was already finished.
Crazy Diamond: I'm bowing down to the people with enough Points to cross worlds. Bottom-tier member solidarity — I'm crying over here with my 800-odd Points.
RawrSoFierce: I just had a vivid mental image of a delinquent doing the crying-face. Weirdly specific.
Eternally Seventeen: Oh my~ Admin is fantasizing about male Group members now. You must have been through something to arrive at this conclusion — yes, that's right, you've finally seen the light! Same-sex is real love; opposite-sex is just base instinct!
RawrSoFierce: Shut UP. You depraved old hag, your moral compass has completely snapped.
RawrSoFierce: Don't think I don't know what you and Yuyuko get up to.
Eternally Seventeen: ...Excuse me??
Yukari, freshly returned to Gensōkyō, stared at her screen with a blank expression.
What she and Yuyuko got up to?
...What did she and Yuyuko get up to?
They were close friends. That was all. An entirely normal, entirely innocent friendship.
And yet the Admin's tone suggested he knew something significant.
She was very curious. Burning with it, actually.
Not that she was going to ask. She was a youkai of dignity. She did not go running after scraps of information dropped by other people.
She was the Youkai Sage of Gensōkyō.
She had standards.
Eternally Seventeen: @RawrSoFierce — you're clearly hiding something enormous. Why not whisper it to me quietly~?
RawrSoFierce: ...I'm worried you wouldn't be able to handle the truth.
Kaguya-sama: Suddenly extremely curious~
Crazy Diamond: Curious +1
Wandering Little Planet: Curious +10086... does referencing China Mobile count as an ad? Can I get a commission? A few hundred Points would be fine.
Eternally Seventeen: Shoo. This is MY secret. Away with you.
Kaguya-sama: But the Admin already knows! And he's a man, which means Yukari-nee-san actually wants a man to know her little secret! The implications of this are deeply alarming!
Crazy Diamond: I'm detecting a distinct romantic undertone.
RawrSoFierce: ??!
Eternally Seventeen: !!?
A romantic undertone?? Yukari, the great and venerable Yukari Yakumo, single for however many centuries, suddenly developing feelings? Absolutely not. Preposterous.
This was Kaguya's doing. Kaguya had been influenced by the Admin and was now causing chaos in the chat. Yes. That was the explanation. It was definitely not Yukari's influence at work — she was a Sage, a figure of wisdom and restraint. Sages did not corrupt minors. Therefore: the Admin was the corrupting force, acting in secret. Case closed.
Having resolved this internally, she sent her message.
Eternally Seventeen: Since you're so determined — go ahead and say it in the Group, Admin!
Eternally Seventeen: I have no idea what you're implying, but my relationship with Yuyuko is a perfectly ordinary friendship. A completely normal and innocent one.
Eternally Seventeen: The Youkai Sage fears nothing!
RawrSoFierce: In the world you come from — the Touhou Project — the setting uses an open license that allows fan-created interpretations.
RawrSoFierce: In those fan interpretations, in approximately ninety-nine percent of cases...
RawrSoFierce: You and Yuyuko are depicted as a pair. The devoted swan kind.
RawrSoFierce: There's a reasonable chance you're a fan-interpretation Yukari to begin with. Which would mean... well.
Eternally Seventeen: !!!!!!!!!
Kaguya-sama: Oh. Yukari-nee-san, your orientation...
Admiral Kizaru: H... how frightening~
Edward Newgate: Frightening...
Eternally Seventeen: SILENCE. There is absolutely no possibility of that. I am CANON. Canon, do you hear me! Those fanfic writers need to apologize to me personally!
Eternally Seventeen: Adaptation is one thing — fabrication is another. The audacity of those doujin authors!
"..."
Yukari fired off her messages in a state of righteous indignation, then let out a slow breath.
She leaned back slightly.
Thought for a moment.
...Now that she was thinking about it, there had been times when Yuyuko looked at her with an expression that was just slightly — not quite normal —
...Hiss. Yuyuko wasn't actually —
Yukari felt that she was in danger.
If something happened without her noticing —
What would she even do?!
☆☆☆
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