Weapon Test Chamber

"Haa."

Fog spilled from her mouth in a cascading waterfall of breath. Everything had frozen solid in the brutal cold — yet the lake stretching far ahead was iced over in a strangely grotesque fashion, as if someone had taken a giant hammer to every sheet of ice and then let the shattered pieces freeze right back into place.

Northern New York, where even the faintest trace of human presence had been devoured by the cold. They moved fast along the lakeshore until they reached the vicinity of their destination, then switched on the detection sensors. A single point came into view, spraying infrared lasers in every direction.

"There. That's the infiltration point."

"Infiltration point…? No matter how I look at it, that's just a lakeshore."

"Your eyesight seems fine, at least."

Of course.

The objective was glowing with a blatant rectangular object marker from hundreds of meters out — and instead of walking straight in, they were circling all the way around the opposite lakeshore. That alone should have been a red flag.

Before long they reached the drop point. A rather large crate was waiting to greet Eugene — easily twice the size of the supply lockers back at base.

She cracked it open without hesitation, and sure enough, something that looked an awful lot like a wetsuit came into view.

"…So we just put these on, right?"

"You're getting good at figuring things out without me having to say a word."

"Never in my life did I think I'd be putting on something like this…"

Well, other fantasy VR games had people fighting in full plate armor. In a way, maybe this wasn't so different. Hard to say which was better — both were just surreal.

As they each pulled on what was less clothing and more equipment, a voice came through the in-com, and the objective lit up on the front UI.

But that wasn't what mattered.

Something far more important had caught her eye.

The tail!

"It's filthy cold out here."

"Heh. Look at that tail."

Eugene's tail — smoothly sheathed in the wetsuit — was thrashing this way and that as if deeply uncomfortable. Naturally, the chat had completely lost its mind. The curves of her body were hidden under the gear anyway, but the tail? That thing had nowhere to hide.

The fact that only she knew it was real — honestly, wow.

The corners of her mouth itched with the effort of holding back a grin.

A small vibration, and the frozen edge of the lake cracked apart.

The enormous lake — over a hundred meters across and stretching several kilometers lengthwise — looked like it could swallow any noise with infinite patience. Then again, the dozen-odd high-rises jutting abruptly from the opposite shore suggested otherwise.

Before long a hole had opened wide enough for two people and a spherical EMP generator to fit through with ease, and the blue interior of the lake — a place neither of them particularly wanted to enter — shimmered faintly into view.

One last weapons check.

"Oh, it's all toasty now."

"Just dip your foot in once. Can you handle it?"

"Let's see… eughhEEK!"

"It's way too cold!?"

"Keep it in a little longer and it'll be fine."

"Oh. Huh, you're right."

The ice-cold contact surface warmed almost instantly — and before Harmony could even properly enjoy the visual of Eugene's tail, Eugene hauled the absurdly oversized EMP generator over and dunked it straight into the water.

They'd been told it was spherical, sure, but watching someone just chuck an expensive piece of machinery into a lake left her momentarily speechless.

The silver lining, if there was one, was that it didn't make a huge splash. Always remembering the basics — that was Teacher for you. Still, while everyone including herself was experiencing a full brain freeze, Eugene continued with complete nonchalance.

"Don't worry. It doesn't break easily."

"Ah… right."

Really. What was there even to say.

The way this person committed acts of chaos as casually as breathing — that probably wasn't just her imagination.

Still, she steeled herself and continued preparing for what had become, quite abruptly, an underwater infiltration — virtual reality or not. As the front UI began correcting her breathing timing and automating her movements, a single line came from behind.

"Ready?"

"…Even if I said no, you'd shove me in anyway, right?"

"Haha. You really shouldn't do that in real life. It's more dangerous than you'd think."

And with that, something settled onto her shoulder… not a hand. A tail. Even wrapped in the wetsuit, that soft, springy, plush texture was not something easily forgotten.

As a shiver ran from the small of her back all the way up the nape of her neck and every hair stood on end, she carefully raised a hand to stroke it — only for a subtle pressure to suddenly clamp around her waist and shoulder, followed by:

"Alright. Stop petting the tail and get in already."

"W-wait? Teacher! Hold on! I'm floating—!"

"Because I lifted you with my tail."

Exactly as said.

With her waist and part of her shoulder coiled in the tail, Harmony rose into the air with almost casual ease — and began to be lowered slowly into the water.

Not of her own free will, of course.

"Eughk!"

Splash.

That was the first dive she would remember.

"Destroy the personnel too, huh. That's a scary way to put it."

"Brutal, isn't it."

The water supply system running through the underground experimental sector of Artemis Technology. Beyond drawing drinking water through the municipal supply, they had built a system to independently purify and use lake water — and today, that system had become the number-one contributor to delivering them straight into headquarters.

After the previous incident of brazenly raiding another building, extracting data, and fleeing, the atmosphere among the PMCs on this side had plummeted to rock bottom. The front entrance of this very building was crawling with menacing turrets and strike-ready patrol teams, prepared around the clock to gun down any suspicious figures loitering nearby.

It would have been ideal to slip back out through the water supply system with enough stealth-play to manage it — but ISO had already ordered them to shoot everything that got in the way.

Bottom line: their options were limited. Put bluntly, "turn every living thing into a corpse and walk out the front door" might have been the more accurate mission statement.

Fine. They'd manage.

As they infiltrated the base, enemy communications began to be intercepted in earnest.

———Thud-thud-thud!

"Khuhk…!"

Despite the utterly ordinary-sounding radio chatter, three patrol members crumpled to the floor with neat wind holes punched clean through their heads.

The infiltration wouldn't last long. The goal was to push as deep inside as possible before the enemy found them. Amid the roaring rush of water, they used a descender to drop straight down.

The target, naturally, was the underground server room. Since the water supply system fed lake water directly into the server coolant, they had effectively closed the distance in a single stroke.

The problem was that the underground facility, based on prior intel, was absurdly vast.

"Weapon test chamber. That doesn't sound great."

"It's probably exactly what you're thinking."

They opened the elevator ceiling hatch, carefully dropped down, and shoved open the closed door — only to be greeted by ominous ambient noise and a blinking siren.

A cutting-edge laboratory steeped in an eerie abundance of white. All around them: drones of every kind, prototypes, an empty lobby office with no one sitting in it — and from the far side, a metallic clanking sound.

A hand signal to Harmony.

Pulse radiated forward.

———Piiiiiing!

Looking at the dozen-odd personnel and unmanned units detected beyond the wall, all oriented toward them, she spoke quietly.

"No exit route. Wipe them all out."

"Got it."

A resolute voice, dozens of footsteps, and the mechanical whirring wedged between them all fused into one — and the next moment, a group began to pass in front of them with sluggish movements.

Given the structure of the underground facility, stealth infiltration was impossible by any method, and the heavy, anxiety-inducing background music was quietly informing them that full combat was now mandatory.

Enemy weak points and vital spots, marked in red.

Firing commenced.

—Thud-thud-thud-thud-thud!

"Enemy con— AAAAGH!"

"All units disperse, disperse!"

Heavy gunfire rebounded off the walls with nowhere to escape, filling the corridor.

Given the underground layout, the path was essentially a straight line — which meant that if they didn't finish the engagement faster than the enemy expected, they'd be surrounded by follow-up teams in seconds.

She erased enemies one by one with mechanical precision — then quickly realized she'd gotten too absorbed again. It had been a while; maybe she ought to polish Harmony's marksmanship a bit.

She eased off the firing pace. The core principle: she would draw out enemies hiding behind cover, and Harmony would finish them.

The moment she deliberately slowed her shooting tempo, the chat instantly caught on to her intent and filled with mischief.

She layered on a line or two for good measure.

"Ugh, my joints suddenly hurt."

"What— Eugene! What are you talking about all of a sudden!?"

The heavy, sunk atmosphere shot upward in an instant, and Harmony — now firing at more than double her previous rate — yanked the trigger with wild abandon, screaming at the top of her lungs.

Her expression grew more and more venomous as it went on. Rolling just her eyes to check, Eugene found her clenching her teeth, pouring fire without pause.

Watching enemies drop one after another, it seemed her skills hadn't atrophied much even without playing ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Dark Zone on her own in the meantime.

A little help on the side would be enough.

She'd shoot the enemy about to fire a grenade launcher so it cooked off on the floor, or continuously hammer one leg of a quadrupedal turret spinning up its chaingun until its balance completely collapsed.

Anyone could eliminate enemies according to objectives and priority. What separated the skilled from the rest was speed alone.

The moment the enemies were cleared, communications resumed.

And what greeted her was Harmony's furious shout.

"You can't just do that without saying anything———!"

"Sorryyyughh—"

Shake-shake-shake-shake.

Harmony grabbed her body armor with a thoroughly displeased expression and rattled her back and forth.

She had it coming.