Chapter 72: Hounds of Trinity

"No… where… am I…?"

Sensei from Schale awoke in what looked like a derelict house long surrendered to time and rot. He tried to move his hands, but they were tied behind a post—any struggle was pointless.

Next, he searched for the Sittim’s Case. Scanning the room, he found it placed against the opposite wall on a battered desk, powered off and abandoned without care. He wasn’t planning on using it, but shifting his body confirmed the adult clearance card was still tucked inside the inner pocket of his coat. If someone came to rescue him, everything afterward would be fine.

"Oh, you finally woke up?"

While he checked his surroundings, a delinquent girl—a sukeban—who had been sitting on a rusted folding chair at a distance noticed him wake and walked over.

"I want to hear what you intend to do with me now that you’ve captured me."

"Knew you’d say that. Simple stuff—we just want you to lend a hand in our turf war."

"Turf war…?"

In Kivotos, for all kinds of reasons, there are students who have slipped through the cracks of school life and formed gangs—sukeban crews, helmet-wearing groups, all kinds. They get lumped together as “delinquents,” but in truth, these factions often clash with one another. So… was she asking him to get involved in that?

"Yeah. The Prefect Team of Gehenna. We’re gonna start a war against those bastards."

But Sensei’s assumption was wrong. Their enemy wasn’t another delinquent faction—it was the Prefect Team. Ignoring his momentary confusion, the girl continued.

"They’ve made us swallow humiliation over and over. If we get into a little shootout with someone we don’t like, they barge in instantly and beat the whole lot of us senseless. Especially the President—she’s insane. Tell me she isn’t violence incarnate."

The President of the Prefect Team… Sorasaki Hina. Sensei, who had interacted with her plenty, thought, Hina doesn’t fight because she wants to… but he held his tongue and kept listening.

"Even when the President’s not around, they suppress us and throw us in detention every damn time. We’re sick of being on the losing end. We want a guaranteed win. So that’s where you come in."

"Me?"

"Yeah, Schale’s Sensei. Everyone’s been talking about the way you command operations. So we figured—if we borrow your brains, even the Prefect Team that always wrecks us would choke on their own spit."

Then the girl leaned in close.

"And besides… rumor says you can’t refuse a student begging you for help. Heh-heh-heh. You’re gonna help us, riiight, Sen-sei?"

It was true—if a student sought help, whoever they were, Sensei would do his best. But should he be helping a sukeban crew trying to pick a fight with the Prefect Team? And worse, he had recently been involved in transporting a Trinity relic, which caused tension with the Prefect Team again. He hated the thought of clashing with them once more—especially with Shiromi Iori, who had been so upset by his actions that he spent an entire day working alongside her to get her mood back to normal.

"We gathered over a hundred people just for this. We picked a day when the President would be away, and when Schale would be undermanned. You gotta cooperate, or we’ve got a problem."

As he hesitated over his response, a distant boom—like an explosion—echoed from outside.

"Huh? Already here to take Sensei back?"

She moved toward the window to check, but the creaky door burst open first, and a crowd of her allies rushed inside.

"What’s with the panicked faces?"

"People in maid uniforms are headed this way."

"What? Maid uniforms? … Wait—don’t tell me it’s Millennium’s special unit!?"

A group in maid uniforms. Millennium. Sensei knew exactly who that could be.

The student council of Millennium—Seminar—and the elite agent team under them: Cleaning & Clearing. Dressed in maid uniforms, they boasted some of Millennium’s strongest combat and tactical execution capabilities. Their leader, Mikamo Neru, call sign 00 (Double-O), was said to be the embodiment of guaranteed victory.

"A tiny tough-looking leader, three girls with big chests… plus a bespectacled one—no mistake, it’s Millennium’s Maid Unit!"

Peering through binoculars, a delinquent shouted this. If it really were them, then no matter how many delinquents were present, Sensei would be rescued. And yet one detail bothered him.

"So fast…?"

Judging from the sky outside, maybe an hour had passed since the kidnapping. Even for C&C, there was no way they could know this quickly, confirm the abduction, and scramble here in that timeframe. Still, as far as maid-uniform strike groups went, C&C was the only match that made sense.

"What do we do…? I’ve only heard the rumors, but that Maid Unit’s supposed to be insane, right? They say the leader’s on par with—or stronger than—the President…"

One sukeban trembled, but the helmet-wearing students responded coolly.

"But are we sure that’s really the Maid Unit? Three of those four have wings like Trinity students, and the last one has horns. Millennium students looking like that?"

"…Probably some kind of foreign branch unit."

That comment made Sensei realize the ones approaching were almost certainly not C&C. The four he remembered didn’t have wings or horns. Of course, infiltration disguises were possible, but…

"Damn it, they’re almost here! Let’s move out and fight!!"

"Hey—wait up!"

All the delinquents rushed out again, and gunfire erupted nearby. From the sound of it, they were using bolt-action rifles and shotguns—completely different from the firearms C&C normally employed.

After a brief barrage, the gunshots ceased. Footsteps pounded closer, floorboards creaking—then the door slammed open.

"Return my Sensei this instant!!"

"Ah—Aika…?"

There stood Aika and the officer cadets—dressed, for some reason, in classical maid uniforms—and Jury, looking exactly the same as usual in her Gehenna Academy uniform, with only an apron added.

"Sensei, you’re unharmed."

"Thank goodness~"

Why the officer cadets were dressed as maids was a mystery, but at the very least, they had come to help. Jury stepped forward, bowed her head, and apologized.

"I’m so sorry, Sensei… all because I was so unreliable…"

"No, there was nothing you could’ve done then. Thanks for coming for me, Jury. And all of you officer cadets, too."

Aika untied the ropes, and Sensei was finally free to move again.

"There’s a lot I want to ask, but… for now, let’s head back."

"Yes, Sensei."

As they prepared to leave, Sensei glanced at the knocked-out sukeban on the ground.

"Sorry, could you wait just a moment? Is there a shop nearby…?"

Sensei walked down the alley behind the building and bought several whole cakes from a small bakery hidden there. Leaving one behind with a written message at the sukeban hideout, Sensei returned to Schale with the four girls, where they shared the remaining cakes together as an apology for causing trouble.

"Ugh… what the hell were those people…"

Some time later, she awoke—a sukeban who had been knocked out by the assault of that maid-clad rescue squad.

They apparently hadn’t been Millennium’s Maid Unit, but first they suppressed the scene by casually unloading an anti-aircraft autocannon mounted on a truck. Anyone who survived that got rushed by a tiny sniper girl wielding a modern rifle, followed by a lunatic redhead who charged with a literal musket like it was the eighteenth century. Meanwhile, supporting fire came from the rear—courtesy of a big chestnut-haired girl and another one with horns. Frankly, she never wanted to fight that type again. If the real C&C were even stronger than these freaks, she prayed never to meet them in her lifetime.

"Hey! Hey!"

While she brooded, one of her gangmates ran over in excitement. Her skull was still pounding—so the shouting was unwelcome.

"What is it?"

"They took Sensei back, yeah—but in exchange, we got cake!"

She glared daggers at him—What the hell are you talking about?—but he didn’t back down.

"Don’t give me that look—just come see!"

At this point Sensei was gone, so whatever. Half-resigned, she stood and walked over. In the room where they’d tied up Sensei, just as he’d said, sat a cake box surrounded by a crowd of delighted delinquents.

"It's seriously a whole cake. Who brought this?"

"Sensei. Here, read this."

She was handed a small note written in slightly rounded handwriting.

『I’m sorry, but I can’t help you this time. Forgive me. As a small consolation, I bought a cake from a nearby shop—please eat it and cheer up.』

"Hah, what the hell is that…? Well, whatever. I can’t even remember the last time I ate cake, so fine, I’ll let it go."

She laughed, even though the person in question wasn’t here. Yeah, that’s right—if we’re going to raid someone’s turf, we can’t go crying to Sensei. No matter how many times we get beaten down or humiliate ourselves, we’ll keep going back. That’s just who we are.

…Incidentally, for a while after that, the word "maid" was banned in our territory.

"I’ve heard the report. Good work—seriously, you all did well."

On the way back from subduing the Hot Spring Development Club that had gone wild in Hyakkiyako Alliance Academy, Hina praised the Prefect Team members who had been attacked by a delinquent student gang during her absence—and had fought them off.

"I mean, what was their deal…? They’d been bragging for days about having some ‘special strategy,’ so we were on alert, but in the end it was just brute-force numbers."

Iori sighed as she spoke. Even if it was just a mob relying on numbers, suppressing them without Hina had been difficult. If, for some reason, the enemy hadn’t already been worn down—what would have happened?

Determined not to let Hina notice how shaken she was, Amau Ako raised her voice.

"Yes, Chairwoman! Even if you step back from the front lines, please leave the Prefect Team to us!"

"…Ako, we’re in the same grade. Are you planning on repeating a year?"

Hit with that jab, the number two of the Prefect Team flushed bright red—though only for a moment. Then she shot back immediately.

"N-no, that’s not what I meant…! Anyway, please rest assured. We’ll protect Gehenna’s order without troubling you, Chairwoman… Iori and the others will."

"Ako-chan…"

Ignoring the slightly cold looks from her subordinates, Ako watched Hina head for the door.

"…Very well. I’ll be expecting great things. I’m going to transfer the Hot Spring Development Club now."

"Yes! Safe travels, Chairwoman!"

And then, the next day—the Prefect Team learned that the delinquents they’d fought had kidnapped Sensei, and that he’d been rescued almost immediately afterward.