After some moments of fooling around, Amesaki-senpai takes out her phone and call her colleagues for the reinforcement.

‘...Yes, we’re at the Kent Hotel right now. Yes, we’re currently resting up. What?’

I hear some barely comprehensible voice from her phone, and then she blushes all of a sudden.

‘N-No, I’m all alone at my room. I’m definitely not with someone right now. No I’m not! Why are you accusing me of lying?’

More incomprehensible voice from the phone.

‘I’m definitely not going to do that! Just mind your own business, Nao! Geez!’

With that, Amesaki-senpai disconnects the call.

‘Is everything all right, Amesaki-senpai?’ I ask her.

‘Yes, don’t you worry. Nao promised to come over with some of our colleagues in a while.’

‘That’s good to hear. But what’s with the last part of the conversation?’

‘There’s nothing wrong. As I said, don’t you worry.’

Her embarrassed expression tells me otherwise, but I don’t want to push her. Must be something Motome-senpai said to her, no doubt. And she definitely could tell that the two of us are sharing a room from the way Amesaki-senpai got all flustered.

She looks at the time.

‘There’s still more than three hours left. What shall we do in the meantime?’ she asks me.

‘Is it alright if you tell me all the missions you went through while being a civil servant?’ I request.

‘To be honest, none of them are worth much of a good story. However, since you have requested, I shall oblige.’

She starts telling me a few of her toughest missions yet. In some cases, they barely survived, and there were also unfortunate deaths. Even so, they could only move on.

‘Remember this well, Kagenashi-kun. Never take a mission lightly, or it’ll be the last one you take.’ she tells me in a serious tone.

‘I understand, senpai.’

‘That said, it’s not all bad. You get go broaden your horizon by travelling. Also, you get to meet all kinds of people.’

‘That sure sounds nice. I would love to travel around the world one day.’

Back in my old world, forget travelling, I couldn’t even afford a decent meal. Now that I’m earning lots of money, I could finally go to all sorts of places without worrying about my financial state. Best of all, I don’t have to travel all by myself.

‘I guess you could take it one at a time. All of you were travelling around Japan until you got interrupted, right?’

‘Yes. That’s true.’

‘Don’t worry. I won’t tell Principal Morifuji that you skipped school just so you could have fun.’ she tells me with a wink.

Drat. She sure is sharp when she’s not an airhead.

She chuckles when she sees my nervous reaction.

‘No need to get so nervous. I may be an airhead, but I can keep a secret if I have to.’

‘Thank you. I really appreciate it.’

‘Think nothing of it. I also used to take a quick breather when I was still the student council president at the Academy too.’

I look at her in surprise. ‘Seriously?’

She chuckles again.

‘I’m not as perfect as you might think. Even I need some time off every once in a while.’

She pauses.

‘I have to admit. I may have taken too many since Sakuya started to think that it’s okay for her to slack off as well.’

‘And she’s still doing it now even after she took over your position.’ I tell her drily. ‘At least, she is according to Ichika.’

‘Oh, don’t be so harsh on her. She could still get things done when it’s required from her. Who knows. You might end up like her when you take over her position.’

I shudder. ‘I hope not. The last thing I want to do is make things worse for everyone who have to cover up my slack.’

She suddenly touches my cheek with her hand so that our eyes meet.

‘I know you don’t want to disappoint those that believe in you. However, you must know when to take a rest before you break down and collapse.’ she advises.

I feel my cheek burning from her touch.

‘I-I understand.’ I stutter.

‘Good. It was my mistake, after all. I was too busy keeping up with appearances that pretty much everyone started treating me like a celebrity. Only Nao remained informal and friendly with me. As a result, I was known as one of the girls who are deemed impossible to court.’

She lowers down her head and sighs.

‘You don’t have to worry too much about that, senpai. You’re charming just the way you are.’ I try my best to comfort her.

She raises up her head while looking all hopeful.

‘Really? Do you really find me charming?’ she asks me with sparkling eyes.

‘Absolutely.’

‘I see…’

Her mood becomes much better, and she’s keep on smirking. Suddenly, she notices that she’s still holding my cheek. She quickly retracts her hand.

‘Sorry about that.’ she apologizes while blushing.

‘It’s fine, senpai.’

She puts her fist in front of her mouth and clears her throat.

‘Now then, allow me to tell you the time when I went to Antarctica. You see, there was a…’ she continues while trying to act like nothing had happened.

She told me a few more stories before it’s finally time to head down.

‘Shall we go?’ Amesaki-senpai asks me.

‘Yes. Let’s.’ I reply.

The other are already waiting at the exit of the escalator when we step outside. Motome-senpai and the manager are here as well. Sakuya stares intently at Amesaki-senpai for a while. Amesaki-senpai stares back while looking confused, probably couldn’t comprehend the reason of her kouhai’s stare. Then, Sakuya looks at me and shakes her head in disappointment.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

‘All those free time and the two of you didn’t do a single naughty thing? How could you, Akira-kun?’ she chides.

‘This is really a bad time for it, Sakuya-senpai.’ I tell her. ‘Besides, we’re not even going out.’

‘What is wrong with you? Didn’t I tell you to make a move on him over the phone call we had just now?’ I hear Motome-senpai whispering furiously to Amesaki-senpai.

‘Like I told you over the phone, mind your own business!’ Amesaki-senpai whispers back.

‘As I’ve just informed your friends, my staffs have been busy asking the guests to evacuate the building for the past few hours.’ the manager tells Amesaki-senpai and I. ‘We made sure to keep things extra low profile just in case the terrorists caught wind of what’s going to happen.’

‘Thank you for your cooperation. Has your employees evacuated as well?’ I ask him.

‘Yes. Both the guests and my employees are at a safe place right now.’

‘I see. Well, please head there yourself as well. With any luck, your hotel will still be in once piece when all of you come back.’

‘Even if in the unfortunate circumstances that it’s not, the government will make sure that you will get compensated for it.’ Amesaki-senpai adds.

‘Thank you. That’s very reassuring.’ the manager tells her.

After the manager left, I turn to the girls.

‘Right, let’s head to the function room.’

‘Some of my colleagues are already inside the room. Some are pretending to be normal worshippers, while one dressed up just like a pastor.’ Motome-senpai tells us on the way.

‘With the robe and everything?’

‘Yes. Coincidentally, he used to work as a pastor before he joined us. If he can’t fool those extremists, no one can.’

We pass by the receptionist counter, and I still see some staffs sitting behind them.

‘Didn’t the manager said that all his staffs had been evacuated? Why are some of them still here?’ I ask no one in particular.

‘I’ve asked some of my colleagues to disguise themselves as hotel staffs just in case the extremists happen to pass by the counter.’ Motome-senpai answers.

‘I see. Speaking of them, have they shown any signs of movements while we were resting?’ I ask next.

‘All of them are still cooped up inside their rooms. The good news is, they’ve expressed interest in the fake seminar since they wanted to use this chance to, and I quote, “educate the locals regarding the greatness of our Lord and Saviour since they know next to nothing about Him.”’ Madoka reports.

‘I guess it really helps that they’re such egoistical little pricks. Thanks for spying on them for us, Madoka.’ I tell her.

She shrugs like it’s no big deal. ‘It’s what I do best. Spying at unsuspecting people. Just like how I used to spy on you.’

‘Wait, what?’

‘Oops. I accidentally said that out loud.’

‘Hey, come back here! What do you mean that you were spying on me?’

Sadly, I can’t question Madoka further since we’re already at the function room. I need to turn on my serious mode from here on. We try to act nonchalant while entering the room.

I see some familiar faces among those pretending to be regular hotel guests. I’ve never seen the one pretending to be the pastor, though. Or rather, he’s just doing his old job after quitting it.

I choose to sit on a chair that’s placed somewhat in the middle. Everyone else chose their seats as well.

‘What time do you think they’ll come?’ I hear Saya asking softly from somewhere behind.

‘Self-important narcissists like them will always arrive late at an event so to show their supposedly superiority to others. I’m guessing that they’ll be very late.’ Madoka replies.

Turns out Madoka was right. They still haven’t arrived even though it was already half an hour to nine. Luckily, the civil servant who acts as the pastor knows how to conduct a real seminar about Christianity and starts talking about the origin of the religion and other boring stuff. Finally, when it’s about to be nine, they finally arrive. The doors are slammed open loudly, and in they come like some celebrities.

I counted twenty two of them, which makes them a group much larger than the one led by Hunter. The one walking in front is clearly the leader. She has the face of a European, but I’m pretty sure that’s not her real face.

‘Our apologies for being late, father. We had some important duties to take care of.’ she tells the pastor.

The fake pastor smiles tolerantly. ‘That is of small matter. Is there anyone else who might be joining us?’

The woman turns her head and makes a quick head count.

‘No. This is all of us.’ she confirms.

‘I see.’

‘Now then, allow us to take over the seminar. I’m pretty sure that our vast knowledge will enlighten these lost sheep far better than you ever can.’ she tells the fake pastor pompously while gesturing towards those of us at the audience.

‘There is no need for that my child, I can just-’

‘Stand down so that your superior can show you how it’s done.’ the woman interrupts rudely.

‘...Very well. I shall relent.’ the fake pastor agrees reluctantly.

A good acting from his part, I say. If he agreed a bit too easily, they might suspect that something’s off. After he stands down from the podium, the woman stands behind it with her subordinates standing behind her. Suddenly, she looks like a cult leader, which she is. All of them were so satisfied that none of them noticed that the doors closed all by themselves.

‘Now then, allow me to-’

Before the woman could continue any further, I quickly nod to Mashiro. She nods back and summons the gecko Destroyer right in front of them. All of us quickly take out our gas masks and put them on.

Before any of the extremists could even react, the Destroyer opens its mouth and breath out its sleeping gas. The gas is too thick, so I can’t see what’s happening for a minute. However, I hear some soft thuds, meaning that some of them are already knocked out. And that’s when things start to go wrong.

All of a sudden, I hear tons of loud buzzing noise. The next thing I know, the gas disappear in a flash. And I’m incredibly disturbed by what I see after the gas clears.

Flies. Lots and lots and lots of flies. Some are blue, some are green, some are gray, black and brown. They might be one fly each for every species discovered so far. Not that I would know. All I know is that there are easily hundreds of thousands of them without even making a rough count. Together, the buzzing noise they make is plain deafening.

I’ve always found these small bugs to be non-harmful and annoying at the worst time. That’s if there are only one or two of them in the near vicinity. Right now, there are so many of them that if I’m ever get stuck in a confined space with them as a way of interrogation, I’ll definitely break down and tell the one who’s interrogating me anything they want to know.

‘So, all this is nothing but a wretched plan to capture us, is it? YOU SHALL NEVER PREVAIL!’ the woman bellows.

Loud as the flies are, their mistress is somehow even louder. It’s like she’s speaking through a megaphone.

The flies are not the only ones flying around. Multiple fallen angels summoned by the extremists who are still conscious are hovering in mid-air. The gas that the gecko Destroyer breathed out only managed to knock out three of the extremists, which is quite a bummer. I guess we have to take care of the remaining ones by ourselves.

‘Mashiro!’ I shout.

Next thing we know, all of us are at an open field. Forget the extremists, even we don’t know where we are right now. However, that doesn’t matter. This place is empty for miles. No people, buildings and/or other fragile things, alive or no, are nearby. We can fight here without any worries. It's dark out here, so Mashiro summoned the bee Destroyer so that we could see by borrowing the fireflies' lights. It's not really bright, but it will have to do.

‘Heretics! To borrow the power of the otherworldly invaders, how blasphemous!’ the woman hisses. ‘Seize the small child with the Destroyer, my brothers and sisters!’

This coming from someone who betrayed her God and allowed a demon to possess her body? Talk about being a hypocrite.

Speaking of her demon, I could only think of one demon that’s possessing her. Naturally, I got the hint from all those flies. Beezlebub, one of the seven princes of Hell, also known as Lord of the Flies. Supposedly, he’s a demon with the head of a fly. This is going to be a tough fight.

While the extremists are all focused on Mashiro, I quickly go to Yui. She was about to take out a talisman, but I managed to stop her in time.

‘Yui, I need you to act like a defenseless young maiden while preparing a huge sealing barrier for the woman!’ I tell her. ‘Until then, try not to reveal your occupation, or they might focus their attention on you next!’

I needed to shout since there’s all the buzzing noise, the screaming and screeching of the fallen angels plus the sound of fighting.

‘I understand, Akira-kun!’ she shouts back.

‘I’ll watch over her!’ Saya shouts.

‘As will myself!’ Ichika adds in a loud voice.

‘I’m counting on the two of you!’ I tell them loudly.

Everyone else have chosen a target and engaged in a fight with them.

Sakuya, Amesaki-senpai and Motome-senpai have intercepted the woman and busy fighting her and her army of flies.

Sakuya is frantically trying to fan away those pesky flies with the wind generated from her fan. Some did got blown away, but most are still hovering around. I’m guessing that all of the flies can suck away magic and other things that might do their mistress harm. Which explains how the sleeping gas disappeared in an instant.

The only good news is that they’re not protected from physical damages. Every time Amesaki-senpai and Motome-senpai (who uses a sword as well) causes a shock wave by slashing their sword real hard, hundreds of flies drop dead on the floor. Unfortunately, there are so many flies even the hundreds of deaths are of small matter. Even if they’re somehow all killed, the woman can just keeps on summoning new ones out of who-knows-where.

On the other side of the battlefield, some of the fallen angels are busy doing their best to capture Mashiro who’s flying all over the place with her wind magic as per their contractors’ will. To stop them, Madoka and the rest of the civil servants are attacking the extremists. It would have been a breeze if it weren’t for the weapons they have and the remaining fallen angels who stayed back to act as guards.

Madoka is once again focused on taking out the extremists directly instead of engaging in a fight with them or their angels. Unfortunately, it’s more difficult now that they’re not showing little to no openings by gathering up and covering each other’s back.

Now then. What to do, what to do?