"Still not asleep?"
Drawing the sheer gauze a little tighter over her shoulders, Tsukiyomi Fuya had already recovered the languid ease and composure she wore by day.
They were all girls here.
Tsukiyomi Fuya figured there probably wasn't anything to make a fuss about regarding her own attire.
It was merely a touch more... evocative, that was all.
A woman adorns herself for the one who delights in her.
Even if it were only to please herself, she ought to make herself exquisite.
Besides... Tsukiyomi Fuya looked at the Su Yuzu before her.
Compared to Tsukiyomi Fuya's own nightgown—one even more evocative than Ms. Unohana's, or rather Unohana Chiyo's—the dress on Su Yuzu's body was practically a good-girl-grade nightgown.
It was just a cardigan-style nightgown, nothing more.
Though the buttons were a touch few, so that when the girl sat there the fabric draped down, baring the girl's long, delicate legs that looked even whiter and finer than the moonlight.
But... set against Tsukiyomi Fuya, it was simply small magic before great sorcery.
Su Yuzu rose, and gave an obedient nod.
After the girl stood up, the soft hem of her skirt fell back into place, covering away that last trace of bewitching allure.
For a moment, Tsukiyomi Fuya actually felt a slight twinge of regret.
"I was looking at the sea."
Su Yuzu sat back down again.
Tsukiyomi Fuya pulled the door shut behind her, stepped out of the observatory, and sat down beside Su Yuzu.
Carried on the night breeze, Su Yuzu could catch the rich, almost cloyingly sweet floral fragrance drifting from the woman.
"Yuzu..."
"Still thinking about that gaze?" Tsukiyomi Fuya followed the girl's line of sight and gazed out toward the night-shrouded sea.
Under the cover of nightfall, the distant horizon seemed about to merge with the very sky.
For this world... this was a rarely seen sight.
In this world's nights, the surface of the sea was always shrouded in dangerous white fog.
A view like this truly was worth appreciating.
Breathing in the soft fragrance beside her, Su Yuzu gave a gentle nod.
She really had been thinking about that gaze—about the matter of The Flowers of Evil.
The Flowers of Evil——
The last time Su Yuzu had heard that term was back when she was on a date with Kujou Katora.
The first late-night movie she and Kujou Katora had watched together was, in fact, The Flowers of Evil.
Back then, Su Yuzu had still been worrying over whether she might end up eaten by Kujou Katora. Back then, no matter how hard she'd racked her brains, Su Yuzu could never have imagined that Kujou Katora would later turn into that... obedient little doggy.
"Yuzu, there's no need to worry too much——" Tsukiyomi Fuya comforted Su Yuzu.
"Even if the sky falls, there's still your teacher to..." After a moment's hesitation, Tsukiyomi Fuya remembered that she wasn't actually Yuzu's teacher—though that seemed pretty nice too~
"And there's still us holding the line up front."
"Yuzu..."
"You just need to face it with an even, ordinary heart."
Su Yuzu nodded softly.
The girl and Tsukiyomi Fuya watched the sea together.
In truth, for Su Yuzu, she had already been looking at this sea for a long while.
But... after Tsukiyomi Fuya sat down beside her, the sea before her seemed once more to take on something worth appreciating.
Su Yuzu sat there with both hands braced against the bench, the little hand propping up her body tilting slightly outward, until all of a sudden it brushed against the side of Tsukiyomi Fuya's thigh.
Su Yuzu felt a little nervous.
She hastily drew her hand back, just a fraction.
It was only that... what left Su Yuzu feeling a slight twinge of regret was—
No Recruitment chime had been triggered at her ear.
It seemed the bond between her and Tsukiyomi Fuya had not yet ripened.
Tsukiyomi Fuya seemed not to have minded the girl's little gesture in the slightest. Gazing off toward the sea, she then stretched languidly.
For Tsukiyomi Fuya——
This hour was no time for sleeping.
On the contrary—
Her night life had only just begun.
The woman's lovely contours were laid out in the finest detail before Su Yuzu's eyes.
Even a wicked creature like Su Yuzu found that, for a single instant... she was drawn in by the woman's flaunting charm, almost unable to tear her eyes away.
A gust of sea wind swept past.
Carrying the faint chill of the night.
Tsukiyomi Fuya stood up and looked over at the girl beside her. "Want to come in and sit for a while?"
She had already seen during the day the girl's curiosity about her observatory. To satisfy the girl's curiosity a little, and to show off her observatory to the girl, was, for Tsukiyomi Fuya, quite a gratifying thing as well.
"Have something warm to drink, to warm you up."
"Okay~" Su Yuzu had no reason whatsoever to refuse.
Leaving the white table and chairs standing there in the howling sea wind, Tsukiyomi Fuya whisked the girl back into her observatory.
Once the transformation was complete, the interior of the observatory had taken on a wholly different style.
It was as if the school bus that Su Yuzu and the others had ridden during the day had been entirely compressed into another space.
The first thing Su Yuzu saw upon stepping through the door was a wind chime shaped like a beautiful celestial body.
A string of crystals hung beneath several brilliantly colored little spheres.
As the door opened, the crystals lightly clinked against one another, raising a string of clear, pleasant notes.
"That's an Orion wind chime~"
"The one nearest to us is..."
"Betelgeuse, the right shoulder of Orion." Su Yuzu answered a step ahead of Tsukiyomi Fuya's introduction.
When she was little, her favorite thing to do had been to nestle together with Soga Yura and gaze at the stars.
A constellation as conspicuous and easy to remember as Orion—how could Su Yuzu possibly fail to recognize it?
Tsukiyomi Fuya's eyes seemed to brighten all at once.
Just as expected~
Both the elder sister and the younger sister were so adorable.
She wanted to whisk them both away to her observatory.
She guided Su Yuzu to sit down at the table, then turned briskly to go searching for something to drink.
"Coffee or black tea~"
"Sorry..." Tsukiyomi Fuya put on an apologetic look. Because of her long-term reversed day-and-night schedule, the woman's little stash seemed to hold only these sorts of pick-me-up drinks.
"It looks like these are all I've got here."
"Oh, that's right~"
"There should still be some of the milk powder I bought last time..."
In truth, Su Yuzu's Material Inventory had absolutely everything one could want, but... seeing how cheerful Tsukiyomi Fuya looked, Su Yuzu still said obligingly, "I'll have whatever you're having, senpai."
"How could that do?" Tsukiyomi Fuya rummaged through the bottles and jars. "A girl really ought to sleep early—it's better for the complexion."
She made two cups of milk.
Then she gently nudged one of them in front of Yuzu. "I added a little sugar on purpose."
"Yuzu shouldn't mind that."
Yuzu cupped the cup in both hands. "No... I like it very much."
More than the milk, what Yuzu was curious about right now was Tsukiyomi Fuya's observatory.
She stared fixedly off to the side.
At that enormous... astronomical telescope hanging down from the ceiling.
Tsukiyomi Fuya noticed Yuzu's gaze.
"Yuzu... want to take a look?"
When it came to the wishes of a well-behaved girl, Tsukiyomi Fuya was always glad to oblige.
What's more... it was in her own area of expertise.
"Mm!" Su Yuzu nodded earnestly.
It wasn't that she was deliberately trying to curry favor with Tsukiyomi Fuya—rather, Su Yuzu genuinely did love the starry sky, and this sort of lens that simply looked so cool.
"Then let's have a look~"
Tsukiyomi Fuya stood up at once and took the girl's hand, leading the girl onto the telescope's observation platform.
She motioned for the girl to bend down slightly and place her eye against the eyepiece, guiding her hands-on.
Su Yuzu was all but held in the woman's embrace.
Su Yuzu gazed blankly at the starry sky reflected in the eyepiece, sensing the silken softness at her back.
So... soft...
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