3 bar menu

Last Embryo Volume 6 Chapter 2 Part 3

「It would seem that this girl’s personal situation is among those that we would usually refer to as 「pretty complicated」, and it would seem that hers has something to do with the fact that she does not want to casually reveal her name to just about anyone. I am sure that you would like to hear it from her, but if she does not wish to tell it to you right now, pushing her to do so might be a bad idea. If you wait for some time, then I am sure that she is going to reveal it to you on her own once her heart will be ready, and when that time comes, you have to be ready to hear it as well.」

「Is that how it is? You need to be ready to hear someone introducing themselves to you?」

「Trust me, it is super-duper necessary. I heard that if you will not be ready to properly hear someone revealing their name to you, then their hearts will explode through their mouths because of stress.」

(M-Miss Kasukabe, what a nice save. . . . .  ! ! !)

Right now, in this very moment, You looked like nothing short of an angel in Ayato’s eyes. Of course, Ayato did not talk about her personal situation to anyone, Kasukabe You included, but it would not take a genius to figure out what the deal with her was all about, especially if you looked at her full name and the fighting style that she has adopted for herself. But more importantly, Ayato was quite impressed how much Kasukabe You has improved as a person since the last time she saw her as Faceless, most likely due to the need for her to become the leader of {No Name} and Floor Master of the East Side. If Jack, who surely must have continued to watch over her from beyond the grave saw her right now, then she would definitely be delighted at the progress that she has made in just a few short years.
「So as I said, all you have to do was to be ready to listen to her when the right time comes, Asuka. You understand?」

「Y-Yes, of course.」

「Good. Then listen closely. This girl’s name. . . . . is Kudou Ayato.」

To say that the time has stopped in that moment would be a grave understatement. It did not even come to a screeching halt. It crushed into it while flooring the gas pedal as hard as possible, causing each and every one of the hair on Ayato’s body to go white from shock and stand on end.

To be perfectly honest, she had great difficulty understanding what has happened just now. You just told Asuka that she should wait with asking about her name until Ayato herself would be ready to reveal it to her. . . . only to reveal it to her herself literally seconds later? Ayato thought that maybe she is the weird one here, but in her opinion, a behavior like that was not normal. It was everything but normal! If it was normal, then You would have taken her own advice and waited until Ayato’s heart was ready to come clean to Asuka, but the way she played this situation out was way too sudden for Ayato’s liking, almost as if she went and took her from the heights of paradise to the deepest depths of her in a matter of seconds. Why would she ever think that Ayato would be all right with her secret being outed in such a sudden, direct way?!

But apparently Ayato was not the only one who was not understanding what was going on right now, because she had quite a large number of question marks floating above her head, and the only words that she was able to squeeze out of her throat were:
「. . . . Beg your pardon?」

「You want me to repeat? Okay, sure. This girl’s name is Kudou Ayato, which is the same name as the one that Faceless had. Oh, but you do not have to worry about anything, because from what I managed to observe, personality-wise she is a completely different person than her and she also does not seem to be related to you in any way, so she is all good.」

(No, Miss Kasukabe! There is absolutely no way that this line of reasoning is going to work for Asuka . . . . ! ! ! ! !)

Ayato desperately tried to convey that message to You from behind Asuka’s back.

Thinking about it now, it was a really stupid move on her part to continue using her Outer World name in Little Garden where a number of people was either well aware of her real identity or they would be smart enough to put two and two together if they heard it and saw her fight even though her current body differed from the one she had throughout her previous life, so maybe it would have been better if she was using a pseudonym, but right now it was too late to do anything about that, and Ayato was already forcing her brain to work at its full capacity in an attempt to try and come up with a lie that would be convincing enough to deceive Asuka even now that the cat was supposedly out of the bag. Maybe. . . . . . . . maybe she should tell her that she has nothing to do with Queen’s Knight and Queen Halloween, or maybe that she ended up coming to Little Garden by pure accident, which, considering the incident with the Minotaur’s attack at the school that Ayato, Homura and Suzuka were attending, would not entirely be a lie?

「. . . . I see. But if Miss Ayato here really is not related to me in any way, then why was she summoned to Little Garden in the first place?」

「Because she was forcibly summoned here by Queen Halloween.」

(M I S S K A S U K A B E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !)

Suffering a Critical Hit after Critical Hit to her sanity, Ayato felt like she was about to break down and start crying right where she stood. How does she do it?! How is it possible for Kasukabe You to be so accurately crushing every single one of Ayato’s escape routes as soon as they appear?! Falling deeper and deeper into despair, at this point all that Ayato could do was to frantically thrash and gesture around in a last ditch effort to convey to You that she should stop digging her an even bigger hole than she already did, but when You finally took notice of Ayato’s attempts at conveying her intentions to her. . . .and much to Ayato’s horror, she raided her right hand while giving her a peace sign, almost as if she wanted to say:

(See, everything has been taken care of nicely, no need to thank me!)

To which Ayato reacted with a:

( N O O O O O O O O O O O O O ! ! ! ! ! ! ! This is not taking care of anything at all! ! ! ! ! ! If anything, you only made the situation even more chaotic than it was before, Miss Kasukabe! ! ! ! )

So while You was smiling with satisfaction, all proud of the way in which she managed to 「help」 Ayato with her predicament, Ayato was actually throwing a whole bunch of different tsukkomi’s at her in her mind. It was literally unthinkable for her how in the world she could be thinking that anything of all the things that she said just could have been even remotely helpful, since her name and her relation to Queen Halloween were the two things that she never wanted anyone, and especially not Asuka, to find out about. But now that You went and said it, she could kiss those secrets of hers goodbye.